Find The Middle Ground Please - Writing Women's Fiction

This last weekend, I was reading submissions and there was a ton of women's fiction coming in. People, you have to find a happy medium here when it comes to plot lines. I literally saw two styles of writing. 

1) Totally depressing stories that would lead anyone who reads it to heavy drinking.

2) Ridiculous and stereotypical "rom-con" plot lines masquerading as women's fiction. 

And guess what? I pretty much rejected both types and the reason was simple. readers, in no way, would be able to connect with either of the plot lines as they should with a true women's fiction novel. Both concepts are simply too extreme.

I have talked about this before, but the thing that makes a women's fiction novel unique is the way it SHOULD connect with the reader. These stories need to have "a take away." That unique idea or concept that the reader walks away with, after reading the book saying "Now I get it. Now I understand X going on in my life, or in the world." These are stories about people, how they see the world and how they navigate issues going on around them. 

However, when writers, in an attempt to "stand out" or "make the story interesting" pile on so much extra stuff, no reader is going to be able to relate to all of it. 

• We can relate to a single divorce, but we can't relate to a divorce, and then pile on a personal disease, a parent who is also sick, a loss of a job and then a kid with a drug problem and then another who is pregnant. 
• We can relate to a funny situation of meeting up with the person you had a crush on in college again, but when we add in that each of you have 3 kids, a housekeeper, and two of the kids want to start dating each other, and you are in competition for the same job in a company, and you both have to relocate, and there is the crazy lady at church trying to get the characters together... too much.

Along the same lines, when it comes to women's fiction, there were a lot of you out there just writing your personal stories and then "fictionalizing" the stories. Honestly, my recommendation is to just write your story and don't try to change it. When authors fictionalize their story, they often add on all of that other "stuff" because they feel "their story" is not that exciting, and then they run into these same issues. 

Bad Things Happen - Deal With It!

I get it, life is pretty cruddy.

You are going to get sucky days. You WILL get bad reviews. You may get cut from lines. 

But you have to deal with it. You have a choice. 

QUIT

or

SUCK IT UP BUTTER CUP AND MOVE ON!

PLEASE PASS THIS ON TO PEOPLE WHO NEED THE MOTIVATON!

This especially goes to my favorite Harlequin Historical Authors!

Here is your motivation for the weekend.

Do You Know Why You Do What You Do In Your Novels?

When I read submissions, I can often tell within the first few pages whether or not the author is new at the game or is experienced in the craft of writing. It really doesn't take much to figure it out. How do I know? It is all about what they are doing in the stories? So many authors inaccurately insert conventions in their stories, or do things to their plots. Does it mess up the story? Not necessarily. But it certainly doesn't enhance the story in the least bit.

Here is the issue. For many new authors, they are busy learning the craft of writing while they are writing. There is nothing wrong with that. But for these authors, they are also attending every workshop they can get to. They are watching every video, attending every online meeting and reading every blog such as mine. They are like a sponge absorbing everything. Again, there is nothing wrong with this, except for the fac that when someone tells them this is going to work great in their story or it is going to make their story better, they put it into their story...without thinking.

One of the things that separates the experienced authors from "the newbies" is that the experienced authors know when to use those conventions and when not to. They also know what those conventions do and the impact on the story. Let me give you an example.

Do you use an prologue or not? What is even the purpose of a prologue? If you are a new author, you might just insert it because you have this short scene that doesn't quiet fit with the rest of the story or has some information you want to dump, but that is it. Is that really a good reason for a prologue? I would argue, probably not. For those new authors, they have seen other prologues with information such as this and they "believe" that is what the author is using it for, but the reality is, they are missing the real reason. The author is probably doing something much bigger. 

To get to the point of these experienced authors takes a lot of time reading and studying the writing of other authors. You don't read for pleasure, but you read to "study." You take the time to stop and ask, "why did the author do that? and "what is that doing to change the story?"

If you are a literature major, you will understand this well. This is really what we all did getting that major. We tried to figure out why Hemingway could mess up his grammar and still make it work. We figured out why Falkner could write those obnoxiously long paragraphs and still somehow make it work. 

I guess what I am trying to get at here is this. Take your time. Learn the craft. Know why you do what you are doing in your story. You will find you are going to be much more successful!

Why Christmas Stories Are A Hard Sell

yes, we all love 'em! I know, we try to say we don't but if you are like me, going to my vet starting in October, they already have the Hallmark Channel running with the Christmas shows running. We're suckers for these stories. Of course, we now think, these have to be in high demand. Publishers ALWAYS need these stories. 

Well, you might be mistaken here. Let me give you a little inside information on this.

Those Christmas slots on the publishing schedule are coveted slots. These are just as hot as the summer reading slots. Every author wants to be placed there. It is just like the movie release schedule when you want your block buster to show up right before summer when EVERYONE will want to be watching! But here is the catch.

Those coveted slots are not going to go to the new authors.

These will go to those people who have "earned the rights". The publishers will give those books to the authors who have a following and who know how to really produce! In many cases, these are even books that will be added their contracts as a separate piece, sort of as a bonus. 

So, why do I bring this up? Because so many of you will spend months writing those stories that are actually pretty dang good, but honestly, will be hard sells because we have to find a way to show the publishers that your story is somehow better than the established authors.

See where I am going to with this?

My suggestion? Focus on a standard story but keep those holiday classics on the back burner. You'll get a chance to write it later. I promise!