Book reviewer gives advice to self-publishers

Publishing is a learning process. With every win
and loss you get better at playing the game.

There’s a lot of similar information available for writers researching their self-publishing options. Jim Cox, Editor-in-Chief and founder of the Midwest Review of Books, has compiled a list of what turns him off when he’s asked to review a self-published book.

• Sub-standard covers 
• Interior flaws (typos, grammatical errors and *gulp* ugly, hard-to-read fonts) 
• Content categories that are flooded in the marketplace 

To overcome these potential pitfalls, Jim says it’s important for self-published authors to appear and act as maturely and professionally in every aspect of contact with reviewers, booksellers and everyone else in the publishing industry they encounter, solicit or market to. And, he says, the book has to speak for itself. It has to be flawless inside and out to compete in the marketplace.

The best piece of advice Jim gives authors is, “Don’t expect to make a profit, or even recoup your initial investment.” Your book represents a foot in the publishing industry’s door. “Expect to learn new (and hone existing) publishing and book marketing tips, tricks and techniques,” and prepare for the long haul. Publishing is a learning process. With every win and loss you get better at playing the game.

For more information about the Midwest Review of Books, click here. For more information about how Sudden Publishing can help you get your book in print, contact us.

Writers! John Cleese says check your blind spot

John Cleese: the key to creativity is to avoid interruption.

Go to John Cleese’s IMDB page and be amazed by how prolific he is. From 1963 to 2009 he has 56 credits from Faulty Towers and Monty Python to the Canadian product Just for Laughs. [Did you know he wrote the story for the movie A Fish Called Wanda?] And, of course, there are his 115 credits as an actor and 42 credits as a producer. All these contributions prove Cleese is a creator and lucky for us there’s video of him talking about creativity.

Cleese says he first knew he was creative when he discovered he could take a piece of paper, write something on it and make people laugh.

He says the key to getting into a creative state is to avoid interruption. Trying to keep “all the balls in the air” is destructive to creativity. To combat this, create a space—an oasis where you can’t be bothered. And, give yourself time—a clear block where no one is allowed to bother you.

But even if you do find this space, Cleese says you might be wasting your time.

To know you are good at what you do requires the same skills required to be good at what you do. Translation: if you’re hopeless, you’ll never know it. This is what Cleese calls “the blindspot”.

How do you check your blindspot? Show your work to honest writers and listen to them.

Sudden Publishing helps writers, visit http://www.suddenpublishing.com/ for more information. Contact us for a consultation on your story.

The difference between a long story, a short story and a short-short story

Isaac Asimov knows.

100 Great Science Fiction Short Short Stories

In his introduction to the anthology 100 Great Science Fiction Short Short Stories (Avon, 1978), Isaac Asimov gets to the point about why some stories are better short and why some short stories are better short short.

In science fiction, experience seems to show that long stories have an advantage over short ones. The longer the story, all things being equal, the more memorable.

There is reason to this. The longer the story, the more the author can spread himself. If the story is long enough, he can indulge himself in plot and subplot with intricate interconnections. He can engage in leisurely description, in careful character delineation, in thoughtful homilies and philosophical discussions. He can play tricks on the reader, hiding important information, misleading and misdirecting, then bringing back the forgotten themes and characters at the moment of greatest effect.

But in every worthwhile story, however long, there is a point. The writer may not consciously put it there, but it will be there. The reader may not consciously search for it, but he'll miss it if it isn't there. If the point is obtuse, blunt, trivial or non-existent, the story suffers and the reader will react with a deadly, "So what?"

Long, complicated stories can have the point well-hidden under cloaking layers of material. Academic people, for whom the search for the point is particularly exciting, can whip their students to the hunt, and works of literature that are particularly deep and rich can elicit scholarly theses without number that will deal with the identification and explanations of points and subpoints.

But now let's work toward the other extreme. As a story grows shorter and shorter, all the fancy embroidery that length makes possible must go. In the short story, there can be no subplots; there is no time for philosophy; what description and character delineation there is must be accomplished with concision.

The point, however, must remain. Since it cannot be economized on, its weight looms more largely in the lesser over-all bulk of the short story.

Finally, in the short short story, everything is eliminated but the point. The short short story reduces itself to the point alone and presents that to you like a bare needle fired from a blowgun; a needle that can tickle or sting and leave its effect buried within you for a long time.

For advice and development of your long, short or short short story, visit http://www.suddenpublishing.com/. 

Fiction Faults Checklist

Ray Nelson, science fiction writer

Ray Nelson is a science fiction writer and inventor born in New York in 1931. Over his writing career he published dozens of short stories and 10 novels.

His short story 8 O'Clock in the Morning was turned into the comic book story Nada, and Nada was made into the paranoid cult classic movie They Live in 1988. He is also famously (or infamously) credited with inventing the “propeller beanie” when he was in high school.

Nelson compiled on his website a checklist of fiction faults from his perspective as a reader, but he didn’t stop there. He also added tips and suggestions on what to do about them.

To mention a few of these faults / tips, Nelson says, “In the beginning, I do not like premature flashbacks.” He suggests, “Don’t tell me about the past until I am worried about the present.”

He also says narration in the present tense is tricky to use. “Though some modern writers use it, they pay for it in obtrusiveness. Stick to the simple past tense unless you have very good reason not to.”

As for characters, Nelson says he doesn’t like “A passive protagonist who is, at best, a spectator and, at worst, a professional victim.” He says, “Select someone more suitable to be a protagonist, or give your present protagonist some spunk.”

Nelson also underscores the problems with “dream endings”, showers of trivia and clichés. Check out the entire list, here: http://raynelson.com/fictionfaults.html.