Guest blogger Sandra Yuen MacKay on writing for publication.
The more you experience and learn, the better writer you will be. Personally, I watch a lot of movies which tell a story in two hours based on a 120 page script. So it makes sense I should be able to entertain, inspire, or excite a reader in 250 pages of a novel.
An editorial assistant at a large publishing house gave the following advice: "We are looking for books that are eye-catching, wow the reader, and are innovative. In order for your book to stand out of the crowd, you must pull in the reader from the first page, move at a good pace, and be original. It needs to be exceptional with characters that readers care about."
When I walk into a DVD store, I look for a movie with a back cover blurb that makes me go 'wow' or one with a fantastic trailer. Similarly, one's book must be marketable and readers must be able to identify with your characters. A protagonist may drive the plot, rather than just react to other characters and events around them. I hear of other writers who say their characters create their own story, and they are only the vessel to deliver the scenes.
Sandra is the author of
My Schizophrenic Life: The Road to Recovery from Mental Illness and her website is http://symackay.blogspot.com
She is also the editor of Majestic, an online newsletter for Lit.org at http://majestic.lit.org/wordpress
Thanks Dixon for asking me to write a tip and posting it here!
ReplyDeleteAll the best, Sandra
Very good post/tip. Absolutely agree. Though, entertainment lies in the eye of the beholder, that's why many bestsellers are rejected by some big houses and accepted by others. Editors are only human.
ReplyDeleteI've recently started to read One Day, a bestselling novel turned into a movie. Guess what? I wasn't entertained at all.
This is a helpful post as I write a back cover for my novella, "Shoes on the Wire". The protagonist is fun and the story moves along at a good clip, but the back cover needs spicing up. Eye-catching, that's the word. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteThanks Stella! Sometimes the book is better than the movie or vice versa. I tried writing a few screenplays. I learned the formatting is totally different and they don't want the length of description or exposition one finds in books. It's a different animal. However, I wrote a novella Hell's Fire with a movie in mind.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Peggy! Good luck with your novella!
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