Open Question Forum

December 30, 2008

 

Mary Rosenblum:  Well, our Forum today is an open question session. You can ask anything you'd like. These open question Forums are a way for you to ask questions I haven't covered in the regular forums.

How long should novel chapters be?
Mary Rosenblum:  Belinda, as to chapter length, it's frustrating. It's entirely up to you and to the pace of the book. Shorter chapters tend to increase the pace of the book, and they work better for YA and novels for kids.  Longer chapters tend to slow down the book a bit.

I got a question right off the bat Mary. For Christmas, my wife signed me up for the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators winter writers conference. I've never been to a writers conference before... so ... what do I DO?? Lol

Mary Rosenblum:  George, good for you, great present! I'd go to the website for the conference. Do some research. Find out who will be there.  Who writes like you do? What publishes or agents will be there.  That way you make the most out of your conference. They should have great panels about publishing and writing, too. Really plan your schedule.

Okay. I read the transcript for the "feminist" science fiction and I wrote one about a woman scientist in a family scene. How much science does it take for science fiction fans to be interested?
Mary Rosenblum:  Julia, as to your science fiction question, it takes a fair amount of 'new' science to work for the SF market.  It's VERY hard to do if you don't read SF. You'll just reinvent the wheel.
  I keep up with a lot of the new discoveries. My main interest is astronomy, but I like engineering and physics, too. I know, I'm weird.
Mary Rosenblum:  I would certainly read two or three issues of Analog, Asimov's or F & SF or read the sample stories you find on their websites.  You're probably better off marketing that to mainstream fiction markets.
I get Asimov and SF & F.
Mary Rosenblum:  Ah, then you should know if your story fits or not.  Character driven SF does not depend on a new idea.  It has to have some SFnal element.  Asimov's tends to be the character development mag, Analog the science-first mag, and F& SF is pretty much what Gordon likes.
Well, so many of the stories are overloaded with technical stuff. I think they need better characters and life situations that are more relatable to the reader. My instructor here agreed with me.

Mary Rosenblum:  Yeah, I've had no trouble publishing character driven SF in those magazines for years.
Mary, if I have a book written and want to find contacts, what exactly should I bring to the conference related to the book?
Mary Rosenblum:  If you have a book written, George, you're going to be looking for a publisher.
That's encouraging.
Mary Rosenblum:  Don't expect to hand the mss to a publisher at the conference, but if they offer pitch sessions with agents, sign up with as many as you can afford.  Attend all the panels with editors on them, the ones that deal with writing and publishing issues.  If you have the chance, chat up editors.  Don't pitch your book -- that is a big no-no -- but ask the editor what they need now.  If your book seems to suit their 'now' need, mention it.  You may get an invite to submit if you're polite about this.
Outline--I use an outline to keep track of where my story has been, I do not have one to show me where to go, I use my story plan for that, okay?
Mary Rosenblum:  Whatever works, One.  know writers who have no clue where the story is going. Me, I do like to know where I'm aiming, but I don't usually outline chapter by chapter. You have to figure out what works for you. There is no right or wrong.
Mary, I am famous, only to myself, for thinking up what I think are good beginnings but have the worst time with trying to come up with the middle and the end. Do you have any ideas for this?
Mary Rosenblum:  Ah, Lisa, it's so easy to start with a great beginning and then...uh...so where do I go now? That used to be my hallmark, too, when I first started!  I have a lot of old story starts kicking around on the hard-drive.  I now make myself wait and scribble notes about the story, waiting until it 'feels' right.  There's the catch -- the 'feels right'.  That takes some experience. If you have to gain it by writing lots of cool beginnings that don't go anywhere, so be it. Just save the beginnings and go through them when you're short of an idea. You will probably find that the middle and end pop into your head years or months from now.
I hate outlining. I write where I want the story to go, step by step in general, sketch out my characters and then let 'er rip. Half the fun is discovering little adventures along the way.
What about the story outlines we use in classes. I seem to get stuck on those too.
Mary Rosenblum:  Whatever works for you, Julia. I used to do that, but I'm lazy. It required too much major surgery in revision to make everything balance. So now I do my structuring...at the basic level at least...ahead of time.
I thought the story was a problem and you knew the solution before you started?
Mary Rosenblum:  Well, let's face it. Creating even a general story summary, like the LR assignments, takes the same amount of creative energy as writing the story from scratch.  That's the hard part...coming up with the story. The easy part is filling in the words! Actually, the summary assignments are...and should be...harder than the subsequent assignment.
I guess I like the surgery part. It's like working in clay, move things here and there until it looks like what it's supposed to.
Mary Rosenblum:  There you go, Julia. That's my analogy for story...it's a clay sculpture. You pinch off some here, slap it on there, and turn it into an arm. Or what have you.  And they can change! I started an anthology story yesterday morning with a clear dramatic arc in mind. New theme later, new plot later, new backstory later, I'm still using that original dramatic structure. But everything has changed a LOT.
So, basically its really try, try again.
Mary Rosenblum:  Lisa, at first a LOT of writing is 'try again'. Eventually, you get more skillful and you don't have to make as many false starts.  Save those starts, Lisa! I have turned many into selling stories, years later.
Do you always have to have a back story, Mary?
Mary Rosenblum:  Sure, Loux. YOU have to know ALL the backstory. You don't put it all into your story, but it's like ballast. It allows your story to 'sail'.  And you weave in enough hints about that backstory that the readers know what they need to know, even though it's much less than what YOU know.  Without backstory you have superficial action in a here and now. That's not enough to engage most readers.
What is the difference between backstory and setting.
Mary Rosenblum:  Setting is usually considered to be the physical location of the story. Tampa, Florida. Havana. Iceland. The moon.  Backstory is the past of all the main characters. Some of it is important. Most of it is not important to anyone but YOU.  YOU need to know it because if you do not, your characters will behave inconsistently and people are not inconsistent in their behavior. So your characters will seem unreal.
So, when I have a back story, I weave in bits of it in my story thru writing "descriptive" hints about why my character thinks how she/he thinks?
Mary Rosenblum:  Pretty much, loux. Use scraps of internal narrative, dialogue, physical reactions to situations.  Don't spoon feed the readers. Let them figure things out.  A few will get it wrong, but most will get it right if you're skillful, and they'll feel as if it's a real situation. Here's an example of spoonfeeding versus letting readers figure it out:

 Carl froze as the dog charged toward him. He had been badly bitten by a German Shepherd when he was four and was terrified of dogs.
One spoonful of processed information. Open up!
Compare to this:
Carl froze as the big dog charged him. Sweat soaked his shirt instantly and he struggled to breathe.
We don't know specifically why Carl is afraid of the dog, but clearly he's afraid. If it's important to the story, Carl can tell someone about that dog bite later on.

What are the basics for plotting?
Mary Rosenblum:  BSs....the absolute basics of plotting are: Give your main character a problem. Now make him/her solve it.  That's it.  That keeps the reader reading, to find out later on why? Instead of telling the whole story at once? You can complicate that solution in many many ways of course.  You have to understand that curiosity is THE basic component of a good read. What happens, will they survive, will she be happy, will he succeed?  We don't WANT to know everything any more than we want to solve the mystery before the end. We want to TRY and maybe manage it on the last couple of pages. But not on page 100.  And you have to satisfy all the questions.

Nothing worse than coming to the end of a book and still wondering why so and so didn't do this or that.
Mary Rosenblum:  Yeah, there is that. And in mystery, you have to be careful that your final chapter is more than just a bunch of loose ends getting knotted!

so at the end of story after the problem is solved, should it reflect back to the very begining of story
Mary Rosenblum:  That gives the story excellent symmetry, bss. But even if there's no direct connection, the end of your story derives from the start.  But you don't have to actually replicate that initial scene. If a mystery started in the library, for example, you don't have to set your final scene there.  It can be a cute closure, but only if it works for this story.  My stories are often asymmetrical, at least my SF ones. That is, there's an implied continuation, even though the main conflicts are resolved.

How do you mean, asymmetrical?

Mary Rosenblum:  Just that the story does not come back to the initial starting point, but rather continues on.  In mystery, you generally come back to the starting point with the revelation of the killer.
Mary Rosenblum:  Any other questions?
Do you think you will write another mystery or is SF your area
Mary Rosenblum:  I'm in the middle of a mystery short story, One. As to a novel, I haven't come up with a series I want to work on. Mostly I'm hoping to bump into a k-9 officer who wants to play.
I enjoyed your mystery series and your latest SF
Mary Rosenblum:  : Thanks, One.  I have to say that I got good news yesterday. My 'Egg Man' an Asimov's story, is going to be included in the 2008 Years Best SF. And  actually, Julia, since you were talking about character driven SF and you get Asimov's, I have a story in the January issue, 'Lion Walk' that is all character story.
All right. I'll look for it. Can you give me some tips on how to query them successfully?
Mary Rosenblum:  You don't query most fiction markets, Julia. You simply send in the manuscript and a cover letter. Very rarely does a fiction market require a query first.

What should I include in a cover letter?
Mary Rosenblum:  As to cover letter for Sheila, at Asimov's just tell her you get the mag, you love it, and mention any publications you have. She's going to read the mss so don't tell her about it. A single hook sentence is okay but don't summarize it.

okay what should a summary for the LR assignments include
Mary Rosenblum:  The story starts here, goes here, climaxes here, ends here.  It's just a matter of giving your instructor a sense of the dramatic arc.  Often my students send me something that I can tell will take 8000 - 10000 words to tell well. So I'll suggest a different plot structure, starting closer to the climax.  Or the summary might make it clear that the end is weak.  It's a way to fix problems before you've written the story out, and it's also a way to make you SEE structure.  When you just start writing with sentence one, you're not as aware of the structure of the story.  This makes you think about it.
Ok I think I understand now
Mary Rosenblum:  I think most students try to make it too hard.

 You all have a great New Year!   Next year, eh?