Indie authors CAN ward off Alzheimer's

Indie Authors CAN Ward Off Alzheimer’s!

For years medical experts have been touting the use of one’s brain to prevent Alzheimer’s disease. They tell us something as simple as working crossword puzzles or reading a book, will help keep dementia at bay.

More and more retirees are becoming self-published authors. The reason? Like me, they’ve figured it out—authors don’t get Alzheimer’s. If you’re an Indie author or thinking about becoming one, take this simple test to see how many years writing can extend the productive years of your brain.

1.     Writing a full length novel                                                                        2 years

2.     Mastering acceptable grammar and punctuation.                                    1 year

3.     Computer problems while finishing your novel.                                       1 year

4.     Computer problems while publishing your novel.                                    2 years

5.     Weeding out favorite words from your manuscript.                                 1 year

6.     Weeding out the word “that”.                                                                   2 years

7.     Finding answers to research questions.                                                  1 year

8.     Formatting your novel yourself.                                                                1 year

9.     Formatting yourself for a print copy.                                                         2 years

10. Fixing problems in your novel after publishing.                                        2 years

11. Finding a cover artist that’s inexpensive and “gets” you.                         1 year.

12. Marketing your book online using social media.                                       1 year

13. Marketing your book using social media if you’re over 55.                      3 years           

14. Publishing more than one book.                                                                1 year

15. Writing in multiple genres.                                                                        2 years

16. Posting regular blog entries.                                                                      1 Year

17. Becoming the target of cyber-bullies.                                                        3 years

18. Getting hacked on Twitter.                                                                        1 year

19. Your Facebook account disappears.                                                        1 year

20. Remembering to get your butt up off the chair every

thirty minutes to walk around.                                                                        5 years                                                                           

Dear Readers,

I hope this post encourages all of you to start writing! Think of all the extra years you can keep your brain active with just a modicum of stress. Well, maybe a little more than a modicum depending on the day of the week. And you can add a few months for trying to do a column of numbers on your blog, which, you can see, I never mastered!

            There is a small caveat to this blog: I’m not a medical professional. The above calculations are based on this author’s experience with Indie publishing. It’s not for sissies.

            Have a great week and thanks for stopping in,

Marla

Red Herrings

RED HERRINGS

And other slippery things!

Inherent in most mysteries, and occasionally suspense novels, is a slate of suspects, any one of whom could be the killer. Savvy readers are primed to pick up every clue, figuring out who did the deed well ahead of those final words, “The End.”

            Planting legitimate clues along with red herrings is a skill an author gets better at with practice. Here are some thoughts on using clues and red herrings.

1.     Mix red herrings in with actual clues. Try not to signal the presence of one or the other by having your protagonist pay more attention to one than the other.  If your protag discovered two items on the victim’s calendar, for example, both near the time of death, don’t have him following up only one, or spend more time thinking about the significance of only one.

2.     Hide things in lists. If your protag is listening to the news and hears about a sports event, a beating death and a traffic jam, which item will the reader key in on? The death. But if the protag hears about the beating death, a murder-suicide, and a child’s kidnapping, it’s more difficult to pick up on the real clue.

A twist on this method is to leave something off the list, i.e., a detective goes through the victim’s personal effects and finds money, a wedding ring and credit cards, but not the cell phone she used incessantly.

3.     Let your protag get it wrong, misinterpret data or evidence, or trust the wrong person. If your sleuth believes the lying witness, readers will, too. Similarly, if your sleuth interprets the blood drops in the car as a sign that the body was transported in the vehicle, readers will, also . . . right up until you reveal that the victim had a nosebleed earlier in that car.

4.     Plant crucial clues early, before the readers have settled in. The clue can even come before the murder. For instance, in the first paragraph or scene, we learn that a character went to Stanford. Three-quarters of the way through, this becomes important when we learn that the victim’s time in California had something to do with his death. Few readers will remember that Character X went to Stanford, or connect it with California. If they do, it will be because you were smart enough not to emphasize that Stanford is in California.

5.     Reveal an important clue, but not what’s important about it. Say your protag finds the victim’s calendar on his fridge, filled with appointments for his last day on earth. What turns out to be important is not any one of the appointments, but the fact that the calendar is a promotional one distributed by a particular realtor.

After completing your manuscript, have a couple of mystery savvy friends read it and ask them to note on the page what items/information the thought were clues, and who they thought did it at any given time. This will help you figure out if you’re “broadcasting’ the killer. If so, you’ll need to delete some clues or find ways to incorporate them more subtly, or if you’re cheating by not providing enough clues for the reader to figure out who dunit!

Dear readers,

I’d love to hear your comments on clues and red herrings. Do red herrings ever become annoying? Or do they make the unraveling of the plot more interesting? I use them in my novels, but sometimes worry that I spend too much time on them, annoying my readers. What do you think? Please leave a comment.

These tips were taken from a wonderful handout distributed at a writer's workshop put on by Mystery Writers of America this summer. I highly recommend attending one of their workshops, which are put on in different locations annually. Excellent information! mwa@mysterywriters.org

            Have a wonderful week.

Marla

EPIPHANY

It happened—a weight loss epiphany!

The answer to a lifetime of struggling with weight-loss came to me today.  It has nothing to do with dieting—the real answer is learning not to gain weight. Not gaining weight is more important than losing it.

            This is a difficult concept to wrap your arms around. It conflicts with all the popular reasons for wanting to lose weight: class reunions, weddings, seeking relationships, New Year’s resolutions. The emphasis is always on FAST. Do it NOW! Lose 10 pounds in 4 days! Every pitch focuses on time. I fall for it, try it, lose some weight, and when life goes back to pre-diet normal, the weight creeps back on. Sometimes just as quickly as it came off. It’s no wonder taking off weight seems like an impossible dream!

            I have two occupations keeping me busy, my arbitration work and my writing. Both are done sitting on my derriere. My favorite hobbies, reading and playing bridge—same position. My lifestyle is not conducive to being lean.  I’ve learned I can make time work for me, use it to move toward a healthy weight. This is a Big Picture method, not a kitschy, lose fifteen pounds in a week, fad diet. It requires long-term life style changes. Done slowly, using my head, it will be relatively painless.

            I’ve merged my epiphany into ten, manageable points.

1.  It’s OKAY to maintain my current weight! The important part of this acceptance, whether it’s for a week or a year is this: I will NOT gain.
2. I will still eat my favorite foods, but not quite as often or in as large quantities as I might like.
3. If I have a day or an occasion of overindulgence, I’ll follow it with a few sensible days.
4. During the holiday season, which for me starts with Halloween and ends with the Superbowl game, I won’t gain weight. I accept that in order to enjoy holiday eating, I will eat lean on non-occasion days.
5. I intend to lose weight SLOWLY. I’m a calorie counter, I know how much I have to cut to lose. My goal is to lose 1 – 2 pounds a month, or even a few a year, until I reach a healthy weight for ME.
6. I’m going to eat when I’m physically hungry, pay more attention to when my body has had enough.
7. I no longer eat at my computer.
8. I’ll keep wearing my pedometer, doing 10k steps a day.
9. I’ll continue to use a notebook to keep track of the calories I take in every day, recalculating my intake when necessary.
10. I’ll keep reminding myself it is the SMALL changes that matter!

   Dear readers,

If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you know I have been practicing much of this for some time now. What’s new is the acceptance that it is okay if I lose weight slowly. For me, staying the same is an effort in itself. The realization that achieving a goal doesn’t HAVE to have a date connected to it, came as a big relief.

I hope this will benefit some others who’ve lived by the scale for all too long!

Marla

STEP SEVEN

STEP SEVEN 

YOU'RE READY TO ROCK AND ROLL!

This is it. The training wheels are off. You have a snapshot of your novel and a rough map for creating it. You know which characters you’re bringing in, what they’ll face, and in what locations.  

            Step seven - start writing the story from the beginning and don’t stop until you have a complete first draft. Writing a novel really is this straight-forward when you break it into the seven manageable steps of the writing pyramid. Still feeling overwhelmed? Some things to consider.

1.     Get over the “every word has to be perfect” mindset. It’ll slow down your writing process. The first  draft is just that—a beginning.

2.     Set a daily writing goal and keep it realistic. I try to do a page and a half. If possible, set aside the same time daily for your writing.

3.     Keep your notebook on hand and refer to it often, adding new character points and sub-characters, names and places, so you’ll always have a reference guide.

4.     Fine-tune your outline as you write, which makes it easy to go back and find things.

5.     Keep your work well organized. If you do it as you go, you won’t struggle with things like missing chapters and out-of-sequence pages later.

6.     Second-guessing your work? Read it out loud. It’s amazing what comes to light when you hear the words.

7.     On days when you aren’t feeling creative—write anyway! That’s what the editing process is for.

Dear readers,

I wish you the best of luck with your writing. If you get stuck with anything, you’ll find a myriad of articles posted on writer’s blogs. It helps to get pointers from others who’ve been where your are.

      A special Thank You to Jess Lourey for creating The Pyramid Approach. I’m sure there are many other structure-resistant writers out there who will enjoy using such a simple guideline for writing their novel.

 Have a wonderful week,

MARLA

STEP SIX - It's Time to Outline

STRAIN YOUR BRAIN

                                                                                                

It’s time to do a rough outline of your novel. Are you ready? Feel like you aren’t? Remember the words of Jack London: ““You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.” Get your clubs out and begin.

A chapter-by-chapter, detailed outline is laborious to craft (Unless you’re James Patterson, who writes from 50 page outlines!) and restricts the creative drive when it comes time to actually write the novel.

Instead, I recommend generating a rough outline that highlights only the major conflicts and character interactions, essentially a more complex version of the summary you completed in Step 2.  A “big picture” outline allows you to always have something exciting to write toward without eliminating the joy of discovering what your characters will do when left to their own deices.

And if you’re still frantically looking around the room for distractions, try these tips:

1.                    Many authors begin with a three-part approach—beginning, middle, and end. With those divisions in place, you can fill in conflict and character details. It doesn’t get much simpler than that.

2.                    Use your outline to fill in dates of events. A broad view of your time sequence will be invaluable once you start your individual chapters.

3.                    Some authors highlight appearances of their main characters with different colors. This is especially helpful if doing a mystery and the protagonist makes regular, individual chapter appearances.

4.                    A large, erasable whiteboard is useful if you need to look at things visually. It puts everything right up front and into perspective.

5.                    Another excellent, visual tool for outlining is a bulletin board. With index cards, you can arrange and rearrange sections and chapters at will.

Dear Readers,

I’m so happy you’ve stayed with me through these steps. For me, using structure is terribly difficult. I’m using these steps for my third novel, and must admit—I need the club!

            But I’m moving forward, and that’s everything. Next week - the last step.

Have a wonderful weekend. Make time for fun and for your writing.

Marla

STEP FIVE

Step Five

Develop each sentence from your paragraph in Step 2 into a full-page description.

You’ve established your characters, their placement in your scenes, and a paragraph’s description of where your story is headed. It’s time to expand. On each page, along with the narrative, try to include at least two sound, two smell, and two feel details. Sensory detail serves to bring the reader into your setting.

            For example, let’s look at the first sentence of The Time Machine summary from step 2: The book opens with the Time Traveler dining with learned peers in the late 1800s England, where he is trying to convince them that he has invented a time machine.

            In expanding to one page, you’d describe the characters’ clothes, the smell and flavor of the food they’re eating, the feel of the tablecloth under their hands, the clank of the forks on their plates. This would also be the time for some preliminary research into the political issues, mores, and scientific breakthroughs of England in the late 1800s, so accurate conversational topics, correct clothing, and hairstyles would be part of the page.

            Specific to the topic of a time machine, you’d brainstorm and roughly outline the give-and-take that would occur in a conversation if someone told you they’d invented a time machine. If at all possible, it's always a good idea to work some dialogue into your opening chapter.

            If your story is a mystery, you may want to think about planting a clue to it’s solution, or a foreshadowing of an event yet to come.

            Do this for every sentence in Step 2.

  

Dear readers,

This step will commit you to a bigger time investment. But this, and the other things you’ve gathered to prepare you for your project, the actual drafting of the novel will be much easier.

            Happy writing and have a good week,

                        Marla

STEP FOUR

                             Step Four - 

Sketch Your Setting

Like paper dolls, coloring books and paint by numbers, Step four is a fun step, especially helpful for all of us visual learners.

If you don’t have a notebook for your novel, buy one. You want to physically draw the neighborhood and the interior space where most of your story will take place. No need to be a graphic artist for this step, a rough picture of your scene will do.

For example, a room used frequently in your story: etch in the major pieces of furniture, placement of windows and doors, as well as which direction is north. In the novel I’m working on, I had to do this for a neighborhood that held a string of buildings important in the storyline. Also, I had to do the layout of the apartments above the stores. With a sketch, you won’t be floundering around later, like I did before the sketch, trying to decipher what’s what, and making sure the layout made sense to the readers.

If your book is set mostly in a neighborhood or small town, sketch out the relevant cross streets and put labeled boxes where you imagine all the businesses and homes would be.

Setting sketches anchor your writing and allow you to maintain congruity in your place descriptions. Staple in a photo or two if you come across an image that visually captures an element of your setting. This step, like the first three, will enable you to go with the flow when you write.

Dear Readers,

Have a good time playing with your scenes this week. If you recall, the Pyramid method, is a “reversed” pyramid with the smaller steps at the bottom. Not sure the next step is harder necessarily, but will be more time consuming.

Have a great week,

Marla

Step three - Creating characters

Invite Your Characters Into Your Book!

You know the premise of your story, now it’s time to create a character bible for profiling each of your significant characters. Devote at least a page to each character and include the following:

Name and photograph. (Photo optional), but if you come across a picture of someone in a magazine or an old family photo that reminds you of your character, add it to the page for an effective way to spur creativity and flesh out character.

Physical characteristics. The basics of height, weight, hair and eye color, etc.

Age. Actual birth date if it’s relevant.

Personality traits and their source. For example, is the character lazy because her mother always picked up after her? Does he love baseball because it’s the only game his father ever played with him?

Quirks. Imperfections that make your character human, such as a tendency to hum when nervous; the more original the better.

Goals and motivations. What your character wants and why he or she wants it.

Conflict - list the obstacles, large and small, that the character faces in achieving his goals.

General story line. Draft a three to five sentence summary of the character’s story arc; this will be a character-specific version of your novel summary from step 2.

As an author you always need to know more about your characters than your reader ever sees. This allows you to create a multi-dimensional, internally consistent population of characters for your novel. Remember to keep your character outlines to one page per person so the process doesn’t morph from novel writing to scrapbooking! Although you may need to keep another list of tangibles about your characters, e.g. car, car color, home details, timelines of jobs, etc.



Dear readers,

This step is the most fun. Watching your characters take shape is a rewarding part of the creative process, and critical to the success of your novel. They say there are no new storylines, just new ways of telling them. And for a new way to work, the reader needs to fall in love with your characters!

Have a great week and an exciting fourth! 


MARLA


Note: The Pyramid approach to novel structure was developed by Jess Lourey, www.jesslourey.com

STEP TWO

The Pyramid on a Point Method for starting your novel

STEP TWO – EXPAND YOUR ONE-SENTENCE SUMMARY INTO A FULL PARAGRAPH

That first sentence, or logline, you wrote in step one, is the foundation of your novel. I know it was hard to write. You probably rewrote it dozens of times before you were satisfied. But what a good feeling after it’s done! You’ve got a great idea and now you’re ready to turn that spark into a full-fledged novel.

You’ll use that first sentence to build from, laying the groundwork for an entire paragraph. It should include the status quo at the beginning of the novel, add what obstacles the protagonist encounters, and how the novel ends. You can use key names or phrases from your summary sentence as a starting point. Unlike a blurb advertising your book, this paragraph is for your eyes only since the ending will be given away.

Using the one-sentence summary step we developed for The Time Machine as an example for writing a logline, here is how it could be expanded.

            The book opens with the Time Traveler dining with peers in the late 1800s England, where he is trying to convince them that he’s invented a time machine. His guests are naturally skeptical. They arrange to dine again in a week, and when they return, the Time Traveler tells them he’s visited the future. He discovered two humanoid races remaining on the planet: the beautiful and childlike Eloi, and the subterranean, haunted Morlocks. He explains his idyllic time eating fruit with the Elois and exploring the area, followed by his discovery that the Morlocks raise and harvest the Eloi like cattle. He ends by describing his escape from the time period, including his burning of the forest, the wresting of his time machine from the Morlocks, and the loss of Weena, his Eloi friend. Distraught, he travels further into the future where he witnesses the death of humanity and the planet. Finally, he returns to the time period he left, providing an exotic flower from Ween as proof of his travels.

            Notice that the ending must be given away to make the paragraph work for you. You’ll be the only one seeing it and you’ll be returning to tweak it as you continue working through the seven steps. Revising as new ideas occur is an important element of writing.

Dear Readers,

I received a comment that these steps were being posted too slowly. I apologize if you feel that way too, but I believe there is value in looking at them individually and following along, applying them to your work. I usually post weekly, but I’ll try to get the steps to you on closer intervals.

Again, this approach was developed by author Jessi Lourey.

Thanks for visiting,

Marla

STARTING A NOVEL? HATE STRUCTURE?

STARTING A NOVEL? HATE STRUCTURE? 

How to jump-start the process! 

Have a novel in your head that you secretly are dying to write and don’t know how to start? Are you a writer contemplating your next project, but stuck in low gear?
     Here is a simple way to tackle that first step toward making your next novel, writing project, or first attempt, a reality. The first step sounds simplistic, but it becomes your galvanizing point, prompting your novel to completion. It also works as a descriptor for your novel after it’s published.

1. Summarize your novel in one sentence.

     Sound easy? It isn’t. But it’s critical to rounding up all the ideas that have been whirling in your imagination and melding them into your final product. Think of all the steps and ingredients that go into making a banana cream pie. The result, the pie, only becomes a dessert on your table after all the steps and ingredients have been accomplished and would never have been there had you not opened the recipe book.
     A good one-sentence descriptor contains the essence of your story. Don’t pack too many details in that lone sentence. Leave out specific names or places: the idea is to be purely conceptual. If you’re looking for ideas, try reading the movie listings in your local paper. They’ll have short descriptions of  two-hour movies just as your one sentence will describe your novel.
     An example using H.G. Wells’ novel The Time machine: An English inventor travels thousands of years into the future, discovering the devolution of humanity where he had hoped to find utopia.
     Another from Jess Lourey’s November Storm: A newly minted Minnesota PI investigates a suspicious hunting accident, uncovering a brutal small-town secret.
     If you craft this sentence well, it will not only give your entire writing process a boost, but you’ll have a powerful selling line to use with a future agent or potential readers.



Dear Readers,

Last Saturday, I attended a workshop for writers put on by MWA, Mystery Writers of America. It took place in Waukesha, Wisconsin. The group of authors who put on the different classes repeat this program at different locations across the country. I attended it with a friend who’s also a writer and we both thought it was extremely beneficial to our writing. I recommend it highly if there is one in your area.

This step is one of seven from The Pyramid on a Point Method by Jessica Lourey. Her introduction to this simple process was the first class of the day.

I plan on continuing the steps weekly. Next week will be step 2. I hope you will find them as helpful as I did.

Thanks for visiting,
Marla

SUMMER BUMMER?

SUMMER BUMMER? – OR IS IT JUST ME?

(Slowdown on Twitter activity since Memorial Day)

      When my Twitter response emails (things like email notifications of RTs, Favorited tweets, Direct Messages and Follows),  took a long trip south on the Memorial Day weekend, I panicked. What was wrong? I frantically changed my browser, contacted Twitter, and checked all my settings. Nothing made a difference, and my normal email response traffic hasn’t returned. A friend of mine, another author, has had the same experience.

       Is everyone except us diehards out sun tanning, swimming and lying on a beach? Or maybe at weddings, graduations and taking the kids to summer camp? (Photo is how we spend summer here on the lake! Pontooning with friends or our dog!)

       I thought everyone stayed in touch these days with their Ipads and Smartphones. If they’re staying in touch it’s not on Twitter. Maybe only with friends?

       Are they buying eBooks for their beach reads on their Kindles? Sales haven’t dropped dramatically, but have slowed down.

       Please help me with this, Twitter friends! Anyone out there know what’s causing this phenomenon?

Dear Readers,

       I hope you’re all having a wonderful beginning to your summer. Unless of course, you live somewhere where it’s winter! We’ve had a couple super-hot days here in NW Wisconsin. I’m waiting eagerly for things to cool down.

Thanks for reading and for your contributions,

Marla

Writer Critique Groups – Friend or Foe?

Writer Critique Groups – Friend or Foe?

A critique group is a lifeline for the new writer. It can assist him in forming good habits before poor ones set in. Without the aid of the group I belong to, my work would not have advanced beyond the sophomoric stage it was at four years ago. I’m a self-published writer, my suspense book She’s Not There is on sale on Amazon and has sold nearly two thousand copies since it came out last August. Would that have happened without the encouragement of my friends in the group? I’d never have gotten there on my own.

            One of our members, Donna White Glaser, author of The Enemy We Know, was the first of our members to ePublish. Her experience and assistance encouraged the rest of us to do the same. I think many would-be authors daydream about the kind of book they’d like to write someday, and that daydream never becomes a reality.  For me, being in a group made that dream come true.

Joining a writer’s group can benefit the new author in many ways:

1.     Improve style and quality of your writing.

2.     Improve grammar and punctuation.

3.     Act as a regular motivator, forcing you to keep up with your writing. Our group meets every two weeks and the members must submit 1500 – 2000 words to each member of the group.

4.     Support you on the journey to your novel’s completion.

5.     Members of the group share experiences with things like marketing, conferences, social media, contests and events.

6.     Gives you a regular sounding board for your work.

Our group consists of only five writers. We limit our meetings to two-and-a-half hours, so it would be difficult to have a larger group and still give each other’s work an in-depth critique.

There are other writer’s groups, larger than ours, who have no regular requirements, instead members share passages of their work by reading aloud, and readings are done on a voluntary basis. We had occasion to read a writing sample from a member of one of these groups and it was clear that a smaller group with regular submission requirements contributes more to writing quality. For a motivated writer, a smaller group provides the greater benefit.

Detractors of the writer’s critique group believe that it stunts creativity. This could possibly be true in the case of a very seasoned author, but in my opinion, the opposite is true. If my work is boring, the group is not shy about letting me know I have to up the creativity to hold their interest. 

Dear readers,

In an interview, when asked what advice I'd give a new author, joining a critique group is always my first point. Please let us know if you have experience with being in a group and how it worked for your writing. Always enjoy hearing from you!

Marla