On Writing About Conflict

I’ve been writing some short stories lately. They take a lot less time to write than novellas and novels, and I get to gleefully skip from one genre to another. I recently finished a gentle, somewhat biographical, tale of a young girl who wants to be the best: the best underwater breath holder, the best pretend mermaid, the best liar.

The other day I presented the story to my online critique group. It confused them. They told me they couldn’t get into the tale because there was no conflict. Of course the story has conflict, I thought (but didn’t say). This particular group writes fiction where the conflict is easy to spot: heroes and heroines fight vampires or Russian agents.

The group’s response forced me to analyze my position.

What is story conflict? And does it require a fight between good and evil? Nope. Conflict is generated when the central characters encounter obstacles that prevent them getting what they want. Overcoming the barriers can mean the difference between life or death, or happiness and misery, or a good day versus a bad day. The drama can be subtle or outsize.

What the character wants, is, I suppose, often the essence of genre. Desiring love is romance. Figuring out who committed a crime is mystery. Winning the bloody battle is war porn. In the best fiction, the writer must understand the character well enough to provide worthy roadblocks.

The critique group response to this story made me sad, especially because I like these people. Though I’ve tried, I can't present my romance stories for critique. The group is convinced that there's hierarchy in genre fiction. What they write is the pinnacle, and romance is at the very bottom. In fact, romance is worthy of ridicule. It’s tough to take. 

I believe such rigid, dogmatic attitudes, including primitive ideas on what constitutes conflict, are a consequence of inadequate breadth of reading and a deficiency of imagination.

Why should it be so hard to understand that a story is a story?

What Buffy Says About Writing

Thanks to http://whatshouldwecallgradschool.tumblr.com/post/68819594127/pep-talk-after-a-failed-experiment

Writing Descriptions

I'm blogging about this topic over at Samhain today!

Is BDSM Erotic Romance Really Romance?

A few weeks ago I asked a service company to come over to look at our air conditioner. As I was watching the guy poke around the unit, he asked me what I did for a living. I said I was a writer. I didn’t tell him I wrote erotica. Nope. I also didn’t tell him I wrote BDSM. Instead, I said, “I write romance.”

That got me to thinking: is BDSM romance fiction really romance? It can be. It’s what I try to write. BDSM stories can end with a Happily Ever After, just like romance; a BDSM plot frequently revolves around two people (or more) ultimately committing to each other.

Readers of BDSM fiction have a hard time reconciling BDSM with romance when the interaction involves sadism. That’s unfortunate. There are all sorts of ways to love and be loved. I realized readers freaked about sadism when Sterling, a sadist character in my first novella My One was viewed as the bad guy. He wasn’t a bad guy. He just wasn’t the right partner for my heroine.

I signed up with a blog tour operation last year, and after dozens of requests to host (mainy) paranormal, I finally said yes. I agreed for only one reason: the novel had a sadist character who was also poly. I asked the author to blog about sadism or polyamory in legitimate BDSM erotic romance. She didn’t, preferring instead to write about her hero being a better Dominant than the guy in Fifty Shades. I was disappointed.

Speaking of Fifty Shades, I did read some of “Master of the Universe”, the fanfic that gave birth to the mega-selling trilogy. I admit that I don’t read a ton of BDSM romance, because I’d like to avoid having my own experiences influenced by the writings of people who just talk the talk. Fifty Shades is a romance. Beneath the paper-thin, dark sheen of BDSM, the obsessed hero of Fifty Shades harks back to the tropes of Gothic romance.

Some strange books have jumped on the Fifty Shades bandwagon. Many of them are neither BDSM nor romance. I read one of them. This novella, reprinted as a novel with a black cover to take advantage of the hype (and in extra large letters to make it appear meatier) was only an unending series of swinger-style sexual encounters with some overtones of control.

Ahhh, but I’ve also seen signs of progress. I recently saw a stack of “Story of O” novels at the airport bookstore.

Vaniller Thriller

About five years ago I wrote a science thriller. It had a lot of sex in it. I sent it off to agents and was stoked when two really, really famous agents (and dozens of regular agents) agreed to look at the manuscript. The famous ones even gave me some valuable advice--along with their rejections. I was flattered and grateful. Ultimately nobody wanted to represent me, though. All except for the one lady who offered me representation halfway through reading the book.  When she finished the novel, she said, "never mind".

Over the years I've been trying to make the book less of a "never mind". I started by reading and analyzing a bunch of science-type thrillers. I deleted a lot of the sex (sadly). Then I devised a mystical Dan Brown type subplot (not involving the Vatican or the Masons, thank you). I also toughened up my female protagonist. I finally finished refining the final draft of this lean and action-packed novel a few weeks ago.

When I'm close to finishing a story, I always have a recurring dream. I dream about packing stuff into boxes. In real life, filling up boxes for a move is an exhausting pain in the ass. But my packing dreams are anticipatory, pleasurable--a metaphor for the excitement of moving on to another project.

Unfortunately, this time, my packing dream was premature. When I collected all the chapters, and did a word count of my thriller, I discovered it was only 66,000 words! That's way too short for a modern thriller. I tried to tell myself a short novel was okay. After all, Michael Crichton's debut, The Andromeda Strain was 66,000 words too.

It's a bad idea for a writer to make up excuses for why it's okay to buck trends, or to compare oneself to some long-time, bestselling author. So after a day-long delusion, I gave up on pretending I was the new Crichton. It's back to the computer to bulk up my novel. I'll invent a few more characters, add a bit of fluff. I'm hoping to finish up my thriller in the next couple of weeks.

Then I'll return to writing some sexy (and short) BDSM novellas. I can't wait!

Extreme Writer's Block

I suppose most writers have trouble writing now and again. I've blogged about some small cures for writer's block. I'm blocked sometimes. I get sick of rewriting and rewriting and rewriting, or life gets in the way. Often it's just laziness and aversion to pain. Like most writers, I push through. But some folks just can't. I have two acquaintances like that. 

I know a woman who planned to write an autobiography.  She had an extraordinary past, well worth reading about. She proudly told her children she was writing the book for them. She collected files and created a special room to write in. But she didn't write. Decades after making the choice to be a writer, her files and special room stand dusty and unused. She tells her children she has writer's block.

And then there's a man who tells his family he's going to write a travel book about certain sacred religious sites being destroyed by parking lot style progress. It's an important and controversial project. His family is in awe. They call it "His Book"--in caps. He quit his job to spend three years exploring these holy places. And three years after that? Not one word on a page. He also says he has writer's block.

Given that I get a lesser form of the malady, you'd think I'd be sympathetic. But I'm not. These folks are trying to collect on prestige they aren't entitled to. It's a form of narcissism. How long can a writer have writer's block before they shouldn't call themselves a writer? I'm not sure. But it's not years. It's not decades. If writer's block is so severe that it's paralyzing, then do something else! Don't call yourself a writer. There are plenty of other, easier ways to be creative or to give life meaning.  The supposed status of being a writer comes with a high price. The actual work is often tedious and hard (and rejected).

Grandiose delusion from fake achievement bugs me. It's commonplace, though. Like when folks say they have a master's degree--having done everything but the thesis. Huh? Isn't writing the thesis important? Isn't that proof of successful study? Hey, if the actual thesis is irrelevant, I want me some admiration for being an Olympic-quality sprinter. I've got everything but the speed.

Best wishes for the new year!

Critique Me Maybe

I've been member of a lot of critique groups over the years. With only one exception, I valued each and every critique, even if I thought it was wrong, or when the critique was just a scattering of smiley faces. Their comments or glyphs--as a whole--made me a better writer.

To keep a critique group healthy, the critiquee (the official writerly term is "victim"), must shut up and listen to the critiquer. Not explain, not clarify, not defend. The basis for this "shut up rule" is that a writer can't be standing over every reader's shoulder to explain what they really meant. If a critiquer says some passage doesn't make sense, maybe it doesn't make sense.

I just recently dropped out of my critique group because the "shut up rule" wasn't followed. Frankly, I don't care if a writer rejects my advice. My comments are opinion, not truth. My issue with defensiveness is that it wastes way too much time.

One group member would always respond to suggestions with long, drawn out descriptions of back story--not in the novel. Another member spent a lot of time telling us what would happen in the next chapter and how that would fix the problems in the current one.  She would also say "Since two of you said this was a problem in my manuscript, it must be a problem." Like critique is the same thing as an election. When confronted with her defensive behavior, she told us her other critique group knew that she wasn't being defensive when she did stuff like that, so she assumed she would always get a pass on the shut up rule. She was defensive about being defensive. She would also grunt her approval or disapproval at critiques directed to another member. I absolutely hated that.
 
Anyone who's in a critique group should, of course, decide if the critiques are valuable. Take it or leave it, burn it or worship it. But they should do it on their own time. If a victim requires postmortem analysis or cleansing rituals, they should do it afterwards, not during.

Clarifying or rationalizing or interrupting during a critique group meeting insults the process.


Psychology Today: Do You Get Defensive When You Get Feedback?

For a great example of how not to respond to critique, see: Why Isn't My Book Selling? 1/1 Jihad Britain

BDSM Books for Writers

Given the the popularity of the Fifty Shades books, I started to wonder if more romance writers will jump on the BDSM bandwagon. If so, how will these folks do research? Will these authors, like EL James, just use the internet? Or will they buy and read "BDSM for authors who don't know much about BDSM" books?

I've already mentioned Tymber Dalton's book Whip Me, Beat Me, Make Me Write Hot Sex in a previous post. (In related news, Tymber has recently published a marketing book Pimp Yourself: Easy, Painless, and Cheap Self-Promotion for Writers).

BDSM for Writers by Charley Ferrer is also a potential resource. Ferrer tells us "It's imperative to understand that BDSM is a distinct community with its own belief system and even its own psychological make-up."  This grand statement is intended to establish her authority in BDSM matters. It's also wildly incorrect. Kink folk don't take a certification class in order to call themselves BDSM practitioners. They are not a mono-culture. BDSMers are just as inhomogenous as the rest of society. I suspect such simplifications may be a general problem with "BDSM for authors who don't know much about BDSM" books. In reality, one person can't explain everything about BDSM. Not the belief system, not the psychology. That usually makes writing BDSM fiction guides pretentious or defensive. Or both.

I was pretty interested when The ABC's of BDSM by Dama deNoche came out.  This book is not meant for writers. Officially anyway. It's a sort of dictionary, wherein various BDSM terms are defined. I downloaded a sample--getting all the A's and midway through the Bs.

I don't review BDSM fiction in this blog, because I consider it a conflict of interest. But I'm okay with reviewing non-fiction. So here's a review of the sample.  (Is it fair to review just part of a book? Maybe not. But the abc's aren't intrinsically biased, and there's no true climax and resolution in a dictionary. )

The ABC's of BDSM starts out with a forward which refers to the "Lifestyle".  Guide books use the lifestyle term all the time. I've blogged about my objections to it. In my opinion, it's an example of pretension: everyone's doing the same thing and lives the same way, and the way BDSMers live is important enough to be capitalized.  

Now to the dictionary--at least up until the middle of the b's. There are indeed many relevant entries in the sample: anal play, aftercare, bondage. The emotional content is, unfortunately, missing. The book gives a dry recounting of what's what. Not the whys. Why does the bottom get a charge out of immobility in bondage? What does the Top get out of tying someone up? No answers in this book.

The weirdest thing about deNoche's book (partway through the B's at least) is a rather long explication of Bestiality. She points out that "the human and the dog can be physically harmed during the sex act even if they are trying to be careful and safe." Most of us, Lifestylers included, would not classify bestiality as a part of BDSM. Neither would they think a dog is capable of being "careful and safe." To her credit, she does admit that consensuality is absent in these interactions.

Books on writing BDSM don't sell as well as general writing books like The Elements of Style by Strunk and White, or Stephen King's On Writing. That could mean that most writers unfamiliar with BDSM use the internet as a research partner. That's probably not such a bad thing--if the research includes investigating the emotional aspects of kink. There are many intimate, highly moving blogs by practitioners on the web.

Another option for BDSM writers is to read guide books for BDSMers. I'd recommend books by Jay Wiseman, Dossie Easton, and John and Libby Warren.

Before You Hit Send Workshop

Angela James of Carina Press is offering another session of her Before You Hit Send Workshop. It's three-weeks of interactive nuts-and-bolts advice about self-editing.

I got to participate in a beta test of this workshop awhile back. It was fun, a bit overwhelming and very valuable. I couldn't believe how many things I was doing wrong (even as a published author)!

--

How Not to Write a Book Blurb: Part II

In a previous blog post I discussed creating a book's "cover copy". In part I, I listed three things not to do. Here I continue with Part II.

1. Don't overwhelm the blurb with names. It's not necessary to give people's last names, particularly if there are more than two characters in the blurb. Try to avoid listing names of secondary characters. Sometimes relationships are enough to identify them. Her brother, her boss, his mother, their children, is preferable. The same thing goes for locations. Don't overload the paragraphs with names of cities or states or regions unless it matters. Don't present lots of names of coffee shops or hotels or companies, no matter how clever you think the names are, if names aren't really critical to the story.

2. Avoid the temptation to give long, poetic descriptions of character's physical attributes in a blurb. Go especially light on describing eye-color and hair-color. "When smoky-eyed, blonde Gemma first sees tanned, green-eyed, curly-haired Ronald, sparks fly." Really? Is the eye-color important? Will a reader buy the book because the heroine is smoky-eyed? Romance/erotica blurbs are permitted to describe a bit about the characters' hotness, like hunky or sexy.

3. Don't provide long excerpts of reviews in the blurb. Self-pubbed folks often list review after review in the description, hoping to lend credibility to their work. It doesn't impress. It usually results in a potential purchaser giving up. A reader wants to know what the story is about. Sure, if you got a review that says "..altogether superior" from some bigtime reviewer, put it in your blurb. Use a very short excerpt (no more than a phrase), the attribution, and only one review. Don't list awards the book has won unless it's a real contest everyone has heard of. Blurb real estate is valuable. Don't waste it.

Living What You Write

A few months ago an interesting drama unfolded in the m/m fiction writer world. A popular m/m author, who claimed to be a gay man, was outed--as a woman. The author had evidently even hired a gay friend to impersonate her at signing events. She also published autobiographical pieces on her life as a gay man.

Can a woman write gay m/m fiction? Sure. To broaden the discussion: Must an author have provable cultural provenance to write about that culture? Such questions have been posed for hundreds of years. Controversy still whirls around William Shakespeare, for example. How could the son of an illiterate glover have created plays about kings and courtiers? Was he a fraud simply because he wasn't a king or courtier? Nope.

I believe an author who has absolutely no real-time experience with a culture, character or gender can write credible fiction. A stand-up guy can write convincingly about a psychopathic serial killer. A great-grandmother who has never ventured outside of her little town in Arkansas can write a war novel. A woman can write stories about gay sex. A non-scientist can write SF. A vanilla man can write hot BDSM novels from the sub's point of view.

Writing outside of experience is possible with enough research, imagination and empathy. In fact, I always distrust BDSM fiction authors who trot out their kink cred at every opportunity ("my Master approved this story", and "I live the lifestyle".)

What about the author who hires an impersonator for a signing event? I think that's fine, too. Writers invent. Why shouldn't they be able to create an identity at odds with real life? Most authors pretend they are more good-looking than they really are. Writers attempt to project glamor, thinness, intelligence, success. An author who hires a gorgeous, edgy model to sign edgy books is just giving the readers what they want. It's performance art, not fraud.

But it's a completely different story when is comes to fakery in non-fiction. If readers are looking to an author as an expert, the author had better be one. Authors who get confused between autobiography and story-telling are cheating. An author shouldn't blog about her firsthand penis experiences--when she doesn't have one. It's unethical, especially since real life m/m frequently involves two.

Saturday Musings

New self-published writers are often advised to produce, produce, produce. The big-time SP gurus like Dean Wesley Smith, JA Kornrath, and John Locke heavily promote this idea. In some SP circles, unless you write four books a year, you're not a serious writer. Now this may just be sour grapes because I'm such a slow writer, but I think this advice is crazy. An author's economic future depends on sales, to be sure. But what are the hidden costs of factory-style creativity?

Back in the day, highly productive best-selling writers started out slowly, learning how to write, improving with every book. Stephen King, for example, first wrote short stories. Nora Roberts got her writing chops by publishing short category romances. But now there's immediate gratification through self-publishing. About 30,000 SP ebooks are uploaded to Amazon each month.

Many of self-published writers are great producers: The young man who announces the release of his very first book--part of a fantasy trilogy. A woman who has just published her eleventh romance book (in two years), which read like fanfic. A writer who is papering amazon with short stories, informing the amazon forums, "Good, bad or ugly, just get it out there. I figure I'm going to hit all sides of the market and like spaghetti on the wall, see what sticks." A young woman who aspires to write 11 books in her fiction series, and then sell licenses for writers who want to play in her universe.

A rapid publishing schedule can't improve writing skills. Writers need feedback during the process, not just after publication. And getting that feedback takes time. Beta readers, critique partners, and superb editors, can all point out flaws. With enough time between drafts, a writer can even recognize problems in her own work. Wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am style of writing is the same as working in a vacuum. Improvement is unlikely, no matter how economically appealing.

The hidden price of mass book production is author stagnation. But the ultimate cost to the self-publishing industry is more devastating. Crap books damage the reputation of SP. There are superior self-published books, but on average, they are pretty bad. With uploads increasing every month, the average quality of an SP book is going to get worse. When the novelty of the 99 cent SP ebook wears off, and everybody has a kindle or nook, readers will turn away from SP. It's a pyramid scheme. The authors who first published cheap ebooks will have reaped the financial rewards, but the newbies won't. Because readers, having been burned too many times, won't risk reading a random SP book again.

How Not to Write a Book Blurb: Part I

A book's "cover copy" is a super important marketing tool. The blurb is a come-on, a seductive invitation to buy the book. The blurb also provides a hint of the genre, the characters, the story, and the conflict. Unfortunately, book blurbs are extremely difficult to write.

Even if the publisher employs a blurb copywriter, cover copy is still the foundation of a query letter. An author has got to learn how. Writing a great blurb is especially critical if the author is self-published or small-press pubbed. For these books the blurb serves a double purpose: readers look to the blurb to entice, and to provide evidence that the writer can actually write.

Here are three tips:

1. Don't be a carnival barker. Don't address the reader directly. Don't ask the reader a direct question, like "Have you ever wondered what would happen if..." Don't promise to take the reader on a transformative, profound journey that will change them forever. Never, ever, ever, say "You have never read anything like this before."

2. Don't provide a synopsis. A blurb is a wink and a flirt, not an entire strip tease detailing the brand name and fiber content of the clothing being removed.

3. Don't make spelling or grammar mistakes.

Here's an example of what not to do (this is taken from real blurbs, modified and embellished to protect the originals.)

There’s a brothel in Colorado posing as a retreat for writers. When a young, Australian girl by the name of Angie is trapped by Buck (the guy running it) strange things start to occur. As if Angie didn't have enough troubles in the present, events completely out of her control unfolding in the past and future are now aligning against her.

Angie and her bestfriend Pam have no idea how to get out from under Buck’s thumb; and each time something strange takes place in the house—Buck blames one of the girls and holds them responsible and they have to be disciplined. When the girls chip in and buy and give Georgina a ruby ring for her birthday because they feel bad for her because Buck broke her arm—when they return one day they discover she’s no longer there—they think Buck did something to her but aren’t sure—but days later they see the ruby ring on Buck’s girlfriend’s finger (and know for sure)—they’re infuriated and pushed to their limits and take the biggest gamble of their sad existences: they plan on killing him. Trouble is, if they fail, somebody’s going to be severely held accountable.

From the deepest reaches of the rocky mountain ranches to the fanciest jewelry stores in Denver, this realistic novel takes you on a journey through the darkest aspects of human existance to enlightenment of mankind's soul.

See also:

Why is my Book Not Selling? Crowdsourcing critique of a book's cover, blurb and first few paragraphs.

The blurb doctor is in For 25.00, this blogger will help you with your blurb.

How to Write a Book Blurb that Sells

Sub Frenzy and Non-Con Erotica

Kitty Thomas is an author who writes fiction featuring non-consensual BDSM. She was interviewed on The Forbidden Bookshelf Blog a few months ago. I've been stewing ever since. In this blog post I’m going to respond to Kitty's interview, and discuss what’s wrong with kidnap and rape BDSM stories.

First, Kitty says:

The rape fantasy is the number-one female sexual fantasy.

The number one female sexual fantasy is to be desired, not raped. Rape and desire are not the same thing--even in fiction. It's a big leap to conclude that readers who enjoy non-con erotica actually fantasize about being raped.

Then Kitty constructs a straw man to justify writing non-con:

A lot of people don't like rape fantasy in fiction because it "sends the wrong message". But I think that's just insane. No rapist is curling up with harlequin novels, bodice rippers, and kinky erotica to "justify" being a monster.

Rapists being inspired by rape erotica is not the only possible reason for objecting to non-con. In fact, I don’t believe non-con is dangerous because it arouses men. It's dangerous because it arouses women. Here's why:

When a new submissive discovers the world of BDSM, (often through reading erotica like Kitty's), she can be overcome with excitement. She longs to experience the intense emotions in those stories. She wants more and more, and she wants it now. This vulnerable state of mind, (or lack of mind), is termed “sub frenzy”. A frenzied novice sub will take foolish risks, discarding common sense. She won’t vet who she’ll be playing with, she’ll fall for the “you aren’t a real submissive if…” and she won’t understand that it is her responsibility to insure her own safety. Frenzy, supported by fictional extreme BDSM scenarios, can lead to serious harm to the submissive.

Non-con fiction glamorizes assault and imprisonment in the same way that war stories idealize battle. The real experience is far different than the fantasy. I believe it's negligent to romanticize kidnap and rape as sensible BDSM.

Finally, Kitty asserts:

A lot of the BDSM books being written now are being written by non-kinky authors for a non-kinky audience. So, if you aren't kinky and you find my fiction uncomfortable, please, just read something else. You have plenty of fuzzy handcuffs and safewords books to read. But those of us who like non-con kink fiction have far fewer books to choose from because of all the people who decided to go on a crusade to control what people are allowed to even think about.

Offering an opinion about non-con fiction isn’t the same thing as mind control or censorship. Nobody is on a crusade; non-con authors are not being victimized. It's an opinion. And finally, writing fiction with safewords (or fuzzy handcuffs) also doesn’t wipe out the author’s kink cred. Not unless a story with condoms is proof positive that the author is a virgin.

It's about safety.

Pigeonholing Genius

Angela James of Carina Press recently blogged about rejections, listing a bunch of reasons why Carina won't reject manuscripts. Two of them concerned genre. Angela said Carina won’t reject a manuscript because it falls in too many genres or because it falls in too “niche” a genre. Carina also won’t reject a story because it isn’t a genre that seems hot right now or because it’s in an unusual time, place or setting. If it’s a good book, the publisher will find a spot for it.

An acquaintance of mine is struggling with genre. She’s writing what I would call a military SF romance. But she refuses to call her novel SF--or even romance. Her fiction is something unique. She’s upset that publishers will expect her to categorize her story. She’s also afraid if she assigns too many genres, her manuscript will get tossed out or deleted unread. She believes publishers are too strict and formulaic. In an effort to be sympathetic, one of her friends pointed to Harlequin as a prime example of a publisher determined to pigeonhole genius.

The whole conversation annoyed me, and not just because I’m a Harlequin author. Harlequin has a ton of different imprints and series. True, each imprint or series has some basic heat-level/plotline requirements. That's so the devoted reader can be reliably satisfied. But Harlequin as a whole? The publisher has only one requirement: the story has to be a romance with a happily ever after. That’s it. And with Spice, Spice Briefs and the Carina Press imprints, that's probably not even true anymore.

Aside from the unfairness of pointing at poor Harlequin as the pinnacle of closed-mindedness, I think it’s a bad idea to indulge an author’s genre whining. The Amazon boards are full of self-published authors complaining about the rigidity of the standard publishing world. Here’s an example:

The publishers may not be able to devote the time to think creatively about marketing an unusual, genre-tangential book. But it's [sic] creator can… And now we have a world of options. [Self-publishing, I suppose]. It beats papering the walls with rejection slips from those who lack our vision.

Here’s another one:

I thought it might be of interest both to readers and to writers here at Amazon to consider the genre of "sensuous literary fiction" as a possible alternative to "Erotica." ... If you've got a book that you feels more accurately fits into this newer category, we'd love to hear about it.

Authors who use the genre excuse for rejections aren’t doing themselves any favors. Why bother getting better at writing or learning about your market if you can always claim your masterpiece wasn’t published because the publishers are idiots? I’m also bugged by authors who describe themselves as “literary”, as if “literary” is just another word for superior fiction, not a genre with strict requirements of its own.

On one of these Amazon forums, a self-described visionary suggested using “tags”, rather than genre, as a way to circumvent the indignity of assigning genre. I guess I don’t see the big difference. Tags, if they say anything about the book, are defining the genre. At most, a tag will also describe sub-genre or niche.

Self-publishing fiction doesn’t give an author a pass on having to figure out genre. "Special" or "unique" isn't nearly descriptive enough to be genre. And genre is what readers use to decide what to read.

Here are a few interesting blogs on genre:

The academician's view of the romance genre

How to determine the genres of your mutt masterpiece

The Long Wait: Writer's Block

Years ago, I saw a newspaper ad inviting folks to come to a "writer's support group". I went to the meeting, excited and curious. Bettye, the support group's hostess, told us the goal was to get everybody writing and publishing. Cool. I started to feel uneasy when Bettye asked us all to do some writing exercises. Why would a critique group need writing exercises? I got really concerned when Bettye announced that someday, as a special treat, she'd invite her therapist to be a guest speaker.

It turned out I was attending a "writer's block support group", not a general "writer's support group". I disengaged just as soon as I politely could.

I do get writer's block sometimes. But I wouldn't have a future in writing if I needed a therapist to fix it. In my experience, the nature of the block dissolution depends on my reason (excuse). So herewith are a few home remedies for the block. They are not therapist endorsed.

Excuse: I don't have time. I have other things I should do. I'm tired.
Solution: Set the kitchen timer for an hour or so, and write until the timer goes ding-ding.

Excuse: I don't know what's going to happen next. I'm confused. Who is my protagonist? This book is too boring for words. Who do I kill off? My plot is illogical. What is my world like?
Solution: Go get a pad of paper, lie down, and daydream without editing. Brainstorm without censor. Write down options. Read your ideas later to get fresh direction.

Excuse: My mind is blank. I'm afraid. I'm tied up like that man in The Long Wait book cover.
Solution: Bring up a nice white computer screen and start writing what's inside your head. Stream of consciousness, or observations of the world around you. Or perhaps you can update your blog?

News

Yay! I just finished off a manuscript today. I'm one of the slowest writers on earth. But I'm a super fast dandelion puller, which is the other thing I did today. This latest story is a contemporary M/f BDSM erotic novella, like My One. The working title is Management Skill.

In a somewhat related note, Tymber Dalton has released a non-fiction book called "Whip Me, Beat Me, Make Me Write Hot Sex: A writer's guide to BDSM basics". It's available on the Amazon Kindle. Though I don't always like the themes Tymber embraces in her BDSM fiction, she is a pioneer in the genre.

Critique Groups

I was recently interviewed by The Black Raven's Erotic Cafe. Janis' questions really got me thinking about some writerly things, especially critique groups.

Based on the circulation of writer's magazines, like Writer's Digest, there are hundreds of thousands of fiction writers in the United States. A majority of these writers are probably going to a critique group.

I used to be one of those writers. I've been a member of several different critique groups during my writing life. I couldn't have survived without them. Writing is such a solitary pursuit, and critique meetings are like a "welcome home" party after getting out of prison. These get-togethers allow writers a place for gossip and support. I wouldn't be surprised if NaNoWriMo (a national project to write a novel in a month) is a sensation mainly because of the social experience. When critique groups click because there's a grounding in mutual respect, it's tremendously satisfying.

Critique groups are, of course, supposed to provide writing advice, too. Not everyone can stomach that part, though. One of my author friends couldn't. Mild suggestions about her pages were an assault on her soul. After one too many panic attacks, she stopped coming to critique. She said her work was too literary for us. Instead of using our free (and low-brow) advice, she paid a vanity publisher $600 to edit her work. Then she paid the same publisher to have this manuscript published (by purchasing advance copies). I bought and read her book. I'm in the acknowledgments. I'm flattered. And also mystified, since she ignored all of my suggestions.

There are specialty critique groups, some which even claim to be literary. I recently saw this invitation tacked to the bulletin board at the local coffee house:

New Literary Critique Group Forming. We are looking for open-minded writers. Must be willing to read works with GLBT themes. Genre fiction NOT considered.

Not open-minded enough to critique genre, I guess.

Some critique groups are run like exclusive secret societies. The long-lived Slow Sand Writer's Society in Colorado is one of those. The group is highly formal, with a rigorous audition-based application process, limited enrollment and its own website. Other groups are more inclusive, perhaps part of a non-profit writer's organization. I belonged to a critique group run by the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers for years. I was also a member of another group, run like an underground cell. I would meet with these secret agent-like creative folks publicly at Barnes and Noble, but I had to know somebody (who knew somebody) to get an invite.

There are lots of online critique groups. They would appeal to writers with inflexible schedules or those living in the middle of nowhere. But I'm afraid to join an online group. Humans are more apt to be flippant and cruel when they think they're anonymous.

Critiquing romance brings up a whole new set of problems. Sex scenes, even when they aren't graphic, are intimate. A romance writer can press a beta-reader's hot buttons (and not always in a good way). I knew I had to leave my secret-agent group when one of the women rewrote my rather tame sex scene using what she considered a more proper feminist perspective. My sex really upset her. In the long run, striking out alone has been a good thing. Writing without a hall monitor allowed me to explore the more intense themes of BDSM erotica.

World-Building

My very favorite romance review site is the Book Utopia blog. Utopia Mom is highly literate and her tastes are catholic (as in wide-ranging, not religious). Her review rubric consists of numerical ratings. She judges plot, entertainment value, characters and "world-building". For a reviewer to put so much weight on the world-building, especially in a contemporary romance, is unusual.

The term world-building supposedly has its origins in science fiction writing. Makes sense. It's difficult to write convincingly of a world nobody's ever seen. But the genre requires it be done well. The world has to be alien, but not so alien the reader can't ultimately comprehend it or care about it. The world also has to have some logical structure. The most primitive aspects of civilization cannot be forgotten in an effort to describe the advanced. Where does food come from? Where are the children? I think the most brilliant SF world-building is found in the Dune series by Frank Herbert. One of the settings in this space opera is a seemingly lifeless, waterless planet of sand, which has a startling ecology central to the economics of this particular universe.

Historical fiction also has high world-building standards. A great example of world-building in a historical is The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco. The setting here is medieval monastic life. The Abbey is so richly described and malevolent, it is a character in and of itself.

I think that's true of the best world-building. The world is a character. An environment has smells and taste; a background society has texture and demands; a setting has intrinsic drama. The purpose of world-building, just like plot and human character, is to draw in a reader. Plot takes time to evolve--a whole book, basically. Human character development also takes time, unless you use stock people. The character of the world, however, can sometimes be described quickly and evocatively.

How does a writer create a profound fictional world in a contemporary romance novel? Suppose the paranormal is closed off to the central couple: there's no magic or vampires. Assume the earth isn't hit by asteroids or swallowed up by volcanoes. Neither is the couple a part of some unusual subculture like the super-rich or computer hackers or druggies. The world of this fictional couple is pretty much the same one you and I occupy.

How can an author make that regular world fresh and vivid?

I'm not sure, because I like writing about subcultures. But I suppose a writer builds a normal world in the same way as a writer develops an abnormal world. Even an environment of Burger Kings, waiting at red lights, paying rent and watching Glee has plenty of texture.

I just read an example of a lovely bit of world-building in a recently released contemporary erotic romance novella. It's called Doll, by Juniper Bell. Here's an excerpt:

She sat on one of the window seats and listened to the symphony of moans and whistles. Far below, she heard the ocean swells crashing against the rocks.

Strange how the wind seemed to be flinging itself at the windows. As if it wanted to get in. To get to her. It sounded like a bitter roar, like Andrew when she’d screwed up every ounce of her courage and told him she wanted a divorce.

The setting in Doll isn't especially strange. Most readers have probably experienced a windstorm and seen the ocean. Nonetheless, the author has created a vibrant and real environmental character. In these few lines, Juniper Bell has made the reader a seductive promise: my characters and plot will be just as extraordinary and satisfying as my world-building.

Photo credit NASA public domain.