GENREALITY

It’s not easy to be creative on demand, but as always, if you want to be a professional write tyou need to be able to blend the business with the creative. You need to be able to write on demand.

It’s easy to write when your motivated. At least for me it was. When I first turned professional, (When I sold my first novel and quit my steady job to write full time) it was easy to write. I never had to worry about my muse running off and leaving me hanging, because I didn;t depend on my muse to be creative.

For me, I was motivated by adrenaline and ambition. I wanted to succeed to the point that all other aspects of normla life dissappeared in that time. Plus, I’ve always been someone who thrived under pressure – to a point.

But after three eyars of constant writing….and weight gain, I decided it try and find some balance in my life. I spent the last year doing that, going back to work, getting out with friends, trying to get myself back in shape and not writing. Now, I’m in the position where I want to write, but I’ve got no pressure to write. No immediate deadlines, and no agent or editor asking when I’ll have a certain project done.

My other authro friends tell me this is the perfect time to write what *I* want to write, except there isn;t any particular story buring inside me that needs to get out. They say I just need inspiration to strike, but I hate sitting around waiting for that to happen because, well, I’m not exactly a patient person.

So,I’ve had to come up with a few ways to give my muse a kick in the pants, and I figure I’ll share them with you becasue i just know I’m not the only impatient person who doesn’t want to sit around and wait for inspiration to strike.

DO SOMETHING ~ It never fails that the best ideas come when your busy doing something, anything, other than writing. Clean your house, workout, walk the dog, cook dinner, build someting. Just do somethign that gets you out fomr in front of the computer and frees your mind. Ideas seem to appear out of nowhere when your too busy to write them down.

WATCH A MOVIE ~ I don’t know about everyone else, but I find movies a great way to relax my mind, and when my mind relaxes, the imagination flares and ideas come.

HUNT AND GATHER ~ I’m not a big fan of craft books, they just don’t do much for me personally. However, I am a fan of surfing the net for information. Sometimes I find it on other writers websites and blogs and reading what works for them. Sometimes I find inspiration in their “how to” stuff, and other times it’s their book blurbs that spark my imagination.

I also likw to just surf blogs. There are all sorts of blogs out there, written by real people, and all of them have a story to tell.

Either way, I enjoy surfing the net and seeing what catches my eye. It’s almost as good as just siting inthe food court at the mall and people watching.

READ~ Sure you can pull a comfort read from your bookshelf, but I also like to read something I wrote. Sometimes, reading some thing I wrote brings ideas to mind, stories for secondary characters, or new avenues, or things I wish I’d done with that story, that end up being the birth of a new story. Plus, it’s very motivating to read something and know it came from my own head. It boosts my confidence and gives me the confidence to do it again. And when writing, confidence in oneself is a must.

What works for you when you need to jumpstart your muse?

Last week’s discussion by Lynn about writing conferences reminded me of one of my long-time rants:  the benefits, or lack thereof, of networking.  I see so much attention paid to networking, and so much pressure put on new writers to go to conventions and conferences.  And the issue isn’t just about how much cash you have to shell out for the experience.  The thinking goes that if you can meet editors and agents face to face, get your name out there in person as well as on the page, you’ll increase your chances of making it out of the slush pile.  It gets to the point where aspiring writers think that if they don’t jump through these hoops, they’ll never get published.

Lies, all of it.

You can have a fine career as a writer without doing any networking.  You can never go to a convention or conference, never correspond with a big name writer, never link to a single soul on LiveJournal, and still sell your novel and have a career writing.  Lots of people do.  Because ultimately your writing will stand or fall on its own merits.  You can be best friends with the biggest names in the business, and it still won’t help you if you haven’t written a saleable book.

The trouble is, we’ve all heard stories of somebody who really did pitch their novel to an editor in an elevator, somebody who did get a leg up in the business because they knew someone on the inside, got their manuscript read because the editor or agent in question is their best friend’s brother, or whatever.  Those things really do happen.  But those stories are rare exceptions, and at that point we’re drifting into the realm of things that we have no control over.  The one thing that all of us do have control over is what we write, and for most of us our time would be better spent working on our writing than trying to cultivate a lot of industry connections.  Because your best friend’s brother may be a high-powered editor, but he’s still going to want to see the manuscript.  This is one business where you may know lots of people and have lots of insider contacts, but you still have to do the homework.

And let’s face it, most writers are chronic introverts.  The thought of pitching to an editor in person makes me ill.  I’m better off keeping to the back of the room and e-mailing my pitch later.  I never met the editor who bought my first story.  I didn’t meet my agent before I hired him.  I didn’t meet my editor until after she’d bought my books.  If I know lots of editors now, it’s because I’ve been working in the business for 10 years.  For me, meeting people and making contacts has been a natural progression of my career, not a means to an end.

I go to lots of conventions and really love meeting other writers and editors, hanging out at the bars, listening to their stories, venting my spleen on occasion, and pushing my books on an unsuspecting public.  What do I get out of this so-called networking?  I get a lot of friendships.  I know a lot of people I can call on when I need advice.  To me, that’s the real benefit of networking — developing literal networks of contacts, a support group that understands the business, feeds me the gossip, and gives me pep talks when I’m feeling down.  Heck, this blog is a form of networking.  It’s not likely to get anyone a contract directly, but it’s just as useful in other ways.  Like, helping with sanity maintenance.

I tell people, don’t network on the basis of who you think can get you something.  Network based on who you get along with, who you’d like to be friends with, and who’s fun to hang out with.  Because then networking isn’t work — it’s fun.  We spend so much time alone, at our computers, wrapped up in our heads, it’s important to develop our social side as well, for our own emotional well being.

“The two most engaging powers of an author are to make new things familiar and familiar things new.” ~Samuel Johnson

2001 was the year I decided I wanted to give writing a try. I didn’t have any friends who were writers. I didn’t know any writers, and I didn’t know anything about the business. Basically I decided to try writing because I’ve always been an avid reader, I enjoyed creative writing in high school (I refused to think about the fact that, for me, high school had ended in 1987), and I wanted a new career that I didn’t have to go back to school for.

After almost 2 years of thinking about giving writing a try, I actually gave it a shot, and sold right away. I started writing short stories on my days off, and basically whenever I felt like it., and I sold everything I wrote. Part of me thinks this was luck, but mostly I think it was because I approached this as a career, and not a passion.

When I decided to seriously try writing I took a correspondence course that guaranteed it would teach me how to make money with my writing. That course didn’t teach me to be a good storyteller, it taught me how to write to the market. It taught me that if I wanted to make money, I had to write what was selling. And when my tutor found out I was a reader of erotica, he aimed in that direction with my writing.

Many authors will tell you if you don’t love writing, don’t try to make a career. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – I disagree. When I started writing it was purely to build a career. I keep writing, because I love the job.

I’ve been writing erotic fiction for 6 years now. I know, it’s not a long time compared to many authors, but it’s been a busy 6 years. I’ve had over 9 novels, 3 novellas, and easily over a dozen short stories published in that time. Oh, and I have another novel coming out in 2009.

Erotica has been around for decades, but traditionally it’s leaned to quite a literary stance. Today’s erotic fiction is mostly aimed at female readers, authors that used to write more traditional erotica have started adding more romance to their stories, and romance writers have started to add more heat. This has it’s pros and cons…but one of the biggest pros is that it means that those who like to write hot and sexually intense stories have many more options to get their work out there.

There are some people out there, be they authors, frustrated writers, reviewers or readers, who can’t stop sniping and snarking that erotic fiction is nothing more than sex or porn, and while that sometimes frustrates me, that’s not what this post is about. What I want to share with you is how the erotic market has changed, and grown. Why has erotic fiction been gaining so much popularity in the last couple of years?

I think it’s because women aren’t shying away from their sexuality anymore. Instead, we’re embracing the power we have. The strong innate sensuality that most women have inside them that has been crying to be let free of its restraints. For years adult entertainment was focused solely on the male point of view. Then women slowly started breaking that barrier. Playgirl was the start, and is still going strong, helping make it mainstream for women to openly enjoy the sight of a hot hard body… and to explore and express their own sexuality

Today’s erotic stories are about women exploring and enjoying their sensual, sexual and downright primal side, sometimes without the need for love and a traditional happily ever after. That’s not to say that there isn’t a happily ever after, just that it’s not always a HEA of the traditional man-woman-marriage sort. (Although there is also plenty of erotic romance with traditional HEA’s as well)

Society is changing; women don’t always want love and a traditional happily ever after anymore. We’ve become stronger and more focused on our own needs and desires instead of the women of my mother’s generation who thought any man was better than no man. And this new mentality is showcased in novels that contain an engaging story, and a plenty of hot sex for those of us that like to read about real honest and intense emotions.

There are critics out there who think just because the stories have a sexual focus that there is no emotion in them, or worse yet, no story. I challenge those people to tell me that desire isn’t an emotion. Or yearning. What about excitement, anger and fear? Those are emotions, and many of them are found in erotic stories. And yes, love can also be found in many erotic stories.

The market for erotic novels and stories has ballooned in the last couple of years. It’s gone beyond fringe magazines, ePublishers, and small press. New York Publishers like Berkley, Kensington, Avon, and St.Martin’s Press are now releasing erotic fiction in multiple styles, lengths, and sub-genres. And that means there are plenty of options for readers … and writers in the erotic market.

I love that the more I write, the more fascinated I became with the genre I’ve chosen. Human sexuality is multifaceted and there are so many ways to write about it. So many sub-genres and specialties and levels of heat. My personal favorite place to check out what publishers of erotic fiction are looking for is the Erotica Readers and Writers Calls For Submissions Page. It’s where I found the guidelines when I started to build my career 6 years ago, and where I still go to see what publishers are looking for. To be a successful career writer, you need to know the market, and be able to write to it. I enjoy writing erotic fiction, but I’m also smart enough to know that enjoying what I write is just a bonus.

I’m reading lots of books on pirates right now, because I’m writing a novel with pirates in it.  How cool is that?  Did I mention I love my job?  I think I was watching the second Pirates of the Caribbean movie when I thought, I could do this so much better.  It’s amazing how many of my stories start that way.  One of the ways of making it better is actually reading some books about eighteenth century pirates.

Research is another one of those things that everyone does differently, I think.  I’ve encountered two main theories:  do lots and lots of research, read everything you can, talk to people, learn a subject inside and out, then write the book.  Or, write the book, figure out what you need to know, then look up that specific information. (This method helps you avoid the pitfall of inserting a lecture on the origins of gunpowder into your otherwise fast-paced genetically engineered dinosaur thriller.  I’m looking at you, Crichton.)  Both methods have drawbacks — if you try to learn everything about a subject before you start writing, you may never start writing.  But if you don’t do enough research before you start writing, you may miss out on the information that takes your story in amazing new directions.  Or you may start working on an idea that couldn’t actually happen.

As with so many things, a middle road is usually best.  I read a couple of books before I started, which gave me lots of ideas that have worked their way into the plot.  For example, before modern shipbuilding methods hit the scene, crews had to careen their ships a few times a year — run them aground and tip them over so they could clean all the barnacles, worms, and slime off the hulls.  Otherwise, the hulls would rot out.  What a great scene!  I had no idea!  But after reading a couple of books, I was so excited to get started I just did, even though I had so much more to learn.  (Like how would they have treated a broken leg?  How did they carry water on the ships?  What kind of ship are they sailing?  I had no idea there were so many different kinds of ships plying the waters of the Caribbean in the eighteenth century!  Sloops, pinks, brigantines, schooners, galleons…)

Like Lynn, I tend to put a bunch of bracketed notes in my first drafts, like what famous pirates were at the Bahamas and when, what a ship’s surgeon’s training would have been, what the captain’s quarters would have looked like, how the prisoners on a slave ship were chained, and so on.  It’s not worth stopping the flow of writing to look up that information when it doesn’t change the story.  That’s not research so much as fact checking.

I never think I do enough research.  I’m sure I don’t.  But see, I don’t have to know a topic inside and out in order to write a book.  I only have to convince the reader that I do.

We’re told to write what we know.  So why is it worth it trying to become an instant expert in a subject we don’t know?  Because not every expert can write a rip-roaring novel about their subject.  Some can (giving rise to whole shelves full of medical mysteries, lawyer mysteries, military-based techno thrillers, and so on).  But a historian specializing in eighteenth century piracy is probably going to spend most of his or her time writing nonfiction about pirates.  Which leaves it to writers like me to absorb all that nonfiction and make an adventure of it.

Obligatory plagiarism notice.  It should go without saying, but there’ve been too many instances where it needed to be said:  research does not mean inserting your source material word for word into your novel.  It should go without saying because interrupting the narrative flow to deliver a lecture on sailing techniques would be dead boring.  Unless you’re Herman Melville, who got away with a lot of exposition because he really did sail on nineteenth century whaling ships.  The thing to do is read lots of books.  Then put the books away and write what you know.

I thought I’d take a cue from Lynn’s post and offer some advice on literary agents. I wrote this for my blog this week, but I thought it worth reposting for any aspiring authors looking for hard, practical advice on getting an agent.