Slaying sacred cows … in a number of sacred fields …  (I say the things others are afraid to say.)

From readers:  “You make me think, reevaluate long held ideas, and you give off sparks like Swedish fire steel,”  “I took quite a liking to the honesty and accuracy of your posts, and to the manners of PYP [Port Yonder Press],” “I haven’t stopped being intrigued by what you write and think,” “You have a caring heart,” “I relate to your thoughts on life and writing in your book, On Being a Rat,” “You challenge me to think outside my comfort zone,” “I feel a kindred spirit in the direction of your writing, in your thoughts on the corporate Church and our roles as Christians in this world …”

Honesty, anecdotes, examples. Want to discuss a post? Check out How to Discuss a Controversial Topic in 7 Easy Steps. You scream & spunk, you flunk. You’re rude & crude, you lose. ;)

How to Get Your Readers Past That All-Important “Page 18″ (Bucking the Odds)

Of course there’s nothing really magical about “page 18,” is there?

In a recent post that was picked up by the Joplin Globe newspaper and rehashed in this article, I quoted a publishing-fact-guru as saying, “Most readers do not get past page 18 in a book they have purchased.”  Are you shocked by that?  I wasn’t, as I often can’t get that far, and believe it or not, I’m not so much a literary snob, but someone who simply enjoys a good, readable story.  Most of the books I’ve started in my lifetime have been less than appealing, and here are a few of the reasons why:

1) Writing style/genre.  This very subjective element is just that: uber-subjective.  What I enjoy reading, you may not, and vice versa.  This in itself is usually no reflection on the author, but the reader.  The important thing here is that the author know his audience very well and write for that audience: religious, crossover, mainstream; favorite styles for a given genre; when to risk something new (will that audience accept it? is that genre kind to risk-takers?); etc.  To risk something new can either be a blockbuster of a win or a tremendous loss.  Few authors have the skill and platform to succeed at something entirely new.  Most will want to stay safe in their genre of choice, and speaking to a certain audience.

2) Writing quality. This element of a book or story is more than a little objective.  Most readers can tell when a piece is well-written and when it’s not. This can involve grammar, wording, sentence structure.  To improve writing quality, read the best books from the larger presses, the award winning books. Take a class or two in writing or grammar.  Read books on grammar; get good at it, and then get better.  There is no shortcut to success in learning to write well.

3) Readability.  Similar to quality (#2), this goes a little deeper into the very word choices and flow of the material.  A piece of writing that doesn’t flow well usually hasn’t been read aloud by its author, nor has it had honest input from critiquers.  Sometimes an editor (if one has been used) has been deficient in their duties, in not pointing out this critical element.  To improve readability, again, read the best award winning books one can find.  Read your work out loud to impartial listeners.  Give your work time to breathe before looking at it again (see #5), preferably several months.  Subscribe to B & N’s Best New Books emails, and other such, and check out those books from your library or download sample chapters on your Kindle.  Analyze and learn why these books became bestsellers, hear the musicality and smoothness of their word flow.

4) Book cover & formatting.  This isn’t really an issue for me.  I’m in the throes of judging a section of a large well-known writing contest, and one of my very favorite books thus far has a no-nonsense paper (not glossy or matte, just “paper”) cover with a hand-sketched design on it.  The contents are incredible.  But most readers would have passed it up on looks alone.  A cover and proper internal formatting can account for a lot in a bookstore setting, especially, though online materials may not be as important.  In the same article I mentioned above, I included the fact that “Seventy-five percent of 300 booksellers surveyed (half from independent bookstores and half from chains) identified the look and design of the book cover as the most important component.”  The lesson here?  Be sure your cover is representative of what’s inside the book, and especially appealing to your reading market.  Work with your publisher to find the right cover. I would even suggest that you insist on a contract clause that allows you to approve cover design before going to press.

5) Time.  This may be the most important aspect of all.  Most readers, including me, can tell when an author has hastily written a book. Many of the above aspects were likely overlooked and what may have been a good story premise has been sacrificed via poor execution, a rushed writing process, a lack of good editing/revision.  A story lives and breathes only through sufficient time, hard work, rest, revision, more time & rest, more revision.  This is such a crucial part of penning anything of quality that it forced Annie Dillard to claim that it takes between two and ten years to write a book (referring to a quality book).  I know authors who work much quicker than that; some good accomplished authors can work quickly.  More often than not, however, it takes more than a few months, a year, to pen a book – it takes patience and planning and much TLC to produce the best results.

Everything I’ve mentioned here I’ve mentioned before in other blog posts, simply because these elements are essential in getting readers into the heart of a book, past those important first pages.  Plot twists?  Strong characters?  Believable dialog & setting?  Sure, that’s all needed.  And often those are emphasized to the neglect of the more obvious points listed here.

Writing style / genre.  Writing quality.  Readability.  Book cover & formatting.  Time:  write a book that soars higher and longer than most others.  I hope you’re committed to each of these, as is this author.

~Chila

WHAT EXACTLY IS A “CROSSOVER” BOOK? (with examples)

I’ve heard it said that the “crossover” beast doesn’t exist. I propose that if we can conceive of such in the world of fable – the Pegasus, chimera, wyvern, and more – then why not in the world of books?

The Free Online Dictionary uses the term “crossover” when referring to some musical styles, those which “appeal to a wide or diverse audience.” Just so with books.

Willard Library’s Hot Crossover Books can be found on Pinterest, but I doubt the validity of  some examples for my purposes:  it includes Stieg Larsson’s The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo – not a book most on the more conservative religious end of things might wish to read.

I’ve heard some define a crossover as a book which crosses genre boundaries.  I tend to call those mash-ups, however, or simply cross genre books.

Novelist Amanda Craig  prefers to define crossover as that which happens in the age realm:

Crossover books –  novels that appeal to adults as much as they do to children – are the publishing phenomenon of the past decade. JK Rowling, Philip Pullman, Lian Hearn and Mark Haddon are all stars of a genre often published with two different covers but successful in both markets.

Another blogger, Christina, agrees but goes for adult to YA instead of children

By definition, crossover books are those which bridge the gap between YA and adult novels; that is to say, they are YA novels that also attract an adult audience.  … I think a great example of a crossover book is Matched by Ally Condie.  I could see the message of this dystopian society passing every age boundary, and I can especially see college students enjoying this novel.  We’re free to make our choices and challenge ourselves, and this society erases that notion, makes us look back and appreciate the small things we do have.  Crossover is a combination of what a reader can get from YA and from adult novels. …

Then finally, out of the blue, I came across an interview of K. B. Hoyle which seemed to mesh with my own mental definition of a crossover book:

I was asked recently in a radio interview whether or not I considered my book, The Six, to be a crossover novel. My answer was, “Yes! But not because I planned it that way.” This interview got me thinking about what it is, exactly, that makes a book a crossover—that makes it appeal to a broader audience than merely your target audience. …

So what makes a book a crossover? I think it is the presence of timeless issues, themes, and elements. A quality story can only be written utilizing these things. Every major crossover book, from The Chronicles of Narnia, to Harry Potter, to The Hunger Games has dealt with themes that transcend the target audience. But as an author, you should know your target audience and write to it. …  [emphasis mine]

Timeless issues. This might refer to issues we see as contemporary but which in principle are quite timeless:  abortion (women’s rights, or deeper yet, intervention in the lives of people by one group over another), political infidelity (it’s really no worse today than before, but merely seems so by virtue of our connectivity), the war in Iraq/Afghanistan (war in general, why we go to war – for money or for truly admirable causes – what war accomplishes, etc.), human trafficking (the depths of evil we’re capable of), etc.

Timeless themes. Love. Peace. Happiness. Conflict resolution. Etc.

Timeless elements. Beautiful word choices, description. A literary flow to the sentences. An honesty in the emotions displayed. Etc.

Thank you, K.B.  I must agree, though let me add that while certain elements will be in place, others will be lacking:  the often offensive elements of hard swearing, graphic sexuality, heavy gore. To me, the lack of those is as important as the presence of the others:  some folks just don’t like to read all that extra jazz.

Examples?  Well, there are those listed above.  Add to them the wonderful books by Louisa May Alcott (Little Women, Jo’s Boys, The Inheritance), L. M. Montgomery (the Anne-girl set, etal), generally anything pre-1950-ish.  Star Wars.  Star Trek.  And on and on.  In other words, books that are somewhat safe for most audiences, non-preachy (though they may contain a light reference to faith or something religious), where story reigns supreme – morality or “message” is but a thread in the entire garment, rather than a wide streak circling from front to back.

So, how does crossover differ from mainstream then?   In my eye, a mainstream book is at greater liberty to explore the darkest sides of humanity, while crossover will be somewhat limited in that regard.

I love reading crossover books, and my goal is to both write and seek to acquire strong compelling crossover books of merit through Port Yonder Press in the days ahead.

Favorite crossover books?

~Chila

Related posts in these new series:

WRITING MAINSTREAM / CROSSOVER AS A PERSON OF FAITH SERIES

CREATING THE BEST LITERATURE SERIES

DECIDING THE FATE OF A BOOK COVER (A story about Wendy: Bird Face)

It’s a marvelous little piece of fiction for pre-teen and young teen gals. Bullies. Friendship. Divorce. Puppies. Anorexia. True love. Suicide. Sisters. Alcoholism. It addresses it all in a realistic yet hopeful way.  The author is Cynthia T. Toney and here’s where we are on the book cover.

It started with the author’s rendition, her mental picture of what the cover could include.

From there, the author and I fed input to our wonderful designer Anna O’Brien, and came up with a few preliminary concepts.  We tried to pinpoint what was working and what wasn’t in each new design.

Bird Face – sample 1

As you can see, we messed with font (original font not shown), font color, people, wording and word placement.  We had the main character with a puppy and without one (none without dog shown here). We had her dressed in various clothes. We widened her face and narrowed her face. We worked on shadows and shading.

We finally got to the place where we felt we needed a fresh look at backgrounds.  A good deal of the story takes place in a school, but we decided we didn’t need to limit the background to portray that.  In fact, the background began to feel somewhat cluttered.  Hence we came up with our final 3, which are shown below.  I’ll call them simply #1, #2, and #3.  Feel free to list your favorite in a comment and tell why you think it’s the best cover.  Click on the image to bring it up separately.

#1

#2

#3

I do realize a few may think something else might work even better.  But for the sake of time and cost, I think we’ll focus on the 3 current choices.  After all, the process could go on forever.

Bird Face. A wonderful and well-written tale about Wendy, a typical 13 year old with all the typical conflicts of a gal her age. You’ll also meet Jennifer and John Monster and a host of others that help (force?) Wendy grow into a more confident young lady.  This is a Port Yonder Press crossover book, suitable for most all ages. PG for thematic elements.

And you?  Which do you feel might be the best cover?  Why?

Thanks for your input!

~Chila

HOW TO WRITE A CLASSIC – Books That Stand the Test of Time

Classic books. You know one when you read it. But my list may be slightly (or very) different than yours, so what truly makes a classic?

One of my favorite quotes is by Edith Wharton,  Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist, short story writer, and designer.

A classic is classic not because it conforms to certain structural rules, or fits certain definitions (of which its author had quite probably never heard). It is classic because of a certain eternal and irrepressible freshness.

Isn’t that the truth?

How about these definitions?

Freshness – Edith mentioned it above – I see this as a unique and almost childlike vernality in a story, a poignant and unforgettable feeling I get on first read.  It’s a book that draws me in, not so much by virtue of the characters or plot, but by something unspoken, a light and airy originality, a youthful vigor that often belies the age of its author.  To me, that’s the strongest mark of a classic.

Wide appeal – Books that cross genres and age barriers, and oftentimes religious barriers.  I refer to them as “crossover” books.

One website listed these 4 aspects of a classic:

  • A classic usually expresses some artistic quality–an expression of life, truth, and beauty.
  • A classic stands the test of time. The work is usually considered to be a representation of the period in which it was written; and the work merits lasting recognition. In other words, if the book was published in the recent past, the work is not a classic.
  • A classic has a certain universal appeal. Great works of literature touch us to our very core beings–partly because they integrate themes that are understood by readers from a wide range of backgrounds and levels of experience. Themes of love, hate, death, life, and faith touch upon some of our most basic emotional responses. [mentioned above]
  • A classic makes connections. You can study a classic and discover influences from other writers and other great works of literature. Of course, this is partly related to the universal appeal of a classic. But, the classic also is informed by the history of ideas and literature–whether unconsciously or specifically worked into the plot of the text.

Wiki had this to say:

The ability of a classic book to be reinterpreted, to seemingly be renewed in the interests of generations of readers succeeding its creation, is a theme that is seen in the writings of literary critics including Michael Dirda, Saint-Beuve and Ezra Pound. …

In the 1980s Italo Calvino said in his essay “Why Read the Classics?” that “A classic is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say” and comes to the crux of personal choice in this matter when he says (italics in the original translation): “Your classic author is the one you cannot feel indifferent to, who helps you define yourself in relation to him, even in dispute with him.”

[And this by Chris Cox] … there are actually two kinds of “classic novels”: The first are those we know we should have read, but probably have not. These are generally the books that make us burn with shame when they come up in conversation…The second kind, meanwhile, are those books that we’ve read five times, can quote from on any occasion, and annoyingly push on to other people with the words: “You have to read this. It’s a classic.“

I wanna write a classic! But how?

Here are a couple of suggestions.  (Let me say here that I hope all our books are “intended” classics; heeding these suggestions may help.)

Write from the emotions (heart) first, the head later.

Lucy Maud Montgomery lamented in her autobiography that she felt “pressured” to write follow-up books to her beloved Anne of Green Gables.  Though the whole series has become somewhat of an icon – Mark Twain called Anne, “the dearest and most lovable child in fiction since the immortal Alice” - it’s the first book, Anne of Green Gables, that we remember best and love most.

Set aside everything you’ve learned about how to write.  Then write the thing that’s burning in your soul. Don’t worry about what someone might say, if it’ll fit into today’s publishing landscape, whether or not you really think it’ll ever be published.

Ever notice how true classics are often one-hit wonders (the first and only book an author ever penned) or first books?  Do the research – you’ll find it to be generally true.  Why would that be the case?  Because of just the thing we’re talking about – the freshness of raw emotion, the unstructured and unedited heart and soul of a person on the page.

Keep a firm grip on your individual voice, come hell or high-minded (heavy-handed?) editors.  Even in the small press world, an industry I’ve only been around for a few years, I’ve seen this happen.  I’ve seen books of relative verdure and inventiveness be turned into “just another book like all the others.”  Insist on your as-unique-as-your-fingerprints voice while allowing for obvious bloopers to be dealt with.  More on this another time.

Read the classics to catch the vernality (freshness) of their authors.  Allow that gentle originality to take root in your soul, and don’t ever  settle for penning “just another book.”

A few of my favorites?

A few that I find to be enduring, universal, fresh, rereadable:  the poetry of Emily Dickinson, the nonfiction of Annie Dillard, L. M. Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables, Lewis’ Narnia, and a few others including the spiritual works of Isobel Kuhn, especially By Searching, and Faith Awakened by publisher Grace Bridges (fairly recent, but the other points apply).  These are all books I’ve read and reread and read again.

How about you?  A couple of your all-time favorite classics?  Books you can read and reread, that have a freshness and originality about them, that appeal to a large readership, and that have stood the test of time?

Closing quotes:

“When you reread a classic, you do not see more in the book than you did before; you see more in you than there was before.” ~ Cliff Fadiman

“What makes a book great, a so-called classic, is its quality of always being modern, of its author, though he be long dead, continuing to speak to each new generation.” ~ Lawrence Clark Powell

“A classic is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say.”  ~ Italo Calvino

__

Ever in search of the next classic,

~ Chila