Tuesdays with Story

Writer’s Mail
Tuesdays with Story
June 15, 2016

The first word . . .

“I like thinking when I write. I just like having a headache, I guess.” – Sierra Jones, a reporter for the student newspaper at Janesville’s Franklin Middle School, in a story headlined Read (and write) all about it, Janesville (WI) Gazette, June 8, 2016

Who’s up next . . .

June 21: Mike Austin (chapter 4, Before I Leave), Millie Mader (poem), Hannah Marshall (poems), Amit Trivedi (chapter, novel), Judith McNeil (short story, part 2, “Just Visiting”), Nora O’Reilly (chapter 2, Bill McCormick’s Bliss), and Jerry Peterson (short story, “Take My Hand”).

June 28:

July 5: Pat Edwards (???), Randy Slagel (part 2, “Watered-Down Witch”), Amber Boudreau (chapter 3, The Dragoneer), Kashmira Sheth (YA novel, chapters, Journey to Swaraj), John Schneller (chapter 2, Final Stronghold), and Bob Kralapp (short story, part 2, “Wings”).

It happened Tuesday evening, last week . . .

Fourteen first-and-third writers gathered around the tables at B&N Westside. Here’s who was up and the critiques their work received:

– Lisa McDougal (chapter 1 rewrite, Tebow Family Secret) . . . This was a re-write. Pat, Judith, and Millie thought it was an improvement over the original. Jerry thinks Ahna still is not likeable. Hannah found the chapter had a lot of intrigue and suggested removing Ahna’s name from the memory in the opening. John thought Ahna needed a bigger reaction to finding out some shocking news about her past.

– Pat Edwards (poem, The Town of Paradise) . . .

– Eva Mays (summary and chapter 1 rewrite, Dhuoda) . . . Reception of my rewritten first chapter of “Dhuoda” was generally positive. Jerry liked the use of the word “quirk” as a verb. Helpful suggestions included making Adelaide’s personality more consistent and developing  a genealogy chart to help readers determine the often complicated familial relationships between the characters.

– Amber Boudreau (chapter 2, The Dragoneer) . . . Pat thought Amber could find a better word than ‘molasses’ to describe the main character’s slow movements. Lisa and a few others were concerned about the parenthetical statement at the beginning of the chapter. As it is a statement on behalf of the narrator, Amber suggested turning it into a footnote, but Amit suggested another reasonable work around. Pat liked it that the woods were more malevolent. Jerry commented that the wyvern had a new talent. Hannah wanted the protagonist to be more concerned with why the dragon was talking to her. And Millie spoiled the entire book for everyone who hadn’t read it before.

– Kashmira Sheth (chapters 18-19, Journey to Swaraj) . . . Kashmira submitted chapters from her novel Journey to Swaraj. The overall feedback was positive. Jerry asked if the story was ending soon as he felt that the climax was there. Others had suggestions regarding using fresher imagery and also adding a scene. Someone also reminded Kashmira to be mindful of passive sentences. Kashmira will submit the last few chapters of the story for the July 5th meeting.

– Nora O’Reilly (synopsis and chapter 1, Bill McCormick’s Bliss) . . . Members agreed that there is a disconnect between the characters presented in the synopsis and the first chapter. I wrote the synopsis more for me than for a publisher but I will keep these thoughts in mind for future synopsis revisions. Jerry would like me to get Bill off to Madison by Ch. 2. Overall I see his point but I’m torn. I think overall people liked my characters. Jerry also made mention that he felt my initial voice was more feminine but settles in to a more masculine tone as the novel progresses. Another group sentiment was that Joel needs a bigger reason to return to Madison. My thoughts were that somehow he needs Bill to sign some papers that would allow him money put away by their parents?? I need to let things percolate before I come up with some concrete revisions taking these suggestions into account.

– Bob Kralapp (short story, part 1 rewrite, “Wings”) . . . Pat and Jerry both liked the new material in the rewrite. Judith wasn’t clear about the connection between Eddie seeing people in the trees and William Blake.

– John Schneller (chapter 1, Final Stronghold) . . .

We have an editor . . .

Got something great about writing, books, or the publishing biz that you’d like to share with our colleagues in our e-newsletter, Writers Mail? Send it to our editor for June, Nora O’Reilly.

Fifth Tuesday . . .

The challenge stories from our May Fifth Tuesday are now up on Yahoo group.

Our next Fifth Tuesday is August 30. First-and-third will host. Here are the first details:
– Place: Nora O’Reilly’s backyard. Nora lives in Mt. Horeb at 920 Vista Ridge Drive.
– Food plan: This is a cookout and potluck. Bring whatever you want to put on the grill plus a dish to pass. And, yes, be sure to put some great food in the dish.

The changing world of books . . .

James Patterson calls them book shots – very short novels, thrillers of 125 to 150 pages in length that will sell for $4.99 in stores. He and his cadre of co-writers propose to bring out 117 over the next several years.

His publisher, Little Brown, will issue two books a month. Patterson would like that to be more, but . . .

Cross Kill, a super-short Alex Cross thriller, is the first out, with a press run of 500,000 copies, the book released on June 7. You can get it from Amazon as a Kindle book for $3.99 or as a paperback for $3.98.

Book shots are short, plot-driven novels aimed at an audience accustomed to doing their reading on smartphones.

But you can also get them as real books – paperbacks. They will be in airports, drugstores, and big-box stores like Walmart and Costco, the books “sometimes affixed to clip strips like bags of gummy bears”, wrote one reporter.

“People want things faster. They want to binge. These books are like reading movies.”

Patterson says they are thrillers without the filler. “In an awful lot of novels, there’s more in them than there should be.”

The sentences in Patterson’s book shots will be simple and declarative, and many will double as paragraphs.

Says Patterson, “Every single chapter is conceived to move the plot and the characterization forward and to turn on the movie projectors in our heads.”