Guest Blog - Juice Your Muse: 10 Creativity Starters

Juice Your Muse: 10 Creativity Starters
By Maria Schneider
http://editorunleashed.com/
Click here

Whenever I interview writers, I ask them how they motivate themselves to write. The one response that comes up over and over again is this: Allow yourself to start by writing crap. Utterly inane nonsense. Pure drivel that no one (not even your mother) would ever want to read.

You can call it free-writing or whatever you like, but the mere process of allowing yourself to warm up your writing muscle by 15 minutes or so of writing without purpose clears the way for real writing.

So let yourself sit down with a cheapo blank notebook, or an open doc on your laptop, and just let ‘er rip.

And if you’re really feeling stuck, here are 10 ideas:
• What’s the best thing that happened to you yesterday? What’s the worst thing? Write it out in a non-precious, raw, emotive way.

• What was the food you most detested growing up? Beets? Lima beans, perhaps? Describe the taste, the texture and the smell and why, precisely, you hated it so much.

• If you’re sitting in a cafe or some other public place, make up some amusing, over-the-top dialogue you imagine happening between a couple sitting at another table.

• Get funny: Go to Flickr Creative Commons and search for the keyword “funny.” Pick a photo and write about the scene you imagine taking place.

• Or get dreamy: Go to Flickr Creative Commons and search for the keyword “beach.” Put yourself in the scene and write as you imagine it.

• Deconstruct (or poke fun at) the lyrics of a nostalgic song on your iPod. (Suggestion: “Someone left the cake out in the rain.”)

• Write about the one item you’d most like to find at a garage sale and why you want it.

• What’s bugging you today? Are there errands you’re putting off? Woke up with a bit of a backache? Go ahead and rant it out.

• Write about how much you don’t want to write.

• Now write about how you’re going to write anyway.

The crucial thing to remember when you’re doing a warm-up free-write is to give yourself permission to be illogical, zany, carefree, sarcastic, whiny—whatever it is you’re feeling that day. Go on, get it out so you can get some real writing done.

Q & A with...Writer Susan Shapiro

Q & A with...Writer Susan Shapiro
Interview conducted by Maria Schneider
http://editorunleashed.com
Click here

Susan Shapiro is a Manhattan journalism professor who has written for The New York Times, The Washington Post, L.A. Times, Newsweek, The Nation, Salon.com and The Daily Beast among others. She’s also the author of four memoirs including Only as Good as Your Word, Lighting Up, Secrets of a Fix-Up Fanatic and Five Men Who Broke My Heart.

She turned to fiction for her most recent book project. Here she shares the process of writing her first novel, Speed Shrinking.

You’ve just written a novel after being known primarily as a nonfiction writer. What made you decide to turn to fiction?

My 2004 memoir Lighting Up chronicled my therapy with a brilliant addiction specialist who helped me quit cigarettes, alcohol, dope, gum and bread—until the only thing I had left to quit was him. I started to write a sequel about how I was giving him up when he quit me by moving away.

I was devastated. I didn’t relapse on tobacco or drugs but as a “substance shuffler,” I became hooked on sugar (particularly cupcake icing) and feared I’d bloat up to a balloon. He charged $200 a session but the shrinks on my new insurance network were only $25 a pop. Desperate to find my head doctor’s clone fast, I decided to see 8 shrinks in 8 days—instead of speed dating, speed shrinking. That’s how I got my title “Speed Shrinking.”

I wrote the first draft as nonfiction. My editor thought it was well written and hilarious but said it wasn’t dramatic. Turned out there were several new food addiction books by authors who had gained or lost 150 pounds and I’d gained 12 pounds. Plus the shrink came to New York once a month when I’d see him which was annoying but not epic or heartbreaking enough to wrap a memoir around. A novelist friend suggested I put the characters on crack (metaphorically) and turn it to fiction, which I did.

Did you find the fiction writing process more or less difficult than nonfiction?

I didn’t really know how to write fiction. I have no imagination whatsoever according to a mentor. So I tricked myself by writing it first as nonfiction.
How does a writer decide whether to pursue a memoir-type story as fiction or nonfiction? Any guidelines?

I didn’t know whether to call my first book Five Men Who Broke My Heart a memoir or a novel since I’d made a few changes to the story. A brilliant Knopf editor friend told me “A novel that’s merely autobiographical is a great disappointment but a memoir that reads like a novel is a great surprise.” So I called Five Men a memoir and added the author’s note: “Names, dates and identifying characteristics have been obscured for literary cohesion, to protect privacy, and so my husband won’t divorce me.” Interestingly, I’m now working on the movie version which of course has to be fictionalized.

From a marketing perspective, do you anticipate having to find a new audience for your fiction or do you think your nonfiction readers will follow you over?

Speed Shrinking uses the same voice (though it’s in present tense.) It’s really a fictional sequel to Lighting Up so everyone who liked that book seems interested in seeing what happened to the shrink. I’m also trying to “play in Peoria” and hope it’ll reach a bigger audience.

What’s your advice to writers who are trying to get published in this difficult publishing environment?

Even in this economy I have students publishing in newspapers, magazines and getting book deals every day. There were more books published in 2008 than 2007, so there are still plenty of opportunities. Maybe the work just has to be even better.

My advice:

• Read what you want to write.
• Take classes with authors you admire
• Hire a great ghost editor (If you email me at: ProfSue123@aol.com, I can recommend excellent ones.)
• If you can’t afford classes or ghost editors, start your own writing workshop.
• Never give up. Keep writing. As my mentor Howard Fast (author of Spartacus and 80 other novels) used to tell me when I’d say I had writer’s block: “Plumbers don’t get plumbers block. A page a day is a book a year.”

Please visit Ms. Shapiro’s wonderful website:

http://www.susanshapiro.net/
Click here

Guest Blog: Authors on Twitter: Who’s getting it right?

Authors on Twitter: Who’s getting it right?
By Maria Schneider
http://editorunleashed.com
Click here

The writing community has frantically embraced Twitter within the past few months. And it’s been a delight to watch well-known authors find their voice in this new medium. With Twitter’s restriction to 140 characters, it’s surely proven challenging for authors who are used to writing in thousand-word increments to communicate with such intense brevity.

I’ve watched as NYT bestselling authors wonder in type why in the world they’re doing this and what they’re supposed to be writing about anyway. And I’ve also noticed quite a few hit their stride.

Recently, I asked this question on Twitter and on the forum:
Who are the authors that are getting social media right?

So in response to my question, here are five of the standout authors who seem to have found their voice on Twitter. They’re very different kinds of writers ranging from fantasy authors to narrative nonfiction to women’s fiction.

5 Writers Who Are Getting it Right

Neil Gaiman
@neilhimself
Sample Tweet: “That’s enough world for tonight. The me & @mgaiman late-night-while-working-on-the-sofa Buffython is paused. Now sleep & dreams & g’night.”

“Neil Gaiman uses his blog and twitter to communicate about his books, other writers, movies, and the world in a way that connects him not only to his fan base, but expands that base.” -Libby Nicole

James Rollins
@jamesrollins
Sample Tweet: “Busy few days. Preparing for documentary video shoot and preparing for the Jake Ransom tour. I have been writing of course!”

“Thriller writer/ fantasy writer James Rollins (aka Clemens) goes out of his way to be accessible to his fans through Twitter. Following him gives you a real sense of what it might be like to be a celebrity author. He takes his fans along for the ride.” -mariaschneider

Susan Orlean
@susanorlean
Sample Tweet: “First donkey sighted just miles from the Casablanca airport, under a billboard for a cellphone company.”

"Absolutely one of my favorite authors to follow on Twitter. Orlean writes literary nonfiction and she is drawn to eccentric stories, like her well-known book The Orchid Thief. She’s currently researching donkeys in a middle-eastern village. You get a real sense of her writing process from following her online and her she comes across as personable, entertaining and accessible, which I find inspiring from such a well-known author. Even though she’s never self-promotional, her social networking really makes me want to continue following her, and of course, buy her books."-mariaschneider

JA Konrath
@jakonrath
Sample Tweet: “I’d eat more vegetables if, instead of vitamins and minerals, they were filled with more essential compounds. Like caffeine and alcohol.”

“His blog tour put him on my radar and he left a breadcrumb trail back to his website. There, he had a free download of the first chapters of his new book. I read and was hooked. I bought a copy. And I was impressed. It was the first time I had bought a novel based on smart advertising. Konrath’s “Afraid” campaign is a template on how to use the internet to effectively promote fiction.” -Craven

Allison Winn Scotch
@aswinn
Sample Tweet: “BLOGGED: How much ownership should you feel over your novel’s film adaptation? Me? Mostly none. http://bit.ly/3GJh43.”

“I get a kick out of Allison Winn Scotch’s tweets. She doesn’t push a lot of writing sites or info, but she always has a fun energy that I like.” -Lisa

Be sure to follow these authors. There’s much to be learned about how authors can use these new social media tools to build and expand their readerships.

Guest Blog: Write it Forward

Write it Forward
By Maria Schneider
http://editorunleashed.com/
Click here

I have to admit I’m getting depressed with watching the publishing industry implode. Rampant layoffs, imprints closing, magazines folding, it’s almost too much to bear.

Seeking some good news, Nathan Bransford has really been inspiring me lately, especially with the positivity week on his blog. I love that he’s not giving in to all of the doomsday talk surrounding publishing. Instead he’s using his platform as an agent to uplift writers. Read his last week’s worth of posts if you haven’t already.

So Nathan’s blog inspired me to think about what I could do to help the cause of not giving in to the publishing industry depression.

In that spirit I’d like to offer a few suggestions for how we can help other writers out through these difficult times.

Here are 10 ideas for how to inject a little positivity and help uplift the writing world. All of these things will cost you nothing but a bit of your time.

10 ways you can Write it Forward:

1. Offer to critique a writer’s work.

2. Visit writers’ blogs and leave supportive comments.

3. If you have a blog, mention other writers and link to their sites.

4. Write book reviews on your blog and link to the book on Amazon or Barnes & Noble.

5. If you Twitter, link to an undiscovered writer’s site.

6. Get active on social bookmarking sites like StumbleUpon and submit your favorite writers’ blogs.

7. Be on the lookout for new writers at local bookstore readings and events.

8. When you find a new writer you enjoy, send them an e-mail and let them know you appreciate their work.

9. Join a writers’ board and answer questions for new writers who are just finding their way.

10.If you already have a platform, use it to help promote other writers.

You’ll be amazed at how meaningful any of these seemingly small gestures can be when it comes to helping out a writer.