From Daily Writing Tips:

Many quotations attributed to famous people are at best paraphrases — though often superior to the original. Others might be subtly altered in the retelling, sometimes with little impact on their effect, at other times irresponsibly changing the meaning.

Some of these might surprise you.

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Bad Dollar is a smashing new collection of short stories and a great idea:

We think there are far worse ways to spend a dollar than on a good ebook. Which is why we’re asking authors to write short stories about the terrible things that could happen if you spent your dollar less wisely.

Go take a look. You can even submit a story yourself.

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Chuck Wendig:

That’s the old piece of advice, isn’t it? “All you need to do is read and write to be a writer.” You don’t learn to write through reading anymore than you learn carpentry by sitting on a chair. You learn to write by writing. And, when you do read something, you learn from it by dissecting it — what is the author doing? How are characters and plot drawn together? You must read critically — that is the key.

Which is why I can never understand writers who say that they only read ‘for leisure’.

I have long resigned myself to the fact that I will never read another book without thinking, ‘How did they do that? And, for that matter, why?’ Critiquing other people’s work is not just a writer’s privilege, it’s a fundamental part of what we do and who we are.

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Episode three of the new format Write for Your Life podcast is now available for your listening pleasure. In it I talk to, with and at my marvellous co-host Myke about writing and sacrifice. We refer to the post I published here on the blog this week and also cover topics including Elton John and special hats. Go listen now.

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I believe that at some point, if you’re to write that great novel or complete your half-finished manuscript, you will have to make some sort of significant sacrifice. You will have to make writing your number one priority.

And that’s not easy to do. Life is a funny old thing. It presents all manner of opportunities, but the more you get, the less able you are to make the most of them. If you take on too much, no single thing will get your full attention, which means that you will either never a) do yourself justice, or b) complete anything.

Start saying no

The solution is sacrifice. You have to start saying no to things that you really might not want to say no to, and sometimes that means making difficult decisions. Before I give you some examples from my own writing experience, I should try and explain what I mean by sacrifice.

It is simply, in this context, a period of time where you put elements of your personal and creative life to one side so that you can work intensively on one project. Your primary project. The project that really matters.

To return to my first sentence, I think this is how great work is generally done. Rarely does eternal multitasking lead to a writer’s best material.

I’ve always had various projects on the go, but whenever it’s come to the crunch, I’ve put everything to one side and focused on the one thing that means by far the most to me: my novel. It is, so far, my life’s work. I’ve never thought about it like that until writing that sentence. But it’s true.

‘Just a simple word’

A is for Angelica took me several years to write and no small amount of sacrifice. Since starting work on it with the simple line, ‘Benny paints pictures with his eyes closed,’ I have, in no particular order:

• fallen in love
• moved house five times
• become an uncle (twice)
• started Write for Your Life
• attended at least 10 weddings
• hosted a successful spoken word night
• lost my auntie and two grandparents
• got married
• gained a Masters (for Angelica)
• got an agent (also for Angelica)
• owned a cat (was owned by)
• started a podcast
• had two jobs
• lots of other things too.

You’ll notice that some of those are project-related and some are personal. That’s because, at various points over the years, I’ve sacrificed both for the sake of my novel. Sometimes I’ve had to hit a deadline. Sometimes I’ve simply decided that enough is enough. I’ve needed to focus. Something has had to give.

Some examples

• My Masters cost a fortune. While friends got jobs or, considerably better, travelled the world, I worked in a bar and learned everything I could about being a writer and what that means.

• Despite not being able to at all afford it, I took two months off work (unpaid) to try and get from 10,000 to 50,000 words. I barely reached half of that. A cruel, early lesson.

• I stopped doing something that I loved, Words Aloud, the spoken word night. We’re doing a one-off special this year and I miss it terribly. But it had to go.

• For weeks on end and on numerous occasions, I worked during the day at my job and then wrote at night until the early hours. I had an understanding girlfriend. She is now my wife.

• I stopped posting to Write for Your Life for a few months. Not that big a deal, I guess, but it was when the site was starting to take off. I knew it was taking up too much of my time and energy. I do things differently now.

• In a total panic about a deadline, I didn’t go to my best friend’s 30th birthday party. I regret it deeply, even though it didn’t affect our relationship. It was the wrong decision, but it was still a sacrifice. I hit my deadline.

• When my dear auntie was dying from a brain tumour, I somehow found a way to get my manuscript edited and returned to my agent (who couldn’t have been more understanding). It didn’t feel like a sacrifice. It was probably cathartic.

If you’re going to do it, do it properly

The point is this.

In every case listed, I made the sacrifice because somewhere deep in my heart, I’ve always wanted to write a novel and get it published.

I’ve always weighed up the options and come to the conclusion that, at that particular moment, if I was to go on and write the best novel I could possibly write – If I was to give myself a fighting chance in an increasingly difficult industry – I had to do it properly.

It had to be my everything. My one and only.

Sacrifice seems like such an awful word for me to use when talking about writing. But it doesn’t have to be. If you have the support of friends and family, they will give you the space and understanding you need. And as for other projects, well, they are other projects. Almost anything can wait.

Because in the words of Patrick Rhone, an internet friend of mine, saying no to one thing is saying yes to something else. All I ask is that you think about your writing and how much it means to you.

Then give it everything you’ve got. Be prepared to sacrifice.

A bizarre but intriguing project that publishes:

Images created using law enforcement composite sketch software and descriptions of literary characters.

My immediate reaction was, ‘I wonder what my characters would look like.’ Then I realised, ‘Oh yes, I made them up, therefore I should probably already know.

(via The Guardian)

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Valerie Douglas guest posting on Emily Chand’s site, Novel Publicity:

There are people out there more than willing to prey on our hopes and dreams, and many authors will pay almost anything to realize those dreams. I know one writer who put thousands of dollars of his own money into a print version of his books. I don’t know how many are still in boxes. Print books are much more difficult to sell. Getting bookstores to take a chance on giving precious shelf space to an unknown, independent writer is difficult. So many authors do that and their garages are filled with broken dreams. Many walk away, their hopes dashed.

And:

That’s not to say that the traditional way is wrong, but unless what a publisher offers you makes your life easier, what do you need a middleman for?

The thing about self-publishing is that it gives writers options. If you want your book out quickly, or if you think you’ll make more money without a publisher, then you know that, with an awful lot of hard work, you might be able to make it happen.

My only advice is to really think about your book, including who it is for and what you want to happen to it. Consider all of your options.

That middleman (or woman, of course) that Valerie refers to could be the person who transforms your good novel into a great one. They could be the one who gets you on national radio instead of just some friendly blogger’s podcast.

Don’t believe the myth that publishers and agents do nothing. It’s nonsense.

I’ll say it again, consider all of your options. Then whatever you decide, do it with gusto, determination and only after carrying out some solid research. Which is what Valerie’s article is really all about. Being mindful about your work and what you do with it.

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From a great interview with Hugh McGuire, one of the chaps behind PressBooks, which I’ve taken a look at and looks fantastic:

Mainly: PressBooks makes it easy to make beautiful books in multiple formats, from one “source file” … online. I think it will solve some other problems, such as collaborating on a book. But, generally we believe it should be as easy for writers and publishers to make and distribute a beautiful book (ebook or print) as it is for them to make a beautiful website. We are replicating for books the model of the web (and WordPress in particular), which is: “build on a solid, structured framework, and apply different styling (Themes & CSS)”. We see no reason this model (content + structure + presentation) should not be applied to books as well.

I’ve got a few ebook ideas boiling in my word pot at the moment. I know that when the time comes, I’ll be using PressBooks to get the thing together. This interview is both a good overview and a chance to hear about the thinking behind the project.

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A nice collection of writing/publishing people and organisations who are using Tumblr. Mine didn’t make the list (a travesty), but you can still follow me on my rather daftly (not deftly) titled blog, Broomeshtick.

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So you know how the new Write for Your Life podcast episodes are of a substantial length? And that because of this, you’ve been worried that you’ll never get to hear one of my shorter, slightly sillier aural extravaganzas ever again?

Well fear not, dear reader/listener, for I have rebooted my Audioboo account and will be posting near-daily audio treats from now on. It’s a great way for you to a) get bite-size writing-related thoughts and tips, and b) listen to more of my nonsense. A Write for Your Life podcast Lite, if you will.

Go there now, subscribe and make me happy.

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I’ve been thinking about blogging recently. How others do it. The things I’ve learned.

Writers create, write and keep up blogs for a number of reasons. Many do it to help promote their work or to build an audience while they’re working on a novel, play, magazine or whatever. Some do it for money, others do it for the sheer heck of it.

For me, Write for Your Life is a place to reflect on and think about the challenges I’ve faced (and continue to face) as a writer. It’s not about saying, ‘Ooh, look at me, aren’t I special.’ It’s about sharing and caring. ‘This is my experience. This is how it affected me.’

I say this because, in this day and age, it’s extremely easy to start a blog and dish out advice without ever pausing for thought. In the endless hunt for comments and pageviews, too much opinion and personal experience gets passed off as fact, when actually, us writers are in a very subjective business. There are few certainties and plenty of options.

I didn’t (really) make any blog-related resolutions for the year, but I have reaffirmed a few personal guidelines:

Write from experience.

Tell the truth.

Be helpful.

Enjoy it.

And finally, when there is something to sell or promote, which inevitably there will be, I’ll aim to do so with thought, discretion and infinite politeness.

Episode two of the all-new Write for Your Life podcast is available to download and listen to right now.

Finally, I get the chance to talk about one of my favourite writerly topics – plain English. And for all you creative writers, don’t think it won’t be useful for you too. Learning plain English transformed my fiction just as much as my copy. Enjoy. Feedback welcome, as always.

This week’s episode is sponsored by Phraseology, a rather splendid iPad app for writers of all shapes and sizes.

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David Tate writing at Certain Extent:

If the world overwhelms you with its constant production of useless crap which you filter more and more to things that only interest you can I calmly suggest that you just create things that you like and cut out the rest of the world as a middle-man to your happiness?

I think most of us who have made the web an integral part of our everyday lives can at times feel overwhelmed by the constant input of information. I’ve often looked at the clock in the corner of my screen and wondered where the heck the previous 60 minutes have gone.

I first read and enjoyed this article before I had my temporary internet hiatus last week when I moved house. It seems that every time I have an enforced break from the internet I realise that a) the world does not end, and b) it’s good to monitor the balance between taking stuff in and pumping stuff out.

Because in a straight fight, consuming never feels anywhere near as good and as satisfying as creating.

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Last week I told you about the exciting news that the Write for Your Life podcast is now part of the 70Decibels network. I’ve since created a special page for the podcast that gives you more information and points you in the right direction for getting all past and future episodes.

Anyway, enough of that, because I have some marvellous news to share with you. Over the last few days, as a result of the big switch, the podcast has been featured in the iTunes store under ‘New & Noteworthy’. It’s also reached the dizzy heights of number three in the ‘Arts’ chart, battling it out with the Archers Omnibus. Imagine!

So yes, if you haven’t already, now would be a great time to check out the podcast and subscribe for free. If you like reading this site, I think you’ll enjoy its audio sidekick.

Thanks as always for your support. It’s appreciated.

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It’s all change here at Write for Your Life as I bring you some exciting news. As of now the Write for Your Life podcast is part of the marvellous 70Decibels network. I’ll explain in more detail when I’m not moving house and trying to blog from a mobile phone, but essentially, joining 70Decibels means:

• weekly shows or your money back
• a whole new audience for both parties
• lots of exciting writerly discussion

I’ll still tell you about new episodes right here on the blog, but to listen and subscribe you’ll need to head over to the 70Decibels site. In fact, you can listen to the very first show in this new season right now. Well, go on. Get cracking!

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Nicola Morgan is the author of around ninety books for all ages, fiction and non-fiction. To writers she is known for the no-nonsense expert advice in her blog, Help! I Need a Publisher! and her highly acclaimed book for writers, Write to be Published, as well as Tweet Right – The Sensible Person’s Guide to Twitter.

Nicolas’s latest book, Write a Great Synopsis (WAGS), tackles one of many writers’ most feared foes, the dreaded synopsis. I kicked off the questions as follows.

I found writing a novel terribly unpleasant at times. Then when I’d finished came the most unpleasant experience of the lot – writing the synopsis. I hated it and I know that I’m not alone. Why does the humble synopsis cause us writers so much distress?

No, you’re not at all alone. I’m one of the few writers I’ve come across who never feared them. Anyway, to answer the question: I think there are three main reasons. First, there are a lot of apparently conflicting messages about how to do them or even what they are, so writers go into them never sure whether they are doing it right. And that’s very stressful, like doing something blind. And second, most writers don’t fully grasp WHY they have to write a synopsis. If they remember that the reason is to show the agent (or whoever) that the story works well and what sort of a story it is, that makes the whole task simpler. Third, we are too close to our book. We care too much. Sometimes I think a reader will find it easier to write a synopsis than a writer. (Until the writer reads WAGS!)

I think my fear was less of the synopsis itself, but of messing up my chances on something so… well… something that isn’t the actual thing – the real writing. How much does a synopsis really matter?

Ah, I’m glad you asked me that! The very good news is that it is easily the least important part of the whole submission. It is very unlikely to lose you a deal if your synopsis isn’t as brilliant as it could be. On the other hand (and this isn’t bad news, not really), if you are a writer, ALL of your writing is important. You want it to be as good as you can make it, which is I think what you are meaning. But I think it’s important to realise that it is only going to lose you a deal if it’s really bad and if your actual sample chapters also aren’t cracking. Is that more reassuring?

It is reassuring, but putting that into practice might be more difficult. I am Captain Pernickety and do like everything to be nice and, you know, perfect. But anyway. I know that you are right. Are these the kind of problems that made you want to write a book on synopses in the first place?

Captain Pernickety is good, up to a point. Captain Over-Analysing is not because he is married to General Procrastination and together they produce Major Paralysis. Anyway, yes, that’s pretty much why I wrote the book. To be honest, I never had a problem with synopses myself (sorry) but it became more and more apparent that many writers do and when I see a problem I like to don a cape and swoosh in to fix it. So, I swooshed.

You say that part of the reason a synopsis can be daunting is because of conflicting information. Where does that conflict usually come from and is there such a thing as the right way to do it?

Conflicting only in the sense that it comes from different sources and is often not talking about the same things. As I say in WAGS, there are several different types of synopsis for different occasions, and what’s right for one occasion is not for another. But the one that we are bothered about is the one that an agent or publisher wants before deciding whether to take the book. And then the right way to do it is the way that a) follows any specific requests of that agent, for example about length, and b) shows that your book works and what sort of book it is.

That’s the one rule I’ve always told people when I’ve been asked: do as you’re told. Would you say that’s good advice? And if so, is it always good advice?

Not always, no! When it’s part of submission guidelines – in other words, the agent or publisher has said “This is what we want you to do,” – then yes, you must do it. They know what they want and there’s every reason to give it to them. But if it’s something like me or someone else saying “you shouldn’t mention the subplot” or “you shouldn’t use unanswered questions”, no: IF you genuinely feel, after reading all the advice and UNDERSTANDING the reasons for it, that your book actually suits a slightly different way, do it your way. Rules can always be broken WHEN you know what they are and what they are there for; and when you are so confident about it that you know that your reason for breaking the rule is stronger than the rule’s reason for existing, break it.

I did mean do what you’re told if you’re following submission guidelines, and I totally agree that it’s all about understanding the rules and what they mean before making a decision. Finally, WAGS is the third book you’ve published via your own means – how’s it all going and will there be more?

It’s going well, thank you, especially the non-fiction titles, because the particular market is not hard to find. So, yes to more! Next in the pipeline are (not necessarily in this order) Dear Agent (the dreaded covering letter), How To Promote Your Book Without Bugging the Pants Off People, and something about writing a non-fiction proposal. Now I just need to write them! But I’m also supposed to be writing some fiction, hoping for “normal” publication, so I need to get going on that, too. And I want to. Fiction is where my heart is; non-fiction is where my head is.

Thanks so much for your questions, Iain. It’s been fun batting them back and forth one by one! Good luck to all your readers and remember: Don’t panic – it’s just a synopsis!

Write a Great Synopsis by Nicola Morgan covers: the function of a synopsis, differences between outlines and synopses, different requirements for different agents and publishers, finding the heart of your book, how to tackle non-linear plots, multiples themes, sub-plots and long novels, and it answers all the questions and confusions that writers have. Nicola also introduces readers to her useful Crappy Memory Tool, explains the art of crafting a 25-word pitch, and demonstrates with real examples. Gold-dust for writers at all stages.

The marvellous Nick Cernis at Modern Nerd:

Printers jam. Printers clog. Printers demand that you curse them in ever-creative ways in order to function. Printers run out of photo magenta even when you’re printing in grayscale. Printers are not generally well-liked.

I hate printers, but I love Nick’s writing so you should go now and read this, his anti-ode to the humble and generally useless home printer. If you’re a writer and you don’t hate your printer, you’re probably not a writer. Or something like that.

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Veronica Roth outlines the publishing process step-by-step and gives a much-deserved nod to the people that make it happen:

I think it’s important to put aside a somewhat romanticized view of book writing in which it’s just the author and the pages and sometimes the editor. And the reason I think it’s important is that there are so many people involved in this process – people who work so hard, and who are really indispensable.

It’s a fascinating and concise insight, especially if you’ve no idea how it all works. The thing I’d like to add to the paragraph quoted above is that yes, all those people do work very hard, but they are also very professional. They know exactly what they’re doing. And we know how important that is.

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From Tumblemoose:

I tend to be more forgiving to the average person screwing up a loose/lose proposition. Writers, however, do not get a free pass on this one. It’s like an accountant not knowing the difference between subtraction and division. It’s like a pilot not knowing the landing gear should be down for landing. And while the consequences of poor grammar cannot be equated to a pile of aluminum on the runway, in terms of professionalism and advancing a writing career the implications are the same.

The odd typo can be forgiven when you’re putting together a tweet or blog post. We’re all human and some of us have fat fingers. What? It’s true. No matter, George is spot on here. You can’t go around calling yourself a writer if you repeatedly make very simple mistakes.

You know what they say: make one mistake and you might have fat fingers, make it again and you’re probably just not very good at writing.

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I’ve just spent the last hour or so transferring all the bits and pieces of my second novel into Scrivener, the popular writing app for Mac and Windows.

This is not my first time using Scrivener. After hearing lots of great things, I first gave it a try early last year. In the end, I felt that using one app to do all of my writing didn’t quite fit with how I work. It seemed too restrictive

I like to make notes on the go with Simplenote and have it sync to all of my devices (laptop, iPad and iPhone). I also like the simplicity of using plain text files in apps like TextEdit or iA Writer, again with documents synced to all of my devices via Dropbox. For me, flexibility is really important.

Scrivener seemed fantastic for those who write in the same place and on the same computer, but not for someone who likes to move around a bit more. I now know that I was wrong, and that with a little setting up, Scrivener can be used alongside any text editor and in any location.

Using Scrivener with any text editor

At its heart, Scrivener is a word processor. It provides a blank page for writing on. But it has many other features too, which although very handy for some writers and might see them use Scrivener for every element of their writing, for me they can occasionally get in the way.

That’s why I wanted to find a way to separate the two elements of my work. I wanted a way to organise my novel, make notes and store research in Scrivener, but be able to use another writing app to do the actual writing.

This is completely possible. Scrivener has a fantastic sync feature, which I discovered via Dave Caolo’s excellent instructions on how to set up Scrivener to work with the iPad app, PlainText.

It works by taking your one giant .scriv file and separating all your Scrivener documents into separate files in a folder called ‘draft’. To set that up, your first task is to choose where on your hard drive you’d like that folder to go.

Use the menu as follows:

File > Sync > with External Folder

From there, you’ll see a dialog box and the option to choose a ‘Shared folder’. Do exactly that, making sure that you’ve got the option to ‘Sync the contents of the Draft folder’ selected. Once you’ve chosen your folder, hit ‘Sync’ and you should end up with a ‘draft’ folder full of text files in Rich Text Format (.rtf).

You should now be able to open and edit those files in any text editor on your computer, from Microsoft Word to Notepad on a Windows PC, Pages to Byword on a Mac.

However, note that when you next open Scrivener, your work will not sync automatically. To make sure that you’re working on the latest versions of your documents, you’ll need to repeat the process described above.

Head to:

File > Sync > with External Folder.

Hit ‘Sync’ again and all should be well.

Go mobile with Scrivener and Dropbox

You know all about Dropbox by now, right?

If not you should rectify that situation immediately. It’s a brilliant tool for any writer who wants to have their work available wherever they are across different computers and devices.

Dropbox works by creating a folder on your computer that syncs with the cloud. Because it’s so good, many other apps have implemented a ‘sync with Dropbox’ function to allow users to sync data between their desktop and mobile devices. And that’s exactly how you can use it to go mobile with Scrivener.

Essentially, you need to follow the same process as before. However, there are two very important differences.

First, instead of choosing to create your ‘draft’ folder in any old place on your hard drive, you need to put it somewhere within your Dropbox directory. Second, you should change the format of your synced files from .rtf to plain text (.txt), as it’s the simplest, most universal format and what most mobile apps use.

You can change to .txt from the same dialog box as before. It’s at the bottom under the ‘Format’ heading and ‘Format for external Draft files’. Choose the Plain Text (TXT) option and again, hit ‘Sync’.

This time you ‘draft’ folder’s contents will be synced to the cloud via Dropbox and the files will be in Plain Text format. All you need to do now is find a text editor on whatever mobile device or tablet that you happen to own that allows you to sync files with Dropbox.

My particular favourite is PlainText, which I use on both my iPhone and iPad. It works seamlessly and allows me to open, edit and save my Scrivener documents without any trouble at all. It’s like magic.

How I’ll work in the future

Using the methods described above, I intend to use Scrivener as the place where I organise my novel. I’ll keep everything in there and I’ll never have to spend hours trawling through Word documents again. It will be the font of all knowledge.

But I will also use other text editors when it comes to the writing itself, which means I will hopefully avoid the temptation to tinker with Scrivener’s many settings and lose myself in research when I should be writing. Best of all, I’ll be able to make notes and continue working when I’m not at my laptop.

I’m really impressed with what Scrivener can do and now I’ve found its capacity to sync and be mobile, it may well become my very best writing friend.