Pen and Ink Confessions

Some links that have come up over the past few days…

Writing and $$$
Lynn Viehl: The Reality of a New York Times Bestseller
Tobias Buckell: First Novel Advances
Kimberly Pauley: A Challenge for My Fellow Authors (more royalty/sales information)

Realms of Fantasy Follow-up
Catherine Valente, Sarah Monette, Kat Howard, Tansy Rayner Roberts, and Barbarienne weigh in on the All-Women themed issue.
Why Film Schools Teach Screenwriters Not to Pass the Bechdel Test
I Didn’t Dream of Dragons: Fallacies of “write what you know” in terms of race, culture, and privilege.  This was powerful.  My thanks to Rose Fox for pointing me toward it.
ETA: Also, updates from Doug Cohen (addressing criticism of his word choice in the original announcement) and copperwise (Artist’s Gallery columnist for Realms, who first pitched the idea for an article about the evolution of feminine images in fantasy art, which I love).

Just for Laughs
The Eye of Argon: MST3K Version: Exactly what it sounds like.  Because I laugh every time I read it.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

Hey all. So I've mentioned the YARebels once or twice, but it's a vlogging group I'm a part of, along with six other lovely writers, and we kick off this week. Each week we cover a different topic, and we each post on a separate day. I'm Wednesday, and so today's my first video!

I'd REALLY love it if you'd take a look, come by, say hi, whatever you have time to do! Look, I even put it right here, so all you have to do is click the play button!



And did I mention that wonderful author Daisy Whitney AND the incredible Catt, from The Dreamer Reader blog (this one goes up later) BOTH did video responses? Did I mention how much that makes my day/night/week?? Because it DOES.


The YARebels can be found:
on Youtube - http://www.youtube.com/user/YARebels
on Twitter - http://www.twitter.com/YARebels
on Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/yarebels

Realms of Fantasy is doing a “Women in Fantasy” issue.  For this issue, they’ll only be accepting stories by female authors.

I’ve got a number of opinions on this, but for once I’m going to keep those to myself, at least to start with.

A deliberate women-only issue of Realms.  What do you think?

PS, That’s right, I can write short blog posts!
PPS, Do read the Realms post for further details from Douglas Cohen.
ETA: PPPS, Per an e-mail from Douglas, they have no intention of rejecting good stories just because they’re written by men.  “If I like it (and more importantly, if Shawna likes it), there’s no reason we can’t use it for a different issue.”

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

It's finally out!!!

You guys. This book. is. AMAZING.



You should know I'm a hard sell when it comes to realism. I like escapism, I like fantastical elements, I like magical realism and mystery and dreamlike worlds.

But wow. This book. Go get it. Here, I'll even give you a link:

BUY THIS BOOK ON AMAZON.

Here's my review:

Some Girls Are, like Courtney Summers' first, but to an even greater degree, was brimming with awesome. But what makes it so special, such an incredible, can't-put-down book, is the intense contradiction woven throughout. It's at once brutal and uncomfortable and captivating and addictive and impeccably written. I was never comfortable or at ease while reading, because the whole time I cared so deeply about the balance, or lack of it, in the characters' lives. Summers' characters walk tight ropes as...more This book, like Courtney Summers' first, but to an even greater degree, was brimming with awesome. But what makes it so special, such an incredible, can't-put-down book, is the intense contradiction woven throughout. It's at once brutal and uncomfortable and captivating and addictive and impeccably written. I was never comfortable or at ease while reading, because the whole time I cared so deeply about the balance, or lack of it, in the characters' lives. Summers' characters walk tight ropes as she balances their lives so precariously, and then does everything in her power to shake the ropes beneath their feet. I held my breath for most of this book.


Courtney Summers has being getting some fabulous nods from her first book, Cracked Up to Be, and the reviews for Some Girls Are have been wonderful, too. This really is an author to read, to get to know, because she's going to be around a long time. At 23, she's already leaving an indelible impression on YA realism.

Happy Book Birthday, Courtney. You earned every star and every word of praise and every ~*~.

If you'd like to win a signed ARC of Angie Frazier's EVERLASTING as badly as I would, then follow this link and enter http://angie-frazier.livejournal.com/71511.html  (Maybe she'll give away two and we'll both win!)

This is the third year I’ve posted about the income I make as a fantasy author.  (See the Money Posts from Year 1 and Year 2.)  Money tends to be a taboo topic, but given all of the myths and illusions about writing, I think it’s important to get some actual data out there.  Because knowing is half the battle!

The background: I’ve been writing and submitting my work since 1995.  Goblin Quest was my first book with a major publisher, and came out in the end of 2006.  2009 saw the publication of my 4th and 5th novels with DAW.  So while I have five books in print, I’m still an early-career author.

I am not a full-time writer, for reasons which will soon become apparent.  I also write only fiction, unlike a number of authors I know who write both fiction and non-fiction (in part because the latter usually pays better).

Thanks to a last-minute D&A (delivery and acceptance) check from DAW, my writing income for 2009 came to $28,940.

Breaking that total down, I earned:

Novels (U.S. Sales): $7700
Novels (Foreign Sales): $20,200
Short Fiction: $520
Speaking Fees: $500

I’m rounding, so the totals don’t match exactly.  The most important thing I take from these numbers is how much I love my agent, who is responsible for those foreign sales.  Most of that money comes from Germany, where the goblin books continue to earn nice royalties.  Any time I hear a writer saying s/he doesn’t need an agent, I think back to those foreign sales.  My agent almost quadrupled my writing income this year.  He’s more than earned his commission.

Expenses from 2009 were between $1500 and $2000.  The biggest costs were from convention attendance and postage.

I also decided to put together a graph showing my income over the past eight years (as far back as I have spreadsheets for):

Things didn’t really start to build until 2006 when the first book came out.  But what’s most fascinating to me is that bump in 2008.  2008 was the first year my writing income exceeded the income from my day job. This was mostly the result of some very nice deals in Germany, including the release of the goblin books, my short fiction collection, audio books … basically, Germany + Goblins = Love.

This wasn’t something I expected to repeat in 2009 (not that I would have complained, mind you). Fiction income isn’t the most steady or stable in the world.  2008 was great.  2009 wasn’t bad, don’t get me wrong.  However, there’s no getting around the fact that I saw a $25K drop in income.

These things happen.  My French publisher dropped me, and Germany hasn’t been as excited about the princess books.  This is why I keep the day job.  (If it was just me, with no family and no medical conditions that require insurance, I might think about going full-time.  But that’s another post.)

I hope this is helpful. Questions, observations, and random comments are all welcome.  And if previous years are any example, we should see a handful of other writers posting similar info and giving a few more data points.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

So the book giveaway ended up with 66 comments on LJ, 15 on Facebook, and 26 on the Wordpress blog.  I used a random number generator to pick three winners.  Congratulations to:

Heidi Santavuori
seldear
sweetlycorrupt

I’ll be getting in touch with the three of you about the details.  Thanks to everyone who entered!  (And for those who want to check out the books but don’t want to wait for my next giveaway, might I suggest putting in a request at the local library?)

Anyway, on to the movie chat.  Amy and I went out on a real, live date yesterday to see Sherlock Holmes.  (Pop quiz — is it a good idea or a bad idea to take your wife to a movie that has Jude Law and a topless Robert Downey Junior?)

My first complaint is that the whole thing is just a ripoff of House.  I mean, really.  Holmes is just House without the limp, and his sidekick Watson is totally Wilson.  Come on, they barely even changed the names!!!

Seriously, I enjoyed it.  Didn’t think it was the most brilliant film of the decade, but it was a fun romp.  I’m not an avid reader of Doyle, so I can’t say how true the film stayed to the book, but it worked for me.  I do wish we had seen a little more of Holmes’ deductions over the course of the movie instead of getting the whole thing explained in one lump at the end, but I understand why they decided to tell the story that way, trying to keep the audience in suspense.

My biggest complaint … involves spoilers.

( Read the rest of this entry » )

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

It’s my assumption that if an editor or agent is happy with a manuscript, except for one thread, then I should resist the urge to tinker with other parts of the story while revising that thread. To keep from getting sidetracked, I spent yesterday and this morning reading SK as quickly as possible. I highlighted and left Post-its where the problematic thread occurs. I plan on going back and making changes only in those spots--and then rereading at a slower pace. I feel like this method is working, but I’m curious if any of you have other techniques.

How do you attack focused revision? Any tricks or hints about doing it?

(Yeah, I did catch a couple of other things that need fixing, but I mostly stuck to my plan)

Some might remember, from long, long ago, when I was searching for an agent, and then an editor, that I decided to change REJECTION to MUNCHKIN. Because it amused me, and made me feel better, and it was fun to say. It dulled the pain.

Well.

I'm here to make a formal declaration.

EDITS are no longer EDITS.



EDITS have officially been renamed TENNIS.



That's right. EDIT is no longer a word to me. It is dead to me. TENNIS, that's okay.

Why?

Because if you ask me "How was the TENNIS today?" then it 1. doesn't sound as depressing, and 2. makes me sound quite athletic, because I get asked this question A LOT.

So, you heard it here. Feel free to use TENNIS as well, if you like. But if you come to me and ask me about EDITS, then I am afraid I will have no idea what you're talking about.

Hey, guys!

Did everyone have a happy New Year?!  I had all these wild plans of staying up late and ushering in 2010 with a bang...but fell asleep shortly after 10pm.  The good news is, this meant I was wide awake by 7am this morning, and made it to spinning at the gym.  Go me!  

So, good news.  Great news, really.  I found out today that HUSH, HUSH won a few awards in the Urban Fantasy Cover Art Awards, hosted by All Things Urban Fantasy, including:

*Best YA Cover
*Best Male Only Cover
*Most Unique Cover
*Best Debut Cover

YAY!!!  Thanks so much to everyone who voted - you guys know you're awesome, right?  Just in case you've forgotten, I'll say it once more.  YOU GUYS ROCK IT TO THE MAX!

If you want to see the results, they're posted HERE.  Lots of truly beautiful covers, including THE DARK DIVINE by breedespain and FRAGILE ETERNITY by melissa_writing 



According to All Things Urban Fantasy, there's going to be one more big showdown between all the winners in each category to claim the title of Cover of the Year.  Very cool.  The contest is open internationally, and everyone who votes will be entered to win a copy of the Cover of the Year 2009 book. 

Now you know I would never pressure/bribe/cajole anyone into voting for HUSH, HUSH, but if you wanna...

Here's the LINK. 


Hope everyone had a fab New Year!
Becca

 

 So I spent New Year’s Eve working on a brief synopsis of SAH. It went together quite nicely until I was almost to the end, then I hit a wall in the form of a flaw in the manuscript.  I had included a detail in my secondary character’s POV, but neglected it in the main character's—and both POVs needed to address the detail. Since the synopsis is only from the main character’s POV, the missing detail stood out like wart on a snake’s butt.

Definitely frustrating, but it did give me a shot of synopsis love. Better to find it and fix it now than miss it.

Here’s a link to my favorite how to post on synopsis writing. It’s the one I always end up falling back on. http://www.bethanderson-hotclue.com/workshops/writing-the-tight-synopsis/

This AWESOME picture is one of three done for me as a gift by the incredible Vania, (the others will find their way into future posts) and it's Lexi from The Near Witch!! And oh my, it is PERFECT. It's hard to see but she's wearing leather boots under her skirt, and those are soo perfect, too.

What a way to kick off the new year, and certainly give me a great much-needed edit boost.

So, it is indeed a new year. Let's usher it in right.

Before I forget, The Elevensies would like to wish everyone a wonderful New Year!

Personally, this year I want to be more present. I want to find balance, I want to be productive, driven. Sure I've got some concrete goals (finish two more novels, read 75 books, either go to grad school or move to NYC, etc) but most of all I just want be as present as possible. I want to live each day with my eyes open.

Whatever your goals, I hope that 2010 brings with it many wonderful surprises.

I know I said you wouldn't hear from me again until 2010, but this is too good not to share. Watch and enjoy. And see if you can spot me giving advice (which I used many times while writing HUSH, HUSH, ha!)

I just realized it's been over 2 weeks since I posted.  Nice.  I'm really on top of things here.  If it's any consolation, I've been having a fun holiday season doing other highly important things like...

SLEDDING!

And shopping.  And eating.  And refining my Lego-building skills.  And cooking!  Lots of cooking.  Speaking of which, I'm about to log off and head into the kitchen to whip up some veggie dip and chocolate fondue for tonight's New Year's Eve party!  Holy freak.  It's almost 2010. 

But before I go, I wanted to squeeze one last post into 2009.  I have five things, and then I swear you won't hear from me again until 2010.

1.  The CRESCENDO character-naming contest ends TONIGHT at midnight.  All I can say is holy cow, you guys have been amazing.  Last I checked, I had over 2,000 entries.  I'm hoping to have a winner announced by January 15, 2010.  Oh, and on an interesting note, the most common name suggestion I've received is Aiden.  Lots of people want a character named Aiden in CRESCENDO, it seems.  (For those of you who have no clue what this character-naming stuff I'm talking about is, go HERE.)  

2.  Speaking of contests, I've teamed up with The Lateiner Gang Book Reviews Spot to provide one lucky reader with a brand new Barnes & Noble Nook and accessory pack. Contest is open internationally, and runs through February 5, 2010!  I'm pretty sure I don't have to say this is a contest you don't want to miss!  Details can be found at: The Lateiner Gang Book Reviews Spot

3.  One of my Twitter followers informed me that HUSH, HUSH is one of Barnes & Noble's Best Teen Books of 2009!  Yes, I'm screaming over here. The full top twenty list is available HERE.   

4.  Tour dates and cities.  I've posted my January HUSH, HUSH tour info on my website, and I'm more than happy to say that next month, I'm going to Texas!  I'll be doing events in Plano, Frisco, Houston, and Webster.  I haven't been to Texas since I was 13 years old, so I'm just a little bit excited by this.  Then, in February, I'm going on tour with Lisa McMann of WAKE, FADE, and GONE.  We're going to have a blast, and we're looking forward to meeting readers and fans in Tempe, AZ, Oceanside, CA,  San Diego, CA, La Verne, CA and Long Beach, CA.  Wow.  It's going to be awesome!  Thanks TX and CA for having me!

5.  Finally, I couldn't wrap up 2009 without saying THANK YOU to all the booksellers, librarians, teachers, readers, and awesomely awesome teens out there who've made 2009 so exciting and special for me.  What a year.  Thank you, thank you.  Here's to wishing you the brightest and best in 2010.  

NOW GO PARTY!

 

I’ve written and read a fair amount about authorial promotion, what is and isn’t effective.  Anyone who’s tired of book sales talk can feel free to skip this one, but I figured some of you might appreciate a little raw data to go with the conversation.

This is a graph of the sales for The Stepsister Scheme (purple line) and The Mermaid’s Madness (black line).  Stepsister has been selling for just over a year now, and Mermaid has been out for about three months.

The sales data comes from Bookscan, which isn’t exact, but it’s the best measure I’ve got for week-to-week sales.  All five of my books have followed the same pattern, starting with that nice big spike in the beginning.  After the first three months or so, many of the books are stripped and returned to make room for new releases, and we head into the long plateau.

With all of the signings, conventions, and other events I’ve done, only two factors have ever caused a visible spike in sales.  The first is Christmas.  Having a book on the shelves in December is a good thing!  (Thank you to everyone who bought books for presents!)

The second is the release of the next book in the series.  You can see where sales of Stepsister more than doubled when Mermaid came out.  I saw that same bump with the goblin series as each new book was published.

I didn’t include the goblin data here, because that would have gotten too messy.  But I’ll note that the release of the two princess books did not cause a similar spike in sales of the goblin books.

Does this mean all of those other efforts are ineffective in terms of sales?  Not necessarily.  For one thing, Bookscan isn’t as good at capturing data from independent book dealers and such, which means there’s a good chance all of those dealer sales from conventions aren’t showing up.  And while any individual event or effort doesn’t show up on the graph, they could still be having a cumulative effect over time.  There’s really no way of doing a controlled study to prove it one way or the other.

And that’s it for 2009.  Happy 2010, all!  No resolutions here, but I am setting a goal to finish rewriting the outline (version 3.0) for Snow Queen by the end of the day, and to finish this @!#$^ first draft by the end of January.  Wish me luck!

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

I’m a big one for New Year’s resolutions and goals. In fact, I can’t remember a year when I didn’t write a long list--but this year it isn’t happening. Well, I guess it is if short term goals count.

Over the Christmas holiday, I worked on revising SAH until my brain bled, my eyes crossed and the manuscript was as spiffy as I could make it. Today,  I sent it out to readers and now I’m headed toward my first short term goals for 2010.

1.       Do an agent requested revision of SK and don’t  get tempted to send it back to the agent until it shines.

2.       Finish my next article for Vermont Bride--due mid-January.

3.       Write a one page synopsis of SAH for the Vt College retreat.

Once that’s done, then I can look at the rest of 2010 and set some more goals.

I have the strange feeling 2010 is going to be The Year of the Revison for me.

 *The tarot card is from Glastonbury Tarot. Click the link to start your new year with a free reading http://www.isleofavalon.co.uk/tarot/index.html

Jack Sprat
by Jim C. Hines

Jack Sprat will drink your blood.
His wife will eat your flesh.
And so betwixt the two of them
They never leave a mess.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

As people may or may not know, every time someone clicks on one of my Amazon links to buy a book (or anything else from Amazon), I get a small percentage back as Amazon gift credit.  This is why I usually list book titles like so: The Mermaid’s Madness [Amazon | Mysterious Galaxy].

For a while now, I’ve used that credit to buy and give away books.  Thanks to everyone who’s clicked on those links over the past month or two, it’s time to hand out some more.

This time, I’m going to offer three signed copies of either Goblin Quest and The Stepsister Scheme.  If you’ve been thinking about trying one of my series but haven’t felt like shelling out $8, here’s your chance.  Or, if you already own the books but want an autographed copy, that’s okay too!  (But if you win a book you already own, I’d ask that you give your old copy to someone else who might appreciate it.)

To enter, just comment on this entry stating which of the two books you’d prefer and why.  Are you Team Goblin or Team Princess?  One entry per person, and anonymous commenters, please make sure I have some way to reach you.

I’ll pick three winners either over the weekend or early next week.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

I wanted to thank everyone for the great comments and discussions from last week’s posts — even the people who disagreed with me ;-)  Based on your comments, I wanted to follow up on a few things.

Booksignings: I’m annoyed at myself.  Rereading what I wrote, I looked at a number of factors, including the financial, the sneezers, and so on, but I completely omitted one of the other reasons I do these events — to connect with my readers.  Eight people made the effort to come out to Nicola’s Books to see me and get me to sign their books, and I came back and wrote about how sometimes booksignings don’t feel like they’re worth it.

I feel like an ass on this one.  I love getting to meet and talk to my readers. I’m grateful to everyone who took the time out of their night to drive out and see me.  The other factors I discussed are important too, and I still need to figure out how to prioritize my own time and energy, but I apologize for ignoring this part of the booksigning experience, and for any hurt feelings that may have resulted from that.

Publishing Lottery: I wanted to address something that came up in a handful of the comments.  When I say every “successful” author I’ve met worked her or his ass off to reach that point, that does not mean:

1. Working hard guarantees or entitles you to success as an author.
2. If you have not succeeded, you are either lazy or you suck.

I don’t believe I ever said or implied either of these things, but they came up here and elsewhere, and I thought them worth responding to.

Every successful author works hard =/= everyone who works hard will succeed.  A lot of the people I’ve seen who stayed with it and committed to improving did eventually break in, but there are no guarantees … except, perhaps, that if you don’t do the work, it’s nigh impossible to build that career.

I’d also say that most of the time, books and stories are rejected because they’re not good enough.  (See Ann Leckie’s post for the potential traps in “good enough.”)  This doesn’t mean that good books are never rejected.  Goblin Quest [Amazon | Mysterious Galaxy] was rejected more than 30 times.  Not because it was a bad book (I hope).  Not because I was unlucky.  But because it takes time, research, and work to get a book to an editor who loves it.

Are there good books that never find a home?  Of course.  Good books get rejected.  So do an awful lot of bad books.  The thing is, when I was first starting out, I couldn’t tell the difference.  I believed, like so many new writers, that my stuff was good.  Like so many new writers, I was wrong.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t believe in yourself.  You have to — otherwise, where do you get the confidence to submit your work?  But don’t let overconfidence turn you into that guy.  And always work on making the next story even better.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.