Lisa Hendrix

Your dirty mind is showing again.  I’m talking about the Marvin Gaye classic, which Amazon is giving away free today and tomorrow.  Just click the banner below and feel the love. And while you’re there, pre-order IMMORTAL OUTLAW

A writer’s education consists of more than going to monthly chapter meetings or attending the annual local conference.  It means reading EVERY book in the 808 section of the library.  Twice.  It means buying a ton of other books and attending critique groups.  It means regularly reading RWR, Writer’s Digest, Romantic Times, any sub-genre rags like Beau Monde.  And industry, craft, and genre blogs.

It means attending the national conference or buying the session CDs from National if you can’t attend.  (The RWR–[that's the Romance Writers Report for you non-romance types] will list the CDs for sale just afterward.  Your local chapter may also buy a complete set.)

It means getting on-line with your chapter members or some other writer’s link or list where you can learn more about the business of writing from others.

It means getting your hands on whatever publisher guidelines are available and reading them.  It means reading romances, to keep up with what’s being published and by whom.

 More than anything, it means listening, listening, listening, not just with your ears, but with your brain, and absorbing every scrap of hard information that you can get.

Conferences:  Attending vs Volunteering

As part of self-education, I’d like to recommend conferences. Attending a conference is wonderful.  You get to hear fascinating speakers, meet your peers–and an occasional superstar writer–and chat with an editor or two.  You come away inspired, feeling recharged and ready to scream through the next chapter of your book. (I’m presenting at a great small all-genre conference at the end of February, the Whidbey Island Writers Conference. Come join us.)

Even better is volunteering for a conference committee.  When you volunteer, you often have the opportunity to WORK with the visiting editors, agents, and writers.  You find yourself in more situations where you can actually schmooze with these folks, and schmoozing is how you really learn about publishing as a business.  In the right position, you get to know people who may be able to affect your career down the road–for better or worse, so do a good job and present yourself well to them.  I met my first editor, Judy Stern Palais,  and Malle Vallick, who is now the Digital Queen of Harlequin (or some title like that) over the phone when I was doing materials coordination–i.e., begging books to give away at a a chapter conference.  The contact with Judy led almost directly to my first sale–although I obviously had to pony up with a good book along the way.  (I’ve told the story so many times…does anyone want or need to hear it again? If so, let me know in comments.)

As another example, NYT Bestseller Kristin Hannah told me that before she was published, she volunteered at an RWA National conference to babysit editor appointments–you know, stand outside and time the appointments, then knock on the door when the time’s up.  The advantages aren’t obvious, but what do you suppose editors do on their short breaks between appointments?  Go to the john, of course, but many of them also stand in the hallways and talk with anyone around them who doesn’t look like they’re going to throw a manuscript at them.  Like Kristin, at the time.  She spoke with several editors.  One of them–sorry, I don’t remember who–finished a little late and came out of her final appointment harried, hungry, and looking for someone to have dinner with.  Who do you suppose was standing there, smiling and handy?  Who got to spend an hour with an editor in private conversation?

Lucky Kristin, right?  In the right place at the right time.  Get real.  She made her own luck.  She put herself in the right place.

And that’s part of selling a book.

Back on January 1, I promised to start revealing my writing process, and I fully intended to do so posthaste.  Unfortunately, I totally underestimated the stuff that had to get done in order for my son to submit his college and financial aid apps, including the delightful Catch 22 of having to give the feds your tax info before you even receive your W-2s, aka FAFSA.

So now that all that’s done, and I’m diving into the fray with a fast draft, 280 pages in 14 days. This could give me the perfect excuse not to blog, but no, brave idiot that I am, I’m not going to use it.  Instead, I’m going to write a book in 2 weeks AND TELL YOU HOW TO DO IT WHILE I DO IT.  Actually, I’m cheating a bit (a lot).  To keep both my word and my sanity, I’ll be trotting out parts of one of my all-time most popular workshop presentations. Over the next couple of weeks you’ll get bits of the infamous Nuts and Bolts workshop, presented at several NW writers conferences during the late 90s to much acclaim, but here spiffied up to at least minimally reflect today’s publishing world. And so, without further ado, the Big Question:

________

SHOULD YOU BE A WRITER?

       Are you earnest?  Not, are you a character in an Oscar Wilde drawing room comedy, but are you truly earnest about writing?  This is not an easy business.

       Are you willing to lose sleep over a character who won’t behave?  Are you willing to let the kids wear their jeans an extra day?  An extra week, at deadline?  Eat more frozen food?  Give up frozen foods and dinners out altogether for six months to pay for that new printer?  Loose track of the vacuum because you haven’t seen it in so long? Grow to love your dust bunnies so much you decide to make them a bed of their own? Are you willing to launch your soul out onto the public market to be picked over, shot at, fawned over, spat upon, lionized, rejected, accepted, revised, and held up for both ridicule and glory?

       If not, give up now.  It’s easier.  It’s less painful.  It’s cheaper.  God knows, it’s cheaper.  That old chestnut about “all you need is a pencil and some paper” is a lie.  That may be all you need to get started, but we’re talking about selling.  Before you’re through, you’ll need a computer, a laser or ink jet printer, plenty of cartridges, and a good case of 20# bond.  (Yes, probably even if you plan to be strictly e-published. More about that later.)

       Anyway, I’ve sold and received the advances on seven books, and with conferences, new equipment, books, and workshops, plus all the miscellaneous expenses of research and promotion, I could still clear more working a minimum wage job.

       But then I’d miss the blank looks and snickers I get when I tell people I’m a romance writer.  And you can’t have all that and a dirty house, too. 

ADDENDUM (2/10/09):  Over on the Novelist Inc blog, Kathy Carmichael offers this relevant examination of another aspect of whether a person should be a writer, the ability to Conceptualize a Novel. Worth a visit.

Next:  Learn to Earn

On Sunday morning, 17 called and asked if he could have some friends over for a last-minute SuperBowl party.  Now this surprised me, because he’s a theater kid and neither he, nor his girlfriend,  nor his theater friends have ever demonstrated any interest in football.  But we said yes, told him to tell his friends to bring the junk food, and set about tidying up the house to make it presentable,  and then I went to fetch a variety of pop and a couple of bags of ice while my dh started making a big pot of chili.

Shortly after the kids arrived, it was clear they did, indeed, have no interest in football, as they brought a Wii and all its accoutrements. By then, the chili  had been brought up to temp and dumped into the crockpot, and dh asked me to taste it for spices.

I did, and almost barfed. Seems one of the packages of ground meat had gone bad.  Way bad. Ugh. Pot of chili ruined.

Love of my life got rid of the nasty chili while I went into the pantry to dig through the cabinets for ingredients for a new pot (For speed, I used a base of canned chili, jazzed up with fancy beans, Ortegas, etc.)

As the new chili bubbled, I slipped off to the john.  It smelled of chili in there, which I chalked up to my husband dumping the first batch down the toilet.

A bit later, however, hubby went in there and promptly stepped in water—overflow, it turned out, from the shower, which had backed up. Turns out that was the smell I smelled, because hubby, bless his heart, hadn’t flushed the chili, but had run it down the disposal.  The whole 6 quarts of it. Clearly too much for the rather finicky pipes of our nearly 50 year old house.

Off to Safeway for Liquid Plumbr.  Let sit.  Nothing.  More LP, more sitting, more nothing.  Much use of plunger (including imprint of hollow handle-top on my palm). Nothing.

Next morning, one more large bottle LP, couple of hours of sitting, more plunger. Nothing.

So, a call was made to the plumbing service  The same plumbing service that was out a few months ago when our incoming water line failed.  Now, to their credit,  they were here within a couple of hours both times, and to their further credit, the receptionist/scheduler didn’t even laugh when I suggested that I was due a freebie.  They just showed up, fixed the problem, and handed me a bill.

So I added it up.  Plumber + ingredients of first batch of chili + ingredients of second batch of chili + multiple bottles of totally and utterly ineffective Liquid Plumbr = $117

All for one pot of chili.

How about you? What’s your most expensive meal disaster?

I’m chugging along on my effort to reduce the size of my ass, down, as of this morning, by some 3 pounds. Not the progress I wanted, but progress. If you want to get full details, check out my weight-loss blog at New Year, New Ass.

Motion s has been a bit slow on the book front, as well, but that’s about to change (as soon as I hit post here, in fact). The problem was a huge plot hole that had me stumped, but I decided that the way to fill it was with my body, so I’m leaping in with a Fast Draft, a la Candace Havens. If necessary, I will pull someone in with me.

Yoohoo. Scott?