Help please?

I have a synopsis due sometime in the next week or two.  I've only ever written one synopsis before so I'm afraid it sounds a little more like a query.  Or maybe it's just lame. But I'm pretty sure it's one of the two.  Anyway, I'm posting it below and if anyone is willing to give me some feedback I will be forever in your debt and mention you in the acknowledgements if and when I get published. 

I'm well below the max word count so are there places that need more details?  Places that are confusing?  Does it sound like a stupid story? I really don't like the last line but can't figure out how to end it.  I'm not sure if the first paragraph should stay or if I should just start with the second.  How's that for some insecurities?  Hmmm, maybe I should have posted this on the first Wednesday of the month.

Feel free to leave comments or email me if it needs more help that can be summed up in a comment box. Thank you so much!


I don't actually have a title yet but here it goes.

Seventeen year old Raisa has had only one goal in life; stay alive.  Now that the twenty year war over her country has ended, her goal might be achievable.  She also might be able to eat on a regular basis, which is life goal number two.  All in all her prospects for a long and happy life look good. Until the soldiers come for her.  

Annexed by the winner, her small country doesn’t exist anymore.  But the history and bloodline of the people do. And it’s that bloodline the king wants.  To breed an heir of both nations the king chooses Raisa to marry his son, Sergei.  As the future queen Raisa will be fed, clothed and taught.  All she must do is leave her family and home, travel to the capital and marry a stranger.  Something she is willing to do if it will bring peace to her over burdened people and food to their empty tables.

At the palace she finds a new life, one she’s never dreamed existed, pretty clothes, as much food as she can eat, a handsome prince, not to mention butter. She also finds people are judged not by what they do, but by who they were born, and she was born a no one. Her bloodline is her only redeeming quality which doesn’t leave her much of a future once an heir is born.  

But there’s one thing Raisa inadvertently brought from her country home; Rusalka, who is known for mesmerizing men. Demanding their worship she ensnares them in a spell until they drown themselves trying to reach her, and she is after Sergei.  Now, Raisa must figure out how to reclaim her bewitched husband-to-be, in-between learning about her duties as a princess, preparing for her official engagement, and trying to bring together a country that has been too long at war, that is. If she can’t break the spell then Sergei will drown, and with no heir, the country will erupt into civil war.  

Skipping out of her own betrothal ceremony she confronts Rusalka. Raisa breaks the spell over Sergei with a kiss but Rusalka escapes. She doesn’t go far, and she isn’t giving up Sergei  without a fight.  Sergei and Raisa search out Rusalka’s weakness.  As a water elemental she can leave the river, but only if her hair stays wet.  They plan to lure her out of the water and keep her there until she evaporates. Their plans are ruined when word comes of the mysterious happenings up and down the river bank; men, drowning themselves for no reason, women telling tales of husbands that are bewitched.  It can only be Rusalka. She is coming for Sergei, and she is destroying everything in her way.  

Seeing it as an attack by a neighboring kingdom the king prepares for a war the country it too weak to win.  Sergei and Raisa must confront Rusalka quickly or watch their country ruin itself. As the only heir Sergei is never without body guards. Neither is the mother of the future heir, Raisa. But they can’t let anyone else suffer for them.  They sneak out of the palace at night and find Rusalka waiting at the river.  They lure her from the water and distract her from noticing her drying hair. When the sun comes up Rusalka evaporates.  Finally free of her pull Sergei and Raisa are left to bring peace to their country, and find happiness with each other. 

And if anyone actually made it through that here is a link to a hilarious video about a day in the life of a writer.  So. Funny.

 

Yeah, but...

If you haven't read this post about the two words you should never say when getting critiqued you really should.  So head over to Writer Unboxed and give it a try. 

I've got family coming in town this week so I'll be a little scarce on the blogosphere.  See you all next week!

H is for Honor

I am honored when someone trusts me with their manuscript.  It is an honor to be asked to read or critique it.  I always try to treat their work with the respect I would want others to show my work.  I try to respond promptly and coherently (I may be deluding myself on that last one) because they trusted me.

Remember that when you beta read or critique.  They trusted you, don't destroy that trust, because someday you'll need someone to read for you. 

What do bookshelves and reviews say about us?

Author Jody Hedlund had a discussion here about what our books say about ourselves.  In a world of Goodreads it's very easy to see what our favorite authors are reading.  Many authors have fairly diverse reading habits and it's not likely that everything they read will fit their target audience.  Should authors worry about what they post on their bookshelves?  Is it possible to offend your readers, or will they too have broad reading habits?  Does an author really want every book they read, and their impression of it, out there on the internet? 

Another question she brings up is rating books on Goodreads. As an author is it alright to leave poor reviews on books?  Is that considered unprofessional or mean?  Yet, if you only leave good reviews does that make you unreliable or misleading as a reviewer?

I know people who refuse to leave less than a three star review.  If they didn't like the book, they won't review it.  Simple, right?  Yet won't that leave false expectations on the book?  I know when I read reviews I want to read the one and two star reviews to see what they didn't like about the book.  That doesn't mean I won't read it.  Sometimes the issues people have aren't issues for me.  And sometimes they have good points and I'm warry about getting the book. 

Personally I like to have a wide range of reviews so I can get the best overall look at the book.  Yet I understand the worry about appearing mean or snarky for low reviews.  Is it enough to leave a well though out and polite, yet honest, review, or will it still give authors bad reputations?  And if so, what happens if authors only give good reviews to books?  How will that change readers perceptions? Or even authors growth, since we do rely on crits for improvement. 

As you can see I've got more questions than answers.  Has anyone thought about this at all?  What have you decided?  

Which way should we go?

It doesn't matter how close to the finish line I am as long as I'm moving forward. Lately it seems that with everything I try I'm spinning my wheels.I hate that I'm not progressing but I just don't know which path to walk down with this MS. 


There's no doubt about it, writers make some difficult decisions.  In my mind one of the most difficult is whether or not it's time to query.  I think one of the reasons it's so hard is that it's not just one choice.  There are a myriad of options.  Is it the plot that's holding you back?  Are there scenes that are very beautiful but don't progress the plot so you need to tear them, and your heart, out? Should you emphasize this subplot or that one? Each word must be tested, weighed to see if it is the best word for the job. Each plot line questioned each character delved into.

It can be very overwhelming and lead to a sense of paralysis. Often this is the time when you need to get feedback. A new pair of eyes can see things you can't, give you a push in the right directions.  But maybe you've already done this.  Maybe your confusion is because you're having a hard time being done with something that has consumed so much of your life.  Maybe your just terrified of the next step and so you keep trying to go down the familiar paths you've already traversed. Sometimes I think we just need to pick a path and walk down it awhile.  If it's not right you can always try another.  At least you're moving instead of stagnating.

 How do you deal with not knowing what to do next? 

Finally!

I just sent my baby off to beta readers.  I'm a little nervous and very excited.  I can't wait to find out how I can make it better because I have no perspective anymore.  I do feel a little hollow inside.  This draft took about three weeks longer than I had planned so I've been pushing myself and it's been all I've been thinking of.  Now I'm not going to look at it until I hear back from them. I'm so very grateful to readers and critiquers.  I couldn't have done this with out them.

Don't worry, I still have plenty to do.  I plan to polish my query, get it critiqued, polish, critique, polish.... you get the picture.  I'll also be working on synopses of it plus the two that follow just in case I can find someone who wants to buy the whole trilogy.  Hey, I can dream.  I'll continue to research agents and maybe, just maybe I can catch up on blogging.  I'll be coming to all you campaigners! 

I just started babysitting again and today is my first day with the 2 month old.  Since we got pretty girl when she was 16 months old it's been 3 years since I had an infant.  I forgot how much they spit up.  Off to clean.

What will you be doing in the near future?  Any fun plans. 

What's In Your Toolbox?

Here's a link to a list of fifty great writing tools.  The think I really like about this list is that it isn't black and white "rules".  It doesn't say, don't use adverbs, it says to watch them and use them when you need to change the meaning of the verb.  It has a lot of useful advice and I hope you can find it as useful as I have. 

Red Pen

I used to be afraid of critiques.  No, not getting them. Giving them.  I in no way felt qualified to tell other people how to write.   I used to read work posted for critique, figure out what I would say, then read everyone else’s comments to see if I had got it “wrong”.

I think everyone will agree that critiques are essential to writing.  Obviously getting comments on your work makes you better, but criting other people’s work makes you look at your work differently. Like anything else we can improve our critiquing skills.  Studying other’s comments is one way I learn.  Also just jumping in and doing it. 

Critiques like any reading or writing experience is personal.  Something that may make touch one person may feel overdone to me, or vice versa, because I’m not reading it with the same background they are.    I recently had someone leave a nice comment about my critiques and I spent the next couple hours trying to figure out if she was serious or sarcastic.  In the end it didn’t matter.  I was commenting on the things I knew and understood and that’s all I can do. That’s all anyone can do.  So don’t be afraid. Pull out that red pen and get to it.

Betas

I'm busy beta reading so don't have much of a post.  If you're inclined leave a comment about beta reading.  Is there a particular way you like to make comments?  Do you read it more than once?  Love your beta readers?  Hate them?  What do you think about it in general? 

Contractions R Us

I received a crit once where I was told my use of contractions was not consistent.  I've been thinking a lot about this comment.  Yea, it was only one person but I want to make sure I get this right. 

In my manuscript I have a character that doesn't always use contractions.  This is not her native language and she does have a little more of a formal lilt to her speaking.  Also there are times when I might have used a contraction but didn't for the sake of emphasis.

"I won't do that."

VS

"I will not do that." 

Do you see a difference?  I try to keep them consistent within those parameters though. 

So the question I have for everyone is:  If you were to read this would the use of or lack of contractions bother you?  I'm very curious about how other writers feel about this. 

Confidence is Key

I recently finished a book, and the first thing I thought when I closed it was “That was a confident book.  That must be what it feels like to KNOW you can write.”  I had never thought of it in those terms before but once I did I realized I had noticed it in books all along.  There are some books  that know where they are going and march strongly forward.  There are some books that can’t make up their minds to follow plot A or B, or that don’t want to hurt their characters, and so they dither along and hint at a lot of things but don’t do anything.  At the end of the book you think NOTHING HAPPENED and feel cheated.  

I once posted a piece and received this crit “ There are wonderful flashes and descriptions, but there are also times when your main character doesn't really appear real, as though you haven't fully entered her world, her time period, her person. It is hard for me to feel anything for her, much as I wish to. For the moment, you are watching her instead of _being her_ and until that magic happens, your work isn't credible enough.”    Credibility.  It’s hard to feel confident in our writing all the time but until we do why should anyone else?  Readers know if there is no confidence or credibility in writing, and if there's not the book never rises above mediocre. 

Wordplay has a post here about vague writing.  After I read this I started to notice some of these things in my writing.  The lack of credibility goes right along with vague writing.  It’s as if I wanted to give myself an out just in case a reader called me on something when what is needed is decisiveness. I'm fixing a lot of that with this draft and I can tell a difference.

What do you think of confidence in writing?

Missing!

I had a scare the other day.  I opened up the folder containing all my documents for Far From the Sea, and it was gone!  The other documents were still there but the main manuscript was missing.  No I didn't scream or yell or cry.  I was too stunned.  My jaw was in my lap and I kept reading the titles over and over thinking it had to be there.  It wasn't.

Since I received my netbook I have been using ZumoDrive (It's like drop box) so I can access my work from both the desktop and the netbook.  When I could breath again I ran downstairs and checked on my netbook.  It was there and I could access it just fine. For some reason after doing that it worked fine on my desktop too.  I think it got hung up the last time I used it on the laptop and ZumoDrive thought the document was still open and so wouldn't let me access it other places.  That's a guess.   

The thing is I have several back up copies.  I keep a copy on my desktop, one on a thumb drive and every now and again I email it to myself.  It had been a couple weeks since I had updated the backups but I still wouldn't have lost too much.  Even if it had been gone it wouldn't have been devastating.  Still, when I saw it wasn't there I was heartbroken.  I stared at the computer in confusion, I could hear my brain telling me "you have backups for this reason"  but my heart was weeping blood at the loss of my baby.  I thought I was ready to let my MS out in the world and that I would be tough enough to take the criticism and rejection it would receive.  After this little demonstration of how much this WIP means to me I may need to toughen myself up a little. 

Have you ever lost a manuscript?  How do you backup to prevent fatalities? 

Feedback

Over at Compuserve we've been having a discussion on giving feedback.  Is it good etiquite to rewrite some of the author's work when giving a crit?  You know, where someone will take a sentence (or paragraph, or page) from the work and rewrite it to emphasis how it could have been tighter, more grammatically correct, etc. 

Some said they like when this is done to their work because it helps them understand what the person giving feedback meant.  Others are very territorial of their work and while they accept the crit, don't want anyone else rearranging their words. 

I've seen it done respectfully and I've seen it done not so respectfully.  Personally I think it's ok if used sparingly and wisely, just a sentence or two.  And only if you know the author thinks it's all right.  I have seen people rewrite a whole page (not a red-line but a rewrite) and I thought that overkill.  What was so important that you had to rewrite a WHOLE page?  couldn't you give feedback without twisting every one of their words?  Maybe that's the problem.  Maybe if we learned how to give better feedback we wouldn't need to rewrite each other's words. 

So what do you think?  Do you like it when others rewrite your work or not? 

Everybody needs a Friend

I'm working on a scene that was one of the first dozen or so I wrote for this novel. It is filled with telling, pov issues, tense changes and a myriad of other issues.  I'm mortified to remember how in my fresh faced eagerness I popped it up for critique immediately after finishing it.  My only defense is that I was naive and inexperienced in the ways of writing. 

Amazingly enough, everyone who critiqued the scene was very positive.  Oh, they pointed out the problems, they didn't hold back.  They just did it in such a way that I still felt I had potential, that I could make something of my story.  They didn't sugar coat the problems but they let me know how I could be better and encouraged me to try.

I am so grateful for the people who took the time to teach me about writing and pushed me to be better.  It is thanks to them I have grown enough to realize how bad that scene was.  

Where do you find help and support?  Crit groups, spouses, parents, children, friends, strangers, who has or is helping you learn and grow?

First Page Crits

Suzie Townsend is offering crits of first pages.  Go here to find out more about it.  DON'T FORGET TO READ THE DIRECTIONS ON THE SIDE BAR!  I heard some people didn't see them.  You know, crazy people, not me or anything.

She's also did a post about first pages in general today, check that out here.

One More Time

Have you ever posted an excerpt for review only to look at it later and see glaring mistakes?  What about giving a crit and you read it the next morning and realize the kind tone you wrote it with didn’t come across and you sound harsh and cruel?  

So much of a writer’s interaction is done long distance and tone can be hard to portray when you don’t have face or voice inflections.  Always, ALWAYS, take a break and re-read what you are going to send/post. 

Sometimes we get tired of going over the same scene again and again.  Our beautiful well written story becomes something we can’t stand the sight of.  You think you probably ought to go over it one more time but you can’t stand to look at it and hit post just to end the misery.  DON’T.  Go over it one more time.  It will save you in the end.