This month at the Stiletto Gang we’ve been talking about transitions and how moving to a new stage of life can affect writing. But I have to admit that as I sat down to think about the topic all I found myself pondering was the actual literal transitions of writing. One of the primary tasks of a writer is to choose not just what to include, but what to leave out. There are very few (if any?) novels that are told in one long continuous stream of time. And every time the writer skips over the trip to the bathroom or the drive from point A to point B she must choose how to indicate that transition.
Chapter 1 The Hard, Fast Break
Some writers like to make each new location or time switch a new chapter.Ā It’s concrete. It’s self explanatory. And pretty hard for the reader to get confused. But others like to the soft break.
***
In the typography world those little asterisks are called dingbats. They come in all shapes and sizes and can be themed to the text. Karen Harris Tully‘s series The Faarian Chronicles is a sci-fi young adult adventure centered on a planet that was settled by Amazon warriors of Earth. This gives the featured culture of the planet a Greek historical context (and strong feminist heroines) and makes the transition dingbats of the omega symbol fun and appropriate.
blank space
The softest break of all is the extra space.Ā As a graphic designer, I’m not in favor of these. It’s far too easy, in a longer work, for the extra space to get buried at the end of the page. Then what does the designer do? Force the text to start lower down on the next page? That looks awkward and can lead to confusion on the part of the reader. Not to mention the fact that coding these for the e-readers and online is more than a little bit difficult. Ā In other words, if I see these in a book I immediately think the writer is a jerk who doesn’t care about how much extra work their designer has to do.
Foolishly, when I first got into the publishing biz I found myself incredibly surprised when my layout manuscript came back for proofing that the designer had kept all of my transitions as I had typed them. Somehow I genuinely thought that I would send off my MS and somewhere out in New York someone would do something clever with my transitions.Ā I was kind of sad.Ā I didn’t want to manage my own transitions – I wanted someone else to do all the work for me.
Which when I think about it, is about what I think about life transitions as well. How unfortunate that there’s no magic wand or designer to outsource those problems to.Ā I guess I’m just going to put my lifestyle setting on “dingbat” and see what I get.
Originally published at the Stiletto Gang on 09.14.16
As IĀ have been exploring the question āWho are you like?ā this month, Iāve also been exploring what other books in my genres look like.Ā This is sometimes gratifying on the base level of my fonts are so much better than yours and also sometimes mystifying on the level of why are there so many bared midriffs in contemporary fantasy?Ā On the topic of midriffs, and purely for exampleās sake, Iāll put the cover of Shifting Jock in Love here.Ā The cover is obviouslyā¦ uhā¦ fully functional, because I canāt stop staring at the uhā¦ weight lifting bar.Ā Now that weāve covered that topic (no, we havenāt covered anything?), let me move on to my point.
Market research, which is what I call shopping and (gently) making fun of book covers over a glass of wine, is important.Ā Itās hard to review my own book cover submissions if I donāt know what the trends are.Ā Not that trends should inform every decision, but I like to know how far out of the current Iām swimming. In addition to finding the occasional good idea that I could be copying, I also find really interesting authors.Ā Research shows that most people buy books based on word of mouth, but in this online age, that canāt ALWAYS be true.Ā From Facebook to google ads, to the wonders of Amazon, we get a lot of recommendations about authors and books online. Ā And without a person to ask, readers are stuck trying to answer āso who are they likeā question based on the marketing surrounding the book.Ā But as we all learned in grade school, you canāt always judge a book by itās cover.
One great resource Iāve found in my wading around the internet is a great website – www.literature-map.comĀ Simply type in an author you like and it will produce of an animated cloud of similar authors aka a handy new To Be Read list.Ā And you can click on the question mark in the corner if you want to add authors to the database to improve results.Ā And now if youāll excuse me, Iām going to go enjoy a little more market research and a Riesling.
Originally published on 8/24/16 at the Stiletto Gang
https://bethanymaines.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Aug2016-Logo-op3-300x69.png00Bethany Maineshttps://bethanymaines.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Aug2016-Logo-op3-300x69.pngBethany Maines2016-08-25 08:24:132016-08-22 23:27:14Market Research
One of the most common questions a writer hears is: Who are you like?Ā In other words, what (famous, more talented, richer, that I would have heard of) author are you like?Ā Of course, as authors we would always like to respond ā I am like no one! I am a unique snowflake of infinite genius!Ā Bow down before my staggering work of novelistic achievement!Ā Possibly at this point is where we also start investing in a parrot, flowing robes, and a pencil thin moustache to twirl.Ā Iām not saying all authors would go full Disney villain. Clearly, the eyebrows and make-up require a more high-maintenance lifestyle than most of us are cut out for.Ā Iām just saying, nobody likes to think of themselves, as ājust likeā somebody else.
However, temper-tantrums and eyeliner aside, it is a useful question.Ā It does let people know where they should look for you in the library and where you fall on their reader spectrum.Ā For the record, I usually answer this question with ā Janet Evanovich.Ā My series Carrie Mae Mysteries is female centered spy series, with plenty of hunks, humor, and huge action scenes.Ā However, I also write in another genre ā contemporary fantasy.Ā I write modern day fairy tales about fairies, vampires, and what happens when a mermaid meets a SEAL.
Writing in multiple genres used to be very ānot doneā because the publishing houses found it hard to market.Ā The prevailing wisdom was that readers donāt read multiple genres (uhā¦ say what?), Self-publishing has opened the door for authors to write whatever their unique snowflake heartās desire, but itās still a risk, and a challenge for those doing the marketing, to figure out what to say to the question ā who do you write like?
I guess for now, Iāll have to go with this answer ā I write like my fingers are fire with sheer greatness and my mascara is totally, totally on point.
***
Originally posted on 8.10.16 at The Stilettog Gang
https://bethanymaines.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/jafar.jpg499640Bethany Maineshttps://bethanymaines.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Aug2016-Logo-op3-300x69.pngBethany Maines2016-08-11 23:44:552016-08-09 23:47:45Who are you like?
In August I will be the recipient of an award from the local business newspaper ā The Business Examiner.Ā Each year, The Business Examiner, holds a Top 40 Under 40 event celebrating business persons under the age of forty in Tacoma.Ā This year, my business partner and I are among the recipients!Ā The event includes a photoshoot for all the recipients and the resulting images get shown on the website and at the event. So of course we did what any sensible business owners would do when on the receiving end of a MAJOR AWARD (careful, itās fra-jeel-ay)ā we put eyelash extensions on the business account.
Now, for those of you who donāt know, eyelash extensions are individual fake lashes that are applied with careful hands, tweezers and glue to your real eyelashes.Ā The effect is that you have somehow magically grown giant cow length eyelashes.Ā Unlike a standard set of fake eyelashes that glue on to the eyelid above the lashline, these look integrated into your own lashes.Ā Basically, your eyes now look like every mascara commercial on TV.
The Stats: Ā In my neck of the woods they cost about $100 (plus tip) and last about two weeks. Ā At two weeks you can get a “fill” appointment that can cost $50, but wait until three weeks and that will cost more. Ā They take about an hour and fifteen minutes to put in and you must be ok with having your eyelids taped in place and have someone poking around on your lash line.
The Pros: As I said, your eyes now look like a mascara commercial ALL the time.Ā This is great when you just woke up and have no make-up on.Ā Somehow, I look delightfully rumpled instead of my normal slightly dead.Ā Since one of the rules is that you canāt wear mascara on them (impossible to clean without taking them out) there is less make-up time involved in getting ready.Ā And for the most part, people really canāt figure out what youāve done to look so smashing.
The Cons: My eyes were a bit red and others report a stinging sensation on the first day. Ā For me, I just felt like I had grit in my eyes for the first two days. Ā Also, every once in awhile one of the falsies twisted around and stabbed me in the eyeball. Youch! They do have to be treated GENTLY.Ā If youāre a side sleeper, be prepared to lose a few early after they get ground into your pillow overnight.
Conclusion: If youāre looking at a week with multiple events, particularly ones where youāll be featured in photos, eyelash extensions might be the way to go.Ā My business partner had the awards photoshoot, a family picture photoshoot and a high-school reunion in the same week ā thatās the kind of week that makes the cost and effort worthwhile.Ā I probably didnāt need them for one photoshoot, but Iāve enjoyed batting my giant lashes for a few weeks.
https://bethanymaines.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Eyelashes-725.jpg1280960Bethany Maineshttps://bethanymaines.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Aug2016-Logo-op3-300x69.pngBethany Maines2016-07-29 15:23:312016-07-29 16:31:01Batting my Lashes
Many things change after having a baby.Ā And I have to say that one of the things that Iām the most sad to see change is the amount of music I listen to.Ā Baby nap times seem to encompass the whole dang day! I used to have iTunes running almost constantly.Ā Not that it wasnāt a battle with my husband over what to listen to.Ā No, I donāt want more Phish.Ā And thereās only so much hip-hop and Grateful Dead I can listen to before going insane. (Yes, my husband is a hippy with a secret love of 90ās R&B.Ā He compensates for this deficiency by being ruggedly handsome and having the miraculous ability to open jars and kill countless spiders.)
The interesting thing is that, aside from the specific bands, where my husband I deviate in our musical tastes is an actual love of music.Ā He loves music.Ā Phish, Dave Matthews, the Allman Brothers, and the Grateful Dead all have one thing common.Ā OK, take a toke and make that two things ā theyāre jam bands.Ā I hate jam bands.Ā Itās just giant swaths of useless music that take away from the important thing ā the lyrics.Ā I love the words. (Surprised?Ā Probably not.)Ā For me, music is like poetry with half the pretentiousness and way more shake-your-bootiliciousness.Ā And I like to play it ALL the time particularly when Iām working.Ā I find that music helps put me in the zone for writing and for design.
But with an in-home office and a baby, itās become a lot more difficult to crank the tunes through the work day.Ā I was excited when the baby hit two and it became easier to send her to daycare/babysitting and thereās only one nap to contend with, but it has also meant that sheās tons more verbal.Ā With a toddler in the house, I donāt feel quite so comfortable cranking up a few of the songs I love, like Donāt Shoot Me Santa by The Killers.Ā I am perfectly prepared to explain that boys have a penis and some people are in wheelchairs and sometimes boys marry boys and girls marry girls.Ā Butā¦ I am not at all prepared to explain why Santa is shooting that guy in the song.Ā Iām pretty sure I see headphones in my future.
The Dingbat Approach
/in General Writing, Graphic Design, LifeThis month at the Stiletto Gang we’ve been talking about transitions and how moving to a new stage of life can affect writing. But I have to admit that as I sat down to think about the topic all I found myself pondering was the actual literal transitions of writing. One of the primary tasks of a writer is to choose not just what to include, but what to leave out. There are very few (if any?) novels that are told in one long continuous stream of time. And every time the writer skips over the trip to the bathroom or the drive from point A to point B she must choose how to indicate that transition.
Chapter 1
The Hard, Fast Break
Some writers like to make each new location or time switch a new chapter.Ā It’s concrete. It’s self explanatory. And pretty hard for the reader to get confused. But others like to the soft break.
***
In the typography world those little asterisks are called dingbats. They come in all shapes and sizes and can be themed to the text. Karen Harris Tully‘s series The Faarian Chronicles is a sci-fi young adult adventure centered on a planet that was settled by Amazon warriors of Earth. This gives the featured culture of the planet a Greek historical context (and strong feminist heroines) and makes the transition dingbats of the omega symbol fun and appropriate.
blank space
The softest break of all is the extra space.Ā As a graphic designer, I’m not in favor of these. It’s far too easy, in a longer work, for the extra space to get buried at the end of the page. Then what does the designer do? Force the text to start lower down on the next page? That looks awkward and can lead to confusion on the part of the reader. Not to mention the fact that coding these for the e-readers and online is more than a little bit difficult. Ā In other words, if I see these in a book I immediately think the writer is a jerk who doesn’t care about how much extra work their designer has to do.
Which when I think about it, is about what I think about life transitions as well. How unfortunate that there’s no magic wand or designer to outsource those problems to.Ā I guess I’m just going to put my lifestyle setting on “dingbat” and see what I get.
Originally published at the Stiletto Gang on 09.14.16
Market Research
/in General Writing, Marketing, The Stiletto GangAs IĀ have been exploring the question āWho are you like?ā this month, Iāve also been exploring what other books in my genres look like.Ā This is sometimes gratifying on the base level of my fonts are so much better than yours and also sometimes mystifying on the level
of why are there so many bared midriffs in contemporary fantasy?Ā On the topic of midriffs, and purely for exampleās sake, Iāll put the cover of Shifting Jock in Love here.Ā The cover is obviouslyā¦ uhā¦ fully functional, because I canāt stop staring at the uhā¦ weight lifting bar.Ā Now that weāve covered that topic (no, we havenāt covered anything?), let me move on to my point.
Market research, which is what I call shopping and (gently) making fun of book covers over a glass of wine, is important.Ā Itās hard to review my own book cover submissions if I donāt know what the trends are.Ā Not that trends should inform every decision, but I like to know how far out of the current Iām swimming. In addition to finding the occasional good idea that I could be copying, I also find really interesting authors.Ā Research shows that most people buy books based on word of mouth, but in this online age, that canāt ALWAYS be true.Ā From Facebook to google ads, to the wonders of Amazon, we get a lot of recommendations about authors and books online. Ā And without a person to ask, readers are stuck trying to answer āso who are they likeā question based on the marketing surrounding the book.Ā But as we all learned in grade school, you canāt always judge a book by itās cover.
One great resource Iāve found in my wading around the internet is a great website – www.literature-map.comĀ Simply type in an author you like and it will produce of an animated cloud of similar authors aka a handy new To Be Read list.Ā And you can click on the question mark in the corner if you want to add authors to the database to improve results.Ā And now if youāll excuse me, Iām going to go enjoy a little more market research and a Riesling.
Originally published on 8/24/16 at the Stiletto Gang
Who are you like?
/in Carrie Mae, General Writing, Life, Marketing, The Stiletto GangOne of the most common questions a writer hears is: Who are you like?Ā In other words, what (famous, more talented, richer, that I would have heard of) author are you like?Ā Of course, as authors we would always like to respond ā I am like no one! I am a unique snowflake of infinite genius!Ā Bow down before my staggering work of novelistic achievement!Ā Possibly at this point is where we also start investing in a parrot, flowing robes, and a pencil thin moustache to twirl.Ā Iām not saying all authors would go full Disney villain. Clearly, the eyebrows and make-up require a more high-maintenance lifestyle than most of us are cut out for.Ā Iām just saying, nobody likes to think of themselves, as ājust likeā somebody else.
However, temper-tantrums and eyeliner aside, it is a useful question.Ā It does let people know where they should look for you in the library and where you fall on their reader spectrum.Ā For the record, I usually answer this question with ā Janet Evanovich.Ā My series Carrie Mae Mysteries is female centered spy series, with plenty of hunks, humor, and huge action scenes.Ā However, I also write in another genre ā contemporary fantasy.Ā I write modern day fairy tales about fairies, vampires, and what happens when a mermaid meets a SEAL.
Writing in multiple genres used to be very ānot doneā because the publishing houses found it hard to market.Ā The prevailing wisdom was that readers donāt read multiple genres (uhā¦ say what?), Self-publishing has opened the door for authors to write whatever their unique snowflake heartās desire, but itās still a risk, and a challenge for those doing the marketing, to figure out what to say to the question ā who do you write like?
I guess for now, Iāll have to go with this answer ā I write like my fingers are fire with sheer greatness and my mascara is totally, totally on point.
***
Originally posted on 8.10.16 at The Stilettog Gang
Batting my Lashes
/in Carrie Mae, Graphic Design, Life, Make-UpNow, for those of you who donāt know, eyelash extensions are individual fake lashes that are applied with careful hands, tweezers and glue to your real eyelashes.Ā The effect is that you have somehow magically grown giant cow length eyelashes.Ā Unlike a standard set of fake eyelashes that glue on to the eyelid above the lashline, these look integrated into your own lashes.Ā Basically, your eyes now look like every mascara commercial on TV.
The Stats: Ā In my neck of the woods they cost about $100 (plus tip) and last about two weeks. Ā At two weeks you can get a “fill” appointment that can cost $50, but wait until three weeks and that will cost more. Ā They take about an hour and fifteen minutes to put in and you must be ok with having your eyelids taped in place and have someone poking around on your lash line.
The Pros: As I said, your eyes now look like a mascara commercial ALL the time.Ā This is great when you just woke up and have no make-up on.Ā Somehow, I look delightfully rumpled instead of my normal slightly dead.Ā Since one of the rules is that you canāt wear mascara on them (impossible to clean without taking them out) there is less make-up time involved in getting ready.Ā And for the most part, people really canāt figure out what youāve done to look so smashing.
The Cons: My eyes were a bit red and others report a stinging sensation on the first day. Ā For me, I just felt like I had grit in my eyes for the first two days. Ā Also, every once in awhile one of the falsies twisted around and stabbed me in the eyeball. Youch! They do have to be treated GENTLY.Ā If youāre a side sleeper, be prepared to lose a few early after they get ground into your pillow overnight.
Conclusion: If youāre looking at a week with multiple events, particularly ones where youāll be featured in photos, eyelash extensions might be the way to go.Ā My business partner had the awards photoshoot, a family picture photoshoot and a high-school reunion in the same week ā thatās the kind of week that makes the cost and effort worthwhile.Ā I probably didnāt need them for one photoshoot, but Iāve enjoyed batting my giant lashes for a few weeks.
Cranking (Toddler) Tunes
/in General Writing, Life, The Stiletto GangMany things change after having a baby.Ā And I have to say that one of the things that Iām the most sad to see change is the amount of music I listen to.Ā Baby nap times seem to encompass the whole dang day! I used to have iTunes running almost constantly.Ā Not that it wasnāt a battle with my husband over what to listen to.Ā No, I donāt want more Phish.Ā And thereās only so much hip-hop and Grateful Dead I can listen to before going insane. (Yes, my husband is a hippy with a secret love of 90ās R&B.Ā He compensates for this deficiency by being ruggedly handsome and having the miraculous ability to open jars and kill countless spiders.)
The interesting thing is that, aside from the specific bands, where my husband I deviate in our musical tastes is an actual love of music.Ā He loves music.Ā Phish, Dave Matthews, the Allman Brothers, and the Grateful Dead all have one thing common.Ā OK, take a toke and make that two things ā theyāre jam bands.Ā I hate jam bands.Ā Itās just giant swaths of useless music that take away from the important thing ā the lyrics.Ā I love the words. (Surprised?Ā Probably not.)Ā For me, music is like poetry with half the pretentiousness and way more shake-your-bootiliciousness.Ā And I like to play it ALL the time particularly when Iām working.Ā I find that music helps put me in the zone for writing and for design.
But with an in-home office and a baby, itās become a lot more difficult to crank the tunes through the work day.Ā I was excited when the baby hit two and it became easier to send her to daycare/babysitting and thereās only one nap to contend with, but it has also meant that sheās tons more verbal.Ā With a toddler in the house, I donāt feel quite so comfortable cranking up a few of the songs I love, like Donāt Shoot Me Santa by The Killers.Ā I am perfectly prepared to explain that boys have a penis and some people are in wheelchairs and sometimes boys marry boys and girls marry girls.Ā Butā¦ I am not at all prepared to explain why Santa is shooting that guy in the song.Ā Iām pretty sure I see headphones in my future.
***
Originally posted on 7.27.16 at The Stiletto Gang