Tag: writing tips

Tips From the Masters: Bill Fitzhugh

Bill Fitzhugh is another of my favorites who should be far better known and appreciated. And I’m far from the only one who feels that way. Maybe not quite a “cult” author, Fitzhugh decidedly commands a “niche” of rabid fans. Carl Hiaasen and Tim Courtney are among them: in fact if you ask any star of funny crime novels who they read, he’ll on their short list. If you doubt me, take a look at his website.

His humor is different from those two–and from anybody else–with a unique, rustly dryness about it. His criminals are folks like you and I who get caught up in something too awful to come to grips with and too quirky to cope with. He’s also a long-time DJ and major record collector, so music figures heavily in his books, including titles like “Highway 61 Resurfaced.” One of my favorite lines is when evil exterminators are cruising Manhattan one asks their guide if he’s sure they’re on the right street and he answers, “Positively, Fourth Street.” If you laughed, or even know why that’s funny, you should enlist in the Fitzhugh cult right away. Besides, he graduated from my own alma mater, U. of Washington. Go Huskies! Continue reading “Tips From the Masters: Bill Fitzhugh”

Tips from the Masters: Barry Eisler

Author Lin Robinson

Barry Eisler has two different claims to fame. To readers, he is the best-selling author of two exciting thriller series: the guy who doesn’t just write about heroes who are ex CIA covert ops specialists, Judo experts, international players, and start-up lawyer/operators but actually IS all those things himself. Or was at some point before coming in out of the cold to do boring things like collect awards for his work.

To indie authors, he’s a hero of another kind: one of the handful of writers like Konrath and Doctorow and Hocking and Locke who have become icons, living totems that not only testify to seismic changes in publishing, but have had a major hand in making those changes happen.

It would be hard to identify a single action that did more to light up new potential and realities for independent writers and publishers than Eisler’s decision last March to snub a half-million dollar advance from St. Martins in order to go his own way. The answer to the sneering, “Yeah, but if they offered you a big advance, you’d take it, wouldn’t you?” officially changed from “Damn straight” to “Maybe”, and that small shift put a very major crack in the monolith. Continue reading “Tips from the Masters: Barry Eisler”

Reviews Are Mixed. How To Deal by Arline Chase

Go Down, MosesQUESTION from the e-mail: I’ve always wanted to be a writer. Recently I finished my first book and got it published. Like most, I tried to promote it by getting book reviews. I got several three and four-star reviews, but many of the reviewers had a lot of negative things to say, too. Sure, they praise my story. They all like the action and suspense. But then they complain about my commas, and my “point of view,” and my characters all talking alike. I went to college. I got good grades on all my term papers, so I ought to know a little about how to write. This negative stuff is hard to hear. Half the time, I don’t even know what they’re talking about. How can there be “too many semi-colons?” You use them when they’re needed, right? Maybe I should just forget about this whole thing.

ANSWER: Good reviewers almost always talk about both the positive and negative aspects of a book. If they don’t, they are usually friends of the author who go and place a glorious, 5-star review just for friendship’s sake. So first thing I know from what you said is that these are “good, honest, unbiased” reviews, not the kind you pay for. They looked for things to pick on as well as nice things to say. That’s “fair and balanced” and tells folks right away that your reviewers are being honest with their praise. Every first novel gets hit hard by reviewers. Continue reading “Reviews Are Mixed. How To Deal by Arline Chase”

Body Parts

I am more than my eyes alone.

“Smooth and smiling faces everywhere, but ruin in their eyes.” – Jean-Paul Sartre

I did not plan on starting this week’s post about eyes. Eyes may be the windows of the soul, but how do you describe your character’s eyes or facial expression without being cliché?  A book I recently finished repeated the same phrase over and over again – “his smile never reached his eyes”. Yes, we can figure out that this person is not genuine. But, what other body parts can we use to gain insight into our character’s motivation, career opportunities, pride or self-esteem? Let’s start with a story about feet.

When we moved to Florida from New Jersey I was disappointed to realize that I could no longer indulge my habit of checking out what kind of shoes people were wearing. I love shoes. Many people in Florida don’t wear shoes – they wear flip-flops. It can be 35 degrees, and they’ll be in flip-flops. And, sadly, for some of them it doesn’t matter to them what their feet look like. Continue reading “Body Parts”