Ask Daphne!: May 2008 Archives

Back from the beach, with a pile of emails and posts to get all caught up on, more reading still to do (although I got through ALL the books I brought with me to read). Also, that guy in the picture? Not so cute up close and personal. Not that I actually saw him, happily, but I certainly FELT him, and the gauze wrapped around my arm to keep me from scratching where he stung me is a constant reminder, in case I forget (Unlikely!). But on to the important stuff -- all sorts of news and updates!

• Alyson Noel will be speaking TODAY at the Fontana Library in Fontana, CA at 4pm. If you're in the area, please stop by! More details on her blog.
• Newsweek has a fascinating article on teens reading that you should check out. One of the best parts? "Young-adult fiction (ages 12-18) is enjoying a bona fide boom with sales up more than 25 percent in the past few years, according to a Children's Book Council sales survey." The issue of Entertainment Weekly I brought with me on vacay also had a take on this, in an article about teens taking over pop culture.
• An editor I happen to like and respect has a great post up on his blog about submissions, and touches on the issue of The Fear in blogging. What can you write if you're scared it will come back and bite you? How does that influence your blogging?
• A very funny post from Justine Larbalestier on crazy writers. What are your methods for writing that seem strange to others?

Ok, that's good for now. I still have even more reading to do, contracts to go over, emails to answer, and books to reshelve.

Friend-of-the-blog Jean O. writes,

I have heard a lot of smack talk about using the present tense when writing a novel. Yet, I see it used frequently in chick lit and find that it works quite well for me as a reader. (I also favor using this tense along with the first person point of view in my own writing). Is this tense (and point of view) something that agents are on the lookout for or secretly despise? I assume it is okay (if used well) in something like chick lit, but what about other genres? Are there some no-no rules when it comes to tenses and point of view and if so, are they genre related?

First of all, Jean, thanks again for writing in. I don't presume to imagine that I can answer ALL of anyone's questions in one go, so feel free to keep those emails coming!

As for tense and P.O.V., I can only speak for myself when I say I'm not aware of any hard-and-fast rule. Your choice of tense and point of view for your novels and your characters ought to be a reflection of the story's voice, and not what any one reader thinks you should use. I find present tense does work well in chick lit because it's a sort of immediate feeling, as if the protagonist is telling the story to the reader as it happens. This may be why first person p.o.v. works so well for it. But you can use that same sense of immediacy in any genre, if that's the feeling you're going for.

If you want the reader to have a longer perspective on things, then past tense works well with either first or third person p.o.v.. I'll admit, I'm not a personal fan of second person p.o.v., mostly because I have yet to see it done very well, and I've seen it too many times done poorly.

But now, I'm not sitting here wishing to find a great third person, present tense novel. I'm looking for a great novel, yes, (and lots of them!) but tense and p.o.v. aren't my first considerations. Hope that helps!

Shannyn writes:

What exactly do you consider women's fiction? Are you lumping all romance categories into that? Or are you looking for the non-romance genre fiction?

Hi Shannyn! I'll admit I'm cheating a bit by saying Women's Fiction. The fact is, 80% or so of all fiction IS women's fiction, if only because women are the primary buyers of books. But "Women's Fiction" is also a handy code. Yes, it means romance, to a big degree, but it also includes non-genre titles, or authors that have stepped out of genre to cross over to a general readership. A book by Jodi Picoult may include a love interest, but it's not typically considered straight romance. Likewise, anything by Nora Roberts is likely going to include some steamy sex scenes, but there's a lot of plot and adventure as well. James Patterson, though I'm loathe to admit it, writes a lot of women's fiction. Tom Clancy -- not so much.

So, for me, "Women's Fiction" is pretty much anything you can think of, assuming it's not overwhelmed by military jargon or politics. It has a strong female protagonist and a driving plot.

Hope that helps!

Thanks to Rexroth for this link to Cory Doctorow on BoingBoing, talking about YA sections in bookstores. He writes:

Living in a space that no one watches too closely is one of the secret ways that people get to do excellent stuff.

So take that, Kirkus! And here's to writers doing excellent stuff.

It is May 1st, and it's snowing, of course, so why wouldn't I choose this day to try to get some important errands done? But driving around this morning in the snow got me thinking about inspiration, and how it truly can come from just about anywhere (and it's usually not sign-posted).

Then again, sometimes it is! I was in the car the other day with Rexroth and passed a small road sign, barely above the level of my window, that read "Elite Cheerleaders Wanted -- All Ages", followed by some details about auditions. Well, my little mind just went to town. Combine that with the song "1985" that I'd recently heard on my iPod, and a novel burst into my head almost fully formed, about a housewife/mom who misses her heyday of high school cheerleading, sees such a similar sign, and makes the team, leading them to championships. It's like "Bring It On" meets "Desperate Housewives." Or something. (First person who writes up said story and queries me gets an automatic request for a full!)

Inspiration can strike anywhere, whether it's something you're watching on tv (did anyone else catch "High School Confidential? So heartbreaking at times!), something you see out of the corner of your eye, something you read that pulls you to consider a topic in a different way, or something that just comes to you in the middle of the night with a "Eureka!" moment. But that's not all you need. Once that inspiration strikes, you still need to DO something about it. Write your idea down, first of all. If you don't have a pen and paper, text yourself your idea! Don't just count on being able to remember it later (a nod to Arthur A. Levine's keynote at this weekend's SCBWI conference outside Seattle). Push through a first draft, when it seems like inspiration was so long ago, and all you have now is perspiration. Keep going. Revise, revise, revise.

Put it in a drawer for a few weeks/months/ages if you have to, until you can pull it out again, read it, and feel that inspirational tug once more.