Scorching Texas temps signal fall literary events

 (Updated July 13 to include Richardson Reads One Book)

July temperatures in Texas are in the high-90’s with “feel-like” temps in the triple digits. Which is great news because – it means autumn’s on the way!

So, for the next few months, here are some literary events in the state to look forward to. But first, a couple of contest updates.

First: The Writer’s League of Texas reminds me their manuscript contest is still open. But only until July 10. Which I’m guessing means the League really, really wants to see our work. I even dug out an older manuscript, brushed it off and sent it in, with the promise of whether their editors loved it or hated the tar out of it, I’ll get feedback in September.

A couple of things in this contest were new to me, although possibly not to more recent participants. Usually, the entry form requests the first 10 pages of manuscript plus a synopsis. This time, the limit is 2,750 words INCLUDING synopsis. My advice – keep the synopsis as short as possible, using the format from my February 22, 2025, post “Writing a synopsis – the short road to a long tale.”

Check the WLT’s site for full details.

Second: Since I posted about the Laree Bryant Memorial Scholarship Contest sponsored by Dallas Mystery Writers the group has updated some of its requirements.

Previously, the contest was advertised as open to all fiction genres. DMW has now added “except erotica” to that list.  Also clarified is that entrants may not be traditionally or self-published in any form of fiction for the past year. That’s after September 5, 2025, for this year’s contest ending September 5, 2026.  Previous winners must wait three years to re-enter.

Unlike the WLT’s contest, there’s no entry fee for this one, and the winner receives a paid in full registration for the October 2026 Dallas-Fort Worth Writers Conference . Again, see my post, “Sunny days of writing & reading – plus a new writing contest,” for details. 

image from  Pixabay

Now, to upcoming events: 

Sept. 11-13: ArmadilloCon 2026, the sci-fi/fantasy/horror convention has a new hotel – Holiday Inn Austin Midtown, 6000 Middle Fiskville Rd. Other than that, it’s the same fan-run, fan-generated convention that’s been putting the “weird” in Austin since 1979.

Besides chances to hear and see favorite genre writers and artists, it includes a writers workshop on the 11^th.

Early bird adult memberships are $80 or add the writing workshop for a total of $179, including Friday lunch and membership in the rest of the convention. See th-ole site for registration and special rates for student and child memberships.

Hotel reservations at convention rates are also available, but this is the weekend for the Texas v. Ohio State football game, so the hotel expects to sell out quickly.

Sept. 15: Richardson Reads One Book, the North Texas city's municipal-wide read-a-thon, returns with New York Times best-selling author Kate Messner's The Trouble with Heroes. The story follows 13-year-old Finn Collins, who lashed out at fate following the death of his father in the COVID pandemic by vandalizing the grave of a legendary woman mountain climber. The woman's daughter offers a surprising chance at redemption--if Finn can match the climber's record while accompanied by her dog.

Free online tickets for the author discussion available starting in September. Contact the Richardson Public Library at 972-744-4100 or at richardsonreadstx@gmail.com for more information.

Messner will appear at First United Methodist Church Richardson, 503 N. Central Expressway, Richardson, at 7: 30 p.m. Sept. 15. 

Sept. 23-27: Archer City Traditional Workshop, sponsored by the Larry McMurty Literary Center . is open to writers of nearly every genre  -- fiction, nonfiction narratives, memoir, history, features (even poetry and songwriting!) at all levels of experience. At the Spur Hotel, 110 North Center Street, in Archer City, with opportunities to visit McMurtry’s former “Booked Up” bookstore and the home of the Larry McMurtry Literary Center. See the site for detailed information, itinerary and registration.

Cost: $795 by Sept. 1, $895 thereafter, $100 non-refundable deposit required upon first registration. Fee includes lodging and even meals Wednesday through Saturday. 

For hotel questions or questions about Archer City, contact Kathy Floyd at kfloyd@lmcmurtrylitcenter.org.

Sept. 30 – Oct. 4: The Larry McMurtry Literary Center also sponsors the workshop, Writing Dynamic Memoir: From Lived Experience to Gripping Story, with instructors Ronin Plank and Glenn Stout. Also at  the Spur Hotel in Archer City.

Ronit Plank is a writer, teacher and editor whose work has appeared in The Atlantic, The New York Times and numerous other venues. Glenn Stout is the author, editor or ghostwriter of more than 100 books for both adult and  juvenile audiences.

Cost: $1,395 by Sept. 1, $1,495 thereafter, with $100 non-refundable deposit. Fee includes lodging and evening meals Wednesday through Sunday. See the site (www.lmcmurtrylitcenter.org)  to register.

For hotel questions or questions about Archer City, contact Kathy Floyd at kfloyd@lmcmurtrylitcenter.org.

Oct. 3-4: DFW Writers Conference returns to the Hurst Convention Center, 1601 Campus Dr., Hurst, TX. Lots of programming and a ticket buys one chance to pitch to the agent or editor of your choice (while time permits).

Regular registration through September 20, $449. Regular one-day registration through Sept. 20, $250. Late registration Sept. 21-Oct. 1, $499 (two-day) and $299 (one-day). See the site  for registration and additional information. Or add on the pre-con Pitch Perfect Workshop, Oct.2 for $20.

Hotel reservations at the adjoining Hilton Garden Inn are also available at convention rates while space is available.

Oct. 16-18: Hay Festival Forum Dallas 2026 presents writers, musicians and activists in conversations, performances and book clubs across the Bishop Arts District in Dallas.

Limited information so far, but Hay Festival Forum Dallas will highlight over 25 artist and 30 events. Now in its eighth year, this will be the largest and most inclusive Forum yet, offering big stage conversations, workshops and book clubs in venues across the city, including The Texas Theatre, Dallas Public Library, Whose Books, Oak Cliff Assembly, and The Wild Detectives bookstore.

The bilingual program promises a world of different perspectives, celebrating the range of backgrounds, languages, and experiences represented by its guests, while bridging the border with local writing stars and headline names from further afield.

Nov. 14-15: The Texas Book Festival returns for venues at the state capitol and around Austin! Stay tuned to the site for more details.

 

Sunny days of writing & reading -- plus a new writing contest

 School's out -- what you gonna do with the kids? Sleep all day, play video games all night? Seriously?

How about a writing camp? With apologies for my lateness, registration for the Dallas Writer's Garret summer writing camps ends today, May 29. If these are for you, contact the Garret promptly!

Here are the options:

Time Trekkers -- discovering Dallas history by traveling through the city and walking its walks, ultimately creating Camp Zine from student writing. Dates: June 8-12.

Rail Riders Summer Camp -- journalism in motions, via the DART light rail system, uncovering real stories at every stop, and creating a Dallas Beat news magazine from student writing. Dates: June 22-26.

Art Quest Summer Youth Writing Camp -- creativities combing visual art with writing, with field trips to area museums including the Dallas Museum of Art and the Amon Carter Museum. Dates: July 13-17 or August 3-7.

All camps are for ages 11-14, maximum of 15 campers for each. Cost: $450 for each camp. See the Garret site for additional information and registration.

***

OK, maybe you want something free, with options for all ages? How about the Dallas Public Library's Science, Math, Art, Reading and Technology (SMART) Summer program, starting this Saturday, May 30, at multiple sites.

The free, 10-week program is aimed at encouraging Dallas residents of all ages to continue reading during the summer. Readers -- even adults -- enrolled in the program can even earn free books.

See the library site for more information, and sign up at dallaslibrary.beanstalk.org or at the Beanstalk app.

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For Richardson, Texas, residents entering grades 5-9, there's still time to sign up for the (also free) Richardson Public Library Young Authors program. Participants must be city residents with Richardson Public Library cards. (Not sure not to get a card? Ask a librarian -- they love to help!)

Registration runs through June 9, with classes through August 4.

With the help of guest speakers, including children's book author Nancy Churnin, participants will learn to write and illustrate their own picture books. They'll get one glossy, hardbound copy to keep, while a second goes into the library's permanent collection. Imagine seeing your own book on a library shelf!

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And now, for some contests. I didn't find any age limits on these, so why not encourage some of your teen writers to take a bite?

Image from Pixabay

First, the for-pay one. 

Now through July 10: Enter the Writers' League of Texas manuscript contest. This is separate from the WLT's conference. See the site for details and submission requirements. You don't need a completed manuscript, only the first 10 pages plus a synopsis. Winners in a number of fiction, nonfiction (including memoir) and children's writing categories will meet virtually with a top literary agent -- the final judge in their category -- via Zoom. All contestants, winners or not, can opt to receive a written critique from an experienced editor.

Cost: $65 for WLT members/$85 for nonmembers, which includes the critique. Or opt out of the critique and pay $25 for WLT members, $35 for nonmembers.

See the site for details.

***

And/or, if you want a contest with no entry fees (who doesn't?) take a look at the Dallas Mystery Writers updated memorial scholarship contest.

• No entry fee! And open to all fiction genres
• Entries can be submitted electronically. (I'm not sure how else you would submit them, unless you show up at a DMW meeting -- held the first Saturday of each month) to hand them over. Which could be a great start!)
• Entrants must be on the Dallas Mystery Writers mailing list. There's no charge to join the list. See the group's tech bro, James, for information.
  
• Entrants cannot be traditionally or self-published in any form of fiction for the public in the past year.
• Entrants must submit a sample of their writing, between 1000-1500 words, along with a bio of not more than 300 words which includes their writing goals.
• Deadline for entries is September 5, 2026.
• Entries must be on a double-spaced manuscript with 1-inch margins, in Times New Roman font, 12-point only, in WORD (.docx) format
• Email entries to sandysteenwrites@gmail.com
• All entries will be judged by DMW

The winner will receive a paid in full registration for the DFW Writers Conference, with a value up to $500. The scholarship will be awarded in time for the conference, October 3-4, 2026.

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Want more literary events? I like Lone Star Literary Life for its state-wide lists. Plus, still to come at this site: fall events including ArmadilloCon, the Dallas Hay Festival Forum, the Archer City Traditional Workshop (held in the hometown of great Texas writer Larry McMurtry) and the DFW Writers Conference, among others.

Some fast & furious updates: contests and conferences

 Sometime ago, I promised an update on the Writer's League of Texas manuscript contest. It's finally arrived! The contest is open now through July 10. This means winners will not be able to meet in-person with a literary agent during the WLT's 2026 Agents & Editors Conference June 26-28. More on this later.

First, though, this Saturday, April 4 is a chance to meet -- free! -- agent Sandy Lu of Book Wyrm Literary Agency. And, for writers in North Central Texas, without hours long travel.

Sandy Lu is the guest speaker at the Dallas Mystery Writers meeting, 10:15 a.m. to noon, at Olive Garden, 4240 Belt Line (at Midway) in Addison, Texas. OK, I said free, but there is a $10 fee (cash only, please bring small bills) for non-members for the program and drinks-only attendees. The fee is reduced to $5 (again, cash only) for non-members staying for lunch. The program is followed by pay-your-own lunch, or just stay and break breadsticks with fellow writers.

As far as I can tell, Lu will not be available for book pitches at the meeting but see her site or contact james@gaskin.com for additional information. 

***

Image: wikimedia commons

Back to the WLT manuscript contest. It's open for unpublished manuscripts by writers in or out of Texas, in a variety of fiction and nonfiction genres. The winner in each category will meet virtually with a top literary agent (and the final judge in their category) via Zoom. All entrants who opt for a critique, whether winners or not, will receive feedback on their submissions from an experienced editor. 

All 2026 winners and finalists will be featured in the fourth edition of the WLT Inklist, a catalog of short pitches shared with literary agents and book editors in Fall 2026.

Manuscript entry fees are $65 for WLT members/$85 for nonmembers (which includes a written critique. Fees for contestants who opt out of written critiques are $25 for WLT members, $35 for nonmembers.

Contestants may enter as many categories as they like, with up to four entries per category. Each entry requires separate payment and entry form.

Winners and finalists will be notified by mid-October 2026. Any submissions that include a critique will receive their written feedback by mid-September 2026. After winners and finalists are notified, all other submissions will receive emails of the judging results.

Again, refer to the site for additional details, formatting rules, categories, etc.

Also, see the WLT site for information about its Agents & Editors Conference in Austin, Texas, including a list of featured agents and editors. Registration: $549 for WLT members, $599 for nonmembers. Pitch/consultation sessions with literary agents and editors available for purchase as space allows. 

***

Also coming up later this year is the DFW Writers Conference, October 3-4, at the Hurst Convention Center, Hurst, Texas. Registration through September 20 is $449 for both days. Registration includes one complimentary session with a literary agent or editor. See the site for additional information and list of agents/editors so far!

Looking ahead to fall: a contest & a conference

I was ready to post about the annual DFW Writers Conference, October 4-5, when a related post hit my inbox: a contest for a scholarship to the conference.

First, because the scholarship contest deadline is September 1, here's the lowdown about it.

The scholarship is from Dallas Mystery Writers, in memory of LaRee Bryant, a founding member of the group. The scholarship's winner will receive paid-in-full registration for the 2025 DFW Conference, valued at $500, to be awarded at the September 6 meeting of the DMW.

Now for the contest rules:

• No entry fee!
• Open to all fiction genres
• Contestants must be on the Dallas Mystery Writers mailing list. There's no for joining the list. See the site and click on the link "James" -- that's James Gaskin, the group's tech coordinator. Or email him directly at james@gaskin.com
• Contestants cannot have had fiction traditionally or self-published within the last five years. This applies to both short and long-form fiction works.
• Contestants must submit a 1000-1500-word writing sample, along with a bio of not more than 300 words, to include their writing goals.
• Entries must be submitted electronically as Word (docx.) documents, double-spaced, with 1-inch margins, in 12-point Times New Roman font.
• Email entries to sandysteenwrites.@gmail.com  

All entries will be judged by the DMW Board of Directors. The deadline, again, is September 1.

LaRee Bryant was involved for more than 34 years with Dallas Mystery Writers. She was also a chapter administrator for both the Harvard Club of Dallas and the Harvard Business School Club of Dallas. See the DMW site for additional information and/or to contribute to the Harvard Clubs GoFundMe campaign to renovate LaRee's homestead.

Now, for some asides.

I'm not eligible to participate in the contest, due to recent short fiction publications. However, I hope my previous experience with this group may be helpful. 

A few years ago, I and several members submitted writing samples for evaluation by the DMW board. My sample was written in present tense. One of the board members insisted--loudly--that she couldn't even read anything written in present tense. Another simply wrote "Present tense. Ick," on my pages. The matter generated a protracted discussion in the group about how many of them detested anything written in present tense.

It's possible the prejudice about tense no longer exists. But you have now been warned. If the winner turns out to be someone who sent an entry in present tense, I'd love to hear from you!

I'm also not sure how the scholarship winner's registration to the DFW Writers Conference will be dealt with if the person had previously registered. That's probably a question to put to the conference organizers themselves.

Image: Pixabay 

So, now to the DFW Conference information.

The conference is a program of the nonprofit DFW Writers Workshop. It will be held at the Hurst, Texas, Conference Center, 1615 Campus Dr. As of this writing, the adjoining Hurst Garden Inn Dallas still has rooms available at conference rates.

 

Regular conference registration for both October 4-5 is $449 through September 21. Regular one-day registration for either day is also available through September 21 for $250. Late registration from September 22-October 2 is $499 (two-day) or $299 (one day only).

Registration includes attendance at craft and business workshops with industry professionals, one complimentary pith/consultation session with a literary agent or editor (with additional pitch sessions available for purchase), lunch with keynote speakers, and more. 

See the site for additional information and a list of agents and editors who have committed. 

The conference also hosts a pre-con workshop, "Finding Your Voice," taught by award-winning, multiply-anthologized author Ari Tiso, a member of the Bribri tribe of Costa Rica.

The pre-conference workshop is October 3, from 12:30 p.m. - 4 p.m. Attendance is $50 for conference attendees, $100 for non-attendees. See the site for additional information and registration.

What a book reviewer wants writers to know

When Dallas Mystery Writers emailed me that their August guest speaker could be a book reviewer. So, how could I resist the chance to see one of these elusive creatures in the flesh? Or at least, on Zoom?

Dallas-area reviewer Kevin Tipple blames his mother for setting him on this path at a young age, when he expressed irritation for book reviewers who got things wrong. Things like plot. Or characters.

"Well," his mom would say (or so he now claims), "you should be a book reviewer!"

 By the 1990's, he finally took his mother's advice seriously, writing actual reviews. All he needed in those pre-internet days was a place to publish them. So, he contacted his local newspaper, only to be told its editors didn't think he had enough professional experience for the business.

He kept reviewing, getting a break when Elizabeth Burton gave him an online platform on her Blue Iris Journal. Eventually, he did what everyone else did in the early 21st century -- started his own blog -- in Tipple's case, of book reviews, at https://kevintipplescorner.blogspot.com. With exposure and experience, he contacted the newspaper again, only to find it was cutting back on reviewers. Not to mention reporters, editors, and paper.

Tipple kept reviewing. He won a first-place finish for best reviewer sit in 2020 from the Critters Annual Readers Poll (of the Critters Writers Workshop) and a Goodreads badge for being among its top one percent of reviewers. Now he gets about 50 book pitches each week from authors hungry for reviews.

And here's what he wants them to know: know your reviewer! Read his/her reviews. And contact the reviewer first, in Tipple's case, at kevinRtipple@verizon.net.

As expected from a reviewer speaking at a mystery writers group, Tipple likes mysteries (he loves game warden stories!), current crime fiction, and police procedurals, preferably those whose characters have lives outside of their professions. He doesn't cozy up to cozies. And although he occasionally reviews historical mysteries, beware of sending him anything set in the 1940's with Nazis.

One thing that doesn't bother him is bad language. "I worked in retail and in education," he told Dallas Mystery Writers, and heard the f-word in both settings, "so I have no problem believing cops use it."

What Tipple wants first is a pitch -- a brief "hook and book" format similar to a back cover blurb -- "if that much," not a blow-by-blow synopsis. And definitely not the entire book or even a PDF.

If he accepts the pitch, he then prefers a print book, although he may try to obtain a copy first from his local library. He will also review e-books, although his old Kindle has died and the new one is on back order.

Image: Pixabay

Don't bother sending him pitches he will automatically delete, such as those for horror. Nothing against those who write or love to read horror, but he reads for escapism, not to be scared. Also, since the death of his wife from cancer, he can't deal emotionally with memoirs about cancer. And he's not going to argue with anyone about what he reads.

Once pitched, don't keep hounding him. Like the author "who sent me his e-book attachment 19 times in five days. And he called me Kelvin. Plus, three more variations of my name."

Authors should allow Tipple, as well as any other reviewers, time to respond. His own time frame is about six months from the time he receives a pitch until the review is published, which he believes is fairly standard, so authors who want reviews close to publication need to plan well in advance.

Still, he makes no guarantees. If he accepts a pitch, he intends to read it. But "if a book doesn't grab me pretty soon, I give up. Life is too short."

He posts reviews at his own site first, before sending them to Amazon and Goodreads. And while he's OK with authors posting his reviews on their own website, he asks that they give him credit, preferably by linking to his site.

Bringing sanity to the dreaded synopsis

I post often about writing contests and conferences, sometimes mentioning, as if an afterthought, that these may require a synopsis of our work. But how long has it been since I actually posted about the writing of the synopsis itself? After attending this month’s synopsis critique session from the Dallas Mystery Writers group, I found that writers are struggling with the same problems that bedeviled me at the time of that last post – in 2013!

So, here’s an updated version of that post now, with interjections from the recent synopsis critiques.

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My personal experience was that, after attending at least numerous panels and any number of blogs in which agents all but swore on their grandmothers’ graves that synopses were a waste of time, I had never written a synopsis worthy of the name. I’d never been taught how to do it. And like writing essays or business letters or feature articles, it’s not a format newbies can expect to toss off instinctively.

Maybe you’re thinking, hey, how can anybody who’s written three or four hundred pages of a novel be baffled by how to write a one-page summary telling what the whole thing is about? Except anyone who thinks that is not a writer who’s ever tried to cram those hundreds of pages into one.

Author/editor Sandy Steen at Dallas Mystery Writers actually gave her students more leeway than that, allowing them extra pages for character lists and elevator pitches – which will be the focus of another post.

Image: wikimedia commons

Two to three pages at most, Steen repeated. More often one page. “If the agent or editor wants it fleshed out, they’ll ask for more….It’s the concept you’re selling.”

Fortunately, Facebook friend and fellow writer Kathleen M. Rodgers had previously posted a link to “How to Write A One-Page Synopsis,” from Susan Dennard’s blog Pub(lishing) Crawl. Following Dennard’s “three rules of thumb, eleven-point method” gave me a coherent one-page (single-spaced) summary within an hour or two. I can’t guarantee this will get you offers of representation. But it saved my sanity and it can save yours.

Here are Dennard’s three rules of thumb:

 -- Don’t name more than three characters in a synopsis as short as one page: the protagonist, antagonist, and relationship character. (Steen also added that characters’ motivations, especially that of the main character should be included and very clear!) In writing my initial synopsis, I broke the three-character rule for a couple of secondary characters. With words at a premium, it took less space on a page to use a one-word name than the two-word description, “protagonist’s mother.”

-- Tell the ending. Right, spoilers and all. (This is not the “jacket blurb,” written to tease the reader. The agent/editor must know how everything fits together and that the ending is worthy of the rest of the story.)

-- Do not include sub-plots unless you have enough space. In writing my own synopsis, I bent this one for an agent who said she wanted to know if there were subplots. I sacrificed a single sentence to convey the biggest one briefly.

The eleven steps will be familiar to anyone who’s read Christopher Vogler’s The Writer’s Journey (although the nomenclature differs slightly) or any works dealing with three-act structure. They are: (1) opening image; (2) introduction to the protagonist, including his/her desire; (3) inciting incident; (4) plot point one; (5) conflicts and character encounters; (6) midpoint; (7) winning seems imminent, but. . . ; (8) black moment; (9) climax; (10) resolution; and (11) final image.

Weirdly enough, I got stuck figuring out what the midpoint was. In desperation, I thumbed halfway through my printed manuscript. And found what I needed.

If you’ve written any story at all, something major has happened halfway through the pages. If nothing leaps out at you from the exact numerical center, flip back or forward a few pages. Picking random examples from what’s on my nightstand -- it’s the place in Wuthering Heights where Catherine dies; where Tita of Like Water for Chocolate refuses the summons of her abusive mother; where the narrator of The Island of Dr. Moreau learns the extent of what the mad scientist has done. You will know the midpoint of your novel when you see it.

Susan Dennard applies this with examples from the movie Star Wars, which will also give you a much-needed laugh in her complete explanation.

***

After posting this originally in 2013, I also located a blog by fantasy writer C.J. Redwine with other tips that may not be obvious to a first-timer: Write in present tense, in third person, in the same font as your novel, and mimic the pacing of your novel.

In general, a one-page synopsis will be single-spaced and longer synopses double-spaced. However, be sure to read the agent’s or editor’s instructions. For instance, I recently was asked to submit a 300-word synopsis with double spacing.

***

And, oh, yes, I’ve also posted cavalier mentions of query letters and pitches. Stay tuned for more on these topics as conference season gets into full swing!

A path through the wilderness of literary publication

Blake Kimzey felt a strange sense of homecoming when he addressed this month’s meeting of the Dallas chapter of Mystery Writers of America on “Writing Out of the Wilderness: Surviving Rejection & Forging a Path to Publication.” Yes, he was a writer speaking to other writers, but the feeling also stemmed from the meeting’s location – an Olive Garden restaurant – a Texas twin of the one in Iowa where he honed his writing skills while working as a waiter.

“I would write stories in the wait station,” he told his audience, while observing his customers.

He came to know the regulars, in many cases, “well, there’s not really a nice way to say this – meth heads –” while dishing out their favorite order, minestrone soup, “because it was all they could afford and all many of them could eat,” given the toll their drug habits had taken on their teeth.

Some of them would inspire his stories.

Sure, Kimzey would go on to take creative writing classes, earn an MFA, see scores of his short stories published, and founded Writing Workshops Dallas  – among other literary accomplishments. But he was standing in front of a group of writers and would-be writers to tell us that if he could practice writing as a chain-restaurant worker, we too could find our way through the writing wilderness. 

 “I think there’s far too much pessimism when it comes to writing and publication,” he said, attempting to demystify the process of publication with “practical steps you can take in the face of insurmountable rejection.” 

image: pixabay

Yes, rejections will come, but the good news is there’s a way through them, and “you can start this journey sitting in the chairs you’re in right now!”

How? Just as when we write, our characters must have both an overall goal and lower-order goals, so must we as writers. 

“It’s a mystifying process to go from dreaming about being in Barnes & Noble to actually getting there, but that was my goal when I realized I wanted to be a writer,” Kimzey said. (And admitted, “I’m still trying to get there.”)

So, the overall goal is being published in a major brick and mortar bookstore, but the lower-order goals are simpler:

·       Read diversely

“Reading out of your genre shows you so many ways to do it.” (Although Kimzey recommends “more novels and less how-to books, for examples of craft he teaches Benjamin Percy's volume Thrill Me: Essays on Fiction.)

·       Write regularly

His daily goal is a modest 250 words – approximately one page. “By the time I get there, I can blow past that!”

·       Study the process

“Who is your favorite author? What publisher would be best for your work? Check your favorite authors websites, Twitter accounts and Facebook pages What replicable steps have you identified? Apply them before you’re ready for publication.” Make yourself “findable” via your own website and social media accounts. “Twitter is a living resume. If you’re not using it that way, you doing it wrong.”

·       Reach out to other people trying to do the same thing

And, oh yeah:

·       Welcome rejection

“Rejection slips are your receipts,” proof that you’re trying. “Everybody’s goal should be to get 100 rejections over a year.”

And how to collect those rejection receipts (as well as some acceptance receipts)? 

Check out the possibilities, he advised. Publications such as New Pages and The Review Review, which can review stories you do manage to publish, as well as Duotrope  and agent listings in Publishers Marketplace and Poets & Writers. 

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As always when I post about wonderful writing seminars and workshops, this is only the barest dip into Kimzey’s discussion. For more, consider signing up for some of the many workshops he directs at Writing Workshops Dallas. Or ask your writing group’s program leader to bring him onboard for smaller group presentations.

Writing beyond character stereotypes and clichés

I heard author Melissa Lenhardt speak to the Dallas Mystery Writers this month about avoiding clichés when writing women characters. The next week at the DFW Writers Conference, journalist/novelist Richard J. Gonzales addressed the art of writing diverse characters without resorting to stereotypes. Their words struck such resonant notes, I imagined them as a sort of literary duet. 

Lenhardt sounded the first notes. Intrigued--rather, infuriated--by a male writer’s claim that he could write in a woman’s voice, she led the group through a writing exercise designed to strip away our cultural stereotypes about women. If some of the men in her audience were uncomfortable, so perhaps were some of us women. 

“(Stereotypes) weren’t done intentionally,” Lenhardt said. “Women are guilty sometimes also. I’m not talking just about men.”

As Gonzales noted, “We all have implicit biases. It’s a human condition. The problem is, it sneaks into your writing. When you focus on the stereotypes as if that’s all there is, that’s when you fall down.”

image: pixabay

And although literature needs more stories by women and more stories by writers of color, of differing sexual orientations, of people with disabilities, and by writers with multitudes of different points of view, this doesn’t mean we can’t write from the viewpoint of people different from us, in whatever way that may be.

“How do you write about people who are not the same color as you? Why do it?” Gonzales asked. “Our population is becoming increasingly diverse and more complex. This is the market of the future. If you continue writing for Dick and Jane, your audience gets smaller and smaller.”

And for those who ask, “But am I qualified or capable to write about them?” he assured us, “Absolutely. Put your guilt outside the room. You are first and foremost writers. Not white writers or black writers.”

He might well have said, and not male writers or female writers.

The problem arises “when you focus on stereotypes as if that all there is,” he said, citing the popularity of films such as Black Panther that “flip stereotypes on their heads.”

Exactly, Lenhardt said. “I started writing (Westerns) because I wanted to write what I wanted to read, to go against the tropes of the genre.” 

Beginning her research with her father’s VHS collection of Western movies and TV shows, she found herself intrigued but wanting “to write a story about the women who were left behind to defend the fort while the men were out looking for Indians. . . Writing to break tropes is embedded in who I am as a writer.

“Make your woman (character) an individual. Don’t relate everything she does to a guy,” Lenhardt said. 

Similarly, Gonzales’ advice was not to make characters of color mere adjuncts of white characters. And just as no characters—especially diverse ones—should be all bad, don’t make them all good either. It’s a mistake even accomplished writers can make, possibly from fear of either frightening white readers or offending minority readers, Gonzales said, citing the “magical negro” stereotype. 

(I'll add, there are also "magical Native American, Asian, female, child, mentally-disabled, etc. characters. Many of whom die in the course of the story).

And about those deaths, Lenhardt said. Does it always have to be the minority character? Does it always have to be the female character? 

“There’s got to be a prize for books that don’t have females as the victims,” Lenhardt said, encouraging us “to write books that don’t show women as victims.” Or, she added, facetiously (or not) “Just make it even. If you’re going to kill women, kill men too.”

(Note to readers—Lenhardt writes crime as well as historical fiction.)

And just as white writers can pander to sexual fears about characters of color, male and sometimes even female writers can feel compelled to soften cultural fears of powerful women by presenting women in in only sexualized ways.

The male writer whose hubris provoked Lenhard’s discussion featured a woman who sexualized herself. Can we imagine a man doing the same for himself? Lenhardt asked. Instead of writing a woman character who’s sexually confident, it’s all to easy to degenerate into a male sexual fantasy.

Her strongest advice—especially if you’re a male writer attempting to write from a female point of view, “don’t ever describe a woman’s breasts. You’re probably describing boobs we don’t have and it’s just going to piss us off.”

(Definitely nervous twitters from the men in her audience at that advice!)

And skip anything that sounds like “rape culture.” “There are ways to signal sexual interest in a way that don’t sound rapey,” she said.

“When a woman beta reads your story and says something is horrifying, you need to freaking believe her. This also counts for African-Americans, Hispanics, fat people and disabled people.”

If writers are uncomfortable with their women characters--or perhaps their minority characters--Gonzales asked us to remember that “for us minorities, we live in a world where we have to negotiate the majority’s norms. How comfortable is that for us? Everyday?”

But discomfort doesn’t have to be the norm. “What we write affects how we see the world,” Lenhardt said. “Write for the world we want, not the world we have.”

For further resources on writing diverse characters, Gonzales lists “We Need Diverse Books,”“Writing with Color,” “Writing with Diversity Resources,” "DiversifYA,” "Why Diverse Genre Fiction is Important and How to Get it Right," and "Why Diverse Genre Fiction is Important and How To Get it Right."

The time of clocks & emotions & the space between

The title of Suzanne Frank’s talk at this month’s meeting of Dallas Mystery Writers was “Writing in 4D.” “Did you think that was a typo?” the head of SMU’s creative writing program asked her audience of writers. “I have written mystery, time travel and women’s fiction,” she said, declaring that she wanted to bring multidimensional lessons from those multiple genres to bear on any form of fiction writing.

And although Frank’s talk spanned second, third and fourth “dimensions” of writing, it was the 4D one that particularly resonated for me. In physics, the fourth dimension is usually considered to be time. In fiction, it’s also time, but not necessarily “chronos” time, the time of the ticking clock variety.

Instead, Frank prefers to concentrate on the emotional component of time, the “kairos” moments. It was a concept I’d heard years before, during a workshop the late Lisa Lenard-Cook presented, based on her book, The Mind of Your Story, (discussed here) in which she advocated harnessing the chronological time, the series of constant, measurable moments she termed the story’s “every-ticking present” and emotional time – the way the characters feel about those moments. 

It’s those life-defining kairos moments, interrupting the passage of the chronos moments of ordinary time, that Frank emphasized. The ones she calls, “Coca-Cola moments,” from her first recognition of this following the death of her grandfather.

image: pixabay

“My grandfather broke his leg, went into the hospital, and died. He and my grandmother had a lifetime romance.” 

A tragic but all-too-common end to a long relationship, a few moments out of trillions in chronological time. But in this case, marked by a moment that became family legend as the bereaved grandmother, exhausted and sweltering in her black mourning clothes in the heat of a Texas summer day exclaimed, “I’d give $100 to anyone who gets me a Coca-Cola.”

And for that moment, time shifted from the ever-ticking present to an eternal kairos in which the grandmother’s cry of grief and physical anguish would be suspended for generations. And then, as always in our human condition, melded seamlessly again into chronological time.

Every life has those defining moments. And so must every character if there’s any hope of readers care for her. 

Frank challenged her audience not just to recount their character’s progress through events, but to understand how those events define the character. 

“Everybody has 12 defining moments. If you ask a 6-year-old, they’ve got 12 defining moments. If they’re 60, they’ve also got 12,” although not necessarily the same 12, she said, urging us to remember those 12 moments for ourselves and notating them both in kairos and chronos time. 

“In a book, you are trying to stuff in as many kairos moments as you can, because you’re trying to stop time for your readers. We’re trying to consolidate a life into a book. This is the fourth dimension, because you’re moving through time. I think this is the thing that brings the most magic to fiction.”

And it occurred to me that the definitive, time-suspending nature of the kairos moments were also the essence of Benjamin Percy’s discussion of “Set Pieces: Staging the Iconic Scene,” in his book on fictional craft, Thrill Me, reviewed earlier at this site. 

“What do you remember when you think about the films splintered into your psyche?" Percy writes. "There are probably several pivotal scenes—scenes of spectacle, scenes of horror or joy or absurdity or shock or profound empathy—that you cannot forget.

“Riffle through the catalog of literature and something similar will occur…those moments that exist like dreams—or life, if only life could be so full.”

Find them, use them, and give them their due, without worrying about getting to the next plot point, Frank said. “Your readers don’t want to get to the next thing. They want to be there.”

 ***

Given that Frank is head of SMU’s creative writing program, she did dwell on a few moments of chronos time, including an upcoming information program at 7 p.m., May 22 on SMU’s programs, including an upcoming workshop in Taos, New Mexico, “The mystery of writing a mystery.”

Conveniently, this will give writers interested in writing mysteries time to prepare before the World Mystery Convention, Bouchercon arrives in Dallas Halloween weekend of next year!

The information program in SMU’s Dallas Hall, but Frank recommends registering for it, to get the perk of a parking pass on the university campus. For registration and additional information, see SMU’s creative writing site. 

At the bottom of the deepest circle of revision hell

The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference. – Elie Wiesel

We have met the enemy, and he is us. -- Pogo

Finally, on our writer’s quest for redemption from The Seven Deadly First Page Sins (as devised by author/editors Tex Thompson and Laura Maisano), we have reached the end. That’s right, the lowest depths of revision hell. And the good news, once we reach bottom, there’s nowhere to go but up!

In Dante’s version of hell, the lowest circles were occupied not by the most lecherous or violent. Those sins, although deadly, he considered the ones most tied to our earthly, bodily nature. He reserved the lowest depths for the fraudulent, the seducers, the flatters. Those who sinned against our intellect, with the devil at the very bottom. Thompson and Maisano call their writerly version of these ultimate intellectual sins, the sins of indifference. Although the sinners of Dante were without hope, there is redemption for even the worst sins of a writer’s craft. But writer beware – the sins of indifference are the most difficult to repair.

In the interest of knowing the enemy (especially when she is us), Thompson/Maisano name the sins of indifference clichés, confusion and – worst and deadliest of all – boredom.

The problem with clichés is, they once worked so well! Like Lucifer, they originally bore the aspect of angels. Some were quick and easy forms of shorthand that packed a lot of information into small packages. Is that crystal clear? Plain as the nose on your face? Does it make you mad as a hatter? Do we even know what these tired phrases mean anymore? 

Some flattered us into the sins off excess with the lure of genre-specific clichés – endless, and endlessly trite descriptions of magic, romance, or bad behavior. 

image: pixabay

Some will try to insert themselves into any genre. Anyone who wants the full course on writerly sins will need to contact Thompson/Maisano (or have your writing group leader do so), so I’ll only provide snippets from their list of the tired but still filthily sinful “dirty dozen” of opening page clichés: character waking up, character addressing the audience, dream sequence, flash forward to something actually interesting from much later in the story (annoying prologue syndrome). 

Stop! I can hear readers crying. Didn’t Metamorphosis (1915) open with a character waking up? Didn’t David Copperfield (1850) and Catcher in the Rye (1951) open with a character addressing the audience? Didn’t Rebecca (1938) open with a dream sequence (not to mention flashing forward to an interesting event later in the story)? And weren’t they successful, now classic, tales?

Remember though, clichés weren’t born that way. They were tactics so brilliant that everybody and her dog used them. Only not so brilliantly. Notice the dates on those original stories – none of them are recent. And a century after Copperfield, the direct address to readers had become so banal that Catcher had to make a deliberate attempt to subvert it. Daphne du Maurier gets additional mileage from her dream opening in Rebecca by telling us directly that it’s a dream, not pulling any tricks. And though it’s also a flash forward, there’s actually even more interesting stuff in the book than the fate of an old mansion.

And for everyone whose critique group has told them never to open with a character waking up, I’ve got to say that waking up to find yourself transformed into a giant insect has got to be out of the ordinary course of a character’s life. It makes me wonder what Kafka’s critique group had to say about it.

Still, before anyone becomes too discouraged, Thompson/Maisano urge us to be as hopelessly dull and cliched as we like on our first drafts. Then . . . do something else.

“Take your first, second, and third ideas and place them carefully in the garbage!”

Clichés, though, aren’t the only sins of indifference. There’s also confusion (who did what to who and where and when?) Leaving questions in a reader’s mind can be a good thing. Or a bad thing.

Good if it makes the reader wonder what comes next, or whether the character will get what she wants, or even wonder what’s in that strangely shaped, ticking parcel? Questions go bad when the reader can’t picture the scene, doesn’t know who’s speaking, or who did what to whom.

And finally, the baddest of the bad, the greatest writerly sin of indifference is . . . boredom. 

Speaking to a meeting of Dallas Mystery Writers, Thompson warned that there is no way to completely boredom-proof a story. There will always be somebody who just doesn’t get it, just doesn’t care. We can, however, make our stories boredom-resistant, by providing them with a unique character, a daunting task, a strange place or thing, an intriguing mystery or an unexpected reversal. 

There’s not room in the opening pages for us to do justice to them all. Pick one and do it well. And save the rest for the rest of the pages of our book.

(Coming – revision doesn’t always need to be hell. One author/editor finds it the part of writing he enjoys most.)

Middle circles of revision hell: when excess turns deadly

Dante dubbed the middle circles of his map of hell the spots reserved for those who committed sins of violence and ambition. Populated by both hoarders and wasters, the wrathful and the sullen, the middle circles teemed with monsters.

In their modern take, writers/authors Tex Thompson and Laura Maisano term these mid-regions, more appropriately I think, the place for sins of excess. And while Dante adopted “abandon all hope” as the motto engraved over the gates, Thompson and Maisano undertake to guide writers bent on revision through these pitfalls and past the monsters waiting to snatch the unwary writers in their version of The Seven Deadly First Page Sins.

Even without a guide, writers can guess that the sins of the middle circles of writerly revision hell include excessive description. No matter how lovely it seems, too much description can be as deadly to readers as a Roman emperor’s shower of roses was to his dinner guests.

image: Wikipedia 

Assuming we’ve already checked our manuscripts for the early circle sin of wordiness, what else can we do when description pours forth in torrents from our pens (or word processors)? Taking as her example the classic “dark and stormy night” of Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Thompson urged us to find the key nouns, the most evocative verbs, and rewrite our Bulwer-esque passages to create a single powerful image.

Does this mean no adjectives? No adverbs? Not at all. But modifiers need to be used thriftily (no hoarding, no wasting!)

Middle circle sins also include excessive exposition (backstory), with each literary genre providing its unique temptations. Fantasy and science fiction allure us to expound on the history of wizards, wars and weaponry. Romance tells tempts us to describe the charms of the plain but alluring heroine. Crime fiction sneers that what we really need are paragraphs-long descriptions of mutilated bodies.

That last brings us to another sin of excess – too much action. I’m tempted to add, too much violent action. And that’s not just fights, but chases, heists, sex, and high-stakes games.

Wait, how can you have too much action? Aren’t we writers constantly told to open with the protagonist doing something? That action is how characters show us their, well, character? And aren’t all the too-much actions the basis of every James Bond movie’s opening sequence.

The answer is yes, but. Yes, we need action but too much can actually keep readers from caring about the character.

My personal test: although I love thrillers, if somebody is thrown off a cliff on the first page – and yes, I’ve seen this – the book goes back on the shelf, unread and unbought.

James Bond has earned the freedom to open with a James Bond sequences because audiences already love him. He’s paid his dues, and we know once he’s gone through his obligatory opening calisthenics, the real story can begin. As writers, our job is to make our audiences love our characters as much as they do 007.

How is a writer to know when she’s fallen into these sins of excess? One test, while we still have movies in mind, is whether her opening scene is filmable. If there’s too little happening, the problem may be excess description.

If, however, the opening scene is all choreography – only a list of actions – the writer has fallen into the sin of excessive action.

Characteristic reader reactions to sins of excess vary from “I didn’t know what the character wanted” to “exciting, but I didn’t really care” and even, “I skimmed/skipped ahead.”

“It’s a good idea to make your first chapter a sampler platter of what’s to come,” Thompson told her audience at the recent meeting of Dallas Mystery Writers. Some character, some action, some description. Don’t overload on any single ingredient!

Writerly redemption can be achieved by starting where the story actually starts (goodbye backstory!), provoking readers’ curiosity, and focusing on the unusual or unexpected in descriptions of people, persons or things. Use actions and descriptions that reveal character instead of concealing it.

(Are we ready yet to confront the lowest of the low? After we’ve shed the sins of the upper and middle circles of hell, prepare for the worst of all writing craft sins!)

Finding our way through revision hell: the early circles

Writers sometimes think Dante didn’t have anything on them. Instead of descending into hell, he should have tried revising a book, we say. Although considering that he wrote books, maybe he did have some experience in the hellish nature of revision. Maybe that even gave him insight into deviously devilish methods of torture. Or at least of all the sins writerly flesh is heir to. 

But while Dante had the poet Virgil as his guide to the underworld, writers – at least those of us in Texas – have our own local guide to the underworld of writing – Tex Thompson. Energetic, cheerful, and outrageously hatted, Thompson was willing to share her take on The Seven Deadly First Page Sins with a recent meeting of the Dallas Mystery Writers.

Warning – the next few posts are only the low-calorie version of the program developed by Thompson and fellow writer/author Laura Maisano, who I wrote about last year in “What’s so hard about book 2: sequels, series and spin-offs”. You’ll have to persuade your writers group to let either Thompson or Maisano speak if you expect to receive the complete program. But who ever said revision was easy?

Dante opened his Inferno with an admission that he had lost his way in the dark woods of life. But how does a writer know she’s lost her way in the hundreds of pages of her novel?  And of all those pages, how to tell if it’s the first pages that led her astray?

image: Wikimedia commons

Hint: if your critique partners or the doomed strangers you press your book upon say the opening feels like throat clearing or has too much backstory, or if it just plain leaves them bored, prepare to plunge into the abyss.

Dante mapped sins onto a map of descending badness – from the sins of the flesh, through the sins of violence to the ultimate in badness – sins of fraud, with you know who at the very bottom. However, “In writing,” Thompson assured us with determined cheeriness, “all sins are equally bad.” 

Some of them, though, are easier to fix. 

Sins of the flesh are those things we’re all guilty of – the things we evolved to do, but then took to excess. In life, we know their fixes are easy. Push away from the table, take a walk, don’t be a grabber.

The Thompson/Maisano writerly stand-ins for those sins of the flesh are the sins of sloppiness. All too human/writerly, yes. But like sins of the flesh, they’re the first things readers/editors/agents see, the things visible even on that dreaded first page, and therefore, the first excuses they have to throw out books/manuscripts/queries into the reject pile.

These include sins of carelessness -- misspellings, weird capitalizations – or not, punctuation errors, grammatical errors. Stuff there’s no excuse for, given the number of word processing programs dedicated to spotting them and marking these sins with those little squiggly underlinings. And sins of wordiness.

 A basic Microsoft Word program will catch most if not all of the sins of carelessness. Although oriented more toward business use than literature, even when I get annoyed by it, it still makes me think. Some audience members also suggested Grammarly as a more story-oriented program. Another mentioned the Hemingway app. Thompson’s suggestion was to try more than one program in tandem.

For the  “wordiness” issue, we’ll have to rely more on our own eyes, avoiding as much as possible distancing words such as “he thought” that come between our readers and our characters; and eliminating easy inferences – stuff the reader can figure out for herself; unnecessary detail; and repeated/redundant references. 

Just as, with fleshly sins, we can’t stop overeating if we haven’t already satisfied our healthy hunger, remember not to become fixated on correcting writer sins of carelessness or wordiness in a first draft. Before that happens, we’ll have run our eyes as well as our writing programs over them.

And remember – redemption is possible!

(Next time – revising the writerly sins of excess)