Dream Writer’s Retreat

Laura Highcove

So my Dream Writer’s Retreat is the Writing Excuses Cruise. I love cruises, so I think that would be a great place to have a retreat. I don’t even particularly care where the cruse goes as long as it’s pretty.

I would have gone this year, but it ended up being in Europe and Brandon Sanderson is not going. As such, I decided that the travel costs were just not worth it. I hope that the cruise will be back in the US next year and that Brandon will be going so I can check off ‘Meeting Brandon Sanderson’ from my bucket list, as well as going on my first writer’s retreat.

An Agent

Laura Highcove

Let’s see, if we’re talking about what I’d want in an ideal agent, I’d certainly like to have someone who is a geek of some variety who knows shows like Psych, Grimm, Lucifer, and those written by Joss Wedon. Bonus points for a gamer/otaku.

I don’t have a particular level of experience needed (ie, I can be their first client), but I would like an agent who is as dedicated to doing their job as I am and has the support of a good agency.

I’d also like an agent who doesn’t try and pigeon-hole me. I’d pretty well in love with fantasy, but I don’t want to have to write the same type of novel all the time. I want to keep growing and expanding.

I also want an agent who doesn’t just see me as a dollar-sign. I mean I’m all for us both to making money, that’s the game, but I want an agent who can help me with concerns as well as helping me progress in my career. I just work better with people when I don’t feel like I have to hide my problems.

And above all, I want to work with someone who loves my writing and wants to see it published as much as I do.

Dedication Page

Laura Highcove

I like the prompts I’ve been using this month for these posts because many of them make me think about things that I didn’t think about before.

The dedication page is one of those. I feel like a dedication page is really dedicated to the person/people who meant the most to you during the writing of the book. So much so that you want to dedicate the book and the idea of the book to them. If I was entirely truthful, I would dedicate The Storyteller to myself, just because of what it means to me as a book. I’m not sure that any other story I write will mean quite this much to me. But I’m pretty sure dedicating a book to yourself is like thanking yourself in an acceptance speech, bad form.

Then I had the idea of what I really want the dedication of this book to be:

To Abigail

For everything you have suffered.

It could be a rather massive spoiler, but because of the nature of this book, I think it is the most appropriate dedication I could come up with. Even if it is bad form.

Character Creation

Laura Highcove

I don’t really plan my characters. I may have a vague idea that I need a character in a certain place and they might be kinda like this. But I never know my characters until I write them. I consciously put more of myself in Tabitha than any other character I’ve written in the past. And even that didn’t happen until I had written a lot of her already. In fact I remember the specific place where Tabitha shoved her personality in my face.

It was a similar situation with Wildrose, in that he ended up being a lot like my husband unintentionally, and later I put more pieces of my husband in there. At the same time he is himself.

And some characters come more easily than others. The Huntsman was the most difficult character for me in this novel. I literally did not pin him down until several drafts in. He was going to be the huge gruff guy, then the comedic relief, and who knows what else. He flopped all over the place until he finally settled where he is.

In general, I don’t think I ever look at a character or a person and set out to write any of my characters based on them. It just drifts that way as I go, but then I am a discovery writer. I am convinced that those characters just exist in my brain and I write until I pull enough of them out.

Writer Swag

Laura Highcove

Writer Swag is not really something I’ve given a lot of thought to. In fact I had sort of ignored the concept until I went to the Roanoke Author Invasion this past weekend. I really paid attention to what people had on their tables and what it did, or didn’t do, to draw me in.

First of all are the books themselves. You’re going to have an opinion about the cover first and foremost. Some covers drew me in, others did not. Same with the large banners behind the tables.

Some tables had free swag like candy, bookmarks, and fliers. The pieces that I liked the most were the free swag that had a description of the book on it. There were several books in which I was in interested that I didn’t pick up while I was there, and with a description I will remember what I liked about it more easily in case I decide to go back.

Another thing I found interesting were the tables that also had other bits of the writer’s hobby displayed for sale, like jewelry or things like that, which I thought was also interesting because it can be another talking point.

Then there are the authors themselves, they were bright and friendly. That isn’t exactly swag, but it is an important part of drawing people to your books.

As a Reviewer

Laura Highcove

So about a half a year ago, I sat down and tried to figure out what it was I liked about the books, TV, and movies that I loved. It was a rather eye opening experience and ever since then my method of reviewing books that I don’t like has drastically changed.

The biggest step in this process came when I started reading A Wise Man’s Fear by Patrick Rothfuss. I had finished The Name of the Wind with an overall …meh. I was torn because by all accounts that book was an amazing, raving success that will change the face of fantasy for years to come. So why didn’t I like it?

I got about a quarter of the way into A Wise Man’s Fear and realized with startling clarity, that I didn’t care about any of the characters. The world Rothfuss created was beautiful and deep, the magic system intricate and believable, and the writing smooth and poetic. But when I realized I didn’t care what happened to Kvothe, or any of his friends/allies, I put the book down as dnf.

Now, I find I can more easily decide to mark a book dnf because if what I enjoy in a book is not there, then there’s no reason for me to finish it. At the same time, I am aware that just because that book doesn’t have what I enjoy doesn’t mean it’s a bad book and it doesn’t mean the author is a hack (In fact I think Rothfuss is awesome, and I would love to meet him some day and/or read his next series.) it just means I didn’t like the book. I just wish more people could understand this concept.

Kill Your Darlings

Laura Highcove

It is a common phrase said to writers, to ‘Kill Your Darlings’. Basically what it means is that sometimes a writer writes something that they just love. A character, a scene, a line that is just amazing. Only that thing either doesn’t improve the story, or in some cases, drags it down. Only the writer doesn’t want to get rid of it because it’s just so cool. This makes it hard to admit to yourself that you need to get rid of it.

I had (at least) one such darling in The Storyteller. Tabitha is going into the Huntsman’s castle to look for the sword. In the first version of the story it read like this:

Tabitha marched toward the castle doors. They opened easily at her touch. She did not let herself hesitate on entering the magical castle. The doors thudded shut behind her.

“Should we have warned him about the demons?” the Man in Black asked, glancing at the Wizard.

“He didn’t ask.”

I even got positive feedback from early readers about those last two lines. And I loved them. And those darlings stuck around until Draft 9 when I finally admitted to myself (because I knew before that, but I was clinging to those lines) that for the rest of the book the narrator sticks right on top of Tabitha, and having any narration when Tabitha is not in the room just doesn’t work. On top of that, while it’s a nice sting, that information is not necessary. Tabitha runs into a demon in the next scene.

It still hurt to delete those words though.

Awesome Writing Moments

Laura Highcove

I am a discovery writer. When I was young I would sit down with nothing but a vague idea and the world and characters would pop out as I wrote. Now that I’m older, and have more skill, I tend to have some of the story itself planned out, maybe vague ideas for the world and characters before I start, but for the most part I can’t plan too much or I flounder.

And I love being a discovery writer because of how those ideas seem to come from nowhere. I get ideas for stories from all over the place, but when I am in the process of writing, I just write my characters doing things or stuff about the world and that random stuff turns out to be super important later in the story. It basically feels like magic, like my brain is working on a higher level and puts things together without me realizing it. Moments like these are always awesome writing moments.

For example: I had Tabitha like apples. I’m pretty sure it started out that way because her kingdom is always in autumn, and apples are a fall crop. Later I realized the apples were part of a very important plot point.

It is this ability for my mind to make these connections that gives me a lot of comfort when I’m writing and feel like I have no idea where I’m going. I’ve learned to trust myself. One of my mantras is: “There is a way all of this will make sense, I just have to find it.”

Cover Art

Laura Highcove

As much as my logical brain wants to claim that cover art on a book isn’t important, it really is. Most of the books I have picked up cold were either by an author I already knew or the cover art grabbed me (and the back cover copy was interesting after that).

At the same time I’ve read about how, in traditional publishing, the author has very little to no say in what the cover looks like. Most publishers will work with an author if they really hates the cover, but they’re under no obligation to. On top of that, the cover art doesn’t always accurately represent the insides of the book. The publishers are trying to make a sale, not show a scene.

Which makes me nervous, in a genre where it’s popular to put women in revealing clothing/armor, I really really don’t want Tabitha to end up looking like a girl on the cover. I feel like that would defeat the point. Maybe I’ll get lucky and my cover art will be a close up of an eye or a picture of a sword or something, then I won’t have to worry about that. Then I’ll just be left to twitch when the second book of my series comes out and the font used for the title on the spine is not the same size as it was on the first book. (I’m looking at you Windwitch.)

Now obviously, I first have to get to the point where I have a publisher, but that’s a different story.

Where My Ideas Come From

Laura Highcove

A lot of times people ask writers: ‘Where do your ideas come from?’ to which the usual reply is, ‘Everywhere.’ While this is basically true. While it seems like an idea pops out fully formed, it is likely that you’re only hearing about it once a lot of ideas from all over the place will finally come together in that one lightning bolt moment.

I can get little ideas from tv shows or movies I watch, other books I read, from music I listen to, or even just things I see or hear during the course of my day. It’s taking all those little sparks and organizing them until you hit that one piece that brings it all together …sort of like the straw that broke the camel’s back, only it’s a good thing.

For the Storyteller, that moment was while I was reading through lesser known fairy tales on the Internet and I read one called The Little Wildrose. When I read that the main character was carried off and then raised by eagles, that’s when the lightning struck my brain. I had wanted to write a story with fairy tales where the characters are aware that the fairy tales are a thing every since I read Mercedes Lacky’s The Fairy Godmother. It wasn’t until this point that I finally had the idea of where to start.

And even with that idea, I had a false start where Wildrose was the main character and was going into the tales alone. This is where I got the idea for playing with genders though, as I made Wildrose male and had him interacting with a female Bluebeard. A few months later I wrote 90k words in October and November with Tabitha as the main character and the rest is now history.