u/Acceptable_Fox_5560

Pretty much nothing else matters.

Reading is a leisure activity. Yes, reading can teach you life lessons and change your worldview, but the principle reason people read is because it’s an enjoyable thing to do.

And writing is a leisure activity too. This is all supposed to be fun.

Reading and writing can of course evoke a range of emotions, and this isn’t to say every story needs to be a comedy or a romp. But as you write, goal number one to which every other goal should be subjugated is to tell an entertaining story.

(This advice is optional. You don’t have to do it. You can write and read boring stories if you want and nobody can stop you.)

It seems like most people used their resources to pull for the new Branded cards, and those cards are really good, but they’re almost useless against Enneacraft. Enneacraft can shut down Branded going first, and can steer directly into a full Branded board going second.

It does the same to Kewl Tune and Dracotail.

Enneacraft is a super tough deck for any deck to counter, because it’s built different than anything else (no hand traps, everything’s facedown, doesn’t SS from the deck or ED, and of course the floodgates) and it’s a perfect counter to the three top decks.

It should be warping the entire meta, but everyone invested in Branded instead.

Lots of people post here that they make extensive outlines, character studies, and world building docs, but then despite years of trying, they can barely write more than a few chapters.

They’re convinced they need to write this way. But if that way hasn’t produced the result you want, why are you convinced this is the way you write?

I think a lot more people are pantsers than they think. I think they set up these giant worlds with so much to get to that it’s literally too much to know where to start. They’re thinking about prequels and prologues and lore that’s twenty chapters away and what’s going to happen to the MC in the book four of the series, and it’s drowning out their ability to think about what’s happening in chapter 1 scene 1.

And the sad part is a lot of these writers are very creative, and if they would try applying all that creative energy to one scene at a time with no huge detailed plans in front of them, they’d probably knock out a story in no time.

The same energy they’ve dedicated to make a thrilling four book series would be zeroed in on making one thrilling opening, then one thrilling second chapter, and so on.

This is simply a thought, not something I’m saying you MUST do or definitely applies to you. But consider it a thought exercise to ask yourself: If you can’t get through a draft despite having an extensive outline, it is possible you can’t get through a draft BECAUSE you have an extensive outline.

We've been on sub for about two weeks with my debut and we're starting to book calls with editors.

I presume those editors are going to ask what else I'm working on. I'm 10K words into a new draft, but I have three other elevator pitches I also think are strong.

Is this the time where I'd ask my agent, "Hey, which of these would be most worth mentioning if I'm asked about another project?" Or is it way too early for that?

Did you ask your agent what you should write for your follow up, or do you just start writing and deliver them a draft when it's ready? Or, do you pitch them multiple ideas and they tell you which is strongest?

This discussion brewed over the last few days on X, TikTok, and Threads. Thought we could discuss it here.

My immediate thought was the same way there are movie brained writers, there are also movie brained readers. I don’t think they make up the majority of readers though.

But as sobering as it is, I also didn’t think they were without a somewhat valid point. Readers skip things they find unimportant. If a passage feels so unimportant that a reader feels comfortable skipping it, the writer isn’t without fault.

Overall I took it as a good reminder that 1) letting the whims of random social media takes dictate how you write is a fool’s errand, because some of these people don’t know what they’re talking about 2) as much as we like to think our beautiful prose and evocative language is enough to keep readers engaged, they really only care about the parts that are juicy, gripping, and fun.

Thoughts?

I'm on sub now and taking some time to make writer-to-writer connections on social media, mainly Twitter and Threads. As I'm exploring the publishing communities on these platforms, I am struck by the posture of prospective writers.

Some posts reek of desperation. Writers are loudly broadcasting how many queries they've sent out, how many rejections they've gotten, copy-pasting and even screenshotting response from agents and posting them for the world to see.

Others reek of bitterness. Writers will criticize form rejections, complain about MSWLs, and even talk crap about the entire profession of agenting.

I know the query trenches are brutal, but I can't help but imagine if I were an agent and had a query in the maybe pile, and I saw the way some of these authors post on social media, I'd be concerned about whether their temperament is that of the kind of person I'd want to work with.

My 9-5 job is in the entertainment industry, not book but brand deals. I can't imagine an athlete who's looking for sponsorships going on social media with their full government name and saying "I've been rejected by every brand I've pitched. These marketing directors don't know what they're doing." Nor can I picture them saying something like "After 40 rejections, I finally got a response from Adidas. Fingers crossed they give me a sneaker deal!" Because Adidas would look at a post like that and go "This person is clearly not in high demand, and any way they seem to lack the kind of emotional maturity of someone I'd want to stake my income upon."

I get wanting to use social media to build a community, and part of that might be commiserating on the unique hell that is the query trenches, but surely a public profile that presents yourself as professional, intelligent, and mature would be a better way to do that, no? Shouldn't you appear self-assured and confident?

The hour you currently spend looking at your phone in the morning or watching a streaming show after dinner can be replaced by 30 minutes of reading and 30 minutes of writing.

That hour of gaming you use to “decompress?” That can be 30 minutes of reading and 30 minutes of writing.

The time you spend day dreaming, outlining, making beat sheets, world building, and coming up with fake coffee preferences for your characters can all be spent reading and writing.

Laundry? Do it after. Dishes? Do them after. Gym, groceries, vacuuming? It can all wait one hour. Friends want to hit the bar? “Sorry, can’t meet at 7. Let’s meet at 8 instead.”

Your partner and your kids want you to write! They have no desire to play the role of “person who stops me from writing” that you’ve cast them in. Your marriage and your family will not collapse in one hour.

Do you want this bad enough to give it one single hour every day?

Morning.

We have made the following addendum to our How to Post guide which hopefully removes confusion about how this rule is enforced.

The entire rule now reads (amendments in italics):

No Generative AI

• Removed - Any post suspected to have been generated by AI
• Removed - Any post which supports the use of generative AI during any point of the creative process including brainstorming, proofreading, translation, or “bouncing ideas”
• Removed - Any post which references (including neutrally or in the past tense, regardless of word choice) the use of generative AI during any point if the creative process including brainstorming, proofreading, translation, or “bouncing ideas”
• Removed - Any post asking for reviews or use cases for software programs whose primary, non-optional function includes generative AI for anything other than spell check within a native word processor
• Approved - Nothing. We do not allow users to introduce the topic of generative AI on this subreddit. We moderate this AGGRESSIVELY.

 

Keep in mind the spirit of our rule against generative AI is not to police your use of AI in your creative process, nor to police your personal feelings about AI. It is to prevent the subreddit from being clogged by a subject matter that is low quality, leads to constant fights, is ripe for karma farming, and doesn't produce anything of value to anyone's writing craft. We will moderate these topics based on the spirit of the rule. Attempts to obfuscate an AI topic will be considered the same as explicitly introducing AI.

END

We hope this offers clarity. Please do not post about generative AI on this subreddit. If you see a post about generative AI, report it to the moderators and do not participate in the discussion.

Your feedback is welcome in this thread and in modmail.

Happy writing!

Part of me thinks it would be cool and nonchalant to not make a post like this, but I've identified myself as having "sour grapes" before, have always relied on HIGMA posts to motivate me, and tried hard to be a contributing member of this community, so I figured I'd share.

To start, I wrote the next book. I was querying what was basically my first novel, which I wrote when I didn't know much about agents, hooks, etc. It was a juicy story, but genre confused, a story clearly written by someone who didn't understand the meta part of writing. I felt I owed it to myself though to keep trying.

I was stuck in an R&R going nowhere from an agent who wanted me to write thrillers instead of litfic, trying to force myself to write 1,000 words a day. I started fantasizing about how much better this would feel with a fresh book, so I said screw it, and started writing something else I'd been thinking about.

2.5 months later I had a new manuscript to pitch. Walking away was hard, but it was the right move.

Stats on that first book: 102 queries sent, 5 requests, 0 offers.

With the new manuscript, I stayed protective over my vision. Workshopping the query here was great, but some responses were chilly, and I had to accept the people who didn't see the vision for the book weren't pieces of feedback I could take. I also didn't do beta readers. I leaned 100% on reading comps with similarly hooky, daring premises and becoming obsessed with how they worked.

I chose to only query senior agents and agency heads. This goes along with the above point. With my first book, I guess I had some imposter syndrome that because I was new, I should pitch new agents. I also pitched a lot of agents who said they "prioritized Black voices." I feel that thought process burned me through a lot of great agencies.

I have the sense that assistant and associate agents are perhaps being more picky/conservative than senior agents and agency heads. With both books, I did MUCH better with more senior agents than more junior agents. And I've vented about the "prioritizing Black voices" agents here before, so no need to rehash.

I had a deferential posture with book one. With book two, my posture was that I was confident I had something that could break through.

Agent bios and MSWL were taken with a grain of salt. Publisher's Marketplace and Query Tracker request rates were my bible. I know everyone says "read an agent's bio to know what they want," but I felt strongly that reading their Publisher's Marketplace page and their Query Tracker stats gave me a greater sense of what I needed.

This community leans a little toward the agent perspective, but, again, I wanted to adopt a different posture for book two, which meant that what the agent wants to communicate about their preferences was less important than a track record of what they could do for me and my book.

I stole my process of picking an agent from another poster here, who I'd tag if I could remember them, but basically it was this: Find the top agencies, pull the agents up on Publisher's Marketplace, query the one whose had the most deals/debuts/six-figure advances that sound like my book. I would also consider the request rates by word count and genre reports on Query Tracker.

Stats on book two: 56 queries, 7 requests, 2 offers. I signed with my agent 75 days after my first query, and 5 months after I started writing the book.

Everything I've written here could be absolute horseshit, and maybe the real differentiator is I just wrote a better book this time, but I did want to share in case it helps anyone else.

Thanks so much to the moderators who've built this community and all the incredible members. Reading your queries and getting your notes on mine has been absolutely invaluable. Can't wait to see you all get

Or don’t. Do whatever you want.

But I’ve found a lot of success holding my drafting time sacrosanct. When I’ve got my few hours after breakfast or few hours after dinner, the *only* thing I use that time for is advancing forward through the plot of my story.

That means not re-reading anything I’ve written before.

That means not editing anything I’ve written before.

That means no fiddling with my outline, character sheets, or world building documents.

That means not looking through the thesaurus for a synonym of a word.

That means not researching random details.

All of that can be done after I have a finished first draft.

Do I always successfully avoid doing that? No. I absolutely at times find myself checking what time the sun would set in North Carolina in August, or going back to my outline to leave a note for myself.

But the purpose of the rule is to remind myself that nothing I do during the drafting process is more important than drafting.

If I’d rather be researching or proofreading, it’s usually a sign the material I’m working on isn’t all that interesting.

I’ve read that one of the main questions to ask on The Call is about submission strategy. I get why this is important to ask, but I’m not sure how to evaluate the response.

Are there strategies that work better than others? How do I know if the agent’s vision for sub strategy is a good one if I’ve never done it before? What even are the strategies?

Thanks!

I get that drafting a novel can be a long, solitary experience. So over the course of that time, you might get antsy for someone to read what you're working on. But I can't stress enough how much you probably don't need outside feedback yet.

If you're not sure if your story works from a structural standpoint, you need to read more books. In the course of your daily reading habit, if you're reading contemporary (last five years) traditionally published books in your genre, you should be able to see what those authors do to craft stories and compare it to your own.

If you haven't done that, feedback won't be helpful to you yet because you won't know how to evaluate the validity of that feedback, nor will you be able to understand it or implement it.

The rush to get feedback is also leading a lot of writers to bad sources. Your friends and family don't necessarily know anything about writing, and they'll happily lie to your face to avoid ruffling your feathers. Random beta readers you find online have no way to confirm to you that they know what they're talking about either. Paying thousands of dollars to an editor from Fiverr who claims they've got 20 years experience even though they're only 32 years old is putting you in a financial hole your story is unlikely to ever make enough money to pull you out of.

So all that means that when you're in a critical stage of your development as a writer, instead of spending time reading and writing, instead of sharpening your authorial confidence, instead of making the kinds of decisions that will lead to development of your style and practice of writing, you're being responsive to the whims of some random person just because it tickles you to get feedback.

Yes, great authors have great editors, but you are not a great author yet. The editor won't make you great.

The point in which you're ready for feedback is when you've written the draft of a story which, based on your extensive history of reading stories like it, you are confident is a strong story. Then, you edit it yourself for multiple rounds based on your extensive history of reading stories like it. Then, the people you need to get feedback from are either trusted writer friends whose work you admire and who have familiarity with reading for a critical lens, or literary agents who you can pitch for free (yes, agents will give you form rejection, but a form rejection IS FEEDBACK--it means your premise or writing didn't wow enough for more than a form rejection).

Feedback feels good. It's entertaining. "Oh my God, someone read my work and is now talking to me about it!" But until you're highly confident that you've got a winner on your hands, you probably don't need feedback yet.

Tell her happy Mother’s Day. Ask her what her plans are for the day. Tell her what you’ve been up to as of late. Thank her, not because she was perfect, but because she tried her best with what she had. Talk to her for at least ten minutes. Even better if you can send her a Starbucks gift card or something so she can buy herself a little treat.

If we all do it, the Hornets should be able to get the 1st overall pick.

[You're free to do this or not do it. This post is for the many, many people who ask for help coming up with story ideas. If your story isn't about any of the things below, I am not saying your story is bad.]

Think about watershed moments. Weddings. Funerals. Family reunions. The birth of a child. A diagnosis. Getting fired. A break in a cold case. A sudden rise to fame. What are things that change people's lives forever? A good way I've heard it verbalized is that the story you're writing should be about the most important thing that's ever happened to your protagonist.

Go to a new place. The wedding takes place on a tropical beach at a fancy resort. The funeral requires scattering the ashes in the rings of a distant moon. The family reunion is back in the rural Montana farming community. The new child requires the posh Manhattanite to move out to the country for more space. The diagnosis leads to a lengthy hospital stay. Getting fired forces moving back in the parents. The break in the cold case leads back to the site of the summer camp where the disappearance first took place. The sudden rise to fame pushes us to Hollywood.

Explore a layered contradiction ("I like big buts"). So this woman is a parole officer. She's surrounded by sad stories every day or drug addiction, crime, and poverty, BUT she remains doggedly optimistic. She was raised by wealthy parents, BUT she chose to help the less fortunate instead, BUT her belief she's making a difference is slipping. Her favorite parolee is a teenage girl whose close to getting her life back together, BUT the girl surprisingly fails a drug test one day. The parole officer's job is to report the truth, BUT she decides to fabricate the test results instead. She thinks she's done the right thing, BUT the parolee is arrested on suspicion of murder. You can get a long way by layering in contradictions, conflict, and BUTS as you're coming up with the premise.

Take an old premise and give it a new twist. Emma Pattee's phenomenal book Tilt took the classic natural disaster narrative and made it fresh by making the protagonist a heavily pregnant woman narrating the experience of the disaster to her unborn child. There are endless ways writers can remix and reinvent stories. That's part of why it's so important to read. Some of the best ideas come from moments where you're reading and think "This is cool, but what if it was like this?"