Writing Excuses

Latest Episodes:

11.03: Layering The Elemental Genres Jan 17, 2016

Show notes

Elemental Genre becomes particularly useful when you start blending the elements for sub-plots, character arcs, or even mash-ups.

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11.2: How To Get The Most Out Of A Conference, with Kathy Chung Jan 10, 2016

Show notes

What's the difference between a conference and a convention? How do we, as writers, get the most out of them?

Writing Excuses 11.1: Introduction to Elemental Genre Jan 03, 2016

Show notes

The word "genre" has a lot of weight to it. Arguments about whether a particular work is, or is not, part of a given genre are long, and tedious. Season Eleven will not be engaging in those arguments. We're giving all that a wide miss by adding an adjective, and defining a new term: Elemental Genre. During 2016 we are going to explore what we write, why we write, and how we write in much the same way as previous seasons have, but our guidepost this year will be this concept of Elemental Genres. In January we'll stay high-level and firm up the framework. Starting in February we'll drill down on each of the Elemental Genres, and explore the writing process. Here's what the year will look like, month-by-month: January: Introduction February: Wonder March: Idea April: Adventure May: Horror June: Mystery July: Thriller August: Humor September: Relationship October: Drama November: Issue December: Ensemble We're really excited about this year's format, and we're confident that by examining our writing in this way we'll learn (and perhaps even teach!) some new things. Note: 2016 is a leap year, but this episode was recorded in 2015. When we said "it's not a leap year" we were confused.

Writing Excuses 10.52: Moving On, with Ellen Kushner Dec 27, 2015

Show notes

Ellen Kushner joins us for the last episode of Season 10. Per the title, folks, it's time to be done. What does "done" mean? How do you go about declaring a project "finished" when you know there are still things wrong with it? How do you clear your head, your work space, and your life for the next thing you need to do? Out of Excuses: Per Brandon's plug in the episode, registration is open for the 2016 Out of Excuses WritingWorkshop and Retreat!

Writing Excuses 10.51: Q&A on Showing Your Work, with Daniel José Older Dec 20, 2015

Show notes

Daniel José Older joins us for a Q&A on showing your work around. Here are the questions, which were submitted by attendees at the Out of Excuses workshop: What's the best way to meet editors and agents at conventions? How do you write a good query letter? What do you mention as credentials in your query letter? You didn't cover self publishing at all this month. Self publishing is legit, right? Can you submit the same work to more than one agent or editor at a time? Can you re-submit a revised work to an agent who previously rejected the piece?

Writing Excuses 10.50: How to Hand-Sell Your Manuscript to Agents and Editors, with Michael Underwood and Marco Palmieri Dec 13, 2015

Show notes

Marco Palmieri and Michael Underwood took the stage with Howard and Dan at GenCon Indy 2015 to discuss hand-selling manuscripts. Marco Palmieri is a senior editor at Tor, and Michael Underwood is an author, and is also the North American Sales and Marketing manager for Angry Robot Books. We begin with a list of the things to avoid doing, including the classic mistakes like chasing editors into restrooms, but we quickly move on to where you get started, and what your task list is going to look like. We cover resources like Literary Marketplace, Locus, and Publishers Lunch, and the not-so-secret-anymore #MSWL hash-tag.

Writing Excuses 10.49: What Do I Do With This Thing Now? Dec 06, 2015

Show notes

We're at the end of our Season Ten Master Class, and if you've been diligent about the homework, you may very well have a finished manuscript in your hands. What do you do with it? Daniel José Older joins us for a bit of reminiscence. We talk about some of our first submissions, and what we did right, wrong, and weirdly. We cover our criteria for selecting publishers to whom we'd like to send our stuff, and we include the shiny intangibles in that list. This episode was engineered aboard The Independence of the Seas by Bert Grimm, and mastered in an abandoned missile silo by Alex Jackson.

Writing Excuses 10.48: Project in Depth, The Devil’s Only Friend Nov 29, 2015

Show notes

Spoiler Alert! We'll be discussing the latest John Cleaver book from Dan Wells with author, podcaster, and unrepentant bacon-lover Dan Wells! If you haven't read it, and you want to be surprised by it, stop listening and grab a copy now!

Writing Excuses 10.47: Q&A on Revision Nov 22, 2015

Show notes

And now for your questions about revision. Or rather, questions from the WXR attendees, who were aboard the Independence of the Seas with us (the answers to these questions are secreted away in the audio file...): During revision, when do you think it's acceptable to throw the whole thing out? How do you fit the whole structure in your head? What do you find you most often need to add? What do you do when your revisions have made things worse? How do you avoid over-writing during the revision process? When revising, how many passes do you make, and what order are they in? Do you take the sounds of words into account when writing and revising? This episode was engineered aboard The Independence of the Seas by Bert Grimm, and mastered in a concrete bunker somewhere in the midwest by Alex Jackson.

Writing Excuses 10.46: How Do I Make This Pretty? Nov 15, 2015

Show notes

The microphones again find us aboard the Independence of the Seas*, to talk about how terribly ugly this manuscript is, and what we can do to make it pretty. In this episode we drill down on line-by-line, paragraph-by-paragraph revisions. This stage of the revision process is where our prose gets wordsmithed. This episode runs long, touching on: Punching up the pacing Turning things upside down Parallelisms Adverbial compression, The pyramid of abstraction Free and direct thought Replacing negative-information descriptions extreme editing exercises like "one sentence per concept." Obviously if you want more than just the bullet points you'll need to have a listen... *NOTE: Registration is now open for the 2016 Out of Excuses Workshop and Retreat! This episode was engineered aboard The Independence of the Seas by Bert Grimm, and mastered ashore in a volcanic caldera by Alex Jackson.

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