So in what has become a very rare occurrence, I'm actually going to post to the blog! I'm so grateful that Lisa keeps this blog up, because I suspect that if it were just up to me, no one would ever know anything about our family because of my posting-laziness. But today, I have determined that I WILL POST!
Some of you know and some of you don't know that I occasionally like to dabble in fiction writing. Deep down, I secretly wish that I could get uber-rich off of writing, retire at age 35 (or maybe 39) and never have to work a day of my life ever again. However, I don't trust writing to make that happen--in fact, writing will have to irrefutably prove to me that it could be a viable career before I'm willing to trust it with all of my family's financial well-being. So until such point, writing gets relegated to the realm of "hobby". But that still means that I occasionally do things that make me look like a writer, one of which was to recently attend the 30th Annual "Life, the Universe, and Everything" Symposium for Science Fiction and Fantasy Writing [in large part because, as a student, I get in free, which is pretty hard to beat when you're looking at getting to hear accomplished authors like Brandon Mull (Fablehaven series) and Brandon Sanderson (finishing up the Wheel of Time series) talk about writing]. It was a fun conference, and I'm really grateful that Lisa was willing to wrangle the kids while I was off attending the sessions.
So I decided that it would be fun to do a debrief of some of the things that I learned while I was there. I learned a lot more than this, but in the interest of keeping some semblance of brevity, I give you:
Top 10 Things I Learned at the LTUE Fiction Conference 2012
10. Avoiding Prosecution in France
During a session on "Stealing from Historical & Current Events" I learned that there's apparently a fair amount of legal protection afforded to fiction writers when it comes to writing about real people. Apparently, if a person is dead, you're basically free to write whatever you want about them--unless you're in France, where you can be sued for defaming someone's ancestors. Budding authors out there, be careful about where you travel (and what you write)!
9. "Computers Have Horcruxes . . ."
". . . they're called 'external hard drives.'"
This was a direct quote from an author named Leigh Averett, who did a session on creating effective villains. I really enjoyed the Harry-Potter-inspired image of a computer splitting a piece of its soul off if you ever use an external hard drive. Leigh was really grateful for her computer's "horcrux" [external hard drive], as it had apparently saved the computer when it's main body had actually died some time ago. It was a very apt metaphor. :)
8. "Don't count on rad pictures to save bad ideas"
A comic book artist named Jess Smart Smiley did a session on taking ideas and converting them into stories, and made this point partway through. He followed it with the comment, "Transformers 2, anyone?" It was a good reminder that your story idea has to stand on its own--special effects or great writing style will only get you so far.
7. "You have not yet written your best work"
This was something shared by Traci Hickman, who apparently has been publishing books for a couple decades now, rather successfully. It was comforting (and somewhat intuitive) to me, because I have yet to really write any full-fledged "work" (at least, books). So I'm happy to know that my best work is still out there. :)
6. Where do factoids come from?
Well, when a mama factoid and a baby factoid love each other very much . . . Actually, I also learned this in the panel on stealing from history. It was a conversation between (I believe) authors Scott Parkin and Eric Swedin about where to find information on the internet.
Scott: "Any hairball can write anything on the internet, but if you have three hairballs agree on something, that's a factoid!"
Eric: "Or at least a common conspiracy."
Scott: "Which is just as good!"
So it turns out there's a thin line between fact and conspiracy, and that's okay if you're a historical fiction writer!
5. Improvisational Comedy is a valuable plot creation tool
I got to see a session by Dan and Rob Wells where they used a story creation structure and then random suggestions from the audience to create the basic plot for a book in the space of an hour. It was a fun little technique to see, and it was very gratifying to know that my days in improv comedy could come in handy for ideation purposes. So if you're ever stuck for a story idea, go find a really large group of people, and make some magic happen!
4. Insanity Is Not a Motivation
This one's also from Leigh Averett's Villains workshop--she made the point that an evil villain has to have a motivation for his evil deeds, and insanity is not a motivation, though it can be the root of a villain's motivation. For example, maybe the villain's motivation for the evil plans he's doing is because he wants to destroy all pretty ponies. The reason he wants to destroy all pretty ponies might be because he's insane, but the motivation is not his insanity. This was kind of an earth-shattering lesson to learn, because it means that if you ever commit any horrible crimes in the future, you can no longer in good conscience claim that your motivation was temporary insanity. Sigh.
3. "Wikipedia is as accurate as regular encyclopedias"
This one made it up this high on the list really just because it was a confirming voice on an opinion I've held for some time now. Once again from the "Stealing from History" session, Scott Parkin referenced the existence of studies that have found Wikipedia to have a similar rate of errors as the error rates of other, more traditional encyclopedias. There's no question that Wikipedia contains errors--it just turns out that other encyclopedias do too, at a similar rate. I know there's still debate over this, but it was gratifying to hear others who believe as I do. :)
2. "Never sacrifice what you want the most, for what you want the most at that moment"
The keynote speaker of the whole conference was writer/comic book artist James A. Owens, who has an amazing story of faith in terms of how his career (and life in general) has progressed. This was the big takeaway from his story, and definitely an excellent one to ponder. How often in our lives, either physically, emotionally, financially, or spiritually do we give up our long-term progression and well-being for what seem like short-term gains?
1. The Playing Field for Authors Has Been Leveled
Traci Hickman led an absolutely fascinating session on what's happening to the publishing industry with the emergence of Amazon and ebooks. With the advent of self-publishing on Amazon and other sites, being an author is no longer about being published, but about having an audience. Because of the changes caused by this, the publishing industry is reeling and is no longer really providing what it used to for its authors. Used to be that when you got together with a publisher, they would provide marketing distribution, and an audience. Now, to compete with self-publishing, they're not really doing marketing anymore (even for their existing authors) and they're expecting authors to bring an audience with them when they sign on (it's all about how many people 'Like' you on Facebook, or follow you on Twitter). They're expecting all of this as much for new authors as they are for existing authors, so the playing field is now leveled (this was a sentiment I heard voiced by a number of established, successful authors at the conference). Hickman believed that if you were starting out as an author right now, there was no real draw to going with a publishing company because you can hire editors, illustrators, etc. independently and you would have to do the marketing aspect yourself anyway.
It was really a fascinating conference to go to, and I really enjoyed my time there--hopefully I was able to pass on just a little of what I learned to you all.
Enjoy!
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