Wendy, Isn't that a fabulous line? Perfect for quoting anytime somebody complains about always knowing how a romance novel will turn out!

I love that line, 'we know the sun is going tonight. Does that make the day boring or predictable?'.

Leslie, I'm sorry I missed responding to your post earlier -- it's staggering how many things floated past the radar! But I love that you have a potential new tool for your box...and it'll be cool to see the results of how it works the first (or first few) times you use it.

Sarah, we'll go into a bit of that during the Braid class -- but there are as many ways of doing it as there are writers!

Regan, it's so cool that your characters write their own plot smoothly enough that reviewers think YOU did it -- gotta love it when they know their job so well. 🙂 And I'm so sorry I didn't see your post until Sunday afternoon; somehow I thought I'd answered 'em all this morning and was startled at a new one in the box...here's a long-overdue thanks for stopping by!

Laurie:

Any tips on setting up a continuity/plot details spreadsheet? I hadn't thought of that!

Linda, I’m betting once you have genre expectations in the forefront of your mind — even if only in the pre-writing stage — it’ll be a lot easier to make sure they’re worked into the story. And just going back through your work in progress, a single scan will very likely be enough to show whether you need to add anything and if so, where. 🙂

Sarah, your line about “if any part of writing a book is easy, which is debatable” made me smile — I’ll bet every writer in the world has thought that more than once. And you’re right about the details inherent in mysteries; I’m always amazed by writers who can keep track of those without a giant spreadsheet. And when they’re also juggling elements of romance, like you are, the task gets even more mind-boggling. Whew!

Ruchama, what a fascinating idea! I like the premise that meeting genre requirements makes it easier for writers to keep producing quality fiction over the long haul — and that’s sure an empowering premise for anyone who worries that genre fiction isn’t as “good” as literary fiction. I’m going to remember this for future classes; thank you!

Oh, Anna, I get your frustration -- it’s so awful to find things not working! Friends were emailing me that they’d posted and nothing appeared, and since commenters normally expect to get word of a response within a reasonable time frame, I hated thinking other people might imagine “hmph, this blogger doesn’t care about replying.” I’m hoping everyone will read the Perfect Storm explanation up top, but suspect some will just decide “Laurie Schnebly is a jerk.” Aaaack!