Ella Joy Olsen

Answers for Those Awkward Conversations with Readers

My whole life I’ve had a star-struck, rock-star admiration for authors. Before I even imagined writing a book I’d pour over back flaps, studying author bios and photos, wondering how much of the novel was inspired by real events.

While I drafted what would become my debut: Root, Petal, Thorn, I dreamed readers would savor the subtle connections and deeper themes in my novel, like I’d done as a reader over the years. They’d ask insightful questions and I’d provide profound answers. They’d know me via my story and I’d know they loved it.

I was in for a Reality Check.

Yes, I’ve had fantastic conversations with readers about my work, but in truth many conversations (especially those which occur in passing) are far from the imagined ideal. Below is a list of the most Frequently Asked Questions, my canned Answers, and What I’m Really Thinking:

Q: How is your book doing? How many copies have you sold?

A: It’s hard to track all of the sales but I think it’s doing well. Enough. *modest shrug*

Really Thinking: I have no solid idea. Turns out it’s very difficult to determine how many copies are sold until that twice-a-year statement arrives. And even then the royalty statements are difficult to read. In this age of constant connection I believe this royalty system should be a little more precise and if not more precise, more transparent, and if not more transparent, at least more timely.

Q: Have you made a lot of money?

A: Not enough to pay the mortgage. Turns out most published authors make less than $10,000 a year. *smile as they gasp in horror*

RT: After I finished Root, Petal, Thorn (but before I got an agent) I must have lived in a bubble. I guess I didn’t read the proper blogs about a typical advance. I dreamed of taking all of my beta readers (and their families) on a far-flung vacation to thank them for their help (I was thinking a Greek Island). About this time I went to a small, local conference where one giddy woman had just sold her book to an actual publisher. I was in a bathroom stall as she stood at the sink washing her hands, discussing her advance loudly over the rushing water. I stopped mid-stream to hear her say, “Seven Thousand Dollars.” I couldn’t finish.

I found that girl later at the conference to confirm. Face pulsing from embarrassment and fingers crossed behind my back that I’d misheard, I stuttered, “If you don’t mind me asking, I overheard you say you received an advance of $70,000. Is that typical?”

She laughed. She actually spit a little of her Diet Pepsi into her hand. “Drop a zero.”

Huge reality check (sadly not a huge advance check…)

Q: I have this great idea. You could write a book about it and we could share the money. You see, there’s this guy and he…

A: *listen quietly for five minutes, then break in* That is a great concept! But it’s really your story to tell.

RT: If you only knew how many fantastic ideas I have. Coming up with story nuggets is the very best part of writing a book because they’re all so perfect at conception. The real work is taking that shimmer of an idea and turning it into 90,000 words.

Q: I found several mistakes in your novel. Things like the true syndication date for The Brady Bunch. I’ve made you a comprehensive list on my Goodreads review.

A: Thank you. I’ll take a look. A team of people read the book before publication but we’re all human.

RT: Are you kidding me? I better also see five stars!

Q: I’ve written six hundred pages about my great-great-great grandfather’s journey from Norway to the United States. I’m wondering if you’d give it a read and provide a little feedback?

A: Actually, you would be better served finding a group of other writers who are at the same place in their writing process. I currently have a group of beta readers who I work with.

RT: No, oh lord, no!

Q: My grandma loved your book but I didn’t read it.

A: Grandmas tend to love my book but so do a bunch of young people. You should read it.

RT: Was she being rude? I think that was a subtle dig. She thinks my book is boring.

Q: The cover isn’t something I’d pick up. Did you choose it?

A: I didn’t. The publisher has the last say about cover art.

RT: The cover for Root, Petal, Thorn wasn’t exactly what I imagined when I wrote the book, but it grew on me over time. I’m still working to embrace the cover image for Where the Sweet Bird Sings. I wish I had more input on my cover art but sometimes we authors don’t always get what we want.

Q: In your second book, where does the title Where the Sweet Bird Sings come from?

A: The story is about secrets hidden in the branches of a family tree. That’s where the sweet bird sings, you see, in a family tree. It’s a search for identity through ancestral and genetic records. It’s about accepting and loving a family even after betrayal, even after tragedy. I hope you read it!

RT: See above. I do hope you read it!

What are the craziest questions/observations you’ve received from your readers? What is a question you’d like to ask your favorite author?

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Ella Joy Olsen was born, raised and currently resides in Salt Lake City, Utah, a charming town tucked at the base of the massive Rocky Mountains. Most at home in the world of the written word, Ella spent nearly a decade on the Board of Directors for the Salt Lake City Public Library System (and four decades browsing the stacks). She is the mom of three kids ranging from just-barely-teen to just-flown-the-nest-teen, the mama of two dogs, and the wife of one patient husband.

Though she’s crazy about words Ella is also practical so she graduated from the University of Utah with a degree in Finance. After years analyzing facts and figures Ella gave up her corner cubicle and started writing fiction. Fun fact: she now teaches a historical fiction course at her alma mater. She has also lived in Seattle, Washington & Savannah, Georgia.

ROOT, PETAL,THORN (September 2016) was her debut and coming in September 2017 – WHERE THE SWEET BIRD SINGS.

Connect with her on her website http://www.ellajoyolsen.com/

Follow her on Twitter https://twitter.com/ellajoyolsen

Or on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/ellajoyolsen/

Like her on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/ella.joy.olsen.author

 

Kathryn Craft

Turning Whine Into Gold

 Bad experiences have damaged many a writer’s trust in critique partners. I get it. Peer reviewers may bring uneven skills and questionable talents to their assessment of your work. But as a practiced reader, each has something to contribute.

To unlock the gold hidden within their feedback, you must first learn critique-speak, an indirect mode of communication in which what people say is not always what you should hear. You might have to dig to find the nugget that’s of use.

1. Skip the solution but heed the feedback.

In offering feedback on a memoir piece that became the basis of my novel The Far End of Happy, advance readers loved the actions of a woman who insists on divorcing her husband after his suicide—but they “didn’t need all that stuff about the farm.” Problem was, the piece, Standoff at Ronnie’s Place, was absolutely about the farm—and I was submitting it in answer to a journal’s call for pieces about setting!

Oops.

I had to choose: scrap the project, or dig deeper to find the real problem. I chose the latter.

What I heard: “Your description is getting in the way of your story.”

Translation: “If you want setting to be important, I need greater orientation to this story by building characterization through setting detail.”

The public had spoken: I had not yet achieved my goal of using the setting to carry the emotional weight of the essay. After I went back to the drawing board, the piece got published.

2. Look where the arrow is pointing.

In reading an early version of The Far End of Happy, a critiquer told me I could cut eight pages of backstory with one of the mothers—it was irrelevant. Despite how it felt, she did not aim that arrow at my heart. It was pointing toward a problem with story structure.

What I heard: “I got bored and started to skim.”

Translation: “This material does not feel tied to the character’s story goal.

I did not cut the material because the three-POV structure was meant to examine what brought each of the characters to the high-tension twelve hours of the novel’s front story. But that was my author goal, not the character’s goal. In revision, I made sure those pages felt relevant to the reader by raising questions about this woman’s past that showed the way her past seriously compromised her current goal.

3. Novels are not meant to be read one chapter per month.

Have you read Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander? Oh my, I gobbled that one up. I stayed up late and got up early, operating on only three hours of sleep as I pushed to the end. I effusively recommended it to my husband, who, upon finishing, really didn’t see what the hype was about. Why? He read it over the course of two years, 1-2 pages per night! This makes a difference.

 National Book Award-nominated author Diane Johnson pointed this out when she was my mentor at Sewanee Writers’ Conference. My first “forever in a drawer” novel was strong enough to gain me entry to the juried conference, yet while there I would learn it was woefully overwritten. Diane determined the reason: my critique group met each month to review one chapter at a time, a span too long for readers to retain continuity. I revised accordingly (read: mistakenly).

“No novel can stand up to that kind of scrutiny,” she said. A novel is an accumulation of cause-and-effect, questions raised and answered, expectations met and dashed—and so much more. That accumulation needs a chance to succeed.

What I heard: “I can’t recall the details of your novel from month to month.”

Translation: “This method of critique isn’t working anymore.”

My solution was to switch from a monthly critique group to full manuscript swaps. Since then I have received much more useful feedback.

4. Warning: gang mentality may be at play.

In-person workshopping is a social activity. When one of your critiquers doesn’t get what you are trying to do—meaning she reads your piece and feels clueless as to what it is about—she is unlikely to admit it in front of the others. Worse, if someone does admit their cluelessness, a feeding frenzy can begin, piling one negative thing onto the next so the clueless readers can assuage their insecurities by dumping on you.

What I heard: “I was confused about the story so I corrected your grammar.”

Translation: “This story did not invite me on its journey. I need to know what your character wants and what incited that desire so I can root for him throughout the story’s complications.”

Why don’t critiquers just say what they mean?

Well, they do. But it’s up to you to learn to speak the underlying language, and then improve the piece based on that. And guess what? This dynamic will still be in play when your manuscript gets to a publishing house. So practice your translation skills now!

 

Do you have any horror stories from the critique trenches you’d like to share? What peer review model do you use and why does it work for you?

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About Kathryn

Kathryn Craft  is the award-winning author of two novels from Sourcebooks, The Art of Falling and The Far End of Happy, and a developmental editor at Writing-Partner.com, specializing in storytelling structure and writing craft. Her chapter “A Drop of Imitation: Learn from the Masters” was included in the writing guide Author in Progress, from Writers Digest Books. Janice Gable Bashman’s interview with her, “How Structure Supports Meaning,” originally published in the 2017 Novel & Short Story Writer’s Market, has been reprinted in The Complete Handbook of Novel Writing, both from Writer’s Digest Books.

Y'all know that I'm the Golden Retriever of the writing world. The grandma cheerleader in a skirt that won't zip (no photo, because no one wants to see that. Trust me).

But I had an epiphany today. I wanted to share, in case it helps you, too. 

It was one of those golden days. You know, the one where you left off yesterday in the middle of a great scene, and you can't wait to sit down and finish it. A day later, I sat down and bam! a plot knot that I had unraveled with the perfect solution - and it even fit in with historical reality!

Double boom.

I know, those days don't happen to me often, either.

Then it occurred to me. Two minutes before I sat down on those days, I had no idea what was going to happen. It could have been a typical day of slogging, or even one of those days where you're chipping words out of granite with a plastic spoon.

Golden Retriever or no, most days, I have as hard a time putting my butt in the chair as you do. Don't get me wrong - I do get my butt in the chair - Every. Single. Day. But I don't float to the keyboard on floral flavored farts. 

Just saying.

So, logically, if I don't know what kind of writing day I'm going to have when I plop down, why the dread? I have going on 25 years worth of evidence that there's nothing to dread - after all, I've survived tons of plastic spoon days. And I have eight books to show for it. Eight books I'm very proud of.

So why does my head go to Armageddon, every time? You know the drill: 

• What makes me think I can do this writer-thing?
• How could I have thought this was a good premise for a book? It's a monkey-shit sandwich!
• This plot snarl is a Gordian Knot. Utterly. Impossible. 
• Even if I flog myself to The End, my editor is going to give me the hairy eyeball - like, REALLY? You spent six months, and this is what you give me?

Do you remember back when you started writing? I mean the very beginning, when all this was new, and you explored. You played. You giggled (okay, maybe that was only me). The point is, you loved it like a first crush.

Back then, you had zero knowledge that you could do this writing thing. You had NO evidence that you could - no The Ends, no published books. 

So, let's recap - when I had no evidence, I thought I could do it. After 8 published books as evidence, I'm pretty sure I can't.

How jacked up is that? What is the difference?

Expectation.

Dumb, isn't it? Think about this, when you're eyeing the chair with dread. Repeat after me...

My brain lies. I CAN do this.

And if I don't do it perfectly today, the chair will be here tomorrow, and I can fix it.

So, whether you have one almost book, or 100 finished books, instead of dread, try approaching that chair with that beginner's attitude: I'm going to have fun, finding out if I can do this. 

Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.

You don't believe it? That's okay. You can lie right back to your brain. It'll believe it, just like you believe it's lies.

You're going to sit. You're going to work through the problem. You're eventually going to type The End. How can I be so sure? Because you're a writer, and that chair is a gateway to your dreams.

Besides, where else are you gonna find a career with such a great uniform?

Am I the only one with 'chair-dread'? What do you do to overcome it?

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About Laura

Laura Drake is a city girl who never grew out of her tomboy ways, or a serious cowboy crush. She writes both Women's Fiction and Romance.

She sold her Sweet on a Cowboy series, romances set in the world of professional bull riding, to Grand Central.  The Sweet Spot won the 2014 Romance Writers of America^®   RITA^® award in the Best First Book category.

Laura began a video blog for writers, answering their burning questions. You can watch all the episodes HERE. If you have a question you'd like her to address in a future episode, leave her a comment!