Realization: Writing to Submission Calls

I've posted a lot about my hybrid career. And I've stated publicly more than once that my very short PG-13 self published novellas paid for the marketing I did on A Missing Peace, have earned out, and continue to ear (all be it less than $5/month now that they are two years old). But I've often struggled with this as A Missing Peace is high concept, gritty, and YA, an easier sell than #cleanromance.

But I've come to understand something. The Fate of A Marlwoe Girl  (the first--a FREE book-- in The Marlowe Girls series was written for an anthology). The Other Marlowe Girl has paid for a lot of writing ventures. This weekend I realized there are two reasons why. 1)It's the second in a series where the first book did marginally well. Decree of Hope  which in my opinion is one of the best books I've ever written and because it was written later--with more experience and further education--is probably the strongest of my published works. But it doesn't earn the way TOMG does. And now I know why. First of all, there is no free book in that series. An imprint owns the first book, so I can't make it free. But secondly the first in the other series was written for a submissions call.

What does that mean? It tells me what I already knew. I'm not great at marketing, or even predicting the market. Publishers are. That's how they've managed to stay in business over the past five or six years with talent going indie. They know what the market is looking for. What's the writing tip here? Look at calls for submissions in your genre. Is someone looking for something specific? Chances are it's because they think it will sell. A submission call is usually just a general idea. A concept. Use it as jumping off place, a springboard. Make it your own, and do with it what you will. Once I finish my thesis, I'm going to be looking at submission calls for several subgenres of romance I think I might be interested in and I'll start planning a trilogy around what appeals to me most.

Have you ever written to a submission call? What has your experience been?

The Book Based Action Plan DIY MFA #3

On Monday, I posted a couple of  reading lists. The most helpful thing I learned all last semester (besides the kick in the butt of a monthly deadline, because some of you know I've been off the bandwagon for a while) was the action plan.

If you scroll down to the "subgenres" list, those books including my self chosen book of Beastly were used to create an action plan in my manuscript. This is how the action plan works. It helps if you can self-evaluate your manuscript before you start reading. What are some weaknesses you need to overcome? Make a note of that. Read 5 books in your genre. (The ones I used are all romance books. If you're a YA writer, you may want to use only YA even though it may still be romance). What do they have in common? That's something the market expects. Did you have a couple of favorites? What are the things those authors did really well? Chances are if it has become of favorite of yours, it has become someone else's favorite too and there is a reason for it. Out of all of this find five steps you can take to improve your WIP. Write them down. Justify to yourself how they will help make your book more marketable. If you're hoping to make a living--or even a royalties check--writing, marketability is the key. It doesn't matter how strong your manuscript is, if no one is willing to buy it.

My action steps were:

1. Pacing (but if you've read the Peace books, you know I can handle pacing, so my action here was to maintain).
2. Characterization--The hero has a redemption arc, and is one of the most hated people in history--literally. He's not likable in the opening scenes, but he has to be relateable. I found a couple of specific lines in the first chapter of Beastly that gave me an idea of how to accomplish this.
3. Setting-- I don't care about this. To me description slows pacing. So by default I'm not good at it. My action here is to add one line of description for each new location. This shouldn't be soo much that it slows pacing.
4. Showing-- The freakin rock in every writer's shoe. My action here is to find 3 places I can show not tell in each chapter.
5. Layering- Flowers from the Storm was a beautiful book. It was so long but still one of my favorites and reminded me of Beauty and the Beast. The most important lesson I learned from that book was the art of layering. There was so much going on, so many conflicts, all overlapping it made for a good story. I thought I could layer my story better by adding subplots with similar themes to the main theme.