8 years 8 genres?!

by M. L. Buchman

Romancing the Genres began eight years ago in May 2011. Curiously enough, my career as a writer began taking off about the same time, so I find myself looking back and going...Huh!

Some of that is a really good Huh! Seven years ago my writing career took off. Why? I think it's because I created something new. The first women of the Night Stalkers helicopter regiment--the women who were so good that the rules couldn't keep them out of the US Military Special Operations. I also work on my craft like a demon, but I've always believed in doing the best I can at something, even when I don't know what I'm doing. Perhaps especially then.

And I'll actually get to the real reason I think it happened down below.

On February 2012, with the launch of The Night Stalkers #1, The Night is Mine, I officially became a romance writer. A romantic suspense writer. A military romantic suspense writer.

To say that's not how I saw myself up to that point would be a vast understatement. I was a science fiction writer, by God. Except my first novel in 1997 was a fantasy. And while the second one was a miserable attempt at military SF (trust me, skip that one), my third novel was hard SF. I'd finally come home. I'd written THE epic masterpiece...which them accumulated some 70-80 rejections and has never taken off.

Now I do have an excuse for what happened next. At one of my first signings (back in the late 1990s), I met a major Western writer, John J. Nance. Okay, perhaps you know him as a major bestseller of Airport thrillers (which he was and is). But he absolutely is a Western writer the way I'm an SF writer. Except he couldn't sell the westerns despite being one of the biggest names in publishing at the time. Why? Because his agent and publisher didn't want to risk dinging his name. In fact, they wouldn't even take it on under a pen name in case word got out.

He said to me, "Try out everything you want to write before you break out. Once you do, you'll be trapped forever in that genre."

Perhaps not the cheeriest outlook, but he was worth millions per book and I'd made about $600 with my writing by that point. 

So, I listened. 

Perhaps the pinnacle of my odd quest to answer his call was the year of 2011. I had sold the original four books in The Night Stalkers series in 2010 and delivered all of them by late 2011. But even with a full-time job, I wrote faster than two-per-year. This was back before the Kindle Christmas, back when having a book published indie was almost unheard of (we sure hadn't come up with the "indie" label yet).

In 2011, I released (some were written earlier):

• My Second Dark Ages fantasy, Monk's Maze
• My science fiction apocalyptic masterpiece, The Nara Reaction 
• Book #1 of a lighthearted Dead Chef thriller series, Swap Out! 
• Book #1 of my most successful Where Dreams contemporary romance series, Where Dreams Are Born
• And then in February 2012, The Night Is Mine became my first military romantic suspense

Five genres in one year. The power of indie had arrived (too bad the first couple didn't sell better, but they were early books). My thrillers do nicely and the Where Dreams series (5 novels and 3 short stories) has been a perennial seller that I really love.

Did I stop there? Of course not! Since then I've sprouted: Paranormal(ish) romance, sweet romance, non-fiction, 2 historical romances (that, thanks to some wise advice, never have and never will see the light of day, not even under a penname [trust me, it was good advice]).

Oh, did I mention that this fall I'm launching a brand-new techno-thriller series?

So where am I going with all this?

I have a successful romantic suspense career (74 novels and short stories). I have most of a second career in contemporary romance (25 titles). Yes, I also have 5 thrillers, 3 fantasies, and over 18 SF (all but those two early novels are short stories--so far). 

I've counted it a couple different ways, but I've roughly written in 8 genres in 8 years. Is this sane or rational or a well-planned, well-organized strategy in any manner, shape, or form? Absolutely not!

But what it has been is massively fun!

Yes, I have some fans who will never read my (pick a genre). But if I limited myself that way, then I'd never have the fans who will only read that genre.

You see, I finished the first draft of that techno-thriller just today, mere hours before this blog went live. (In fact, it's a good thing I finished it when I did or this blog might never have existed.) And what did I achieve by writing a new book in a new genre that may never take off?

Well first, maybe it will take off.

But second, it forced me to reconsider how I tell story. How writing so many romances has shaped and honed my voice in ways that I wasn't aware of. 

I was talking with my now-pal Damon Suede the other day. (If you're going to be at the RWA National Conference in New York this July, look for our talk with SC Mitchell, Men Writing Men in Romance.) And we talked about breaking "the box."

That's what The Night Is Mine did and I firmly believe that (on top of craft) that's what finally started my career. I broke "the box" and was perhaps the first author to put the women in combat positions and placed my love stories in the theater of Special Operations. 

Breaking the box is what I also tried to do with my Henderson's Ranch series in which the second story and the last novel, Big Sky Dog Whisperer, were about a veteran who lost a piece of himself and became more of a man in the end than when he'd been a SEAL. Am I the first to write about wounded vets? Of course not. But it sure broke any box I'd been comfortable writing romances in. When I first created Stan in Reaching Out at Henderson's Ranch, he got the love of a dog and I figured that was all he'd ever get from me. Instead he concluded one of my most successful series, one-armed dog trainer, scarred face, and all.

It's what I did when I wrote this crazy thriller.

I forced myself to keep growing.

Yes, I've written in 8 genres in 8 years and I count myself stretched in way more than 8 ways.

I can't wait to see what the next 8 years brings.

Love to hear how you challenge yourself to keep it all fresh.

(Hint: I can honestly recommend not doing it by writing in 8 genres. 😉 )

M.L. "Matt" Buchman has over 60 novels, 90 short stories, and a fast-growing pile of audiobooks out in the world. M.L. writes romance, thrillers, and SF&F…so far. Recently named as The 20 Best Romantic Suspense Novels: Modern Masterpieces by ALA’s Booklist, he has also been selected three times as "Top-10 Romance Novel of the Year." NPR and B&N listed other works as "Best 5 Romance of the Year." As a 30-year project manager with a geophysics degree who has: designed and built houses, flown and jumped out of planes, and bicycled solo around the world, he is awed by what's possible. More at: www.mlbuchman.com. 

Shutting Up The Inner Editor

For most of us authors, when we first ventured into writing, we were aglow with unbridled creativity, and the story flowed unhindered through our fingers onto the page (or screen). I know it was like this for me with my first novel, and similar still with my second.

Then, by the time I started the third, something had shifted. I got stuck. A lot. I found myself second-guessing every sentence, every word, and--on the big picture level--the whole idea itself. What had changed from when I'd first picked up pen and notebook and just spent hours happily writing away?

Answer: I had started actually learning the craft.

Along with the (very necessary!) immersion in and acquisition of the standards of fiction writing, the rules and conventions, came a new filter in my brain, one that would come in handy at revision time. All that learning and honing my craft had awakened my inner editor. And don't get me wrong, she's great! So nitpicky, so discerning, so merciless, she slashes through the sludge of First Drafts with the ease of a hot knife sinking into butter. She's just what I need after I finish writing the story and start on the crucial polishing.

Problem is, she's exactly what I don't need when writing.

Photo by Laura Ritchie, available under a CC BY 2.0 on Flickr

In that initial phase of getting the bare bones of the story down onto paper/screen, the presence of an overly critical, persnickety, question-every-word inner editor is counter productive. It's inhibiting to the point where I will sit in front of my PC, fingers hovering over the keyboard, and discard every thought that pops into my mind as not up to par with the high-polished standards of my inner editor. I type something only to backspace the heck out of it the very next second. "I've used this exact phrase three times already. Gotta come up with something better." And then I'll sit there, pressuring myself to think of a more fitting description while the minutes tick by. If I'd just used the lame description I'd had before, I could have already moved on with the scene and gotten more of the story down. I could always edit it later--but you can't edit a blank page, as La Nora so succinctly put.

But such was my fate after having absorbed that much knowledge about writing--when it came time to write, it took me far too long to get anything down. I overthought everything. Ev-ery-thing. My inner editor wouldn't shut up.

Until I stumbled upon a method of shutting her up that's so easy it's mind-boggling.

To sum it up: It's writing in sprints with a set word goal. Yes, I know. It's ridiculously obvious. But I'd never written like this. I'd set myself word goals for the day, but not in combination with a set amount of time, and so I'd sit there, squandering away my time for writing because I didn't exactly have a deadline. Turns out, I work well with deadlines.

I saw a dear writer friend of mine--Melia Alexander--do these sprints of 15 minutes during which she had to write 250 words, and my first thought was, "I could never write 250 words in 15 minutes!" I really thought that was an unattainable writing speed for me. Until I tried it, and found--to my great surprise--that I could easily do this. With one condition, though: I had to forcefully shut up my inner editor.

Photo by Shawn Rossi, available under a CC BY 2.0 on Flickr

With only 15 minutes to write 250 words (that's a little more than 16 words per minute), I knew I couldn't stop to ponder the intricacies of "Is this too much telling?" or "What's a better word for 'thrust'?" I couldn't stop to edit myself, because I didn't have the time. So simple, and yet so liberating. Did my inner editor pipe up and start critiquing what I wrote? Sure she did. But I didn't listen to her. Every time she began speaking, I responded with, "No time. Will fix later." And I kept on writing.

Make no mistake, though, it niggles at me that what I'm writing isn't my best effort. I know much of what I jot down like this will have to be edited, but that's not important. I'm getting the words down, I'm getting the story out there, and I'm not mired in paralyzing self-doubt anymore. It's important to be able to write the whole story.

And once I'm done, I'll let my inner editor out to play and have her fun.

What tips and tricks do you have to outsmart your inner editor and be more productive? Let me know in the comments!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Following her lifelong passion for stories and languages, polyglot Nadine Mutas went from tangling with tongues at a translation agency to wrestling with words in her writing den. She pens wickedly sensual paranormal romances, and her debut novel, Blood, Pain, and Pleasure, which was published on May 28, 2015, has won several awards for excellence in romance writing. You can find more info on Nadine and her books on her website: www.nadinemutas.com

Small Town Settings-Big Author Challenges

By Linda Lovely

I write romantic suspense and mysteries with romantic elements. My choice of setting—large city or small town—plays a large part in shaping each of my novels. Of the five books I’ve published to date, all but one feature small towns—well, actually small communities, which is slightly different.

My decision about setting is driven by two factors—familiarity and plot. Since I’ve lived in smaller communities most of my life, I have a good grasp of their social fabric and how things work, including who has power/clout and how it can be used for good or evil. This helps me construct credible plots that are intimate and personal.

In big-city thrillers, the villains (and heroines) tend to be individuals we’re unlikely to meet face-to-face. I find plots far more compelling if the villains could be signing my paycheck or passing the collection plate at church. I’m also more passionate about rooting for heroines and heroes who sound a lot like next-door neighbors who share my everyday joys and troubles.

That’s not to say there aren’t problems writing small-town fiction. Here are three biggies:

• Accuracy & Research. If your fiction is set current day in a “real” small town, you’d better be committed to doing solid research. You also have to expect disconnects between your research and readers’ experiences. The trendy restaurant where your heroine hangs out may have gone belly up by the time your reader visits it on the written page. The woods where you have a crucial chase scene may be leveled to make way for a used car dealership. Streets may be renamed. Courthouses may be moved. The list is endless.
• Permission If you plan to include real institutions and commercial entities in your book, seek written permission if there’s any chance someone might think the mentions put them in an unflattering light. An example? Saying your heroine is poisoned at her favorite restaurant—even if the villain (who has no association with the eatery) slips in the poison while your heroine visits the ladies’ room. Still most restauranteurs would not want “poison” and their business name coupled in the same paragraph. 
• Unintended Slurs. Okay, we’re talking fiction, but that doesn’t mean “real” police officers, sheriff’s deputies, bankers, preachers, developers, university presidents, or entrepreneurs who reside in your real burg won’t see the depiction of any unsavory characters in their professions or institutions as being a potential slap in the face.  

So, how can an author solve these problems? Here’s what I’ve done on a book-by-book basis.

DEAR KILLER: I lived on a barrier island outside Beaufort, South Carolina, for a dozen years. I wanted to capture the special flavor of the Lowcountry and life in a small residential/resort community. However, I didn’t want to use any real island since the plot included less than admirable characters in the island’s power structure. My solution? Fictional Dear Island, a composite of several islands. I located it near Beaufort, but in a fictional adjacent county. This compromise allows my characters to visit many favorite tourist spots in Beaufort, Hilton Head, and Charleston without the risk of accidentally impugning anyone’s reputation.  

NO WAKE ZONE: My second Marley Clark mystery is set in Spirit Lake/Lake Okoboji, Iowa. I love this real community, having spent many wonderful summers there with my aunt, uncle and cousins. There’s a statue of my late cousin Steve Kennedy on the waterfront, honoring his contributions to the area. I collaborated on the history of the area with Steve. After he died, I asked for special permission to include the Queen II excursion boat, the Iowa Great Lakes Maritime Museum, and Arnolds Park, a century-plus old amusement park, in the plot. It’s worked out beautifully.

DEAD HUNT: This is the second romantic thriller in my “Smart Women, Dumb Luck” series. I now live in Upstate South Carolina, and wanted to incorporate real and very special Foothills wilderness locations and state parks in this plot. However, I once again decided on a fictional town and county. In this case, the heroine is head of security for a private university, and I didn’t want to associate threats with any real university so I created fictional Blue Ridge University.  

LIES:  Unlike my prior novels, this romantic suspense is not set current day. It takes place in 1938 in a real Mississippi River town, Keokuk, Iowa (my hometown). While I did considerable research to make things as accurate as possible, I also asked two librarian/historians to review the manuscript for accuracy. While I attempted to get most things “right,” I did create a fictional bank to avoid maligning the history of any current institutions. At the suggestion of one of the reviewers, I’ve also changed the names of a couple of my fictional characters to avoid any possibility of offense. For example, I had no idea that the name I picked for one of my characters was the owner of a bank in 1938 and his relatives still live in the town. LIES is set for release this summer.

If you’d like to know more about my settings or my writing process, please visit my website— www.lindalovely.com —or add in any comment here that you’d like to receive my newsletter. Don’t worry, you won’t be inundated. I tend to send an average of one newsletter a year!