Book: Write a Great Synopsis by Nicola Morgan

Genre: Non-Fiction/Writing Advice

Most writers hate writing synopses. They need dread them no more. In Write a Great Synopsis – An Expert Guide, Nicola Morgan takes the stress out of the subject and applies calm, systematic guidance, with her renowned no-nonsense approach and laconic style.

Write a Great Synopsis covers: the function of a synopsis, the differences between outlines and synopses, dealing with requirements for different agents and publishers, finding the heart of your book, how to tackle non-linear plots, multiples themes, sub-plots and long novels, and it answers all the questions and confusions that writers have. Nicola also introduces readers to her patent Crappy Memory Tool, explains the art of crafting a 25-word pitch, and demonstrates with real examples. Gold-dust for writers at all stages.

I’ve been waiting on tip-toes for this book to be released – synopses are tricky stuff to write, and it’s always nice to get an expert’s tips on them. While the UK publishing industry is a little more friendly than the US industry there’s a lot less information available online about it. We’ve got The Writer & Artist’s Yearbook, Carole Blake’s From Pitch to Publication, and now there’s Nicola Morgan with Write A Great Synopsis and her more general industry advice book Write to be Published. The best part about it – WAGS is only £1 in January! You can buy in here from Amazon UK.

Nicola’s book is a short and snappy read that covers all the bases – the only thing I would have liked is a more formulaic method, which tends to work best for me (Susan Dennard’s method worked a charm for me recently). Nicola’s recommendations don’t rely on a formula or a section break down, but this this allows her methods to work for a much wider range of stories. Her tips work brilliantly for both your run-of-the-mill 3 Act stories and for non-fiction and fiction that doesn’t follow a standard structure. She even includes some particularly useful advise for books that jump around, include flashbacks, or have multiple endings.

This is a succinct and brilliant book, and I recommend it for any writers (UK, US or otherwise) who’re tearing their hair out getting that synopsis written.

Originally posted by Emma Maree Urquhart on EmmaMaree.com

Today, for their Road Trip Wednesday feature, YA Highway asked: If you couldn’t use your own name, what would your pseudonym or penname be?

This is a question that, due to my own over-thinking about branding and the future, I’ve already dealt with in small ways.

My original penname was just my full name, ‘Emma Maree Urquhart’, but for future books I’m shortening my penname to just ‘Emma Maree’.

It’s short, it’s memorable, it makes a snazzy URL, it’s easier to spell and pronounce than ‘Urquhart’ (Urk-hart), and it helps avoid any fussing about if I ever have to change my maiden name.

I wouldn’t mind trying out a brand new name if I ever had to write anonymously, it would be kind of fun to create a new identity from the ground up. I think it would have to have either a nice ring to it, or a subtle pun there somewhere – most of my favorite pseudonyms do (Frank Quitely, for instance).

EDIT: Thanks to the lovely Colin in the comments, I’ve now decided my super-anonymous(/gender neutral) pseudonym is: M. Amaree. Ta-da!

Originally posted by Emma Maree Urquhart on EmmaMaree.com

Today, for their Road Trip Wednesday feature, YA Highway asked: What’s your numero-uno reason for writing?

I feel like what I should be responding with is ‘to be read’. Because that’s what we all want, right? To have people read our stories, love our worlds, remember our characters.

(Alternatively, some might say they write because they enjoy it – but I’m a firm believer that sometimes you hate writing, hate your stories and hate the words that come out on the page–and this is all a necessary part of the struggle to improve your own work.)

But the head, the heart and the gut all agree that this isn’t why I started writing, and it isn’t why I still do it. I write because story ideas and characters show up in my head and I think: ‘That’s really cool. I want to share that.’

I write because these are the kind of stories I love – and the books I would read and obsess over for weeks afterwards. These are the stories that would dig deep into my mind and make me ask questions, and the characters that I’d want to know in real life.

The old writing adage definitely holds true for me: I write the books I want to read.

(And the books I think other people will want to read, too. Because I have fantastic taste. ;P)

EDIT TO ADD: A fitting and very true image…

Originally posted by Emma Maree Urquhart on EmmaMaree.com

In between college and when I went to get my masters degree in creative writing, I worked as a fiction editor at a publishing house in New York. I learned about all the journeys a manuscript takes on its way to becoming a book—from its cover design, to the strategic selection of its publication date, to the marketing that gets it picked up off a shelf and into the hands of the right readers. As an aspiring writer, the most valuable lesson I learned during my days at the publishing house was the power of focused revision.

Writers are touchy. And writing feels very personal. Getting a twelve-page revision letter from an editor is enough to send many writers back to bed for a week. I had new writers call me crying after I’d sent them what (I thought) was a very positive and encouraging revision letter. And I can understand that fear. In high school and even college, I loathed the idea of revision. When I was finished with an essay or a short story, it was over, done. I’d completed it to the best of my ability. I never wanted to look at it again. That was then.

These days, I see revision as the moment when my stories really begin to sing. Every first draft feels impossible for me. Every revision gets the book closer to what it always wanted to be. Revision is FUN. You just need a little help from your friends and separate file to keep all the scraps you’ll have to cut (maybe they don’t belong in this book, but surely you can write them into your next one). Here are some tips I try to write and revise by:

• Don’t revise while you’re writing. I could revise all day long and never write anything new. I make myself draft forward, instead of going back in to revise. I do that all the way through until I’m completely finished with a first draft. Then I have a foundation. Then I can go back in and make it better and have fun.
• Once you’re finished with a first draft, take some time and space off. A week is good, a month is better. Don’t even open your document. Take a breather. Read some books. Do the things you’ve been abandoning while you were finishing that book. Let your mind breathe, marinate.
• When you’re ready to dig back in, read the whole thing once. I load it on my Kindle, but before I had a Kindle, I would just read it on the computer (changing the font to something else, which makes it feel, bizarrely, like you’re reading something completely different—Try it. It works.) Read the whole thing in as few sittings as you can. Make notes on what stands out as working really well or not at all.
• Based on the notes from your reading, take a stab at revision. Are there scenes you can’t see clearly? Flesh them out. Is your character feeling something on page 26 that doesn’t ring true in the larger context of the book? Reevaluate her emotional landscape. Are you bored? Trim the word count 10%! (A daunting but excellent rule of thumb) Did you laugh out loud or cry? Pat yourself on the back.
• When you have one or two revisions completed on your own and you think your manuscript is really good, that probably means it’s time for someone else to take a look. Find a friend who you can swap stories with. If you don’t have writer friends, join a book club or a writing group to make some. I’ve done that in every new city I’ve lived in. Expect your reader to come to you with suggestions. Accept that your book is not perfect and will benefit from taking your readers’ questions into consideration.
• Don’t follow advice from someone who doesn’t understand what you’re going for.
• Do follow advice from someone who pushes you further than you thought you needed to go. There should be a voice in the back of your mind that says, “ohhh, this sounds really hard but it might be just the thing this story needs to be great.”
• Go back to your book and make it better.
• Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.
• Never give up—not after the first rejection letter or the hundredth.
• In terms of publication, all you need is one person to say “yes.”
  

Lauren Kate is the bestselling author of “The Betrayal of Natalie Hargrove”, “Fallen”, “Torment”, and the newly released “Passion”! You can find out more about her work on her official site.

Aren’t these editing tips fantastic? I had no idea Lauren had a job as a professional editor, but it really shows in these expert tips! I’ve already been working to apply them to my work, and I hope they come in handy for all your aspiring writers.

Originally posted by Emma Maree Urquhart on EmmaMaree.com

Hey, I was wondering if you could give me any tips on getting published? I’ve done a few searches on the internet but it’s hard to know which sites are scams and which ones are actually for real these days. Many thanks

- Comment by Gord

Hi Gord! Okay, a quick overview of the publishing process for commercially published fiction. It works like this:

1. Finish the manuscript. This is the hardest step. Re-draft it, edit it, polish it up until you’re sure it’s your best work. Give it to people to read and give some honest critique on. Don’t rush anything, just spend all the time you can getting it as perfect as you’re capable of.
2. Get an agent. This requires sending out a query giving a summary of your work and any writing credentials you’ve got. There are lots of good sites for advice on writing a query – I recommend looking at all the links down the side of Nathan Bradford’s blog, and taking a long browse of Query Shark. Editorial Anonymous is pretty snazzy as well. You can find editors by browsing online, or picking up the latest Writers’ & Artists’ Yearbook. Expect a huge amount of rejections at this stage – rejections in the hundreds isn’t uncommon, even in the thousands sometimes. With a bit of luck, you’ll have some agents requesting partials – the first few parts of the novel – and if they like it they’ll request the full story. With a lot of luck, they’ll then take you on!
3. Once you get an agent, they’ll set to work on finding you a publisher. Concentrate on whatever you want to work on next when this is going on, don’t get too hung up on it. The agent might ask you to tweak certain things in the book.
4. The publisher will give you either a single book-deal, or a multi-book deal – these deals are good if you’re doing a series of novels, as they mean you’ll definitely be able to publish the other books in a series even if the first book doesn’t do fantastically. Most sci-fi and fantasy contracts are multi–book deals.
5. An editor will work on the book before publication, and the manuscript will go back and forth between you and the editor until everyone’s happy. You’ll sometimes get sent cover ideas to look at, but authors generally don’t have much say in this. About a year to two years after you get your contract, it should be printed and ready to hit the shelves.
6. Once it’s out, you’ll need to spend a lot of time and energy doing interviews with papers, news programs and blogs as well as doing signings, workshops and school/library talks. This is all a key part of publicising the work and it can be costly depending on how much you want to help push the book, and how big the publisher’s advertising budget is. A published will usually send out a few copies to reviewers, maybe put a few adverts in magazines and posters up in bookstores, but if you’re a new author don’t expect too much. You can get paid a decent amount for doing talks and workshops, though
7. Once the book has earned back it’s advance – a lump sum given to you when you sign the contract which os usually nothing spectacular (working a normal job is far better financially) – you’ll start earning royalties depending on how well the book sells. These are a percentage of the book’s sales, varying according to your contract. If your book is sold to other countries you can make some decent money on the side as well and the publisher may take you on a promotional tour to do signings in that country.

Wikipedia has this to say on royalities:

Hardback royalties on the published price of trade books usually range from 10% to 12.5%, with 15% for more important authors. On paperback it is usually 7.5% to 10%, going up to 12.5% only in exceptional cases. All the royalties displayed below are on the “cover price.” Paying 15% to the author can mean that the other 85% of the cost pays for editing and proof-reading, printing and binding, overheads, and the profits (if any) to the publisher.

The publishing company pays no royalty on bulk purchases of books since the buying price may be a third of the cover price sold on an singles basis.

All you really need to know is that per book, it’s not much. If your profits don’t make up for the advance, you won’t get any royalties at all and the publisher will be a bit unhappy. I really can’t stress enough that for new authors, it’s not a high-paying job and you quite often need to keep at least a part-time job even after publication.

Very importantly, a publisher will never ask you for money up-front. Neither will an agent or editor. If they do, they’re not legit so get out of there quickly – legit publishing people make their wages through taking percentages of what you earn, you don’t have to pay them for anything. That’s the quickest way to tell if a publisher is a scam, and the Writer’s Beware! blog is excellent for catching out dodgy businesses as well.

For further reading, check out the latest “Writers’ & Artists’ Yearbook”, Stephen King’s “On Writing”, or reader recommendation Carol Blake’s “From Pitch to Publication”.

Update: I’ve put up a brand new FAQ page to keep track of good questions like this.

Update 2: Added a few book recommendations after some good feedback from Brian (MyNairn/SFFChronicles).

Originally posted by Emma Maree Urquhart on EmmaMaree.com

Just added two new pics to the Saint gallery – just some rough color pieces. There’s an unfinished upper body shot of Tyler with his wings – probably not going to be finishing it anytime soon, so might as well put it online. Also, a toonier (and grumpier) portrait shot of Tyler, which was fun to work on even if the style doesn’t look right at all.

I’m really quite excited about how this story is going, despite my moments of self-doubt. I just need to get out of my habit of reading editor blogs and query information and then panicking. Just got to concentrate on the task at hand first!

How are all you lovely lot? Let me know by leaving a comment or visiting the forum. How’s your week been, and what are your weekend plans?

Originally posted by Emma Maree Urquhart on EmmaMaree.com

Hello Emma! I am in the middle of yor first book, and I have to say it is very interesting. I’m in the middle of writing my own novel, Im 14 and I’ve been writing mini stories also since I was around 10 also. I would like to have some tips from you on how to keep moving foward and what happens if you get writers block? Big Fan!

-Chris

Experiencing a ‘block’ – when you can’t think of what to do next or when everything you try to doesn’t feel right – is part and parcel of any creative career, from writing to music and art. Sometimes it lasts a day, sometimes it can last months. Sometimes you’ll get it once or twice, sometimes every other day.

It sucks, but there are a few ways to get through it. Here are my Golden Rules for Avoiding Writer’s Block.

Keep At It – There’s this little thing called the ‘inner critic’ that most authors have. It’s good in small amounts – being overly egotistical can ruin your work – but it usually comes in large amounts, which is when we need to switch it off.

When you’re writing a novel the first step is getting it done. It’s a big project, and if you’re stopping to change things around, to edit and re-edit your opening and ideas, to fix up continuity and perfect that one troublesome paragraph, you’re going to get bogged down and you will grind to a halt. If you find yourself getting stuck perfecting it all, just stop and keep on going.

If you’re not happy with a scene, mark it and leave it. Get the first draft done, and then you can go back and start working on making it perfect. If you don’t finish the first draft that perfect opening chapter won’t be much use.

Mix It Up – If your chapter just isn’t working out, skip to a scene that does work. When I’m working on a novel, I try to keep it linear, but if I get stuck I’ll start fleshing out that future moment that I know is going to be awesome. In the process, sometimes I’ll figure out something about the characters that’ll make that section easier to complete – either way, I’ll be one step closer to the finish line.

In a more extreme example, I used to have a habit of switching projects entirely – so I’d be working on entirely different stories at the same time. If this works for you, go for it. I do it sparsely now because it slows down my progress and can get confusing, but it was fun for a while. One thing to watch out for is that, if you’re enjoying a side project a lot more than your main work, sometimes it can be better just to put your current piece inside and write what you’ll properly enjoy.

There’s also switching mediums – I like to sketch out character designs and key scenes to break up the writing, but the more musically inclined might like to create their own soundtrack for their works.

Be Inspired – Take some time off and read some books, watch TV and movies, play video games and listen to music. Getting a good experience of what’s out there, what works and what your enjoy is essential to understanding how creativity works, and will help shape you into a good writer (as long as you don’t let it drain away all your time, I had to cut down on TV and gaming to have more productive hours). Not to mention going out there and being social – things like having a good ear for dialogue and writing convincing characters mean going out there and understanding how people work, and how they interact.

If you get ideas for your story from all of this, all the better. Plagiarism (lifting stories and ideas straight from other sources) is a no-go if you want any kind of success as a writer, but giving your own spin on concepts is what this career is all about. Writer’s don’t just pluck ideas out of the air – it’s a bit more like cataloging everything you see, hear or experience and using it to understand how to make characters and stories, before shaping it into your own ones.

Personally, I like to listen to songs with a relation to my work and play through scenes in my head that match the music – I get a lot of very visual ideas doing that. I’ll also watch some TV shows with similar themes, or read books related to the idea. Right now I’ve got I’ve got a big reference book on religious mythology to leaf through, and I’ve been reading some Stephen King for some help with writing clean, believable first-person narrative.

Last but not least, relax. There’s no such thing as permanent writer’s block, or ‘losing’ your talent. Maybe you’re just pushing yourself too hard, or there are some other factors in your life that are getting in your way – stress and illness can wreck your creativity, as odd as that may seem. Spend some time with friends and family and take some time off, it’ll all come back to you soon enough.

Originally posted by Emma Maree Urquhart on EmmaMaree.com

This week I received my orders of an XL black and white ink cartridge, a massive box of 2500 sheets of printer paper and a box folder. I’d say these are simple pleasures, but they’re actually quite expensive. :O With my website bills to pay that’ll be my bank account running on empty for the month.

I’ve been quite busy! In case you haven’t guessed by the geeky supplies above, writing is still going a-ok. Been getting a few opinions on the first part of the story which is providing some fun fuel for improvements and future plans.

Aside from that, the house has been noisy with the other half’s DIY. Dave’s gotten ahold of a drill and has been improving everything, adding new catches to every door, putting up blinds  and jigsawing out the bottom of one of my desks (I have two in the same room, and love it), drilling down wood over any entrance points that might be used by spiders…the house is looking all the better for the improvements.  Not to mention there’s a huge mirror waiting to go in the living room which will take at least two people to lift.

He rearranged my pens and pencils when doing this, though. … I wasn’t best pleased.

Other than that I’m just huddling up in my big rainy day fleece-lined hoodie, because it’s pouring rain outside and I feel the cold too easily.

I’ve also been…

Reading Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, a alternative history fantasy novel set in 1800s England. This is a huge book, and I was put off from reading it for a while because it has a really slow start. I took it in to work and got started, though, and about a third of the way in the plot was unfolding at a good pace, and by the last part I was hooked and desperate to find out how it ended. An absolutely charming novel, with patriotism flowing through it and a historical and magical lore so in-depth that I found myself wondering if all the footnotes were from real novels. If you’re into old-fashioned fantasy or historical writing, you’ll love it.

Playing Final Fantasy 13/XIII. Another slow start, it begins with a tight hold of your hand and 20 hours later (about half-way through according to the quoted 40 hours gameplay) it’s still reluctant to let go. A brilliant storyline and fantastic environments and graphics make it all worth it, though, and now that characters are becoming more likable I’m more than willing to keep hammering the ‘A’ button just to see more. It completely sucks you in.

Watching Doctor Who – Cold Blood, which was a bit depressing but an okay episode. The first part was a messy affair and I’m not sure the second part was good enough to save it  – the overuse of voice-overs really didn’t do it any favors. Those final minutes really stole the show, but they didn’t exactly end on a feel-good mood.

Time can be rewritten though, right? Right?

Oh, and being extra-picky: I’m really not a fan of memory erasing plot devices like the Crack in Time. It just leaves too many plot holes – for instance, in the Weeping Angels 2-part episode, shouldn’t some other Clerics have been brought along in place of the ones who were erased? The Bishop isn’t going to take an empty ship. It’s best not to think too hard into sci-fi in general, especially time-travel sci-fi, but still.

The rain also canceled out plans for a BBQ, so we watched The Eurovision Song Contest instead. Which is fine, really, because it allowed me to indulge my sillier music tastes and make comments about it on Twitter throughout. My favorite by far was Turkey’s soft-rock band maNga, who took second place. Winners Germany were okay (the girl was adorable!) but not really to my tastes musically, Greece was dance-y and fun and so was France. Graham Norton’s comments were brilliant – I’m not a huge fan of his, but his commentary was hilarious. Oh, and the UK were infuriatingly awful. I had a bad feeling when I saw Pete Waterman credited as a songwriter, and that gut feeling proved spot on. A trite mess of meaningless, optimistic-sounding lyrics.

Listening to alternative rock band Brand New’s album “Daisy”. I love Brand New, and I’m glad that this album is still as good as I would expect from them. It’s a lot less ‘catchy’ than “The Devil and the God…” and “Deja Entendu”, but that’s mostly due to the layers in each track. They all take multiple listens to even begin to be understood (and a few Google searches for the exact lyrics), but that doesn’t stop them from sounding brilliant. My favorite tracks hands-down is “Gasoline”.

When the army had to hold the line
you were nowhere near the front.
Before the kids could tell the dog goodbye
you were loading up your gun.
I want to know what is the great divide
I want to know what I’ve become.
You’re think that no one else is lonesome
you think that you’re the only one.

That verse in particular has a great rhythm too it, which reminds me faintly of Nine Inch Nails track “Capital G”. The album’s single “At the Bottom” is a bit catchier with an equally strong rhythm to it.

Anyway, I’m off to take it easy in my comfy hoodie and get some work done before bed. I’m loving the long weekend!

Originally posted by Emma Maree Urquhart on EmmaMaree.com

Hello. I’ve an update to one of our most popular posts, an explanation of why Aultbea Publishing (also known as Script Publishing) are an untrustworthy business.

I’ve recently been directed to the Nutraceuticals Now website, for a medical magazine produced by ‘Jonson-Jonsen Publishing’, a company name that brings up nothing other than the magazine on Google and is very unlikely to be a registered business.

It turns out this new Inverness-based publisher is an alias of Aultbea. Under contact info, the address for the company is not the address to the Church Street Script/Aultbea Publishing offices, whose lease has now lapsed, but the home address of these company’s owner, Charles Faulkner – real name Sultan Zuberri.

Faulkner/Zuberri, who has previously always had the position of ‘owner’ and has never mentioned literary qualifications in any press release or media interview, is down on this site under the position of Editor.

The magazine itself has a decent publishing history, though I can’t vouch for the quality of content.

Thanks to the Invernessians who brought this to my attention. This guy is persistent.

Originally posted by Emma Maree Urquhart on EmmaMaree.com

It’s Burns Night, a night when Scots young and auld sit down for a proper Burns supper of haggis, ‘neeps and tatties; whiskey and a recital of some of the bard’s famous works.

Well, we had haggis. One out of three isn’t so bad, right? …Right?

Came home for work and bought a haggis for Dave to cook for dinner, after haggling over what kind of tatties we were having (no ‘neeps, Dave isn’t too keen on turnips). He was surprised that I bought a real haggis instead of a tinned one. I’m not entirely sure why anyone would eat haggis out of a tin, the squishy meat-bag in the fun part.

Tastes better than you'd think

We had it with some Pimms & lemonade, played video games, watched TV, washed the dishes, and made Rocky Road. It wasn’t exactly traditional, but it was delicious.

Now I’m checking up the Wikipedia page on Burns Suppers, getting excited about the ‘Address to a Haggis’ and regretting not reading it. Then I try to read it and get horribly self-conscious about how ridiculously Scottish I’m sounding, and keep interrupting my own reading going ‘What…?’ and ‘I don’t know what that means…’ before trailing off confused and defeated.

I think next year I might do it properly, complete with embarrassing poetry readings, a messed-up Toast to the Lassies because Dave will no doubt have made the meal again, and maybe even a fair share of whiskey.

I love To A Mouse, and not just because I went through a fangirl stage for Steinbeck’s “Of Mice and Men”.

But Mousie, thou art no thy lane,
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men
Gang aft agley,
An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,
For promis’d joy!

Still thou are blest, compared wi’ me!
The present only toucheth thee:
But och! I backward cast my e’e,
On prospects drear!
An’ forward, tho’ I canna see,
I guess an’ fear!

…It’s because we all guess an’ fear sometimes.

Now, I’ve got some Rocky Road to nom on.

Love,

E.Maree
xoxo

Originally posted by Emma Maree Urquhart on EmmaMaree.com