Monday, July 18, 2011

In Which I Wrap Up

This will be the last post regarding the 4th Street Fantasy Conference Hannah and I hit a few weeks ago. There's no real rhyme or reason to this post, I'm just going to list remaining quotes or comments I wrote down made by the authors at the conference. They're all interesting but weren't strong enough for a whole blog post (or I just got lazy. Probably both)



Patricia C Wrede - She suggested that as an author, you should really hire an accountant to help out with the taxes and junk. She doesn't have one, but that's only because she was an accountant until she could support herself with her writing


Elizabeth Bear - "Nobody with a clean house ever wrote a book"


Patricia C Wrede - "There's only 2 rules to writing. You have to write and what you write has to work"


Lois McMaster Bujold & Steve Brust - both touched on the term Burn Story, which meant writing through the story points as fast as possible, trusting you'll come up with more.


Steve Brust - in regards to Burn Story - "If you're saving something (a plot point, etc) for later, you won't come up with something new"


Elizabeth Bear - "Writing is too hard to do well, which is why we have to do it in stages with revision"


Sherwood Smith - In regards to derivativeness of Eragon and Christopher Paolini - It's possible the people who published Eragon did so purely for financial reasons and the money, but we mustn't forget that Christopher Paolini wrote Eragon out of joy, because he loved those aspects of the genre.


Emma Bull - in response to Sherwood Smith's above comment - Joy, though, doesn't necessarily = readable fiction. That's where craft comes in.


And to wrap it up, Elizabeth Bear shared a motto she and her CPs had in regards to getting that agent or book deal - "Right Day, Right Desk, Right Story, Write Better"

24 comments:

Maria Zannini said...

Ref:
Patricia C Wrede - "There's only 2 rules to writing. You have to write and what you write has to work"


This one says it all in a nutshell.

Anne Ahiers said...

both Eragon comments were spot on.
And weren't the 'publishers' of Eragon just his dad?

Anonymous said...

Lots of good points in here. I have to say, I agree with Elizabeth Bear's points wholeheartedly.

Jacqueline Howett said...

Enjoyed. Some interesting points of view!

Hart Johnson said...

Great stuff... Am I right that Burn Story is basically the same as the WriMo goal--power through with the main story, fill in the blanks later? I've come to love writing that way.

I happen to LOVE Eragon, but I do recognize it as very under-edited. I also think it would have been wise to write it ALL before publishing any, as I suspect the delay on the last is because he's written himself into a corner somewhere... the ability to have EDITED that would have helped a lot.

Sarah Ahiers said...

Maria - yeah it does. It sounds so simple...

Anne - yeah they are.

Tracey - oh me too. me too.

Jacqueline - thanks! And thanks for stopping by!

Hart - Very true. I don't hate Eragon, but it is very derivative for people who are well read in the genre. Riding dragons that can talk has been done to death before, not to mention the hero's journey, etc

Austin Gorton said...

Joy, though, doesn't necessarily = readable fiction. That's where craft comes in.

Indeed. I'm sure the people who write fan fiction love it too, but that doesn't mean I want to read it or that it should be published.

I would LOVE to be successful enough to hire an accountant some day. I have ZERO interest in that kind of stuff, so it'd be great to have someone who just takes care of all that for me.

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

Those comments about Eragon were funny! It didn't translate well into a movie, either.

Anne Ahiers said...

@Alex- i've never been so impressed with Costume and the Cast as i was with Eragon- only to be blown away by the crappiness of the plot and the Script Supervision

well, except for maybe the Last Airbender, but that's a whole 'nother level of epic failure

Sarah Ahiers said...

Teebore - my fanfiction was badass! So many single tears cried...enough to fill an ocean. And i totally hear you. Just thinking about the taxes give me a headache. I would definitely have to go that route

Alex - ugh, you're telling me. We saw that movie FOR FREE and we still regretted it

Anne - Shyamalan is DEAD TO ME!

RennMan said...

Elizabeth Bear - "Nobody with a clean house ever wrote a book"

But what if it is a non-fiction "How to" book from the Guru of housecleaning? Huh? HUH????

Yeah, that's what I thought. ;)



And Sarah, I agree with you, I haven't liked ANYTHING that Shyamalan has done since Sixth Sense.

Kalen O'Donnell said...

You know, its so easy to take cheap shots at something like Eragon, but Sherwood Smith (love her!) is absolutely right - Paolini didn't write it to cash in, he wrote what he loved, and that's worth remembering. I'm not actually a fan of it as I did find it derivative, but that doesn't change the fact that it has millions of fans for whom it wasn't derivative - we all read different books, after all. At the end of the day though, its just like Twilight or Amanda Hocking's books or any other popular work of fiction that gets flack for not being well-crafted or original enough - it keeps people reading and looking for more, and how can that ever be a bad thing?

Hannah said...

I liked Eragon too, but I haven't been reading Fantasy since I was wee. Now Twilight on the other hand...

Jamie Gibbs said...

I love the last quote! I have still to read Paolini's series. It was him that got me started in fantasy writing in the first place (purely out of jealousy - little upstart :P)

Anita said...

Nice wrap-up!

Anne Ahiers said...

@ Kalen- i don't give Twilight flak for being unoriginal or poorly crafed. I give it flak for the misogyny

@Renn Man- touche :-)
We like Shyamalan alright (eh- the Happening was not the best, but up to that we enjoyed his stuff. Signs and The Village are still some of my favorite horror/suspense movies of all time) so we were actually excited to hear he would be doing Airbender. But after what he turned in we can NEVER FORGIVE HIM

Kalen O'Donnell said...

@Anne - the messages made by Twilight, both intentional and unintentional, are an entirely different thing, and I levy my own criticism at them. Just kinda a different context from the Paolini discussion, is all.

Jessica Ann Hill said...

Those are all great tidbits and quotes. Thanks for sharing. :)

Mary Aalgaard said...

Great quotes and writerly advice.

Matthew MacNish said...

Are you melting yet?

Sarah Ahiers said...

Renn - touche. touche (i don't know the html code for the accent...)

Kalen - that was the gist of the conversation regarding Eragon, that for people who aren't well versed in the genre, riding a dragon who talks is a novelty if that haven't read Anne McCaffrey, Mercedes Lackey, etc. And it was ok to acknowledge that everyone starts somewhere and we should use that as an opportunity to introduce them to other works

Hannah - you were wrong to like Eragon. Hah! I'm kidding. I've actually read it twice and there are parts of it that i like. I can always find some bit worth liking

Jamie - Hah! That's hilarious!

Anita - thanks!

Anne - yeppers indeed

Kalen - true. And that's a whole 'nother blog post i don't plan on ever getting involved in

Jessica - you're welcome!

Mary - it was a great conference

Matt - god yes. It sucks bad right now. Air conditioning can't keep up and the dogs are going stir crazy since it's too hot for them to be outside. Effing climate change

Carolina M. Valdez Schneider said...

Oh my word, now this one resonates with me: "Nobody with a clean house ever wrote a book"

I do know people that seem to have clean houses, but I can't help but wonder if perhaps they have housekeepers or well disciplined children.

Sarah Ahiers said...

OR! Maybe they use their children AS housekeepers!

Rebecca T. said...

I love quotes like these from authors. So much greatness in such little phrases. Things to keep you thinking :D Thanks for sharing!

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...