Pulling Readers In With Sensory Perception

Whatever you write, you need to find a way to make it accessible to your reader. One way to do this is through sensory detail.

I can already tell that I’m going to love working my way through this book. Every other page has an exercise, a writing prompt, or some other way to dig in and put what you are learning to work.

The way that Darwin has you work with sensory detail is to sit someplace and take it all in. But you don’t just sit there. You spend a minute focusing on each of the individual senses – sight, sound, touch, smell, taste, and kinesthesia or an awareness of the position and motion of the body. Write down whatever it is that you note.

Next, you build that historic bridge. Think about the time and place in which you are setting your story. Do this same exercise for that particular time and place. You may not have done all of the research that you need to do, but think about it. If you can sense it, it is going to feel more real to your reader.

Feel stuck? Sit in your backyard and do the exercise again. What do you see? What do you hear? What is within reach that you can touch? Don’t forget smell (fresh mown grass), taste (your neighbor’s charcoal fluid on the air), and kinesthesia.

Now think about the time period your story is set in. I’ve set one story in 1969. What if my character was sitting out in her yard in 1969? What would she see? Hear? Etc? How would this be the same as what you sensed in your own yard? And how would it be different?

When you go to work these perceptions into your story, be sure to include three different senses per manuscript page. Often, the easiest are sight, sound and touch? What else can you work in? And how can you vary things so it isn’t the same three senses on every page.

These sensory perceptions will help your reader feel like they are there. And when you can do this, you will know that you’ve built a bridge.

–SueBE

What Every Publisher Wants Is a Little Different

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com

Whenever I start working for a new publisher, I have to pick through the specifications very carefully. It doesn’t matter if what you are doing for both is a middle grade biography. Something is going to be different and it may well be something big.

For my current project, they just decided that the series won’t have any sidebars. There was only one per chapter so getting rid of them isn’t too difficult. The other publisher that I write for adores sidebars. There are normally at least three per chapter.

One publisher includes one or more infographics per book. The other has none.

For my newest publisher, once the book has gone through final design, I have to proof it. This is also when I caption photos and paginate the index. Of all three of these things, captioning photos was the most difficult. Why? Because the first time through, every caption was obvious and quite frankly boring.

“This football team plays that football team.” “So-and-so talks to this-other guy on the sidelines.” It took some serious thought to create captions that were actually interesting. My key to success? Don’t say exactly what is shows. Say what it illustrates. “A good coach can keep a player’s spirits up even during a difficult game.”

If you aren’t sure how to do something, ask! This was the case the first time I indexed a book for my new client. Word actually has an index function. I’ve never used it but I felt certain I could figure it out if that’s what they wanted. But it wasn’t. Instead my editor explained how many items I would need and how to select them. Then I just had to lit them alphabetically. Some days that alphabet is super tricky!

A job for a new client can seem incredibly confusing. That’s why I always reread the guidelines and spec sheets before I get started. Then I rewrite what is expected. Why rewrite it? Because I’m a linear thinker. If I need three sections and two sidebars in each chapter, I will write out something like:

Chapter 1

• Section 1
• Section 2
• Section 3
• Sidebar 1
• Sidebar 2

Five chapters would mean that I repeat this for Chapter 2 through Chapter 5. It is the best way that I’ve found to keep it all straight. This is especially important since one of my clients isn’t a publisher but a packager. This means that each of their clients will also want something slightly different. It is critical to do whatever you can to keep it all straight!

–SueBE

Rainbow Book Month

June is Rainbow Book Month.™ Sponsored by the American Library Association (ALA), this is a nationwide celebration of the authors and writings that reflect the lives and experiences of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, pansexual, genderqueer, queer, intersex, agender, and asexual community.

It was originally established in the early 1990s by The Publishing Triangle as National Lesbian and Gay Book Month. As our understanding has changed, so has this observation to include the greater queer community.

Recently I read a Publisher’s Weekly article, “In Conversation: Leah Johnson, Kyle Lukoff, and Abdi Nazemian Share Their Hopes for Queer Children’s Lit.” One of the questions that these authors was asked was how their own books within this community have changed over time. Johnson talked about how community has found its way into a lot of her recent writing.

Lukoff discussed changes in the body of LGBTQ books as a whole. Going from one character vs the world to one character existing in a particular, specific cultural context. As a former anthropology student, that comment really spoke to me.

Nazemian discussed the importance of self-realization that resistance and celebration can occur simultaneously and don’t have to be separate things. This quote really moved me. “. . . When exploring queer life in Iran (yes, it exists, as it does in Gaza, and everywhere else in the world) for Only This Beautiful Moment, I was also reminded that for all the repression and injustice, community and creativity still find ways to flourish.”

This reminder feels especially vital given the number of challenges that rainbow books receive. The number of book challenges in 2023 was 65% larger than the number of books challenged in 2022. Nearly half of these books represent the experiences of LGBTQIA+ and BIPOC individuals.

As all of my readers know, or quickly discover, I’m strongly anti-ban. Sure, you can parent. Every book is not suitable for every young reader. But as soon as you start telling someone else what their child should not read? That’s a slippery slope, my friend.

–SueBE

Motivate Yourself

One of the text books for my class.

Recently a fellow writer asked a group of us how we keep ourselves motivated while querying. Basically, she wanted to know how to maintain the drive to keep querying when finding an agent might take years. Sure, she knows that she should get to work on her next novel. After all, that might be the one that lands her the agent. But how to keep motivated?

Isn’t that the big question for all of us?

For my part, I also do work-for-hire. Let’s face it. Work-for-hire school library writing is my day job. It is how I keep the lights on and rice and beans in the pot. And I think that helps a lot. Because I’m seeing my work in print and on library shelves.

But it can still be really hard for me to get something done. In addition to who knows how many picture books, some of which are ready to submit, I have no less than four manuscripts in progress. One is a middle grade science fiction novel that I abandoned something like 15 months ago. Then there is the cozy mystery on its second iteration. There’s a graphic memoir which is an outline, several spreads worth of text, and lots and lots of notes. And there is a new early middle grade.

When it comes to fiction, I am much better at the early stages than the writing. But I want to see something make its way to final. My plan is to start with the cozy. Because it is historic fiction, I am starting an independent study today on writing historic fiction and time travel fantasy.

The instructor is Melanie Faith. While I’m not planning to write time travel fiction, Melanie has a tendency to inspire me and send me off in unexpected directions.
And that is something that we writers all need periodically. We need that nudge out of our comfort zone. It helps awaken creativity.

And, in this case, I’m hoping it helps me get a grip on historical fiction. And that that in turn will drive me forward.

–SueBE

June is Audiobook Appreciation Month

Did you know that June is audiobook appreciation month? I know that not everyone loves this art form, but it really is an art. Whether it is full cast audio (each character voiced by a different actor) or a single reader, it takes skill.

One of the great things about an audiobook is that it can help a reader understand the story. I hadn’t thought of this until a friend told me that her son likes to listen first and then read. Hearing the text read aloud actually helps him decode the story.

Another reason to love audiobooks is that you can listen to them in the car. I can’t read in the car because it gives me a headache. But listening to a book? I can do that for hours. That said, I wish libraries had a search function for listening time. The drive to the lake and back is 5 hours. Austin and back? That was 25 hours. I don’t want to get home and only be half way through a book.

I will also listen to book that I would never read. In my experience, a lot of adult nonfiction would benefit from a good edit. And I mean but 25 percent. Maybe it wouldn’t be possible buy trying to do it would definitely improve the text. I can listen to one of these books while I knit or fold laundry. I can listen while I walk. I’ll stick with it if I’m doing something else but I wouldn’t if I was reading the book.

I know, I know. There are people who say that listening to a story doesn’t count as reading. Really? Because it helps build vocabulary, you have to decode character motivation, and more. It is simply another way to engage readers. And for those of us who love to HEAR a good story, audiobooks are the best.

What audiobooks have you recently listened to? I’m wrapping up THE HOUSEKEEPERS: A NOVEL by Alex Hay. It is a historic caper that will keep you guessing what happens next.

–SueBE

Rounding Out Your Knowledge

Today is Juneteenth. Maybe that’s what pushed Into the Depths forward in my social media feeds. Or maybe it was simply the fact that someone decided to make sure people found out about it since today is Juneteenth. Regardless, finding one podcast led me to look for more.

The reason why is simple. Far too many of us are ignorant of Black culture and Black history. And that’s ridiculous. After all, it is part of American culture and American history. Expanding your awareness won’t qualify you to write as a BIPOC author, unless you are BIPOC. But it can help you prepare more well rounded work.

Take a look at this list of podcasts and click on the titles (I’ve linked the titles to the podcasts) of those you find intriguing.

Into the Depths

National Geographic Explorer Tara Roberts worked with divers, marine archaeologists, descendants of those brought over on ships, and historians to investigate the stories of the people lost to the slave trade. She’s shares their stories to honor the estimated 1.8 million people who died during the Middle Passage. Join her as she discusses the work of Black scuba divers searching for buried slave shipwrecks dating from the 15th to the 19th centuries.

The Black History Buff Podcast

This weekly podcast covers topics ranging from afro-samurai to pistol-wielding poets. No matter the topic it covers overlooked stories and people.  Episodes include interviews with historians, authors, and experts, as well as discussions about the importance of Black history.

The MLK Tapes

If you are more interested in true crime podcasts, this one explores rare recordings of eyewitness interviews and never-before-heard testimonies of those present when Dr. Martin Luther King’s was killed.  This series makes it clear that the plot to assassinate MLK went far beyond what was recorded in the history books.

1619

Composed of 5 episodes and an introduction, this New York Times podcast series by Hannah Nicole-Jones examines the economic, social, health and political costs of being Black in America.

Historically Black

I am a sucker for object history. Each episode of this podcast explores the story behind an artifact submitted by a listener. It might be a photograph, a piece of jewelry, or even a musical instrument. This podcast has been created with the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture. Learn how personal history can be tethered to political history.

I hope that one or more of these podcasts tempts you to learn a bit more about our past which can only help shed light on our present.

–SueBE

Don’t Panic: Tell Your Editor When You Make a Mistake

Last week while I was photographing sources for my editor (read the post here), I found something that made my heart sink. Not only had I spelled an author’s name wrong in the footnotes, I had spelled it wrong when I quoted him in the book. The book was moving toward layout, so I knew that I had to speak up and speak up fast.

I put together a quick email. I had to let this editor know. Here’s more or less what I said.

“Here’s where I have to admit that I’m dyslexic and names are wicked hard for me. It is wrong in the footnotes and it needs to be changed in paragraph three of chapter four assuming it didn’t get cut or moved.”

When she responded she told me that she had already found and fixed the error and it wasn’t a big deal. But then came the part that surprised me. She thanked me for following up, because almost no one does that.

Her response floored me. First of all, the kindness of it amazed me. For several years, I worked for an editor who melted down any time she found this kind of error. Academia was even worse. When a professor caught me in a mistake, he called me out in front of the entire department. “Do you not know what a dictionary is for?”

Despite people like this, you need to be straight forward and fix any mistakes that you can. Let your editor know when you spot something. Don’t try to cover things up. After all, you are all working as a team. Your goal is to produce a quality reading experience for your readers.

And I understand why you don’t want to admit that you made a mistake. So often we are told that if someone spots a mistake, they won’t want to work with us. And that may be the case with some people. But other people will simply acknowledge that we are all fallible. These are the team players who know that being a punk to you isn’t going to do any good. These are the people you want to keep close!

–SueBE

Luck or Hard Work?

I was in the midst of doing something else yesterday when I spotted the above quote by Helen Hanson. It immediately reminded me of a letter from the editor I recently read from C. Hope Clarke. She is the author of something like 19 books in three series and the editor of the Funds for Writers newsletter. She wrote about the fact that very few people see her list of books and think, “She’s treats her writing like a job.” It is much more common for people to think, “She’s really lucky.”

And I get it. When you see the books of a successful author stacked up on the shelf, it is tempting to think just how lucky this person is.

There is an element of luck in publishing. Your work has to cross just the right desk at just the right time. If your novel about a capybara farm reaches an editor the week after they sign a novel set on a capybara ranch, the different won’t be enough to get you a contract. And if she has a pathological fear of capybaras, you will also be out of luck.

That said, if you send it in the week after her four-year-old decides that capybara are the best animal ever, she may request a full because she knows what capybara are and recognizes their awesomeness. But for that to happen, you have to have developed an idea that has a sound story structure and three-dimensional characters. Tension has to rise a the right points but also periodically back off so you don’t exhaust your reader.

All of this means that you’ve written and revised. You’ve asked people to read over your work and then you’ve combed through their comments and suggestions. You’ve rewritten and revised numerous times.

So much effort goes into making the luck possible. It doesn’t just happen. Day job. Evening job. Weekend job. However an author decides to do it, they have to put in the effort for the luck to happen.

–SueBE

Interview with Angela Yarber

We have a special treat today. Angela Yarber, author of Queering the American Dream, has dropped in for an interview. I’m going to relinquish the floor to her because she has so much wonderful information to share.

SueBE:  You have written a complex, compelling narrative.  How would you introduce it to writers who primarily write for young readers?

Angela: Every family is different, but not all families are treated equally, even though they love each other just like all families. Queering the American Dream is the story of how my family was treated differently because we have two moms and an adopted child. It’s a story of how I had to leave my job because I’m gay, so my family traveled all over the country to decide what to do next. Our journey is fun, funny, meaningful, and sometimes challenging because of our differences. But we didn’t travel alone. Instead, there were a lot of different women who inspired us and made our travels possible, so I share some of their stories, too.

SueBE:   When I picked up your book, I expected part travelogue, part eulogy, and biographies about those you have painted.  With such a complex and varied topic, how do you make sure everything fits?  That you haven’t gone astray? 

Angela: The stories of the women I’ve painted are so intricately woven into my life, vocation, and research that sharing glimpses into their biographies are inseparable from my own. I also had to do quite a bit of editing. There are plenty of stories from my travels that I didn’t share simply because they didn’t really fit the themes or draw the narrative forward.

And, to be honest, I do go astray sometimes! Part of memoir, particularly of the queer and feminist variety, is showing how life doesn’t always go as planned. When I left on the journey I recount in Queering the American Dream, I hoped I’d write about it, but I never imagined I’d do so through the lens of death and grief, for example.

SueBE:  No, that really isn’t the kind of thing you plan to do but it did help create a powerful narrative. With Elizabeth’s power saw analogy in mind, what advice do you have for creators who are finding it difficult to recharge? 

Note to the reader: On page 108 of the book, Angela relates an analogy Elizabeth uses in describing work surrounding empowerment. I’ve included it below to help you understand Angela’s response to my question.

If your power saw doesn’t work, there are typically one of three things
wrong:

• the blade is too dull and needs either sharpening or replacement,
• your battery is drained and needs charging, or
• your power source is faulty and won’t adequately charge your
  battery.

Angela: This is such an important question. The poignance of the power saw analogy is that it gives us a three-pronged approach to self-care and recharging. We must “blade sharpen” by honing our writing skills, creating regularly, and having discipline, but this is not enough. We must also find constructive ways to charge our drained batteries; not just with bubble baths or spa days, but with radical self-care for collective liberation. To me, this means setting and abiding by boundaries, resting, getting plenty of sleep, eating fresh, vibrant, enlivening foods that delight our senses, asking for help from my community, exercise, and meditation. But the third element is actually the most important, and that’s acknowledging that many of our power sources are faulty. Sometimes, no matter how much “blade sharpening” we do and how many bubble baths we take, we still feel overwhelmed, stressed, burned out because the sources we’re plugging into for recharge are inherently oppressive. And those systems need dismantling!

So, if it’s at all possible, step away long enough to pause for a writing retreat. If you don’t have the time or resources to go somewhere fancy, ask a friend to take the kids for a few hours and head to the public library with a cup of your favorite tea; make a retreat with your intentions (and some libraries are gorgeously inspiring). Give yourself time every day to quietly and gratefully breathe and gently stretch. Join an online writing community that aligns with your values for solidarity, encouragement, and accountability. And offer yourself some grace; you’re a human with feelings and needs and not a writing robot who can just spew out product day after day!

SueBE:  What valuable advice! When you, Elizabeth, and Ru ventured to Hawaii, you had to make a choice.  Go with your original plan or break away and do something different.  What advice do you have for writers who aren’t sure that moving forward with a manuscript, a publishing opportunity, or even a class they have signed up for is a good idea? How might they evaluate their situation?

Angela: As a Type-A creative, I’m a big fan of combining strategic planning with intuitive creativity to form a happy medium regarding how to move forward. So, I love to make a good ol’ fashioned pros and cons list. But I don’t stop there. Rather, I also approach the list intuitively, assigning more value (or bigger, bolder font) to the items on the list that mean more to me, while minimizing those that mean less. On the one hand, I recommend strategically evaluating the ROI (return on investment) of a class you registered for or a manuscript you’re working on, while simultaneously listening to your gut. I imagine a creative like dancer Isadora Duncan—who would remain supine with her hands on her solar plexus until inspiration arose—combined with a business savvy CEO with a spreadsheet in hand.

Good evaluation means bridging the gap between heart and head, body and soul, solar plexus and spread sheet to best evaluate your situation. Sometimes the gut wins out over the spreadsheet. Other times, the pros clearly outweigh the cons, even when your heart tells you otherwise. Most of the time, though, I think the evaluation comes when these two sides of ourselves serve as conversation partners.

SueBE:    I love that different items have different sized fonts! Last but not least, what question do you wish I had asked?  And how would you respond to it?

Angela: How about the classic question, “Why did you write this book?”

I wrote my book because I’m sick of seeing so many marginalized people bound to the so-called dreams that have been systematically designed to disenfranchise us. Heteronormativity. White supremacy. The 9-to-5 rat race. Broken education, medical, and criminal justice systems. We’ve been told to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps by a country that has stolen our boots. And that’s not ok.

Or, to quote my queer clergywomen coven, “Honey, it’s not you. It’s the system.”

I wrote and published this book so that readers can see examples of what it means to live and dream differently. Because, in the words of Toni Morrison, the only life “you can have is the one you can imagine.” My inspiration is an exercise is radical imagination, of dreaming what life and work and vocation and family could look like if we heed the wisdom of queer women of color who have been dreaming creative, alternative, dismantling dreams from the jump. It wasn’t easy, but my wife and I tried to follow this queer, intersectional wisdom.

SueBE: And can I say that I am so happy you did? Because this book is amazing and it will be valuable to so many people. Thank you for sharing so much of yourselves and your lives with us and for taking the time to discuss your craft. Thank you, thank you!

To my readers – Angela is now on tour for her book. To keep up on what is going on in her quest to Queer the American Dream, check out the information on her site here.

Gut Instinct: Paying Attention to Your Writing Hunches

Before I started drafting chapter one, I bounced a few ideas off my husband. I knew which one I liked best but I was seeking validation. “Don’t do that one. This one will be more positive.”

Really? I still wasn’t sure it was the right choice but I gave it a try. I simply am not loving this chapter. It doesn’t have enough tension. It feels amorphous.

Sure, I could rewrite it but before I do, I’m going to try something else. I’m going to draft a completely different chapter. This isn’t just a case of “I’m right and you’re wrong.” It is a matter of paying attention to my writing hunches.

Years ago, I was at the KS-Mo SCBWI Advanced Writers Retreat with Karen Boss of Charlesbridge. She told about sending out a rejection letter.  She e-mailed the writer, briefly explaining why the manuscript didn’t quite work.  She got a response.  “Thank you for your feedback on my manuscript.  That’s what I thought was the problem, too.”

Boss went on to explain that this didn’t happen to her once but multiple times. Sometimes it was face-to-face at a conference critique. Other times it was following a rejection letter.

What’s the problem with telling an editor that you too had spotted that problem? Because if something isn’t working as it should, and you realize it, you need to fix it. If as you are revising, you have this niggling feeling that the setting is too generic or you need more beats of action, fixt it.  Rewrite your story.  Don’t wait and see if someone else notices the problem. This is especially true if your work is going to an agent or an editor.

Have faith in your instincts. Let them tell you when to scrap something or make repairs.

–SueBE