A number of months back I talked about how I came into professional fiction writing, the short story per week and such. But Laura asked a question after my last post that I figured might be helpful to talk about. In so many words, the question is simply “Did I always write in this same push/rest style?”

Nope. Along the way I’ve tried just about every work method there is. Every one. And I still lust after being more of a regular writer. And I really lust after writing fiction like a day job, eight hours a day, five days a week. I have not managed to do that for any length of time yet, mostly because I’m too lazy. But I keep thinking about it. <g>

So let me back up and talk a moment about how I wrote my first five novels. The first one I mentioned before was written on a typewriter, ten pages per day, thirty days, very rough draft, without much use of white-out. I had forced myself to do it that way because up to that point I had started a half dozen novels and finished none. The time was winter/early spring of 1985. For four years I had been pounding out a short story per week. So that was my first attempt at very consistent writing and it worked.

Second novel was started shortly after the first one and done the same way. Both were destroyed and lost in a house fire just as I was finishing the second novel in early May of 1985. I have no memory of those two books, to be honest, more than likely because they were bad, and partially from the loss aspects of not wanting to think about them.

So, time passed. Remember, during all this, I was working jobs to keep rent paid and all that. I was starting to sell short stories, but the money was always just found money to me. So after the fire, one and a half years passed until I got a letter from an editor at Bantam books asking me if I had a novel. She had seen a couple of my stories in Night Cry Magazine, the little horror sister of Twilight Zone Magazine. She had liked my stories and hoped I was marketing a novel.

Now I had no ideas that letters like that existed. Trust me, that was a very good day.

In a snail mail letter back I said, “Sure, I got one.”

A complete lie.

I went to work, pounding on my new computer as fast as I could, in pure panic mode.

“Send me the first three chapters and a proposal,” she said in a follow up letter one week later. I sent her the first three chapters, freshly off the dot matrix printer, and a suckie outline that next week. (Thank heaven’s I had been following Heinlein’s Rules up to that point and could do just that.)

Then, I went back to work, writing as fast as I could, which during those days was not very fast it seems. The fear of an editor actually reading the book slowed me down something awful and two months passed with me writing, or trying to write, and driving Kris and Nina nuts until the editor asked for the entire book. No consistency at all. None.

One month later I managed to release the book off to the editor. Winter 1987. Entire process just under four months of stop/start/stop/start/panic.

She bounced it, but in the mean time, I had another editor I met at a convention really excited to see it and he bought it in May of 1987 and the book came out of Warner. So book #3 was my first published book.

Now, the week after I mailed the book to the first editor, I was so angry at myself for taking four very long months, I decided to write another novel quickly. I took a week off of work and sat down and typed, hard, fast, and laughing, since the book was a thriller political satire that made me laugh. Ten days later I had a finished draft. Short, about 65,000 words, but a finished draft. I have never mailed that book. Not completely sure why, to be honest, since I still remember and like it. This was the spring of 1987.

Then came Pulphouse Publishing. Years passed. Here comes 1992. Five years later. I was still selling short fiction when I got around to writing it, but mostly I just did Pulphouse. Then John Ordover calls and in the conversation with Kris wants to know if we would write a Deep Space Nine novel. Two months later we turned it in and I have never stopped writing novels since.

Five novels written from the Winter/Spring of 1985 to the summer of 1992. Over 90 novels written since those first five.

Now, during the years since 1992, I have had some times where I wrote every day, like it was a job, but mostly I wrote to deadline, often pushing back starting until I had to really panic and write hard to get to the deadline, which I never missed. Ever.

In the last few years, I am working to learn once again how to be more of a regular writer, going upstairs to my writing office at about the same time every night. It is working some at the moment, but to be honest I would rather work to editorial deadline. That’s how I do my best work.

But I suppose old dogs can learn new tricks, and since I have written regularly in the past, I know how. I just don’t enjoy it as much as play/play/play/panic/write fast and long/play/play/play.

But to each his own. Try every method. You will, over the years, find what works for you. However, if you are not producing pages, then your method is not working. But that’s a topic for another post.

Cheers, Dean

I get lots of questions about writing fast and how I do it? Often the question goes something like this: “How do you put out so many books?” Or more bluntly, “I wish I could write as fast as you, how do you do it?” Or they hear I have sold over 90 novels and just shake their heads in disbelief.

They often treat me like I have some secret. Nope, no secret. I just plant my butt in my chair longer than most writers. Nothing more.

Actually, I am what is known as a sprint writer, while my wife, Kris, is a steady writer. We both type about the same number of words per hour when going, anywhere from a page to three pages an hour, maybe four when a story is really moving. But she works a set amount per day, while I tend to take large chunks of time off playing around with other things, then when I write, I do long sessions, day after day, often late into the night.

I do that because I discovered that is what works best for me. I wish I could be more like Kris, but it seems my brain likes to work hard and fast and long, then take long breaks off.

So how do I write so fast? Answer, I don’t. But I am a professional writer, so I report for work, and when I report for work, I work. Of course, that answer never really makes anyone happy, so I tell the person asking to go ahead and just do the math.

One page per day, a simple 250 words, more than likely an amount shorter than this post, will get a writer to finish a 90,000 word plus novel in one year. Fred Pohl, a grandmaster of science fiction, wrote four pages every day no matter what. And he did that for decades and decades. He often wouldn’t allow himself to do anything else until his four pages were done. That turns into three or four novels a year.

I am like almost every other writer I have ever talked to. I struggle with openings, I have to often drag myself through the middle, and I write like a mad man when nearing the end of a book. I can spend days trying to figure out an opening on a novel, writing drafts and tossing them away, until I get the right opening. I can spend chunks of a book writing one or two pages an hour, and other chunks of the same book writing three or four pages per hour.

So, back to doing the math. Let’s say I can manage an average of 500 words per hour on a novel. Let’s say I am under an extreme deadline for a publisher, so I work ten hours a day, not counting taking time off for lunch, a nap, dinner, another nap. So I do that, I manage 5,000 words a day at the pace of two pages an hour. Actually, on days like that I tend to get about 7,000 words.

At that pace, I always have down days or bad days, so figure one of those every five days or so. That means I am writing about 40,000 words a week, a novel in about three weeks, give or take. But that’s under pressure when I have been paid to write fast.

Really, I am lazy. (Remember, I do nothing else but write.) So most of the time I manage, when under an easier deadline, to get about four hours a day in. That produces about 2,500 words a day. That pace takes me about seven to eight weeks to write a book. Then, of course, because I worked so hard at 4 hours a day, I have to take a month or so off and just play around. <g>

That still produces four or five books a year and causes me to get all those questions about how I write so fast. But the reality is just simple math. Put one page on your novel every day and in a year you have a finished book. Put two pages and it will take you six months to write a book and you will be considered very fast.

Write four pages a day and you write about four books a year and you have to write under pen names or in romance, where they like that pace for their authors. It is just math, nothing more. No great secret.

Of course, there are very few of us on this planet who can do what I think is simple. Everyone has their excuses and reasons why they don’t write, why they can’t make it to the computer to write 500 words, but yet can write huge blogs like this one, and a ton of e-mail. I call these excuses the “myths” of writing, and there are a ton of them. We spend a lot of time in the workshops we teach helping writers through the myths.

Professional writers who get to the computer and finish books regularly have worked through or over or around most of the myths of fiction writing. Me, I just follow Heinlein’s Rules and keep going. They worked for him and hundreds of other professional writers, and they work for me just fine. In fact, without those rules, I doubt I would be a professional writer, and I doubt I would be known as a fast writer.

So, to answer the question about how to write fast one last time (I wish). Simply put your butt in the chair and type regularly until the book is done, then repeat on the next book and then repeat again on the next book. Beyond that, there is no right way, just the way that works for you. But until you plant the butt and type, nothing else matters.

Cheers

Dean

I got a lot of responses from my post about agents and the state of the industry right now. And most of those asked how to get an unusual book in front of editors these days if they couldn’t get an agent to bite. Well, there is one way. Go to writer’s conferences that have editors from major houses and make a five minute appointment with the editor.

I can hear the “Huh?” from many of you out there.

In this new world of publishing, there has developed a wonderful learning tool for all types of writers called a writer’s conference. There are hundreds of these around the country. Kris and I teach at a few every so often. But mostly, the reason for all of you to go is to meet editors and agents. Let me add the word “good” in front of both editor and agent.

Of course, the conferences have wonderful panels with top people speaking.  You will learn a ton about craft, about business, about plotting, about editing, everything.  Nonfiction or fiction writers.  Doesn’t matter.

Many of these conferences are set up so that the editors meet for a few minutes with people who sign up. Now this is a horrid grind for the editors, but the editors do it because they are hoping to meet that one special writer, find that one special book that will fit their line, discover that one new talent and maybe the next bestseller.

So that allows you to get your book in front of an editor.  Easy, huh?

Well, not really. First off, you have to know what type of book you have FINISHED. Don’t bother meeting with an editor unless you have a finished book. If you know the type of book you wrote, then you have to research the editors attending the conference you are looking at. Say you wrote a paranormal romance. Are there any editors going to the conference who edit those kind of books? Or even better yet, two editors.

Are the editors with major New York houses? Research the companies, the book lines as well as the editors.

Then you have to work out your pitch, boil your entire book down into a really nifty “elevator pitch.” An elevator pitch is this. You get on an elevator on the 4th floor and an editor is there. Editor turns to you as the doors close and the elevator starts down. “What are you working on these days?” You have until the doors open on the first floor to light up that editor with your book, control their interest, make them want to read it. That’s an elevator pitch. Or sometimes called a Hollywood Pitch, or a High Concept Pitch.

Before you go to the conference, have that pitch ready and practiced. And be ready to answer questions in an excited manner about your book. If you’re not excited about it, how do you expect an editor to be excited?

If you are saying, “But I can’t afford to go to conferences, or workshops, or conventions.” Find another profession. You really don’t want to be a writer. What you are saying is “I really want to be a lawyer, but I don’t want to spend the time and money to go to law school.”

Kris and I could not afford to go to conventions in our early days of writing. We once shared a room at a hotel with seven other writers. One convention I had no money to eat and didn’t really know editors enough to buy me a few meals, so I managed to get enough food by taking a cooler from home and grazing the free food at a couple of parties. If you want this career bad enough, you do what you need to do.

And one good way to get around the agents is go to a writers conference prepared with a finished book sitting at home. You might need an agent if the editor is interested in your project, and if they make an offer, you MUST get an agent. But at least you can meet editors and get your book looked at by simply going to writer’s conferences.

And don’t forget that while you are preparing to try to sell your first novel, write the second one.

Cheers, Dean

As I continue to slowly work on the bibliography section of this site, I thought this book might be a fun one to mention up front here. Actually, this is only one book in a four book series I wrote under this title for Adventure Boys. None of these books, plus the four books I wrote as Sandy Schofield for them, have seen print yet in any real fashion. Bummer, I had a blast writing them.

The idea for Adventure Boys was a great one while it lasted. And who knows, it might still happen.

This was a really fun series, set in the Wild West, and actually, this is the second book in the series. It follows five boys as they try to make their way across the west following a really bad guy and his gang. A perfect setting for all kinds of adventures, that’s for sure.

The company had some top writers working on different projects. Kevin J. Anderson, Michael Stackpole, Loren Coleman, Steve Perry. All of us wrote books for them that have never come out. I had a blast writing them and was under contract to write three more in this series when the entire thing went down.

I suppose that I should talk to the newer writers here for a moment about how often this happens in publishing. Simply, a great deal. Over the years I have been contracted for over ten books that fell through for one reason or another, not counting these eight. I have written, counting the Adventure Boys eight books, twelve books total that were under contract and yet never appeared. For those of you who think that one book, your novel, is going to make your career, this ought to scare the pants off of you. This is one of the major reasons that Kris and teach that writers are people who write. Period.

Sure, the point is to get your book published, but what matters is the writing. You have to do your best on every book, do you best getting it into editor’s hands, and then move on. Write the next book. And then the next. Because the publishing side of things is out of your control. You have a contract with a publisher, but past that, you have no control over what happens on the other side. None.

So, I had a blast writing these Wild Boys books. I got paid. I hope they come out at some point down the road. But if not, it won’t stop me from writing more young adult novels, more thrillers, more mystery novels, whatever. I am a writer. That’s what I do.

Cheers

Dean

Okay, I am going to be very careful with this post. I get a ton of questions about agents, and Kris and I spend a week in the marketing workshop dealing on this topic and other submissions of novels topics. (Check out the workshop list if you are interested. The workshop is called Marketing and there is one in November.)

In the current world of publishing, agents hold a very strange place. First off, they are an employee of the writer. Yet at the same time, publishers require in their guidelines that the writer hire this employee before they will consider work from that writer.

Now by all business thinking, this is a very strange practice. How can someone come into my business and tell me to hire an employee? Yet, because of events over the last fifty years, this has become the norm in fiction publishing. And to understand all the events that lead to this takes time, but is critical to understanding how to deal with this as a new writer. So for now, just take it as a strange practice. I don’t have the week of typing here to try to explain it all.

Agents are in a bad way with these new guidelines by publishers. They are forced to look at all the crap, the total garbage that this rule stops writers from sending to publishers. They, in essence, have become the slush readers for publishing, a job that used to be done by low employees in the publishing houses.

Now trust me, as a person who has read slush for years, this is not something you ever want to do. Yet publishers, without consent from the agents, have forced this onto them. And every agent is dealing with it differently.

Most top agents have full lists of writers and thus pay almost no attention to the stuff coming at them. If they look at all, they search for something really catching and hot for the current market. Many try their best to read the query letters they get. But remember, they work for their authors and reading query letters is something that makes their other writers no money at all.

Newer agents who open up to this wave soon become overwhelmed and have to cut back. This often means they take on writers who end up getting shorted in one way or another as certain writers sell and go to the top of the agent’s list. But these new agents also try to look at every query they get.

Scam agents who couldn’t sell an ice cream cone in a heat wave make a ton of money off the hungry newer writers in more scams than anyone can imagine.

And, of course, this pounding causes the agents to be so busy, they encourage their writers to slow down, to take their time with books because the agents are just too busy, for the most part, to handle an old-style writer who does three or four books a year. Not all agents, but I have been hearing it more and more, especially from newer agents who have been slammed by this.

But for the publishers this is a two-edged sword. They don’t have to pay for slush readers, their already fantastically busy editors and assistant editors don’t have to deal with this either, and thus the tide of garbage is pushed aside. But, of course, there is one problem with this slowing of the flow and jamming of the agents. Good product is also slowed down or often blocked completely. They (the editors and publishers) don’t even know what they are not seeing. What they do see has already been preselected, pre-edited for them. Fine and dandy if book lists didn’t have to be filled every month. Somehow, editors need to see good books, yet agents have only so much time, can send out only so many books. At the moment, the balance seems to be holding, but there might come a time when the demand goes past what the agents can supply.

So, how is this new twist in the business of fiction publishing going to iron out? How is this massive road block between writer and publisher going to be solved? Not a clue. Right now it is doing what the publishers need, sort of. And more agents are pouring into the business to help take up some of the shortfall. But publishing is a growing business, with lists expanding and more and more books being published every year. And those new authors somehow have to get through this mess, get their good work in front of editors in some way or another.

And I have a hunch that editors will start worrying about what they are missing. New trends, new books, the strange, the different, do not get through this system as it stands at the moment. And that’s a bad thing for readers, for publishers, and for writers.

Okay, now that all the newer writers reading this want to slash their wrists, let me add this. In my opinion, this is the best time in my memory to come in as a new writer. And actually the easiest. You think this system is bad, you should have seen some of the earlier ones in the history of this business. This system allows a writer to help agents sell books. This system allows you to go around agents at certain times. This system does allow good books to be read by editors. But the writer has to take a ton of responsibility for having this happen.

Let me repeat that in a slightly different way. It is the responsibility of the writer to get his or her book read by either a good agent or a good editor. No one can do it for you.

Again, Kris and I spend a full week teaching writers how to market their novels (and surprisingly, there is still room in both November and May marketing workshop.) We teach how to get around this problem.

How? It sounds impossible. (I could hear the shouts <g>.)

Lots and lots of ways. To start off with, learn how to write a really good query that uses your voice, the voice of the novel, and is standard enough to fit, yet different enough to draw attention from either an agent or an editor. (Starting to see why learning this takes at least a week? <g>) You must sell your novel from word one, and I have read a ton of great novels in novel workshops that never got sold because the writer sucked at query letters, proposals, cover letters, and simple marketing.

First, to come into this business now, you have to write a good book, just as it always was. But secondly, you now must also learn how to write great query letters, great proposals, and great cover letters. And thirdly, you must understand how to market your work, how to find the right agent, the right editor. And how to even know when an agent is a good agent or a bad agent for you. A good agent for me might be horrible for you. Or the reverse. You have to understand that.

And so, so much more. After all, this is an international business you are trying to write for. If you can be stopped early in this business, you should be. It never gets easier. If you don’t know how to find the information in this information age, then maybe another business is a good idea for you as well. If you are unwilling to go out to workshops, to conferences, to find professional writers and talk to them, then just stop now. You don’t stand a chance.

But for the writers who know how to learn and have the drive to go the distance, this is the best time to come into this business and make a living with your fiction.

Agents are employees of the writers. Publishers require agents to be hired by the writer. I have a hunch that given time, this very strange practice will change. I just have no idea to what. As a former slush reader, I know that something has to be done to stop the waves of garbage while at the same time finding the new, dangerous, fresh voices in fiction. But will this current system work or will something else take its place? It will be interesting to see what the next step is, that’s for sure.

Cheers

Dean

As I slowly put together the bibliography section of this web site, I decided to talk about some books up front here, as I did under the Schofield name. And I do mean slowly, especially when there are about eighty novels I can talk about and well over a hundred short stories. I won’t talk about them all up front, but every so often I have a book that I am fond of and proud of, so I’ll banter about it here before putting it over on the other page.

This book came back to mind yesterday when I found a tee-shirt I had never worn while cleaning out a drawer in my closet. It is bright red and has a picture of The Shadow Warrior cover on it, and on it the saying “Who want some Wang?” is printed in bold. I am still saving it to wear at a special workshop or something.

SHADOW WARRIOR #1. For Dead Eyes Only. Pocket Books. October 1997.

I don’t think there were many Shadow Warrior novels ever done after this first one, even though I left the very last scene on a cliff hanger like a pulp fiction novel for the next author. This was a complete voice novel because in the game, the Shadow Warrior has a real voice and attitude, and for some reason, I really got into the voice, walking around the house for a month while writing this novel sometimes breaking into Shadow Warrior talk. Drove Kris nuts.

And there is one line in here that got me a call from the editor at Pocket. He was laughing so hard, all I could manage to make out was, “Can’t believe you did that.” Now trust me, that’s a phone call you want from an editor when you are writing comedy.

I remember writing the first fight scene in the restaurant and then walking around for a day laughing and worrying that I had taken it too far. I just reread that first scene and it still makes me shake my head and laugh. I learned a number of years back that this book, because it had gone out of print after about 40,000 copies sold, had become a collector’s item on the secondary market. I doubt it is anymore, since the so much time has passed, but at conventions, I tend to sign a bunch of these and have great discussions with fans about the Shadow Warrior. However, make note if you want to talk to me about this, I never played the game and have no clue about it. I just listened to a few lines from it before writing and tried to nail the voice. Everyone tells me I got it.

A fun book. And someday soon I’ll sit in a workshop with a bunch of writers and I’ll be wearing the “Who want some Wang” tee shirt. After all, if you can’t have fun writing, what’s the point. And I had a blast writing this book.

Cheers, Dean