Bravo to those readers who tell it like it is on Amazon and Barnes & Noble, the good, the bad, the typos. Sometimes of course, you wonder. Why did they pick that book to read? Was PMS involved in the writing of that review? What were their expectations? Every reader approaches a book with expectations — what the story will be like, what the reviewers said, what they read last, how the synopsis grabbed them, how their week went. Here’s a review I got recently for The Bluejay Shaman:

I enjoy Alix Thorssen, art dealer and amateur detective. I like it very much when she describes the local landscapes and makes smart observations about various characters. But-I hate the South American boyfriend, and the books have way too many crying women, all of whom need constant mothering. This whole “by a chick for chicks” plot, present in every book, is very tedious and makes me skim that part. Jack Reacher she isn’t. I would very much like to see more mysteries, but without all the clinging.

Written by man, as you may have guessed. I certainly hope men read my books. I know many who have. I’m scratching my head over this “whole ‘by a chick for chicks’ plot” though. If I, a woman, write a book about a woman it seems like there is an expectation that it would be, well, about chicks. The part about “too many crying women” made me laugh. Alix Thorssen is a stoic, not a cry-er, so I guess he means her sister, or maybe the entire women’s group, Manitou Matrix. Lots of chicks there.

Then he says: “In every book.” Does he mean he’s read all my books, or all books by chicks…? Because if he’s read all my books and still finds too many plots by and for chicks, well, he’s my hero! (And FYI: South American boyfriend doesn’t last.)

“Jack Reader she isn’t.” Talk about your expectations. If you want men’s action adventure don’t read amateur detective novels…

I have read very little Lee Child. You can read about one of my deconstruction projects of a Jack Reacher novel here. I have nothing against Jack, he just isn’t my thing. No surprise, then, that Alix Thorssen doesn’t resemble Jack. You want Jack Reacher, you read Lee Child. You want arty, landscape-loving amateur detectives, you read Lise McClendon.

The cool thing is reader reviews tell you something about the person writing them. Taste in novels is incredibly nuanced. If you’ve done your job as a writer and the review is glowing, you know you and the reviewer have similar tastes. (Because you’re not going to convince anybody to change their beliefs in a novel, especially a genre novel.) If they don’t like the book, find it “tedious” or “bland,” there’s not a whole lot you can learn about your writing but there may be something. I read all the reviews, good and bad, and try to glean something  from them. Especially if several people mention the same problems. But reviewers bring their expectations. As a writer you can’t know what those are, you can only try to write the best book possible.

And don’t try to make your character Jack Reacher. Make them unique. You, minus the crying.

Attracting readers (and buyers) is one thing. Dame Phyllis’s publishers in the UK and the US knew what they were doing, releasing it during the big holiday book-buying season. I just wish the experience had matched the expectations.

Nothing is awful about ‘Death Comes to Pemberley,’ but nothing is all that great either. The story begins as Darcy and Elizabeth have been happily married for six years and have two young sons (which in aristocratic fashion they love but rarely see.)  On the eve of a ball at Pemberley the youngest Bennet sister, Lydia, arrives in typical fashion: in a crisis and hysterical. Her husband Wickham and old beau Captain Denny have disappeared in the woods nearby and gunshots were heard.

But before this action James feels it’s necessary to recap the entire story of ‘Pride and Prejudice.’ This was unnecessary in my opinion. A classic novel, one of the most widely read in the English language, and the entire reason for the current work? It’s a fair assumption that the story is known by readers. If not, hey, go read it, people! Or watch one of half a dozen movies. The recap just made me antsy for the story.

Which would be fine if the rest of the story lived up to the original. That was silly of me, wasn’t it, to hope for an experience as magical as ‘Pride and Prejudice?’ Ah, I didn’t really, but yeah, okay, a little. The joy of the original was in the characters, their wit and charm and sparkling repartee. None of that wit and charm transmits in James’s prose. Darcy is upright and proper but little else. Elizabeth is a great hostess. Lydia is annoying. Wickham is a bad boy. But none of them live and breathe.

Even that might be okay if we were experiencing a classic PD James mystery, full of intelligent, cagy people and twists and turns. Unfortunately the entire story leads up to Wickham’s trial, mostly angst and historical facts about the English legal system. At one point James almost gives a dissertation on appellate courts. It’s just, sadly, dry as toast. And when it’s all over she favors us with a conversation between Darcy and Elizabeth to wrap things up, and wrap and endlessly wrap.

P.D. James is my hero! At 91 she is still writing novels. Maybe she’ll go back to  Adam Dalgleish and modern problems. Many writers have written continuations of Austen novels before her, and more will probably in the future. If ‘Death Comes to Pemberley’ is any indication we’d all do better to go read Jane’s ouevre — again. They never disappoint.

In editing the first draft of my new novel I often find places where the flow was present. Unfortunately that usually means I show (not tell for godssake) my characters moving from place to place, thinking thoughts they’ve already articulated, and generally feeling a bit too much. Logistics, getting people from place to place, are the first to go. They are usually unnecessary. Take them out and see if it still makes sense. (It will.) I remember teaching seventh graders writing and a boy who was completely stumped at how to get his story started without having his character get out of bed, brush his teeth, take a shower, eat breakfast, etc. etc. All the boring parts of living, right? As Elmore Leonard says, take out the boring stuff. 

The other thing in editing your second draft is that the first chapter can probably go. It was necessary for your flow when you started. It made you get deep inside the psyche of your character. But now that you’re there don’t burden your readers with it. Let it come out naturally later. I tend to load up my protagonists with heavy baggage so I’ll have something to work with later. Maybe it’s not necessary. Or maybe I can work it in little by little and not load up the poor reader too.

One thing I’ve learned as a reader is that I don’t like serious angst at the start of a book. It’s a turn-off. I’ve done it myself, and I’ve read it. You have to be seriously skilled as a writer to make it work for you, to draw in a reader to care about your damaged character. Depression, sadness, grief: they aren’t attractive to readers. Start elsewhere, young writer. Crack a joke. It’ll get you farther. Then after the story is trotting along dig a little deeper. It’s okay to have damaged people, hey, they’re out there, plenty of them. But draw the gentle reader along, don’t hit him over the head.

Back to the editing. Wish me luck.

Reblogged from PandoDaily:

It had to happen sooner or later. Paul Carr had to get something about the startup business right. He’s been saying for years that books and publishing was going to get sexy again– and not just for wonks like us who write books and naturally care about the fortunes of the boutique industry. If you’d asked me whether SOPA or books would drive more traffic our first week, I never would have guessed books in a million years. Books are apparently the new Lady Gaga Pantsless in Paris. (The phrase AOL once used …

Heads up on this new blog, PandoDaily. Sarah Lacy and friends write about publishing, ebooks, technology, and the internet. Good stuff.

Those are the basics. John taught and researched plant physiology his entire career and continued his interest in the origin of species in a book he wrote after retirement — we still have to get that book together, sisters! (Grandsons?) It sits on his computer, waiting for us to rediscover it. John had three daughters, none of whom followed him into science, a consequence that never seemed to bother him. Or if it did, like many things, he never mentioned it. He ended up with four darling grandsons to make up for the lack of sons. They often remind me of John. They are tinkerers and thinkers, conjurers of brew, hands-on builders of stuff,  outdoor adventurers, and computer whizzes — all things he loved.

My father had to teach freshman biology every so often at the University of Nebraska. It makes me squint just thinking about. I never took a course from him, but now I wonder why. I should have. I had friends who took classes from him. I’m sure he wasn’t the best lecturer in the world and public speaking was low on his favorites list but I’m also positive that his students felt his genuine love of pure science and the way it relates to the world we live in. (Zero Population Growth was one of his passions.) I can hardly remember one thing my father ever said about his teaching. He wasn’t one to discuss his work, successes or not. Like many academics he felt his work spoke for itself, or maybe that none of us would understand. A family story — when I was about six or so and wanted to be noticed by my father (middle child, what can I say: I always wanted to be noticed) I climbed on his lap, stroked his cheek, and said in a vampish voice: “Tell me about your enzymes.” I still have no idea about enzymes, not really. So if you, blog reader, want to tell me about your enzymes, go ahead.

My father named me Lise after a physicist he admired, Lise Meitner. An Austrian physicist, Meitner helped develop nuclear fission. The spelling is often a problem, people never know how to pronounce it (lee-za) but I will never change it. (Yes, I am still daddy’s girl.) He loved to sail, a consequence of growing up in Minnesota around all those lakes. He had a sixteen-foot sailboat on the Chesapeake Bay when we were young, and made us a little yellow bathtub sailboat with a polka dot sail to learn on. I’ll never forget sailing with him around the Bay, and the time the wind knocked the boom into him, he tumbled overboard, and lost his glasses! Fun times!

In 1999 my parents came out to Montana for a vacation in our ski house at Big Sky. My book, Nordic Nights, had just come out and I was going on a little tour around the state to bookstores. I piled the kids and the grands in the Suburban and hit the road. I love so much that we were able to share that time together. Like my father I don’t like to boast about my work. Writing, like research science, is a pretty private affair. My father loved to read and would often pass me mysteries he loved, like Tony Hillerman or P.D. James. He particularly liked James, whose books include brainy characters like himself. At a reading in Whitefish someone asked me if I was Norwegian like my character, Alix Thorssen. My father popped up in the back of the room (so much for shyness!) and said: “The Scots are just shipwrecked Vikings, you know!”

He had a great sense of humor. Mostly he loved a good pun — “the lowest form of humor.” I will always remember his laugh — even if I have forgotten all those puns. I hope you’re enjoying a pun and a dram of single malt with Darwin, Daddy, wherever you are. Love you always, Lise.

I’ve been writing fiction — by myself! generally — since 1984. I had been teaching broadcasting at a community college in Wyoming, which at the time seemed like a dream job. Especially in the middle of Wyoming. There aren’t too many professional jobs in a field as esoteric as broadcasting and communications anywhere, and in a little town in a giant county in a low population state, very few. I felt blessed. Especially when I gave birth to my second child with only one final exam to go in spring semester. But as things turned out, they cleaned out my desk and gave my office to somebody else over the summer and I didn’t go back. I did a little PR hack work, publicized the heck out of a town centennial, then turned to fiction. And never looked back.

While I’ve been involved with writing groups over the years, many of them excellent, I don’t do that much anymore. I’ve moved a couple times as well and searching out writers in new towns is like the proverbial needle in a haystack. Where do they hide? Who knows, but they are probably like me, working at home, solitary, on my own schedule, and liking it that way.

But sometimes, well, it just makes you weird. You start shouting on twitter and facebook about your books, endlessly, wondering if that hollow sound is your voice returning unheard. You make a nuisance of yourself to your friends and relatives. You wait eagerly, trying to look nonchalant, as your friends try to sell your work to strangers. (Thank you, friends, know you are so appreciated.) You try to explain your work to others, faultingly, then give up. Your family doesn’t understand. They leave you alone if you’re lucky. But then you are…

ALONE.

I resolve to read more! National Gallery of Denmark: Constantin Hansen, 1826

You have to be happy in that solitary state. Susan Isaacs once told me, “it’s our dirty little secret… we just want to be left alone in our rooms.” So true. Without that alone time I go a little nuts. Then I’ll swing the other way and get bonkers about not seeing anybody for days and go on mad cleaning sprees and hang out at the mall just to see people. It’s a strange life but over nearly thirty years it has felt so right to me. Writing fiction makes you introspective, if you’re lucky. You consider the human existence, what it might mean, how it begins, how it ends, and everything in the middle that matters. Which is a lot of stuff to think about. You can’t put it all in one novel. So you grab onto one idea and run with it until it reaches its natural narrative end. Then you do it all again, and again. May we never run out of ideas, and people to write about.

Back to my bad habits, since you’re all dying to know. I confessed to one the other day: my messy office. It is a source of marital friction especially since my current one is right off the front hall, in plain sight. Right now, despite my pledge to spend ten (okay, fifteen) minutes a day keeping my office tidy, there are piles of manuscript pages on the floor in front of the white board where I am rearranging scenes and trying to figure out the structure of my new manuscript. I *will* tidy up the piles and get them off the floor tonight! I will! I know people who do this and they seem perfectly sane. Well, sort of sane. For me, tidying up is something your boss makes you do, or you do on your own once a year when you finish a project. Or your mother is coming to visit. Otherwise, forget it. Chaos reigns. I like it that way.

My next resolution is stop tweeting about my books and obsessing about sales numbers. With the advent of small press publishing at Amazon and all the other outlets, you can get your sales data in real time. This is a revelation because for ages and ages, publishing companies have sent you royalty checks for books you sold a full calendar year in the past, and that was the only way you knew what you were selling. But now I know, for instance, I sold one copy of Jump Cut today. One! (Only one. Or rather, not none!) This is a plus/minus situation. I would really like to not think about books I’ve already sent out into the world and get on with the next one. Because we all know it will be better than the last. Or would be if I spent more time on it and not on the internet getting weird about sales figures.

And lastly, I would like to write here more, spend more time being personal with all of you whoever you may be. Because it’s a lonely life being a writer. Not in a bad way at all, but it is just me most of the time. It’s my dirty little secret that I like it that way. And my dirty little secret that I don’t.

Here’s an excerpt:

A San Francisco cable car holds 60 people. This blog was viewed about 3,100 times in 2011. If it were a cable car, it would take about 52 trips to carry that many people.

Click here to see the complete report.

Then they go home or back to school. Time to get organized for the new year. First and foremost (because it bugs the hell out of my hubby) is that I will spend ten or fifteen minutes every day keeping my desk clean. Confession: I am a messy person. Usually I clean my desk and office when I finish a book. Also, I leave the mail on the kitchen island and catalogues all over the place. I take this messy persona as evidence that I am a creative person, and therefore don’t really care if you can’t find a paper clip or a receipt or the chair in my office.  I embrace my chaotic side but must hit it with a hammer: clean it up! File it! Throw it out! Box it up! Get it out of sight! (Maybe not exactly what my husband wants but it will suffice.)

My office is not always a mess. Here is evidence for a guest blog I recently wrote. Look at that gleaming wood! My downfall, I confess, is piles of stuff: printouts, files, notes, and other detritus. I resist putting things into file folders because I fear I will forget to do something. Hey, it’s happened. And keeping it all in your head is one of the things about being a novelist that makes you … different. You have to keep that entire story going in your head. Not word by word, but the trajectory, the back story, the goal. It’s not easy, and even with outlines, sticky notes, and bulletin boards (cue messy crap) you have to keep it all juggling. A glance at some research you printed out two months ago may trigger something that gives you a new perspective, a new idea for the project in motion. But not if you dutifully filed that printout. Hey, how many of you go through your files?

So happy tidy new year. But keep the chaos going because no matter what your spouse says, a certain amount of mess is what being a writer is all about.