Why Your Writing Isn't Working

Wondering why editors and publishers are saying no? Discover the seven writing problems that
keep books from being publishable in the diagnostic tape, Why Your Writing Isn’t Working and
What to Do About It. Once you’ve identified your writing problem, move on to a week long
seminar-in-a-box, The Writer’s Tool Box, which covers these problems in depth and gives
examples and exercises for correcting them.

Look at the following excerpt:
"The Hookless Beginning:
In writing fiction, your opening should accomplish three things:
1)establish the scene
2) introduce the main character
3)let readers know what the character wants or needs - what the character will be reaching and
struggling for that determines the action and direction of your story.
If you’re writing non-fiction much the same applies. Your beginning should be as clear, concise
and straightforward as possible and it will still have to accomplish the three things that fiction
must do:
1) it needs to establish the scene, but in this case instead of creating a fictitious scene your job is
to report the scene - to ground readers immediately so they’ll know the
who/what/why/when/where of what you’re writing about.

2) non-fiction often has a main character, a protagonist who will be featured in your work. As
with fiction, you’ll want to introduce this person early on. That introductory hook you need
could well be an image of your protagonist at some dramatic moment. It could be:
a president being sworn in
a prospector discovering a big vein of gold
a scientist receiving the Nobel Prize
a woman giving birth
a man dying
a lost child finding its home

3) such an image is an excellent way to start a story that will be about the protagonist’s long hard struggle to the point of success.
There are essentially eight different types of openings for either fiction or non-fiction. The first of these is the SUGGESTIVE SETTING:

If you’ll be working with a setting that lends itself to a vivid opener, start with a description of it.
This will set the tone and mood of your work and give readers an immediate mental picture to get involved with:

It is still dark outside her window. But she has been unable to sleep. Her fear is
now a continual inner roar. "I don’t want to die," she thinks.
She cannot see the flag outside, drooping in the dark, but she knows it is
inscribed, "Central Vermont Medical Center." She knows every detail of the view from
her window, every item in her room....

Does this sound like an interesting fictional opening? Guess again. These are the opening lines
from "The Quality of Mercy," an article about nurses who practice compassionate medicine. The
article appeared in the April 1998 Smithsonian magazine.
Let’s look at what this opening accomplishes:
We are put inside the heart and mind of the woman in the hospital room ~ seeing what she sees
and remembering with her what she cannot see in the dark. We are grounded, knowing we are in
the Central Vermont Medical Center, and we are intimately aware of her fears. Of course she
doesn’t want to die. Now that we’re there with her, we don’t want her to die, and we want to
know what this threat to her life is. So we read on, hooked by the somber setting.

This opening has accomplished the three main jobs of an opening:
1) It establishes/reports the scene
2) It introduces the subject character at a dramatic moment, grabbing readers’ interest
3) it informs readers what that character wants -- to live! — which is such a universal longing that we are immediately in empathy with her situation.

This is a wonderfully successful lead-in. Having gotten our minds and emotions into the
character’s situation, the article then explains how such thoughts and feelings are dealt with
through compassionate medicine.

Why Write Your Life Story?

Writing your life story is embarking on a journey through the past. It’s a unique journey, one no
one else has ever taken. That’s because the road you’ll travel is built from your very own
memories and experiences ~ your very personal reactions to all the situations and events you’ll be remembering.
Your life will pass before your eyes. You’ll re-experience its pleasures and pains, longings
and achievements, loves and hates. This is not a journey for the squeamish, but those with the
courage to walk this road will be wonderfully rewarded. These rewards will radiate out, from
you, to your family, to your entire society.
"How can that be," you ask? "I’ve led such an ordinary life." Well, that’s what you think!
In reality, your life is unique. It is a bridge to the past. Your life story is your finest legacy and
an invaluable gift for your family.

Members of your family want to know more about your life than you realize. They’ll treasure
every word you write. To them, you are the connection, the bridge, between the remarkable past and the present. You are history, and history disappears if you don’t record it.
You’ve been living through one of the most event-packed periods of human history. From
splitting logs to splitting atoms, the 20th Century has brought immense change.. You’ve seen it
first hand and have thoughts and feelings about it. Now’s your chance to tell about them.
There’s little opportunity today for kids to hear the stories of their family’s past. Not only don’t
they experience the lifestyles their parents and grandparents lived, too often they don’t even know about them. Most of today’s kids exist in isolation from their own pasts.
When we’re marooned from our ancestors and traditions that have evolved -- within the family,
the tribe, the nation, the culture from which we sprang -- we’re separated from a meaningful sense of SELF. Kids need the connectedness that comes from knowing their grandparents as people; from understanding their heritage and the basis of their family’s values.

So that brings us to the first reason for writing your life story: to create a legacy for your family
Writing your life story is the perfect way to link generations. It’s a voyage of self-exploration - a
way to discover more about yourself and how you came to be the person you are today.. It’s
equally important for society, allowing others to experience another historical period. In offering
younger people the chance to participate in life as you’ve known it, you make it easier for them to understand the forces and values that shaped your life. It can give kids courage. The message
they receive is:

Some things in life never change. Some things are scarey, but you can get through them. Look
at me! I was just as scared as you are, and I made it. You can, too.

Or:

Okay, so you goofed. It isn’t the end of the world. Let me tell you about a goof I made at your
age..."

Writing your life story also offers you the possibility of PERSONAL TRANSFORMATION.
As you journey backward through your life you’ll gain new insights. With the passions of earlier
moments now behind you, you can review them more calmly. You can begin to look back on your
life with more understanding and sympathy -- to understand not only your place within your
family but your place in history. Not only can you begin to forgive others, you can also begin to
forgive yourself. You’ll see your life-so-far in new ways. You’ll begin to see patterns and
threads of continuity you hadn’t been aware of. You’ll recognize themes, life-long desires and
preferences. Through these recognitions, you may discover hidden meanings and even missions in your life.
You may discover that your personal mission is as family historian. Or this may be only the first
stepping stone toward a life of greater awareness, fulfillment and satisfaction in a work which you are yet to discover.
In either case, prepare yourself for this journey’s personal adventure of self discovery!

Reasons for Rejection

There are seven reasons why manuscripts are typically rejected by publishers. The first of these is The Hookless Beginning.

1) All writings have a beginning, middle and end. Each of these has a job to do. The job of your beginning is to hook your readers (and that includes editors, who are your first readers!) This is done by setting the tone, creating the scene and enticing readers with a promise of what you're work will deliver. You have only a few paragraphs to do this. You have to grab readers' attention fast, before they have a chance to lose interest and reach for the remote control.
There are several ways to grab them. They all boil down to starting with something intriguing. It can be an event, a setting, an image, an insight, a character, or even an unusual writing style.
If you'd like to know more about this and the other six reasons, check out my website: www.acappela.com

BEFORE YOU WRITE

Writing a book is a lot like getting married. It is intensely personal, it calls for a big commitment, and it requires a sustained effort. And like marriage, it carries no guarantee of success.
Books and marriages often fail for the same reasons. The most common reason is that the writer doesn’t know enough about the four essential components of a successful book. It may surprise you to know that the first and most important of these components is the self.

1) self -- Many writers get an idea and jump into writing about it, never giving any thought to the motive behind writing it. Yet why you want to write helps determine what you write.

The second component is:
2) the subject --Do you know enough about your topic to convey how your (or your character’s) experiences felt? Do you know enough to teach your readers what they want to know about the subject?

The third essential component is
3) the readers -- Are you clear about who you are writing this book for? Do you know the profile of the ideal reader of this book?

The fourth component is, of course, the actual writing of the book. This includes the format, mechanics, style, tone, etc.
4) the writing -- Do you know the writing techniques that will create and sustain reader interest in your book?

If you have sufficient knowledge about your motives, your subject and your readers, you’ve already solved many of the most aggravating problems of writing.
Successful writing requires a harmonious blend of writer, subject and reader. When this is achieved, an alchemy takes place. This alchemy informs the writing process, cutting through the common problems writers face. Once the alchemy is there, a writer can usually work swiftly and efficiently, avoiding many writing pitfalls and completing the book in less time than (s)he expected it to take. Achieving this alchemy depends on knowing a number of things about yourself, the writer, and your motives; about the subject to be written about, and knowing some essentials about the people you hope will read your book. Let’s take a look at each of them:

WHY YOU WANT TO WRITE:
Maybe you’ve always dreamed of achieving fame and fortune as an author. You’ve pictured yourself chatting with David Letterman or Jay Leno, or being interviewed on Good Morning, America. You see yourself autographing books for a long line of admiring readers or standing before large audiences, telling them about your book. Perhaps you see your book being made into a movie. Do you know what kind of book to write to turn this dream into a reality?
Maybe you want to write as a means of self-actualization. You know you have things to say that others will find interesting but you’ve never taken the time to organize them into a meaningful text. Writing a book can create just the opportunity you need to organize your vast body of knowledge on a subject, or to explore your own psychological depths. Do you know who would be interested in reading this book?
Or maybe you hope to gain immortality, to perpetuate yourself through your autobiography. Other reasons for writing an autobiography include creating a legacy for your family, to give children and grandchildren a sense of belonging and continuity. Your motive for writing a book might be to help others. You may have pioneered an experience (anything from a self-cure for cancer to rollerblading across the U.S.) or discovered a new or better way to do something. What you’ve done or learned could help others, and you want to write a book to share. Do you know who would welcome this information?
Recording knowledge, experience or history is a valuable contribution. It can bring fame and fortune, help you self-actualize, advance your career or be a way to spend your spare time constructively. Your book could provide an important teaching tool. It is important for you to know which of the above motives are your reasons for wanting to write, because your reasons are tightly connected to whether or not the kind of book you write will be a success.

WHAT YOU WANT TO WRITE:
First, what types of books are there? Books can be broken down into fiction or non-fiction. Fiction includes general, romance, Gothic and historical novels; westerns; mysteries; suspense and adventure stories; children’s books. Nonfiction includes all factual books: how-to’s; cookbooks; books on history; art; travel, plus academic books on any area of knowledge. There are also hundreds of professional and trade journals which print articles in specific areas of interest. These can be written in any of the following nonfiction forms: news, feature, analysis, how-to, opinion, speculation, interview, inspirational, evaluative, study, narrative, history, journal, observations, creative nonfiction, summary, list or satire.
Now, how can your motive influence the success of the kind of book you want to write? Well, consider these facts. According to the Writer’s Market, only 5% of writers earn over $80,000 a year. Your chances of attaining fame and fortune will be better, therefore, if you write the type of book that the greatest number of people want to read. It helps if it’s the kind of book that will translate well into film or video format. The most popular kinds of fiction books are love stories and legal thrillers. The most popular non-fiction books are how-to’s, followed by books on health care; men/women relationships; business and management advise; spiritual and psychological works, and dieting
If your motive is self actualization or to help others, the popularity of your book will be a minimal factor for you. You may already know that your book will appeal to only a limited market. Who over 40, for instance, will be interested in rollerblading across the United States? How many people will be interested in reading the history of your home town, or your opinions, evaluations, or your life story?
Perhaps your main motive is career advancement. Will this purpose be best served by targeting beginners in your field as your audience? Your peers? Those who have been in the field longer than you? Do you know what differences in approach are needed to write successfully for these three different markets?
The same questions apply to those who want to write a book to help others. Who are these people? How much do you know about them? Is your reason for helping them to impress them, to encourage them or to inform them? These are all factors in determining the contents and style of your book.
Now you need to know if you have what it takes to write that book.

IF YOU CAN WRITE:
Doyou have the time to write? Do you like to write? Are you an idea person? Do you have patience? Do you have the training to be a polished writer? Can you make the emotional commitment to the type of solitude and perseverance required to write your book?
Don’t get discouraged if you’ve answered no to some of these questions. By following the step-by-step approach outlined in my book, you’ll find that a time commitment of as little as one hour a day can get the job done. The essential part is your emotional commitment.
You’ve got to believe in your project and believe in yourself. You have to be convinced of the importance of writing this book. You have to commit to it, and the best way to do that is to make a contract with yourself. Your contract is your vow.
Decide on a time of day when you can consistently devote time to writing. Then assess how much time you can spend at it daily. Don’t overestimate. It’s important for you to write consistently each day, at the same time and if possible in the same location. If all you can realistically expect to devote to writing on a daily basis is fifteen minutes, then contract with yourself for fifteen minutes. Then, if it turns out that you can spend two hours at it on some days, consider that bonus time.
Once you’re clear with yourself about when, where, and what time you can give to your writing, write a simple contract with yourself: Here’s an example:
Don’t over look this step. It seals your commitment to yourself to follow through on this project and solemnizes the importance of this task. It also formalizes exactly what part of your life you will carve out to make way for this accomplishment, and it commits you to getting into the habit of writing.
Now inform your family, friends and associates that you will be unavailable at those times. It’s important that your writing time be uninterrupted. Other people will have to take it as seriously as you do, allowing you quality time for your work.

May Newsletter

A Cappela Publishing, home of your Aujthor's Advocate, helps writers successfully write and market their works. And shows them how they can choose the publishing option that's best for them.

A Cappela also features a free monthly newsletter for writers.
The May Newsletter is available at http://www.acappela.com/
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The Editor's View - Amazon and you
Mother's Day Special - help Mom (or grandma) create a family legacy
Pat's Pick - how to fix broken links
Writing Tips: explanation of Rights; be careful with adverbs
Writing Q&A - what are Secondary Rights?
Media Contacts -- get interviewed; get into film
Word Play - what is the Bozone?
Markets -- screenplays, true stories
Contests - Screenplay contests, juvenile short stories, poetry