Timothy's Thoughts

Most writers are looking for someone to give them permission to write. Many go looking for a call from God or approval from an agent or recognition from a publisher. What writers are looking for is someone to say, “You’re good enough to be an author. Be fruitful and publish.” Publishers are looking for something else, a little thing called platform . If we consider that, publishers aren’t in the business of giving people permission to write. Publishers are looking for those people who come to them saying, “I’d don’t need your approval. I’m going to be out here doing my thing and getting my message out. If you want part of the action, come on. If not, that’s your loss.” The only successful writers are those who take the bull by the horns and do it, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t pay attention to other people. My family and friends have been more enthusiastic about my writing than I have been. They think my books are better than I think they are. That’s the way it’s supposed to be, i...

Rachelle Gardner says that book ideas are a dime a dozen and that where most book proposals fall apart is in execution. If I were a literary agent, as she is, and I had thousands of queries in my inbox each month, I would probably agree. I’m not. I’m a writer and my perspective is different. Book ideas may be a dime a dozen, but good book ideas are priceless. The way I see it, if I write a book with a good premise, but poor execution, I can fix it. It may be hard work, but I can fix it. If I write a book with a poor premise and great execution, there’s no one who can fix it. From an agent’s/publisher’s perspective, there’s an over abundance of ideas. From a writer’s perspective, good ideas are few and far between. One aspiring writer commented the other day that the hardest thing for her is knowing what to write. She continued along the lines of “tell me what you want me to write and I’ll write it.” I’m sure she would gladly give someone a dime for a dozen ideas, but writers keep their...

Sex is out. At least it is in the movie industry. Films with sex aren’t doing so great right now. One of the theories on that is that economic recession causes people to stay away from excess of all kinds. Historically, there is some truth to that. There is also some biblical truth to that, since God sends hardships when he calls for people to repent. But what does this mean for Christian books? My prediction is that it means edgy is out. Okay, so edgy has been out already, but if you’re trying to push edgy Christian fiction, your life just got harder. During an economic downturn, publishers are less likely to take big risks and even if they did, readers aren’t interested. I think the trend will move away from the feel good religionists and back in the direction of “thus saith the Lord.” When people are hurting, they don’t want to hear what people imagine must be true about God. They have a hard time believing that God will solve all their problems if they’ll just send some preacher mo...

Yesterday, I wrote about the Moment of Hope . That’s my name for it and you won’t find it in a text book—that I know of. The Moment of Hope is that moment in a novel when we get a surge of hope that the protagonist will succeed. It’s like when you’re watching a young child reaching for a cookie. It’s just out of his reach. If his arms were only a centimeter longer it would be his, but then you see his mother come into the room and you know she’s going to tell him he’ll spoil his dinner. She lifts up the plate and moves it closer to him. Not ever novel has a Moment of Hope and not every novel needs one. The Moment of Hope is like a pressure release valve. We’ve strung the tension pretty tight and we’re still cranking on the strings. The reader is flipping pages like crazy, wanting to find out what happens next, but he can’t catch his breath. Page after page we build and build and keep building. Then comes the Moment of Hope , giving our reader something to get excited about. The Mome...

There are seven key emotional moments in a novel, the beginning , stasis equals death , the inciting incident , the mid-point , all is lost , the climax and the end . Of the seven, the climax is my favorite. In my own writing, I’ve noticed what I will call the moment of hope . It is the emotional climax of the novel and may occur on one side or the other of the true climax. It may occur in the A plot, but it usually occurs in the B plot. It is that moment in which the reader realizes that this thing’s going to work, whatever it is. In How to Become a Bible Character , our protagonist is in the hospital, not expected to live after taking a beating from his best friend’s father. The senior pastor’s wife is on her deathbed. Our first person narrator has called for a prayer meeting and expects just the faithful Wednesday night crowd to show up. When he and his family arrive at church, the building is filled with people, a testament to the influence our protagonist has had on the people a...

In fiction, nobody is really clear whether author marketing efforts translate to significantly greater sales or not. The prevailing wisdom is that it certainly doesn’t hurt. – Rachelle Gardner Fiction and non-fiction are two different beasts. Non-fiction is ridiculously easy to sell, compared to fiction. For one thing, you can sell it using the title alone. If I were to post a page on my website promoting the book How to Sell Novels in Twelve Easy Steps , someone would buy the book. I don’t have a twelve step program for you, but I’m confident that some of the people reading this post got here because of a search engine hit on that title. Another thing about non-fiction is that we know where to find our audience and they tend to be in clusters. If you look at the quote above, it seems like publishers are saying, “we don’t have a good way to sell fiction, but we might as well throw the author and the kitchen sink at the problem.” Even with some of the best selling books, only a small pe...

Is it just me or is my writing getting more incoherent lately? Don’t answer that. Please. The most important skill an author can have is the ability to evaluate his or her own writing accurately. The great writers all have this ability. The shabby writers all think they have this ability. And the thing that keeps the rest of us up nights is wondering which camp we are in. I encounter bad writing frequently. There’s something about it that makes me think we ought to be able to quantify it and describe it, but I’ve failed every time I’ve tried. I have, however, noticed a characteristic common to many bad writers. They are easily angered by people they feel don’t respect them as writers. But we can’t go around offending writers just to decide if they are good or not. Besides, I figure that writers learn to handle criticism as they are learning to become better writers. Still, there are some people for whom it is safe to say they’ll never “be ready,” to use the euphemism publishing industr...