World Building Tip: Holidays and Rituals

Photo credit: mine

So in the US, yesterday was Thanksgiving, and today is Black Friday, both of which include very different rituals that come about this time of year, every year. This weekend and onward, holiday decorations will go up—lights and ribbons and fake presents, etc. will twinkle around public places until they get taken down in January. Soon it’ll be Hanukkah, and Christmas, and Kwanzaa, and New Years Eve—all of which are celebrated in different ways with different traditions.

So, naturally, it got me thinking about world building. Because all of that right there? It’s world building IRL—and each celebration and way of celebrating completely depends on various people’s ethnicities, geography, religion and personal traditions.

For example, I’ve always lived in places with cold winters (with one minor exception of a year of school in the south, but even then my winter break was spent at home). My associations with Christmas, then, involve hoping for snow, hot drinks, evergreen trees, bundling up in winter coats and scarves, and wintry decorations. For most of my life, I celebrated Christmas with the Cuban side of my family, so we’d eat frijoles negros (black beans) and rice, pork, plantains, flan, and we’d finish off the night with café con leche (Cuban coffee latte)—all alongside more traditional American sides and desserts (salad, casseroles, apple pie, etc.).

Those traditions and associations are based off a mix of factors: geography, religion, ethnicity, and nationality. And that’s just me.

While I don’t frequently see holidays mentioned outside of contemporary novels, I do think these kinds of traditions can be a fantastic way to add another layer to your world building regardless of the genre. Holidays and specifically the way we celebrate them are so incredibly varied—and sometimes this can be a really nice detail to add a little verisimilitude to your novel.

Have you considered this aspect of world building in your writing?

Twitter-sized bites:

Have you incorporated holidays and rituals into your world building? Join the discussion on @Ava_Jae's blog. (Click to tweet)  

World building tip: what holidays and rituals does your story world have? #writetip (Click to tweet)

Fixing the First Page Feature #17

Photo credit: Victor Bezrukov on Flickr

NaNoWriMo is almost over, Thanksgiving is tomorrow, December is nearly here, and the next Fixing the First Page critique has arrived! Yay!

As per always, I'll start by posting the full first 250 excerpt, after which I'll share my overall thoughts, then my redline critique. I encourage you guys to share your own thoughts and critiques in the comments (I'm just one person with one opinion!), as long as it's polite, thoughtful, and constructive. Any rude or mean comments will be unceremoniously deleted.

Let's do this.

Title: WICKED ME

Genre: New Adult Contemporary Romance

First 250: 

"Sam 

Deliver to abandoned warehouse 

4 miles E of city

5 pm sharp

Bring shovel. 

It was the last line of Hill’s text that had made sweat drip down to my balls, not the roasting D.C. heat made worse by concrete and rush hour car exhaust. My Chevy Impala had barely crawled forward six inches in the last ten minutes. A glance at the dashboard clock showed 4:53.

Yeah, I wasn’t going to make it. 

But none of that mattered as much as his weird request. Why the hell would he need a shovel? Unless the shovel wasn’t meant for him, but for me to dig my own grave. But I already did that when I was 'recruited' to work for him. 

Recruited, blackmailed—same difference. 

The light several cars ahead turned green, and I thought that maybe, just maybe, I might be able to creep along a whole seven inches this time. 

4:54. 

Shit. I cranked the dial on the radio, the speakers blaring a before-my-time Metallica song, and glanced in the rearview mirror. A crowbar and Hill’s small, brown paper-wrapped package sat on the backseat in plain sight. A crowbar, not a shovel, because my day job didn’t have one. 

The car ahead pulled forward, and as I touched the gas, a perky ass to my right made me do a double-take. It stuck up in the air like some kind of supernaturally rounded homing beacon. The woman the ass belonged to stood in the middle of a crowded sidewalk with three bags of luggage surrounding her."

So! First and foremost, this excerpt really has the guy NA voice nailed, which I noticed pretty much right away, so fantastic work! I really like where we're starting here—we've got the protagonist with a goal (do what the text says), immediate conflict (he's stuck in rush hour traffic and going to be late) and some mystery—who is Hill? How was he blackmailed? What is this job? I have a lot of well-placed questions which definitely makes me want to keep reading.

Let's take a look at the (I suspect, minimal) line-edits:

"Sam 

Deliver to abandoned warehouse 

4 miles E of city Just in terms of logistics here, this is super vague as far as directions go. How would Sam know which warehouse to take it to? Or where to even begin looking (I mean, "four miles east" could be a lot of places. Has Sam been there before? This may be something you're going to answer later, but as far as the opening goes, it's unclear to me how he would know where he was going without a street address.

5 pm sharp

Bring shovel. 

It was the last line of Hill’s text that ha'd made sweat drip down to my balls (Awesome voice), not the roasting D.C. heat made worse by concrete and rush hour car exhaust. Do you mean asphalt? Concrete doesn't really reflect heat back up—but asphalt does. My Chevy Impala had barely crawled forward six inches in the last ten minutes. A glance at the dashboard clock showed 4:53.

Yeah, I wasn’t going to make it. Really like the placement and voice here too. 

But none of that mattered as much as his weird request. Why the hell would he need a shovel? Unless the shovel wasn’t meant for him, but for me to dig my own grave. I don't necessarily need to know right this second, but I'm not sure if the grave comment is serious or a joke, which makes it harder for me to judge how serious this, er, job is. But I already did that when I was 'recruited' to work for him. 

Recruited, blackmailed—same difference. Love this line, too. And extra points for more voice.

The light several cars ahead turned green,. and I thought that mMaybe, just maybe, I might be able to creep along a whole seven inches this time. Adjusted to remove filtering of "I thought."

4:54. 

Shit. I cranked the dial on the radio, the speakers blaring a before-my-time Metallica song, and glanced in the rearview mirror. A crowbar and Hill’s small, brown paper-wrapped package sat on the backseat in plain sight. A crowbar, not a shovel, because my day job didn’t have one. More great voice! And nice clarification. A+ for voice.

The car ahead pulled forward, and as I touched the gas, a perky ass to my right made me do a double-take. It stuck up in the air like some kind of supernaturally rounded homing beacon. *snicker* The woman the ass belonged to stood in the middle of a crowded sidewalk with three bags of luggage surrounding her."

Okay, so as I suspected, really minor line edits—and really, what I found was mostly polishing and/or nit-picky stuff. This is a really strong opening, definitely fits the NA vibe and if I saw this in the slush, I'd absolutely keep reading. In fact, in a Fixing the First Page crit first, I loved this sample so much I showed my boss, Stephen Morgan, who is an editor at Entangled Publishing and we'd love to see if the submission is right for us. So consider this a request from Stephen to submit to Entangled Embrace, if you would like to. :) Overall, fantastic job!

Thanks for sharing your first 250 with us, Lindsey!

Would you like to be featured in a Fixing the First Page Feature? Keep an eye out for the last first 250 crit giveaway of 2015 next month!

Twitter-sized bite:

.@Ava_Jae talks NA voice, strong openings, and polishing in the 17th Fixing the First Page critique. (Click to tweet)

Vlog: On the Info Dump

World building can be tough, especially when it comes to conveying necessary information. But how do you get the info you need across without info dumping? Today I share some tips.

RELATED LINKS: 

• How to Avoid Writing Info Dumps
• How to Sprinkle Background Info into Your WIP

What strategies do you have for avoiding info dumps and gradually conveying information throughout your WIP?

Twitter-sized bites: 

Struggling to build your story world w/o info dumps? @Ava_Jae vlogs strategies for gradually conveying information. (Click to tweet) 

When world building, @Ava_Jae says to "think of your information as a cooking spice." What do you think? #vlog (Click to tweet)

Are You Using Your Story World to Its Fullest Potential?

Photo credit: mine

So as I’m writing this post, it’s snowing. Really hard. It’s the perfect silent snow storm with giant white flakes and we’ve got close to five inches on the ground already and it’s not going to let up any time soon. And I’m loving it. (Day later update: we got a foot of snow.)

But it got me thinking about story worlds and settings and how easy it is to forget to use the world itself to its fullest potential. Sometimes—and I know I have totally been guilty of this from time to time—we get so caught up in the plot and character that we forget that, if done correctly, the world can be a character in itself. The world can create problems—massive problems, if we let it—for our characters.

I mean, those of you who live in snowy places know what it’s like to cancel plans because of a blizzard. Or how terrifying it can be to get caught driving on one. Or how easily slippery road conditions can totally mess up your day.

Those of you who live in the coastal south likely know what it’s like to have to hunker down inside during a hurricane. Some of you in the plains know what it’s like to hear tornado sirens, or how scary it can be to hide while the sirens are going. Those over near active fault lines know exactly what an earthquake feels like.

There are loads of examples of the way the world directly affects us—and that’s without even diving into how societal things influence our identities and plans. And yet, when it comes to writing, it can be so, so easy to forget to incorporate those things.

Granted, you have to be careful. It’s also easy to use weather in cliché ways (i.e.: raining during a sad scene, bright and sunny during a happy one), or to not properly set something world-related up before using it. But if properly set up and carefully incorporated, your story world can be a really interesting layer that can complicate the plot and impact the characters in really fascinating ways. You just have to be willing to use it.

Have you utilized your story world to complicate the plot in your writing?

Twitter-sized bite:

Have you used your story world to its fullest plot-complicating potential? Join the discussion on @Ava_Jae's blog. (Click to tweet)

Fixing the First Page Giveaway Winner #17!

Photo credit: Stacie Stacie Stacie on Flickr

Quick Sunday post today to announce the winner of the seventeenth fixing the first page feature giveaway! Yay!

*drumroll*

And the winner is…

LINDSEY LOUCKS!

Yay! Congratulations, Lindsey! Expect an e-mail from me shortly.

Thank you to all you wonderful entrants! If you didn't win, as always, there will be another fixing the first page giveaway next month (the last one of 2015!), so keep an eye out! :)

A 2015 Diversity Reading Analysis

So a little while back I saw this post from Shaun Hutchinson where he examined the books he'd read in 2015 to try to determine how many diverse books he'd been reading. I thought it might be constructive to do the same, given that the year is ending and I'll soon be making goals for next year's reading challenge.

So of the 53 books I've read so far this year, 33 of them included some sort of marginalized representation, and 20 did not. I've been making a concerted effort to read more books with marginalized characters this year, so I was pretty happy to see that ultimately, it looks like my efforts mostly paid off.

Of the diverse narratives, 8 included mental illness representation, 11 had major QUILTBAG characters, 21 had major characters of marginalized races, and only 2 had physical disability representation. You'll notice that if you add the 20 that don't have representation in, I have more than 53, and that's because many of the books fit more than one category, and so were counted more than once.

I was kind of pleasantly surprised to see how many books I read with characters of marginalized races and ethnicities. A good chunk of those (9) were assigned readings for a Contemporary Muslim Literature class I took last semester, which in retrospect was an excellent choice of class, both to help with my reading goals and just because it was a great class.

I was disappointed to see how few books I came across with physical disabilities, but I can't say I was particularly surprised, given that they're not the easiest to find. I'd definitely like to make more of an effort to look for them specifically in the future, though, so something to keep in mind for next year.

Now looking at the authors, I read 36 books written by women, 14 written by men, and 3 written by non-binary authors.

Based off of what I know of the authors, 25 books I read were written by marginalized authors, and 28 were not. There may be some variation here, because again, this is just based off of what I know and/or was able to find about the authors. 

Next year, ideally, I'd like to read more books written by marginalized authors than not, but I think my trend here is overall headed in the right direction, which is encouraging. 

My takeaway here, I think, is that next year I'll continue to search out books with representation of some kind, focus more on finding narratives that include physical disability representation, and try to continue to seek out books written by marginalized authors. I know I've got quite a few books on my TBR list already that fit into some of those categories, so it'll be more a matter of paying attention to what books I prioritize in terms of buying first. 

What sorts of reading goals did you aim for this year? Any idea what you'll be focusing on next?

Twitter-sized bite: 

.@Ava_Jae breaks down books she's read in 2015 in terms of representation. What 2015 reading goals did you have? (Click to tweet)

Some Pre-Debut Thoughts

So chances are really likely if you follow me on Twitter, Instagram, tumblr, or Facebook, you’ve seen me kinda sorta freaking out over happy Beyond the Red news, namely, that ARCs are now a thing that exist. My editor and publisher sent me the pics below:

I'll be sharing this all day today: my lovely editor @nicolefrail17 sent me this pic today. BEYOND THE RED ARCs are real! And so bright, and pretty, and shiny! Can't wait to get my copies. 😊 BEYOND THE RED releases in March 2016 from @skyhorsepub! Not too far away now... #booknerdigans #bookstagram #YA #BEYONDTHERED #SweetSixteeners #SciFi #books #read

A photo posted by Ava Jae (@ava_jae) on Nov 13, 2015 at 12:31pm PST

You guuuuuuys! 😁 #bookstagram #booknerdigans #SweetSixteeners #Repost @skyhorsepub with @repostapp ARC alert! We just got in copies of BEYOND THE RED by @ava_jae and DIVAH by Susannah Appelbaum. Get your copies March 2016! #skyponypress #YA #yalit #yabooks #novel #fiction #fantasy #scifi #sciencefiction #distopia #racism #space #alien #queen #paranormal #angels #demons #possession #nyc #girlpower

A photo posted by Ava Jae (@ava_jae) on Nov 16, 2015 at 10:43am PST

It’s super exciting! And while I do not have my copies yet (yet!) I know I won’t have to wait much longer at all. And that on it’s own is crazy amazing, but it’s also mid-November which means there are three and a half-ish months before Beyond the Red hits the shelves. That’s it.

Which is so exciting! But also means all the out-of-anyone’s-control nervous-making stuff is going to be starting, like, soon. Like really, really soon.

Things like whether or not readers and reviewers like the book. Things like how well the book does/doesn’t sell. Things like the takeaway people get after reading. Things like whether people buy the book or whether it fades into obscurity. Things like sales rankings and lists the book may/may not be on and whether, a month later, anyone remembers it at all.

The thing is, I’m just barely entering that transition where the book goes from mine to everyone’s. And I know that this, ARCs becoming real and being sent to people—this is where it starts. And I know that with the way this year’s been going, I’m going to blink and it’ll be March, and my book will be a hardcover thing you can buy in a bookstore.

This is not a complaining post. This is just me being real and transparent with you guys, because I’ve always felt like that was important, given that many of you are aspiring to one day go through the same milestones.

The truth is, right now I’m okay. Most of the time. But then I’ll remember something—a particular scene, or sentence, or messages, or whatever and the nervousness will be a kick in the stomach. And then I’ll breathe and think oh, so this is the pre-debut anxiety they were talking about and then I’ll distract myself and think just do the best you can and hope for the best and that’s what I’m doing. And right now I’m okay, but we’re still a couple months out and I still have a couple chances to make changes if I want to but eventually those safety nets will be gone and it’ll be time to hold my breath, and smile, and hope for the best.

And I think, that right there, the moment when it’s completely out of your hands—that’s the part that so many authors mention getting anxious about. And I thought I understood before, but I’m really starting to get it now—one jolt of anxiety at a time—and I know there are steps I’ll need to take to protect future me.

Steps like doing my absolute best not to look at numbers I can’t control. Steps like doing everything I can to learn and listen so I can continue to improve as a writer, as a person. Steps like burying myself in my next project so that hopefully, in the future, I’ll have more good news and books to share with everyone.

My writing, the way I handle my career, the places and times I choose to engage: those are things I can control. Those are things I know I’ll need to focus on more and more if I want to survive as an anxiety-prone writer.

And yet, I know myself. I know I’ll probably slip up and fret about things I can’t control. I know there will probably be moments where my anxiety will get the best of me, even despite all the steps I’ve taken to make it as manageable as possible. I know some days will be really friggin’ hard, and that’s okay too.

But for now, for today, that’s where I’m at. In this rapidly contracting space of in-between where I’m doing the best I can to be the best I can.

I hope in March it’ll be enough. But I guess that’s the sort of thing that only time will tell.

Twitter-sized bites:

Curious about what life is like before debuting? @Ava_Jae shares her thoughts on the experience thus far. (Click to tweet) 

"My writing, the way I handle my career...[when] I choose to engage: those are things I can control." (Click to tweet)