Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America

by Juliette Wade

I thought I’d discuss that ubiquitous genre activity – the one that always drives my spell-checker insane – making up words. Thereafter, I’ll give a little thought to the idea of redefining existing words.

I’m guessing that after my last post you can imagine how making up words contributes to an effect of foreignness. Whenever you replace an English word with a foreign one, you lose every connotation and context associated with that English word. The feeling provided by the newly created word will depend on the evocativeness of its pronunciation. This may come from an association with Earth languages that it resembles (which will give the new word some of the contextual association with the language in question), or from general principles of onomatopoeia (such as the association of voiced sounds/o/u with large or loud things, and voiceless sounds/a/i with small or quiet things). Any further associations will have to be deliberately provided by the writer.

I’ve often heard it said that “if it’s a rabbit, call it a rabbit.” I tend to agree with this. After all, why put your reader to the trouble of divesting a word of all its associations if the people in your story use a word with precisely the same associations?

Another created word context is that of words coined from combinations of other words (or parts thereof). This most often occurs in science fiction, when you’ll find people using comlinks and any number of other more exotic things. These words retain and combine associations, provided that the parts of the word are recognized and can be successfully extrapolated.

If you’re using a created word, think through what associations you want it to have. It’s not hard to show a reader through demonstration what the denotation of the word is. By all means, do so – but don’t stop there. For your word to take on life and feel real in the world of the story, it will help if it comes with some of the other types of associations that our words commonly do. I’m thinking of emotional connotations. Here’s an example.

Let’s say you have a word, Korinye, which means a particular type of police officer. In order to define it for the reader, you put one of these on a street corner (or chasing the protagonist, etc.) , point him or her out and say “watch out for the Korinye.” But that alone doesn’t tell you how the Korinye group is regarded in society, whether for example they’re a secret police for a fascist government or whether they’re just a friendly policeman on the beat (who nevertheless won’t be on your side if you steal from the shops). As you go through the story, think about whose point of view you’re in, and how that person regards Korinye in different contexts. Their view of Korinye can even change over the story. Or you can have alternate points of view to show that some people consider the Korinye to be upholders of the law, while others consider them to be ruthless brigands who pillage in the name of the law. Don’t just let your word sit; let it expand just a little each time you use it.

In general I’d suggest that you keep the most subtlety, the most extensive building and explanation only for words that are key to your main conflict. This may be a bias of mine, but why make people put a lot of effort into a word that will give them little reward? Of course, this does assume that you want the reader to feel like an “insider” with the word(s) in question. If you have a human going to an alien planet and feeling lost because all the words are different, then keeping to the human viewpoint will probably mean not explaining any of the alien words.

You can also turn this around. What if you’re in the alien viewpoint? It may surprise you, but my first suggestion for an alien viewpoint is this: Minimize the number of created words.

Part of putting your reader in an alien’s head means making him or her feel comfortable there. So have the alien give not very much thought to things he/she doesn’t feel are important. Names of animals, for example, can be tossed in with just a couple words of context, and even used as metaphors for other things, like “he was mad as a cornered ughara.” Give much more attention to those concepts that will allow readers to understand the alien’s motives. These concepts don’t even need to have made-up names.

Yes, I am suggesting that you can redefine English words rather than putting in created ones every time. Sure, your alien may have an idiosyncratic sense of honor, but you don’t have to call it “zinni” or anything else. Instead, use strategically designed context and explanations to designate the associations that you want, and pluck away the ones you don’t. In my forthcoming Analog story, Cold Words, the aliens have a very distinct set of social judgments associated with the words Warm and Cold (but not Hot). Since these are integral to the plot, I spend some time building them up contextually. The other word I change in that story is “friend.” This one works slightly differently because it is a concept that the aliens do not have. I have to treat it carefully because as you might imagine, this does not mean they don’t have close relationships. In order to change it, I have my character give some conscious thought to what it means and how it fits into the relationships he is familiar with.

I love this stuff – in particular the relation between words and social meaning, which will lead us into our next topics, pragmatics and sociolinguistics. This will be the final post on semantics unless any of my readers have specific questions. If you do, please feel free to comment and ask.

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How morphology can help you! is reprinted by permission of the author.

Juliette Wade is an author of science fiction and fantasy who loves language and its cultural consequences. Her fiction appears in Analog and other short fiction magazines. She has degrees in Linguistics, Anthropology and Japanese.

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U.S. District Judge Denny Chin has granted preliminary approval to the revised Google Book Settlement, which was filed on Friday.  He has set the date for the fairness hearing on February 18th, 2010.

The Open Book Alliance, of which SFWA is a member, has a  post-mortem of the revised settlement on their website, as has SFWA’s own Victoria Strauss. OBA released a statement today in response to the preliminary approval.

“Today, in an expected procedural move, Judge Denny Chin granted preliminary approval to the revised Settlement of Google’s copyright infringement lawsuit. This is not a surprising development and is not any indication that the court will or will not accept the terms of Settlement 2.0. The same procedural preliminary approval was given to Settlement 1.0, and now sets up a court process that will allow those opposed to the revised settlement to let their objections known to the court. The U.S. Department of Justice has until February 4th to weigh in with the court, as their investigation into the matter continues.”

SFWA will continue to keep you posted as events develop.

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In November, 2009, Harlequin Enterprises, Ltd. announced the launch of a new imprint, Harlequin Horizons, for aspiring romance authors. Under normal circumstances, the addition of a new imprint by a major house would be cause for celebration in the professional writing community. Unfortunately, these are not normal circumstances. Harlequin Horizons is a joint venture with Author Solutions, and it is a vanity/subsidy press that relies upon payments and income from aspiring writers to earn profit, rather than sales of books to actual readers.

The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, Inc. (SFWA) finds it extremely disappointing that Harlequin has chosen to launch an imprint whose sole purpose appears to be the enrichment of the corporate coffers at the expense of aspiring writers. According to their website, “Now with Harlequin Horizons, more writers have the opportunity to enter the market, hone their skills and achieve the goals that burn in their hearts.”

SFWA calls on Harlequin to openly acknowledge that Harlequin Horizon titles will not be distributed to brick-and-mortar bookstores, thus ensuring that the titles will not be breaking into the real fiction market. SFWA also asks that Harlequin acknowledge that the imprint does not represent a genuine opportunity for aspiring authors to hone their skills, as no editor will be vetting or working on the manuscripts. Further, SFWA believes that work published with Harlequin Horizons may injure writing careers by associating authors’ names with small sales levels reflected by the imprint’s lack of distribution, as well as its emphasis upon income received from writers and not readers. SFWA supports the fundamental principle that writers should be paid for their work, and even those who aspire to professional status and payment ought not to be charged for the privilege of having those aspirations.

Until such time as Harlequin changes course, and returns to a model of legitimately working with authors instead of charging authors for publishing services, SFWA has no choice but to be absolutely clear that NO titles from ANY Harlequin imprint will be counted as qualifying for membership in SFWA. Further, Harlequin should be on notice that while the rules of our annual Nebula Award do not expressly prohibit self-published titles from winning, it is highly unlikely that our membership would ever nominate or vote for a work that was published in this manner.

Already the world’s largest romance publisher, Harlequin should know better than anyone else in the industry the importance of treating authors professionally and with the respect due the craft; Harlequin should have the internal fortitude to resist the lure of easy money taken from aspiring authors who want only to see their work professionally published and may be tempted to believe that this is a legitimate avenue towards those goals.

SFWA does not believe that changing the name of the imprint, or in some other way attempting to disguise the relationship to Harlequin, changes the intention, and calls on Harlequin to do the right thing by immediately discontinuing this imprint and returning to doing business as an advance and royalty paying publisher.

For the Board of Directors,
Russell Davis
President
SFWA, Inc.

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Today, Mystery Writers of America (a sponsor of Writer Beware, along with the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America)  issued this announcement to its members:

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Dear MWA Members:

Recently, Harlequin Enterprises launched two new business ventures aimed at aspiring writers, the Harlequin Horizons self-publishing program and the eHarlequin Manuscript Critique service (aka “Learn to Write”), both of which are widely promoted on its website and embedded in the manuscript submission guidelines for all of its imprints.

Mystery Writers of America (MWA) is deeply concerned about the troubling conflict-of-interest issues created by these ventures, particularly the potentially misleading way they are marketed to aspiring writers on the Harlequin website.

It is common for disreputable publishers to try to profit from aspiring writers by steering them to their own for-pay editorial, marketing, and publishing services. The implication is that by paying for those services, the writer is more likely to sell his manuscript to the publisher. Harlequin recommends the “eHarlequin Manuscript Critique Service” in the text of its manuscript submission guidelines for all of its imprints and include a link to “Harlequin Horizons,” its new self-publishing arm, without any indication that these are advertisements.

That, coupled with the fact that these businesses share the Harlequin name, may mislead writers into believing they can enhance their chances of being published by Harlequin by paying for these services. Offering these services violates long-standing MWA rules for inclusion on our Approved Publishers List.

On November 9, Mystery Writers of America sent a letter to Harlequin about the “eHarlequin Manuscript Critique Service,” notifying Harlequin that it is in violation of our rules and suggesting steps that Harlequin could take to remain on our Approved Publishers list. The steps outlined at that time included removing mention of this for-pay service entirely from its manuscript submission guidelines, clearly identifying any mention of this program as paid advertisement, and, adding prominent disclaimers that this venture was totally unaffiliated with the editorial side of Harlequin, and that paying for this service is not a factor in the consideration of manuscripts. Since that letter went out, Harlequin has launched “Harlequin Horizons,” a self-publishing program.

MWA’s November 9 letter asks that Harlequin respond to our concerns and recommendations by December 15. We look forward to receiving their response and working with them to protect the interests of aspiring writers. If MWA and Harlequin are unable to reach an agreement, MWA will take appropriate action which may include removing Harlequin from the list of MWA approved publishers, declining future membership applications from authors published by Harlequin and declaring that books published by Harlequin will not be eligible for the Edgar Awards.

We are taking this action because we believe it is vitally important to alert our members of unethical and predatory publishing practices that take advantage of their desire to be published. We respect Harlequin and its authors and hope the company will take the appropriate corrective measures.

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SFWA will be posting its own statement against this action shortly.

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Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Hot on the heels of the launch of West Bow Press, Thomas Nelson’s new self-publishing division, Harlequin Enterprises has unveiled Harlequin Horizons, a company that “that offers aspiring romance writers the opportunity to self-publish their work and achieve their goals.”

The official press release is here.

Like West Bow Press, Harlequin Horizons is powered by self-publishing conglomerate Author Solutions, though its standard packages are considerably cheaper–from $599 to $1,599, as opposed to West Bow’s $999 to $6,499. You can also spend up to $3,499 for a specialty package (West Bow’s specialty packages top out at an eye-popping $19,999–are Christian writers richer, or is it just easier to persuade them to part with the big bucks?)

Both West Bow and Harlequin Horizons also give authors the chance to expend sizeable additional sums, such as $11,999 for a premium Christian publicist (West Bow) or a just plain premium publicist (Harlequin Horizons). Interestingly, while several of West Bow’s standard packages and all of its specialty packages include a bookseller return program, with Harlequin Horizons that’s available only as an extra.

Like West Bow, Harlequin Horizons wreaths self-publishing in nebulous, glowing verbiage, extolling benefits and ignoring downsides. With West Bow Press, you can Begin Your Legacy. With Harlequin Horizons, you can Reach the Stars. And just like West Bow, Harlequin Horizons cordially extends the carrot of commercial publication: “While there is no guarantee that if you publish with Harlequin Horizons you will picked up for traditional publishing, Harlequin will monitor sales of books published through Harlequin Horizons for possible pick-up by its traditional imprints.”

Unlike West Bow, Harlequin Horizons bears its parent’s name. And that is making some Harlequin authors quite unhappy.

On the Dear Author blog, a lively discussion of the new venture is summarized here. Authors’ concerns include dilution of the house brand (if low-quality self-published books carry the Harlequin name, the overall reputation of Harlequin may suffer), a loss of prestige for non-self-published Harlequin authors (the perception that “anyone” can get published by Harlequin), new authors spending money on self-publishing in the belief that it’s a path to getting noticed by Harlequin (well, of course; this is one of the new service’s major marketing pitches–no surprise, since Harlequin Horizons is a money-making enterprise), and the choice of Author Solutions as a partner (given the complaints about several Author Solutions brands–one of my blog posts is referenced).

In a followup post, some of these concerns are addressed by Malle Valik, Harlequin’s Digital Director, who reveals that while “Harlequin put its name on the Harlequin Horizons site to clearly indicate this is a romance self-publishing site,” Harlequin Horizons books will be branded HH (not Harlequin), and that “[t]he copyright is not associated with Harlequin.” As to why Harlequin is establishing a self-publishing division, Ms. Valik says,

Bowker reported in 2008 that more titles were published through self-publishing than traditional publishers. Self-publishing is a fast growing and vibrant part of the publishing industry today. Harlequin has decided to provide a romance focused self-publishing business for those that choose to go down the self-publishing road.

In other words–self-publishing is a big business, and Harlequin wants a piece of the pie. As I noted in my post on West Bow Press, the potential for new revenue is large indeed:

In 2008, according to PW, the number of on-demand and short-run titles (the bulk of which represent offerings by self-publishing companies) jumped by 132% (total growth since 2002: 774%), outstripping books produced by “traditional production methods”. Not only does adding a self-publishing line allow a publisher to cash in this trend, it presents the possibility of monetizing rejections. By the same token, the self-publishing service’s connection with a major publisher will be a major attraction for authors–especially if the publisher suggests that it may take the better-performing books commercial.

For the record, I don’t for one teeny tiny second believe that discovering new writers, or giving them a chance to “begin their legacies” or “reach the stars,” plays a major part here. That’s just a marketing pitch. This is about money. Now more than ever, commercial publishers need to shore up their bottom lines–and adding self-publishing divisions is an easy and profitable way to do so.

Harlequin Horizons offers more confirmation of this fact. But what it confirms even more is the ambition of Author Solutions. Over the past few years, Author Solutions has been absorbing its largest competitors. Now it seems to have come up with a lucrative new business strategy that offers even more possibilities for expansion. For that reason alone, I think we’ll be seeing more self-publishing divisions in the coming months or years.

(Something I didn’t know: Although only West Bow Press and Harlequin Horizons have received wide attention, they are actually the second and third such Author Solutions partnerships. According to this article in the Indianapolis Star, Author Solutions is also partnered with another Christian publisher, LifeWay. LifeWay’s website makes no mention of self-publishing, but a tiny link at the very bottom leads to Cross Books, “a Christian publishing company that blends the best attributes of self-publishing and traditional publishing.” Author Solutions isn’t named on Cross Books’ website, or at least nowhere that I could find, but the Terms of Use confirms the connection.)

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Paul Di Filippo and Sheila Finch have accepted appointment to the jury for the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for the best SF novel of the year. In 2009, Paul A. Carter retired from the jury after having bravely served for many years, almost since the Award’s inception.

Sheila Finch is the author of seven science fiction novels and numerous short stories that have appeared in Amazing, Asimov’s, Fantasy Book, Fantasy & Science Fiction, and many anthologies. A collection of the “Lingster” stories recently appeared as The Guild of Xenolinguists. Sheila taught creative writing at El Camino College for thirty years and at workshops around California. She also writes non-fiction about teaching creative writing and science fiction, most recently, a series of short essays on the field that appear online at the SFWA website. Her work has won several awards, including the Nebula Award for Best Novella, the San Diego Book Award for Juvenile Fiction, and the Compton-Crook Award for Best First Novel.

Paul Di Filippo sold his first story in 1977, and his second in 1985. Since then, he has accumulated over 150 periodical credits, and had twenty-five books published. He has two more due out in 2010. He reviews for a number of venues, including The Barnes & Noble Review. He has lived with his partner Deborah Newton for 34 years in Providence, Rhode Island, currently with a calico cat named Penny Century and a chocolate cocker spaniel named Brownie.

The Campbell Award is one of the major annual awards for science fiction and is presented by the Gunn Center for the Study of Science Fiction. The first Campbell Award was presented at the Illinois Institute of Technology in 1973. Since then the Award has been presented in various parts of the world: at California State University at Fullerton; at St. John’s College, Oxford; at the World SF Writers Conference in Dublin; in Stockholm; at the World SF meeting in Dublin again; the University of Kansas; and in a joint event with the Science Fiction Research Association in Kansas City in 2007. The current jury consists of Gregory Benford, Paul Di Filippo, Sheila Finch, James Gunn, Elizabeth Anne Hull, Paul Kincaid, Christopher McKitterick, Pamela Sargent, and T.A. Shippey.

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Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Yesterday, PW reported on the launch of AgentInbox, a new service from collaborative writing website WEbook (I’ve blogged about WEbook before).

“AgentInbox is a service that connects publication-ready authors with reputable, vetted literary agents,” says the service’s FAQ for writers. Writers enter their book’s “vital stats,” including title, genre, query letter, and all or part of the manuscript (there are several tutorials to help with the polishing process). They can then check AgentInbox’s roster of participating agents and choose which ones they’d like their submission to go to. WEbook staff pre-screens submissions, then forwards them on to the agents chosen.

According to PW,

AgentInbox will focus in particular on query letters while also ensuring the manuscripts adhere to basic editorial standards and readiness, said Ardy Khazaei, president of WEbook.

WEbook’s team of in-house and freelance publishing professionals will review pitch letters, make sure that the letters match the actual manuscript and that the manuscript is properly formatted, but the company will not make any recommendations about the quality of the content.

How does it work for agents? According to AgentInbox’s FAQ for agents, agents create a profile listing their interests and submission preferences. They can then check their submissions online, sort them by various categories including genre, and “[r]eject unsuitable submissions with a single click, and contact the gems directly.”

At present, AgentInbox is free for writers, though in future, premium services may be subject to a fee.

AgentInbox reminds me a lot of Creative Byline (about which I have also blogged), an automated submission service targeted to publishers. Creative Byline provides not just screening, but actual editorial feedback on writers’ materials–but otherwise the setup seems quite similar.

Both AgentInbox and Creative Byline are a riff on the manuscript display site, or electronic slush pile, which aims to attract agents and publishers by moving the acquisition process online, and to serve writers by promoting their work direct to publishing professionals, without the need for sending multiple queries. There are many iterations of this basic idea, from the static display site where writers’ submissions hang like banners in hopes someone will come along and view them (example: BooksandManuscripts.com), to supposedly more selective display sites where submissions are pre-screened for quality before being made available to registered agents and publishers (example: OnlyOneChapter), to crowd-sourced display sites where reader rankings drive submissions to the top for consideration by participating agents and editors (example: Authonomy).

The display site idea first surfaced in the late 1990’s. Despite innovations in concept and advances in technology, electronic slush piles have so far failed to establish themselves as a genuine alternative path to representation or publication (for writers), or as an alternative method of manuscript acquisition (for agents and publishers).

Will AgentInbox–which already has signed up an impressive roster of participating agents, one of whom, according to PW, has already found a client via the service–be the tipping point? Only time will tell. Worth noting, however: Creative Byline, which has been in business for more than a year and a half, continues to have difficulty expanding its publisher list (currently, only six publishers are signed up), and has reported no sales as a result of writers’ use of the service. Simply because agents can be more flexible in their acquisition guidelines than publishers, I’d expect a greater success rate for AgentInbox, at least initially. But I would also guess that unless AgentInbox staff do a bit more than just make sure that manuscripts are properly formatted, agents will lose enthusiasm for the service.

(Writers take note: whether or not it improves access to agents, AgentInbox won’t help with those most common of writerly gripes, form rejection letters and nonresponse. For agents, one of the advertised perks of the system is that they can “delete [submissions] or send automated rejections with a few clicks.”)

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posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

As readers of this blog know, I’m fascinated by the strange phenomena that flourish at the fringes of the publishing world. So I was thrilled recently to discover yet another example: an online course that teaches people how to become Virtual Author’s Assistants.

What’s a Virtual Author’s Assistant, you may ask? The course website offers this explanation:

Author’s Assistants are people who work behind the scenes to create, organize and coordinate all the different pieces necessary to get a book published. To writers, they are miracle workers.

The world of publishing can be frightening, overwhelming and frustrating. An author’s assistant is the expert the writer turns to guide them step by step through the process.

From their homes, Virtual Author’s Assistants organize the publishing process for authors around the country and around the world.

Expert? As it turns out, potential Virtual Author’s Assistants need know nothing about the publishing industry. “[D]on’t worry. We’ll teach you. All you need is a love of books, a few basic business skills and a desire for fun and interesting work.” (Wow. Who knew this publishing stuff was so easy and entertaining? I must have missed that nugget of wisdom in my 25+ years as a writer and writers’ advocate. And gosh, I must be awfully dense, because after all that time, I’m still learning.)

Read the rest of this entry »

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In January of 2009, SFWA adopted a new set of Nebula Rules. This year is their first in effect so we thought we’d review the process for those who are curious.

• From November 15^th – February 15^th, Active and Associate members may nominate up to 5 works in each category of the Nebulas, the Bradbury and the Andre Norton Award.

• Members may change their ballot at any point during the nomination period.

• Only works published between July 1, 2008 and December 31^st, 2009 are eligible.

• Works may not be nominated by their authors, editors, publishers, or agents, by spouses or domestic partners of their authors, or by any other party with a monetary interest in the work.

• The 6 items in each category that receive the most votes go on the ballot. (The Norton Jury may add up to 3 works on the Norton ballot.)

• By March 1st, the final ballot is sent to Active members only.

• The Nebula ceremony is in May

What is eligible for a Nebula?

Works published between July 1, 2008 and December 31, 2009 are eligible in the following categories.

a. Short Story: less than 7,500 words;
b. Novelette: at least 7,500 words but less than 17,500 words;
c. Novella: at least 17,500 words but less than 40,000 words
d. Novel: 40,000 words or more.
( At the author’s request, a novella-length work published individually, rather than as a part of a collection, anthology, or other collective work, shall appear in the novel category. )

This is the confusing bit. As part of the transition rules, works which received at least five (5) recommendations under the previous Nebula Awards® rules and were published after July 1, 2008, but didn’t make the 2008 Preliminary Ballot get to have those nominations added to their total for this year. Members who recommended these works last year will not have their total number of allowed nominations reduced, but they may not nominate these works a second time.

Works which received less than five (5) recommendations under the previous Nebula rules and were published after July 1, 2008, may be nominated but their nominations don’t carry over from last year.

According to the last published NAR, the following works and members are affected by this.

Novelette
6 Kosmatka, Ted: Divining Light (Asimov’s, Aug08) DWGoldman, STourtellotte, EJStone, NKress, MMcGarry, CDeLancey

Short Story
5 Burstein, Michael A.: I Remember the Future (I Remember the Future, Apex Publications, Nov08 <Single-author collection>) JPelland, CArdai, MResnick, PLevinson, RSawyer

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At World Fantasy there was a one-hour panel on the Google Book Settlement with Russell Davis, Karen Wester Newton, Charles Petit, Jay Lake, Christopher Kastensmidt, and Dan Gamber moderating. Though all agreed that the panel was too short it covered some good ground.

Sorry you missed it? Not to fear, Rick Kleffel’s Agony Column has the full podcast of it.

Here’s what the website/little book had to say about this (death) panel:

“The Google Books Settlement has caused worldwide controversy and will have a marked effect on every author and publisher. Hear various viewpoints on this issue.”

It’s sort of like saying, “Well, you can throw this match in that pool of gasoline, but there might be some side effects.”

Animated does not do this panel justice. So, let me say, up front, that, whatever they’re paying Russell Davis for being the Prez of Sifwa (Science Fiction Writers of America): It ain’t enough. It ain’t nearly enough. That guy is a rockin’ firebrand, folks and if you doubt my words, well …

Click through to read the rest of his review of the panel or follow this link to the MP3 of the full panel.

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In an announcement that has scientist and science-fiction authors alike reeling with the new possibilities, NASA announced today that it has found a “significant amount” of frozen water on the moon.

Preliminary data from a dramatic experiment on the moon “indicates the mission successfully uncovered water in a permanently shadowed lunar crater,” NASA said in a statement.

“The discovery opens a new chapter in our understanding of the moon,” it added, as ecstatic scientists celebrated the landmark discovery.

Read the full article for more details. Our question is: How many science-fiction books and stories have just become out-dated, do you think?

via Brandie Tarvin

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by Juliette Wade

Neural networks are really amazing things. In my last post I talked about how a word brings up all of its meanings simultaneously; today I’m going to talk about how that’s not all it brings up.

I’m talking about connotations and allusion.

Along with all of its meanings, the mention of a word can bring up all the contexts in which we’ve encountered it. With exceedingly common words, there may not be a particular context that stands out, and the word may have a more generic feeling. With less common words, we may really notice how they evoke the context in which they were created (Quidditch, anyone?) or in which they were used. Regardless, these contexts always tag along, and they influence the way we hear a word.

Has anyone ever tried to use the word “ejaculate” as a dialog tag? No? It used to be common enough, but I’m guessing you can see why we don’t use it so much that way any more. (Dialog tags are out of fashion anyway because they can be distracting.)

This reminds me of a discussion I had on the Analog forum about euphemisms. They tend to get “used up” and replaced by others quite quickly. Why? Because of the contexts in which they are used. If those contexts are considered dirty or low, then the quality of the context will be evoked in the speaker or writer’s mind with every occurrence of the word, and eventually the word will be sullied by its association with that context.

In my classes at the school of Education at UC Berkeley, occasionally the word “intertextuality” came up. It essentially means that a word will evoke in the reader’s mind all the texts in which they have seen it. “Monster” can bring up Frankenstein, or Monsters Inc. or any number of other things. This is one of the reasons that my friend Paul Carlson was able to put together his list of words that evoke particular genres (find it here).

When you’re writing, it might be daunting to remember that there are a million layers floating behind everything you say, particularly when you choose a word that doesn’t occur so frequently as to become semi-generic. Almost any word can become more than it is, much like the few critical words used in ancient Japanese poetry (I’m thinking primarily of tanka, not haiku).

Daunting, sure – but what an opportunity! This stuff can allows you to imbue a scene with a sense of foreboding or excitement. The other thing it can do is allow you to illuminate your point of view character. All of the judgments of value inherent in a particular word will reflect on the user of that word. We see this all the time in oral language when we judge people based on their use of cuss words or insulting words for others. In a piece of narrative writing, all those judgments will be associated with the point of view character. It’s one of the ways that point of view can extend into your writing far beyond the simple first and third person pronouns.

That’s it for today, but stay tuned for the next installment.

Juliette Wade is an author of science fiction and fantasy who loves language and its cultural consequences. Her fiction appears in Analog and other short fiction magazines. She has degrees in Linguistics, Anthropology and Japanese.

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Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Some blog posts and articles that piqued my interest over the past few weeks.

Inspired by a silly piece by writer Jeff Rivera on GalleyCat, in which he, the owner of a self-publishing service, and an anonymous author question the usefulness of literary agents, agent Miriam Goderich of Dystel & Goderich provides an eloquent rebuttal: Who Needs an Agent? You Do.

From agent Holly Root: why not to sweat the small stuff. “There’s a ton of ink spilled online over do’s and don’ts for writers, and while I am a firm believer that knowledge is power and all, too much information can be paralyzing, and some of us on this side of the desk are guilty of making it seem much harder than it already is. If you really read and adhered to every.single.thing. every agent said online you would never finish a book or a query letter and if you did it would probably be a bland groupthinked mess, which actually will get you rejections.”

Agent Jennifer Jackson provides some helpful advice on query letters, including this explanation of what your query letter may say about you and your book (query-hating writers, pay heed): “Now, I’m not going to say that it’s not hard to sum up the book that the writer has spent months, or even years, producing in a way that will make someone want to read it. I think it’s a challenge. And you should definitely give it your best shot. Because, yes, the query is an important part of the initial submission. It sets the stage for reading the synopsis and sample pages. It can reveal things such as the writer’s background, whether their approach is professional, how they see their novel, and other intangible gut feeling responses.”

A pair of really informative posts from agent Rachelle Gardner: How Book Royalties Work and Is Your Book Worth It? (covers what commercial publishers spend on book production).

For writers who, like me, are not enamored of the relentless pressure to self-promote, this New Yorker parody of a marketing plan may make you laugh–or cry.

From writer Caroline Hagood, a short essay on writer’s block that I totally relate to. (For me, actually, what Ms. Hagood describes isn’t true block–it’s more the getting stuckness that I think all writers experience from time to time [and I experience a lot]. True block–the absolute dearth not just of ideas, but of words–is something else again.)

Speaking of being stuck: from Colson Whitehead and the New York Times, some not-exactly-serious ideas for what to write next.

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Norilana Books presents THE CAPTAIN’S WITCH, a stunning, erotic, dark epic fantasy by the acclaimed historical novelist Rosemary Hawley Jarman, newly revised and expanded, and detailing the complex story of true love and impossible evil.

“One of the greatest dark fantasies ever written — in any genre.”
– Tanith Lee

THE CAPTAIN’S WITCH by Rosemary Hawley Jarman

Front Cover:
http://www.norilana.com/TheCaptainsWitch-TPB-Front.jpg

Full Cover Flat:
http://www.norilana.com/TheCaptainsWitch-TPB.jpg

ROSEMARY HAWLEY JARMAN was born in Worcester, England and came to fame in 1971 with her novel We Speak No Treason. Reprinted many times, the book’s hero is the much maligned King Richard III. It sold 30,000 copies in its first week of publication, and gained her the prestigious Author’s Club Silver Quill for best first novel, while in the U.S.A. she was nominated as a Daughter of Mark Twain. Further equally successful novels followed, also an illustrated account of the Battle of Agincourt. She lives in an antique stone cottage between sea and mountain in West Wales. The Captain’s Witch is her first fantasy novel, and she is now working on a sequel.

Read the rest of this entry »

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There is at least one confirmed possible case of H1N1 coming out of World Fantasy.  Australian editor, Jonathan Strahan, reports on his blog that he became ill immediately after the World Fantasy Convention and it has been diagnosed as the flu H1N1.

Please do note that there are no other confirmed cases at WFC, but given the incidence of con crud at a normal convention, it seems prudent to mention this.

For more information about H1N1, visit the Center for Disease Control. The CDC reports that the incubation period from exposure is 1-7 days, with 1-4 being most likely.

Edited to add: Jonathan let us know in comments that though his doctor diagnosed it as H1N1, he did not do clinical tests.  Let’s hope that it is not.

Meanwhile, get well soon, Jonathan.

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Good Afternoon,

I’m very pleased to announce that SFWA has a new Nebula Awards Commissioner (NAC). Madeleine Robins has agreed to take on this role, and see us through the first year under the new rules.

Madeleine Robins is the author of nine novels, including THE STONE WAR, POINT OF HONOUR, and PETTY TREASON: a double-handful of SF and fantasy novels, has worked in both book and comic book publishing, and has been a SFWA member for an unbecoming number of decades.  In addition to her tenure as Czarina of the Service to SFWA Committee in the ’90s, she was Secretary of SFWA in 2001.  She has a hard time resisting volunteer activities. She is a founding member of Book View Cafe, an e-fiction writers’ collaborative, and is hard at work on yet another damned book.

I’d like to thank Madeleine for coming on board, and also especially want to note the extraordinary effort given to SFWA by the outgoing NAC, Brook West. Brook has given outstanding service to SFWA and the Nebula Awards for many years, and is deserving of our deepest thanks.

Cheers,

Russell Davis

President

SFWA, Inc.

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As an author, it’s important for you to know how to sell and market your book. Because there is no shortage of books and articles on the subject, I’d like to tackle the subject of marketing your book from a more metaphorical approach. (If you’ve ever heard me speak, you should know I’m pretty big on metaphors to help you better understand topics in a different way.) In your case, I feel that it’s not only important to understand how to sell, but also understand a little bit more about a typical sales cycle.

When I was thinking about a metaphor, I was envisioning how authors are a lot like blacksmiths who tire endlessly, crafting and perfecting beautiful swords. So, in this post, I’d like to ask the question: Do you know how to sell your sword?

Let’s say that outside the town of Fantasie, you are a blacksmith who has just created a magic sword. This sword is the only one of its kind and it is (in a word) gorgeous. You know that once the word gets out, everyone will want to buy your sword. After months of negotiating and contracts with the local magistrate, you now find your magic sword is being sold at Ye Olde Sword Shoppe. Unfortunately, the magistrate tells you that in order for you to continue being a blacksmith, you need to sell a certain amount of swords. Unfortunately, this means you’re going to have to help sell your sword to the local townsfolk.

So, the first thing you do is go to Ye Olde Sword Shoppe to talk about your sword. The store is only open from dawn to dusk, so you schedule your talk right around the dinner hour. You post a few notices and pick a certain item on the sword to talk about. Then, when you get into the store, you realize that there’s a lot of darn swords. How are you ever going to be able to sell yours? “It’s magic!” you nervously tell the few people who’ve shown up to hear you talk. “It’s a one-of-a-kind, unbreakable sword!” One of the readers pipes up from the audience and says, “Right, because we haven’t heard that one before!”

Okay, let’s pause for a second. Obviously, I’m talking about author readings and signings. Walking into a bookstore is very, very intimidating because let’s face it: there are an awful lot of other books for readers to buy. (It’s also pretty intimidating to sit next to a best-selling author, believe me.) In order to sell your book, though, you need to give people a reason to buy it. Usually that means that you have to learn how to describe your book in a way that will appeal to a broad audience, but it can also mean connecting with your audience in a personal way. Some authors use humor; others provide readers with the so-called “elevator pitch” like “This sword is Excalibur meets Kusanagi.” In this one-on-one relationship, the seller has more control over cultivating the sale, because they have total control over the environment the customer is in. Additionally, you can physically hand the book to your readers, which is something you can’t do online.

Of course, retail is also a bit more complicated because some companies make the products they sell and some don’t. In this case, the sellers at Ye Olde Sword Shoppe know a thing or two about how to present the swords to their customers and how to discount them in the store. Unless you’re the store owner, you don’t have that level of control, which is why many people are advocating online marketing to boost awareness and increase sales. Let’s get back to Fantasie and see how this might work.

Remember when I told you that in the town of Fantasie the stores were only open from dawn until dusk? Let’s say a plague hit the town and the town magistrate decided to quarantine the townspeople. Now, instead of walking to town, the townspeople can sit at home and browse whatever stores they want to at any time through a magic window (e.g. the internet). Ye Olde Sword Shoppe notices a change in their business, because now they can “see” (via website analytics) when customers “come” to their store, what they’re looking for and how quickly they leave, etc.

The online sales cycle is a very passive one for retailers, because no matter how much any store owner may try — the seller is not in control. The buyer is. At a convention, for example, organizers will help facilitate traffic and flow based on the physical layout of the hall. For any website, a reader can access that store from any page because of something called natural or organic search; not “just” the home page. Now, sales just got a lot more complex. Online, the buyer can also easily leave any website to compare factors like pricing, shipping, availability and reviews with the touch of a button. That level of research takes a lot more time if a buyer has to drive around town.

Because online and offline sales cycles are so different, the same types of marketing efforts that you might do offline don’t necessarily translate well in an online environment. The only way you are going to understand what works and what doesn’t is through patience and testing. This, to me, is the biggest mistake I see most authors making. The natural tendency is to either overcompensate by banging that “buy me” drum all the time, or undercompensate by hoping a reader will “discover” them just by being online. However, online marketing is not “just” about sales: it’s also about getting people to perform a desired action. Without the right web analytics data, it is also very challenging (nigh impossible) to see a one-to-one correlation between your marketing efforts and your book sales. However, there are things you can do to help facilitate those sales. In my next post here on the SFWA blog, I will provide you with a checklist of things you can do for your web presence to ensure that your readers are getting the information that they need.

Do you have some tips or recommended links to share for your fellow authors? Be sure to post them in the comments below. Until next time, ask yourself how you’re going to sell your beautiful sword!

About the Author

Monica Valentinelli is the content and web analytics manager for the digital sheet music retailer and publisher Musicnotes.com and the project manager for the horror and dark fantasy webzine Flamesrising.com. Monica is an aspiring novelist working on revisions for her first novel; she has several non-fiction, short fiction and game writing credits to her name including her recent guest blog post for Crackle.com about Bram Stoker’s Dracula and The Devil’s Night, which is a Free One-Scene SAS for White Wolf Publishing.

To read more about Monica, visit her blog located at www.mlvwrites.com.

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Literary scholar, Karl Kroeber passed away this morning. He was 82.  Best known for his work with Native American literature, he was also English and comparative literature at Columbia University.  Our condolences go out to his sister, Ursula K. Le Guin, and to all his family and friends.

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Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Copyright, literally, is “the right to copy.” It guarantees the authors of creative works–including books, artworks, films, recordings, photographs–the exclusive right for a set period of time to allow other people to copy and distribute the work, by whatever means and in whatever media currently exist. It also prohibits copying and distributing without the author’s permission. You own copyright by law, automatically, as soon your work is fixed in tangible form–i.e., the minute you write down the words.

Contained within copyright is the entire bundle of rights that an author can grant to others or utilize him/herself. For book authors, this includes the right to publish in book or other form, to make translations and audio recordings and films, to create serializations or abridgements or derivative works…the list goes on, and continues to expand as technology makes different forms of publication and distribution possible.

When you sign a publishing contract, you are granting the publisher permission to exploit (i.e., to publish and distribute for profit) some or all of your rights for a defined period of time. Because you own the copyright, granting rights doesn’t mean you lose or abandon those rights–merely that you authorize someone else to use them for a while, either exclusively (no one else can use them at the same time) or nonexclusively (you can also grant them to others). Eventually, once the contract term has expired or the book has ceased to sell in significant numbers, the publisher will cease publication and relinquish its claim on your rights. This is known as rights reversion. Sometimes reversion is automatic (as in a fixed-term contract); sometimes you must request reversion after the book has been declared out of print (as in a life-of-copyright contract). Once your rights have reverted, you are free to re-sell them if you can or use them yourself, as you choose.

For many readers of this blog, the above will seem pretty elementary. But confusion between rights and copyright is not unusual–not just among authors (one common misplaced fear, that granting rights to a publisher means you lose them forever, is often used as a justification for self-publishing), but among inexperienced publishers. If I had a dollar for every small press contract I’ve seen that hopelessly conflates rights and copyright (for instance, requiring writers to grant copyright, but then reserving a variety of subrights to the author), I could take my husband Rob out to a very fancy dinner.

Some suggestions to untangle the confusion and protect yourself:

- First and foremost, understand copyright and the rights it gives you. The US Copyright Office, the UK Intellectual Property Office, and the Australian Copyright Council all offer information. The more you know, the more likely it is that you’ll recognize bad contract clauses when you run across them.

- Except in specific circumstances, such as doing work-for-hire, don’t give away your copyright, not even temporarily. Inexperienced publishers sometimes ask for this, believing they need it to properly exploit authors’ rights. They don’t–and if things go wrong, it can work out very badly for you.

- You don’t necessarily need to be afraid of life-of-copyright contracts. In a fixed-term contract, you grant rights for a defined amount of time–say, three years. In a life-of-copyright contract, you grant rights for the duration of copyright (currently, in the USA and most of Europe, your lifetime plus 70 years). New authors often find life-of-copyright contracts very scary–but they’re standard in commercial publishing, and many smaller presses have them also. They are not intended to allow the publisher to hold your rights until 70 years after your death, but rather to create an open-ended situation in which the publisher can keep your book in print for as long as it continues to sell.

Of course, you need to evaluate the situation. For a new small publisher, life-of-copyright might not be such a great idea, since the failure rate for new publishers is very high. A fixed-term contract might be better, as it would at least ensure you got your rights back eventually, even if the publisher didn’t bother to return them before disappearing. And a life-of-copyright grant term must be balanced by a rights reversion clause (see below).

- Speaking of grant terms, make sure there is one. Whether it’s three years or life-of-copyright, your contract should state the term for which rights are being granted. I’ve seen small publishers’ contracts that lack this important detail.

- Make sure your contract includes some provision for rights reversion. While you want to grant rights to a publisher that will properly exploit them, you also want eventually to get your rights back. When and how this happens should be clearly spelled out in your contract.

A time-limited contract is one way to ensure reversion–but beware of automatic renewal clauses that make it difficult for you to terminate, or that rely on you remembering to send the publisher notice before the renewal date and thus can easily be forgotten. Beware also of excessive grant terms–for instance, the contract of one well-known author mill extends for seven years, which is longer than many commercially-published books remain in print. For a smaller publisher, three to five years, with the possibility of renewal if both parties agree, is probably the most you want to consider.

For life-of-copyright contracts, there should be a rights reversion clause detailing when the work will go out of print (ideally, this should be tied to minimum sales or royalty levels, rather than mere availability for sale, so that the publisher can’t hang on to your rights if your book is selling just a couple of copies a year) and what steps you can take to demand that the publisher return your rights (usually, a letter asking the publisher either to republish or return rights, and providing a timeframe for the publisher to respond). Never sign a life-of-copyright contract that does not include such a clause. Yes, they exist; I’ve seen them.

Also look for a clause requiring the publisher to publish within a specific period of time (say, 12-24 months), or else return rights. This will prevent the publisher from sitting on your book without ever publishing it, or from pushing the publishing date back indefinitely due to incompetence or malice.

- Last but very definitely not least, never rely on a publisher’s verbal assurances. A confused or devious publisher may assure you that, even though its contract requires you to give up copyright, “you aren’t really losing your copyright, because we’ll give it back later on.” Or, even though its life-of-copyright contract doesn’t include a reversion clause, “you don’t need to worry, because we never hold on to rights forever.” Maybe the publisher means it, maybe it doesn’t–but do you really want to risk signing with a publisher whose contract doesn’t match its promises? Along with Yog’s Law, a principle by which authors should always abide is this: If it’s not in writing, it doesn’t exist.

For more on copyright, including the reasons why you don’t need to register copyright for unpublished work and a discussion of several common copyright myths, see the Copyright page of the Writer Beware website.

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by Victoria Strauss

Unlike commercial or trade publishers, whose business model is based on book volume (selling as many books as possible from a limited number of authors), author mills’ business model is based on author volume (selling a limited number of books from as many authors as possible). The most famous example of an author mill is PublishAmerica, but there are others, such as VDM Verlag Dr. Mueller, an academic author mill.

Unlike vanity publishers or self-publishing services, author mills don’t charge upfront fees–which is why they can convincingly present themselves as “real” publishers–but they often do their best to turn their authors into customers, heavily encouraging them to buy their own books, or incentivizing self-purchases with special offers and discounts. Because of the need for author volume, editorial gatekeeping is lax (though many author mills, knowing how much authors crave validation, claim to be selective). Author mills protect their profits by doing everything on the cheap, with minimal or nonexistent editing, interior and cover design that’s straight-from-template, and no meaningful marketing or distribution, resulting in tiny sales for the average author mill book. They also often have exploitive, nonstandard contracts.

Because author mills are typically deceptive in the way they present themselves, many writers believe they are signing up with real publishers, and are bitterly disappointed by their publishing experience. Author mills may also be ineffectual, haphazard, or grudging about fulfilling their contractual obligations–so even writers who go into the relationship with their eyes open may not receive what they expect.

I’m currently writing an article on author mills, and as part of my research I’d like to hear from writers who have published with an author mill. I’m interested not just in writers who had problems, or whose expectations weren’t fulfilled, but in writers who chose an author mill specifically for what it could do for them, and were satisfied with the result.

Please email me at beware@sfwa.org. In accordance with Writer Beware’s policies, I’ll keep all information completely confidential (it will NOT be shared) unless you specifically give me permission to quote you (which I can do without using your name, if you prefer). Don’t worry if you get my autoresponder–I’m away from home at the moment, but will be back early next week and will reply then.

Thanks so much!

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