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April Critique-a-Palooza!

After a lengthy hiatus, I'm bringing back one of the most popular parts of the Dancing on Coals workshop experience--the in-depth critique. Coming soon, I'll be starting a mentor service as well and will once again accept complete manuscripts for critique. More details to come on both of those items.

For the month of April I'm opening 10 slots for in-depth critique.

I know your first question is the cost, so let's get right to it. For this month, I'm offering two options:

In-depth critique of 25 manuscript pages for $50*
In-depth critique of 50 manuscript pages for $100*

Before submitting your document, I'll ask that you follow these formatting guidelines:

• Pages should be formatted with 1" margins all around, 
• Font no smaller than 12-point
• Text must be double-spaced
• Files must be on .doc, docx, or rtf format

Note: I'll accept manuscript pages from any genre except erotica, and may decline to work with a manuscript if it has excessive violence or profanity. I don't mind some, but there's a line I don't like to cross. If you wonder if your work falls into any of these categories, please e-mail me to discuss it.

What's Included?

You'll get a complete and comprehensive critique of the pages you submit with a focus on characterization, tension, plot, dialogue, goal/conflict/motivation, clarity, pacing, structure, sentence structure, organization, and voice. I make notes directly on your pages using MS Word's Track Changes feature. A critique is not necessarily the same as a line edit, although there may be some crossover. I'll focus more on making sure your story is working. 

Why should you choose to work with me? 

I'm a national bestselling author with more than 30 books on my back list, written across several genres. I've also been teaching writing classes online and in person (and offering critiques as part of the deal) since 1993. I bring more than 20 years of experience to the table. As a novelist myself, I understand writer's voice and respect individual style. I tailor my comments to help you shine, not to make you sound like me (or anyone else.)

I'll give you my honest opinion and feedback, including suggestions of things to consider, but your manuscript is your own, so take what resonates with you and leave the rest. My goal is to help you gain a clearer picture of what you want to accomplish in your book and how you might be able to do that. 

Interested? Want to get one of those elusive 10 slots for the month of April? 

Click here to fill out the form 

Once you've done that, I'll send you an invoice via Dancing on Coals on PayPal. Pay with your PayPal account or use your credit card. (Note: the form will say that you're subscribing to a list, but I'm not adding you to a mailing list. You won't receive any unsolicited email from me, just the invoice for your registration fee, instructions for submitting your manuscript pages, and private emails containing your critique.) 

*All registration fees are nonrefundable. 

Writing Across Genres

I've spent the past 20 years writing in different genres, and I’m frequently asked how I do it. As the market grows and genres spawn sub-genres and sub-sub-genres, it’s become such a broad topic, I’m not sure anyone can actually cover the subject exhaustively. Several years ago, I asked

The members of my longest continuous running workshop to tell me what they'd want to hear if I did a workshop on the subject. They came back with a few suggestions, so I thought I’d share them here.

One asked: “How is writing a romance different from writing a mystery, different from writing a time travel in terms of mind-set, creative process, & plot?”

I think that every genre and sub-genre has its own language, its own rhythm, and its own feel. Short contemporary romances are far different from long contemporaries in terms of pace, rhythm, and language, and those are different from romantic suspense.

Romantic suspense is as different from traditional mystery as night from day, and time travel is completely different from fantasy romance. That’s one reason I was never a big supporter of the once-common wisdom to brush up a manuscript that had been rejected, lengthen it or shorten it, toss in a ghost or take the ghost out, and submit the manuscript to an entirely different publisher.

Submitting to a line that is similar in tone and texture is fine, of course, but I've heard editors comment about manuscripts that have obviously been redone, and I think authors make a mistake when they put themselves in that position.

I think it would take a fairly new editor without much experience not to recognize a short contemporary that's been turned into a long one, or vice versa. There's a big difference in the world view of the readers of the various genres, as well.

When I'm writing a long contemporary romance, I'm writing to people who believe that in spite of a few problems, life is generally good and love conquers all. The characters are rarely truly cynical people, and if one appears cynical, there is good underlying motivation for the attitude. In traditional romance, characters generally believe in the human race and they're fairly upbeat people as a general rule.

When I'm writing a time travel romance, I find that I can be a little more cynical about life, but I still have to write with the belief that love conquers all—even to the point of leaving behind everything that is familiar, everyone the character loves, and settling in happily in a new time period.

It’s personally very difficult for me to believe that someone could willingly walk away from loved ones, so when I write time travels I tend to make the traveler something of a loner, with very few people to leave behind. And the one time I didn't, the loss of his loved ones was an ongoing problem during the book.

Still and all, in time travel romance, fantasy romance, vampire romance, shapeshifter romance, or any other kind of paranormal or fantasy romance, the overriding belief is that anything is possible, even the impossible and that romance will win the day.

Inspirational romance, especially Christian-centered romance, will be decidedly different in tone than an erotic romance, and not just in the noticeable presence or absence of sex. The characters’ views on life, family, love, and politics will be vastly different. Their thoughts and thought processes will differ.

In romantic suspense, the life view may be even more cynical, and though love doesn't necessarily conquer all, it is a great healer. And, of course, as you move through all the various subgenres of romance and romantic suspense, things change a bit. But still, the language is romance language, in general a bit softer and more flowery (for want of a better description) and more introspective than some other genres.  

When writing straight mystery, love doesn't really play a part in the world unless love, the quest for it or the determination not to lose it, is the catalyst for the murder. In general, characters in these books don't have to believe that love conquers anything—and neither does the author.

Obviously, if the life view is different for each type of book, it's important to make sure that you're in the right mind-set when you approach the book.

If you have a somewhat cynical view of life and you're trying to write short, sweet contemporary without a lot of success, that difference may account for some of the problems you're experiencing.

If you've been raised to believe that sex before marriage is wrong and you're trying to break in to the market writing sizzling hot books, you may have trouble finding the success you want.

And if you see nothing wrong with a good roll in the hay on the first date, or if “date” is a loose description of the characters’ hook-up, but you're trying to break in by writing for a sweet market, you just might have the same problem.

Now, the truth is, that most of us have more than one side to our personalities, and that's where getting into the right mind-set becomes important.

I'm capable of feeling both cynical and optimistic about the world and the people in it, so making sure that I'm in the right frame of mind is vitally important when I move from one genre to another.

If I've just finished writing a murder mystery, that is the time for me to do my next mystery proposal while I’m still in that frame of mind.

The first thing I would do before sitting down to write a Harlequin Superromance was to read one or two just to get back into the right frame of mind and to begin to feel the rhythm of the speech for the book I needed to write and the world my characters were going to live in.

In general (and remember, I’m talking strictly in generalities here since there’s not time nor space to become more specific) mysteries and suspense novels flow at a different pace and use a different set of words than do their romance-genre cousins. Chapters are probably shorter. The pace is probably quicker. There’s much less introspection, especially about relationships with other characters.

Chances are, if you treat a romance reader to three pages of introspection about what a character is feeling and why, or how another character looks and what your POV character thinks about that, she’ll be perfectly okay with it. Offer a mystery reader three pages of introspection about any topic and you’ll probably lose the reader.

Writing across genres and absorbing pieces of different genres into your books may not be as difficult in these days where the publishing world has changed so drastically. Authors no longer have to convince an editor to take a chance on their work, but they still have to come across believably to readers. No matter how much you may love a particular story, if it doesn’t ring true to readers, you may not achieve the success you want with it.

Bottom line, the advice I would give to any writer today is the same advice I would have given twenty years ago: Read. Read, read, read. Read voraciously. Read all kinds of books. Understand reader expectations for the genre, subgenre or sub-subgenre you want to tackle. It’s the best kind of research any of us can do. 

An Unbending Honesty

In my previous post about finding what’s wrong in your work, I said that I think writers need to understand the structure of a scene to identify what’s wrong with a scene.

Another thing I strongly believe a writer needs is an unbending honesty with himself. This means you have to tell yourself the truth, not what you want to hear. This is tough to do, especially if we’re in the habit of smoothing our own ruffled feathers in other aspects of our lives. If we’ve learned how to pat ourselves on the head and make ourselves feel better over real-life issues, we should at least suspect that we’re capable of doing the same thing when it comes to our writing.

If you want to strive for excellence, you need to be honest—both about what’s wrong with your work and what’s right. No running yourself down relentlessly, indulging in false modesty and refusing to acknowledge your strengths. No glossing over your weaknesses.

One thing I clearly remember from my early days as a writer was making the decision to read the work in hard copy rather than on the screen when I’m revising. I think doing that is one of my subconscious triggers. As long as it’s on the screen, it’s “mine.” Once it’s printed on the page, I find it easier to distance myself from it. To read it as if someone else wrote it. Unless I do that, I can’t honestly determine whether I’ve hit the bar I’ve set for myself.

The first time I sat down to read a manuscript I wrote from beginning to end, I talked to myself long and hard about forgetting that I’d written it so I could approach it with some detachment. I believe this is another key element in being able to identify what’s wrong. As long as we remember that it’s our work, we retain a deep personal attachment to every word, to every scene, to every idea on the page.

When you sit down to read something you’ve written—whether it’s a page, a scene, a chapter, or an entire manuscript—remind yourself that nothing is sacred. Absolutely nothing.

It doesn’t matter how long or hard you’ve worked on a scene, how much you like a particular description or phrase—if it doesn’t fit, if it doesn’t feel right, it needs to go.

If a character or a location isn’t working, he goes, she goes, or it goes. Absolutely nothing is sacred. Absolutely nothing is safe.

If you’re approaching your work feeling protective in some way, determined to preserve, to fix, to keep what you’ve written, you are automatically shutting down some of the internal voices that will help you identify problem areas before you even begin.

To find the flaws in what you’ve written, you have to remain logical. Logic and sentiment don’t work well together. Sentiment will allow you to keep contrived and unbelievable situations because you like them or you don’t want to work as hard as you need to in order to fix them.

If you’re a discriminating reader, logic will pinpoint those problem areas immediately. You’ll know what works and what doesn’t. And that’s when you need to remember that ideas are just ideas. Words are only words.

Much as we like to talk about pouring our blood and our souls into our work, ideas are still just ideas. No matter how often we wax eloquent about the “book of my heart,” words are still just words.

When you’re looking at a scene, a chapter, or an entire manuscript and trying to figure out what’s wrong with it, remember that you’re looking at the whole picture, not just a single element. If you’re focused on a beautifully written sentence, for example, you might not be able to sense that it’s actually making your character seem weak or ineffective, or that it’s making a character behave out of character. You might not recognize that the character’s motivation is weak, or that the emotion you’ve written for her is contrived.

Remember also that an idea doesn’t make a plot. Ideas are everywhere. Some ideas can be spun into plots, but ideas and situations are not plots all by themselves.

Plots have—here comes that word again—structure.

If you don’t fully understand what your plot should be doing, it will be very difficult to identify when your plot isn’t doing it.

Does your plot have an inciting incident that’s big enough to drive the plot forward? Are your characters sufficiently motivated to keep them moving when things get tough? Does your scene contain actual conflict, or is it full of anticipated or remembered conflict?

Is your character spending too much time thinking about what just happened or what’s going to happen? It’s possible that too much time in his own head will make him feel self-centered and selfish, and that you’re losing sympathy for him without even realizing it?

Is he falling in love with a weak character or one who is TSTL (Too Stupid to Live?) Is the antagonist he’s facing too weak to present a challenge that will keep readers engaged? Are you relying on an unrealistic coincidence to either move your plot forward or bring it to a conclusion?

Do you have actual turning points, or is your plot plodding along on a predictable path? How many times has your protagonist thought about his or her goal, motivation and conflicts? Are you presenting new information to the reader, or are you rehashing stuff they already know?

Be honest with yourself. Don’t ignore those flickers of doubt. Don’t automatically assume the doubt is justified, either. But at least give it some honest consideration before you duck and run.

If you feel that something’s wrong with your story, but you don’t know what it is, ask yourself when you last felt that the story was absolutely right. Go back to that point and read what you’ve written to see if you’ve taken a wrong turn.

Have you forced a character to follow a pre-determined path just because you once decided that’s what needed to happen? Should you have listened to the character when he said that’s not how he felt and wanted to go in another direction?

Another big question I would have for anyone who has trouble identifying what’s wrong in their own work is: How much do you read?

I’ve said this before, and I’m certainly not alone. Reading is not optional if you want to be a writer.

Are you reading at least one book a week?

When you read, what are you reading? Are you reading the work of authors who are where you want to be? Are you reading outside your chosen genre? Are you opening yourself to ideas beyond what other authors in your genre have used? Even if you're writing sweet contemporary romance, you can learn a lot from someone who writes fantasy or action/adventure or mystery, or even (gasp!) literary fiction.

If all you ever read are books from one genre, how will you identify if you're relying on genre cliches to carry your work?


Are you constantly and consistently studying the medium in which you’re trying to work, or do you put off reading, (the necessary study of your craft) because there are other things to do?

Do you write consistently and regularly? When you sit down to write is there any discipline involved in what you’re doing?

If the answer to any of those questions is no, then I have one more question for you—how do you expect to understand what’s wrong with your work?

If you’re not working at your craft—and I mean really working, not playing, not talking about it—if you’re not actively trying to improve your understanding of the craft and practicing what you’ve learned, and stretching yourself a little more every day.

If you’re not studying by immersing yourself in the work of other authors who are where you want to be, then how do you expect to know when you get there?

As I said before, you need to clearly understand where you’re heading before you’ll even have a clue whether or not you hit the mark.

You need to earn the understanding you’re looking for. No one can hand it to you. You can’t learn it from reading a book--or even this workshop. The best teacher in the world, the best critique partner in the world, the best how-to book in the world can’t do a thing to help you if you’re not willing to help yourself.

And willing doesn’t mean intentions. Willing means action.

Yes, we can learn from others. I wouldn’t write this blog or offer workshops if I didn’t believe that. But ultimately, we learn from doing. We learn by write by writing. By trying someone else’s technique or suggestions, seeing if it works for us, and either keeping it or discarding it.

We learn by trying new techniques and perfecting the old.

So go.

Write things!

Identifying What's Wrong in Your Work

We all know that creating is an art, but editing is absolutely a science. Unless you understand the tools of your craft, the scientific part of what we do as writers, I’m not sure a person can ever really identify what’s wrong with something they've written. 

A writer must know what should be happening in the work, in literary terms, in dramatic terms, in terms of structure, before he can identify what’s missing.

We can’t necessarily command the artistic part of what we do. Nobody can truly control art. But we can command the rest. Write like a wood sprite in a meadow if that's what works for you--but then pull out your tools and get to work making all those pretty words into something solid. 

No matter how exciting we may think a story idea sounds, it’s not going to rise to the level of excellence if we aren’t in command of the craft while we write it. We must know the tools of our trade. We must have a clear understanding of the structure of a scene and how all the components fit together before we can identify when one of those components is missing or weak.

Simply reading about scene- or plot-structure isn’t going to cut it. The only way I know to truly learn anything in this business is by doing it. Not just once. Not just 10 times. Not just 100 times. But over and over and over again.

If you’re having trouble identifying what’s wrong in your own work, stop and think about this honestly—how many scenes have you crafted, being true to the “science” of scene structure? How many times have you clearly identified your character’s goals and then made absolutely certain to keep your characters moving toward those goals as the scene progresses?

Like any other artistic endeavor, writing takes practice. Most adults can string words together to make a sentence, but being a writer is much more than that. So if you’re approaching your scenes haphazardly, writing whatever seems kind of right, “kind of” understanding goals, but not really. Kind of moving toward them—but usually not . . . 

Or moving toward them only by accident, then it’s going to take a whole lot of luck to figure out what’s wrong when they don’t work right.

Intending to use scene structure one of these days or to get structure into your scene by osmosis isn't the same as identifying where the support beams go and making sure the load-bearing walls of your scene are in place. Thinking is not the same as doing. 

Thinking about it or talking about it won't give you the same level of skill that you’d get if you actually worked at learning scene structure, worked at writing scenes using it, and worked at polishing and revising those scenes again and again until you knew, deep in your own gut, that you had it right.

If you’re trying, then abandoning it because it’s hard, or because you don’t get it, or because it takes too long—or for whatever reason you may be deciding not to use it, then I don’t know what to tell you about how to find what’s wrong in your work.

Because the structure that I follow—that I believe in absolutely—is how I find what’s wrong in my own work.

And it’s how I identify what to do to fix it.

If you’re approaching a scene that you feel is weak and rambling, then the only thing I can suggest is to look at the scene’s structure. Does your viewpoint character have a clear goal?

Do your non-viewpoint characters have clear goals that are in opposition to that of the point-of-view character? Does the viewpoint character move steadily and relentlessly toward achieving that goal? Do the non-viewpoint characters move steadily and relentlessly toward achieving their goals?

Is the conflict clear? Is it interesting? Does it move the story forward or is it repetitive action—just more of the same thing we’ve already seen? Is it real, active conflict, or is it anticipated conflict (a character thinking about what might go wrong) or remembered conflict (a character thinking about what did go wrong)?

Are you deep enough in the character’s head and heart to convey clear emotion? Is that emotion real, or is it merely convenient for you, the author, so you can move your characters to the next place you’ve decided they should be?

Do you understand the character’s motivation? Is it believable? I mean really believable, not conveniently believable, or I-don’t-have-time-to-rewrite-it believable, or genre-cliché believable. If you were in that character’s shoes in the same set of circumstances, would you do the same thing? Or are you trying to force characters to do things simply because they sound good for the plot you’ve made up?

How much do you understand about the “science” of characterization? How much do you understand about the science of conflict and motivation? How did you come by that understanding? From working relentlessly on your own work or from reading what somebody else says about it?

Do you know absolutely, on a gut level, what comprises a strong scene? The pacing you should be following in the book you’re writing? Do you have a clear, working understanding about the layers of conflict and how best to weave them together? Because if you don’t know what’s right, how can you expect to figure out what’s wrong?

A doctor can’t diagnose congested lungs unless she knows what clear lungs look and sound like. A mechanic can’t diagnose a dead battery unless he knows what’s supposed to happen when the battery is working right. A musician can’t diagnose music being played off-key or in the wrong rhythm unless she knows what the key is supposed to sound like or understands the rhythm as it’s supposed to be.

Bottom line: An author can’t identify what her scenes aren’t doing unless he knows what they’re supposed to do in the first place. Putting the magic in fiction takes a lot of hard, gritty, realistic work. 

More Thoughts on Focus

Continuing from yesterday's article on staying focused ... 

Do I do anything special to jog my brain into writing mode before I start writing? 

My answer at the time: 

Well, I used to. One of the things I've realized recently is that when I became a full-time writer, I lost some of the unconscious cues I gave myself that used to work so well. I used to get up every morning and go to work. Then I came home and spent time with my children until 9:00. 

At 9:00, they were on their own to get ready for bed and I began to write. They were not to interrupt me for anything that didn't include blood, but they could come in to kiss me good-night. They pushed the envelope at first -- after all, my youngest was only 5. But that was old enough, and she quickly learned that I meant what I said. 

I got up every Saturday and Sunday morning at 5:00 and wrote until the kids woke up and needed my attention. Note that I said woke up AND needed my attention because waking up did not automatically mean they needed my attention immediately. Like I said, my youngest was 5 then. She was old enough to watch cartoons for a little while and she could even fix herself a bowl of cereal (as long as the milk carton wasn't full.) 

My oldest was much older, and very self-sufficient, so if she ever woke up before the little one lost interest in cartoons, she could help entertain her sister. Not that she did. My oldest loved to sleep and the little one didn't, so I encouraged my youngest to become more self-sufficient. 

Anyway, that gave me at least four uninterrupted hours every Saturday and Sunday morning, and sometimes more. I did not allow myself to clean house, etc., until after my writing hours were over. There was plenty of time to mop the floor, but there wasn't plenty of quiet time to write. 

Once I began to write full-time, I must have unconsciously believed that I had unlimited writing time, even though I knew logically that I didn't, so I let guilt begin to niggle at me because it started feeling mean to tell the kids they couldn't interrupt me when I was working. Time wasn't so precious anymore, I guess. 

Little by little, I let the distractions creep in, so I'm just now in the process of developing habits again and mind-cues to let myself know it's time to work. I still get up at 5:00, and I spend at least one hour working on things for the writing classes I teach. 

After that, I allow myself an hour for RWA things (I was serving on the board of directors at the time). After that, I spend 30 minutes on my spiritual well-being. Then I know it's time to work. If I don't time myself on the class and RWA stuff, though, it can easily get away from me. 

It's 11:00 now and that's obviously not RWA time. Shame on me!!! Proof positive that I don't have it down to a science yet! But do I light candles and things like that? No. I've tried doing that, but it doesn't seem to send any signals to my brain except fear that the cats will knock over the candle and start the apartment on fire! Music helps. I do try to do that because it does help set the mood. 

My answer now: 

I'm still struggling to create a schedule I can stick to. Just when I think I've got it, something real life happens and it's impossible to stick to the schedule. Recently, I spent three weeks in Missouri taking care of my grandchildren while my youngest daughter was out of town for a wedding and I realized all over again how difficult it is to make and stick to a schedule with small children around. 

For the past two weeks, I've had to take three hours out of every work day to shuttle my daughter to and from work. We live in an area where there's no mass transit, so when her car broke down, mom taxi became the only option.  

On the plus side, getting up and dressed and out the door at a certain time every morning has made me focus on what I need to do when I get home again, so I've accomplished almost as much in my shorter work day as I usually do when I have all sorts of time stretched out in front of me. 

The difference has been so marked, in fact, that I have decided to create a daily commitment to get up and dressed and a commute for myself on work days once I'm no longer playing taxi. I'm hoping that a drive to the local convenience store and the purchase of a beverage of my choice every morning will help my brain click into work mode as I drive back home. 

As appealing as the concept of working in my pajamas may be in theory, my brain, accustomed to being in the work force for more than half my lifetime, reacts to pajamas at home as a day off. I can frequently glance at the clock and realize I've frittered away the entire morning without realizing it. 

Music is no longer a help to me. Since my youngest daughter had a frightening bout with depression during her senior year in high school, music makes me nervous and fidgety, so it doesn't help me write anymore. 

For a while, thanks to health concerns, it was almost physically impossible to focus, and that's a whole different set of challenges, especially when you have contractual obligations to be creative. 

I guess the thing is, focus is something we'll all have to struggle with and the struggle will take on new and different shapes in different seasons of our lives. Sometimes it may be a case of mind over matter, and giving yourself physical cues that it's time to work, like turning on the music or moving into your special writing space, may do the trick. 

Oh Winter, let's get married via photopin (license)

If you don't currently have a space dedicated to writing, think about creating one. Not everyone has the luxury of space for a home office, but moving to the same corner of the dining room table at the same time every day could help your mind realize it's time to create. 

When physical health issues aren't a problem, try not to let your muse dictate when you write. You'll always be able to find excuses for not writing. Those are much easier to come by than the determination to write. Get words on the page, even if they're stupid words you know you'll delete or revise later. 

Sometimes simple discipline, or BICHOK (Butt in chair, hands on keyboard) is the answer.  

On Staying Focused...

A few years ago, I was asked this question in one of my workshops: 

So my question is: I know you make a living by writing. So what are some tricks you've learned to help you schedule in the time to write and do you do anything before you start to write that helps you to be able to focus on your story and the characters?

My Answer: 

I think that being able to focus on writing is something that will probably haunt me as long as I'm pursuing a career in writing. Maybe it's that way for all of us. You may struggle for a while to focus, then hit a few years where it's relatively easy to focus, and then swerve off track again and find yourself struggling. 

We all know that many factors can affect our ability to focus - small children, teenage children, adult children, demanding husbands, people who think they need to eat three meals a day, friends with troubles they need to talk about, friends who unwittingly sabotage you, neighbors who don't understand, neighbors with noisy dogs, aging parents, personal illness, family tragedies, national tragedies, finances..... It's hard to keep focused, as we all know. 

A few years ago, I was tremendously focused. I wrote through major surgery--not the surgery itself, of course, but the recovery--without batting an eye. I just put pillows over my incision and a laptop on top of that, and I wrote. And wrote. And wrote. 

I wrote through several moves. I wrote in spite of family illnesses, deaths and funerals. I was focused because I knew where I was going, and I knew what I needed to do to get there. 

For the past few years, I've been struggling through a period of almost equally tremendous lack of focus--and that's one reason this topic appealed to me so much. Maybe because it's so important, and maybe just because I've been thinking about it so much and trying to figure out how to get my focus back. 

I think the main thing that helps with me focus is to clearly identify my goals--goals, not dreams. We all know what our dreams are, but for most of us dreams are things we can't control. You can't set a goal of becoming published with a traditional publisher because you can't accomplish that alone. But you can set a goal of being a writer because you make yourself into a writer, regardless of what anyone does with what you write. 

My first clear goal was to finish that first manuscript because I was very successful at beginning stories and a dismal failure at finishing. I decided that I would write to the end of one book, no matter what. No matter if it smelled like rotten fish guts in a hot sun, I was going to finish the stupid thing. And it did, but I remained true to my goal and I finished. I wrote it by hand because I didn't have a typewriter or a computer, but I finished it, by gum!

And suddenly, just knowing I could do that gave me a whole lot more focus. 

Maybe it seems silly to some people, but it took me a LONG time to really know in my heart that wishing I was a writer and talking about being a writer didn't make me one. Writing made me a writer. Persevering made me a writer. Learning my craft made me a writer. 

I also realized that nobody was going to knock on my door, announce that they'd heard I was a writer, and offer to buy books I hadn't written. Starting and never finishing wasn't going to get me where I wanted to go. 

I also had to learn in my heart (not in my head, that's the easy part) the difference between dreams and goals, the difference between those who want and those who do, the difference between those who wait for things to happen and those who make things happen. Maybe it's possible for some people to stay focused without a clear goal in mind, but it isn't possible for me. I know because I've tried -- over and over and over again. It just doesn't work, no matter how much I try to delude myself into believing that it does -- and I DO try. 

You have to know where you're going so you can plan how to get there. Specific goals divided into pieces I can accomplish with just a little will-power and discipline is an absolute must for me. 

Discipline is a biggie. I was talking to my daughter's drama teacher at parent-teacher conferences last week, and she talked at length about how she focuses on teaching the discipline because until you know the discipline of your art--whatever that art may be--you can't be free to express the art. 

That struck a real chord with me and I've thought about it a lot since then. I've known for a long time that discipline is one of the biggest factors that used to keep me so focused back when I was writing three or four 350-page novels every year. It's true of any art. The discipline comes first; the freedom of expression comes after that. 

And let's face facts. If you can't find the discipline to write when there's no pressure except what you create for yourself, you're going to have a tough time finding it when you're facing the pressure of writing a book under contract. Until you face that hurdle, you can't even imagine how much pressure it is. 

I froze for months after I sold my first mystery and my first romance and suddenly had to write under contract. Signing those contracts didn't fill me with the self-confidence I'd expected it to. Instead, I turned to stone. I found myself terrified that everyone would now realize what a fraud I really was. 

So discipline. Anyone who wants a career as an author must learn how to write in spite of life because life will never slow down, give you a break, or become easier. Identify what distracts you and then figure out how to eliminate or minimize the distractions. If e-mail (or social media) is a distraction (she said looking guilty) then find a way to reduce the distraction. Don't allow yourself to log on until after you've produced pages. 

If the TV is a distraction, find a way to turn it off (there's this little thing called a remote....) or figure out a place to write where you can't hear it. If kids are a distraction, bribe them. If the phone is a distraction, turn off the ringtone or set up a signal your children and spouse can give you so you know it's them calling and train yourself to ignore any ring that isn't them.

Figure out exactly how important writing is to you. If all these other things (like e-mail and TV shows) continually get in the way, then have a really stern talk with yourself and figure out what you really want. Do you want to be a writer? Really? Are you ready to do everything that means? 

Or do you just want to have written a book? 

Because if you want to be a writer, then the act of actually writing must become a priority in your life and you must train yourself and the people around you to accept that, even if they don't understand it. 

If, on the other hand, you want to have written a book but the act of actually writing it holds no appeal--well, that's something you need to know.

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Since writing that original answer, I've encountered more road blocks and more speed bumps, and I've had more of a struggle with staying focused than ever before. 

Once I thought it was all a case of mind over matter. 

Now I know that some things in life are way too big to think your way around. Sometimes you have to let your mind grapple with survival--your own or that of a loved one--and there may be no room for writing or creating when that happens. 

Now I know that if you're battling an illness yourself, your mind may not be able to get around even the simplest matter, like where you put your keys or how to find a mechanic to work on your car, much less creating an entire world out of nothing. 

Now I know that sometimes it's not enough to want something desperately. Sometimes, you need to take a step back and let yourself heal. 

If you're there, you know it. Don't let anyone try to convince you otherwise. Be kind to yourself. Be patient. Be gentle until the crisis has passed. 

If your health is good and you haven't just gone through an internal, emotional earthquake, and you're still having trouble writing, consider the possibility that you’re approaching your work from the wrong angle. Wrong characters? Wrong plot? Wrong location? Is the motivation strong enough? Is the conflict realistic? 

Consider the possibility that you’ve made everybody too nice and you’re boring yourself. It can happen. Trust me. Or maybe you're making your characters too unrealistically awful, without any redeeming social value. 

Consider the possibility that your characters aren't emotionally invested in the plot you've created, even if it seems like a perfectly good plot to you. Remember that absolutely nothing you've planned is so wonderful you can't afford to toss it and replace it with something that works. 

Consider the possibility that you're letting fear get the best of you. In that case, put your head down and get to work. 

(See tomorrow's blog post for more on this subject)