Author - John Coyne

Last month (1/30/2010) there was a great article in The Wall Street Journal  entitled, “The Death of the Slush Pile” by Kathrine Rosman. It told of the depressing straits in publishing, how an unknown–unless extremely lucky–can’t  find a publishers. No publishing house is reading unsolicited manuscripts. Most film producers won’t read anything that comes from a new writers, unless they have an agent. Why? Well, film and television executives are afraid of being sued for plagiarism. There is the 1990 case where Art Buchwald sued Paramount, alleging that the studio took his idea and turned it into the movie, “Coming to America.” Also publishers and movie executives say they can’t avoid to hire young college graduates to read through the mail. And since 9/11 and the aftermath, remember the anthrax scares? Well, everyone is afraid to open the mail. It doesn’t get any easier (getting published) at place where unsolicited work is read. The . . .

It takes more than prose to get your book published. First, there is the competition, other writers who have written books they want to sell. For example, more than 5,000 students graduate every year from creative writing programs. Most, if not all of them, have collections of stories or a novels ready to be sent to an agent. Any agent. On top of that you have all those would-be writers who attend literary festivals and conferences all summer long. Plus, and let’s not forget, those silent novelists steadily (we might add cunningly, too) writing away in  backrooms of homes somewhere in the world, churning out stories while living in garrets, hovels, or Third World countries. You can’t stop anyone who wants to write. Writing a book, however, is the easy part. You write your book on your own, at your own pace, enjoying (for the most part) the process of creating on paper, or on . . .

Day Nine 1. Write. 2. Write more. 3. Write even more. 4. Write even more than that. 5. Write when you don’t want to. 6. Write when you do. 7. Write when you have something to say. 8. Write when you don’t. 9. Write every day. 10. Keep writing. Brian Clark www.copyblogger.com You now have made: A commitment to writing your book Developed a working schedule Know what your story is Have developed a number of characters Thought of a plot of the entire story Have a short narrative of what your book is about Take the day off. This is the first of the Coyne Holidays. Time to let your book brew in your subconscious while you decide if you want to continue the course, invest money and yourself in How To Write A Novel In 100 Days or Less. To help you decide, I am including now a . . .

 I sit here religiously every morning-I sit down for eight hours every day-and the sitting down is all. In the course of that working day of 8 hours I write 3 sentences which I erase before leaving the table in despair…. Sometimes it takes all my resolution and power of self-control to refrain from butting my head against the wall.  Joseph Conrad Keep asking the question, “why?” As you reach the start of your second week you will have a stack of 5×7 character cards that spell out intimate details about the personal life of each and every character in your story, down to their waist measurement and favorite color. [The novelist Vladimir Nabokov, by the way, composed all of his books on index cards.] You will have a one page summary of what your book is all about, basically the ‘plot’ of your novel. You will also have begun . . .