Author Archives: Murderati

Contamination

Julie said to me the other day, “I’ve been with you too long.”

Goodie, I thought, we’re finished. I can go girlfriend shopping at the weekend. I wonder where Giada will be.

But seeing as Julie was talking and I really should take notice of her from time to time, I decided to hear her out and said, “What do you mean?”

“I keep seeing the dark side of things.”

“Tell me more, Haley Joel Osment.”

“Wednesday, I’m talking to Susan and I’m looking out the office window. There’s a man and a woman. The man is holding the woman’s arm. They’re smiling, but he’s gripping her bicep a little too tightly for it to be friendly. Across the parking lot are two guys. The man with the woman waves at the two men. Everyone walks to the middle of the parking lot. The man with the woman maintains his grip on the woman’s arm all the way across the parking lot. Guess what I think?”

“I don’t know—maybe that you should be listening to your boss and not looking out the window?”

“No, I think kidnap exchange. That’s your fault. Years ago, I would have seen friends meeting to chat. Now I see a felony in progress. Because of you, I can’t see the world in normal terms. You’ve ruined me.”

What could I say to this? It’s a hefty accusation. So I just smiled and said, “Love you.”

Actually, I know what poor confused, Julie means. Telling stories of crime means I tend to look at the world in criminal terms. Now I don’t mean I go looking for evil doers doing evil on street corners, but I look for oddities in the world around me. I see something that catches my eye and I concoct a story to suit what I’ve just seen. I see someone leafing through a trashcan, I don’t think homeless guy, I think money drop. I see a guy sitting alone in a dull sedan, I don’t think guy waiting on his wife, I think FBI surveillance on Columbian drug cartel operating out of a Happy Donuts. I see a flatbed truck chock full of giant seed pods, I don’t think a horticultural expo must be in town, I think alien invasion is on and I shouldn’t go to sleep.

My gears are always turning. I’m forever looking for fictional crime scenes or inspiration for a story. Julie suggests we go on a road trip, I jump at the chance because I have a scene in mind for this book I’m writing in my head and I can suggest we go to a certain location. It’s great—in a way. Julie gets her wish and I get mine.

The problem is that the more I look and think in terms of novel plots, the more my grip on reality lessens. That’s sort of a scary thought. I’ve been scribbling so long I’m not sure I can switch it off now. I already have a wall of post-it notes with book and story ideas pinned to it—all of them gagging to be told. How far will my delusions go? I’m not sure. It makes me wonder if I’ll end up like James Woods in Videodrome where reality and delusion run off on vacation together to leave poor Jimmie inserting videotapes into his tummy. I hope not, because it didn’t work out too well for JW.

Anyhoo, I don’t think things will get that bad. I can’t see myself letting go of the string to my sanity balloon and watching it float off into space. For all my mad mental doodling, I’m quite a grounded person. So if you’re a little worried, don’t be. I have Julie for that.

Yours with one foot still on the ground,
Simon Wood

Those Lazy Hazy Crazy Days of Summer

by J.D. Rhoades

God, I hate August.

We are well and truly into the dog days of summer around
here. Vacation’s a distant memory. The kids are bored and cranky. And the heat,
good lord, the heat. When the dog goes outside to do the dog thing, he stops at the door,
sighs heavily and looks mournfully back over his shoulder at me as if
this is all my fault before slumping out the door with his head and
tail hung low. Walking from my office to the courthouse in a suit is like
the Sun’s Anvil scene in Lawrence of Arabia.

It’s hot enough to make a bishop cuss. Birds are pulling worms out of the ground using pot holders. I saw a dog chasing a
cat and they were both walking (rim shot).

So damn it, if we’re stuck inside, let’s have some fun.
Let’s play a game.

I confess, this particular game is lifted from a recent thread
on the USENET newsgroup rec.arts.mystery.

To play, you have to come up with a
line from a mystery or thriller novel containing something a well-known character
would be highly unlikely to say or do.

For example, RAMer
Jim Barker (who designed the cool logo at left) comes up with this gem:

“Jack Reacher admired the cut of his new Armani
suit, luxuriating in the feel of his
silk boxers against his skin.”

From Mary:

"Never mind the evidence, Watson," Holmes cried, "I just have a funny feeling about this!"

Here’s one of mine:

"Screw this elevator music,"
Harry Bosch said, ejecting the Art Pepper disc from the player. "Hand me
that Dixie Chicks CD."

See how it’s played?

So, what line are YOU unlikely to hear from your favorite
mystery/thriller character?

And while we’re talking heat, give me your best “It’s so hot
that…” joke.

And since every really good game should have prizes, best
one in the “unlikely lines from beloved characters” wins all three volumes of the Jack Keller
series so far: THE DEVIL’S RIGHT HAND and GOOD DAY IN HELL in paperback, and
SAFE AND SOUND in hardcover. All autographed. Best “it’s so hot that…” joke
gets to pick any one of the three. Entries must be posted to Murderati by
midnight EDT Thursday. Decision of the judges (me and possibly my wife) is
final.

And just for fun…what line is unlikely to come from YOUR
lips?

Yoga Los Altos

by Alex

I did an interview yesterday with Murderati regular Stacey Cochran for his upcoming Raleigh-based author interview cable program, THE ARTIST’S CRAFT.

It’s been my experience with interviews that you always, always learn something about yourself and your work and specifically your relationship to your work, and yesterday was no exception.

The very first question Stacey asked was, “How did growing up in California influence you as a writer and your decision to become a writer?”

Now, I don’t know if I’ve talked about this with Stacey before or if this was some conclusion he came to on his own because he’s sharp that way, but of course growing up in California had worlds to do with my becoming a writer, and I’ve been aware – maybe not for always, but for a very long time – that I was incredibly lucky to have been born there. Actually, I was incredibly lucky to have been born in the US to begin with, and to my particular parents, but today I’m going to talk about California, and I hope the rest of you will see where I’m going and be moved to talk about your home states/cities as well.

Except for short (a year or less) forays living in different states and cities, which I find an extremely inspiring and important thing to do, regularly), I have lived all of my life in California. Berkeley, Los Angeles, Palo Alto, San Francisco – alternating large stretches of time between Northern and Southern California (which are different universes, at least to Californians. I won’t even get into the “What is Northern California, Middle Calif., Southern California?” debate).

I’ve also been lucky enough to visit every state of the Union (except for Alaska, actually, but now, of course….!!!!). And it struck me from the time I was a very small child, on our yearly family cross-country road trips, that states in the US are really almost like different countries are on other continents. Every US state has a mythos, carefully crafted by tourist boards and state and local governments and its special geography and sheer weight of history. Each has its own dialect, its own political philosophies, its own way of dress, its state birds and mollusks and legends.

When you think of California, what do you think? The Gold Rush, the Hollywood dream machine, “fruits and nuts”, hippies, free love, beaches, granola, feminists, surfers, yoga, cults, movie star politicians (sorry about that last one, people, not MY fault).

Those are the legends, but it’s all true.

If you want to be a movie star, come to California. If you want to be a movie writer, come to California. If you want to strike it rich, come to California. If you’re gay you most definitely want to come to California.

Now, my parents are scientists and they didn’t want me to go into the arts any more than any loving and caring parents ever want their child to go into the arts. But we were living in California and alongside my parents’ parental messages (“Go to college, get a degree, find a steady profession, save for retirement”) were all of these ever-present California messages: “Follow your dreams”, “Be yourself”, “Do what you love and the money will follow”, “Question authority”, “A woman’s place is in the House – and in the Senate”, “Free your ass and your mind will follow…”

Well, you know. When those things are constantly projected all around you, you believe they’re possible. It’s like hypnosis.

So yes, while I had the challenge that every aspiring writer or artist has in breaking free of loving parental messages, I also had a lot of cultural programming – make that counter–cultural programming – in my favor. There’s no question that made the whole career path easier.

After I graduated from Berkeley (and THAT is a place unlike any other, the People’s Republic of Berkeley – it’s like living in Wonderland, or Oz. It’s no wonder at all that I can’t write straight reality to save my life, because Berkeley is simply supernatural), my idea of a practical career plan was to move down to LA to become a screenwriter.

But in California moving down to LA to become a screenwriter WAS a practical career plan. I had a degree in theater. I had a resume of production experience three yards long. I’d written, directed and produced full-length, large cast musicals.

When you’re a writer no one ever asks to see those things, of course, but it all meant that I had trained for the job – I wasn’t some naïve, flying in on a wing and a prayer.

And in California, the movie industry IS an industry, just like any other industry. You are paid to do the work you do because if you’re good at it, it makes the corporation money. It doesn’t get any more practical than that.

But – writing – all writing – is also a dream job. And I believed I could do it because my state taught me to follow my dreams.

So I’m wondering. What are your state legends? How did your state and/or city influence your career path? Did it help or hinder your personal dreams?

PS – for those who were wondering, the state mollusk of California is the sea slug.

But that’s another post entirely.

Ghosts and Other Friends

By Ken Bruen

If you’re Irish, you grow up with all kinds of superstitions, ghosts, bogie men and of course………..the inevitable banshee

First off, I want to congratulate Alex for her wondrous nom………The Harrowing is one of the finest supernatural thrillers I’ve ever read, equaled only by Sara Gran’s Move Closer…….

And the hugely ignored chiller, Anne Siddon’s The House Next Door

Do I believe in Ghosts and all that………..am stuff?

When my mother was dying, , minutes before she passed, she grabbed my hand and said

“Can you smell the roses?”

OK, I’m as suggestive as anyone but I swear to God, excuse the pun, the whole room was infused with the aroma of roses

On her first anniversary, we had the mass, I was coming out of the church, keeping me mind blank which is how I muddle through most emotion and stopped to dip me hand in the Holy water font and I tell you, floating in it there, was one perfect red rose

Coincidence…………..absolutely

I dunno about the USA but here they say, if a feather floats into your path, your Guardian Angel is at hand

You can imagine my response to that

Right

Recently, some hard times were coming down the pike and I was spitting iron, means enraged in Ireland, and glad I wasn’t driving, as me car was in for the tune up. I’d come out of a coffee shop, the rain was about to come down, and turning up me collar, a single pure white feather came floating by, landed right by my foot

An elderly woman, standing behind me, muttered

“Sweet Jesus, did you ever see such a feather?”

I picked it up and it was indeed quite remarkable, I handed it to her and she shuddered,

said

“But it’s for you.”

I said

“So, now it’s for you.”

She was still staring at it when I looked back

Now it’s move it up a notch time

As we say here, make of it what you will and simply put it down to……………….fook, how much Jameson are you guys putting away ……………..or

Two stories

Short………..of course

I mentioned in another blog how my best friend killed himself, it’s five years ago now and I think I finally forgive him………………yeah, I know, how decent of me, but I was fookin angry, I’d been with him the night before and never saw him in better form, my books were just beginning to take off after years in the wilderness and no one, no one was happier than him. His big passion, indeed his only passion was Harleys…………and our shared joke was…………if I ever won one award………..he’d buy me a Harley

Yeah

The chances seemed as outlandish as that

Then …….well, the phone call came the next day and I thought

“Fook you and your Harley.”

Fast track, against all the odds, The Guards won The Shamus in Toronto, Reed Coleman said he never saw anyone happier in their whole life

Well, I’d lost the Edgar, The Macavity, The Barry, you get the picture and yes I do know, I was delighted to be nominated but even my editor was dreading sitting beside me as he whispered

“Here we go again, one more loss”

When I got home to Galway, outside my door was a tiny, made of wire, Harley Davidson

Probably a friend……………right

The 2nd story is less, how will I put it………..colorful

When I was starting out as a teacher, I lived in Greece for nigh on 2 years, and used to spend all me weekends on Santorini, sit on the balcony, sip some Ouzo, dream of being a writer, I had a wondrous lady in my life then, the mother of my late daughter and I loved her to bits, I was twenty, thought I knew it all, god forgive me, I wanted to be a poet, blame the Ouzo and the Greek weather

Every morning, I’d be up at the crack, do a run along the cliffs of Santorini, fit and lean as ……………..as a Galway hound who never heard of Frances Thompson

A greyhound and with the same mad energy

And

There’d she’d be…………this tiny girl,

Staring out at that stunning seascape and after months of passing her, just nodding and

saying

“Kalimera”

She never answered, seem entranced by the sea, I related to that.

Once, she looked at me, briefly, turned back to the sea

She had those

Greek brown eyes, all sorrow and wailing, beautiful long brown hair to her waist and she might have been all of five years old

She never answered me

Not once

Till

My last morning on Santorini, my last morning really in Greece as I had this amazing job waiting in South America, awaiting in an envelope in Athens in our apartment, I said my usual Kalimera

And she answered me.

Said,

In Greek,

“This is your home, don’t leave”

And added

“Ti krema”…………………….ie…………

“What a terrible pity”

I bent down to tie me shoe lace and she was gone

Out of curiosity, I asked the locals I knew who she might be and they all gave me strange looks, there was no such girl, and certainly never would be out alone at that hour

After South America, and other………………stuff, I was in the British Museum, you’re thinking………………just the place for a Mick……………..and looking up angels for a piece on the doctorate I was planning…………….hold the phones………….trick of the light……………………too much rage in me life, too much cynicism…………..but there she was…………….The little Archangel ……………..yeah, you guessed it……………of

Pity

So……………………..

What do you do

I went for a pint

The British Museum………………the fook do they know?

Confounded Fool

by Pari Noskin Taichert

If it did not seem crazy to talk to oneself, there is not a day when I would not be heard growling at myself, "Confounded fool." Montaigne

I’ve got a question for you: Which came first, the need to write or the need to be read?

After Alex’s and Mike’s wonderful posts this weekend, I’ve been thinking again about writing as a business. That’s sure been the biggest lesson for me during these last four years. All of my fantasies — those Technicolor visions of multi-million-dollar contracts, fans swooning at my feet, international critical acclaim and interviews on Charlie Rose have been eclipsed by the sheer day-to-dayness of sustaining a novelist’s career.

In Repetitive Virginity, I wrote about the fact that when each new book comes out, I fall into the same wide-eyed traps: the fantasies, the giddiness and anxiety, the deep awareness of wanting my work to be read by an ever-growing audience.

This is a good thing. It reminds me of the blessing of not remembering the physical pain of childbirth. Without that amnesia, population growth would be at a standstill.

Without repetitive literary virginity, I’m certain far fewer books would be written.

We need to hold on to some of our Panglossian world views — our faith in the rightness of outcomes — to continue writing for audience.

Sometimes, I wonder how I got into this purposeful track in the first place. When did writing for audience overtake the simple act of writing for personal pleasure? I know these aren’t mutually exclusive, but, for me, the experience of writing now has a different quality.

I struggle with creating novels because of my internal judges and editors (yes, there are more than one of each). But, the sheer act of putting words on paper, finding a new story, meeting characters for the first time and having all of it come together into a viable manuscript is an absolute rush. Seeing that manuscript become a book is heaven. Meeting readers is bliss.

I also love the research. Last week, I took the kids down to Las Cruces to poke around for my fourth Sasha Solomon book. It was one of those blessed trips wehre everything fell into place. I met the right people, had opportunities to see things I never expected to be able to see and ate some fine food. I even met a woman at the farmer’s market there who had read my books and was a true, dumbstruck fan. Talk about a great and unexpected ego boost.

But, most of time as a novelist is spent in front of the computer talking to myself, getting frustrated because I don’t think the story is moving well, feeling irritated that my first drafts read like lousy Dick and Janes.

At this point in my career, I do factor in different considerations than I did when I was younger and wrote only for myself. I CARE about what other people think, how my words might affect them. That doesn’t mean I try to write to other people’s expectations — my books are far too quirky for that — but I want my works to work for strangers rather than for my own self-indulgence.

What madness is this?
Why write?
Why write for an audience?

If you don’t have answers for those questions, how about these?

What fantasies did you harbor before you started writing fiction?
What fantasies sustain you now?

Readers: What’s your take on this craziness?

Promote Your Book… the You Tube Way

By Mike MacLean

Even bestselling authors don’t have many avenues to promote their books. There are reviews of course, and signings. A few score local radio spots; fewer still are lucky enough to nab some TV time. But a national commercial? Unless your name is J.K. Rowling, Steven King, or James Patterson, forget about it.

Maybe this is why more and more novelists are turning to You Tube and promoting their latest offerings with video trailers.

"The battle is ongoing to grab some attention," said Shotgun Opera author Victor Gischler. "I’ve been told my novels are very cinematic, so maybe a trailer was the natural way to go."

According to Gischler, the "fine folks" at Bantam Dell surprised him by producing a trailer for Suicide Squeeze. He was so pleased with the results he asked them to do another for his novel Shotgun Opera, which was later posted online.

"I didn’t even know about the Shotgun trailer at first," said Gischler. "A friend e-mailed me and said, ‘Dude, I just saw your book trailer on the Onion AV website!’ I was thrilled. Not only was the trailer cool, but it was apparently getting in front of the right demographic."

Monster novelist David Wellington claims his own demographic as "The entire population of planet earth."

"It’s a very competitive industry out there and it’s not just a question of periodically crossing over into another audience anymore," said Wellington. "These days you have to be constantly broadening your appeal and finding new markets to serve."

After brainstorming with his Webmaster and wife, Wellington came up with a concept to showcase the anti-romantic vampires of his newest book Thirteen Bullets. The result was a You Tube trailer entitled the "Evolution of Horror."

"I’ve tried a lot of different ways to reach people with my books," said Wellington. "…putting them online, putting them on iPods, putting them in bookstores, and now this video."

Author Don Bruns didn’t stop at You Tube when promoting his upcoming crime novel Stuff to Die For. A 30 second version of his trailer will also play in 20 theaters in the Miami area. According to Bruns, four grad students from the University of Miami produced, wrote, cast and directed the video, which has already created quite a buzz.

"I think anyone who is intrigued with action and adventure will like the video," said Bruns. "It’s well acted, has plenty of action and hopefully it will attract new readers."

Bruns went on to say that he has received very positive feedback from the trailer. He even heard from several agents who thought it had feature film possibilities.

But the question remains, will these trailers actually garner increased book sales? And how can their success be measured?

Both Bruns and Wellington have been contacted by readers who bought their books after seeing the trailers, which suggests the videos are doing the job.

Yet Victor Gischler perhaps described the possibilities of video promotion best, saying, "If you can produce a really cool trailer, get readers jazzed for your story, provide a link to Amazon or something … hey, I have to think it’ll help."

To check out Victor Gischler’s trailer click HERE.

To check out David Wellington’s trailer click HERE.

To check out Don Bruns’ trailer click HERE.

And this just in, a first look at Alexandra Sokoloff’s trailer for her upcoming release The Price. Download ThePrice_v004.wmv

As always Murder fans, I have questions. To the writers, would you ever consider creating a video trailer? Do you think this is a good vehicle for book promotion? To the readers, could a video trailer convince you to buy a book?

And, if you know about any great book trailers out there please feel free to post a link in your comments.

So you want to know about screenwriting

by Alex

I know, I know, it’s the dog days of summer and I’m sure – I hope! – everyone is at the beach this weekend.

But JT has been after me to do this column for ages and I just happen to have gotten a lot of e mail and MySpace questions on screenwriting lately and, always one to go with the flow, I thought I’d at least start this discussion, and maybe make it a two-parter, so that people can come back (from the beach) next week with all their questions.

And maybe RGB will be inspired to do his own column with his perspective, and Toni will jump in with hers, and maybe we can even entice Guyot back to share some of his experience as well.

First, a brief background (and of course you can read more in depth at my website.). Before I sold THE HARROWING, I worked steadily as a screenwriter for ten years. I had a pretty typical screenwriting career, actually – I worked for every major studio (except Universal, for some reason) and some independent production companies, I sold original scripts and got hired on assignment to do novel adaptations, I made a good living, and in all that time I had one movie made (depending on who you talk to, it’s estimated that somewhere around 400 scripts are bought or commissioned for every one that gets made. Not good odds.) Which is the second reason I started writing novels. The first reason is that I’m passionate about my work and not only was I sick to death of having things I wrote not made – I was sick to death of having things I wrote butchered – and THEN not made. I was sick to death of seeing other people’s great scripts butchered, too, but that’s another column. I’ll try to keep this one in focus.

For the purposes of this column, I’m going to be talking primarily about feature screenwriting, although I will mention television writing as well. (And I’m talking specifically about Hollywood feature screenwriting, not independent feature screenwriting, which is a completely different animal.) Feature writing and television writing are structured very differently, but what I want to point out right up front is that in television, writers have the power (not at first, but once you get into the higher ranks). In features, directors have the power and writers most assuredly do not.

We’ll get back to that, though.

I’ll start with the first thing you need to know about screenwriting, and the biggest misconceptions I find people have about it.

IT’S A JOB.

Authors – and aspiring screenwriters – rarely seem to know this about screen work. It’s a job in a way that writing novels just isn’t. Employers (studios, producers) are looking for writers who are committed to doing the screen thing as a living, full time (double full time, is often the real case). They don’t want to just buy your fabulous spec (meaning original script), pay you big money and never hear from you again. The chances are infinitesimal that they’ll ever make your movie at all. Your script is just a sample to show that you can write the movie THEY want to make, which they will dictate to you, and which probably won’t make a whole lot of dramatic sense, but they’re paying you to do it.

So, speaking now to authors who are thinking of toying with screenwriting – unless you’re willing to move to LA (and it has to be LA, unless you want to do independent film, which pays even less than novels!) – and really go for it, it’s probably not what you want to be doing. A lot of your time as a working screenwriter is taken up trying to GET jobs, and that in the end was the most frustrating thing to me – how much wasted time and writing was going on with nothing to show for it. Except, of course, I was making a living.

For the vast majority of novelists, it’s a much more viable idea to work on optioning your novels and getting some money from Hollywood without having to pursue a screenwriting career. On the other hand, if you’re fairly young and film or television is your passion, and you want to make a living exclusively at writing, it’s a really viable job. You can get paid for writing, you can support a family, you can work in a glamorous business with wildly talented people (and a lot of jerks, too, but truly, a lot of brilliantly talented people) and once in a while you can get something done.

Another thing novelists never seem to know about screenwriting is that screenwriters are union workers. Working screenwriters belong to the Writers Guild of America – WGA – East or West, depending on which side of the Mississippi you live on. The WGA is a federal labor union and handles collective bargaining for screen, TV, game and news writers. The WGA has negotiated, through long activism, a very good MBA, minimum basic agreement, which ensures that WGA members get paid certain minimums for their work, including pension and health benefits. That’s why screen and television writers are paid so much more than novelists, on average.

But what, you ask, is the catch?

Yes, there is a huge catch. We got the contract, and salary minimums and benefits – but in order to do that, we gave up copyright. When studios buy your script, they buy your copyright. It’s their project. And from then on, you are an employee, and you can be fired off your own script at any time, for any reason or no reason, but the reason is almost always the same – the studio/producers will want a bigger writer on the project. In fact, they will want a whole series of bigger writers on the project, the more the better, somehow – it’s not unusual for two or three dozen writers to work on a single project (although only three writers or teams of writers are ever allowed to be credited on any one movie) and that, in a nutshell, is why movies are so bad these days. And that’s another column, too.

But I’m sure you’re not here to read about collective bargaining (even though it’s kind of crucial). I’d like to say, though, that I’ve not just been a working screenwriter – I’ve also been tremendously active in the WGA, including a 2 year term on the Board of Directors, and administering a private message board for WGA members only. So when I speak in sweeping terms about what makes a screenwriting career, I’m not just speaking about how I did it, personally – I actually have had a ringside seat from which I see very specifically who does break in to the business and how they break in and how they sustain their careers.

Now, on to what you really want to know, what everyone wants to know:

HOW DO I BREAK IN?

The way you break in is: write a great script (and having a male lead doesn’t hurt), get a great film agent and have that agent market your script as a weekend read and hopefully get into a bidding war. I’ll get into more details later, but that’s the process in a nutshell. Chances are you won’t sell that script, especially because the spec market has been depressed for years (although RIGHT now is a good time to sell a script – more on that later, too).

But whether or not you sell the script, if it’s good, even if all the studios and financing companies pass (and there are only about 10 real sources of money in Hollywood at any given time), you will be flavor of the month and they will want to meet you and you will then go through a couple dozen meet-and-greet meetings in which execs and producers will tell you the projects they’re trying to get going and you can potentially get an assignment out of that – or you can work harder and go in with a pitch of your own that you might sell and be hired to write.

That is how the vast majority of screenwriters get started. That is precisely how I got started – great script (I thought!) got me great agent who sold it to Fox in a bidding war. Script never got made, but I was “in”. I got an assignment off that, and kept getting from there.

So, next question.

HOW DO YOU GET A FILM AGENT?

This is how I got my film agent. This is how most screenwriters I know (and I know a lot) got their film agents.

First, they lived in Los Angeles.

Second, they worked as story analysts, or readers, for a studio or agency or production company. A story analyst reads scripts and books that are submitted to companies for consideration for film or TV development, and writes “coverage” – a 2-10 page synopsis of the book or script (depending on the company’s requirements) and a one-page evaluation of the material’s potential as a film, complete with a grid that scores the script in terms of character development, story, dialogue, action, and other narrative elements.

People get those jobs by living in Los Angeles, where you can’t throw a rock without hitting someone who works in the business.

I didn’t get my first job as a reader by throwing rocks at my neighbors, but I did get the job through a neighbor who was working as a reader herself and had too much work to handle. I ghosted some of her scripts, and when a reading job came up at her company she recommended me, and I got the job – it was that easy.

Working as a reader is tremendous training for screenwriting because you learn the format, you learn what works and what doesn’t, you learn how the business really operates from a writing point of view, and you learn who the agents are, out there.

When I was a reader I kept file cards on every single script that came in to my company and every single agent who submitted. So when I had my great script finished, I knew exactly which agents I wanted to approach. I made a list and cold-called those agents, and explained that I was a reader at this company and I’d read these scripts of the agent’s by these clients and I had a script that I thought that agent would respond to.

Every single one of the agents but one said to send the script. I got multiple offers of representation and picked the best one of the bunch, and he sold that script to Fox.

BUT WHAT IF I DON’T LIVE IN LOS ANGELES?

Well, as I said above, if you’re not willing to move to Los Angeles, you’re probably not going to have a career as a screenwriter. It happens, but rarely. At least in the beginning, you have to actually be there.

But – there is a tried and true way to get an agent and break into the business if you don’t live in Los Angeles. You will still have to move to Los Angeles to sustain your career, but you can take this road to break in without actually moving yet.

THE CONTESTS:

There are some established screenwriting contests and fellowships that have launched many a writing career. There are a million writing contests out there and most of them will not help you to a screenwriting career at all. But the following contests have consistently gotten the winners and placers good agents, writing assignments, or TV staff jobs:

– The Nicholl Fellowship – the most prestigious and best breakthough screenwriting contest out there. Many pros say it’s about the only contest that can lead to a professional career. http://www.oscars.org/nicholl/index.html

– The Disney Fellowship and Nickelodeon Writing Fellowship – winners get an actual job and hands-on training. The Nick Fellowship grooms writers to work on one of their shows.

– The Warner Bros Drama Writers Workshop and Comedy Writers Workshop – a fast-track way into TV staffing. You write your hour spec and submit. They get about 600 scripts a year; they pick 25 to interview, and choose 13 for the program. You write a second spec under their supervision, and they get you interviews with current CW network and studio projects. About half of any given class gets hired on staff out of the program. Being in the program can get you a good agent if you don’t have one.

– For University of California students and alumni, the Goldwyn Award is also major. There is huge industry competition for the first-place winner, and the Goldwyns heavily promote the winners. Just about every winner becomes a WGA member and is working in the industry within a year of winning.

– TVwriter.com and WriteSafe contests: I know winners of these contests who have gone on to industry jobs. TVwriter.com is also just an excellent resource and community for aspiring TV writers. The film equivalent is Wordplay – Wordplayer.com – about which more next week.

AND JUST ONE MORE NOTE ABOUT BREAKING IN…

… because even though I’ve not even scratched the surface of this subject, I think I’d better let some of this stuff absorb and pick it up again next week. But since I’m on the subject of breaking in, I might as well say this.

It’s a hard time to be breaking in to screenwriting because, as I said the spec market has been dismal for quite a while, and also the WGA contract with the studios expires in October and we are very possibly going to have to strike. But that means – if you have a great script, RIGHT NOW is a very good time to get it out there, because the rumor is studios are starting to stockpile (meaning buying scripts to tide them over if there is a writers’ strike). But then starting in November, the town might shut down.

However, if there is a strike, the few months right after the conclusion of a strike has always been the very best spec market, with the very best prices paid. So IF the pattern holds, if you can write yourself a spec script and plan to take it out right after the strike, lockout, or whatever the hell happens, you are in a really good position to sell/break in. (See, I told you collective bargaining was important!).

I hope some of this has been helpful. Please feel free to deluge me with questions. The ones I don’t answer today I’ll address next Saturday, and the Saturday after that if it’s warranted, and I hope our other Rati screenwriters and others out there will jump in with their experiences as well.

Next week I’ll also talk about the craft of screenwriting.

And now – everyone get to the beach.

baseball and art

by Toni McGee Causey

I love baseball. Not the way that a lot of people love it, where they can reel off stats of this player or that team and one-up each other on trivia. I love baseball for the poetry and motion, for the hope it gives, for the way it makes you believe again in wonder and miracles and faith.

Both my sons played and the beginning of the season was always fraught with tension. The first day — the nerves, the missed balls, the frustration. They practiced basic skills and watching them come back to form after a whole year off was like watching a retired musician struggle to finesse an old tune, once familiar, now only awkward. They had a difficult time dealing with their lack of grace, how how hard they had to work at it. Then it happened eventually: the skills worked, something ignited, and the whole became greater than the sum of its parts. In one of my son’s first double-headers, he played second base and caught two line drives and got the man out on first both times. I think he floated off the field. He didn’t even seem to notice that they lost the game — all he knew was that the ball didn’t get past him.

I remember playing softball at his age. I remember the shock of the first line drive of each season, stinging in my glove. The smell of the grass, fresh cut on a spring day. Praying that someone would please hit a fly out to you so you have an excuse to out-run the mosquitoes. (Well, maybe that’s more of a Louisiana tradition.)

You’d have to understand just how much of a non-athlete I usually was in school to grasp the freakishness of the fact that I pitched, first string. It was my one cool moment, my one grace during the hell years of junior high. We were a championship team, unbeaten, with a coach who believed in fair play. Everybody got a turn, everybody played and we always won. When I had nothing else, I could pitch.

I zoned on the mound. I wasn’t this skinny, scrawny kid. I couldn’t hear the crowd, the chatter; it was me, that ball and that catcher’s glove. Rhythm. Motion. Rhythm. Motion. Strike.

When my oldest son was eight, there was no one to coach his team at the Y except this really sweet college girl who had been assigned to us, but who had never thrown a ball in her life. I volunteered and dragged my dad into it as well. My dad and I were still at the point in our relationship where I hadn’t quite forgiven him from being the royal pain-in-the-ass to live with that he had been and he couldn’t quite accept the fact that I wasn’t still the most-stubborn-child-on-earth, so it was an uncomfortable, prickly, strange sort of relationship between the two of us as we set out to coach this poor little orphaned team.

There were teams in this league who had already been playing together since kindergarten — most with the same coaches every year — and they worked with beautiful, efficient precision. Let me tell you, that was scary. They were over there saying: Here’s how to do a squeeze pay while we were saying: This is a ball. Here’s how to hold your bat. Here’s how to swing.

When we practiced, we worked with each and every kid, equally. We taught them everything from how to bat to how to slide to how to steal to the art of catching the fly ball… all the plays and the nuances of the game. They were shaping up into a fine little team.

Except for Michael.

You would have to see Michael to really understand. He was a tall, thin black kid with a sweet, cherubic face, but his eyes were just… vacant. Nobody was home. Every single time Michael drifted up to bat, I had to go over there and show him how to hold it all over again. He never swung at the ball. It whizzed past him, splat in the glove. Not only did he not catch anything in the field, he never really even seemed to know that he was playing baseball. I’m not sure if we heard him utter a single word during all those practices.

His mom and sister were there, day in, day out, cheering Michael on. Ninety-nine percent of the time, they were the only family who stayed for the practices. And Dad worked with him every day, drilling on those skills, giving him extra attention when the other kids had learned it and Michael was back at square one.

Michael played every game. That’s when I really saw my dad. That’s when I saw the man. He believed in fair play. He believed that each and every kid deserved their chance to try. He believed that the second string would improve greatly with game experience, and they did. He believed that it was more important what you teach the kid about life than how they do at baseball.

Michael had no clue. I can’t tell you how many times I’d have to call out to him to get him to turn around and face our field. I watched my dad keep encouraging Michael, both on and off the field. I watched him tell his mom how much Michael was improving, in front of Michael, so that they both could be proud of him. It would have been a lot easier to let Michael sit on the bench; I wasn’t entirely sure he’d even notice.

There are moments in your life when something clicks, when you hear the tumblers in the universe settle into place and you know — you know this was what it was all about. This was a moment you were meant for, because it changes everything.

We had split the team into two and were playing a scrimmage. Everything seemed exactly the same. Michael was up and I had to show him how to hold the bat again, remind him how to swing it. My dad shouted, “Hit me a home run, Michael,” from the first base line where he was coaching the runners. The pitcher released a fast ball and Michael pumped the bat around. It was the first time I can remember him swinging. I mean, actively swinging, with the bat going all the way around in the right kind of motion and momentum like you’re supposed to do when you swing at the ball.

He hit a home run.

I’m not sure who was more shocked: me, dad, his mom or Michael. Dad was so beside himself with joy, he was jumping in the air, shouting for Michael to run the bases. He said later that Michael’s face was so wide with shock and his mouth hung soooo far open, that he’d have made it around the bases faster if it hadn’t been for the wind drag. He ran the bases and came in to the entire team cheering. His mother and I went completely hoarse.

After that, he hit home runs just about every game. He started catching the ball, making plays. His eyes weren’t vacant any more. His mother told me he had started participating in school. They were able to move him up a class.

Michael was talking.

My dad and I were, too. We figured out some stuff, forgot and forgave some other stuff. We got to know each other then.

Now some would say that it was just a little league team, an unimportant game in the grand scheme of things. Possibly entertainment. Maybe the expression of craft, but never art, as if art has to be validated by others and hung in a museum or voted on by esteemed committee. That’s cynical, really, and it’s easy to be cynical. None of what we did was out of the ordinary–thousands upon thousands of coaches and parents do this every day. There was never another season like that one. But that moment, when Michael connected that bat to that ball, that moment of unadulterated joy… that was art.

I think, sometimes, we miss too much of what actually is art while we’re waiting for someone to label it so. I read a few things this week that transported me. They connected. This came at a time when I was exhausted and needing something to entertain me, to rebuild my faith, to energize me and it worked. I’m ending the week feeling happy and at peace and in the face of some of the things I need to accomplish, that’s pretty amazing.

Lately, I’ve been noticing the deprecating term “guilty pleasure” when referring to genre works as if there is some sort of literature police out there who are going to arrest us if we declare something worthwhile that isn’t on some sort of aesthetically acceptable list. I don’t have a clue whether anyone else would consider any of the books I read this week art. It doesn’t matter. Art arts. It creates within us a response. Our world changes.

They were art, to me. Like that baseball game was to Michael.

Michael changed that day. There’s hope in the arch of that ball, the swing of the bat, the beauty of a story. This is what I love. This is art.

What has changed you?

Did You See The Hello Kitty Darth Vadar?

When you overhear someone saying this, you can only be in one place—Comic-Con.

I attended my first Comic-Con the other week. Wow, isn’t it big? From its humble beginnings as a comic book convention, it’s grown into a multimedia extravaganza, covering comic books, movies, TV, video games and books. Its sheer size is staggering. Somewhere around 150,000 people attended this year. That’s about 100 times bigger than the average Bouchercon.

Numbers, shnumbers, I say. I’m seasoned. I can handle anything thrown at me. I strode onto the exhibition floor ready for anything and left about twenty minutes later crying. It was total sensory overload. There were so many bright and shiny things to look at that I couldn’t focus. I saw comic book heaven and it hurt. I know how Bruce Banner felt when he got blasted with all those gamma rays. I learned my lesson fast and only returned with a welder’s hood over my head.

Luckily, I didn’t look out of place with my protective headgear. Comic-Con fans aren’t ones for hiding their love under a bushel. No, they’re quite happy to toss their bushels aside for four days. There were plenty of rabid fans dressed up as characters from Star Wars, Star Trek, Batman, Superman, Heroes, 300. You name it, people were dressed up as it. I took a keen interest in the dozens of ladies dressed up as Princess Leia from The Return of Jedi wearing that bikini. You know the one I mean. And as far as I’m concerned, you can’t have enough semi-clad Princess Leias running about. Giada would make a good Princess Leia. Hmm, Giada…

“So what were you doing at Comic-Con, Simon?” I hear you cry. You should be asking why Jemma Jameson was at Comic-Con, but I’ll answer your question. I’m a little bit of a fan boy. As a dyslexic, I took refuge in comic books. Telling stories with pictures was a lifesaver. So it was a little bit of a pilgrimage, but it also turned into a little bit of a busman’s holiday as I was selected for panel duty. I was on a panel entitled “Where did that come from” with F. Paul Wilson, David Morrell, Mike Carey, Chris Golden, Stephen Woodworth, Jeff Marriotte, and Richard Kadrey. This was quite a lineup. Mike Carey has written X-Men scripts and I tried talking him into creating an X-man based on my special powers of mediocrity. He said he’d not think about it. I’m a big David Morrell, so that was neat-o. He asked me a question and it had nothing to do with getting him some water or to get out of a chair because an adult should be sitting there.

It was interesting to see how many big name authors are writing comic books these days. Orson Scott Card, Tad Williams, Brad Meltzer and Denise Mina are just a few to have snapped some of the big name superheroes in comics. David Morrell has a Captain America story coming out later this year. I’m hoping this trend continues and an opportunity falls my way. First, it’ll be a dream realized. Having spent years consuming these stories, it would be an honor to return the favor. Secondly, there’s the challenge. I like to tell stories, whether that be novels, short stories, plays, etc. Comic books would be another opportunity to tell stories, but it’s not as easy as it sounds. You really do have to show and not tell, and what is shown has to be laser sharp. There isn’t room for reams of dialog. Telling details have to illustrate a character. The way I would introduce a character in a novel would be totally different in a comic book. It’s a hard discipline, but I think I can do it. The problem is with all these big name authors snapping up the higher echelons of the comic book world, that there isn’t much room for me. As far as I can see, there’s only Atom Ant and Snugglepuss left, but that’s cool. I’ll take the assignment. I know can do it. Heavens to Betsy, I can do it. J

Comic-con also provided an opportunity to congratulate my good friend, Cullen Bunn, on his movie rights sale to Dreamworks for his comic book, The Damned.

I do have a couple of people to thank for looking after me while I was at the convention. Thanks to Eunice Magill for showing me the ropes and to Maryelizabeth from Mysterious Galaxy bookstore for the panel assignment and for embarrassing me in public. She knows what she did.

Yours a caricature,
Simon Wood

Anatomy Of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome

By JT Ellison

Thanks, Carly, for that little trip down memory lane. I never know which I think about first, Carly Simon or ketchup, but by God, I remember the words of the song, and the feelings it evokes. Very nice job of branding, that.

So. Anticipation. Great word, huh? Nothing quite like it really. It’s one of those terms that means the same thing to every person who read it. And I love the anticipation of reading a book from my favorite authors. In my mind, having something to look forward to is one of the best parts of reading.

But when it’s one of my literary gods, I’ve got strange habits.

Child, Sandford, Connolly, Slaughter, Gerritsen, Eisler — when one of those authors has a book coming out, you better well believe I’m marking the calendar, counting down to the on-sale date. And in the interest of helping the numbers, I don’t pre-order the books. I want to know that perhaps, in some small, infinitesimal way, my buying the book during the actual release week may be the sale that puts them on the bestseller list.

With the title bought and taken home to be revered for a few hours, I find myself stalling. I want to read the book. I NEED to read the book. I open the pages and gaze, unseeing, at the print. But something in me just doesn’t want to. Not yet. I put the book on the bookshelf by my chair where I can see it. I tease myself, sometimes for weeks. Knowing that I have this treasure so close builds the anticipation to a fever pitch.

I avoid any and all reviews of my gods’ books, too. I can’t be bothered with what other people think, I need to make up my own mind. Does it stand up to the series? Did the character do what I expected? Is the writing to par? Am I still going to love them as much as I have in the past???

I sit, and I watch the book. I admire the cover. I wonder about what’s inside. And finally, with great reluctance, I clear my schedule, get the book off the shelf, and start. I’ve yet to be disappointed.

But a new horror entered my exquisite self-torture this week. Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows has been one of the most anticipated books for me this year, as well as millions upon millions of others. For the week before the release, I left the Internet behind, ignored the news, sang loudly at the top of my lungs any time the subject came up. I refused to have this book ruined for me.

I was successful, if you can believe it. Despite ridicule at my extreme measures, friends who dangled tidbits, waiting to see if I’d take the bait, the book arrived Saturday, pristine and, thankfully, with the story unspoiled. I opened the box, gazed longingly at the book, and . . . set it aside. Somehow, it sat for a full thirty-six hours before I felt sufficiently prepared to experience the final episode in this amazing series. I took Monday off — didn’t answer the phone, left my email alone, and read. I wasn’t disappointed.

I’d like to salute J.K. Rowling. "Bah!" to the naysayers. This woman has single-handedly changed the lives of millions of children, giving them the most wondrous gift of all — a love of reading. And for the adults she’s affected so spectacularly, like me, if I ever have a child of my own, I will be honored to share and experience Harry, Hermione, Ron, Ginny, Dumbledore, Sirius, et. al. anew.

So tell me. Who do you anticipate the most???

Wine of the Week: 2004 Sutcliffe Ddraig Goch — A Colorado red named for a Welsh dragon.

P.S. I will be off for the next two weeks getting my stupid wrist fixed up. Our intrepid guest blogger, Toni McGee Causey, will be subbing for me while I’m away. Treat her well!