Writing advice – Page 2 – The Stories of Scott D. Southard

February 15, 2015

Throwing Logic to the Wind: Talking about Permanent Spring Showers at Focus on Fiction
Greetings, fearless readers!

I have recently written a post about my new book Permanent Spring Showers. It is called “Throwing Logic to the Wind” and is being showcased on author Nancy Christie’s site Focus on Fiction. Here is an excerpt from the beginning:

There is no logic to writing. At least that is what I have learned playing this author game.

It doesn’t matter how much I have outlined a work, considered its potential on the market, or other such nonsense, there is no guarantee that it will fly or even work in the slightest. My computer is a graveyard of abandoned characters and plots. Their folder names are like little tombstones to the stories that might have been. And just like a visit to a real cemetery, there is an almost eerie silence when I explore that realm on my computer.

Permanent Spring Showers, my latest novel, is a great example of the non-logic of creative writing.

You can read the rest of the post here.

Permanent Spring Showers was just published by 5 Prince Books. It is available on all online retailors but you can find it on amazon here in both print and ebook.

I hope you will grab a copy! And then buy one for a friend… and then a second friend… and then a third… it’s good to have friends.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Permanent Spring Showers

by Scott D. Southard

Giveaway ends February 26, 2015.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter to win
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December 2, 2014

Writing a Good Christmas Story: Four Things to Consider
I totally get it.

Each year the media world is starving for new holiday stories. They want them for the bookshelves, for the TV screens, and the cinemas. So why wouldn’t any struggling writer (which is 98% of us) not want to give the old Santa Claus an adventure or two?

It pays the bills and, maybe, you will unwrap the golden present. In other words, create a holiday tale that becomes a classic, one that audiences return to yearly… which can also pay the bills yearly as well.

The problem is that for all of the attempts to make that blessed holiday classic it so, so rarely happens. Most holiday tales disappear at the end of the year. The books and the DVDs end up in the bargain bins, and the TV specials and movies are shown at random times in the early morning (if they are shown at all).

Recently, I reviewed a new collection of holiday short stories called My True Love Gave to Me (edited by Stephanie Perkins). My review will be on WKAR’s Current State later this month. I don’t want to say too much about my review here, but the book, in the end, just left me feeling sad.

Not exactly a Christmas feeling, I know, and probably not the one most of those contributors were hoping for. But it is a common feeling for me each year as I dare to check out the new holiday samplings from my fellow writers.

So why is it so difficult to write a good Christmas story? Basically, it is because most holiday writers seem to forget four important stocking-stuffing-ho-ho-ho points. These points are what separate the classics from… well… anything on the Hallmark Channel. (more…)
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June 23, 2014

BLOG HOP! The whats, whys, and hows of my writing!
Recently, author Kelly Hand asked me to take part in a “blog hop.” She had already included an entry (which you can read here). Thanks for thinking of me Kelly!

To be part of this shindig, I just need to answer the same questions as the other writers out there taking part in this hop. Cool! It’s like an international meet-and-greet for authors and readers. Everything but the little snack foods and punch bowl.

I hope you enjoy my entry below:

What are you working on?

Right now I am busy working on the editing of my novel Permanent Spring Showers, which is set for publication this October by 5 Prince Books. We are about halfway through the editing process now. I really love this book and I hope you will check it out when it is released.

One of the side projects I have going on is I am publishing a book collecting some of my personal posts from my blog “The Musings & Artful Blunders of Scott D. Southard.” (Yeah, the site you are on now.)That book is called Me Stuff. Should be a lot of fun (at least I hope so). I plan to have it out sometime before the end of the month. I try to write two to three things a week on this blog; it’s really amusing for me and great practice since I can write whatever I want on the site. There are no limitations. Hopefully, the fact that there is such freedom and possibility, readers will return to it from time to time to check out what is going on with me. For me, it always feels like it is evolving.

On the new fiction front I am kind of between a few things. I have a book called My Days as a Thief, which I consider the first part of a trilogy that I’ve been working on for almost a decade. The draft is done, I just got to get around to fine-tuning it. What is distracting that is this new novel idea I have. I’m writing it long hand which I think adds to the flavor of it, but will delay anyone seeing anything new from me for a bit. It kind of has a Douglas Adams, Wes Anderson, and Kurt Vonnegut vibe to it. I’m really having a lot of fun discovering it. (more…)
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May 20, 2014

Want to finish that book? Need some experienced help?
“Scott was a gift I gave my book. He led me on a wild and wonderful expedition, where I was expected to do all the work. By the end of journey, I had discovered that I was no longer satisfied with just scratching the surface. I trusted my guide as he pointed out danger zones and to places he thought I needed to explore further. I dug, and I dug and I dug…and lo and behold, there was my treasure. Right where I’d buried it. Hire this man, your book, will thank you for it.” -Terri Lee, terrileeauthor.com

One of the things I love to do from time to time is work as a freelance editor with authors. For me, editing is not just about finding those little mistakes (that is the easy bit), it is about finding the better book.

If you are a new writer and want an experienced eye to review your book, sadly you won’t get that through most editing services. They will focus mainly on grammar and then point you to their publishing services and charges. My goal is the same as yours, to make the best book possible. The kind of book that sweeps a reader off their feet and takes them someplace they were not expecting.

I contract my editing services through Rebecca T. Dickson (editor and founder of Write Raw and author of the book The Definitive Guide to Writing on Your Terms), you can find her and her writing services at her website here. If you would like to learn more about hiring my services or availability, you can reach her directly at beckster7219 (at) gmail (dot) com. And you can learn more about my editing, my writing and editing philosophy, and my experiences on my page for editing here.

I hope to work with you soon!
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May 13, 2014

Thoughts on Book Reviewing
I’m coming up on the year anniversary since I started doing the book reviews for my local NPR station. Soon my twentieth appearance will be on WKAR’s Current State. (You can check out links to them here). I really love doing them, and I look at each of them as not just as an opportunity to share my opinion on a book, but to also educate the listener of how to read a book or what to look for. I have even been known to throw in facts about literature and its vast history.

What can I say? I love the artform. Books are my passion.

I’ve written quite a few posts on this site about book reviews today. The good, the bad, what not to do, the questionable things, the author experience. I thought I would share the links to four of those writing posts below and give some updates as well since when I wrote them. Enjoy!

The Thin Muddy Line of Online Book Reviews. All the problems I discuss in this article still happen all the time. And I still get requests to “exchange” reviews. It makes me so uncomfortable and I am surprised how many writers are okay with it. As an NPR reviewer, I could never, ever consider such an enterprise since it would put all of my reviews into question. But I wouldn’t have considered it even before I started this great gig! Whatever the case, whenever I get an e-mail or a tweet asking me to do this I get a sick feeling in my stomach and a little angry.

The Troll Under the Bridge: How to Write a Good Bad Book Review. Trolls don’t go away. But you know, I think a lot of people don’t realize that is what they are doing, or the impact it has on other people. It reminds me of the time when I was a kid and with a friend we called a 1-800 number on a milk carton asking what color their cows are that give chocolate milk (we were 8). It’s like that mentality.

Charging the Melancholy Dragon. A lot of my heart as a writer is out there in this post. I really discuss in some spots on the difficulties of writing and dealing with reviews (good and bad).

Loving Goodreads (And Some Reviewing Suggestions). This is my most recent post on the subject. I still love the site, but I don’t know how it could be improved without some reviewers hired to review the reviewing (say that five times fast), or to “star” certain reviewers as being more “legitimate” and their reviews given more girth in the grading. That last point is definitely something to consider.
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April 21, 2014

Loving Goodreads (And Some Reviewing Suggestions)
I am addicted to Goodreads.

I visit the site a few times a day and I can lose hours (hours!) just scrolling through the home page, looking at what readers are reading and saying about books that they had just finished. It’s almost like a sport as I moan and then cheer.

Yeah, I can get depressed by how few classics are being read by the population (I’ve never been one of those people who believe reading something is better than reading nothing), but it is always a thrill to see this immediate literary data. People always like to claim that literature is dying, but I see breath and heartbeats on this site everyday.

Right now, I have over 4,300 “friends” and over 80 fans. Some of this is related to my Twitter account, but I think it’s also because of my books, my blog (Hello!) and the book reviews I do on my local NPR station (you can check them out via links on this page).

The thing about book reviewing is that in many ways it is an art onto itself. Yet, ever since Amazon so long ago allowed customers to review products and books, that special door controlling whose voice is heard in the market has swung so far open that the hinges are broken. That door will never be fixed, and everyone is now welcomed in.

I know someone who will never give a book 5 stars. Never. Her reasoning, nothing is perfect. Case closed. I also had one person give my novel A Jane Austen Daydream only 4 stars with the comment that she would give it 5, but she wanted to encourage me to write more. I still don’t know how I feel about that. (Does that mean I am encouraged? I don’t feel encouraged, only a little confusedly sad.)

So yes, anyone can review on Goodreads, and, yes, anyone can review how they want. But I would love to give some suggestions for my fellow Goodreaders. Consider these my recommended new ground rules before you join this new literary sport.
(more…)
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March 6, 2014

Is the word “said” too boring?
We live in a very fast world.

The days of quietly sitting and putting all your focus solely on the words in front of you are gone. Books are not even always on paper anymore! We might listen to music while we read, have conversations, text message, the TV might be on, etc. And then consider how we read things on the internet?

We are a pack of skimmers now. We skim articles, skim status updates, skim blogposts (Hello!), etc. Skim, skim, skim, SKIM! Yes, we might get the gist of what a writer is trying to say through that quick glance, and maybe that is enough, but we are just not consuming the words like we once did.

So, as storytellers, one of our new challenges is to fight to keep the attention on the page… or screen… or whatever.

We need to fight the distractions of television, movies, the internet, video games, and, well, life, getting our readers from page one to the last page with as few distracting hiccups as possible. Which brings me to my little controversial writing thought for the day…

Have we (readers and writers) outgrown “said”? (more…)
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January 15, 2014

“To write or not to write.” Part two of my interview with Nancy Christie
Part two of my interview with blogger and author Nancy Christie is up on her site! (You can read part one here.) Check it out via this link!

In this segment of the interview, I dive more into my life as a writer and a reader. For example in this question I am asked which three authors I would like to have a “one-on-one” with.

The idea of meeting a hero has always been terrifying for me. For example, one of the authors I would put on the list would have been Kurt Vonnegut. But I had his home phone number for years on my desk! I am not kidding, for years. It was given to me by a friend. I just never had the courage to call him and now it is, of course, too late.

I think someone needs to sit down with William Shakespeare and get the truth on the authorship question. That interview has to happen just so we can get the discussion behind us, good or bad.

Growing up, I exchanged a few letters with Ray Bradbury. I would have loved to have spoken to him in person. He was very kind to me then.

You can read the rest of the interview here. Thank you Nancy for this chance to speak to your readers!

My latest novel, A Jane Austen Daydream, can be purchased in print ($13.46) or as an eBook for the outrageously low price of $3.99 for Kindle. You can find it on Amazon here (http://amzn.com/B00CH3HQUU).
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January 1, 2014

“Nightmares and dreams” Part one of an interview with Nancy Christie
Happy New Year faithful readers!

Last month I was interviewed by novelist Nancy Christie as part of her “One on One” series. It was quite a long and fun interview, and she has turned it into a two-part series for the site!

If you ever wanted to get really into my writing head, meet the wizard hiding behind the curtain, this is that interview! The first part of her interview was released today; you can read it here. In this excerpt is my answer to the most challenging undertaking I have had as a writer:

A JANE AUSTEN DAYDREAM was easily the most difficult book I have ever undertaken, because I had to be true to Jane. In other words, I wanted her to be alive on the pages, which means her own dialogue and spirit had to be part of the narrative.

So first, I had to research her life and her books thoroughly. I used to be able to quote entire passages of her novels! (Not anymore, now that space is taken over by cute kid songs from Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood thanks to my young daughter’s obsession with the show.)

Then I had to decide what of her life I wanted to keep and what I wanted to use for the book. See, I wanted the plot to be influenced more by her own stories than her actual life (it is a daydream).

After the plot was in place (with some very notable surprises and literary twists included), I then had to write a book where her voice would feel natural, but not too dated to scare off a contemporary reader.

Yes, it was a slow process, with each sentence and chapter written and re-written numerous times. By the end, I felt like I had run a marathon (or at least what I assume that would feel like). But it was all very worth it.

You can read the rest of the interview here. Part 2 of the interview will be on Nancy Christie’s site on January 15. Thanks Nancy!

My latest novel, A Jane Austen Daydream, can be purchased in print ($13.46) or as an eBook for the outrageously low price of $3.99 for Kindle. You can find it on Amazon here (http://amzn.com/B00CH3HQUU).
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December 11, 2013

Charging the Melancholy Dragon: The Down Bits in Writing Today
Being a writer can be… depressing.

This is really not surprising and most that work in the arts feel this to a certain degree, because you are putting a piece of your soul out there for the world to see and judge.

And everyone judges.

Yet, for an author there is something about writing that makes it seem so, so much more personal.

It’s probably because a story begins in one’s mind and resides there for months to years, until that fateful moment when a writer finally hits “print” on their keyboard or “send” in that first e-mail. And when you consider that most authors are introverts to a certain degree to being with.… Well, it just spells depressing doom, doesn’t it? Yes, this all seems completely explainable, so why does it affect all of us so much?

Because creativity is all illogical! It’s on a completely different side of the brain from logic! Creativity resides with emotion and once I am ready myself to show or talk about a book, I usually expect to be disappointed and a little down. This is not me being a glass-half empty kind of guy; it’s just the nature of being a writer, especially in today’s overly-congested market of authors peddling their wares.

Yes, we writers when we are young to the field all dream of accolades and awards and long lines of readers desiring autographs at the local bookstore, but that doesn’t always happen. The chance of that happening to any of us is the equivalent of winning the lottery. Maybe three lotteries… back to back… in one day… and then getting hit by lightning while picking up the winnings.

These are the two most important lessons that get me through the rough authoring patches… (more…)
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