Advice to Writer's

This is the advice Tamora PIerce has for all us budding authors...

Where do you get your ideas?

Some I stumble across: watching his nature programs, I decided British naturalist Sir David Attenborough would make a cool bio-mage: he's the basis for Numair's friend and teacher, Lindhall Reed. Watching my mother and sister produce blankets from balls of yarn and crochet hooks, I thought of it as a kind of magic, and wondered what all could be done with thread magic. Wrestling with my best friend's dove gave me the ideas for Kel's relationship with the baby griffin in SQUIRE. Pictures in magazines also give me ideas, as do stories in the news.

Other ideas come from my past obsessions. From the time I was six or seven until I was ten, I read anything and everything I could find about knights, the Crusades, and the Middle Ages. Then I fell into a new interest and ignored the Crusades: my next area of interest in knighthood was in the fantasy novels and Arthurian legends I read in middle school. I wrote my first book, on a girl disguising herself to serve as a page and squire to achieve her knighthood, without doing any research on medieval life. Except, of course, I had--back when I was very young, reading articles in encyclopedias because I liked finding out more about knights. That was the first time that I realized my old interests could give me ideas. When I got stuck while I wrote LIONESS RAMPANT, I thought about my old obsessions, and drew ideas from that book and for the Queen's Riders from my prolonged binge of books about the Vietnam war in the early 1980s. James Michener's description of a city carved all of rose-red stone in his book THE DRIFTERS, which I read at the age of 15, marked the beginning of my life-long fascination with the city of Petra, in Jordan, which I shaped to become the Black City in ALANNA: THE FIRST ADVENTURE and Chammur in STREET MAGIC. My long fascination with crime and criminals has given me fuel for The Circle Opens quartet.

Another way I get ideas is from people. My Random House editor, Mallory Loehr, suggested that Kel be a commander, very different from my usual loner heroes. (I wasn't sure if I could write someone who works well with others!) My agent Craig Tenney pointed out that in the final action of the first draft of STREET MAGIC Evvy virtually disappeared; he just couldn't see Evvy sitting about, waiting to be rescued. It's due to input from my husband Tim that Lord Wyldon and all Stormwings are not capital-E Evil. My friend Raquel has always been fascinated by animation and making non-living things seem real, like the shoe that was destroyed by Dip in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" and the computer-animated carpet in "Aladdin." She talked about those things so much that a part of my brain grabbed onto the idea that objects, things, could become characters. That turned into the darkings of THE REALMS OF THE GODS, the living blots that became characters in their own right.

Current events and history are also fertile ground for ideas. I was driven to write one of my most effective 15-minute radio plays based on the case of a subway vigilante in New York in the 1980's; I got a short story out of a group of well-to-do kids tormenting people in Central Park and another short story out of my feelings about the Taliban's treatment of women (written over a year before the events of September 11, 2001). I based Dedicate Skyfire, Winding Circle's chief defender, on a Civil War general and am about to develop a character based on the French statesman Talleyrand, a tricky piece of work by all accounts. Shannon Faulkner and other women who have entered military schools fueled The Protector of the Small; the cholera outbreaks in Rwanda and Zaire of the early 1990s led to The Circle of Magic: BRIAR'S BOOK. Keep a file of events and figures that interest you; it might prove useful one day.

The best way to prepare to have ideas when you need them is to listen to and encourage your obsessions. Watch and re-watch all the TV programs and movies you have a need to watch (I lost count of how many time I watched the Richard Lester verson of "The Three Musketeers" and its sequel "The Four Musketeers" (I passed 17 viewings while I was still in college); read and re-read all the books, magazines and comic books; visit all the museums, zoos, galleries, concerts and wilderness areas; and listen to all the kinds of music that interest you. If you get a sudden passion for anything and everything to do with, say, gang warfare, starling behavior, painting frescoes, or jousting, go with the urge. Find out all you can. Even if you can't use it right away, it'll go into some holding zone deep in your brain, and surface when you need it. All creative people--not just writers!--expose themselves to as much information, in as many forms, as possible, in the hopes that it will be useful down the road, or even right now. You never know what will spark something new!

some more advice...

How do you deal with writer's block? Here are some fixes I use when I get stuck:

Introduce a new character, a strong one with an individual style in speech, dress and behavior--one who will cause the other characters to review their own actions and motives to decide where they stand with regard to the new character. Don't forget that with me, at least, new characters include animals: most characters will react to an animal intrusion of some kind in an interesting way.
Have something dramatic happen. As Raymond Chandler put it, "Have someone come through the door with a gun in his hand." (My husband translates this as "Have a troll come through the door with a spear in his hand."😉 Machinery or vehicles (cars, wagons, horses, camels) can break down; your characters can be attacked by robbers or pirates; a flood or tornado sweeps through. Stage a war or an elopement or a financial crash. New, hard circumstances force characters to sink or swim, and the way you show how they do either will move things along.
Change the point of view from which you tell the story. If you're doing it from inside one character's head, try switching to another character's point of view. If you're telling the story from an all-seeing, third person ("he/she thought"😉 point of view, try narrowing your focus down to one character telling the story in first person, as Huckleberry Finn and Anne Frank tell their stories. If down the road in the world you've created someone has written a book or encyclopedia about these events, insert a nonfiction-like segment (that doesn't give the important stuff away) as a change of pace. Try telling it as a poem, or a play (you can convert it to story form later).
Put this story aside, and start something else: letters, an article, a poem, a play, an art project. Look at the story in a day, or a week, or a couple of months. It may be fresh for you then; it may spark new ideas.
If you have an intelligent friend who's into the things you're writing about, talk it out with him/her. My husband often supplies wonderful new ideas so I can get past whatever hangs me up, and my family and friends are used to mysterious phone calls asking about things seemingly out of the blue, like what gems would you wear with a scarlet gown, or how tall are pole beans in late June?
Most important of all, know when it's time to quit. Sometimes you take an idea as far as it will go, then run out of steam. This is completely normal. When I began to write, I must have started 25 things for each one I completed. Whether you finish something or not, you'll still have learned as you wrote. The things you learn and ideas you developed, even in a project you don't finish, can be brought to your next project, and the next, and the next. Sooner or later you'll have a story which you can carry to a finish.

and more...

How do you start a book or story?

Do your advance work: whatever research you might need. (You may end up doing more research as you get into your story, but at least do what you need to get started.)

Find out the time, place, and manner that makes you want to write the most: at a desk, in bed, with your younger siblings running around fighting over the TV remote; with a computer and keyboard, special pens, a certain kind of paper, a brand new notebook; if you can arrange your day, figure out what time is best for you; gather all you need to write (so you don't have to keep getting up to find things). If you have a ritual to get you in the right mind to write, do it (for example, fix tea, wash dishes, put on music), do the ritual, then place your behind on chair (or wherever you work).

Sometimes it's best to begin traditionally: "Once upon a time/Sing, Goddess, the wrath of Achilles/Let it be known that in the days" or "Chapter One: I am born."

I start with scene: people meeting to talk: describe the setting, the first person there, then the second--try to introduce at least one main character

Some can write scenes from different points in the story, scenes which are easiest for them to imagine--they don't need to start at beginning, but fill in around the scenes they've already written (most of us have to start at the beginning)

Pick a point, any point, and start writing. If you've started the story too soon, or too late, you can always rewrite.

How long is a book supposed to be? This answer also applies to that other FAQ: Why don't you include more about Alanna, Daine and Numair, Kitten, Coram, etc., in your books?

The limit on most novels for teenagers--up until recently, at least--is 200 manuscript pages (about 250 pages in final book form). (For Intermediate/Young Reader books it's been 150 pages.) For me 200 pages is just long enough for the main character to get into, and (we trust) out of, serious trouble. Often when I try to include detailed information about secondary or minor characters, particularly those from earlier books, I end up having to cut it to meet my page limit. I know what people from other books are doing as I write the new ones--I just rarely have the space to include it. Thanks to J.K. Rowling and Philip Pullman, we're now being given a bit more room: Scholastic has let me run up to 220 pages; Random House gave me an extra 100 pages for SQUIRE. At the risk of sounding weird, though, I think for me keeping the story to around 200 pages, except when writing so complicated a book as SQUIRE, actually makes a better writer of me. I keep the story direct and moving, the cast of characters short; for me, that seems to work very well. (Don't tell my publishers I said this. These days I don't have to panic if I run over 200 pages, and that is a good thing!) Also, even with the wondrous bounty of 300 pages in which to tell the story, I still have to stick pretty close to the story of the main character and those secondary characters most involved with her/his life. I still don't have time or space to include everything about everybody.

Of course, adult novels are a different story, sort of. A good length for a first novel intended for an adult audience is 400 manuscript pages. If your first novel goes over 500 pages, pray that it's really good, because publishers are very skittish about backing a long book by an unknown unless a number of those who have seen it are certain it will be a hit. There is an economic reason for manuscript limits: the cost of paper. If your book is over its limit, even by a handful of pages, paper suppliers bump the price to print it up to the next price category. For example only--I don't know how much the real prices are: paper costs a publisher about fifty cents for 250 pages in final form; a book which comes to 260 pages bumps it up to the next price category, which is seventy-five cents. Publishers care about costs like this if you aren't a bestselling author, and sometimes even if you are.

Why haven't your books been made into movies? First of all, until it comes to the point where an offer is made which I can take or turn down, I have no control over this. Most authors don't. Movies happen not when the author deigns to allow people to make her/his books into movies, but when movie companies or producers decide that a particular book would make a good movie. My agent always sends books to companies and producers to be considered for movie projects, but offers are rare. So far two companies have bought the option (a set time period in which they can own the rights to develop books for a movie) to the Alanna books, but they haven't taken the next step to making a movie from them. For one reason or another, they decided it wasn't profitable to spend more money in developing a movie project.

My books operate under a double whammy: they are costume movies set in a historical period (translation: much $$ for costumes, the transportation of cast and crew to a location which looks historical, and the purchase of a license to film there), and they involve a great many special effects (translation: much $$ for computer, marionette, and makeup effects). Animated movies could get around some of these problems, but they are expensive to make, and most animation producers prefer not to have to pay an author for rights in addition to their writers and animators. It may be that the success that's expected for "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" and "The Lord of the Rings" may change studios' minds about how profitable fantasy can be, but we won't know that for a while, yet.

To be honest, I'm not really sure that I want the books to be made into movies. I certainly wouldn't complain: it means a lot of money, and more book sales once the movie appears. At the same time, no matter what the final result is, it won't match the vision in my mind. Also, movie people are notorious for rewriting your material. (Think about it--how many movies resemble the books they're based on? LITTLE WOMEN with Susan Sarandon and Wynona Ryder and THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS with Jodie Foster stayed close to the books, but those are the exception rather than the rule.)

I know this is an annoying practical answer to a question that involves the most romantic area of the arts, but that's me--annoyingly practical. What other kind of person would go from Red Sonja comic books, in which Red Sonja always wears a chain mail bikini, to write of a hero who bundles up in multiple clothing layers because she hates the cold?

How can a new writer get an agent?

Agents are great, but they are also hard to come by. The most important thing to keep in mind is that agents generally don't want to talk to non-famous writers until that writer has a complete book manuscript in hand. This makes sense: many people start books; it takes something special to finish one. Short stories when published look great on a writer's record, but few agents will represent someone whose only work is in short stories and articles, because there isn't all that much money involved. Don't forget, agents have expenses of their own that have to be covered by their commissions: it's hard to pay a secretary when all you get is forty or sixty or a hundred dollars per short story sales!

If you think an agent is the way to go, the best way to find one is to track down THE WRITER'S MARKET (for the current year; these books come out with updated information every year in November) FOR AUTHORS' AND ARTISTS' AGENTS. Try the library first--these books cost about $25 each. If you can't find a copy in the library, try any good-sized bookstore in the Reference Section. It's important to get the book for the current year, because there are always changes in the industry: an agent may decide (like mine) not to take on new clients, or an agency may close, or agents may decide to concentrate on different books and authors than they did the year before. The annual issue of the MARKET will tell you what agencies are looking for new clients, what kinds of books and writers they represent, whether or not they charge a fee to read manuscripts (if they do, I wouldn't send anything to them--I don't trust agents who charge writers to read books), their address, and how they want you to send material to them. (Some want the whole manuscript--ms. for short--some want a query letter, a one-page description of what the book's about, in letter form.)

more...

oh, just read this entire page!

http://www.tamora-pierce.com/faq.htm

does anyone else have advice from other authors?

http://www.starrigger.net/advice.htp

http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Studios/5116/advice.htm

http://www.sff.net/people/davekirtley/teenwriter/OnlineAdvice.html

more more!! keep it coming! they really inspire me as a fellow writer

As a published writer (mainly of poetry, horror shorts and non fiction articles,) I would say the best advice to give anyone is to write... take at least ten minutes a day, every single day and write something, even if it is total junk... in this way writing becomes habitual, and easier... also never be discouraged... a lot of my stuff has been rejected, (most of it in fact!!) but throw enough and some will stick... choose your market well, and remember, only a commissioning editor can tell you if your stuff is publishable!!

The most important advice that I can give is just to write. The publishing, the agents and editors and everything else will come later, but ultimately, the writing is giong to speak for itself.

more advice: the ' is not needed in writers

most people think, "Oh, I want to be the next JK Rowling, or the next Steven King."
What's been done is done. YOur work should be original, that publishers and even tv producers want to invest in your work.
Then I hear the stuff like, "My work's competeting with other ametures."

Realize that you are competeting against JR Rowling, Steven King and everyone else out there.

Don't fall into the trap of same old same old. Instead of having the typical librarian with the female, black glasses and skirt, have a librarian who is a man and wears jeans to work.

Be as origiinal as possible. Don't try to be the next . ..whoever. Find your own voice.

spell check. great advice.

thank you so much Phoe! the agents thing is trouble, i've been trying o get the courage for years..

Yeah, agents can be very tricky. I have a whole list of agents who've I've sent stuff too.

Advice to aspiring writers: Write what you know, always be ready for criticism and rejection.

What if you're young (14)? Can you still get an agent?