Romancing the Blog | Romance Authors and Readers Who Blog

How much room does a writer really need? This is something that is often touched upon in writing books and articles in the popular magazines on the writing life — the importance of carving out a space to call your own, where you can sit and do your writing. It’s up there with stressing the need to develop a writing habit, where you plant your butt in the chair on a regular basis and get down to business, whether it’s for an hour every morning or half an hour each night or even a frantic twenty minutes stolen from your lunch hour. But how important is it, really?

I’m sure that everyone would love to have an actual room to write in. An office of some sort, with a desk and comfortable chair, some bookshelves filled with favorite volumes of inspiration and research materials, maybe a filing cabinet with notes and scribbled outlines. Perhaps a bulletin board to post hand drawn maps of the world your story inhabits, photos or sketches of the important landmarks in your characters’ lives, or other pictures that help put you in the proper frame of mind for tackling your latest opus. But in many cases, that is not practical. The rooms in your house are occupied already, with children and pull-out couches and televisions or what have you. The garage already houses the cars, plus the hubby’s workbench and the lawnmower and a bunch of recycling bins. So maybe you have one of those armoires stashed in a corner somewhere — the kind where the doors open to reveal your computer monitor and the desk is a tray that slides out with your keyboard. Or maybe you have nothing more than a laptop that you pull out from under the coffee table and plop on the end of the dining table whenever you have a spare moment. Does it still work for you? Can you get your writing done? Or are you surrounded by distractions?

That’s the key, in the end. Not having a room of your own, as fabulous as that is, but having space where you can get away from the regular hustle and bustle of life, escape the noise and movement that tugs at your concentration. Picking a place, and sticking to it, wherever it may be, so that your brain understands when you sit down to work: “Ah, it’s that time, that place, I know what to do.”

When those books and magazines stress having a regular time and place to write, they’re talking about giving yourself mental cues. As your body knows to sleep when you go to bed at night and turn out the light, as your dog knows it’s time for a walk when you pick up the leash, your brain should know it’s time to create when you sit down at your work space to write. Building habits is the true key to productivity, to showing your creative mind who’s boss. Now, I’m not saying your creative mind won’t balk at times, try to fight back, but in the end, more often than not, it will respond to the repetition, to the habit of demanding that it produce for you when you go to that special place of your own. Even if you just curl up with a pad and a pen in a comfy chair at the local library, it can still provide the cue that your brain desires.

So, where do you work? Is it always the same place? If not, are some locations more writer-friendly than others, allowing the words to flow more freely?

It’s pretty obvious to me that fairy tales are the stuff that romance readers are made of. My favorite movie when I was little was the Walt Disney version of Cinderella, but I loved the story long before I ever saw the film. Someone — my mother? a family friend? — had bought me a hardcover, illustrated copy of the old Charles Perrault version when I was very small. The cover was pale pink with an iridescent illustration mounted in the center of the front, and the illustrations inside looked like old fashioned paintings, the colors muted and somehow even more magical because they had that nineteenth century feeling to them. The pumpkin that became the gilded coach had winding green vines stretching out to either side, and Cinderella’s ball gown was edged in gold. And of course the prince was handsome, with thick, dark hair and a serene expression — until, of course, his dream girl ran off, and then he looked suitably miserable.

The film held a different appeal. Yes, my little girl heart went pitter patter when Cinderella danced with the prince at the ball, but the guys over at Disney knew that preschoolers had a limited attention span for true love, and so they threw in a lot of other things to keep us entranced. I think it was my favorite Disney film because of those other details more than anything else. The idea of little mice and birds helping you dress in the morning (as opposed to your mother yelling up that breakfast was getting cold while you struggled with your head caught in the hem of your pullover) really appealed to me. The wicked step-mother and step-sisters were wonderfully vivid villains, more real and scary than any witch because they wield very authentic and possible power over Cinderella. And I adored the music — I ran around singing “bibbity bobbity boo” for days on end after I saw the movie, to the point where my mother bought me the record for my birthday.

Now I’m a bit (okay, quite a bit) older, but I still have a soft spot for Cinderella. When my parents packed their house up to move last winter, I made sure my beloved old book was one of the volumes that made it into the box and not into the pile for Goodwill. When the film first came out of the infamous Disney vaults and made an appearance on VHS, my college roommate knew to buy me a copy. And I still feel a bit of a thrill when I see Cinderella wandering around at Disneyland.

But what, exactly, is the lasting magic of this story for me? Yes, I’m a fan of the other fairy tale heroines, both original and Disney versions, but Cinderella remains my number one pick. So I sat down to analyze it, as only someone who spends way too much time thinking about romance stories can do, and I came up with a few reasons:

1. I like Cinderella as a person. This is a girl who works hard with a smile on her face, despite having been turned into a servant in her own home. She’s not stupid — she knows her step-mother and step-sisters treat her badly and that they’re in the wrong, but she sees that being bitter won’t really get her anywhere. The girl’s a smart cookie.

2. She appreciates a windfall. Cinderella may be surprised by her fairy godmother’s appearance, but she knows better than to turn down such a wonderful gift. She’s grateful, and then she makes the most of her opportunity.

3. The danger in this story is real. The step-mother and step-sisters are human, manipulative women with power in their hands. They have Cinderella at their mercy, and there’s not much I find more frightening than a real-to-life threat that a reader can relate to. Witches and vampires are lots of fun, but give me a situation that I could see happening next door, and that’s going to keep me up at night.

4. I also like the prince. This is a boy who knows a good thing when he sees it. I also like that he’s willing to hold out for true love; he won’t marry just any princess, he wants to marry this particular girl. We all want a man who will fight for us. Even if that means fondling every smelly foot in the kingdom to find the one that fits that lost shoe.

5. Which brings me to my last point: How can you not love a story that hangs on a beautiful, custom-made slipper, glass or otherwise? ( I was a shoe lover even as a child.)

Next month I’m going to Disney World with my brother and sister-in-law and my two nieces. The baby is two, and apparently obsessed with Snow White. She wore the costume last year for Halloween, and now watches the DVD repeatedly as often as her parents will let her. She told my mother “high ho” on the phone the other night. My mother mumbled something about seven dirty old men, and how my niece has a lot to learn. I just figured she’s more or less on the right track, and that there’s another romance reader in the making.

I have always been an old fashioned girl, addicted to the feel of a book in my hands. I love to see all of my favorite titles lined up on my bookshelves or to loan out volumes to friends I know will appreciate them as much as I do. But in recent years, I’ve come to face the fact that I am fighting a losing battle against my book collection. Books live piled all around the room including in front of the shelves, hampering access to whatever managed to get into the bookcase before the leaning towers developed… not to mention hampering access to my bottom dresser drawer, the left hand side of my closet, and my filing cabinet. And so, when my boss announced she was purchasing me an Amazon Kindle, not a word of protest passed my lips.

As an agent, having an electronic reader that allows me to walk around with a pile of manuscripts in my purse and leave the laptop behind is a joy. It doesn’t hurt that I can now download new reading material from Amazon.com at will, either. I’m not saying that my shiny new toy will replace real books, any more than shopping online has ceased my trips to brick-and-mortar bookstores. After all, not all books are available for the Kindle, and certain books just beg to be held in your hand and have their pages turned. But for the books that I read and then struggle to find a home for–summer reading, work reading, endless piles of romances and science fiction and fantasy and young adult novels that gather dust or try to trip me on my way out the door–well, electronic feels like the way to go.

I have definitely seen a decrease in the number of books I’ve purchased in traditional format in the past couple of months, though not in the number of books purchased in general. In many ways it’s worse to know that even as I sit sipping coffee at a local coffee bar, I can download some fresh reading material. “Download” makes it sound free, doesn’t it? And it feels free, until my credit card bill shows up. As a member of the instant gratification generation, I know this is something I’ll need to monitor, and I wonder if compulsive book-buying can fall into the same category as an addition. If I download new books the way others pump the slot machines, I could be in serious trouble. But it’s a risk I’m willing to take, both for the sake of my straining bookcases, and for the delight of always having something new to read.

The only other true downside is that it’s impossible for me to loan out these books without handing over my entire device — and that just isn’t happening. So friends who might have been able to borrow my new favorites will now have to settle for a glowing recommendation and a trip to the library or bookstore on their own. I find myself curious as to how the e-book culture will adapt for libraries — if it will at all. The low-cost of producing e-books allows for a much larger profit margin for publishers, and so it would seem advantageous to find a means of allowing them to circulate in a similar manner to the more traditional and costly book formats.

I wish I could say I already see an improvement in my book clutter, but alas, that is far from true. I still have those piles of books surrounding me, and of course, Book Expo was a few weeks ago, and they don’t hand out ARCs in Kindle format. So now I have several tote bags of shiny new reading material lined up in my hallway, waiting for me to find some time to indulge. Electronic media might very well be the wave of the future, but the paperback still reigns supreme.

If there were just one thing that I could teach all aspiring writers, it would be that despite lofty ideas of creating art or the firm belief that you “just write and let someone else worry about the rest,” the truth of the matter is that publishing is a business. Writing by itself can be a hobby or a lark, but once you cross the line into the realm of publishing, where you put your work out there in the hopes of selling it and seeing it on the shelves, you are talking bottom line, down and dirty business, with emotions and personalities put way back on that rear burner. And when you’re dealing with business, that means you need to learn to be a professional, even down to the simplest correspondence.

The knee-jerk response is one that agents see with surprising frequency. In this day and age of electronic everything, when many writer/agent relationships begin with a simple e-mail query or an online introduction by a mutual friend, it has become all too easy to dash off a quick message or reply before taking the time to really think it through. The most classic example of this is the writer who does not like a rejection letter they have received and shoots off an immediate response to let you know what was wrong with it. Sometimes I hear that my letters are too short, or too long, or that I should have told them how to fix their manuscript based on the three chapters that failed to capture my interest. My favorites are the persona insults, the ones that inform me I clearly have no taste or knowledge about the industry and that I’m in no position to judge their brilliance, talent, art, etc. Recently I was told to go play in heavy traffic.

It is easy for me to warn people that they should not respond in the heat of the moment. Rejection hurts, I understand that. It can be frustrating, particularly when you’ve heard the same thing over and over again. However, I have also noticed that the people who succumb to their emotions and respond off the cuff in such a negative, insulting manner, are also the people who cannot maintain a proper business attitude in any other aspect of their writing careers. These are the same people who don’t make the effort to read agency guidelines and learn the proper way to submit a query to the agent of their choice. Or they don’t take the time to note what genres an agent represents, and therefore waste both their own time and the agent’s by submitting queries for projects the agent will never sign on. And so the person who queries me on their hot new thriller idea appears far more likely to shoot back an insulting remark to my response that I don’t represent thrillers, than a romance writer whose work didn’t quite click for me and received a standard rejection. But regardless of your goals, it is best to keep to professional behavior, even when your emotions try to get the best of you. Behavior in one area seems to set the tone for many other interactions.

Quick-on-the-draw responses can cause trouble in other areas of your career as well. I have met with a fair number of writers who query both agents and editors in an effort to sell their books, hoping that if they have a book deal in hand, it might make them more attractive to a prospective agent. And it is true that this can happen, but you must be very careful in how you handle your negotiations. If an editor calls you up and offers to buy your book, it can be very difficult to keep your cool in the midst of all that excitement. Too many writers accept the deal as is in a fit of elation, whether they are concerned that the offer might be taken off the table or they are simply too elated to do anything else. However, that acceptance becomes hard and fast, making it very difficult for any agent you sign with after the fact to come in and help you improve on your deal. If you agree to the publisher’s standard boilerplate, you not only lose out on potential money for that book, but you set a precedent in your own contract history with that publisher, making it very difficult for the agent to change certain aspects of the contract even on future deals. So, no matter how excited you are if that offer comes along, remember to keep your business hat on and do not commit to any deal if you intend to bring an agent in to negotiate. Sometimes being professional means knowing when to call in someone else to do the job.

Discretion should be another key word in the writer’s business lexicon. It is very easy to become chatty about the ins and outs of your writing career, particularly when you’re involved in writers’ groups and organizations and have critique partners with whom you share both your successes and your failures. Blogs also create another source of conversation of sorts, where writers trade the details of their careers with other writers and readers. But certain things should be kept under wraps — sometimes for a set time period and in other cases for good. If your agent is shopping your manuscript, don’t discuss its progress online, and certainly do not mention which editors are reading it in your daily blog update. Editors read blogs too, and by sharing your submissions process, you are giving those editors ammunition in the negotiations process that they should never have, such as how many other editors they’re up against or if anyone has rejected your manuscript already.

Money is another hot topic. Yes, writers like to know what kind of advances are coming down so that they can judge where they themselves stand in the publishing hierarchy, but the truth is that no matter what you find out, the comparisons are still completely unequal. There is no instance where you can accurately judge whether another person’s effort is worth more or less than your own. Instead, comparing advances is more likely to lead to hurt feelings for one or more people. Also, do not quit your day job after publishing four books simply because your favorite author chose to do so. She may think you’re ready, but she has no idea if your sales and expenses match hers precisely, and so again the comparison is meaningless. It’s wonderful to help other writers, or to seek out information from writers more experienced than yourself, but always keep in mind that publishing is a business, and no two writer’s business dealings will ever be precisely the same.

Writing is a creative endeavor, and at times it can also be surprisingly social, with writers’ groups and meetings and lunches with agents and editors. Particularly thanks to the internet, it is easier than ever to create a writing community that helps support you emotionally and intellectually. But writing for profit is still a business, and as with any business, it is important that you remember to keep a professional attitude and always put your best face forward.

If the words “book tour” conjure one set of images for authors — reading their work before a packed audience of fans squeezed into every nook and cranny of a wave of bookstores across the country — they bring up different images for a reader. Part of the joy of reading is getting the chance to travel the world without ever leaving your comfortable couch, but it can also be fun to travel to the places you’ve read about and see them for yourself. Sometimes, reading a story, you just wish that you were there, experiencing that moment in that place. Enough that you might plan a vacation around your dream destination. For romance readers, that can mean trips to some pretty fabulous locations. Have you ever read a western romance and dreamed of spending a week on a dude ranch with a handsome wrangler of your own? Or sharing a kiss on the Eiffel Tower, inspired by your favorite heroine’s experiences? And who can’t imagine a road trip through Jane Austen country — the lakes that so thrilled Elizabeth Bennett or Bath, where so many drawing room intrigues played out in Austen’s world?

For writers, this can be even more of a draw. Not only do you get to share the scene you loved to read, but you can study how the original author plied her trade. It can be a wonderful lesson to visit a place that a writer has immortalized in a book. To see what they saw, and to take note of how they put that vision down on paper. What details were included to really set that scene, and how might you have done it better?

With books written about every corner of the planet, you don’t need an expensive vacation to go check out some of the locations of your favorite stories. Some writers choose fairly generic locations — the country, a suburb, a city — and work from there. Other writers make the most of the area where they live and introduce it to a wider audience. Think of Nora Roberts’s fondness for the Chesapeake Bay area and Ireland, or Jayne Ann Krentz’s love of the Pacific Northwest. Anyone who’s ever picked up a work by Anne Rice has felt her strong connection to New Orleans.

If you’re interested in making your locations sing, in really capturing the flavor of an area and giving your reader the sense of being there, take your own book tour. Find out if any novels have been set in your town or near where you live, and read them to see what characteristics other authors have played up. If not, check out local travel guides and pamphlets from your historical society to help you decide what makes your location unique. Take a walk through the center of your town and really look around, maybe with a camera so you can capture some snap shots of the buildings, monuments, and so on, to study the architecture further at your leisure. What is the town’s overriding characteristic? Is it a sleepy place with a single gas station and a few basic shops? Or a cookie-cutter main drag that has succumbed to the invasion of the mall stores, with Banana Republic and the Gap vying for space with Restoration Hardware, and Starbucks anchoring a corner at either end of town? How many banks are there? Law offices? Doctors? Several? One of each? Think about how the proportions of different types of businesses reflect on the demographic of the town. What does it say about the kinds of people who live and work there? Do people travel somewhere else for their jobs? Or do commuters invade your space five days a week and turn the town into a bustling mini-metropolis? What does it smell like when you walk down the street? Bread from the bakery? Coffee from the corner cafe? Exhaust from all the cars? Manure from the cows fenced in a half mile away?

This does not mean you need to write about your home town when you set out to write your novel; it can simply be an exercise. It does, however, give you a sense of the characteristics that make a place feel real — particularly important if you decide to go with a fictional setting you must build from scratch. You must be writer, tour guide, and city planner all in one if you want to depict your characters is a realistic setting, a place that will inspire your readers to murmur, “Oh, I wish that I were there.”

It’s the day after Christmas and, even though I have written this in advance of the date, I know exactly what I am doing. I’m at my parents’ house in Connecticut, probably wearing a bunch of sweaters and extra thick socks since, after five years in Los Angeles, my blood is finally starting to thin out when it comes to winter weather. My brother and sister-in-law will have packed the kids in the car right after breakfast and taken off to drive back to Virginia. My mother probably has classical music on the stereo while she reads the newspaper, and then maybe Christmas music later as she tries to figure out what we should have for dinner. My father is in the living room reading one of the books I got him for Christmas. And me? I’m sitting in my childhood bedroom, curled up under my down comforter and propped up with pillows, with a cup of tea on the bedside table and a book in hand. Doesn’t matter what book — it might be a new acquisition or some old favorite pulled off the shelf — and I may even read more than one. What does matter is that I’m not paying attention to anything but the words on the page in front of me. All day, from just after breakfast until late afternoon, pausing only when it’s too dark to see in order to flip on more lights. This is tradition, and has been for as long as I can recall.

At some point my mother will come knock and ask if I’m hungry. Chances are she’ll have to knock more than once, and will eventually give up and just poke her head in to get me to respond. I will try to answer while still actually reading. If the book isn’t too high-brow, I might succeed, but if it requires my undivided attention, chances are I’ll frown when I am forced to stop reading and look up. But eventually I’ll comment as required on her various dinner options, and a half an hour or so after she goes back downstairs I will finally put down my book and wander after her, following the smell of reheated leftovers in some new form. I’ll set the table and open a bottle of wine and toss salad or whatever other little last-minute tasks my mom has left for me, knowing that despite my best intentions I won’t have been able to stop reading until the last possible minute. Then there will be dinner and conversation and discussion of books read, and plans for the next day that will involve movies or walking through the snow or venturing into New York to see the tree at Rockefeller Center. No more long, uninterrupted reading days — just that one. But that’s okay, because sometimes one is all it takes to remember just what a treasure they can be.

Best wishes to all of you during this holiday season, and may you find at least one uninterrupted day to spend exactly as you wish.

I’m a seasonal reader. Always have been. And really, I don’t think I’m alone in this. After all, most major book reviews list “summer reads” some time each spring, giving readers an idea of what to cart with them to the beach or on their plane trip to Europe as soon as vacations roll around. I agree that summer is the perfect time for light, fluffy reads that don’t make you work up a sweat; after all, the temperature generally takes care of that for you. I’m big on romance in the summer (well, more so than usual), and I also like a good, scary horror novel for a day by the ocean. Somehow Stephen King gives me fewer nightmares when I can glance up from the page and check out the sea gulls frolicking at the water’s edge along with toddlers making sand castles. But when autumn rolls around, my mood shifts, and with it, my reading habits.

Fall always makes me think of school. Call it too many years trained by the academic calendar, but I tend to feel a bit more serious come September. I still read plenty of light books (or manuscripts, as the case may be), but I find myself craving something a little meatier as well. Maybe a multi-generational romantic saga a la John Jakes, or something with an exotic setting such as Russia or Morocco. And let’s not forget books with a bit of a dark edge — gothic romances and paranormals. After all, Halloween is right around the corner. These books also make a great lead up to what I consider to be winter reads — thick literary novels of the sort you might use as a door stop, perfect for cold Sunday afternoons when the snow flies.

But I’m also a traditionalist, which means each autumn I fall back on a few favorites and indulge in some rereading. My schedule limits this treat to some extent, but the great thing about rereading a favorite book is that you already know what’s going to happen, so there’s no rush to get to the end. You can savor it in bits and pieces, maybe just rereading the most memorable sections. If there are other books on your nightstand, you can save it for evenings when you’re too tired to concentrate on something new, or as a break between books to cleanse your literary pallet.

My fall rereading list has remained pretty much the same over the years, with just a few alterations depending on what new gems have been added to my favorites. Pride and Prejudice is an old standby. Like many women I know, I never grow tired of this book. I love Austen in general (with the exception of Northanger Abbey, which I’m afraid makes me cringe), but P&P remains at the top of the pile. If I feel too pressed for time to enjoy the whole book through, I tend to just skim through and reread the letters: Darcy explaining his actions to Elizabeth after she has refused him; Elizabeth’s aunt explaining Darcy’s assistance regarding Lydia’s rescue. And beyond those, that conversation between Elizabeth and Darcy when all is finally clear between them. I’ll pause at other bits, but those remain the sections that fall open by themselves when I hold the spine of the book in my palm. Like they’re just there waiting for me to visit.

I like Shakespeare in the fall, too. Nothing tragic, though. Romances. Comedies. A little Much Ado About Nothing, or maybe Twelfth Night. Then, after my more academic yearnings are satisfied, there’s The Eight by Katherine Neville, a wonderful romp across countries and time, with love and adventure and history and chess all woven together in a spectacular, surprising manner. If I’m feeling in the mood for something mysterious, I’ll pick up Donna Tartt’s The Secret History. And for over-the-top Southern gumption, there’s always Gone with the Wind.

Sometimes it’s difficult to justify rereading books, given my job and the huge number of new works published each year. There are days I get a panicky feeling in my stomach because I know I’ll never finish all the books I would like to read. But then, I’m also getting harder to please as I grow older. I think it’s the nature of both maturity and my work that I am tougher on the books I read — I expect more of them. I’m more easily disappointed by the next big hit than I might have been a decade ago, which makes me more willing to retreat occasionally to those books I know just won’t let me down. Rereading can remind me of the endurance of a good story — something it’s important to consider in this industry. And sometimes rereading is simply familiar and welcoming — like the comfort of encountering old friends after a long summer away.

So what about all of you? What are your favorite rereads? Do they call to you more at any particular time of the year, or perhaps your writing schedule?

Long before the rise of the cyber-generation, I loved to write letters. I think it began because I loved to receive letters — anything really, from postcards with a single scribbled sentence to charming notes on pretty stationary to long, flowing, handwritten missives — and I quickly realized that the only way to guarantee a steady stream of incoming mail was to send some out myself and wait for a reply. I started with relatives, writing my older cousins and watching the mail box anxiously for their responses. When I got a bit older, I wrote to friends who were off to camp. I made sure to write them early in the summer, sometimes before they had even left, just to make sure that my letters arrived in plenty of time to guarantee an answer. In high school, I was one of those girls who sat in the back of the most boring classes and wrote long letters to friends on notebook paper that I’d then shove into a locker or backpack on my way through the halls. When I went away to college, I’d write my parents, my friends at their different schools, and my roommate over summer vacation. It was an addiction.

My first job out of college was in publishing, working as an editorial assistant. It was not my favorite job, despite the exposure to books — I learned rather quickly that I did not have the temperament to be anyone’s assistant. But one wonderful perk of the position was the letters. Letters from writers, letters from agents, all showing up in the mail each day. Most of them were the sort of things I see now: sales pitches, queries, requests for author blurbs. But every once in a while something golden would float across my desk — a note describing an author’s research process, or an apology attached to the next three chapters of a manuscript coming in piece-meal. Each letter gave me a peek inside a writer’s mind, and I loved that exposure.

Years later, letters still appeal to me on a number of levels. They’re a way of reaching out, communicating, telling someone something important without the pressure of a live audience. You can take your time when you write a letter, working out the nuances of an argument or finding the best phrasing for a particular piece of juicy gossip. Letters indicate a willingness to pause during your busy day to send a little piece of yourself out into the world. And there is a permanence to something you write in a letter; there’s no backing out or changing your mind, you’ve provided the reader with proof of your feelings. Letters can also serve as a break from some other writing-type task that refuses to flow, a way to jump start the brain regarding the latest novel idea or term paper. They can be a distraction during a difficult time, or offer comfort that can be reread and cherished far longer than a phone conversation.

But as someone invested in books and narrative, I also think letters are about story — about whittling down your tale so that it captures your readers’ attention and coaxes them to continue, choosing your details carefully, aware your space is brief. They are about creating something interesting and, to some extent intimate, in just a few paragraphs. Not quite poetry, not quite prose. A personal letter is not a short story or a novella or a novel, but it is still a story of sorts, a narrative conveying an event or a glimpse into the author’s life or a window into their emotions.

A well-written letter says so many things about the writer, about their voice, mood, tone, education, upbringing, and so on. I am fascinated by letters written by novelists — by the differences in their voice between fact and fiction. I am equally interested in letters written as a part of fiction — epistolary novels, or letters woven into the fabric of a story. Think of the letters written by Jane Austen as part of Pride and Prejudice, and all that they reveal about the characters.

Sadly, letter-writing appears to be a dying art. It has been replaced by the telephone and e-mail, as each new technology provides people with a faster, cheaper method of communication. Even in novels, the characters zip off quick little notes on their computers, cold and impersonal messages filled with acronyms and web shorthand that make the writing feel generic and lacking soul, or text each other from their cell phones, limiting themselves to words that can be represented by brief combinations of letters and numbers. There’s an impermanence to communication nowadays, as thoughts are deleted from screens almost as swiftly as they appear. Those skills of narration that people developed through communicating in well-thought-out paragraphs now bow to the need for speed, and stories are limited to a beginning and an end with very little meat in the middle. Soon we will see no more of those fascinating books gathering the correspondence of famous authors — as the correspondence themselves will have been lost in the last computer crash or deleted entirely.

Letter-writing is the narrative form of the masses, the way in which every educated person once told stories. Not every person can write novels or poetry, not everyone becomes a journalist — but writing letters requires no great skill beyond an ability to hold a pen and form words on paper, to speak one’s mind, whether in protest to a politician or to declare love to one’s sweetheart. There will always be writers, whether professional or hobbyists, who sit in front of typewriters or computers or legal pads and pour their hearts out using words as their tools. But as people cease to write letters, the general, everyday newsy letters of the real, everyday world, another form of storytelling fades from existence. So perhaps the next time thoughts of a far-away friend have you logging into your e-mail, you might try reaching for a nice note card instead.

Conference season is upon us, with RWA National, the granddaddy of them all (at least for romance writers), less than a month away. As an agent who frequents conferences, I often find myself on the receiving end of a writer’s pitch. Sometimes these are formal sessions, arranged by the conference organizers and taking place over a set period of time — anywhere from three minutes in a crazed imitation of speed dating to ten minutes sitting across from each other at a table. In other cases, writers ask to chat with me and at some point I invite them to talk about their current projects. These pitches come in all shapes and sizes and levels of preparedness. Some writers shake so badly I worry they might pass out, while others barrel ahead with all the aggression and self-possession of a slick used-car salesman. And so, in an effort to ease this process, I come bearing a bit of advice.

This is not your only chance to sell your story, or yourself as a writer.

Too often, writers place a great deal of emphasis on the few minutes they get to speak with an agent or editor, and this makes for a nervous pitch session. Relax. This one pitch is not your only opportunity to present your material to an industry professional, it is merely a small foot in the door. Agents accept submissions all the time, in a variety of ways, and those remain open to you long after the conference has ended. Look at your pitch as a chance to meet someone on the other side of the desk, and to get to know them a bit, not as your last ditch effort to break down that wall between you and a writing career. If you’re calm, and personable, you’ll make a good impression, and even if the agent or editor does not request to see your current project, they will be more likely to remember you if you submit something else down the line.

Be brief and to the point.

At a conference, you only have a few minutes to pitch your work, but even if you have more time, a blow-by-blow description of your book is never a good idea. While you’re still home preparing your pitch, try writing the equivalent to the blurb on the back of a paperback novel, keeping your synopsis of the story to a couple of short paragraphs. Focus on the hook or what makes your premise different and the impetus that kicks your story off, and then a bit about your characters. Avoid long, drawn out descriptions that ramble on, such as “and then this happens, and then they go here, and then so-and-so does this.” You want to intrigue, to entice, to draw your listener into your concept, but you don’t want to end up telling the entire story. If the agent or editor has additional questions about your material, they will ask them.

Don’t pitch the kitchen sink.

Keep your pitch to one, or maybe two projects. Do not offer up a list of every finished manuscript you have sitting in your drawer at home. You’ll just end up diluting the impression you made with your initial pitch and leaving the agent or editor unsure of what you are interested in selling. The best approach is to pitch your best work, and then have a second idea in reserve, ready to pitch if the agent or editor asks about additional projects. But even if they ask, keep your pitches limited. There are other uses for the extra pitch time.

Bring your questions to the table.

A pitch session is actually an excellent time to learn more about the editor or agent and the industry as a whole. If you have a few minutes left — which you will if you’ve kept your pitch brief — have a couple of questions in mind. It will send the message that you are serious about your career and learning the business, and not simply interested in getting a book published no matter what. And depending on the answers you receive, it might help you determine if the agent is someone you really would be interested in working with down the line, should you receive an offer of representation.

Remember, this is business.

Agents and editors want to work with talented writers who can maintain a business-like attitude. Yes, writing is a creative industry, but publishing is still driven by sales, and a writer who understands that makes the process much more enjoyable. While there’s no need to dress in a suit or bring a briefcase or resume to your pitch session, you should still go looking neat and presentable, and arrive on time. Bring a small pad and pen or pencil so that you can write down any vital information during or after your pitch, particularly if the agent or editor asks to see your work.

Breathe.

It does no good to write and memorize the perfect pitch if you proceed to hyperventilate in front of your industry professional. Take a few cleansing breaths before you approach your pitch session if you still feel nervous, and try to enjoy the experience. Good luck.

Write something fresh and different. Find a new angle on an old idea. Avoid the stock character types and overdone plot twists, and write something that shines. Great advice, all of it, but if you’re a frustrated writer, banging your head against a wall of editors and agents in an attempt to get someone’s attention — anyone’s attention! — it can be easier said than done. We all know that, if you want to get published, it’s important to write a story that’s uniquely yours while still appealing to your potential audience, but how exactly is a writer supposed to do that? Where do all of these innovative ideas come from?

Good question.

It strikes me that another bit of advice we hand out can do just as much harm as good when it comes to helping writers dream up their most original work: Read. Now, I’m not saying you shouldn’t read — far from it. If a writer doesn’t read, they have no business trying to write. But it’s a common practice to tell new writers to read all they can in their genre of choice, so that they can really get to know the market and find out what is working for other writers. And it makes sense, to a point. After all, it’s hard to know if your idea is fresh if you haven’t checked out the stories already on the bookstore shelves. But it’s possible to get too familiar with the successful works in a given genre, so familiar that the tone and rhythms of your favorite writers begin to flavor your own work, as well. It’s difficult to be original when your brain is filled to overflowing with the wonderful plots and characters of the current best-sellers. It’s human nature to dream up more of what we love and enjoy.

How do you get around this rather paradoxical dilemma? It seems simplistic, but read other things. Go right ahead and continue to read your genre of choice, but try mixing it up, particularly when you’re in the process of brainstorming your next story idea. Do you write paranormal romance? Go ahead and read a few, but if you’re writing about witches, stick to vampire books for a while, and then branch out into some romantic suspense and maybe a good western. Take a detour down the mystery or science fiction aisle and see what you stumble upon. And by all means, stroll over to nonfiction and see what sort of research might inspire you; brush up on the history of the Salem witch trials, check out a book on Tarot readings, and maybe find a couple of good travel guides to the area you intend to use for your setting — even if it’s your own hometown. Who knows what you might learn?

Expand from there. Pick up books that sound interesting, or that someone’s recommended, but that you wouldn’t normally read. Not a big nonfiction reader? Try a literary biography about a writer whose work you admire. Or start small, with essays or magazine articles. Get one of those “Best of” anthologies that come out every year, and read at random. They have them for nonfiction as well as for fiction; check out the one on travel writing or sports writing for a change of pace. Read about a religion other than your own — or any religion at all, if it’s not generally your thing. Thumb through a science journal or a technology magazine, and find out how tomorrow’s innovations might help you jump start today’s fiction. The mind is a funny thing, and you never know how something you read will play off the ideas already circling your imagination. You just might stumble upon the next big thing in romantic sub-genres.

A friend of mine reads like a demon most of the time. She goes through books so quickly that I practically drip envy from my pores when we talk about our latest reading; she easily zips through about twenty books for every single one I manage to squeeze into my schedule. But said friend is a writer of young adult fiction, and when she’s working, those YA reads pile up next to her bed and under the coffee table and all around her home. She won’t read YA when she’s writing YA, because she doesn’t want her writing style or her ideas to become infected by someone else’s work. That’s not to say she doesn’t read everything else, however. And the moment she finishes that draft of her WIP, she dives for her YA hoard like Carrie Bradshaw after a pair of half-price Manolos. Other writers I know still read only within their own genres while they work, and find it doesn’t affect their creativity or their voice at all. It’s an individual thing, like so many other aspects of the writing process. But if you’re finding yourself stuck in a groove, where your ideas just don’t seem big enough or fresh enough to break you out of the pack, try a little variety in your reading life. You never know where it might take you.