Melva Gifford

These are notes from the LTUE conference. Any inaccuracies are the fault of the note taker.

Q: How can you distance yourself from an idea?
– Don’t think of your work as a baby. You have a product. You want it to be the best in front of an agent or an edit. Think about how you raise your children. Think of what your children want to become. Kids may do something that will not be useful when they are adults. Why is your idea not going toward your goal? What limits your manuscripts to make it more mature to publication?
– The section of your story that comes from you as a person is often the sections that need to be cut, it is something that you wanted to happen. Panelists have a deleted scene folder. One panelist had a file for every book that includes things he’s deleted. He can’t read through those darlings and print parts of the book with a deleted scenes section. Shove them in the closet for a while.
– You have to look at the work you are trying to produce as a finished product. The final product as a whole is the important thing. You don’t have to go looking for scenes to delete. Instead, you need to see which part of the book is broken. The ending is not working. Is it not built up properly? Is your side character more interesting than your main character? What is the problem and how to fix it? Fixing a problem means fixing or delete the item you love. The result is that the final product will be better.
– When you have been writing long enough you can learn to delete a favorite scene it feels ok. The deleted scenes might become something else. The sculptor is already in the marble and you have to chip away the marble to get the stature. Through time and distance, you can see later why a scene was deleted. Some old scenes that might be able to use in other stories.
– Some deleted scenes might become a standalone short story.
Q: how we abandon an idea without guilt?
– The presenter has a 20 yr. old daughter who has not left the home. As a father, he is not certain if he is ready for the child to leave the nest. He invested a lot of time and finance to raising that child. That is why the presenter has a deleted scene folder. The distance can give you a perspective. Write a book put it way and come back to it. Time can give you more perspective.
– Writers create things. You need to think of yourself as a creator of new things and not a preserver of old things. The odds are good you have to go through 6+ revisions of the same book. You get to fix that hole or change the characterization. You need to add new scenes because the new scene is better because you are a better writer.
– One author put in a scene of a Spaghetti Dinner. It killed the tension of the story. The reason she had put the dinner in the first place was that it had been the motivation of the story. You need to have a scene serve multiple purposes.
Q: why feel guilty?
– We need to address those emotions underlying the guilt. You pour your heart and soul into a story. You are emotionally invested and it feels like a real person to you. The presenter loved the first scene of his first book. The opening scene was a kid being bored. The reader said you don’t want to be your reader to be bored. He deleted the scene and took what was important in the scene and wove important information into later chapters.
Q: should we mourn the loss of a book or scene?
– One panelist got stuck on a book and stopped writing. A friend told an author that the reason she could not rite is she was morning the loss of part of a book or writers’ block, and could not continue. Some feel regret about losing a scene because it is part of the author that defined that scene.
Q: how to delete a darling that helps the story but you don’t like what the story has become?
– You want someone else to care about what you write and realized that as an author, I can’t write for me. You need to abandon your ego. You may not like what a story became but you can be a successful author by making changes that improve the story. Once you’re successful you can write your passion projects.
– It does not have to be an all or nothing. What your editor tells you is not necessary, that advice is a hard and fast rule. See if there is a way to keep the essence of your idea. Make sure the darling is essential to your story and not to stroke your ego. See what is wrong with the scene and revise it.
– The best writer-author knows are the best reviewers. Your job is to keep working on something until it is awesome.
Q: how do you identify the darling that is throwing something off?
– Those who can help define a problem in your story, is a good editor, writing group or beta readers are also good resources. Authors often can’t see their own mistakes. Maybe the problem is that the climax does not work. Is it not setup right? Is the character not likable?
– If you write a series you have book one and book 2. During book two you realize it would have been better if a certain event had happened in book 1. As you become a better writer you will find solutions to how to work out a solution without having to revise book one. As you revise an ending scene some of the beginning scenes may need to be advised.
– A darling may need to be deleted because it introduced a plotline that is no longer relevant.

These are notes from Life the Universe and Everything. Any misinformation is the fault of the note taker.

– The presenter has three brands, one brand is romance; he keeps it separate from his two others. Children’s Dungan master exhamineamator.
– You need to think about what you are doing. What is your target audience and what are your goals? What are you trying to accomplish?
– Treat your fiction like Niki Shoes Company. You even define fonts to match the brand on how you publish your author’s name. People buy who they know.
– Having a name that is unique on google is also very powerful.
– Cowboys branded cattle so you know what belongs to whom. Determine what belongs to your brand. The same goes for your brand on your website and brand on business cards. They all need to look like they belong. What are readers going to expect when they pick up one of our books?
– Your persona: when you interact with fans you have a certain feel about you. One author always wearing a black shirt and a leather jacket.
– Some authors will have different author’s names for different genera.
– A brand is the set of ideas and images you want readers to associate with you. Ideally should be a small and clear set. Disney hired consultants: The Company interviewed employees to get their perceptions. They identified Disney as magical family fun. The same should work for you as a writer. Have a set of concepts, images, and artists that represent you. This author wears hats. It is a way to be memorable.
Q: How do we discover our brand?
– Thinking of your fan base ask who is your target audience. One author might like dark tragic and no humor. Now targeting some humor as a new brand by keeping the same name attached to politically incorrect humor. May lose some fans but other fans will see that he does dark and humor. For his children’s fiction brand he does use a different name but the same initials. Branding is to make money. Make sure your fans like what you are delivering. They can come back to get that time after time
– The reason one has a brand is to rise above getting lost amongst all the other authors. Finding your brand. The presenter talked to a dentist and he said what kind of dentist do I want to be? He decided to become the BMW of dentists and set his branding. Everyone else misspelled his name.
– Before I write a story, he looks for pictures of books or TV shows that show the image of your brand. Try to define what they illustrate and how your match. Find out what your core principals are according to your brand. What lines will you cross or not cross? He reviews comics for Brandon Sanderson. His staff needs to avoid words that Brandon Sanderson would not use to maintain his brand.
– Be deliberate with your brand. You never know what you’re going to sell. You want to choose a strategy upfront. As facts change you need to change. Find out your brand from your writing group. They can determine what you write. What do amazon reviews say about your work? When readers say when they say I like ** about you.
Q: What role does passion play in making your brand?
– If a publisher does not publish it, you can yourself. Make sure the brand is definable to attract a lot of people. Stay true to yourself. The further you get away from your own code, the less happy you will get. You have to look at what you love and incorporate them. Look at Brandon Sanderson’s website (https://www.brandonsanderson.com/).
– Some of the tropes in children’s movies are actually true.
– He loves dr. who. They all wear coats. So the author likes cool jackets. He loves to write fantasy but his fiction was not coming outright. The presenter saw air bender and following that type of slant and the similarities have made the presenter happier and more successful in his fantasy.
– You are not writing yourself you’re writing for others. Chefs cook meals for their customers and get paid. You want other people to pay you. You have to be your own number one fan. You need to see what your circle is your target audience. What genre is you needed to be in the center of? Do you write politically incorrect humor, then I am your reader. You have to love what you do. You have to be passionate about what you write.
– Reasons he wrote romance, he like romance movies. He loves chick flicks. He does not promote that brand as himself. Romance just sells. What does your target audience want to see?
Q: Query your readers.
– Keeping a brand with the public:
– No matter what brand you have, you have to be a kind person. Think about how you treat other people. What goes around comes around. My team managers and agents will push me to not have any political or religious opinions on social media. You will lose half of your audience so you might give political jokes on either side. If you do a political brand that becomes divisive. Some will make money by motivating people to feel rage. Some becoming provocative to sell books.
– The right way to be creative is to believe in abundance. There is enough abundance that you don’t have to steal someone else’s success. Be willing to do a blurb for authors just to support others. The presenter will organize periodic meetings free for writers in the community to share advice. He has a poet come into his home to support the creative community. He believes there is enough for everybody.
– What tip do you have for this group? What do you watch out for? Don’t do anything by accident everything is by purpose. Be intentional from the beginning of this point forward. You are allowed to have your opinions but social medial is forever.
– Do what you love. You will be happy to write about what you love. Sometimes deviating your energies to little pet projects can hurt your brand.

Q&A:
– even a blurb needs to be part of your brand.
– Can recommend something that will coincide with your brand. we want to match our recommendation of other authors’ brands/ products that are similar to our brand. If you do recommend other work that does not match our rand make it clear how it is different.