How Do I Know What I Think Until I See What I Say?

The new FTC rules on endorsements have caused a bit of a stir around the online writing community, because they apply to bloggers as well as to corporations. Basically, if you haven't heard, the new endorsement rules require bloggers reviewing a product (including a book) to disclose if they got the book for free.* That's pretty much it. There's a lot more detail, and some fine distinctions as to who is considered an "endorser" of a product, and who is just a consumer blabbing about a personal experience, but the long and the short of it is that, if you get the product for free, you should mention that when you write about the product on your blog.** If you think about it, the new rule*** makes sense. If I'm reading a blog about books and the blogger has gotten a bunch of books from a publisher for free, that's relevant information. Most blogs are run by individuals and their ties to corporations are not obvious. I wouldn't know, necessarily, that ...

By nature, I am a planner. Not in my writing , as I've mentioned before, but in my life. I set goals, I work toward them, and I achieve them. I am someone who can "get things done." But over the last few years, I have changed my perspective on goals. It started when I was in graduate school and realized that what I had been working for since the fifth grade (a PhD in literature)* was not going to make me happy. So I bailed on that and went to law school, because it seemed interesting and lawyers made a decent living.** Still, I was a planner. Goals, work, achievement, lather, rinse, repeat. I thought that the law school thing was an anomaly, not an indictment of the method. Then, about four years ago, my personal plan for myself was disrupted in such a fundamental way that there was no going back. Everything I saw for my future, everything I had planned...gone. Immediately and irrevocably. At that point, I realized that long term goals don't work for me. Bet...

1. I was sick this weekend, so instead of having a nice relaxing weekend at home, I had a crappy phelgm-filled weekend. blech. 2. I also read a book this weekend that I was hoping would be good, but was not. Note to self: if your main character is going to do something reprehensible like cheat on his "perfect" significant other, it's important that he be either (a) interesting or (b) relatable.* Otherwise, the reader will end up thinking she wasted her time reading about a jerk who cheats on a nice girl for no real reason besides the other girl is hotter.** 3. I am lukewarm about the band Paramore*** and the song "Use Somebody" by the band Kings of Leon, but here is a perfect example of how two lukewarm things can become one steaming hot pile of amazing. It's Paramore's acoustic version of "Use Somebody," which shows that Paramore is more talented that a lot of people (including me) give them credit for, and that "Use Somebody"...

At some point, everyone who writes gets asked this question: Where do you get your ideas? Stephen King talks a lot about where his ideas come from, I think mostly because some of his ideas are so horrifying/strange that people really want to know. Nick Hornby, who writes books that are less strange than King*, probably doesn't get this question quite as much. But no matter what type of writer you are, I think this is a common question: people who don't make up stories always wonder how people who do make up stories do it. I can't speak for anyone else, of course, but what happens to me sounds pretty similar to what happens to King or anyone else, so I wanted to provide an example of how an idea came to me, recently.** I read a website called One Sentence , which is a place where people try to tell stories in one sentence. Pretty self-explanatory, right? Sometimes the stories are funny , sometimes they are sad , sometimes they are bitter , and sometimes the writers writ...

I'm in the midst of some major revisions on The Book at the moment, and let me tell you, there is nothing more amazing than going back through something you wrote and seeing how it all hangs together. Seriously, there are times when I'm looking at The Book and thinking to myself "I cannot believe that I, Jay, put this together!" Of course, then you change one teeny thing and BAM! the whole structure falls apart. Revision, my friends, is like a sweater. Pull on one thread and a whole bunch of other stuff unravels and the next thing you know a sleeve falls off and now you don't have a sweater, but an asymmetrical sweater vest, which who wants that, you know? No one, that's who. Because this is a major revision, I'm doing it on paper. I know it's ridiculously old school of me to have printed out all 265 pages of my manuscript and be marking it up by hand, but I find it much faster than doing revisions on computer for two reasons: 1. when you're ...

Over at Fangs, Fur & Fey, they've got a great topic of the week: Five Signs a Book Was Written By You.* Here are mine: 1. One of the boys has a girl name . :) Or, if not, know that one of the boys did have a girl name until my readers told me to "just change it already, Jay. Jesus!" 2. The main character will be the oldest child or an only child. I may branch out at some point, but this is true of all of the stories I'm working on right now. 3. At least one of the male love interests will be tall. Tall is good. :) 4. No one will save the world. Something may get saved at some point, like a house, or a cat, or mybe even a whole town , but the world? No. No way. 5. The mother will be scary. Scary mean, scary smart, scary talented, scary hot...or just plain scary. ~~~ * If you read that blog, you might have already seen this entry, since I cross-posted over there.

Last week, agent Nathan Bransford mentioned that he is considering disabling anonymous comments on his blog as a result of a couple of trolls who are making inappropriate comments. The response was heated, to say the least. Now, of course, Nathan can do whatever he likes on his own blog. Plus, Nathan has a day job that doesn't involve moderating the hundreds of blog comments to make sure they're all appropriate every single day. Who has the time, right? So whatever he wants to do over there is his business. I'll still read the blog, regardless of what Nathan decides about anonymous comments, because it's entertaining and useful, a win/win of blogs, if you will. But I don't think I'll be posting over there anymore.* Why not? Not because I'm some ideologue who assumes that she has the right to say whatever she wants wherever she wants. (I don't.) Not because I'm "taking a stand" against the banning of anonymous comments. It's Nath...