Location: Books & Such Main Office, Santa Rosa, Calif.

This week I’ve touched briefly on significant impediments to writers being able to produce quality work. Physical ailments, such as hand problems and blindness, can be frustrating for writers with the urge to create. Emotional impediments and addictions tossed into the mix of ailments can be nearly impossible to overcome. Yet for writers with an impelling voice or story to tell, such hurdles made a challenging life just a little more difficult; their stories still got told.

For those of us with less vexing circumstances, healthier lives, and fewer demons, writing still can be full of obstacles.

How do you encourage yourself on days of discouragement?

How do you keep the spark of creativity flowing?

What steps do you take to enable your body to physically handle the stress of sitting in a computer chair hour upon hour, day after day, possibly forever?

How do you get past barriers to the pure joy of telling a story in your unique voice?

Location: Books & Such Main Office, Santa Rosa, Calif.

I grew up in a community of folks who knew how to party well on Saturday nights. Charming, funny, clever and lovely, they nearly all enjoyed a drink or two. And then they thought themselves  funnier, more clever and devastatingly attractive. I learned early to distrust alcohol and the words of people even “slightly under the weather.”

Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Hunter Thompson and Lillian Hellman all were famous for their “alternate reality” ingestion while creating literature. I’m sure we all know more authors who had a problem with drink and drugs. Did it help their creativity?

Hemingway notoriously said, “There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.” Is it possible these talented writers needed the alcohol to get them past the personal horrors from which their writing came?

And is it only alcohol and drug abuse that’s the problem?

Kay Redfield Jamison detailed her life with manic-depression in her well-known book, An Unquiet Mind. I’ve never forgotten, however, how she described her reluctance to take lithium because while it moderated her “lows” it also took the edge off her manic “highs,” thus leaving her feeling less creative. (Nowadays she knows to take her medicine and feels she leads a more productive life.)

Hemingway and Fitzgerald succeeded in writing fine works of literature because they had an uncommonly devoted editor: Maxwell Perkins. Famous for his uncanny ability to find the glorious writing among the rough, Perkins nursed a generation of writers through their demons to produce quality work. Among other heroic activities, Perkins induced Thomas Wolfe to cut 90,000 words out of his first novel, Look Homeward, Angel.

Where does creativity come from? Does it need a chemical “start?” What types of non-addictive behavior  have you observed or used to encourage your own creativity or writing life?

Location: Books & Such Main Office, Santa Rosa, Calif.

It started innocently enough at Thanksgiving. My adorable two-year-old grandson began to cry. When I picked him up, I nearly dropped him from the strain on my thumbs. Hyper-extension? The pain stabbed through my thumbs and left my hands throbbing.

I typed carefully, but by Christmas I could barely function–using scissors burned my hands like fire. I longed to rest and tried icing, heating, Ibuprofin and temper tantrums demanding help. Nothing soothed the dragons engulfing my thumbs. I bought carpal tunnel splints I called “mitts,” but typing actually didn’t hurt all that much–it was everything else I did using my hands that hurt, including playing the clarinet.

I scoured the Internet and became more frantic. When I finally saw the doctor, he was matter-of-fact: “Not carpal tunnel. Severe tendinitis in both thumbs. Take Aleve, rest as much as possible and stretch. Do you have to type?”

What a relief! A different set of mitts to stabilize my thumbs, hope for the future, and a determination to be careful.

It didn’t last.

Ten weeks of physical therapy followed by x-rays that showed minor arthritis. “Do you have to type?”

How could I not type? I was a writer. yet my hands hurt so much I could barely manage a pen.

Six weeks later the hand specialist was more blunt: “No cure. You have arthritis, not tendinitis. Forget about yard work, you’ll play the clarinet in pain, and all I can do is give you a shot. Do you have to type? Next.”

I have always thanked God for capable hands and eyes that can see. I’ve never taken either for granted. I’ve always been careful. How can this have happened? And how do I write if I can’t use my hands?

I’m working pain free today; we’re just back from two weeks of vacation where I did not touch a computer, clarinet, dish, laundry or anything else more challenging than a Rick Steves’ guide book. I’m hopeful, but leery–the typing is going great, the traditional 120 words per minute–but I have no clue about the future.

The last eight months have been a roller coaster of questioning emotions. Do I have worth if my hands don’t work well? Can I write in pain? What can I do to mitigate my hand use? Should I switch musical instruments? Do I need to type?

Let’s examine impediments to writing this week; I invite you to join me in brainstorming how to get around physical and emotional difficulties.

In the meantime, however, do as my physical therapist recommends: Step away from that keyboard, and stretch your hands!

When you return, tell us about writing impediments you’ve experienced.

Location: Books & Such Central Valley Office

Weather: 84º and sunny

You’ve got queries and proposals circulating. You’re writing new books. Is there anything else to be done while you wait?

Goodness, yes! You need to get your infrastructure set. If you think through your office, your computer and your online presence right now, designing the perfect systems, you’ll be set for the crazy busyness that could follow getting contracted. And if no crazy busyness ever follows? You will still be set up for maximum personal and professional productivity.

Let me just make a list of some of the elements that come to mind. Some will apply to you, some may not, but try to think ahead. Those having to do with your online presence we’ll address tomorrow. Think of these today as your office infrastructure. You’ll never again have the time to be as objective and intentional in developing your system.

• Office Design. Having a separate room for an office is a blessing. It will help you set the stage for productivity from day one. Just like any office, you will need a filing cabinet, a desk, a computer, printer and good chair at minimum. You will spend long hours in this room. If resources allow, make it the room in which you most like to spend time.  If you must start out writing on the kitchen table, create a mobile office with files in one box and office equipment, supplies in another. Often plastic crates work well to create a mobile system.
• Mail Collection. Think long and hard before you use your home address as your write-to-the-author address. (Remember the movie Misery?) Now might be the time to get a post office box and to begin using it for your business address. (Yes, writing is a business.)
• Physical Filing System. Even in this day of digital files, you will need a file cabinet with real file folders. You’ll need financial files, files for each project–sometimes multiple files for each project, you’ll need idea files, publisher files, a file for each organization you belong to, files for conferences, events, etc.  No one else can develop and organize your filing system. You need to think about your life and organize accordingly. You can find excellent books on the subject including my favorite, Organizing from the Inside Out by Julie Morgenstern. Just remember, if you have a stack of papers that sit on your desk because you don’t know where they go, you have a flaw in your filing system.
• Computer Organization System. Now is the time to learn your computer inside and out. Discover as much as you can about each program you will use. Learn to use the “Track Changes” function in Microsoft Word since that is how you will most likely work with your book edits. Just as you must design your physical filing system, you need to develop a hierarchical computer filing system for your documents and email. (”Hierarchical” means folders within folders.) When you open your documents file, you should see subfolders that divide up your life. You might have something like: Church, Computer, Personal, Family, Organizations, Photographs, Reading, Speaking, Travel, Writing. In each one of those you will have subfolders. In “Writing” you might have: Agent, Articles, Books, Interviews, Publishers, etc. If you were to open up the “Books” folder you might have: Published/Contracted Books, Ideas, Unsold Books, etc.  Knowing how to get to a file in seconds will save you hours later. You will also want to set up a system for naming files so you can always tell which is the latest edit for instance. Again, there are great books on how to do this.
• Contact File/ Address Book. Start at day one to capture and organize addresses. I am a Mac user so everything is integrated across all my systems. I use the Address Book application. I fill out the v-card completely, including a photograph. I can usually find one on the web or in Facebook if I don’t have one. Once the v-card is in place, I never have to type an address again. I use this to automatically print labels, sync wirelessly to my iPad and iPhone, address letters and envelopes and even send Christmas cards. I can organize it any way. As long as you commit to doing this every time you get home from a conference with a stack of business cards, it will never become overwhelming and will form one of the most valuable resources of your business.
• Calendar. Learn to use your calendar program, including how to send and accept invitations, how to have airline flights go automatically to your calendar, etc. Make sure there’s a way to sync this to your phone.
• Project Tracking/ Planning. This is often part of your calendar program, but I just bought a task/project program called Things for Mac that I already love. I have it on my desktop, laptop, iPad and iPhone– syncing across all platforms. Because you’re going to be working to deadline on multiple books at the same time, make sure you learn how to use a project tracker.
• Reader Data Files. One of the most important things you are going to build as a writer is your reader base. From the first day, collect every name and address either physically or digitally. This reader list is what will impress or depress future publishers. This may well be one of your most important assets as a writer. Set up a system now that can capture every name. Make sure you are able to separate them by zipcode for mailings and to let them know geographically when you will be in their area. In addition to reader files, you’ll need to have influencer databases, reviewer databases, etc.
• Telecommunication. Decide now whether you will use a land line, a cell phone or both. Make sure you have voicemail and know how to use it. Learn your phone just like you plan to learn your computer. The more comfortable you are with technology, the easier your job will be.
• E-Book Reader. Our world is changing. Get to know e-books and how they work. I bought the very first Kindle immediately and changed to Kindle II the day it came out. I got my iPad immediately as well. Why is this important? I understand books in a whole new way and I’m not afraid of the changes. Content is still king no matter whether it is delivered on the pulp of trees or on digital readers. The more technology you can master while you wait, the better.

So what did I forget? Can you give us more tips of setting up an office, mastering technology and building the infrastructure?

Location: Books & Such Main Office, Santa Rosa, Calif.

Two days ago, Kristen brought up a hard-to-answer question about series romance. To view her comment click here. Her question left me thinking about who’s really in control of what’s being published. Here are my free-for-all questions:

Does the market really reflect what readers want to read, or are readers only being fed what publishers want readers to read?

How do you see the newish era of e-books affecting the future market? I wonder, in twenty years will there still be fads like Vampire and Amish, or will everyone separate out into small reader circles because of the ability to publish anything online?

I look forward to reading your thoughts! Thanks so much for your great comments this week.

Location: Books & Such main office, Santa Rosa, Calif.

Yesterday we discussed an agent’s response to receiving rejection letters that essentially say, “I loved this book, but I’m going to have to pass.”

Thank you to those of you who shared what your responses would be. It’s true that these types of rejections are more encouraging than rejections that point out that something is wrong with the project, but at the same time they leave you without any direction on how you can improve your project and pitch. As Robert shared, you can run out of places to send a project, so you definitely want to be sending the best possible draft.

So my question for you today is, how do you, as a writer, take a rejection like that and make it into something that helps you toward publication?

I have some ideas, but please add to my thoughts.

1) When you receive a positive rejection, take your book once again to your target audience to collect feedback. Ask them to answer specific questions after reading; don’t just ask for an overall feeling. Come up with a list of key issues you want to be sure to get feedback on and  include the list with the manuscript when you show it to your readers.

Sample questions: How did the book affect you on an emotional level? What did you gain from reading the manuscript? Why would you or wouldn’t you read this book again? For fiction: How did you connect with the main character? How could this connection be stronger?

(Remember to phrase your questions so the reader can’t answer with just a yes or a no.)

2) Write another book. If you’ve received positive rejections but no contracts for a particular project, the timing is most likely not right for that book. The editors like your writing style, but the book isn’t quite right. Try your hand at another idea. Your writing should be stronger the next time around, and perhaps the new idea with strike the right chord with the editors.

3) Consider attending a writers’ conference. It helps to meet editors and agents face-to-face. Sometimes that personal touch can be all your project needs to be set apart from the rest.

4) Consider seeking endorsers, especially for nonfiction. Having the right name associated with your project could make the difference. This can be a tricky business because you don’t want to overwhelm published authors with endorsement requests, but sometimes these connections can be made in an organic way through writers’ conferences, writing groups, mentoring clinics, etc. Never force these connections, let them come about naturally, if at all. And don’t you dare use the line, “Rachel Z. told me to ask you for an endorsement.”

5) Enter your manuscript in a writing contest! Some contests even offer publishing contracts if you win. If you’ve received that much positive feedback, your chances will be pretty high.

Do you have anything to add? How can you be proactive in response to rejections that don’t offer any suggestions for improving your project?

Location: Books & Such main office, Santa Rosa, Calif.

Researching at a bookstore is fun and you can learn a lot, but you can find out about trends in other places as well.

Spend some time looking at books online (which will give a broader selection than a bookstore) to find out who’s publishing the type of material you’re interested in writing. This can help you to answer the question, is there a market for my work? If a number of books exist in your category, spend some time figuring out what makes your idea unique. For nonfiction, a competition section is an important part of a proposal, so you’ll need to do this anyway. If nothing exists like what you’re writing, you’ve either had a stroke of genius or your idea has been tried and has failed–several times; so publishers are no longer interested in producing books on that topic.

You can also find out a lot about new releases in magazines and publications like Publishers Weekly and Christian Retailing. These often contain articles about book trends and current acquisitions.

Publisher’s Marketplace, (www.publishersmarketplace.com) requires a subscription, but book deals are reported by agents and editors on the site usually the day they’re sold. Since it can take as long as two years for a book to be published, spending time looking at the deals reported that day gives you a peek into the future of those bookshelves.

Another way to stay on top of the market is to subscribe to publishing house e-newsletters. Take advantage of the marketing the publisher is doing and use it to learn of new releases and excitement in the industry.  Catalogs and advertisements from retailers can be insightful as well.

I also encourage you to continue to read! It’s so easy to get wrapped up in the writing and researching that you forget to spend time reading books that have been published. Perhaps you’ll want to pick up the competition to see what made it shine. Not to mention that reading good books will help you to write a better book.

What book market research tips do you have to share?

Location: Barnes & Noble, Santa Rosa, Calif.

When I was in Denver at the Jerry B. Jenkins Writing for the Soul Conference, two questions I was asked frequently were, “What’s popular now?” and “What book trends do you see in the near future?” I want to walk you through ways to discover answers to these questions and to predict the market as best as we can. It’s impossible to know the future, of course, but we can make educated guesses. Today and tomorrow we’re going to talk about the bookstore and what it can teach us about the market.

Here we are! Let’s go in together. A bookstore is one my my happy places.

All those books on the shelves represent an investment made by the bookstore as it tries to predict what customers are going to buy. So, what topics and themes do you see a lot of on those shelves? Be sure to check out the section that you imagine your book would be shelved in. What do you see?

Are there 100 copies of the latest vampire fantasy?

Are most of the novels contemporary or historical?

Which books are faced (on the shelf with the cover facing out)?

Do you see more evergreens (books that were published a while back that sell well) or are there more newly published books?

Are there other people browsing in your section? What are they looking at?

After we finish at this store, we might want to see if the things we noticed here are popular at the competing store as well. This fun exercise can give you a good idea of what’s hot.

If you’re writing a Christian book, be sure to check out the corresponding general market section. I’ve heard frequently at writers’ conferences that the Christian market is about 2 years behind the general market in the topics/concepts being published. That’s something to keep in mind as you try to predict the future interest in the market.

Another way to do this type of research is online at sites like amazon.com or barnesandnoble.com. You can check out the top-selling books in any category.

Something to keep in mind is that it can take as long as two years from the signing of the book contract to publication. So many of those newly published books on the shelves were purchased by the publishing house about two years ago.

While at the bookstore snapping these pictures, I asked myself the questions I posed in this blog post for Christian historical romance. I’ll unveil my findings tomorrow. I might even include more pictures.

Location: Books & Such Literary Agency Main Office, Rain-soaked Santa Rosa, Calif.

The comments you wrote about outlining on Monday’s blog left me wondering a couple of things. First, I was wondering (and have no way to prove it) if the need to outline would be different if you wrote fiction or nonfiction. Perhaps I wouldn’t outline a novel, but I think I’d need an outline to complete a nonfiction project.  Somebody else might be the opposite.

This thought lead to my contemplating  ideas about our brains’ right and left hemispheres. In general, the right side of the brain has been shown to be the more creative, emotional side while the left side focuses on logic. Would right-brained thinkers choose not to outline while left-brained thinkers would outline?

Here are definitions of left-brain and right-brain thinkers:

Left Brain: Objective, analytical, looks at parts, logical, sequential, rational

Right Brain: Random, intuitive, holistic, synthesizing, subjective, looks at wholes

Click here for more on right- vs. left-brain thinking.

In this article, I found reference to a case study done by Gott, Hughes and Whipple in 1984. They studied one woman who supposedly could switch between being a left-brain thinker and a right-brained thinker. She described the left side as her “business woman side” and the right as her “gardening side.”  Wouldn’t that be a unique gift? It’s almost a superpower.

Are you a right-brained or left-brained thinker? Or a dual-thinker like the woman in the study?  Here’s a quiz that can help you to find out. (I’m not sure of the accuracy of it, but it’s fun!) According to the quiz, I’m left hemisphere dominant. I answered 11 questions with left-brained answers and 7 questions with right-brained answers. I would have guessed that I am a left-dominant thinker.

Once you’ve figured out which side you tend toward, please feel free to post a comment! I’d love to know

what kind of thinker you are;

if you outline before write;

and if you think you’d outline fiction, nonfiction, both, or neither.

If you’re interested in tapping into the other side of your brain while writing, I found a site with prompts for both types of writers.  It’s also fun!

To inspire left-brained writing.

To inspire right-brained writing.

I’ve really enjoyed your comments so far this week. Thank you for participating.

Location: Books & Such Main Office, Santa Rosa, Calif.

Another article I found from the Monitor on Psychology researched the dedicated memory needed for writing. Dr. David Galbraith, PhD, found in his study that distracting writers with spatial memory tasks, like asking them to trace a Velcro strip with their free hand, resulted in less ability (by about half) to plan an essay than those who were foot tappers (a kinetic task).

Check out the article here.

Spatial memory is the dedicated memory responsible for recording information about one’s environment and its spatial orientation. This is the memory that is taxed when your surroundings change. So if your children are coming in and out of your office, or you can overhear conversations and people around you, or if your dog won’t stop barking, your ability to write and generate ideas is significantly impaired. You probably didn’t even need this article to know that, but the study gives validity to the need of a quiet writing place or time that is as distraction free as you can possibly make it.

In the second study addressed in the article, which was done by Dr. Kellogg, PhD, writing is shown to use many facets of your working memory, too. He says that, “Even something as simple as making an agreement between a subject and a verb puts a demand on working memory.”

Writing involves much more of the brain than you might think! You need to be able to concentrate more than just your working memory on the task.

So next time your dog barks at you while you’re writing, you can tell him it’s been clinically proven that he needs to leave you alone.

External distractions take away my ability to write even these blogs, which are only a few hundred words. I remember from my college days that my brain would actually hurt after trying to write an essay in a classroom–a distraction-filled environment.

Is it obvious to you when your mind is distracted during writing? Do you think your writing suffers because of the time/place you’re choosing to write? What could you change to lessen the distractions in your writing life?