Blógünder Schlock

This week’s Writing Excuses features Stacy Whitman, as well as a healthy helping of “no Howard.” If you’re interested in getting your writing published “Submitting to Editors Part 2” is a must-listen (though you should also must-listen to last week’s as well.)

In this podcast Stacy, Dan, and Brandon cover how to approach editors at cons, how to inquire about work you’ve already submitted, and how to butter editors up by asking about their current projects.

The next two weeks of Writing Excuses were recorded while I was at a convention, and our friend Stacy Whitman was in town. She works as an editor at Mirrorstone (an imprint of Wizards of the Coast), and discussed submitting manuscripts to editors with Brandon and Dan.

It’s a very, very educational podcast, and it’s one which I would have had to sit out on even if I’d been in town. I know as much about submitting stuff to editors as I know about vacationing in Nepal… which is to say, I’ve had friends do it, so all I can tell you is what they told me.

Have a listen. This one’s really good.

This week’s Writing Excuses is my favorite episode yet. Why? Well… I brought my iPod along, and fired up the stopwatch, so we could all see exactly how much time we’d spent.

This really kept us moving. And it’s fitting, because we were talking about pacing. This is fifteen very lively, content-filled minutes of podcast, and my iPod’s stopwatch should get credit in the liner notes.

In related news, The Salt Lake Tribune interviewed Jordan Sanderson (the Writing Excuses webmonkey and audio guy) and me for an article about podcasting in Utah. Yeah, it’s a “slow news day” piece, but that’s really the only kind of day I want to make the paper.

I’m amazed at how wiped out I am after a convention. Good morning, world! It’s 11am, and I’ve been in bed pretty much for the last 12 hours.

I’m still collecting my thoughts, and they’re pretty scattered. Between Chimaeracon, Brainshare, and Ad-Astra, I’ve had three events in two weeks. I’m pretty sure today is a wash.
While I convalesce, here’s a new episode of Writing Excuses.

On Friday, whilst preparing to record Episodes 10 and 11 (yes, even in Podcasting there are buffers to be had) we recorded a three-minute long segment on “The Rules.”

How do we keep our podcasts 15 minutes long? No Expounding, No Cans of Worms, No Waffling, and judicious use of the Pimp Signal.

This 80%-shorter-than usual bonus episode features far, far more screwing around than most of our ‘casts do. It’s also the first episode we recorded using the old-school “everybody through the laptop mic” technique (accidentally, mind you — Jordan is face-palming that flub), so let us know what you think of the sound quality. We need to know if episodes 10 and 11 need to be re-recorded.

We’re up to around 3,000 listeners per week over at Writing Excuses, which means all you aspiring novelists who are not currently listening in now have some stiff competition from the folks who are. This week we talk about villains.

How do I know this podcast is that good? Because it’s already helped me tighten up my own writing. Not my own advice, mind you. I get that stuff for free. No, I’ve been benefitting from Brandon and Dan, and while I suppose SOME of that could stem from just rubbing shoulders with good writers, what seems to resonate is the several listens I’ve given to each of these podcasts.

I listen in order to try and figure out how to do the next podcast a little better, but I think osmosis takes over and I start absorbing good writing advice from these guys. Just last week I threw out an entire “okay” script that had a decent punchline, and replaced it with a really, really good script that made me laugh. Looking back, I can see that I was doing “Killing Your Darlings” and “Beginnings” at the same time (oh, and “Pacing,” but that episode hasn’t aired publicly yet.)

In other news, I’m off to Toronto this Thursday for Ad Astra. Watch this space for my schedule, and other assorted plugs.

… and I’m taking the day off.

Meanwhile, enjoy another “Writing Excuses.” This time it’s “Flaws vs Handicaps.”

This week on Writing Excuses Brandon, Dan, and I discuss heroes and protagonists. Brandon almost caught me flatfooted with this topic, but Professor Google bailed me out

(Okay, it was John August who bailed me out, but Professor Google performed the introduction.)

Speaking of being caught flatfooted, on Friday Brandon, Dan, and I recorded a “Bonus Episode” of Writing Excuses in which we talked a bit about Gary Gygax and what his work meant to us. It’s only about eight minutes or so long, and I’m sure we got half our facts wrong.

That’s what we get for playing without the source-books in front of us…

It’s Monday, and that means another installment of Writing Excuses is live. This time around, Brandon grills Dan and I on “first lines,” the importance of hooking the reader, and why he worries that this gets too much emphasis when aspiring writers seek instruction on the craft. Have a listen to Episode Four: Beginnings.

There are a couple of great moments in there — at one point I shout “Heresy!” and at another Brandon has a massive brain-fart (silent but deadly, in this case.) I also use what I now believe to be one of the weakest metaphors ever. For the record, I shall never again compare your writing to a used car.

In unrelated news, I had a great birthday, and I owe you all at least one or two more photos of the Wall O’ Postcards. It looks wonderful, and I don’t want to ever take it down.

Also, we will be shipping the Rule 1 t-shirts this week. Please stop ordering them for a few days (don’t make me delete the link to the store item!) so Sandra can catch her breath.

Pleasure before business — last night I recorded a podcast with The GeekDads, who very graciously invited me to join them for the evening. You can find it at www.geekdad.com, or via iTunes. It’s called “Episode 13: Rule Number One - Pillage, Then Burn.”

On to business…

Pre-orders on the “Pillage, THEN Burn” T-shirt are drawing to a close. We’ve added 5XL shirts to the size matrix, but if you want one of those, the only way to guarantee you get it is to pre-order. If you ordered a 4XL and want to change your order, please email schlockmercenary@gmail.com with your order number and we can make the change.

We’re closing the pre-orders on March 1st, and will begin printing shirts the following Monday. At that point the shirts will not be available for regular orders for about two weeks.

We’re going to print about 20% more shirts than were pre-ordered (it’s called “re-investing the profits”) so we will have some of these available at conventions (including Chimaeracon and Ad-Astra), but let’s do the math for a moment… about 300 shirts have been ordered. That means there will only be 60 shirts in inventory. If you really, really want one, I suggest plunking down money now.

As a reminder, if you bought one of these from me at LTUE, there were curing problems. I owe you a new shirt. There are an even dozen of you out there (plus Matt Moody, who bought one out of the trunk of my car) and I’ve only heard from TWO of you. Certainly you’ve been doing your laundry, and have washed the shirt and discovered the fading problem by now! Email schlockmercenary@gmail.com with your name and address, and we’ll get you taken care of.