HINT: These are a lot more fun if you imagine them being delivered in Jeff Foxworthy’s voice.  Here is an example.

If your thank-you notes typically run on for 14 pages, you might be a writer.

If you edit the ingredients list on cracker boxes at the grocery store, you might be a writer.

If you fight insomnia by counting typos, you might be a writer.

If you ask your child whether the new kid in school is the protagonist or the antagonist, you might be a writer.

If you feel that your life is dull because it lacks flashbacks, you might be a writer.

If your-hate list includes Wordless Wednesday blogs and music CDs with no lyrics, you might be a writer.

If you’ve ever stood up in church to correct the preacher’s grammar, you might be a writer.

If you said “But the book was so much better!” after seeing The Matrix, you might be a writer. (Look it up for yourself!)

If you prefer closed caption TV because they broadcast the screenplay, you might be a writer.

If you tell your child to redo his math homework to make it more compelling to the audience, you might be a writer.

If you avoid drinking milk because yogurt has more culture, you might be a writer.

NOTE: The following video is part of the post.  “Read” it next.

If you buy a jacket only when there is a “blurb” on the back, you might be a writer.

If you’ve ever staged a sit-in over the inappropriate use of a comma, you might be a writer.

If you autograph the magazines in the rack at the checkout counter, you might be a writer.

If a whole shelf on your bookcase is dedicated to books with your name on them, you might be a writer.

If your reaction to a designer dress at the mall is “Who wrote that?”, you might be a writer.

If you prepare an outline before telling your spouse about your day, you might be a writer.

If you’ve ever called out the President of Honda for misspelling “Infiniti”, you might be a writer.

If you hold back crucial scheduling details from your family to keep them in suspense, you might be a writer.

If you fantasize about typewriters, you might be a writer.

If you even know what a typewriter is, you might be a writer.

If your favorite part of vacation is “booking” the flight, you might be a writer.

If you can’t wait for them to make a movie out of Roget’s Thesaurus, you might be a writer.

And if you are still reading this long-winded post, you are obviously a writer.

What is so magical about 500 words?  Well, there is a common perception that if an article is 500 words or more, Google will like it more than if it is under 500 words and Google will rain darts and stink-bombs and itching powder upon your website.

The basis of this perception is that shorter articles are not as good quality as longer ones.  The number 500 is a very arbitrary choice, with no basis in fact (actually some websites insist on at least 300 or 400 words, and others on at least 600 or 700 words – in any case, an arbitrary number).

However, there is some reason to suspect that if your website has articles that are mostly 100 words long it might not be judged as having as good quality content as the site with articles that are mostly 700 words long.

Garbage, no matter how long

As a writer, you should write to the point – you should get right to the point.  Say what you want to say, and when you are finished, say no more. Sadly, a lot of people keep writing long after they have nothing more to say. I have read a lot of garbage on the Internet of 1000 words and of 700 words and especially of 500-520 words.

Why especially of 500-520 words?  Because a lot of people write 100 or 200 or 300 words of information, but take just over 500 words to say it. They are trying to please Google.  Or to conform to websites that are trying to please Google.

Quite aside from how ridiculous this charade is – like an endless Monty Python skit caught in a repeating loop – this makes for some pathetic writing.

Thomas Jefferson said, “The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do.” In order to please Google, many people will use two, three or four words where just one will do, and their writing quality suffers big time for it.

When you write to the point, you stop when you have said your piece.  That might be at 100 words.  Or it might be at 200.  In the case of this article, it is at 451.

The version above was shared by Amy Vernon, and is pretty long and humorous.  But after it was captured and shared it on social media, the headline was altered, adding a word and replacing three words with longer ones, making the following headline even longer…

Can long headlines work?  I would say this is an example of when they can. A long, startling headline with plenty of words.

These pictures might not be worth a thousand words, but for Wordless Wednesday they’ll do.

RECOMMENDED: Wordy Wednesday – Hagrid moonlights

 RECOMMENDED: Lyrics – The Ent and the Entwife (with video)

“I gotta say, it becomes kinda hard to love your job… when no one else seems to like you for doing it.”

–Wreck-It Ralph

Wreck-It Ralph, as an anti-hero and video-game villain in his day job, is in fine company. In his book What Foreigners Need To Know About America From A To Z, Lance Johnson provides surveys that list some of the service industries and related jobs Americans rank as lowest and complain about the most:

• Oil companies
• Real estate agents
• HMOs
• Tobacco companies
• Auto dealers
• Cell phone companies (contracts)
• Collection agencies
• Banks
• Auto repair
• Mortgage brokers

If your characters hold a profession everybody hates, that makes your job as a writer more challenging, but in the case of Wreck-It Ralph, it can also be a rewarding journey.  Everyone (including, ahem, writers) can relate to days in which no one appreciates what you do. Yes, Wreck-It Ralph is about Generation X, the video game and most maligned recent generation, but it is also about our jobs and our livelihoods.

Does the job define the character? 

Does the job define the person? In our society, yes, it does.

Does the job define the character?  In the case of cop dramas, legal dramas, political dramas, hard-boiled police procedurals, stories about sex workers, stories set in the entertainment industry, stories about teachers, even family dramas in which Mom and Dad are the (toughest of all) job titles (what parent hasn’t felt unappreciated at some point?), the answer is yes.

Whether it’s Detective Olivia Benson on “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” who lives for the job, Sherlock Holmes, Captain Kirk (when the movies prompted him to admiral and took him away from the Enterprise, that sparked major character conflict and a four-movie arc), there are many examples in which the job defines the character. But it’s also the character’s relationship to the job that creates drama and conflict.

FREE help to describe your characters!

In Wreck-It-Ralphs’s case, he just wants to be a part of society and be valued. His external goal is to get a medal, but in the course of “going turbo” and leaving his game, he develops other relationships.

This works for true stories, too: If your client has a job that the public has preconceptions, especially negative, about, such as the mortgage industry (Confessions of a Subprime Lender), IRS agents, Hollywood agents (sorry), salespeople, or politicians (if you land such a gig), your job is to make the case as to why the reader should care:  Is it a tell-all?  A personal struggle with illness?  A friendship or love story that changes lives? A how-to book on consumer advice?  A cause that’s bigger than the job?

Yes, it is hard to separate people from their jobs, because one of the first questions we ask is, “What do you do?” Why would your characters, including in nonfiction, be any different?  Also, other than their stated job title, characters have different jobs to do in your story.  Hero, comic relief, best friend, messenger, shapeshifter, mentor, sidekick…

Don’t knock the villains (even though we all love to). In my follow-up post, I’ll give some love to the antagonist/villain’s job and why, in Ralph’s words, “I’m bad, and that’s good. I will never be good, and that’s not bad. There’s no one I’d rather be than me.”

Back to the job!

Today (well, in two weeks, actually) we are giving away to one lucky winner a free copy of Write a Marketable Children’s Book in 7 Weeks by award-winning authors, Shirley Raye Redmond and Jennifer McKerley. They have authored more than 30 children’s books and are published by Random House, Simon and Schuster, Gale-Cengage and other houses.  You can take a peak at their Write Children’s Book website here.

You will note that the authors of our giveaway prize are well-placed to provide guidance on both fiction and non-fiction books, which they do.

In fact, here is what one book reviewer (Kathi Linz) has had to say: “If you want clear, concise, easy-to-understand directions, then pick up Write a Marketable Children’s Book in Seven Weeks by Shirley Raye Redmond and Jennifer McKerley.”

Here is what another reviewer (Rachel Burns, writer of young adult books) has had to say on Amazon: ”Jennifer McKerley is a true professional who knows the ins and outs of children’s book writing. From researching story ideas to revision methods and everything in between, Jennifer can help you get your book on the right track.”

How to enter

There are three ways for you to enter this Rafflecopter Giveaway contest (the more times you enter, the better your chance of winning!):

• Tweet about this contest, so that more people will know about it.  You can do this once each day during the contest (which gives you more chances to win!)
• Follow me on Twitter
• Share our free Character Description Cheat Sheet for Children’s Books  using any of the buttons on the right of that page (you can do this one more than once, too – share on each of your social networks).Just remember to use the Rafflecopter widget below to tweet, follow and record your sharing.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Here is a quick synopsis of the novel:

Growing up, April Byrd longed for more than her very ordinary life. She was born and raised in a sleepy, small Midwest town where she spent her whole life waiting – waiting for something big to happen. When college graduation provided an escape, she knew just where to go – New York City. There she could reinvent herself and finally have the extraordinary life she’d always dreamed of. She said goodbye to her family and high school sweetheart for the bright lights of the big city.

But things don’t always go as planned. Getting to New York City was the easy enough, but nothing has turned out the way she planned. April shares a one-bedroom, walk up apartment where she sleeps on the worn, living room, sofa bed of her wild, party-girl roommate. She has a grunt job at a public relations agency, and eight months after her arrival to the “big city,” April’s life is still completely ordinary; until an uneventful visit to a psychic changes everything – starting with a certain sexy, blue-eyed, tattooed rocker named Van who never even knew she existed. Until now.

Now that April’s on Van’s radar, her life will never be the same. He’s a mysterious, captivating, bad boy and April is helpless to his charms; but she can’t figure him out. Does he really like her, or is she just another conquest? As she follows Van down the rabbit hole, she begins to realize his mysterious air just might be a façade masking a darker, more disturbing side.

You can pick up a copy of the book yourself on Amazon: She knows what the future holds: A Novel

And the Character Description Cheat Sheet I announced then was, not surprisingly, also aimed at an adult audience.

But what about if you are preparing a manuscript for a children’s book?

No problem – we have now developed the (equally free) Character Description Cheat Sheet for Children’s Books.  Here is a snapshot of what it looks like, and you can download it for free (well, for the price of a tweet or a share on FaceBook).

I would like to thank children’s author Janet Smart for assisting with this special edition for children’s authors.  She was helpful in reminding me of a number of points that I had overlooked.

My answer always, goes something like this, “Most stories are fascinating.  Almost anybody who thinks they have an interesting story does; it just takes a good writer to bring it out, to make it come to life.”

Of course, there are a few people who come to us whose stories really are not interesting at all, but that is pretty rare.  But this does give us a moment to consider what makes a successful book, so I would like to share my thoughts on this with you.

It’s the idea – the story

Above all, it is the idea.  It is the story.  And it is how that idea or story is developed. It needs to be interesting.  But what makes an interesting idea, an interesting story? Here are a few elements:

Strong emotions.  A compelling story makes us feel the terror of the main character(s).  Or the deep hunger for power or to be loved or to escape or…or…for something!  Or the deep love or lust of two people.

Incredible challenges. Strong emotions need equally strong challenges.  The fears need to be set off against the imminent realization of what is feared.  The hunger against seemingly insurmountable barriers.  The romance against circumstances that keep the lovers apart.

Suspense.  If the reader knows in advance how things will turn out, it is hard to keep her interest.  Suspense means keeping the reader guessing.  It means twists in the story line.  It means holding information back.  It means surprises.  It means, sometimes, the hero has to lose a battle.

If all this sounds like rules for fiction, they are.  And for biography.  And for history.  And the more of these rules that you can apply to a business book or a self-help book or a scientific report or a spiritual book, the better.

It’s the writing

 Of course, the quality of the writing is important, too.  Many an amazing idea has crashed upon the rocks of mediocre writing.  The basics need to be accounted for:

• Proper word usage
• Proper punctuation
• Proper spelling
• Proper capitalization

But “proper” is just the base.  Word usage is more than just about using the proper words.  It is also about how to use the most effective words.  The amateur tries to color his manuscript by adding lots of extra adjectives and even some extra adverbs.  The professional writer tries to remove adjectives and adverbs as often as possible and replace them with strong, descriptive nouns and verbs.

Here are a few more techniques that boost the quality of writing:

• Vary the length of sentences, sometimes just for variety (to keep the reader from getting bored of the tempo) and sometimes to set the pace of the story.
• Vary the length of paragraphs.
• Except when a longer word adds more meaning, use the simplest word available (“use” instead of “utilize”)
• Use synonyms deftly. Avoid too much repletion of a single word, except when used specifically to build cadence.
• Dialogue is good.  The more, the better – to a point.
• Internal dialogue is good, especially if it gives insight into a character’s motivations or emotions.

This list could grow to a hundred points, but these are some of the basics.  And these are techniques, not “rules”.  Different writers will use different techniques to different degrees, but these are some that are fairly universal among good writers and ghostwriters. Feel free to add to it in the comments.

It’s the pitch

A good idea, well-developed and well written, is still just a manuscript sitting in a drawer.  You need a good pitch.  I don’t mean a business case that you will see recommended in so many places.

“Last year there were 1200 books of this genre published and only 17 that were directly targeting this demographic.  There were twelve best-sellers in the genre, including three directly targeting this demographic, therefore…”

That’s a business case, not a pitch.  I am not saying to ignore the business case, mostly because don’t want to invite nasty comments for such a trivial issue, and because for non-fiction a business case can actually be very helpful even before defining your target audience (you might slightly alter whom you write the book for).

I am saying you need a solid pitch. Think about what might be written on the back of the book.  That is the basis of the pitch- what the book is about and why someone should buy it.

If you want to sell your idea to a publishing house, you’ll need the pitch to sell to them and, more importantly to sell them on being able to sell your book to the public. If you plan to self-publish, the pitch is what you’ll tell the public directly.  Either way, you’ll need the pitch in social media and when approaching book reviewers.

One note about the pitch and your genre.  If your book is fiction, you are trying to pull at people’s emotions and sense of suspense.  For some non-fiction genres, such as history and biography, you are doing the same.

But for more practical genres, such as business, how-to and self-help, you are trying to pitch the usefulness of your book.  And rather than focusing on readers and book lovers, you need to find people in the niche.  For example, a book on woodworking needs to be pitched not through book reviewers, but through woodworking bloggers.

Will my book be successful?

I don’t know.  Your idea is probably good, since few people think of writing a book without a feasible idea.  Few people with no ghost of a chance get told by their friends, “You oughta write a book.”  So, it is possible that your idea will fail of its own lack of merit, but not likely.  It might need some further development

If you come to us, you know you will get top-notch writing and help developing the idea.  You might already have it incredibly well-written on your own.  Either way, your manuscript has all the ingredients for success.

As for the pitch, that is a tougher one to define, and often the biggest factor in the success of a pitch is your own perseverance.  We can provide a synopsis and query letter (at no extra charge to our book writing clients, upon request), but you have to be able to ignore rejection after rejection to eventually find the publisher ready to take a chance on a new author on the strength of your manuscript alone.  Sometime the first publisher will recognize your genius.  Sometimes the 100^th.  And sometimes, your route to success is to self-publish.

RIGHTS

The most important thing to make sure is covered in a contract is rights.

(NOTE: Nothing in this blog posts constitutes legal advice; for that you must contact a duly recognized attorney.)

International copyright conventions recognize the writer as owner of his or her own words.  So it important to make sure that any contract between you and your ghostwriter assigns all rights, including foreign rights, film rights, etc.  So important are rights, that I would say this is the main reason we work with contracts when writing books rather than just a hand shake, as we do mwith most other projects.

PRICE and PAYMENT SCHEDULE

Price is the most obvious item to include in a contract.  You want to know how much you will pay and when it is due, and it should be clearly stated.  Some ghostwriting agencies will include a calendar schedule for payment, others (like us) base it on milestones.  We typically divide payment into thirds, but we are flexible on that.

WORD COUNT

This might also be obvious, but be careful.  All our contracts specify a range of words rather than an exact count, and there is a reason for that.

Word count is important, because it defines the quantity of work you will receive.  If you pay $12,000, you don’t want to wind up with just 10,000 words.  On the other hand, if you pay $12,000, the writer does not want to be stuck writing 120,000 words.

But – and this is critical – you do not want to identify a specific number of words that the writer is compelled to write.  If a writer has to write exactly 60,000 words, she will be far too focused on reaching that word count – at the expense of the quality of the manuscript.  Added fluff or cut corners is not to your advantage.

Our contracts always specify a range of words, such as 55,000 – 65,000 words.

CONFIDENTIALITY

This might or might not be important to you.  If it is, make sure it is included.

RESEARCH

If you are expecting the writer to do research for you, best outline that in detail.  Our default contracts specify no research.  Our writers typically do some research, such as small fact-checking or details about a location, but if there is anything specific you need, that will need to be specified and paid for.

If you are dealing with a high-priced agency, one that charges something like $25,000 for a 75,000 word book, you should expect unlimited research (in my opinion), but don’t try telling them that I said so.  Just make sure that it is clearly stated in the contract.

CONTACT

You might want to specify what type of contact you will have with the ghostwriter.  For a few people, face-to-face meetings are important, although they obviously lead to higher costs.  Some clients want frequent contact with the writer; others want to let the writer run with the topic.

Our default contract makes it clear that it is the client’s responsibility to make sure he is satisfied with the content as it is being produced, which means there is a chapter-by-chapter contact built in.  It also offers a default price for face-to-face meetings, should the client wish to do that after signing the contract. Of course, we have the ability to be flexible in areas like this.

TIMELINE

This is the trickiest element.  Often a client wants to specify a timeline, so that the writer does not drag on too long.  Understandably, you are eager to see your book published.

But the writer is a professional who pretty much sticks to a rigorous schedule.  The client, on the other hand, has a life.  And the client does not always have the time to review each chapter as it comes back from the writer.  A busy person might take a month to get back to the writer with an “OK” or a list of changes required.  A six-month job sometimes takes 12 months, as a result.

Ironically, the few times a client has insisted on specific dates, they have inevitably failed to provide timely information required for the project.  Not even close.

Our contracts all specify an expected end date.  It is important to have mutual expectations, but nobody benefits from rushing either the writer or the client.  We once had a client disappear – phone, email, mailing address – for nine months, then return to complete his book.

CONTRACTS and WRITERS

The bottom line is that you want a contract to address the legal matters and perhaps also to set parameters.  But you do not want contracts to cramp the creative process.  Keep one eye on the legal aspects (specific) and the other on the creative process (flexible) and you have the basis for an effective ghostwriting contract.

Just remember that no contract will ensure a successful ghostwriting project.  For that, you need to decide if the ghostwriter is easy to work with, whether she knows her craft and if the writer and the agency are accommodating in their approach.

So many stories.

So much inspiration.

We have even posted a chart showing how many people are seeking biography writers compared to other writers.

That is why I had to break out in a grin when I read this fortune cookie at Home of OHM:

I always tell a story to my kids at night; even when I am too tired, they won’t let me off for a night. I always make the stories up on the spot.

At some point, they asked me to tell a Potter Puppet Pals story, which evolved a bit in my telling so that both Harry and Ron have squeaky voices, Hagrid often falls out of the sky at random times crushing various characters (but mostly Harry), Snape gets no respect and Lord Voldemort is a silly character (building on the great Mustache Buddies tradition from the “real” Potter Puppet Pals – see second video below).

For Wordy Wednesday, (my personal protest against “Wordless Wednesday” blog posts), I thought I would share with you one recent story – shorter than most, was nevertheless one of the better ones. I am not normally a screenplay writer (although I have a couple good ones in my employ), but here is how it goes:

Hagrid sells Kleenex door-to-door

(Harry and Ron greet each other)

HARYY: What are you up to Ron?

RON: Not much, Harry? How about you?

HARRY: Nothing. Hey, here comes Hagrid. And this time he’s on foot!

(Enter Hagrid)

HAGRID: Y’aright, Harry? Ron?

HARRY: Hey Hagrid, what are you doing walking into the scene? Is that in the script?

HAGRID: Got myself a new job, I did.

HARRY: What, you got fired?

HAGRID: No, nothin’ like that. Just makin’ some extra cash on the side as a door-to-door Kleenex salesman.

HARRY AND RON: A what?

HAGRID: A door-to-door Kleenex salesman.

RON: But where’s the money in trucking around huge boxes of Kleenex that sells for…what, a dollar?

HAGRID: Just one box. This one is enough.

RON: What?

HAGRID: Need a Kleenex? Twelve dollars for one.

HARRY: Twelve dollars for a box?

HAGRID: Twelve boxes for a tissue.

HARRY: But Hagrid, who’s going to pay twelve dollars for a tissue?

HAGRID: Well, I…uh…I can’t be givin’ away trade secrets, now, can I? But I have…uh…found a market.

(Enter Snape, Hagrid recedes to a corner)

SNAPE: I see we have here that obnoxious Potter kid and his Weasley sidekick.

HARRY: We love you, too, Snapy Baby.

SNAPE: Harrumph.

HARRY: So much so that I kissed you in your sleep. And may I say that those lipstick marks on your cheek are very becoming.

SNAPE: That’s it. I’ve had enough of your driveling insolence. Fortunately, I have just concocted a wonderful potion of my own design that will teach you a lesson.

(Snape sprinkles some potion on Harry and Ron.)

SNAPE: Gesundheit. Heh, heh.

(Snape exits.)

HARRY: Ah…ah…ah-choo!

RON: Nose itches…

HARRY: Mine is getting all puffy…

RON: Need Kleenex…

(Hagird steps forward)

HAGRID: Kleenex? One for twelve dollars.

END

I hope you like it as much as my daughters (and their cats) did.

Postscript. I rarely follow up one day’s story with a sequel, but the next day the “Kleenex salesman” returned selling anti-dragon-bite pills.

Unlike most of the songs in Lord of the Rings, which I find tend to slow the story down as I stumble to pronounce all the names, I find this song a pleasure to read. In fact, this song strikes me as a classic love song, perhaps the most classic of them all. What a beautiful story it tells, if you care to read through to the end.

I would love to share the lyrics with you today, which I have done below. I was also able to find a recording someone* has put to music in the video below.

If you need lyrics written for a song, let us know.

The Ent and the Entwife

Ent:

When spring unfolds the beechen-leaf and sap is in the bough,
When light is on the wild-wood stream, and wind is on the brow,
When stride is long, and breath is deep, and keen the mountain air,
Come back to me! Come back to me, and say my land is fair!

Entwife:

When Spring is come to garth and field, and corn is in the blade,
When blossom like a shining snow is on the orchard laid,
When sun and shower upon the earth with fragrance fill the air,
I’ll linger here, and will not come, because my land is fair!

Ent:

When Summer lies upon the world, and in a noon of gold
Beneath the roof of sleeping leaves the dreams of trees unfold,
When woodland halls are green and cool, and wind is in the West,
Come back to me! Come back to me, and say my land is best!

Entwife:

When Summer warms the hanging fruit and burns the berry brown;
When straw is gold, and ear is white, and harvest comes to town;
When honey spills, and apple swells, though wind be in the West,
I’ll linger here beneath the Sun, because my land is best!

Ent:

When Winter comes, the winter wild that hill and wood shall slay;
When trees shall fall and starless night devour the sunless day;
When wind is in the deadly East, then in the bitter rain
I’ll look for thee, and call to thee; I’ll come to thee again!

Entwife:

When Winter comes, and singing ends; when darkness falls at last;
When broken is the barren bough, and light and labour past;
I’ll look for thee, and wait for thee, until we meet again:
Together we will tkae the road beneath the bitter rain!

Both:

Together we will take the road that leads into the West,
And far away will find a land where both our hearts may rest.

I am proud of Chantalyne, her first time co-staring in a film.

For the record, you don’t have to go scriptless yourself. We have plenty of good screenplay writers you can hire if you have an idea for a feature film that Hollywood really should know about.

Enjoy this scriptless episode…

Please note that this video has also been cross-posted at http://self-help.thehappyguy.com/2013/01/09/name-your-tune/

Whatever your age
Whatever your faith
Wherever you are

I wish you the very best in life

In love
In self
In 2013

But most of all, may your tree be jam-packed with books!

For Wordy Wednesday, I was moved to write the lyrics below. I had hoped Chantalyne would sing them for you. She said she wanted to, but each time she said so, she set aside the lyrics.

Normally this would be where I would give her a good nudge, to help tip the scales in a pre-teen’s constant struggle between motivation and laziness. But given the delicate subject matter, I decided to abstain this time.

Therefore, I present you the lyrics of Children of Connecticut today without vocal accompaniment.

Need lyrics written?  Click here.

Lyrics to Children of Connecticut

Children of Connecticut
My heart goes out to you
I know that I can never feel
The things you’re going through

The hurt, the pain
The doubt, the fears
The shock, the strain
The eyes filling up with tears…
[pause]

Children of Connecticut
My heart goes out to you
I’m sending you long distance love
It’s all that I can do

Killer in Connecticut
My mind is bent on you
There is no way to understand
What you were going through

You took a gun
Up off the shelf
Shot everyone
And then you shot yourself…
[pause]

Killer in Connecticut
My mind is bent on you
What makes a person lose his head
And do the things you do?

People of the Planet Earth
What are we going to do
Another crazy killer strikes
And leaves us feeling blue

It’s not the first
Won’t be the last
Not quite the worst
Wish this was all long past…
[pause]

People of the Planet Earth
What are we going to do
To save our kids from killing sprees
After all that we’ve been through

Victims of Connecticut
My prayers go out to you
Your lives were cut way too short
There was nothing you could do

You learned, you played
You laughed you cried
You slept, you ate
You lived, and then you died…
[pause]

Victims of Connecticut
My prayers go out to you
May your souls rest in peace
May God’s love be with you

(c) David Leonhardt
All rights reserved.

But a writer has to be able to do so much more, because how you describe hair sets the tone for how people see a character.  This applies equally to fiction, biography an any other book (or blog post or article) that involves storytelling.

TIP:  Pick up our free cheat sheet to help describe your characters.

When you read that a character has long hair, you right away assume that this is a free spirit, perhaps laid back, somebody who is not in authority.  When you hear a man has short hair, you assume that the person is ambitious, someone in authority or a self-disciplined person.

When you read that a lady has long, blonde hair, you assume the lay is fun-loving, probably popular and perhaps not much of a thinker.  “Blondes have more fun” and “dumb blonde jokes” might seem like  outdated stereotypes, but people still make assumptions in line with those old clichés.

Hair is more than color and length

Pop quiz:  What does the hair in this photo tell you about this unfortunate man?

Answer: It tells you that I had spent way too much time ripping apart lathe and plaster walls.  But demolition is fun, so it wasn’t all that bad.

But there is more to hair than color and length.  Consider texture.  Hair could be rough or smooth or shiny.  Or slicked back with gel. It could be frizzy or curly or straight.

What about smell? Yes, smell.  Most often smell is mentioned in steamy romance novels…

He grew dizzy from the soft fragrance of her hair, like lavender carried on a fresh morning breeze,  enveloping his face, stunning his senses…

OK, so now you know why I leave the steamy romance novels to other ghostwriters on our team, but you get the idea. The smell of a person’s hair sets the tone for what the person is like, and even where that person has been.  The arsonist can change his clothes, but isn’t that a slight smell of gasoline I smell in his hair?  Or smoke?

So pay more than passing attention to a character’s hair when describing the person.  You don’t have to say that Jimmy is an auto mechanic, you just have to say…

Jimmy’s hair was slicked back, just as if he had combed oil into it.  Oil?  No, the smell was not that of oil, but of automotive grease.  There is a difference.  Maybe the scent was coming from his hair.  Or maybe it was coming from his clothes.  Or perhaps it was just a part of him, so basic an element that his very skin smelled of it.

Class assignment:  Jenny is a 35 year old, recently divorced, a nature-lover and a bit of a hermit.  How would you introduce her to your readers, using her hair to do so?  Please feel free to write in the comments below.

In this case…poo!

No, honestly. A poo cookbook. Actually, “Poo” is the nickname of Bangkok chef Saiyuud Diwong, and in Thai, it means “crab”, not “crap”.

“Cooking with Poo” is either pure marketing genius, since the book has been talked about (even becoming a trending topic on Twitter) or a dead flop, because all the marketing in the world won’t get me to buy a cookbook that makes me feel queasy.

So what do you think? Marketing genius? Or gross-out flop?

For a different take on the issue, perhaps this might be of interest…

• Definition of ghostwriter/ghostwriting.
• What a ghostwriter does – and doesn’t do.
• Who needs a ghostwriter – and who does not (in what situations is a ghostwriter your best option?)

 Definition of ghostwriter

What is a ghostwriter?  Simply put, it is a writer who is not seen.  A writer who is not credited or acknowledged.  A writer who is invisible – like a ghost.  You read a book or an article and you never know who the real writer was, because it was ghostwritten.

You would be surprised at how much is ghostwritten.

Almost any autobiography of famous people is written by a ghostwriter. Think about it; it makes sense.  Somebody might be a great statesman, or a great scientist or a successful businessman.  But that does not mean he is a good writer and more than a good plumber or a good teacher.  For teaching, he sends his kids to school and lets a professional handle the job.  For plumbing, he calls a plumber to fix his leaky pipes – a professional who knows what he is doing.  For writing, he calls a professional ghostwriter.

Most speeches you hear have been ghostwritten.  Busy political and industrial leaders have neither the time nor skill to write their own speeches, so they hire speech writers.  For important addresses, very often they will edit and send back for several drafts; but most of the writing is done by a ghost.

What does a ghostwriter do?

A ghostwriter does the writing.  The ideas come from the “author” or the speaker – the client.  Done properly, the writer picks the words that best express how the client would write or speak if he had the time and ability to pick his own words.  This is not always easy and sometimes not completely possible.  But it is the ideal goal.

The ghostwriter does not make things up.  OK, sometimes a ghostwriter and/or PR department and/or political handlers do make a lot up.  When I worked for a politician, there was a fair amount of material that I wrote on my own initiative, guessing what my boss would have said.  But in such cases, the ghostwriter has a “regular” client and can make such guesses based on previous experience.

• The ghostwriter might do research.
• The ghostwriter does keep in the shadows.
• The ghostwriter does not reveal her identity.
• The ghostwriter does not take credit.
• The ghostwriter does not (usually) get royalties.

When do you need a ghostwriter?

There are three factors that you need to factor in when deciding whether to hire a ghostwriter or to choose some other alternative (which you can probably guess without even looking at the list):

• Skill
• Time
• Money

Skill is the biggest show-stopper.  If you can’t write well, you need to outsource, the same as you probably need to do with plumbing and teaching and growing wheat for your bread.

Skill is not a black and white factor.  It is pretty complex.  There are many people who simply can’t write.  I could show you reams of partially legible emails I receive. And there are many people who write quite well. And there are many people who write passably – they can communicate their ideas, but they do not inspire or pull the reader along.

But one’s skill at writing depends also on what one is writing.  I write good quality blog posts.  I write great how-to and self-help material, and I can write excellent humor.  But if I wanted to write a novel, I would outsource the project.  Yes, a writer hiring a ghostwriter.  I simply do not have the skills required to write convincing fiction.

And then there is speaking.  You might be surprised how many people have difficulty with highly personal speeches, such as for accepting an award of some sort or  best man or other wedding speeches.  They often call on a speech writer.

Time is also a big deal.  Many of our clients are hard-pressed business leaders who simply do not have the time to put all other things out of their heads and focus on writing their business book or autobiography.  Some have the skill, many do not, but none have the time.

Time is money, so if you don’t have the time to spend, it might even be less costly to spend the money.  Better to spend $12,000 in ghostwriting fees than $100,000 in lost time.

Speaking of money, ghostwriting does cost money.  Here is a list of some “typical” pricing.  In real life, plenty of high end ghostwriters charge more, and plenty of low end writers charge less.  But you have to be careful, because you will discover that at the bottom end the quality really suffers.  We try to keep our prices below average, at least to the extent that it does not sacrifice quality.

If you can’t afford the cost of writing your book, your screenplay, your letter or your speech, you might have to spend more time and write it yourself.  You might have enough money to hire a writer to edit your writing, which costs much, much less.

But a word of caution: if your writing skills are not fairly strong, your manuscript might not be good enough to edit.  You won’t save much money if the writer has to rewrite your material from scratch.  So, as I said above, skill is the show-stopper.

If you don’t have the money, you might be able to inspire some wealthy relations.  Maybe they will hire a ghostwriter for you.

But, wait!  What’s this? There is a hole in your pocket?  You have very little money to spend on promotion?

Fear not.  It is not how much you spend that counts, but how cleverly you spend it.  And that is why you need…

Whether you have a publisher or whether you are self-published, whether you are trucking around crates of paperbacks or trying to pull in clicks to a website, the Frugal Book Promoter is full of tips on how you can spread the word without breaking the bank.

Read Kristin’s review
of the Frugal Book Promoter,
which we published earlier.

And now, to make things even more frugal for you (in case that hole in the pocket is really getting out of hand), we are giving away three free copies of the Frugal Book Promoter to three lucky contest winners.  The contest runs all through November, and there are four ways you can win:

1. Tweet this contest.  You can tweet once a day, and each tweet is another entry in the contest.

2. Follow us on Twitter. We do blab a lot about everything from website promotion to health, business to entertainment, finance to …well…pretty much whatever. But it’s all good stuff.

3. Follow Carolyn Howard-Johnson on Twitter.  She is somewhat less of a blabbermouth than we are.

4. Blog about this contest.  This is the big one, worth ten points, giving you a much better chance of winning one of the three prizes.

Three winners will be chosen in the first week of December based on the number of entry points they rack up.  The Rafflecopter widget below makes it easy for you to enter and easy for us to tabulate.

a Rafflecopter giveaway