If you can talk, you can write. And you can sell what you write. Your life is full of stories that only you can
tell. Believe it. I call it yarn-spinning. The only thing you have to do to learn this “method” is to write like you talk.
In the thirty years I’ve made my living as a writer, I’ve found that all writers, myself included, have literally failed their way to success. Rejection slips are plentiful, especially if you’re writing fiction. Editors say you have to be published for them to read your submission and yet you can’t be published unless you’ve had something in print. For many, the first fifty or so rejection letters are just too much.
But wait, didn’t John Grisham have “A Time to Kill” in his desk drawer for several years before he sold “The Firm” which went on to become a bestseller and a huge draw at the box office? How do people like Grisham manage to keep going despite all that rejection?
I started to look at the work of successful writers- including my own- and found several keys I eventually worked into a course I used to teach at a local college. I called the course Creative Yarn-spinning.
It was truly a light bulb moment for me when I realized all good writing had some really, really important things in common. That there were certain techniques that can be used no matter what you’re working on. Until then I had assumed that because the news work I did during the day was in Associated Press style and the work I did on the side, editing in “Chicago” (or manuscript) style for Amazon’s former publishing division, BookSurge, that the rules would all be different. And of course, the style rules are. But the tone of the writing doesn’t have to be.
For example: newspaper and magazine articles have “leads, nut graphs and body” and stories, articles and book-length manuscripts (whether fiction or nonfiction) have “hooks, climaxes and conclusions.”
That’s just the lingo used in the business. In reality, it just means that in news all the important information is put at the top of the story in case there isn’t enough room to include the whole article, and in fiction, you have to “hook” the reader fast and then build to a climax and leave them with a satisfying conclusion.
But it’s the wording and style – not the rules of the game- that keep readers turning pages. From that realization, I developed the coaching method of Creative Yarn-spinning and I’ve used it in all genres with both beginning and experienced writers, journalists and authors.
So why not offer the different components of it here? It’s something you can pick up or put down at any time. It’s not like taking a writing course or attending a seminar. The brief articles you’ll find here will take on single subjects concerned with writing, self-editing and publishing, and you can pick and choose which ones you want to read.
These articles will be about writing. Our writing, and how we can improve it. As we move along, we’ll tackle plot, character building, scene-setting, leads, conclusions, climaxes, and even the daunting subject of “submissions” to editors, agents and publishers.
If you send me your email and choose to receive notice of the new articles as I print them, the first week of each month the person who sends me the tenth email will receive a free copy of my “Editor’s Guide to Perfect Press Releases,” a short easy-to-read handbook I wrote to accompany my talks to groups about how they can get notices of their organization’s activities, charities and events into newspapers and on radio without placing a paid ad.
Everything submitted as “calendar-type” news doesn’t make it into print or on the air because believe it or not, even free public submissions have guidelines and especially if the submission comes from a business, a lot of worthy material goes into the trash basket because of the way the information is presented.
Hey- if you don’t need the press guide you can always use it as a holiday gift! If Nancy Reagan can re-gift why can’t we? Meanwhile, we’ll be improving our writing and hopefully starting to make some sales.
So, are you ready?
If you can talk, I’ll bet you can write. Watch for my next article titled “Plot is a Verb!”