Category: Writing Resources

Before I sold my first few books, I never had either a synopsis or outline of the story I would write. I would just get started and bam —

Of course, my first book was an unwieldly 1200 pages and needed to be broken into three stories for it to be marketable. I managed to break out the first story, but never sold it. One day I may dust it off and see what to do about it.

Since then, I’ve learned the necessity of having at least the basic elements of the story in my head before I sit down to write the dreaded synopsis. (I so hate writing the synopsis!)

So, before I write, I consider the following three points in the overall story arc:

1. The ordinary world of both the hero and heroine and what their role is in that ordinary world.
2. The ending, namely, what I want both the hero and heroine to have learned and accepted about themselves when the story ends.
3. How I will make them confront their internal conflict at the height of the story (the black moment as it were).

For example, in HONOR CALLS, I knew that the heroine, Michaela, was a loner in her ordinary world and devoted to a cause – hunting the vampire that raped and killed her mother. The hero, Jesus, was also a loner with a devotion to his own cause — the FBI and upholding the law.

What ending did a want? Well in a romance it has to be a happy ending so I knew I had to get them together somehow and they had to have learned something about themselves. In this case that they didn’t necessarily have to be alone for the moment. (I say this because I would really really like to continue this story in a full length novel.)

As for their internal conflict at the height of the story — sorry, I’m going to tease you and say you’ll need to read the story to find out.

With those three basic plot points you can then write the scenes to start your story, know what you have to do to reach the black moment and where you will go once you overcome that obstacle.

For those aspiring writers out there, I hope that this helped! Also, if you’ve got a project and need a jump start to get it going, check out the Liberty States Fiction Writers Mayke It Happen Challenge. (No, that’s not a typo!). The Mayke It Happen Challenge ends in May, hence the MAY in MAYKE.

If you reach your goal by May 31, you will be eligible for a drawing for a critique. Three people will be chosen and either an editor, agent or published author will offer a critique of your work. From now until May 31, you will be on an e-mail loop sharing your progress, asking questions and being mentored by four published authors! The four published authors are:

Debra Mullins
Linda Parisi
Caridad Pineiro
Lois Winston

For more information on the challenge, you can click here!

On another note, HONOR CALLS is now available at Eharlequin.com! For more on this novel, you can click here.

Registration of the domain name and building a brand

You know those long addresses that go something like this http://yahoosites/user/mynameismud.htm

Not so long ago it was expensive to register a domain name and there was only one Registrar, but not anymore. There are lots of domain name registrars out there and the prices can be as low as $8.99. Be sure when you get that great price that it doesn’t include some kind of advertisement requirement for the registrar.

Also, since you have to have someone host your website (in non-geek speak – the company who has the web server that will hold the files for your website), they may offer a deal where they will purchase and set-up your domain name as part of the hosting package.

But back to the domain name. What should it be? Something fun and sexy?

Sexyromanticsuspensefromcaridadpineiro.com?

Keep the domain name manageable in terms of length for starters. If you’re going to use a pen name, google it and see what pops up to make sure there aren’t a lot of other people with the same name. Also go to the WHO IS and make sure it’s not registered yet before you not only try to register the domain name, but before you start designing your site. The last thing you want is to find out the name is taken and you have to redo your graphics, etc. You can do the WHO IS at this link:
http://www.networksolutions.com/whois/index.jsp

Another thing to consider is whether you are going to be a .com, .net, .tv, .us or some other dot extension. The most common extension – and the one most people expect to see – is .com so lean towards going with that.

Back to the naming issue, which goes hand in hand with the branding issue.

I’ve learned over the many years I’ve been publishing that the one thing that keeps changing in my career are the genres in which I write. The one thing that remains steady (for the most part) is my name. When my first books came out under Caridad Scordato (an error which could not be corrected), I opted to go with caridad.com as my website because I knew (1) that I would be changing my last name and (2) that Caridad was unique enough that most readers would associate that name with me regardless of that last name that was being used.

So build your name and not some idea of the writer you are now because the latter will change while the former will likely not change.

If there is some other message you want to get across to readers, go with using a tag line/slogan. Check out Rayna Vause’s: When you need a little paranormal in your romance

Tag lines/slogans are a good way to reinforce what you do, but again, the emphasis should always be on you.

We’ll go into how to get people to visit your site next Tuesday, but as I mentioned last week, you may wish to design banners for when you start getting word out about yourself and your work. The banners should have the same look and feel of the site if at all possible and again, should stress your name so that people will start recognizing that name.

Hope this Tuesday Tip was helpful!