Packing Heat: Erotica Writing Tips and Techniques

Packing Heat 095: Subtle Ideas

Jordan Castillo Price — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 22:14:00 GMT

Talk, talk, talk

Talking to people can yield up subtle details and observations that you simply can't get anywhere else. I was able to visit a taxidermist recently to do some research for my upcoming books Sleepwalker and Insomniac. I think seeing his space and talking to him in person gave me a lot more information to play with than it would have if I'd just emailed him a couple of questions.

Digging through forums

When it's impractical to talk to someone in person--either you don't have time, or the subject matter is too obscure, or it's a bit scary--you can usually find forums related to your subject matter where people in the same situation as your characters are giving each other advice. I used forums to get info on chemical castration and pelvic injuries.

Ideas are like...

It's funny, the ideas non-writers think would make good stories. I seldom agree! I also noticed that non-writers (or wannabe writers) tend to overvalue the idea. Yes, you can't write without an idea, but think of all the stuff you have to do to get a story once the idea is in place:

learn the craft of writing
write it
find a market for it
pitch it
sell it
edit it
market it
maintain your web presence on Facebook, LJ, Twitter, Goodreads, etc.

The idea is such a small part of the process!

Spew 'em out

I'll bet you can come up with more ideas than you think, even if you're stuck. Come up with 10 ideas today, and allow them to be stupid because you don't have to use them all. Do the same tomorrow, and the next day. 10 anything-ideas. At the end of three days, I'll bet you end up with a few really good ones that merit further development!

Your Assignment

Ask an open-ended question to someone you already know pretty well, and pay attention to the sorts of details they give in their answers. Start training yourself to be a perceptive listener.

Packing Heat 094: Lower That Club

Jordan Castillo Price — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 18:39:00 GMT

Stage Fright

The visions I had of my self-employed self rolling out of bed and attacking my writing with gusto haven't yet come to be. I'm going through a kind of stage fright where suddenly I'm second-guessing everything.

World's Worst Dialog

Sometimes actors can make up for the lousy dialog they're given by delivering it well. But sometimes a line of dialog is such a clunker, there's no way anybody can make it sound good.

I give the clunker my "10 things" treatment.

Your Assignment

Read some of your dialog aloud. Determine if it sounds both natural and in-character.

Packing Heat 093: Ready the Red Pen

Jordan Castillo Price — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 13:31:00 GMT

Preparation and Thought

I'm getting ready for NaNoEdMo -- the next step after NaNoWriMo. You know: that 50,000 words of gobbledygook you wrote in November. (I didn't do NaNoWriMo this year, but I do have some shelved novels from prior years.)

The idea behind NaNoEdMo is to commit to putting in a big block of editing time and logging that time weekly. In order to complete NaNoEdMo, you must log 50 hours of editing time over the course of the month.

See www.nanoedmo.net for details. I just signed up.

I have a really flawed manuscript I'm considering for the project. Here's my game plan.
1. Determine whether the book is even worth saving. If the answer is "no," I have another project I can edit. I won't know until I re-read and journal.
2. Think before I write. Consider what big changes will help the book and write down some strategies, rather than jumping in and fiddling with individual words and sentences
3. Be willing to change. Rather than tweaking parts that are not quite right, be willing to totally rewrite them. The written word isn't a finite resource; total rewrites might take about the same amount of time as picky little tweaking, and result in a much better final product.

Your game plan may vary, but do have one. None of us can afford to spin our wheels for 50 hours.

Your Assignment

Do you have something big that could use 50 hours of reworking? Dig it up!
Go visit nanoedmo.net and check out the rules

Packing Heat 092: Eye Eye, Ma'am

Jordan Castillo Price — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 23:20:00 GMT

I'm revisiting my old podcast The Eyes Have It and determining that I'm not quite as much of an eye-color hardass as I was two years ago. However, I still think it's important to not use the over-mentioning of eye color as a crutch. Surely there's something more interesting about your character than the color of their eyes!

Here's an example from Spanish Fly Guy where eye color is important:

...it was a guy. A hot guy. Ryan swallowed and looked away, but he’d seen enough to get his mind racing. Young. Slim. Casually hip, like a socialite who’d been out clubbing and was on his way home the next morning. Dark hair, finger-combed back. Eyes—well, Ryan hadn’t looked long enough to see what color his eyes were. Intense. Lively. Smart. He’d seen that much.

The character Ryan has trouble meeting people's eyes when he talks, so he takes a quick glance at the love interest, JP, and no more. Then here, later on:

JP crouched in front of Ryan and nuzzled the bulge in his jeans. Ryan stammered, “You don’t have to…I’ll make you the copies.”

He was so accustomed to looking down that it didn’t occur to him that all JP needed to do to lock gazes was turn his head. Blue. His eyes were blue. Like the bay after a storm. “It’s not about the copies.”

So when are some appropriate times to mention eye color?

When characters first meet, provided they're close enough to see or notice eyes
As two characters are pulling out of a kiss
Whenever lighting and proximity are right for eye color to matter

Your assignment

Read a story and take note of the first instance of eye color mentioned. Do you think it adds to the story or not?

Packing Heat 091: Promises

Jordan Castillo Price — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 14:09:00 GMT

Promises

Do you make a promise to your reader when you’re telling a story?

Sometimes you get to the end of a story and you’re stuck. Yes, I know, many people say you should know what your ending is before you start the story. But let’s face it. Sometimes you don’t.

Take a look at your first couple of chapters. Did you make any promises to the reader in those chapters? If so, have your ending address those promises so it will fit your story beautifully, and leave everyone satisfied.

Writing is a series of choices. Every step in the process holds hundreds of potential options, and once a writer makes a choice, a new series of choices fans out from the decision that was just made. Your choices are what make you unique. Your writing voice is made up of your series of choices. No one else will pick out the exact route that you do.

Your assignment:

If you’re working on a story, think of five different ways you might end it.

Or, record a TV show, watch it, and pause 10 minutes before the end. Think of 5 ways you might end that show.

If your’re curious about the story I use as an example in this podcast, check out Moolah and Moonshine, available February 14, 2010 at JCPBooks.com

Packing Heat 090: Retrofit

Jordan Castillo Price — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 15:05:00 GMT

Retrofit

Even for the most linear writer, sometimes writing is not linear! Sometimes we're most of the way through a story when we have our "a-ha" moment, and we realize the story is about something other than what we thought it was about--that the protagonist is someone else, or that the theme is not at all what we thought it was.

Don't force your story into your original plan or outline "just because." Maybe your subconscious has been brewing something more interesting all along, and your story just needs a few tweaks to retrofit it into your newer, better idea.

And here's an anecdote about a cool box that made it easy for me to give up a really cool theme idea that wasn't serving my story!

Your Assignment

If you don't have a theme in your current project, take a few moments to determine what a fitting theme might be

If you're stuck on something, try on a few different themes for size and see if maybe a new theme would give your writing some exciting direction

Packing Heat 089: 5-year Plan

Jordan Castillo Price — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 17:44:00 GMT

New Intro

It seemed to me my old intro was too wordy, so here's a new one. I forgot to say this is episode 89, ha ha.

5-Year Plan

You do have a 5-year plan, don't you? (If you're giving me a blank look right now, maybe you do but you just haven't formalized it.)

It's Official

I'll reach my goal of being a full-time writer early this year. I finally resigned that "temporary" day-job I took NINE YEARS AGO. I should probably have given myself a YAY. I'm a bit stunned.

Your Assignment

Think about your 5 (or 3 or 10) year goal. If you don't know what you want, how can you begin taking steps to get there?

Packing Heat 088: Mindset

Jordan Castillo Price — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 00:48:00 GMT

Yay

My friend Heather Boyd and her romance writer pals have a new blog called Ladyscribes, featuring crit Fridays! Go have a look.

Seriously, Back Up Your Shit

I can't express this enough. If you back up your shit in three places, you probably need it in four.

Mindset

For many of us, analytical mindset is waaay different than creative mindset. Value those creative mindset times! And respect those analytical mindset times. What can you do in analytical mindset if you find it impossible to write?

Bully yourself into doing a few hundred words anyway
Edit
Market research
Outline/plot (I hadn't though of this 'til after recording, but maybe this would be a grand use of analytical brain!)
Catch up on other chores so your next day is clearer

Your Assignment

Make a plan about what you'll do the next time you're not in the right headspace to write, then jot it down somewhere as a reminder.

Packing Heat 087: Discouragement

Jordan Castillo Price — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 23:14:00 GMT

I'm on Facebook

I'd love to see you there. Here's the page.

Pick a Month

It might not always be necessary to sideswipe yourself into doing tasks that you dread. Pick a month, and tell yourself that task WILL be completed that month. See if it works for you!

Discouragement

As writers, we're sensitive and we tend to care about what other people think. That means that sometimes we get discouraged. If something routinely discourages you, it's best to have a plan in place to help deal with it the next time it crops up.

Your Assignment

Pick a month and assign yourself that task. You'll feel lighter once you've got it out of the way!

Packing Heat 086: Timely Advice

Jordan Castillo Price — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 01:46:00 GMT

Your Time is your Greatest Asset

More and more, I'm finding I value my time above all else.

Here's a cool interview of the author of Time Traveler's Wife from Writer's Digest magazine where they discuss having control over your own day.

What are some time-sucks for you?

Watching TV
Commuting to work
Talking on the phone

What would happen if you were to do these things analytically rather than robotically? Can you derive more value from some of these things?

And if you watch hours and hours of TV, are you really enjoying it?

Happy New Year, gang, and I'll catch you in 2010!

Packing Heat 085: Habit Forming

Jordan Castillo Price — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 21:04:00 GMT

Backup Has Been Achieved

An article in Time magazine called Cloud Storage got me in gear. I went to onlinebackupsreview.com and chose Carbonite to back up my art computer and Mozy for my writing computer.

I'll deal with archiving my big files as a separate step.

Do you have a multi-part project where your indecision over a single step is holding you back? Maybe you can separate it into multiple tasks and handle the parts you feel sure about.

Habit Forming

If you're not in the habit of writing every day, why not? How about focusing on building a daily habit this coming January rather than achieving a big end-goal? This idea was inspired by the exercise chapter in Leo Babauta's Power of Less.

Make a very small goal, say writing 100 words a day, or 10 minutes. Then be a total hardass about holding yourself to that goal, no matter what.

Your Assignment

Pick two characters and write in first person what they're getting their significant other for Christmas. I did a piece in my December newsletter that features five of my characters. Use this exercise to work on character voice. How do their circumstances and the assumptions they make about their partners color their experiences?

Packing Heat 084: All Systems Go

Jordan Castillo Price — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 17:31:00 GMT

More Thoughts on Backup

Not only do I need a good backup system, I need to figure out a good way to archive big files. Thinking about DVD.

Handwriting

I took of photo of some writing I did while I was in a doctor's waiting room and it occurred to me that I was tortured for my penmanship when I was in grammar school. It seems mind-boggling because handwriting is becoming more and more obsolete. I wonder what else we place so much value on today will be obsolete in 10-20 years?

Systems

We have a system in our household we call the "night things" which is to feed the fish, set up the coffee for the next morning, and scoop the cat litter. Knowing these three things must be done at bedtime takes away the decision-making and the melodrama. Are there writing systems we might employ to defuse the melodrama?

I also talk about how the inbox system of The Power of Less doesn't work for me -- and I fear it might not come across that I do love Leo Babauta's ideas and I follow his blog, it's just that this particular system would create more makework than results for me.

Your Assignment

Think about a way in which you consistently create melodrama in your life, and decide if there might be a system you can put in place for 2010 to create some free time and mental space for yourself.

Packing Heat 083: Storybook

Jordan Castillo Price — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 02:15:00 GMT

This Cover Totally Rocks

If you have a LiveJournal account, and you love the cover of my novel Hemovore as much as I do, consider casting a vote for it at Elisa Rolle's LJ. Voting closes December 11.

More Writing Freeware

Dark Room - PC only, a plain writer designed to eliminate distractions
StorYBook - PC and Linux, kind of like Celtx but created with novelists in mind

Back Up Your Stuff

Don't lose your hard work! In fact...

Your Assignment this Week

I'll say it again! Back up your stuff!

Packing Heat 082: Write Fast

Jordan Castillo Price — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 16:36:00 GMT

Housekeeping!

A huge thanks to everyone who gave me some stars on iTunes. It makes a big difference!

Sprints
I've done exactly ONE writing sprint so far on Twitter. You can follow me there at twitter.com/jordancprice

style="text-decoration: underline;">Yay
I've partnered with 1RomanceEbooks.com to distribute some of me stories. They're very self-publisher friendly, so check them out if you get to the point of self-pubbing your own work.

Writing Fast

I needed to write FAST last week, and I had an 8-12,000 word weekend. (I wrote so much I didn't even count it. Around there, though.) Here was my method:

1. Get a chunk done with dictation software. I use Dragon Naturally Speaking. Take a break.
2. Come back to the story and type for 400 words or so. Take another break. Keep switching between dictation and typing with breaks in between.
3. If the problem is that I'm unsure "what happens next," switch to handwriting and journal until the next scene becomes evident
4. Start writing again, reminding myself "you KNOW what has to happen next" if I feel resistant.

I found that the points of view of different characters worked better with the different methods. One guy was more of a dictation POV, the other one more of a typewritten POV.

Your Assignment

Think about your goals for 2010
Think of a few things you accomplished in 2009 that you're proud of

Packing Heat 081: Note to Self

Jordan Castillo Price — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 23:20:00 GMT

Writing Sprints

One of my friends challenged me to a writing sprint on Twitter when my motivation was flagging. Her encouragement got me to my goal that day! If you follow me on Twitter, I'll try to start posting some writing sprint start times and we can all post our results.

http://twitter.com/jordancprice

Note to Self

It seems to me that being able to find the information you're looking for in your notes is just as important as keeping notes is. Don't you love it when bloggers are really good about tagging their blog posts so that when you're digging a post of theirs, you can find more of the same in a single click?

Wouldn't it be great if we could tag our whole lives?

Your Assignment

Google notebook. It's free. It's versatile. What are you waiting for, go play in it!

Packing Heat 080: Switcheroo

Jordan Castillo Price — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 00:01:00 GMT

Yay
I get a yay today. This week in Amazon's Kindle "Ghost" category, 5 of the top 25 stories were mine. In erotic horror, 11 of the top 100 were mine (a combo of ebook shorts, ebook novellas and paperback novels.)

Listener Question
My friend Celia (http://celiathepoet.blogspot.com) asked:
What do you do when your piece switches on you? Your novel is a novelette after all; or maybe it's a memoir! How sure are you of your form when you begin?

It's a precarious balance. Sometimes trying to force a story into a form will kill it, and sometimes it'll make that story stronger. If your story isn't under contract to be a certain way, I guess you have some room to play around and explore!

Can you Spare a Star?
Packing Heat hardly has any ratings on iTunes. Do me a solid and gimme some stars!

Your Assignment
Think about a story that's not working for you, and try to imagine it in various forms: longer, shorter, as a comic, as a poem, as a series. What are the story's strengths? Do the lend themselves to the form you're trying to cram that story into, or would you be better off switching?

Packing Heat 079: Old Friends

Jordan Castillo Price — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 21:03:00 GMT

Mega-Interview

Check out my great big interview at Jenre's blog, Well Read. Part 1 - Part 2

Old Friends

Tools and techniques can sometimes drop away like old friends who've fallen out of touch. Are any of your old methods worth revisiting? Maybe with a few tweaks you can rediscover something to inspire your writing. Here are three old friends I was happy to revisit.

AlphaSmart Dana

The clock I lost. Boo hoo, I miss it.

This keyboard absolutely rocks. I'm finding that when I'm stuck somewhere and I don't have it, I miss it. Good thing I found a big purse at a garage sale! (Cripes, now I have to start carrying a purse.)

Here's a review of the Dana in the Gageteer

Celtx

I had loads of fun planning the novella I'm currently working on in the open-source screenwriting software, Celtx. It's Mac/Windows/Linux compatible, and it's free! Heck, it doesn't get much better than that. (Though we could nag the developers for a novelist mode.)

Get Celtx here!

ToodleDo

A very small tweak in the way I set up the due date for my tasks turned my relationship with ToodleDo from discouraging to hooray! Sometimes a little tweak makes all the difference in the world.

Check out ToodleDo

Your Assignment

What method or tool did you used to use, but you've fallen away from. Can you pinpoint why? Maybe a little tweak, like my due date preference above, is all it would take to re-kindle your love of your "old friend."

Packing Heat 078: Checklist

Jordan Castillo Price — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 21:48:00 GMT

Followup on Critique with Care

It's not cool to ask an author if their characters are bobbleheads.

Yay!

I've experimented with adding some bonus material to my latest release, Sympathy. I'm really happy with the way it came out.

Checklist

As I was wallowing in my nebulous cloud of "what should I do next?" I realized that a checklist or a procedure for launching a new book would be a really great idea.

What sorts of things might a writer create checklists for to steamline some of the decision-making. How about editing?

Sample editing checklist

1. run spell check

2. run grammar check

2a. Do a chapter by chapter summary

3. read through for exposition

4. read through for voice

5. give it to a critique partner

6. start a new story immediately so you don’t waste time worrying about your critique partner’s reply

Listener Question

Jarod asks if it would be plagiarism to borrow a plot device from a scene in a book that moved him. Thanks for the question, Jarod!

Your Assignment

Think of three tasks you can streamline by writing procedures

Packing Heat 077: Critique with Care

Jordan Castillo Price — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 20:29:00 GMT

Critique with Care

Want to know a sure fire way to lose your critique partner? Tease their writing in an attempt to be funny -- that'll get rid of 'em fast!

Assuming you'd like to keep your critique partner around, here are my ideas of the tone you'd aim for:

Yes

Direct
Persistent
Exacting
Ask for Clarification
State your Feelings

No

Blunt
Hurtful
Melodramatic
Insulting
Snarky

My samples

I read these two writing sections and crit partner reactions, but I thought I'd include them here in case you want to refer back to them.

If I’d said, “Dad didn’t have to answer that phone,” I knew damn well Sal would’ve understood what I meant. But even now, it was too raw to go poking around like that. [A1] So instead, I said, “Tell Chip he’ll be the first one to know if I get sick of the business.”

[A1]I can sense something significant here that I'm missing the significance of. What you're communicating here, why it's important, needs to be clarified more.

No. Not now, not after that first awkwardness was past. I wasn’t willing to let him back away now; that would be worse then having never kissed at all. I cupped the back of head and let his hair thread through my fingers [A1] . Not quite short, not quite long, and damp with sweat from the heat of the kiln.

[A1]I'm starting to see variations on this phrase in all the recent m/m that I've read lately. Just so you know. It's a pretty phrase, but it's becoming one of the new clichés.

Your assignment

Be on the lookout for snark. It's not your friend. It's not cool. Honest.

Packing Heat 076: Damage Control

Jordan Castillo Price — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 18:03:00 GMT

Ain't No Utopia Here

Thanks so much to Kat M. who ran an incisive post on Adele Journal about my recent, life-sucking incident with plagiarism and copyright infringement. Here's a link to the article.

The fact is, shit happens to all of us. We all have big, crazy, uncontrollable things that happen while we're trying to be writers. That's life!

But when it's happening to you, here are a few tactics you could use.

Tactics

Look at a calendar - plot out when everything is due, and if you can give yourself more time for certain projects, say to yourself, "I'm doing that NEXT week," write it down, and put it out of your mind. You've got enough hamster wheels going on in your head without worrying about something that's not actually due yet.
Look at what's effective - if you have to pick and choose what to do and what to leave undone, make sure you do your effective tasks.
If you're too freaked out to write - your administrative tasks aren't going anywhere. Chip away at them so that when you do get some mental space in which you can write again, you won't be stuck paying bills, registering your copyrights or catching up on correspondence.

Your Assignment

Do you keep a list? Try putting your stuff on the calendar if you're stressed out.

Do you keep a calendar? Try thinking about what actions will make the biggest impact rather than which ones are most urgent.

Come and See Me

I'm doing a reading with the Madison Vampire Coven!

7 pm on Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Borders Books West
Madison, WI