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Every night at bedtime, I make up a story for my daughter.

She loves them.  But she’s a very picky listener.  She prefers stories centered around her favorite cat, Shadow.  With the magic of storytelling, Shadow can speak English and have exciting adventures.

In real life, Shadow is a fluffy, fat, beautiful tomcat.  He’s also really mischievous. It fits his personality to have him do mischievous things in the bedtime stories.

But if my daughter can tell that my story is veering off into an area where Shadow is getting into some sort of scrape and heading into trouble, she revolts.

“No! Don’t make Shadow do it, Mama! Change it! Change the story!”

Yes, she would rather hear a watered-down, happy-sappy story about Shadow having a picnic with her on the top of a breezy hill in the sunshine rather than hear an exciting tale of adventure with Shadow possibly getting in over his furry head.

She just can’t bear to hear anything bad—even something made up—about her favorite pet.

It reminds me of the problems JK Rowling faced when she was writing her last Harry Potter book.  I read an interview with her where she expressed her discomfort at the fact that parents would email her begging that Harry’s life be spared so their children wouldn’t be devastated.

Then there was the case of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.  He eventually got so tired of writing Sherlock that he killed him off during a fight with his archenemy Moriarty at a waterfall.  Readers were so outraged that he had to bring Sherlock back from the dead.

I don’t really have much of an answer for this. Obviously writers want creative freedom to write the story the way they want to. This has, I think, to be balanced with the commercial element of writing for our readers. 

I think if we are planning to do away with a main character, then some foreshadowing would be a good idea.  Anything that’s really abrupt and out of the blue and doesn’t fit with the tone of the story and our readers might feel cheated. 

Yes, I can have Shadow the cat get into a major jam and have to spend his imaginary afternoon in time out for his mischief.  (I would never dream of having the kitty get into any harm in a story.) But if I’ve lost my listener because she’s plugging up her ears, then I’m basically telling a bedtime story to myself.

How much are you taking your readers into account as you write your book or your sequels? 

I think I’ve put off posting about Twitter, except for my weekly tweet roundup.

For a while, I’ve gotten some hints from tweeters that I should have a sort of Twitter Manifesto. :) But I’m not much of a manifesto writer.

I get a lot of the same questions from folks on Twitter, though—through @ replies and DMs, so I figure I should probably run a post on them. For anyone who’s on Twitter, I’m at @elizabethscraig.

I’ll post this in a Q & A format and cover the questions I usually get:

How did you start tweeting links and why?

I was reading a lot of writing links and it seemed like it would be helpful to pass on ones that I thought were especially good. That snowballed until I had followers that were very interested in a variety of writing-related tweets. These were writers in different stages of their writing career—some just starting out, some veterans. So I started searching for good, solid posts—even if they were on topics that didn’t directly apply to what I’m writing.

It’s a platform for me, too, and provides a very indirect way of marketing and getting my name out there—and being indirect is really the only way I feel comfortable with promo.

How do you find the links?

I don’t get them from my Twitter feed—I actually subscribe directly to the writing blogs’ RSS feed and read them in my Google Reader.

How many blogs do you subscribe to and how do you browse them?

According to my Google Reader, I subscribe to 1,482 blogs. Ack. I have my Google Reader set on “list” view and I scan through them quickly—usually looking for writing craft-related posts.

How long does it take you to find posts, read them, and tweet them in a day?

It usually takes a little over an hour each day.

Are you on Twitter all day?

Actually, no—I usually just check in with Twitter a few times a day. If I have more free time, I check in more frequently.

How do you schedule tweets?

I use an application called “Social Oomph” to schedule my tweets. The idea is to spread them out through the day so that they’re (hopefully) not overwhelming and are reaching people in other time zones.

Why aren’t you following me back?

I follow everyone back, although sometimes I get a little behind with updating my list. If I’m not following you, then I think you’re a spammer or else you’ve just started following me. If you’re not a spammer, just send me an email at elizabethspanncraig(at)gmail(dot)com. Or try to DM me on Twitter (jury’s out on whether you can DM someone who doesn’t follow you on the new version of Twitter) and let me know. :)

What’s the best way to contact you?

I check my DMs on Twitter at least once a day, but you can also email me at elizabethspanncraig(at)gmail(dot)com.

I have a great writing blog—how can I bring my blog to your attention?

I’m always looking for new writing blogs to add to my Google Reader. Just send me a DM or an email with your link and I’ll subscribe to the RSS feed.

How do you pick which posts to run?

I’m usually looking for craft-related, industry-related, social media, or promo-related posts. I love posts that are easily skimmed, have great content, and can be helpful to a lot of writers.

Can you tweet my book review?

I don’t usually tweet reviews, sorry.

Can you tweet something out to your followers?

It depends on what it is—I’m trying to stick to writing-related, tip-related tweeting. I figure the more I send spammy stuff, then I’m watering down my tweet stream.

(From PR firms, who do like to contact me): What is your marketing strategy behind these tweets? Does it seem to be working?

There wasn’t a whole lot of marketing thought that went into this, which is why I’m probably getting so many DMs from PR people! I’m focusing on the tweeting mainly as a service to other writers, but I am gaining a nice platform in the process. It seemed to work out really well with pre-orders for my last book.

Do you read your tweet stream?

Honestly, I find my tweet stream totally overwhelming. If I try to read or follow all those incoming tweets then it makes me feel like I have ADHD. :) I follow over 6100 and I can blink and find 20 updates.

What if I wrote a great blog post and you didn’t notice it—can I bring it to your attention?

Sure—feel free to DM me with it. I can’t promise to run it, but I promise to take a look…and I’ll make sure I subscribe to your feed.

If I wrote a great post a few days ago and tweeted you about it and it hasn’t run, will it ever run?

Sometimes I schedule tweets way out—sometimes a week or more…so it might still run.

Do you @ all of the blog post authors whose links you tweet?

I used to, and I’d really like to be able to. Some of them I do know by heart, if they frequently have good material. Some of them I’ll @ because it’s someone I know I’ve never tweeted. But usually I just don’t have enough time to look up the Twitter handle on each blog to @ the authors. If your “Follow Me on Twitter” is very visible to the top of your blog page, then you’re a lot more likely to be @ed.

Do you ever chat on Twitter?

I don’t ever @ anyone in conversation…but I do have DM conversations with people. I’m just trying to keep my Twitter profile page completely link-related so make it an easier resource for folks to access.

What types of posts are most likely to be tweeted by you? Which are most popular and most likely to be retweeted by others?

Craft posts and clever humorous posts are the top favorites of my followers. List posts are appreciated, too. Anything that’s helpful about social media, or organizing our writing life helps, too.

Is there a way to make my blog posts more likely to be tweeted by you or by others?

Definitely. I’d recommend a post title that is clear as to the post content, an RSS feed button, and a visible Twitter button on the top half of the blog main page. I’d also recommend a non-rambling post, top-notch, concise content, and something that’s easy-t0-scan (bullet points and bold type helps.)

Some days your links seem better than others. How do you do quality control?

Sometimes, despite the large number of blogs I subscribe to, there’s a lack of content out there…right now I’m blaming NaNo. :) Holidays play into that, too. And…sometimes I’m busy and I have less time to hunt through my Reader.

Do you do #FF and #WW? Why not?

I used to, but with the number of followers and FFs and WWs I get now, I’m just not able to return the favor without sending out an entire page of spam. I really appreciate the ones I get from followers, though!

Is there a place where I can locate these links or search them?

I’m posting all my tweets from the past week each Sunday here on my blog. My blog is searchable (top, left corner). I’m going to have a page with all my Twitterifics on one page, which I think will make searching the content easier. I’m hoping to get started on that soon. :)

And now…a disclaimer (I know–so corporate-sounding…)

Occasionally I’ll tweet links that I think show an interesting point of view on, or controversial approach to, writing or the publishing industry. This doesn’t necessarily mean that I agree or disagree with the post’s author–just that I think the discussion is interesting and believe that others would, too. Please don’t assume my opinion of a subject, or my support of an author’s opinion, based on my tweeting the link.

That being said, if I think a post’s writing advice is completely wrongheaded, I’m not tweeting it.

Thanks everyone! Hope this helps.

I’ll admit that as I’m writing, I keep half an eye on my word count.

It used to mess me up to do that. But now, I think it’s like checking my speedometer when driving a car—it just helps keep me in line so I don’t get into trouble later.

If you’re way over or way under the target word count for your genre, it’s going to mean some work later on. You don’t want to feel like you’re adding fluff to a book to get up to the target count and you don’t want to feel like you’re slashing important scenes, either. Sometimes it’s easier just to watch it as you go along.

When I’m done with a first draft, it’s usually a short 68,000 words. I write pretty sparely now—it used to be that I’d babble on and on when I was writing and wasn’t sure what direction I was going to take the plot next. Now I just stop writing when I get to that point and do some quick brainstorming. Otherwise, I have filler to remove later.

My target is 75,000 words and my manuscript goes right up to that after I add setting, character description, and the small subplots that I love including.

If you’re a newer writer, though, it might be better to just write the book you want to write and worry about the word count during revisions. I know that worked better for me while I was getting my feet wet.

I know some writers worry that word count limits creative freedom. But we can write whatever we want and make the book as long we want it….it just might not sell. If our goal is to sell our finished manuscript, at some point word count is going to have to be considered. Unfortunately, even if your book is excellent, it’s going to be hard to have it read by an agent or editor if it’s too long.

Here are some useful links to consider if you’re at the point that you need to take a look at your word count:

Word Count for Novels and Children’s Books: The Definitive Post

Think twice before querying your 291,000 word book

A Few Words on Word Counts: How to Beef Up or Slim Down (especially for freelance writers, but some tips that will help novelists, too)

An agent on word counts (and here, where she defends her position)

Writing Nowadays–Word Count Violations and You

Bolstering Your Word Count

How To Get Ahead When You Are Behind On Your Word Count

Do you watch your word count as you write, or is it something you worry about later in the process?

Before I emailed the Memphis 3 manuscript to my agent on Monday, I followed a checklist of problems to look for and things to do before submitting the document.

I tried to read the first five chapters as if I were a brand-new reader for the series. Would it all make sense to someone reading about these characters for the first time?

I made sure I’d sketched out the characters and setting—and not just kept it all in my head and thought I’d written it out.

Readers let me know (they’re good about that :) ) that they wanted more chapter breaks. I put in breaks around every ten pages.

I looked for my favorite words that I overuse.

I looked for wishy-washy words that undermine my writing: “I think,” “maybe,” “I guess,” “a little,” “some,” “seem.”

I looked for filler words.

I looked for repetition in the story and repetition in dialogue.

I looked for anything murky that sounded confusing.

I made sure the characters seemed consistent from start to finish (unless I wanted them to change—and I made sure I had good motivation for a change.)

I looked for continuity errors and other boo-boos.

I sketched out a timeline as I read the draft and made sure the story was linear and made sense with the timeline.

What kinds of things do you look for when you revise? And…if you write different genres, do you look for different things?

Part of my busy weekend last weekend involved travel. :)

I visited San Diego with my college roommate—just to go somewhere that was scenic and relaxing, that we hadn’t visited before.

But I needed to finish my manuscript and send it to my agent yesterday—so I used every minute of that five hour flight to and from San Diego to Charlotte, to work. I inserted place description, character description, chapter breaks, and a full subplot. I’ve a feeling, actually, that I might have driven the folks beside me nutty with my typing.

But after ten total hours of flying, I had a manuscript that was ready to turn in.

Both flights were totally packed with people—not a seat was free. And the flight to California from North Carolina was stressful at times.

When we were waiting at the gate in Charlotte to board the plane, there was a toddler of about 13-14 months who was absolutely pitching a fit.

I think every one of the passengers was praying that we wouldn’t be seated next to that baby, or near him, for the five hour flight.

Fortunately, I wasn’t. But that child had quite a set of lungs on him. His wailing—no, really, it was screaming—lasted for the entire fifteen minutes before boarding the plane and a full hour after we got on. He certainly had stamina.

What was interesting to me was the reaction of the other passengers on the plane. And what that reaction seemed to say about them.

There were some people who just looked stoically miserable.

There were some passengers who turned to look angrily back—at the parents.

There was a woman who looked concerned about the baby.

There were a couple who somehow managed to go to sleep, making me wonder why they were exhausted enough to doze during that racket.

I saw one young woman in her early twenties who put down her Cosmo magazine, looked back toward the baby with great irritation and rolled her eyes at me when she saw me looking at her.

I saw several people plug their ears with earbuds and listen to their iPods and not think twice about it.

I heard one elderly lady behind me tell the person next to her, “The poor thing. He doesn’t understand what’s going on.”

I heard one person say, angrily, that the parents shouldn’t fly a child that age for that length of time.

For me? I just worked right through it for the hour. Anyone could correctly draw the conclusion that I had kids of my own, a lot of work to do, and was immune to the noise.

The nice thing about showing character through reaction is that we can actually let the reader draw their own conclusions—even incorrect ones. That gives us room to write surprises into our stories. We can lead the reader to believe one thing about a character and make a surprising revelation about them later.

There were a few people on the plane who I figured weren’t parents—just solely based on their angry reaction. But my impression could easily have been wrong.

They might just be really impatient people who would be just as upset if their own babies were screaming like that.

They might have just been unusually tired or flying to a stressful situation—like a family member in the hospital. Maybe a situation like that one wouldn’t ordinarily have fazed them, but did this one time.

Do you use character reactions to a situation to show something about them? Do you ever purposefully give a misleading impression of a character? How else do you give readers clues to a character’s personality?