How to write for winning awards [Archive] - Absolute Write Water Cooler

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HRH

04-21-2005, 10:00 PM

I know I am not going to make myself very popular with this first post... but I need to ask..
my intro... I intend to start on my first full length novel.. aiming at 100,000 words.. sort of decided the topic on human relationships.. slightly thriller touch...

ok, the question is: what do judges look for in a work to give it a prize? more specifically, what do the judges for famous prizes, like booker or guardian, look for?

Jamesaritchie

04-21-2005, 10:59 PM

Fresie

04-21-2005, 11:48 PM

Probably, they look for you -- that is, they look for something truly special they haven't seen before. Something they don't expect. So the "recipe" here is probably the same as for writing all good prose: be yourself and speak your mind. Don't try to please anyone or write to somebody else's taste. Just put your own soul into the bloody thing and see what happens. Fingers crossed. :-)

James D. Macdonald

04-22-2005, 12:00 AM

It has to be the best darned thing they read that year.

===================

Go read these books:

The Pulitzer Prize

1995 The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields
1996 Independence Day by Richard Ford
1997 Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer by Steven Millhause
1998 American Pastoral by Philip Roth
1999 The Hours by Michael Cunningham
2000 Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri
2001 The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon
2002 Empire Falls by Richard Russo
2003 Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
2004 The Known World by Edward P. Jones

The National Book Award

1994 A Frolic of His Own - William Gaddis
1995 Sabbath's Theater - Philip Roth
1996 Ship Fever and Other Stories - Andrea Barrett
1997 Cold Mountain - Charles Frazier
1998 Charming Billy - Alice McDermott
1999 Waiting - Ha Jin
2000 In America - Susan Sontag
2001 The Corrections - Jonathan Franzen
2002 Three Junes - Julia Glass
2003 The Great Fire - Shirley Hazzard

Let us know when you've done, and what you've learned about what prize committees look for.

NeuroFizz

04-22-2005, 12:35 AM

Don't write for anyone (judges), write from your passion. That way, all you have to do is put your pen to paper, hold on with all of your might and hope you stay within the margins. Also, I woudn't suggest you start by setting a word limit. Let the story unfold without worrying about how far along you are. That's the best way to get into the mid-story slump. If your story comes out at 50,000 words, you can beef it up later. The most important thing is to get to the end of that first draft.

Jamesaritchie

04-22-2005, 03:25 AM

maestrowork

04-22-2005, 04:44 AM

I'm surprised I have read quite a number of them, and I'm not an "avid" reader.

I have good taste. :cool:

Mark Anderson

04-22-2005, 07:02 AM

I'm surprised I have read quite a number of them, and I'm not an "avid" reader.

I'm an avid reader and I've only heard of one of those books (Cold Mountain) and two of the authors (Roth, Sontag). I am illet...iliterete...dum. :Wha:

mdin

04-22-2005, 07:30 AM

I think it should be mentioned that the book needs to be well-published, first off. These prizes are all something that came after publication. There are a couple legitimate prizes out there for unpublished works, but the odds of winning any of those are quite a bit slimmer than the odds of getting it published, especially if it's good enough to win such a prize in the first place.

Write the book first. Then worry about getting it published. After that, let your publisher worry about entering it for those prizes. If you're the one that has to submit everything for a major book award, you're probably on a fool's errand. I was reading something about the Booker prize a while back where they were forced to limit publishers to only three entries because they were getting so many.

Good luck.

Julian Black

04-22-2005, 07:32 AM

I've read six of the Pulitzers and four of the Nationals. I enjoyed most of them, but I learned prize committees are looking for what I don't write.Same here. I read and enjoy a lot of stuff that wins awards, but I don't write it. Not even close.

I tried to write that sort of thing, and even managed to finish a novel last year, but by the time I was halfway through it I'd lost all interest in it. I rescued one character before consigning the ms. to the depths of my desk, where it now does a fine job keeping the whiskey and junk food stash from sliding to the back of the drawer.

Now I'm writing the kinds of things I want to read, but can't find enough of on my bookstore shelves. For me, it's the only thing worth writing anymore.

maestrowork

04-22-2005, 08:35 AM

The reason why I have heard of and read some of these books is that I also watch a lot of movies, and many of these "award-winning" books eventually get made into Oscar-nominated films, such as The Hours, Cold Mountain, In America, Empire Falls, etc. I'm a Michael Chabon fan so that's not really a surprise there. I have read reviews of The Correction, Three Junes and Middlesex to pique my interest. I don't write books like them, but some day I'd love to write a book worthy for an Oscar-caliber adaptation... here's to dreaming.

HRH

04-22-2005, 12:51 PM

wow

thats about the only word that comes to me... had no idea there would be 10 replies so soon :) :) thanx all...

i agree with all here.. write the book with your heart, get it published, and if the publisher thinks it is good enough, they will take it from there...

by the way, what, if any, is the agents role here? also, this is my first serious attempt at a novel, and i really do want to see it published... bestseller lists, awards et all are secondary.. so please tell me how useful is an agent, and how to go about getting one?

Julian Black

04-22-2005, 01:18 PM

Liam Jackson

04-22-2005, 01:30 PM

May I ask how you became interested in cat-vacuuming, and if you've ever considered going pro?

James D. Macdonald

04-22-2005, 06:54 PM

... so please tell me how useful is an agent, and how to go about getting one?

An agent is really, really useful.

You get one by writing a good book, then submitting it to the agent following that agent's stated preferences.

DO NOT PAY AN AGENT AN UPFRONT FEE!

Kate Nepveu

04-22-2005, 09:19 PM

To Julian:May I ask how you became interested in cat-vacuuming, and if you've ever considered going pro?Hey! If there's a pro league of cat vacuumers, why wasn't I informed?

Julian Black

04-22-2005, 09:59 PM

May I ask how you became interested in cat-vacuuming, and if you've ever considered going pro?Liam, honey, I was born to vacuum cats. Right now I have seven of them, so there's always bound to be at least one that needs vacuuuming.

As for going pro--I thought I had to sit down and write books in order to support my cat-vacuuming. Does this mean I can just vacuum whenever I want, and not have to bother with the whole writing thing? Wow...

James D. Macdonald

04-22-2005, 10:14 PM

I've met would-be writers who, without ever starting a work, had mapped out year by year the advances they would receive and the awards they would win.

This led to disappointment.

Write the best you can. Submit your works to the best places you can. What more can any of us do?

Maryn

04-22-2005, 10:38 PM

I have, too, Jim. While a certain amount of confidence can be helpful to anyone, even us reclusive introverted writers (who else can sit alone in a room for so long?), unfounded confidence doesn't help. Writing the book, that helps!

Maryn

maestrowork

04-22-2005, 11:16 PM

Julian Black

04-22-2005, 11:35 PM

DARN! I was all set to receive my Pulitzer in 2006, and a Nobel in 2008!Hey, I was all set to publish my first book by the time I was 20, and be raking in the big bucks as a Famous Author by the time I was 30. I can't remember when I was supposed to get the Pulitzer, but it may have been by the time I was 40.

Hmph. I've still got two more years, haven't I?

[goes back to writing]

Maryn

04-23-2005, 12:18 AM

Just remember, when you get that Pulitzer, that Mad magazine will give a free one-year subscription to anyone photographed with you and holding an issue of Mad.

Really! (The father of one of our kids' friends won, and did this for anyone who asked, starting with the libraries.)

Maryn

HRH

04-23-2005, 10:02 AM

Start with On the Getting of Agents (http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/004772.html) at Making Light--read the comments as well as TNH's original blog entry.

Here at AW, there's always the Ask the Agent forum (http://absolutewrite.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=58), with threads on various topics, as well as the Ask the Agent mega-thread (http://absolutewrite.com/forums/showthread.php?t=525). There's tons of information there, and of course you can always post questions.

And as if you needed more homework, head back over to Making Light and read Slushkiller and the subsequent comments (http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/004641.html). It's not specifically about getting an agent, but it is an education in why manuscripts get rejected--or accepted--by publishers. I can't recommend it enough.

hey julian, thnx a ton for those links... i was up most of the night going thru those pages....

An agent is really, really useful.
You get one by writing a good book, then submitting it to the agent following that agent's stated preferences.
DO NOT PAY AN AGENT AN UPFRONT FEE!

AND

I've met would-be writers who, without ever starting a work, had mapped out year by year the advances they would receive and the awards they would win.
This led to disappointment.
Write the best you can. Submit your works to the best places you can. What more can any of us do?

the would-be-writer sounds suspiciously like me :) :) :)
yes, i suppose finishing (to my satisfaction) the book should be first priority, then finding a good agent... but even before that, finding a publishing house that deals in books of type that i will write...

is there any listing of publishers with their genres? or is it the good old google way? am okay with googling.. but who wud not want things on a platter :) :) ?

by the way, also please please help me with this one... is there anything like a currently-in-style-topic or is that just something best ignored?

Liam Jackson

04-23-2005, 03:20 PM

I made a living for many years "herding black cats" (I don't know when or where the military use of this phrase originated, but looking back, I can see that it was damn sure appropriate.)

Neither am I sure 'professional cat vacuuming' pays anything, but it'll look good on that Pulitzer bio for you, Julian. Personally, I'm boycotting any awards that feature a 'z' in the title. It's a personal thing. Therefore, I'm aspiring to a Stoker or Hugo, if not in this lifetime, then another.

Kate, application kit for professional membership is in the mail.

pianoman5

04-23-2005, 04:11 PM

the would-be-writer sounds suspiciously like me :) :) :)
yes, i suppose finishing (to my satisfaction) the book should be first priority, then finding a good agent... but even before that, finding a publishing house that deals in books of type that i will write...

is there any listing of publishers with their genres? or is it the good old google way? am okay with googling.. but who wud not want things on a platter :) :) ?

by the way, also please please help me with this one... is there anything like a currently-in-style-topic or is that just something best ignored?

At the risk of sounding snarky, HRH, (should we call you "Your Majesty" or will "Your Highness" do?) the currently-in-style topic is: Capital Letters.

They're an awfully bourgeois convention, I know, but a surprising number of editors have learned to treat them as worthwhile components of the written word and more or less insist on them, in the right places. And to the best of my knowledge, all prize-winning authors use them liberally.

(Edit addition) Of course, in an informal environment like this nobody gives a rat's about the strict proprieties of form. But if you want to be a writer it's not a bad idea to get into the habit of writing correctly -- it saves you a lot of time in proofing/editing that is better spent on creative stuff.

James D. Macdonald

04-23-2005, 04:45 PM

is there any listing of publishers with their genres?

Yes. Writers's Market or Literary Market Place. Your local library should have both.

by the way, also please please help me with this one... is there anything like a currently-in-style-topic or is that just something best ignored?

Best ignored. Write what stokes the fire in your heart. Who knows what the "trendy" books will be three to five years from now?

Jamesaritchie

04-23-2005, 06:28 PM

the would-be-writer sounds suspiciously like me :) :) :)
yes, i suppose finishing (to my satisfaction) the book should be first priority, then finding a good agent... but even before that, finding a publishing house that deals in books of type that i will write...

is there any listing of publishers with their genres? or is it the good old google way? am okay with googling.. but who wud not want things on a platter :) :) ?

by the way, also please please help me with this one... is there anything like a currently-in-style-topic or is that just something best ignored?

It never hurts to find publishers who are looking for what you have. It may work out that you have to submit to a few publishers yourself. But one of the great things about having an agent is that she will know all the publishers out there, and will know what each wants, and when and how they want it.

I've always contended that a wise writer knows as much about publishers and publishing as a good agent knows, but it's awfully nice having someone who can handle that end of the business for you.

HRH

04-23-2005, 06:56 PM

At the risk of sounding snarky, HRH, (should we call you "Your Majesty" or will "Your Highness" do?) the currently-in-style topic is: Capital Letters.
~~~
if you want to be a writer it's not a bad idea to get into the habit of writing correctly -- it saves you a lot of time in proofing/editing that is better spent on creative stuff.

:) :) :) HRH will do just fine.. it really isn't the His/er Royal Highness acronym... and I do not have any claim of my blood being blue.. or even traces of blue...

About the capital letters... Sir Yes Sir! Will try to inculcate good habits, even if nobody gives a rat's whatever it is you wanted to say.

Writers's Market or Literary Market Place ... my first task tomorow. Time to do the homework. Thank you all for the prompt replies to a greenhorn's querries.

Just one more question, is it allright if I post chapters of my book on this forum for review and/or suggestions by all you great people? Believe me, I am NOT trying to save on editing fees :)

James D. Macdonald

04-23-2005, 06:59 PM

Just one more question, is it allright if I post chapters of my book on this forum for review and/or suggestions by all you great people?

The appropriate place is the "Share Your Work" board.

I'm not convinced that's a good idea.

wurdwise

04-23-2005, 08:20 PM

James, I'm curious as to why you say that, that you aren't convinced posting in Share Your Work is a good idea?

maestrowork

04-23-2005, 08:23 PM

James, I'm curious as to why you say that, that you aren't convinced posting in Share Your Work is a good idea?

I've heard that the mod there is a jerk... ;)

James D. Macdonald

04-23-2005, 09:19 PM

James, I'm curious as to why you say that, that you aren't convinced posting in Share Your Work is a good idea?

Couple of reasons, Wurd. First is the question of prior-publication v. first serial rights. This hasn't been definitively answered.

Second is that the quality of the comments you get will be all over the map.

Third is, for novel-length works, I'm not sure that comments based on just one chapter are useful to start with. With a novel the first concern should be the shape of the plot, not the paragraph-by-paragraph prose.

wurdwise

04-23-2005, 09:21 PM

That all makes sense, thanks.

Lenora Rose

04-23-2005, 10:20 PM

Couple of reasons, Wurd. First is the question of prior-publication v. first serial rights. This hasn't been definitively answered.

Second is that the quality of the comments you get will be all over the map.

Third is, for novel-length works, I'm not sure that comments based on just one chapter are useful to start with. With a novel the first concern should be the shape of the plot, not the paragraph-by-paragraph prose.

James is right. Most of the better respected Critique groups on the internet are private registration only to avoid the issue of prior publication.

The bit tossed into AWIdol is a bit of story I rather wish I hadn't thrown out in the open because I do mean to finish and sub the story, and now I might well ahve to note that part of it appeared in a public forum in my cover letters. In the unlikely event I'd gone on to the next phase of the contest, I'd have started all original pieces to avoid that.

The last point, about novel-length works, is what I would call the real "aargh!" factor - that those of us who write long works, this makes most critique venues less useful. I've used excerpts before, and got worth out of it, but only to people who knew the plot summary, and could check what they read against what was going to happen. (And that depends on having a clear enough idea what is going to happen to write a summary that *won't change* much before the end of the story. Since I only get second drafts critted, this is slightly easier.)

Still, it's better in the end to finish it all, then look for beta-readers who're willing to do a full length novel.

Yeah. I do :Lecture: .

I'll shut up now.

HRH

04-23-2005, 10:35 PM

reph

04-23-2005, 10:56 PM

Some publishers do consider a work published if it's been posted on a forum that isn't password-protected and limited to a small number of viewers. If you've used up first rights that way, you can't sell them.

I'd like to read Slushkiller. Unfortunately, my machine can't handle it. It looks like an Opera production: a column one word wide in places. Nothing should take ten minutes to download – and freeze the screen partway through.

James D. Macdonald

04-23-2005, 11:05 PM

Reph:

There's a bug somewhere in the CSS for Slushkiller. It's associated in some way with the Blog Ads.

Here are some fixes:

With Opera, you can turn off CSS.

Some people find pressing F11 twice helps.

Others find that pressing the Back button on their browsers (after the page has been given plenty of time to load) helps.

wurdwise

04-23-2005, 11:10 PM

Though I did say I think these three points make sense, and I agree with the other two, I can't say I agree with the one about posting an excerpt here for critique. If the novel is good, I seriously can't see how a publisher would care if one chapter of it had been on a public critique forum. There are so many such forums on the internet, if that were the case, sure would be a lot of books not getting published. I think it would be the farthest thing from their mind. And as far as a chapter being actually published on a website or in an online mag, from what I've learned, that's a plus, not a minus to the publisher.

brinkett

04-23-2005, 11:13 PM

Not only that, authors often post a sample chapter from their soon to be published work. Publishers do the same on their web sites.

Lenora Rose

04-24-2005, 12:25 AM

Not only that, authors often post a sample chapter from their soon to be published work. Publishers do the same on their web sites.

This is what's known as promotion. The excerpts in question are ALSO final draft, as they'll appear in the book.

However, an early draft of a chapter might not be representative of the final work as published. In fact, it can be guaranteed to be worse. So a rough and cruddy early draft of a chapter showing up on a web site might actually be anti-promotion - someone looking for a author's name finds the excerpt, doesn't note what kind of site it's posted on (Of course, we know everyone really checks these things carefully and reads all the comments before making a judgement...), could be turned off reading the final book.

Some authors have done some interesting promotional things on their site that involve the text of the whole novel being available to read. Some have done so while they're working on it. These are known as experiments, and exceptions, not standard practice.

maestrowork

04-24-2005, 12:32 AM

Excerpts on publisher's or author's site (or Amazon's "Search Inside the Book") is different -- they're for promotional purposes only, and also the rights have already been sold to the publisher. The author has the copyright as well.

I wouldn't put an excerpt of my WIP on the web, however.

brinkett

04-24-2005, 01:04 AM

So a rough and cruddy early draft of a chapter showing up on a web site might actually be anti-promotion - someone looking for a author's name finds the excerpt, doesn't note what kind of site it's posted on (Of course, we know everyone really checks these things carefully and reads all the comments before making a judgement...), could be turned off reading the final book.

That's true. It might also convey a lack of confidence on the part of the author, which could also be a turn-off.

Sassenach

04-24-2005, 02:29 AM

reph

04-24-2005, 03:25 AM

Reph:

There's a bug somewhere in the CSS for Slushkiller....With Opera, you can turn off CSS....
Thanks for that and the other suggestions, but what's CSS? Can I turn it off if I don't have Opera, or does that have to be done at the webmaster's end?

Maryn

04-24-2005, 08:03 PM

Originally Posted by Lenora Rose
So a rough and cruddy early draft of a chapter showing up on a web site might actually be anti-promotion -

What could possibly possess a writer to post an early draft?

Would you go to a job interview half dressed?
Serve a dinner that's only partially cooked?

To quote the eminent philosopher Cosmo Kramer:

"That's crazy talk!"
Without pointing fingers directly at the other writing site I frequent (admittedly, less and less), the rough-and-cruddy-draft mode is an online constant. My suggestion that everyone spell check before posting was booed down. Despite decent ideas, not one person who's ever posted a WIP there can produce a single page of manuscript that contains no mistakes. It's petty, but I feel better about my own writing, knowing that any agent or publisher who sees my work might reject it for content but not for lack of mastery over the language.

(Although I've served a dinner or two that wasn't as cooked as it should have been, come to think of it.)

Maryn, better writer than cook--or is it the other way around?

HRH

04-26-2005, 10:27 AM

Hi all, I am reporting on my homework.. :)
What I did was this:

Downloaded a list of agents from the anotherrealm.com site. This site has a $ sign for all those agents who have, on record, verified sales to legitimate royalty-paying publishers. I deleted those agents who did not have the $ signs. That left me with 1,123 agents. The site also recommends agents, on what criteria I do not know. Just to cite an example, this site recommends 66 agents, but does not recommend David Godwin, the agent of Arundhati Roy. I dont know why. Godwin, ofcourse, has stopped accepting new clients. The site doesnt mention this either.

Anyways, I took the recommended and highly recommended agents on a seperate document. There is a very large number of US agents, so I also took all overseas agents who were not recommended too. So now I have a list of 109 agents, much more do-able than 1123.

Most of these have contact addresses, others I will have to search for. Now I will prepare an introductory letter outlining the proposed novel, information about me, and ask if they are interested. I hope I recieve atleast one positive reply, then maybe I will get an agent. Otherwise, start mailing to the other 1014 agents...

I know people say that the best time to get an agent is when a publisher accepts your work. I also read that major publishers take submissions only from agents. So this is my attempt at getting an agent first.

May I post the list of 109 agents here so that I can benefit from your advice? Lots of things, maybe you know them personally, maybe as your agent...

debraji

04-26-2005, 05:01 PM

I hope your novel is complete and polished before you start contacting agents. They won't look at incomplete or proposed novels by unknown authors.

Jamesaritchie

04-26-2005, 05:37 PM

To reitrate what debreji said, there's no point in even thinking about an agent or a publisher until you've written the final draft of your novel, and have it spit-polished to perfection.

HRH

04-26-2005, 10:25 PM

I hope your novel is complete and polished before you start contacting agents. They won't look at incomplete or proposed novels by unknown authors.

To reitrate what debreji said, there's no point in even thinking about an agent or a publisher until you've written the final draft of your novel, and have it spit-polished to perfection.

So first I have to work on the novel... revise it, polish it, buff it, till I am satisfied... then get someone good to edit it.. redo the revise-polish-buff exercise and then start looking for agents and publishers...
Good strategy, the product should be ready before you start hawking it... but I had completely missed it... enthusiasm?
Now I realise that it will be a looooooooong time.. labour of love, eh?
Work, dear boy, work.
By the way, assuming one does not hit the (in)famous writer's block, how long to write a first draft, say 80,000 to 100,000 words?

Jamesaritchie

04-26-2005, 10:51 PM

So first I have to work on the novel... revise it, polish it, buff it, till I am satisfied... then get someone good to edit it.. redo the revise-polish-buff exercise and then start looking for agents and publishers...
Good strategy, the product should be ready before you start hawking it... but I had completely missed it... enthusiasm?
Now I realise that it will be a looooooooong time.. labour of love, eh?
Work, dear boy, work.
By the way, assuming one does not hit the (in)famous writer's block, how long to write a first draft, say 80,000 to 100,000 words?

Well, to be honest, I don't know many selling writers who get someone to edit the novel for them. Beta readers, yes, editors, no. Editing is part of writing, and it's pretty difficult to be good at one without being pretty good at the other.

As for how long it takes to write an 80-100K first draft, well, not to be a smart***, but it depends on how many words you write each day.

Seriously, two months is as reasonable as four years. from 2,000-2,500 words per days is not at all uncommon with a great many writers, even part-time writers. Others have trouble writing 2,000 words per week. But even at 2,000 words per week, you get your first draft in a year.

NeuroFizz

04-26-2005, 11:10 PM

HRH,

Writing a good story isn't like sitting on the porcelain growler and grunting a few times. Don't think about who you are going to show it to. Don't worry about its length.

Uh . . .

God . . . I'm soooo sorry. I just submitted a facilities improvement grant proposal for my other life, and it was just like the description above. How's that for motivation to do the fun stuff we talk about here?

maestrowork

04-26-2005, 11:17 PM

I do have a question, though. Who nominate books for awards? The publishers? The readers? Reviewers? Media?

Just curious.

HRH

04-27-2005, 08:46 AM

I do have a question, though. Who nominate books for awards? The publishers? The readers? Reviewers? Media?

Just curious.

Atlast.. one question I can try to answer :)
I know for sure that for the Booker prize, the publishers send a list out of which the judges choose.

Ella

04-27-2005, 08:52 AM

I do have a question, though. Who nominate books for awards? The publishers? The readers? Reviewers? Media?

Just curious.

Publishers can submit. Writers can submit. Readers can nominate. Some awards are vote-driven; the author & publisher get out there so that their names are recognized on the list of nominees.
The sticky part of trying to get in the lists for awards is watching the copyright date - some only choose books from within that year, so if you have a new book, go hard in the first year it's out.

firehorse

04-27-2005, 09:11 AM

a) My cat needs vacuuming (see below)

b) I couldn't make it through Middlesex. I felt there was something great in there, and he's a brilliant writer, but I just didn't care enough about the lead character.

c) I would love to write something as brilliant as The Hours.

d) I probably never will.

aadams73

04-27-2005, 02:43 PM

d) I probably never will.

Never say never. Your work may be better than The Hours.

HRH

04-29-2005, 10:18 AM

Hi ppl...
A friend asked me a question, why are award winning novels "boring" ? I said its a matter of taste.. but I am not convinced with this answer... could you please help me out?
A question not related to winning awards, but to writing...
Is it good / advisable to co-author? The obvious plus is that since writing styles differ, it can help in characterisation.. and the obvious minus is that it can be in-consistent. Please please tell...
Another one, this time about topics. Why is it that there are a very few "military life" novels? Is it because they dont sell or because authors are not comfortable with it?

James D. Macdonald

04-29-2005, 10:28 AM

Hi ppl...
A friend asked me a question, why are award winning novels "boring" ?

It's 'cause they're assigned to you in school.

I said its a matter of taste.. but I am not convinced with this answer... could you please help me out?
A question not related to winning awards, but to writing...
Is it good / advisable to co-author?

Only if you have someone totally compatible with you, who brings something to the partnership that you don't have yourself, and who you won't mind hating afterward.

The obvious plus is that since writing styles differ, it can help in characterisation.. and the obvious minus is that it can be in-consistent. Please please tell...
Another one, this time about topics. Why is it that there are a very few "military life" novels?

Say what?! The racks are full of them. Not just series like Griffin's The Corps, but hundreds and hundreds of techothrillers.

Is it because they dont sell or because authors are not comfortable with it?

Neither.

Liam Jackson

04-29-2005, 10:45 AM

<<<...Griffin's The Corps>>>

Griffen wrote eight (I think) novels about the Corps, set in WWII. Highly popular series. His also wrote the NYT best seller, Under Fire. (Korean War)
If you're interested in this genre, W.E. Griffin's work is a good place to start.

HRH

04-29-2005, 09:47 PM

Griffin's series.. technothrillers.. umm.. I was refering to something like "the life n times of".. I havent read the Griffin series.. should start now.

BTW, Uncle Jim, if I may call you that, do all co-authors end up hating each other? I would hate to loose a good friend to a book...

maestrowork

04-29-2005, 10:08 PM

Catch-22 is an interesting "the life and time of" military life book.

;)

HRH

04-30-2005, 07:30 PM

Looking at

BBC's Big List,
Booker Prize list,
Commonwealth Writers Prize list,
English PEN's Bigger List,
Larry McCaffery's 20th Century's Greatest Hits,
National Book Critics Circle Award (Fiction) list,
Orange Prize for Fiction's 50 Essential Reads by Contemporary Authors list,
PEN-Faulkner Award for Fiction list,
Pulitzer Prize Winners for Fiction list,
Radcliffe Publishing Course's 100 Best Novels of the 20th Century list,
Random House Modern Library 100 Best Books of the 20th Century Fiction list, Giller Prize list,
The Guardian's 100 Best Books of All Time list,
and the
Whitbread Book Awards list,

the following stats emerge:

Books:

Midnight's Children (Salman Rushdie) won 7 awards, maximum for any one book,

followed by 1984 (George Orwell), The Grapes Of Wrath (John Steinbeck), Ulysses (James Joyce), 5 each,

and

Beloved (Toni Morrison), Brave New World (Aldous Huxley), Catch-22 (Joseph Heller), Harry Potter series (J.K. Rowling), Invisible Man (Ralph Ellison), Lolita (Vladimir Nabokov), On The Road (Jack Kerouac), One Hundred Years of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez), Slaughterhouse-Five (Kurt Vonnegut), The Catcher In The Rye (J. D. Salinger), The Great Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald), The Sound And The Fury (William Faulkner), To The Lighthouse (Virginia Woolf), 4 each.

Authors:

William Faulkner (A Fable, The Reivers, As I Lay Dying, Light In August, Absalom Absalom!, The Sound And The Fury) has won most awards for books written (6),

followed by Charles Dickens, Ernest Hemingway, Henry James, Jacqueline Wilson, James Jones, Philip Roth (5 each),

D. H. Lawrence, Don DeLillo, E. M. Forster, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Ian McEwan, John Updike, Joseph Conrad, Roald Dahl, Terry Pratchett, Willa Cather (4 each)

Since 1991, the Booker Prize winners are:
1991 The Famished Road - Ben Okri
1992 The English Patient - Michael Ondaatje
1992 Sacred Hunger - Barry Unsworth
1993 Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha - Roddy Doyle
1994 How Late It Was, How Late - James Kelman
1995 The Ghost Road - Pat Barker
1996 Last Orders - Graham Swift
1997 The God of Small Things - Arundati Roy
1998 Amsterdam - Ian McEwan
1999 Disgrace - J. M. Coetzee
2000 The Blind Assassin - Margaret Atwood
2001 True History of the Kelly Gang - Peter Carey
2002 The Life of Pi - Yann Martel
2003 Vernon God Little - DBC Pierre

Can we come to any conclusion about what characterises books that win awards? Obviously, all are well-written. What about topics? Play of emotions? Conflict? Triumph? Writing style?

wurdwise

04-30-2005, 07:36 PM

The common theme I see is human suffering, and the authors knew how to make us feel as if we actually knew their characters, or were their characters. Total immersion into the world of the book.

JanaLanier

05-01-2005, 02:10 AM

Can we come to any conclusion about what characterises books that win awards? Obviously, all are well-written. What about topics? Play of emotions? Conflict? Triumph? Writing style?

Insight into the human condition? Great writing? Since the writing styles and topics and are all over the map, I'd say the bottom line is that there's no formula to win a literary award. And as a corollary, I don't think any one of these writers wrote their novel in order to win an award.

I'm not trying to be snarky, but my goals as a writer are: 1) to get published by a traditional publisher and 2) to entertain my readers. Award lists are for people looking for something good to read.

:)

maestrowork

05-01-2005, 07:10 AM

Wow, I've only read "The Life of Pi." I tend to stay away from reading too many books about "human suffering."

HRH

05-01-2005, 08:01 AM

~there's no formula to win a literary award~

umm... I think I dont agree, but may be I am wrong. There are certain given constants on basis of which one can evaluate work, unique for every field. This is true for every evaluation, may it be grading of school papers, deciding on how you will vote (for the non-belongers), and possibly even literary awards. Its just that as a novice writer, I dont know what criteria judges use for judging literary awards.

~I don't think any one of these writers wrote their novel in order to win an award.~

I dont think so too.. :) but they did win, which means that their works were good enough, judged good enough on certain criteria... the whole purpose of this thread is to know what these criteria are...

HRH

05-01-2005, 08:03 AM

I am posting this as a seperate post so that JanaLanier doesnt think this is directed towards her. What follows is just me.

I dont know why, maybe it is just my feeling, but everytime I talk about awards, who wins what award and why, I get replies like "you dont write for winning awards" and "writing is an expression of your soul" and all other such. I sometimes feel asking such a question somehow gives the impression that I am writing JUST for winning an award. Then there are all the holier-than-thou answers.

If writing can be viewed as a commercial venture, then why not aspire to be the best? And how do we, and indeed our readers and peers, judge/know our quality? It can be 1) getting published 2) by the popularity of our work 3) the awards we recieve 4) any other criterion, which I am unaware of.

Winning an award is a recognition of the quality of our work. Now I absolutely love Forsyth and Archer, they are popular too, but I dont see their names on the Booker list. Also, I know I am not cut for writing pop-thriller-hero-saves-the-world fiction. I am a simple person with simple ideas. I can talk about life, challenges, obstacles, loss, triumph... what I see around me. Herman Wouk's Inside Outside is a book I like. This can be a terribly boring genre, but hey, do you notice that most of the award winning books talk about exactly that.

In order to write a book in this genre, get it published and to give the reader money's worth, make the reader feel for the character, the book has to come from deep within.. some call it the soul. It has to be written well, in acceptable, standard language, which doesnt put the reader to sleep. But there has to be something more, something much more than a well written cry of the soul. That something is what I want to know.

The popularity of this thread on AW shows how pertinent/popular this question is. Lets face it, winning awards IS a big deal. It establishes the quality of your book, the quality of your writing, increases sales of the book, guarantees great sales for the coming two books atleast, it also means recognition, fame, and sometimes, money.

So, Ladies and Gentlemen, please lets talk more on what is it about some books that they are judged "best in the year"... what makes them click?

wurdwise

05-01-2005, 08:21 AM

HRH, yes, of course we would all love to win any kind of award, we joke about the Pulitzer and the Nobel prize, but I think what everybody is trying to say is that you can't plan to write an award winning book, or strive for that. It is a miniscule kernel of hope that lives in the back of your mind, that if your writing is great enough, if you can deliver a great, universal message, if you work you tail off and be good, maybe, just maybe, could you win an award someday? But see? If you have that in the forefront of your mind? It will kill the true purpose of writing, which is to strive to do all those things for the reader, not for an award.

Ray, I don't think it's so much that people LIKE to read about human suffering, it's just that we all do suffer, and to read about someone going through the same struggles, and for a writer to make the human condition beautiful in spite of the suffering, to see man rise above his circumstances, those to me are the great books.

HRH

05-01-2005, 08:42 AM

~you can't plan to write an award winning book, or strive for that. It is a miniscule kernel of hope that lives in the back of your mind, that if your writing is great enough, if you can deliver a great, universal message, if you work you tail off and be good, maybe, just maybe, could you win an award someday? But see? If you have that in the forefront of your mind? It will kill the true purpose of writing, which is to strive to do all those things for the reader, not for an award~

if your writing is great enough, if you can deliver a great, universal message, if you work you tail off and be good... see, thats a start on a list :)

seriously, i see awards as recognition of merit. I will say it again, I do not plan to write to win the Booker/Pulitzer/Nobel... I just want to know how merit is judged :)

Jamesaritchie

05-01-2005, 09:41 PM

If writing can be viewed as a commercial venture, then why not aspire to be the best? And how do we, and indeed our readers and peers, judge/know our quality? It can be 1) getting published 2) by the popularity of our work 3) the awards we recieve 4) any other criterion, which I am unaware of.

Winning an award is a recognition of the quality of our work. Now I absolutely love Forsyth and Archer, they are popular too, but I dont see their names on the Booker list. Also, I know I am not cut for writing pop-thriller-hero-saves-the-world fiction. I am a simple person with simple ideas. I can talk about life, challenges, obstacles, loss, triumph... what I see around me. Herman Wouk's Inside Outside is a book I like. This can be a terribly boring genre, but hey, do you notice that most of the award winning books talk about exactly that.

First, I don't think winning awards such as the Booker or the Pulitzer means you're the best. Nor do I think it's a recognition of the quality of our work, except with one or two awards, and in a few cases. To believe this, you have to believe a handful of judges, nearly all of whom setadfastly refuse to read popul;ar fiction, knows the difference between quality and crap. Too many types of novels are automatically excluded from winning such awards, and politics, snobbery, and the "credentials" of those who win such awards play far too large a part in the process for me to believe this.

I think judging quality is very simple. 1. If a bunch of readers like it, the novel has something going for it. 2. If the general reading public still reads it for pleasure a hundred years after it's written, it's a quality novel.

I think that's all there is to it. I want readers to judge my fiction by how much they enjoy it. I absolutely do not want readers who judge my fiction by what my peers say, or by what some small group of judges sitting on an awards panel thinks.

What matters to me as a writer, all that matters to me, is how much my fans enjoy what I've written. And what matters to me as a reader, all that matters to me, is how much I enjoy reading a novel someone else wrote.

Our readers should judge us by how much THEY like what we've written. Not by what our peers say, not by what some tiny panel of judges say, but purely and simply by how much they like what we've written.

And in my opinion, all awards are not created equal. The Pulitzer tends to get it right more often than any of the other awards, and outside the Pulitzer, I'd say you have a 99% chance of knowing what kind of novel it is, and how it ends, without reading it. Even the Nobel Prize for literature has become so political over the last twenty years that, as far as I'm concerned, it's long since a worthless prize. The Nobel is no longer a measure of quality, but of political correctness, or a belief system the judges are sure to approve.

Many of the award winning novels are well written, and many are absolute crap. Nothing goes as unread as award winning novels. I've seen polls showing that well over half those who routinely buy such novels never finish reading them. They buy them as status symbols, and when they are read, it's often so the reader can say he or she has read them, not because they love the writing or the story.

It's like all the voting that was done to determine the best 100 novels of the last century. In nearly every poll, the top novel was Ulysses, by James Joyce. Trouble was, later questioning revealed more than half the judges had never even read it, and many who did read it hadn't liked it. And it's one of the most unpopular novels ever written with the reading public. And many who voted for it are the same people who vote for many of the awards we're talking about here.

Award winning novels aren't voted on by readers, but by a select few judges who almost always have an agenda. Sometimes they get it right, and some award winning novels are both very well-written, and popular with readers. Others are not at all well-written, and are hated by readers.

Now, by and large, I like Herman Wouk's fiction. I enjoyed "Youngblood Hawk," "The Winds of War," and "War and Remembrance" a great deal. And by and large, I like Larry McMurtry. "Lonesome Dove" won the Pulitzer, and deserved it and more. But even "Lonesome Dove," great as it was, had a miserable, can't-win ending.

If you really want my opinion of what award-winning novels have in common, it's an unhappy ending. I can't recall the last time I read an award winning novel that had anything resembling a happy ending, or that was conservative in nature, or that was pro-Christian, or even that had the main character win at anything without paying for it with everything he cared about. And "Lonesome Dove" was the last award-winning novel I read that had main characters I'd want to have anything to do with in real life.

You say you love Forsyth and Archer. So why do you believe the opinion of a handful of judges, who have likely never read either Forsyth or Archer, and wouldn't admit it if they had, is better than your own? In my opinion, writers like Forsyth and Archer don't win awards precisely because they write for people like you and me and the reading public at large.

The Pulitzer gets it right fairly often because they do take popularity into account, at least to a degree. The Nobel used to do this, but it's no longer the case. When you take popularity out of the equation, I think you also, for the most part, take quality out, as well.

If I ever win an award, I want it to be a popularity award, pure and simple. I want to be voted on by readers, not by judges. Give me a Hugo and you can have your Booker.

I love Hemingway and Faulkner, but to be honest, I'd a hundred times rather read a novel by Stephen King, Louis L'Amour, James D. MacDonald, Dean Koontz, or Nora Roberts than 98% of award winning novels, including the Nobel.

By and large, I think it's the judges of most of the awards who have a holier-than-thou attitude, and I don't think their taste in fiction is anymore to be trusted than my own, and considerbly less so than that of the reading public at large. The reading public may buy bad novels, but such novels don't last. The reading public really can tell the difference between popcorn and steak, and over enough years, they discard the popcorn and keep the steak. I'm not at all convinced most judging panels know the difference.

And in the end, I think the ONLY real test of worth is time. A novel can win every award there is, and then sink into oblivion, never to be read again. It happens all the time. Another novel can win no wards at all, and still be bought and read and loved a hundred years later. I'll take the latter over the former every last time.

I don't think there's anything at all wrong, or holier than thou, with saying the smartest thing any writer can do is to read what they most enjoy reading, and to write what they most enjoy writing. I sincerely doubt any successful writer, including those who win awards, does it any other way.

JanaLanier

05-01-2005, 10:25 PM

[QUOTE=HRH]But there has to be something more, something much more than a well written cry of the soul. That something is what I want to know.
QUOTE]

That's the million-dollar question, isn't it? I'm not a literary judge, just a writer and a reader, and I can tell you I haven't a clue.

But I'd agree with James A Ritchie -- some of the best books I've ever read haven't won awards. Take Stephen King's The Stand, which is one of my favorite books. I bet people will still read it, for years to come, and enjoy it. Yet The Stand didn't win anything, except spectacular sales figures. That's the kind of book I want to write.

You mentioned that writing is a commercial venture. Yet many of those award winners will never sell as many copies as other mainstream works.

So the bottom line -- to steal from Uncle Jim -- tell a story that people want to read. That's our job as a writer.

HRH

05-01-2005, 11:00 PM

WOW.

Please pardon the capitals... but the above posts are really good.

I whole-heartedly agree that popularity is the best yardstick... about award-winning novels not being great reads is also something I will agree to...

If you really want my opinion of what award-winning novels have in common, it's an unhappy ending. I can't recall the last time I read an award winning novel that had anything resembling a happy ending, or that was conservative in nature, or that was pro-Christian, or even that had the main character win at anything without paying for it with everything he cared about.

more to the list of what you (dont) want to put in your novel if you want to win an award..

You say you love Forsyth and Archer. So why do you believe the opinion of a handful of judges, who have likely never read either Forsyth or Archer, and wouldn't admit it if they had, is better than your own? In my opinion, writers like Forsyth and Archer don't win awards precisely because they write for people like you and me and the reading public at large.

I dont say I believe the opinion of judges as the last word, however, these judges (who may be biased, groupies or whatever) decide the award. Winning an award adds to the author's reputation, however good or bad that author might be. It also has a positive effect on sales, whatever the reason the public may want to buy the book.

Salman Rushdie, George Orwell, Aldous Huxley, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Virginia Woolf, William Faulkner, Charles Dickens, Ernest Hemingway, D. H. Lawrence, E. M. Forster, Joseph Conrad, Ben Okri etall are celebrated authors, in part because of the awards they won. I am not saying they didnt write great. Yes, their popularity is to a very great extent because they wrote/write well. But possibly, the awards also help...

I will make a possibly controvertial statement. I personally did not like Arundati Roy's God of Small Things. I did not get past the first page of that book. In my circle of friends, only one person claimed she liked the book, but when pressed, said she did not understand it. It won the Booker. It made Roy a world-famous writer, lots of sales, decent money.

I agree that possibly Forsyth, Archer, and other popular writers do not win because they write easy-to-understand, goody goody books. The point is not if award-winning books or writers are great, not even which awards are good. It is not even about how a writer should go about writing, what goals to set etc. The discussion is about why some books win awards and others dont.

I don't think there's anything at all wrong, or holier than thou, with saying the smartest thing any writer can do is to read what they most enjoy reading, and to write what they most enjoy writing. I sincerely doubt any successful writer, including those who win awards, does it any other way.

oops. If I came across that way, please pardon me. I meant the remarks which I heard in my discussions. Things like "okay, it's your book... you want to write for winning awards, go ahead, but that isnt how you should do it..."

Jamesaritchie

05-02-2005, 04:49 AM

WOW.

Please pardon the capitals... but the above posts are really good.

I whole-heartedly agree that popularity is the best yardstick... about award-winning novels not being great reads is also something I will agree to...

more to the list of what you (dont) want to put in your novel if you want to win an award..

I dont say I believe the opinion of judges as the last word, however, these judges (who may be biased, groupies or whatever) decide the award. Winning an award adds to the author's reputation, however good or bad that author might be. It also has a positive effect on sales, whatever the reason the public may want to buy the book.

Salman Rushdie, George Orwell, Aldous Huxley, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Virginia Woolf, William Faulkner, Charles Dickens, Ernest Hemingway, D. H. Lawrence, E. M. Forster, Joseph Conrad, Ben Okri etall are celebrated authors, in part because of the awards they won. I am not saying they didnt write great. Yes, their popularity is to a very great extent because they wrote/write well. But possibly, the awards also help...

I will make a possibly controvertial statement. I personally did not like Arundati Roy's God of Small Things. I did not get past the first page of that book. In my circle of friends, only one person claimed she liked the book, but when pressed, said she did not understand it. It won the Booker. It made Roy a world-famous writer, lots of sales, decent money.

I agree that possibly Forsyth, Archer, and other popular writers do not win because they write easy-to-understand, goody goody books. The point is not if award-winning books or writers are great, not even which awards are good. It is not even about how a writer should go about writing, what goals to set etc. The discussion is about why some books win awards and others dont.

oops. If I came across that way, please pardon me. I meant the remarks which I heard in my discussions. Things like "okay, it's your book... you want to write for winning awards, go ahead, but that isnt how you should do it..."

While I love well-written literary fiction, I can't get through more than four of the writers you listed. Those four are very good, I think, but I firmly believe the others won not because they wrote well, not because their books were popular, but purely because they made a statement the judges wanted to hear. The reading public seems to agree.

There's no doubt that winning big awards can help a writer's reputation, especially in some circles, and can help sales, at least for a while. Though sales of many award winning novels are surprisingly low. But I think the day is gone where writers who are already widely popular, as were Hemingway and Faulkner, stand much chance of winning such awards.

I think many writers who win the big awards, particularly the Nobel, win for a lifetime of work, and not just for a single novel.

I'm excluding the Pulitzer here, though it's following along more and more, but I also think you have to wirte about social issues, and take the "proper" view on these social issues. This seems to be key in winning big awards.

I also think many of the awards, partivularly the Nobel, took a left turn in the early eighties and started handing out awards with no thought at all to anything except politics and political correctness, something that wasn't true before that time. Nobels before the eighties were usually, not always, but usually, handed out to good writers the public loved reading. There were exceptions where politics played a definite role, but that wasn't the norm.

If you really want to aim for most of the awards, I think it's pretty simple. You write about ordinary people facing real life problems, you stick a social issue in, and you don't have a happy ending, unless the happy ending involves some power structure losing. What you absolutely can't put in is a good guy protagonist who wins, and who lives happily ever after.

Now, I don't hate awards, and I'd take a Pulitzer in a second. But honestly, the way most awards are handed out now, and looking at the winners, if I won most of the other awards, I'd seriously wonder what I was doing wrong.

But seriously, I don;t think there's any real way of knowing what to put in or what to leave out except by reading and studying the last twenty years of awards. I've read a lot of them, enjoyed some, hated others, but all I really know for certain is that writing novels like those is not why I became a writer.

oswann

05-02-2005, 03:37 PM

FWIW I have judged awards in a different discipline (painting) on a number of occasions and there are characteristics common to all of the awards I have participated in.

The juries are always looking for specific things which often may not have anything to do with the quality of the work presented. In one particular award, I was asked to preside over the jury and make the final decision. What were offered as the juries choices were works suitable to win an award. This means work which fulfilled criteria to keep a small number of people with direct interests happy. Magnitude, volume, density, history, impact. And size, the work needs to be big to merit an award. I know these are vague terms but these are the things discussed.

For this particular prize I chose a work completely different to the juries choice (provoking much consternation) based on which work I liked the best.

It was small and exquisite in a sea of puffed up award winners. I defended my choice to the end and presented a considerable amount of money to a teary young artist who had made a beautiful painting. I was thanked for my time and never asked back to judge.

Os.

HRH

05-05-2005, 11:04 PM

~The juries are always looking for specific things which often may not have anything to do with the quality of the work presented. ~ Magnitude, volume, density, history, impact. And size, the work needs to be big to merit an award. ~I was thanked for my time and never asked back to judge.
Os.

Hey, Os! How should we translate Magnitude, volume, density, history, impact and size from paintings to books? Any ideas?
And you did good, standing up for quality... never asked back eh? Does this reflect on most, if not all, judging processes?