What is "layering?" -- writing tip.

Question from the e-mail: Someone in my writers' group mentioned "layering" as a technique. I never heard the term before, can you tell me what they meant?

Answer: Sometimes, I use a method I call "layering." I'm sure this isn't a technique original to me and believe that many writers may work in this fashion. Didn't know anyone else used the term, but then when I taught at the correspondence school I carried an average student load of 500 over the 15 years I worked there. So, I have a lot of ex-students who might have gone on to call it that, too, for want of a better name.


I write in layers, concentrating on one thing at a time and going through the material several times with a single objective in mind. This method works for me and it worked for some of my students. My usual practice is to write the first draft hot -- slash and burn straight through to the end of the story -- not stopping for anything. No rewriting until the first draft is DONE.

Some writers see the action "like a movie" in their head. Some are auditory. I tend to "hear" my characters, so I know my images in first draft are weak. First thing, I go back and layer in every image I can think of. I'm only working on images at this point. Show, show, show, show, show!

By the time I've finished that, I discover that I've added a lot of the "over-explanation" that seems to plague my work. Then I go back again and cut prepositional phrases. I search for: and, to, of, because, but; for, and any other prepositions and make certain that I need BOTH bits of information. If, as often happens with me, I've said the same thing two ways, then I cut one prepositional phrase.

Then I go back again and rewrite the transitions, and end of scene hooks, to make sure I've not left out anything important. The transition (opening sentence of a scene) must ALWAYS contain the who, where, and when, and I remind myself, when checking these, that the viewpoint character Must be mentioned First. The end-of-scene hook should leave the reader with a question that will be answered later in the story.

For my final layer, I look for anything that can be left out of dialogue. In real life if someone says, "Where did you get that hat?" Someone else will say, "Why? What's wrong with it?" But in dialogue, the answer should be, "Macy's." Sometimes I have a real tendency to let characters talk on and on when they should be saying, "Macy's." So for this layer, I tighten things up.

I have a one-track mind and sometimes it jumps the track. I can't think of everything all at once. Thank goodness, in writing, we don't have to.

Sure it would be nice if everything came out perfect in the first draft. That may happen with some writers, who knows? But it sure doesn't happen with me. So I use "layering" to fix it.

The good news is, as Anne LaMotte is fond of reminding us, no matter how execreble a first draft is, once we have that one down, we can fix it.

Jalapeno Cheese Balls - Recipe

Ed Petty’s Jalapeno Cheese Balls

2 lbs. mild and grated cheddar cheese
1 lb. prepared pimiento cheese
1 lb. softened cream cheese
1 7-oz. jar of chopped jalapeno peppers
2 medium chopped onions
6 cloves of minced garlic
4 tbs. lemon juice
4 tbs. Worcestershire sauce
1 4-oz. bottle of chili powder

Mix all ingredients except chili powder together and shape into 1-lb. balls. Put chili powder into a flat dish and roll each ball until all of them are covered. Wrap each ball in plastic wrap or tin foil and refrigerate until all of them are set. Makes four to five balls depending on size.

Contributed by Edward Petty, author of Four Flesh Feasts and an After Dinner Mint, Naked, and Jared’s Little Playground...People can only be pushed just so far before they snap and claim justifiable revenge. This is not your everyday, garden-variety retelling of 'Good' versus 'Evil'.

Royalty Payments Question -- writing tip

Author K. S. Brooks posted this on Facebook, thinking it was a joke.

A testimony to the economy for authors: "I got my royalty statement for last quarter and instead of a check there was a bill with it."

This whole thing started at my hairdresser yesterday. She asked how the "book market" was and I was trying to explain to her that last quarter had slowed down a lot for everyone I've spoken to. She actually came up with the "bill" with the royatly statement instead of a check! I thought that was pretty funny. :)


This is not really a joke.

Actually, some sales sites charge authors an annual fee to list their books for sale. Some charge $12 a year, some more. We have seen listing fees as high as $35 annually.

Amazon would never do this, but some other sites do. In some cases, the fee gets billed whether or not there are sales to deduct it from! So this actually DOES happen to some authors who list books for themselves. Publishers with more than 25 titles are usually exempted from such fees...

Self-publishing makes perfect sense if your name is already known. Recently self-published authors like Steven King and J.K. Rowling will have no problem finding an audience. Authors who are prolific, technically adept, and good at self-promotion, can make a good living just selling e-books.

But there can be disadvantages, there, as well. Those "listing fees" for instance that only crop up in the finest print, where it stresses they will be deducted from your royalties. It may not mention that you will still have to pay the fee if there are NO royalties. When a slump comes along, as it did last quarter...well, authors get bills instead of checks. That's not a joke.

We have more than 300 authors. Only 78 got checks last quarter. But NOBODY got a bill for their titles being listed for sale on our website! Or for our listing their work for sale in anybody else's on line store, either. And it takes quite a bit of technical expertise to get the books listed on the other store sites. Each site requires submission in a different format, for instance. Converting all the book files takes us a lot of time, but it also gives our authors more of a chance to offer their work to a growing audience of e-book readers. That's not being good-natured. When our authors make money, we make money. It's work we SHOULD do.

There are, though, sales venues we don't pursue. Some venues are in business to sell books, even some who charge fees are in business primarily to sell books. But the plain fact is that some venues are in business to make money by charging authors for services. We deal only with those sites that we genuinely feel have the authors' best interests at heart. We choose not to deal with sites that may be designed to make money from selling services to the authors, rather than from actually selling books.

One venue we queried, after authors mentioned it to us, offered to sell us a book on how to prepare our files to be uploaded on their sales site, and the book was available to anyone who wanted to post books with them, at only $25! Most sites provide a free PDF with file prep directions to anyone who clicks on "download."

We read their contract VERY carefully, and decided to opt out of that venue, even though other publishers were (at the time) shouting that they were the best thing ever, the "only place you need to be!" and the answer to the prayers of all self-published authors who wanted to "maintain control."

Now, on some private lists, those same enthusiastic people complain of non-payment.... And for the record, I'm not saying they aren't being paid for sales at the venue. We are quite certain the company adheres to the letter of their contracts. We have no personal knowledge of how that venue operates financially, as we are not participants there. We only know that after reading their contract, we chose not to sign it.

Many fee-charging venues are Big Business with well-recognized names. Others are smaller. It's the Internet. ANYone can set up a web site. If you are self-published, check out all venues carefully. Note how many hits they get per month, see how many books they have of their own, or how many are the result of being an "affiliate" of a larger site. Check how many larger sites they list their original titles with. Then read the contract again.

Not all sales venues charge fees, of course, and I won't name the ones that do here. I'm just saying to READ all contracts carefully. Be aware that such fees exist and then choose whether the price is worth it to you.

Catching UP!

Books that went to press or went to press again this week:

A FRIGHT OF GHOSTS, by Helen Chappell


Gallleys that went out, or went out again this week:

TOO DANGEROUS, by Geoff Geauterre


Work began or continued on the following:

The Mistake by Bruce Castle

Mr. Pish III, by K. S. Brooks

HOUSE TO KILL FOR, by Juditth Reveal.


Galleys still out with the authors:

THE COLLECTED STORIES OF VICTOR URIBE, by Victor Uribe

A GRANDFATHER'S GIFT, by Hugh Carter Vinson

Ginger Cookies - Recipe

Brenda Boldin’s Ginger Cookies

2 cups self rising flour
(OR 2c. flour, 1tsp. baking powder, ½ tsp. baking soda, ½ tsp. salt)
1 tsp. ginger
11/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. ground cloves
½ tsp nutmeg
1/2 cup sugar
½ cup shortening
½ cup molasses
1 egg yolk

Mix sugar and shortening; add molasses and egg yolk. Sir in dry ingredients. Roll on lightly floured surface, 1/4 inch thick. Cut out shapes. Bake on lightly greased cookie sheets at 350-F or 177-C degrees for 10 minutes.

Cool before removing from cookie sheet.
Makes approx. 30 cookies.

Contributed by Brenda Boldin, author of the Alex Masters Series, Dead Birds Don’t Sing, Jailbird, A Bird by Any Other Name, and Swan Song...Alex Masters is back, calling herself “Lexi” now, and working a real job in her brother’s software company. Money disappears, disks go missing, then a dead body turns up, and once again Alex/Lexi is suspect Number One.

Question from the e-mail -- writing tip

Question: What's a Triple-O Outline? I never heard the term before....

Answer: It's a technique I used to teach in my classes, though not in the workshop you attended at the International Womens' Writing Guild conference at Saratoga where we met. Essentially, it's a shortcut to doing a plot outline....

I have a handout on it and will post it below.

Triple O Plot Outline

Every story is about someone who wants something and whether they get it or not. Any story plot can easily be broken down into three parts: Objective; Obstacles; Outcome, sometimes referred to as the Triple-O Outline. There are hardly any new plots, so don’t be discouraged if “it’s been done.” The challenge for any writer is to make the characters and events so fresh and interesting that the reader forgets they have seen the plot before.

Plots for short stories should be short. If too much action is incorporated, the story will grow longer and longer and may become unwieldy. If too many obstacles occur, the reader could grow impatient and give up.

Be careful not to confuse “back story” (information needed to explain the characters personality and mindset to the readers), with current plot action. Whatever has happened before the real action begins is “back story”. Be careful not to confuse explanatory action, with a plot turning point. A plot turning point is always when something CHANGES forever.

To use a classic example, in the story Cinderella her mother’s death and her father’s remarriage to the evil step-mother, are all “back story”. The mean way the rest of the family treats Cindy is explanatory action used to set up the objective--more back story. Because the Objective for Cinderella, is that she wants to go to the ball. Until Cinderella decides she wants to go to the ball nothing has really happened, everything is going on as usual. Remember, plot always happens when something changes. When the character knows what he or she wants, that is the objective and the objective is always the beginning of the story, the beginning of the Plot. Now the character has a problem to solve – how to get what s/he wants. Once there is a problem statement, it’s time to get on with the story.

If there is no problem, nothing is happening, and there is no story. Stories are about overcoming something. If there is no “overcoming” then there is no satisfaction to the reader at the end.

Here are The Triple-Os

Objective: The objective (some call it object, but I like objective better) is what the character wants. Once your character knows what s/he wants, s/he has an objective. Cinderella wants to go to the ball. Her sisters are going and she darned well wants to go, too.

Obstacles: Whatever stands in the character’s way of getting what s/he wants are Plot Obstacles. There's an old writer's axiom called the "rule of three" that tells us not to include more than three things in any one sentence.

For hundreds of years three has been a magic number in our culture. Genies grant three wishes, Cinderella had two ugly sisters, there are usually three turning points or complications in a story plot, with the last one resulting in the crisis/bleak moment (some people call it the “black moment” and my friend Carla Neggers calls it the “big gloom”), just before the resolution. So it is unwise to plan more than three obstacles in any plot.

Cinderella’s obstacles are not the ugly step-sisters, the way she is treated by her mean and jealous step-mother, or her father’s inability to see through his new wife. These are her obstacles:
1. She has nothing to wear.
2. She has no way to get there.
3. She has a fairy-godmother (who solves the first two), BUT she must be home by midnight or the magic wears off!

As with most story plots, obstacles one and two are overcome, but obstacle three leads to what I like to call the bleak moment. In every story there is (or should be) that moment when it looks as if all is lost. For Cinderella, that moment happens when she’s in the Prince’s arms and the clock strikes 12. She runs, for she knows that when the clock finishes striking, she will be standing there in rags. For Cindy, the party is over and she’ll never see the prince again. (Bleak moment)

Outcome: The outcome is simply how your story ends. Every story has an outcome. Some are happy, some sad, but whatever the outcome the main character or his or her circumstances should change because of it. In our sample story, the Prince finds the slipper. Truly smitten, he searches for Cindy until he finds her. And the Outcome, of course, is they marry and live happily ever after.

Not every story has a happy ending, of course, but there must be a resolution and the story will be better received if that resolution is satisfactory to the reader. Take the movie version of Titanic. (Another Cinderella, story plot.) Unlike Cindy, Rose is rich, but she is also a victim of her family and of her abusive fiance. Here, quoted from the movie, is Rose’s problem statement:

"I saw my whole life as if I'd already lived it...an endless parade of parties and cotillions, yachts and polo matches...always the same narrow people, the same mindless chatter. I felt like I was standing at a great precipice, with no one to pull me back, no one who cared...or even noticed."-- Rose DeWitt Bukater

Rose’s Objective: Is to escape the life she lives and a loveless marriage so that she can find freedom.

Rose’s obstacles:

1. Her family and fiancé who punish her when she doesn’t conform

2. Depression that leads her to consider suicide.

3. The ship’s sinking and Jack’s death (bleak moment)

Rose’s Outcome:

Though Jack dies, Rose is rescued and goes on.

Rose is Cindy in reverse. She’s a girl who has everything, money, position, and a millionaire fiancé. Yet Rose is severely depressed and feels confined by her life. Then she meets Jack, a free spirit. Instead of going to the palace ball, they dance with the peasants in steerage. Even though Jack dies when the ship sinks, Rose goes on to dump her fiancé, and to live out all the dreams she and Jack had planned together.

This is evidenced by her photo collection, Rose as a pilot, on a roller-coaster, riding a horse, and treading the boards as an actress.

So ther's not a happy ending to the romance, but a satisfactory ending to the story, because Rose has escaped from the narrow-minded people and her confined life, she has changed forever, and goes on to find a fulfillment for herself.

Even though the hero dies, Titanic is still a romance.

The ending, while sad, resolves the issues, and is satisfying to the reader.

Cranberry Jelly - recipe

Joan Bramsch’s Home Made Cranberry Jelly

1 cup sugar
1 cup water
1 package (12 oz) Ocean Spray fresh or frozen cranberries

In a saucepan, mix sugar and water. Stir to dissolve sugar. Bring to a boil. Add cranberries. Return to boil, reduce heat, and boil gently for 10 minutes or until jelly starts to gel: stirring occasionally.

Remove from heat and cool completely at room temperature - then refrigerate. Makes approx. 2 1/4 cups. Serve with hot biscuits or it’s equally good over vanilla ice cream.

Contributed by Joan Bramsch, author of With No Reservations...This sizzling romance features Ann Waverly, hotel executive, and Jeffrey Madison, an unkempt late-night arrival seeking a room. Though he keeps secrets he awakens in Ann a longing so powerful, she is stunned.