Lords of LA #2

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Trailer: https://youtu.be/yE_UTGba3NE

After writing my seventh novel, my twelfth screenplay, and my ninth comic book/graphic novel, I’m still learning what not to do. I often speak to other writers who ask me for suggestions and the first thing I ask is: “What is your story about?” I’ve heard things like, “It’s about a world where…?” or “It’s a cookbook, but also a story about my life in Afghanistan. The recipes are pages sprinkled into the story.”

My initial response has been awestruck, but then gathered my thoughts and said in respective reply, “A story is never about a place, it’s about people.” To the second, “Your book is either about your life in Afghanistan or it’s a cookbook, it cannot be both. It can be a cookbook with a little anecdotal companion to each recipe, but you can’t stop the story to throw a recipe on a page and then continue – it would be jarring.”

The secondary response to each is the same – “How does the publishing marketing team market your book?” In the case of the biographical cookbook, it can only be marketed as one thing, so it’s either a cookbook or it’s a biography. It can’t be marketed as both. One will always take a backseat to the other. Sure, there are dual genre stories, like supernatural romance and sci-fi fantasy, but you’re still marketing to one set of readers. In other words, know your audience; know exactly to whom you are marketing. If you find yourself marketing to two different audiences, then there’s an error somewhere that you must reconsider.

After you choose your genre, then you must define your story. You can do this in one of two ways: 1) Create a character and then build the story around them or 2) Create a story and then build the characters that will run the obstacle course you’ve built for them. I’ve done both. Especially in the comic book medium, you find yourself building the character first. From there you must create the hero’s journey, which must be present in all stories. This is what makes your character not only relatable but makes the reader root for them. The harder the struggle, the more the audience will engage. However, that struggle must be grounded in the reality of your story. If your character falls a hundred feet from a cliff in the 1800s and in the end must win a foot race against the villain, most readers are going to check out due to the implausibility. Make sure you’re not going too far out of the box.

Make sure you stick the landing. I read a great many books published by major imprints where I find the ending ill conceived and disappointing. An ending doesn’t have to be epic, but it should give a nice bit of closure to the main character’s story where have achieved their goals and become the person they were meant to be. Give the ending a great deal of thought and make sure you get the opinion of several people before you settle into the editing process.