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Today we have a guest blogger, the talented (and very versatile) Mindy Klasky, whose new book Perfect Pitch has just been released. Here's the book cover and Mindy...
No, this book's not speculative fiction, but hey, it's Mindy's so you know it well-written.
As to Perfect Pitch, well, let's let Mindy talk about that, and you can discuss it in the comments. Take it away, Mindy!
******
Confession time: Once upon a time, I thought a book didn't count unless it was a minimum of 300,000 words long.
I cut my reading teeth on fantasy epics – The Lord of the Rings, The Belgariad, The Riddle-Master Trilogy… You know the books I'm talking about. I'm sure most of you read them too. Those were the first books I bought for myself, the ones I used to foster friendships in elementary school and junior high, the foundation of my independent reading.
And the foundation of my writing, too.
My early attempts at creating fiction were all modeled after the fantasy series I loved – long, complex stories that displayed complex worldbuilding and intricate facets of worlds not our own. My first published books were The Glasswrights Series, a five-volume fantasy series set in a secondary world where caste hierarchy controlled all social interaction and people believed in a thousand gods.
Which sort of makes me wonder what I'm doing writing The Diamond Brides Series now. Each volume of the Diamond Brides is a short, hot contemporary romance novel – 42,000 words (about 150 pages.) There are nine wholly-independent volumes in the set; each one follows a different player on the (imaginary) Raleigh Rockets baseball team. The first book, Perfect Pitch debuted on March 31, and the others are being published on a rapid basis between now and November 2.
Perfect Pitch and the rest of the Diamond Brides Series are doing a very different thing than my earlier fantasy novels. Both series deliver strongly plotted, character-based stories. But then the genres take over and illuminate different ways of storytelling.
The fantasy novels I love are built on presenting a world that is not our own. Good fantasy authors tease out the telling details, the specific examples from their imagined world, the minute "facts" that make the strange seem familiar. When these creations are done well, fantasy is an immersive experience—we can live with our heroes and heroines, know in our bones exactly how they'll react to the very different challenges they face.
It takes words to craft that reality – sometimes lots and lots of words. Sure, a deft author can sketch in backstory without taking a volume and a half to share the religious underpinnings of the major architectural style that predominates in a minor village. But an essential joy of the fantasy genre is immersing in a created reality.
Romance—and contemporary romance in particular—has a very different function. Despite the real-world setting, romance novels clearly trade in fiction. They present a "reality" where deep emotion leads to heartfelt, well-reasoned conversation, where the physical expression of love is always fulfilling, where misunderstandings can be worked through once, and tangled, complex, dark emotions can be untangled with a single confession of true love.
Romance readers expect an emotional arc in their work. They seek specific signposts on the characters' journey. But the power of that transformation, the very roots of the story, are often bound in the very fact that it happens in our world, in the midst of common complications, familiar challenges, well-known snags.
When I'm writing my Diamond Brides books, I need to create believable characters. I need to structure a specific setting for them—an imaginary baseball stadium, with a credible semblance of a team, playing according to essentially familiar rules of a sport. But I don't need to define a religion for my characters, or an economic structure, or a social hierarchy that circumscribes their interactions. The real world takes care of all of that.
Without the massive weight of formal worldbuilding, I can take shortcuts as a writer. I can focus on emotional arcs. I can consciously pare away subplots, so that I'm sharing the essential romantic journey of one man and one woman.
And I can write a 42,000-word novel that is complete, even when I grew up reading books that spanned thousands of words.
What do you think about book length? Are there books (or series) that are simply too long or too short to ever hold your interest? Have you read exceptions to the general rules I've sketched here—complex fantasy worlds that can be shown in very few words or satisfying romantic stories that thrive on expansive narration?
No, this book's not speculative fiction, but hey, it's Mindy's so you know it well-written.
As to Perfect Pitch, well, let's let Mindy talk about that, and you can discuss it in the comments. Take it away, Mindy!
******
Confession time: Once upon a time, I thought a book didn't count unless it was a minimum of 300,000 words long.
I cut my reading teeth on fantasy epics – The Lord of the Rings, The Belgariad, The Riddle-Master Trilogy… You know the books I'm talking about. I'm sure most of you read them too. Those were the first books I bought for myself, the ones I used to foster friendships in elementary school and junior high, the foundation of my independent reading.
And the foundation of my writing, too.
My early attempts at creating fiction were all modeled after the fantasy series I loved – long, complex stories that displayed complex worldbuilding and intricate facets of worlds not our own. My first published books were The Glasswrights Series, a five-volume fantasy series set in a secondary world where caste hierarchy controlled all social interaction and people believed in a thousand gods.
Which sort of makes me wonder what I'm doing writing The Diamond Brides Series now. Each volume of the Diamond Brides is a short, hot contemporary romance novel – 42,000 words (about 150 pages.) There are nine wholly-independent volumes in the set; each one follows a different player on the (imaginary) Raleigh Rockets baseball team. The first book, Perfect Pitch debuted on March 31, and the others are being published on a rapid basis between now and November 2.
Perfect Pitch and the rest of the Diamond Brides Series are doing a very different thing than my earlier fantasy novels. Both series deliver strongly plotted, character-based stories. But then the genres take over and illuminate different ways of storytelling.
The fantasy novels I love are built on presenting a world that is not our own. Good fantasy authors tease out the telling details, the specific examples from their imagined world, the minute "facts" that make the strange seem familiar. When these creations are done well, fantasy is an immersive experience—we can live with our heroes and heroines, know in our bones exactly how they'll react to the very different challenges they face.
It takes words to craft that reality – sometimes lots and lots of words. Sure, a deft author can sketch in backstory without taking a volume and a half to share the religious underpinnings of the major architectural style that predominates in a minor village. But an essential joy of the fantasy genre is immersing in a created reality.
Romance—and contemporary romance in particular—has a very different function. Despite the real-world setting, romance novels clearly trade in fiction. They present a "reality" where deep emotion leads to heartfelt, well-reasoned conversation, where the physical expression of love is always fulfilling, where misunderstandings can be worked through once, and tangled, complex, dark emotions can be untangled with a single confession of true love.
Romance readers expect an emotional arc in their work. They seek specific signposts on the characters' journey. But the power of that transformation, the very roots of the story, are often bound in the very fact that it happens in our world, in the midst of common complications, familiar challenges, well-known snags.
When I'm writing my Diamond Brides books, I need to create believable characters. I need to structure a specific setting for them—an imaginary baseball stadium, with a credible semblance of a team, playing according to essentially familiar rules of a sport. But I don't need to define a religion for my characters, or an economic structure, or a social hierarchy that circumscribes their interactions. The real world takes care of all of that.
Without the massive weight of formal worldbuilding, I can take shortcuts as a writer. I can focus on emotional arcs. I can consciously pare away subplots, so that I'm sharing the essential romantic journey of one man and one woman.
And I can write a 42,000-word novel that is complete, even when I grew up reading books that spanned thousands of words.
What do you think about book length? Are there books (or series) that are simply too long or too short to ever hold your interest? Have you read exceptions to the general rules I've sketched here—complex fantasy worlds that can be shown in very few words or satisfying romantic stories that thrive on expansive narration?