Kam Oi Lee » writing resources

The end, and other stories

Kam Oi Lee — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 23:14:06 +0000

I wrote the end of Sweet Heart Catalyst yesterday! Now all I have to do is write the, ahem, pesky middle part

But before I do that, I have to finish up that shortie about my bad guy who’s bad, bad, bad, and how he got that way. It’s about 1700 words so far. For now, the working title is Sergio after the main character, but I hope I can come up with something that sounds a little more badass. (Side note: I apparently really like the name “Sergio”; I just realized that I also have a “Sergei” in another, unrelated story.)

Short stories Encounter on Planet 352 and Desert Walker are temporarily on the back burner.

I recently discovered She Writes, a site for, by and about women writers (thanks to my friend Kat for the heads-up!) It’s a great resource with an active community of writers. I’d like to encourage all you writer folks on my list to join me there. (Men are welcome too, though the site is female-focused).

I had to write an intro blurb for one of the groups I joined on SW, and one of the questions was about our current WIP. So it forced me to think about just what the frell this thing is that I’m writing, anyway. Here’s what I came up with: “A twisted mutant hybrid of near-future biopunk-ish science fiction and political/crime thriller”. Heheh! … although I forgot to add, “with a delicious coating of dark chocolate”.

things are moving… slowly…

Kam Oi Lee — Tue, 18 May 2010 04:44:50 +0000

Wow, that really doesn’t look like much progress since the last time I posted a progress bar, does it?

I’ve become a big fan of the Stuff You Should Know podcast. It’s a really good resource when you don’t know much about a topic, and need to find out the basics in like, 20 or 30 minutes. I’ve been listening to all the episodes I find especially relevant for the purposes of this story, such as “How SWAT Teams Work”, “Are there people who feel others’ pain?”, “The Real Jack the Ripper”, “How Witness Protection Works”, “How Hostage Negotiation Works”, “How Body Armor Works”, “What’s the best place on your body to get shot?”, and of course, “How Rigor Mortis Works”.

Too bad research doesn’t count as wordage.

Flogging the Quill: Crafting a Novel that Sells

Kam Oi Lee — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 00:28:43 +0000

If you follow Ray Rhamey’s blog Flogging the Quill, then you know the premise: Send in the first page of your novel, and Rhamey will read, analyze, and tell you if he found it compelling enough to make him turn to the second page (and why or why not). The key word here is “compelling”. Editors and agents are busy people, and it’s your first page that determines whether they read any further. The idea is to hook them right from the get-go, and that’s what the FTQ blog is all about. The experience of having my first page “flogged”, and watching others get whipped as well, was a real eye-opener for me, and FTQ continues to be one of my must-read blogs.

Now Rhamey has a new book coming out: Flogging the Quill: Crafting a Novel that Sells. With the goal of bringing a novel manuscript up to publishable quality, Flogging the Quill is a Swiss army knife fixit tool for a myriad of beginner-novelist problems, as well as a valuable resource for experienced writers and editors.

This book is filled to the brim with advice and coaching from an author with years of experience in advertising, screenwriting, novel writing and editing. From the press release:

The first section, covering the craft of storytelling, includes lessons on creating tension, creating the character “care factor,” what drives a plot, the six vital story ingredients, and tools for spotting shortcomings in a narrative.

In Description, writers learn how experiential description can characterize, plus how to handle the tricky character-description hurdle, staging, and overwriting.

The Dialogue section helps writers avoid leaden overuse of dialogue tags, enliven a dialogue scene with action beats, and deliver the sound of dialogue.

The vital “when to tell, how to show” lesson in the Technique section has been praised by literary agents and college teachers. The section also coaches on point of view, including the problems “head-hopping” can cause with readers.

With the Words section, Rhamey reveals unique insights to the good and bad of using adverbs in a fiction narrative, and guides writers in weeding out weak, wasted, and wrong words.

Computer tips that make writing more productive are included, plus a “workout” section where writers apply lessons learned to real efforts by beginning novelists.

New York Times bestseller Tess Gerritsen says, “…it’s a must-have for any novelist.” Literary agent Dan Conaway of Writers House says, “…Ray Rhamey’s book provides the sort of practical, sensible advice that really can help you become a better writer.”

Pre-order Flogging the Quill from Amazon