Lydia Michaels talks about writing entirely in the male POV. Oct. 27, 2013

Award winning author, Lydia Michaels, has kindly consented to allow me to turn her inquiry about this blog into a guest spot in which she discusses the male POV. She has just published a very interesting and unique romance. Entirely in the male POV. 

   

I wrote Simple Man because I heard a song (Some Nights by FUN) and the story came to me. It came to me in male POV. I also saw some reader forums where women were searching for the ever hard to find male POV, so I figured I'd go for it. My Character, Shane, is a man in his 20's with no reason to act like an adult (not an uncommon situation). When I wrote Simple Man I did so in a matter of 5 days. It was one of the easiest stories I've ever written and while editing I found myself cracking up, because, let's face it, men get to say things women characters can't always get away with.

When I first pitched Simple Man I was told the title was "not sexy" and almost changed it to Unsung Hero, but the song Simple Man spoke to me and that was what I was going for so I kept it. Then I was told Shane was simply "unredeemable". You see, he's very irresponsible in the beginning. He's also selfish and burdened by financial problems and the like. He isn't the typical "book boyfriend". His priorities are beer, making sure no one smokes his stash, and getting laid. He thinks like a man. Us women like to fantasize about our heroes being perfect, but real men aren't. They aren't built like gods, they can't last forever, and they hardly say what we expect or hope. Yet, we direct our real lives around love, love for the real man. My characters, not just in Simple Man, but in other books I've written, have a tendency to be "real". My latest bestseller (SKIN) is about an obese woman who hates herself so much she can't recognize genuine love when it's staring her in the face. I've had more success with my "real" characters than my "fantasy" ones and my readers now look for them in my work.

I watched men and thought long and hard about what makes them tick, what motivates them to grow and mature. There is a need to work, to provide, to be self sufficient. Where romance seems to motivate females, men are directed by the simple power of pride. The male ego seems to be the driving force in all decisions, yet there are hidden vulnerabilities woman may not see or want to see.

Simple Man is a romance and as such, I played on those insecurities. Is he making enough money? When he's laid off is she judging him? His reluctance to get government assistance vs. his need to keep his home, which is a meager trailer. She has a nice house and he's afraid to go inside because it will kill his mood. The thing is... there's now a child involved and Shane must step up and swallow his pride in a lot of ways to be the hero he needs to be for his defenseless nephew. But when his happiness is threatened, all his attempts and little successes come tumbling down and he breaks in a way.

I think it is a truly realistic story and one readers (so far) seem to really enjoy. I'm attaching a blurb and excerpt here for you to look at and if you have any other questions I'd be happy to talk some more. Thanks!

Here's the book trailer if you want to take a look:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwSnY5u_sak (Preview)               

Simple Man isn't on Amazon yet, but will be available there on Monday. The link is http://www.amazon.com/Lydia-Michaels/e/B0071ZV41G/ref=sr_tc_2_0?qid=1382787561&sr=1-2-ent

Called to Order
Calling for a Miracle
Destiny Calls
White Chocolate
All for You
To Catch a Wolfe
Chasing Feathers
Breaking Perfect
Sacred Waters

 

Thanks so much and best of luck with all of your work!

~Lydia Michaels
www.LydiaMichaels.org

 

 

Thank you so much, Lydia.

 

You all know I like to present a video at the end of the post. Reading Lydia's comments led me to choose one of many driven young men with defects . . . Johnny Cash.

 

Walk The Line: trailer, 2005

 

 

Writing down the bones, October 20, 2103

Writing down the bones, October 20, 2013

I’ve recently had the good fortune to read a first draft romance as part of a swap project with my first draft. I quickly realized that things were missing from my swap partner’s manuscript. What wasn’t missing was the bones (the necessary character and scene development). Using this technique, you write each scene you want and quickly. You pay attention to the dialogue and interior monologue but go swiftly or sparingly through what might normally slow some writers down, like research, description, the senses, the who, what, where, why, and when.

How do you write your first draft?

 

Sometimes you don't have to do any research at all and your work can be a hit! Both my nine and six year old grandsons know the words and sounds to this, this, well see for yourself the most viral video in the world today.

 

 

A hero who plows straight ahead, October 13, 2013

Your hero takes a surprising turn.

Does your hero walk straight ahead? If so, he’s not a real man. Heroes (and heroines) must adjust to circumstances. It’s better if the character arcs have stops and starts, up and downs, not necessarily scene by scene. A story that is too smooth is boring, monotonous. For instance, a couple may have decided on principle to wait until they’re married but sometimes the plot or circumstances draw them into each other’s arms before they say I do. The complications resulting from their ‘compromise’ is a story in itself. We’re here to entertain not make stereotypes or stick figures as stiff as cardboard.

I see this type of writing as Baroque art: The Baroque is a period of artistic style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted details to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, architecture, literature, dance, and music. (Started in Rome around 1600 . . .)

Try not to create your hero like this guy did using dead parts from here and there.
Frankenstein, 1931

 

To indie or not to indie, October 6, 2013

Alice: Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?
The Cat: That depends a good deal on where you want to get to.
Alice: I don't much care where.
The Cat: Then it doesn't much matter which way you go.
Alice: …so long as I get somewhere.
The Cat: Oh, you're sure to do that, if only you walk long enough.
 ..............................................................
I stand before a fork in the road.

I have just finished a great course on indie-publishing which left me conflicted about which direction to take. Over two and a half years ago I joined RWASD to meet fellow authors/agents/editors, take classes. Get better at craft. I did. Plus I made friends. I have met my idols close up, starting with Mary Leo. I have submitted ‘fulls’ to various agents/editors, but so far no takers. Apparently I write in a different tone. I ascribe that to not yet being all that I can be as a writer, not to being male.

At one point I was asked by an editor if I wrote like a male or a female (we were partially joking around). I tried to explain that I could mimic a female writing, but I now know that was the “buzzer” bad answer. I write like an experienced writer!

Yet I’m conflicted. I’m sitting on four romance novels. Three of which have received very high marks in contests. The first one I wrote, not so much. Unless lightning strikes I’m, going to publish over the next year all four through my own company (of one) WEB press.

There’s my plan. I’m not driven by dollars or fame, but I do want to see my babies born. I’m an artist and believe my work has value. Secondarily, I intend to land an agent/editor for whatever I’m working on at the moment (when it’s ready) and if I don’t I’ll hand the ms. over to me, owner of WEB Press.

I do have a question. What do you think about a banner or back cover statement about a division of WEB Press which publishes guys who write romance, along with their mission statement? Is any publicity good publicity?

An apropos scene from Disney's Cartoon classic: Alice in Wonderland

I can't give you anything but love, baby. September, 29, 2013

Sign up to rescue your damsel, right here. (spoken with a New York City accent)

Guys whether they be alpha or beta or crappa-outa want to rescue damsels in distress. Some may fumble trying which is also the stuff of romantic and screwball comedies.

It’s built into our DNA. Guys want to protect, come to the rescue, help. Knowing this trait and how overwhelming it can be is a useful tool in developing reasons why the guy is attracted to a gal and/or part of why the romance gets started. The hero might ordinarily overlook the waitress/secretary until he finds out she’s a divorced mom. The heroine needs a man. I’ll be so bold as to say this hero will rationalize his attraction so that he could help her.

So why would a guy who normally likes Asian women go for the down on her luck red head? Because by serving, he proves his worth, he has done a good deed. He has found somebody who would appreciate him.

Being loved back is the most important consideration of a guy. The heroine will see him as a knight in shining armor. This strokes the male ego and rewards both parties.

I guess what I’m saying is try not rely on physical attraction alone. Besides, building in these tropes and traits makes the story more interesting.

Can you think of some prime examples?

Here’s one: “It isn’t everyday a guy saw a headless beaver marching down the side of a road, not even in Dean Robillard’s larger-than-life world.” Thus starts, Natural Born Charmer by Susan Elizabeth Phillips. What upstanding member of the male human union would not want to rescue a headless beaver?

Here’s another example:

 

BRINGING UP BABY,  Katherine Hepburn & Cary Grant, 1938

 

Can you tell it's a guy writing the romance? 9/22/13

A question has often been asked, does a man write differently than a woman? September 22, 2013

I’d like to reframe the question, does one person write differently than another? Here, the answer is a definite yes. It’s called the author’s style. A good feeling for what I mean by style comes from recalling great authors like Susan Elizabeth Phillips or Harlan Coben. If you even read the tiniest of passages from them, perhaps with the help of context, you likely recognize their writing. (This is not author intrusion or showing off, but rather the vibrancy of a great artist applying his/her master strokes.)

It is true that any individual man would have more difficulty getting into the head of a woman and visa versa or more difficulty applying whole brain versus right brain problem solving techniques. BUT, not for the great authors. In my opinion, a great author has the ability to slip into any character’s mind and action and deliver a story we’ll never forget.

Just for fun who wrote these tiny, obscure snippets from best sellers? If you fail to get any, congratulations, you are normal. If you get all three, slow down, it is possible you may be reading ‘too’ much.

Who wrote?  . . . he took her hand in his and she felt the way it warmed her the whole way back. (to her parent's home)

The answer to the above will be the subject of the attached video at the bottom of this blog post, but for the next two I’ll leave them without answers, unless you ask.

Who wrote? . . . and he pressed her hand lightly as he took it to place in Note’s. As he did so, the child moved within her, and she winced because the movement was so sudden and so firm.

Or? . . . He had her over a barrel, and he knew it. She took in the messy motor home, the surly teenager, and the fussing infant. Then she gazed at the big, roughneck of a man with his broad shoulders and devil’s smile. Did she want to stay on the run badly enough to put up with all this?
* * *
There’s something else all three of these snippets have in common. They’re all plain English. I believe the most important part of any individual style is clarity. It has to be, if readers don’t understand something they might start drifting. If they start drifting, they may stop reading. Great writers, male or female, retain large audiences.

 

To our brothers and sisters 9/11

September 11, 2001

In honor of those who died on 9/11

NINETY-NINE STORIES
By RW Richard

A wall of searing blue flames pressed Hussam to the melted and broken windows. He couldn’t breathe and the heat was hell.

“It’s you,” the pretty girl from personnel ran up and said. Over the months, he had stolen glances of her and she did the same, both gutless wonders.

“I’m Hussam Fayyad, your boss’s boss.”

“I know. Save your breath. I’m Sarah Bernstein.” He knew.

They locked their hands, tight. Leaned out and hesitated. Then, Sarah’s wavy auburn hair caught fire.

“Marry me.” She screamed from the pain, tears evaporating. Taking off his jacket, he wrapped her head.

“I will. . . . I do.” Holding hands tightly, they jumped out from the ninety-ninth floor.

 

“I do,” she tried to say—her breath pushed inward by the rush of air—not that he could hear her anyway. She closed her eyes, he held unto her like a vise, as if they were one. Perhaps now they were.

"Mom and Dad, I’d like you to meet my fiancée, Hussam Fayyad.” Her folks' home, a big split-level in Oradell New Jersey, had beautiful large tile floors, a modern kitchen, with a menorah on the table. The candles had pooled on the tabletop.

“I guess it’s stupid for me to tell my daughter she should have chosen a nice Jewish boy?” Sarah’s mom asked rhetorically.

“We’re soul mates,” Hussam said.

“We’re besherte, mom.” She put it in Yiddish terms.

 

He dared not open his eyes and lose this vision of her mom and dad. He had always thought about Sarah, trying to get up the nerve to ask her out. Worried of cultural, political, and religious differences. He didn’t believe in treating women like second-class citizens, not at work, not in marriage. His hiring practices and office policies touted the heart of a modern liberated Muslim.

“We’ll always love the thought of you,” her mom and dad said, hugging him.

“We have to go to the wedding now,” Sarah said, pulling his hand.

 

At the wedding, Hussam’s little brother carried the ring on a purple pillow. Sarah always knew Hussam would come by, lean on her desk, ask her out. They’d marry; have three kids, two girls, one boy, or the other way around. They both wanted to be outvoted in either case. These gorgeous kids would grow up brilliant and loving, real menches; oh yes, two dogs, just right.

“I am so happy to have you in my heart.” Hussam’s parents, both a little portly, hugged her by the orchids stationed at the first row of seats in their garden.

Tears turned to rivers. Images rifted through her of falafel, lamb kebob, along with gefilte fish, Manischewitz Blackberry for the toast. Bruce Springsteen’s band struck up, ‘Here Comes the Bride.’

“He took my hand,” she explained to his mom and dad by way of apology.

“Thank you, pretty Sarah. My son, he always work, work, work.”

Sarah wished the world a better place, maybe a little less work, a little more love.

“He needs a strong Jewish girl to love him,” his dad said. They kissed her cheeks.

“I always had and always will love him,” Sarah said. She had harbored a tiny love, like a seedling, hoping to water it. No doubt about her feelings, now.

Martin Luther King without thinking forgot to add one word, Muslim. “. . . when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews, Muslims, and Gentiles, Protestant and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: 'Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last.'”

Sarah’s heart beat the rhythm of Martin’s words. She felt Hussam heard and saw Martin with her at the Lincoln Memorial, because he squeezed her. He’d never let go.

I am within you, Sarah.

I am within you, Hussam.

“Great Grand Papa.” Isaac Bernstein was gassed at Auschwitz, yet thin, young, suspendered, a silly fedora, munching on a pipe, his eyes opened to heaven.

“You bring the right man with you, mazel tov. Hussam’s great grand mom and pop are at the bridge table with your great grandma, waiting for me to come back. You see, I’m the dummy. Those two died in Gaza. Bam, to pieces.” He splayed his hands.

At the wedding, Cyndi Lauper spread her many orange, red, and yellow petticoats on the back step. With a sad face, she sang, 'Time After Time.'

The Rabbi and Imam smiled from under the canopy on this day of brilliant blue. They finished with one voice, “in death you will start, because love is eternal.”

 

Almighty God, Allah, blessed them, opened his arms, and said, “Kiss already.”

We kissed