Job Description: Creative Writer

A creative writer who approaches writing as a job, that is, a fulltime permanent vocation, needs a job description to help explain what he or she does.  Consider the following:

JOB DESCRIPTION: CREATIVE WRITER

Purpose: To create and tell stories in writing, fulltime or part-time, for publication as novels, short stories, novellas and/or screenplays, and/or creative nonfiction.  (Can also include poetry.)

Facing the blank page

Duties and Responsibilities:

• Work with the imagination to acquire ideas
• Develop ideas into stories and determine whether they are novels, short stories, novellas, screenplays or creative nonfiction
• Research to authenticate characters, setting, time period and any other elements
• Write the stories, including the first draft and all revisions
• Work with an editor to polish the stories (product) for publication
• Research literary agents and/or publishers
• Develop list of appropriate literary agents and/or publishers
• Develop and write queries (sales pitches) about stories for literary agents and/or publishers
• Send out queries, track responses in database, follow up on responses
• Set up website and/or blog about product to generate interest
• Read other writers’ blogs and leave comments to generate interest and network
• Network with other writers, literary agents or editors online through Publishers Marketplace and other social networking or professional websites
• Read novels, short stories, novellas, screenplays and nonfiction, widely, voraciously, from all centuries, in all genres
• Read publishing trade publications and writing publications such as Publishers Weekly, The Writer, Writer’s Digest, the online newsletters from Publishers Marketplace
• Work with publisher to prepare stories for publication whether a book publisher, magazine publisher or literary journal
• Promote the published stories through online resources, bookstores, media, word-of-mouth.  Be available to read publicly, sign copies of book, tour or be interviewed

Additional Duties and Responsibilities:

Planning – develop annual strategic plan and goals for writing, marketing and publication.
Marketing – develop marketing plans for each project, listing markets, strategy, target audience

Budget – develop annual budget if working fulltime, track business income and expenditures, keep excellent financial records for tax purposes.

Maintain a work calendar

Maintain office equipment – buy office supplies and equipment

Manage daily mail and e-mail

Manage incoming phone calls

Work with outside vendors including the US Post Office, UPS, and FedEx Office

Maintain professional associations and memberships

Attend professional workshops, seminars, conferences

Qualifications and Requirements:

• Knowledge and mastery of craft of writing, including character development, narrative structure, plotting, English usage, grammar and spelling
• Ability to use computer hardware and software: proficient in MS Word, internet applications, database and spreadsheet software plus e-mail
• Typing 40 wpm or more with few errors
• Bachelor’s Degree preferred; Masters degree not necessary but helpful with marketing to literary agents and publishers (general public doesn’t care as long as the story and writing are good)
• Highly skilled in communication, written and verbal, interpersonal and business
• Highly organized with the ability to multi-task effectively, prioritize and manage resources
• Critical thinking, analysis and problem-solving
• Research skills including face-to-face interviewing, phone interviewing, library work and internet research
• Expert at time management: identifying deadlines, next steps, meeting deadlines, multi-tasking, prioritizing.  Must be able to meet deadlines.
• Proficient in project management: planning, identifying goals, set and manage schedule, anticipate and identify issues, remove obstacles, track task completion
• Must be self-directed, self-motivated and disciplined
• Must be able to work well alone
• Must be creative
• Must be able to handle rejection effectively
• Must be able to work well with readers, agents, editors, publishers, i.e. accept and utilize feedback on projects

Salary Expectations:

• $0 annually or sample copies until major publication
• $0 to $20,000 annually after major publication
• Do not expect bestsellerdom and/or millions of dollars 

Work Schedule: 

• Part-time: whenever writing can be fit into regular schedule, 7 days a week
• Fulltime: 40 t0 50 hours per week, Monday through Saturday
• Vacation: Never to infrequent

2010 Nebula Awards

The Science Fiction Writers of America have released the list of nominees for the 2010 Nebula Awards.

Let’s Get Really Personal: Characterization

Every adult human on this planet is a product of his or her childhood.  Writers ignore this fact at their own peril.  Different experiences in childhood produce different adults.  But it’s not true that the same experiences will produce the same adults.  Why?  Because the number of variables is huge.  For example, what happened to the child before the set of experiences shared with another child?  Those earlier experiences will affect the way the child processes and assimilates the shared experiences.

Characters need to have childhoods (if they’re not child characters, or even if they are).  To get to know a character (and avoid running into characterization problems later), a writer needs to spend time with his character in the character’s childhood.  This is getting really personal with a character.  None of it need appear in the story, of course, or perhaps one incident or issue could be used to give the character’s behavior depth and psychological meaning.  How does a writer enter a character’s childhood?

Write the character’s biography, focused on her early years.  Take an omniscient approach first, then write the biography from the point of view of her father, then from the POV of her mother, then write from the character’s POV.  What were her early talents?  Did she like school?  Was she social or withdrawn?  What happened one day that changed her life?  What happened to her that changed her parents?  More questions may come as the biography progresses.

Write the character’s childhood diary as if you’d just discovered it.  Capturing the child’s voice can give insight into the character and what’s important to him, his dreams, how he sees others, his thoughts about school, ideas about life.

Interview the character about his childhood.  Think about your own childhood and how you could be interviewed about it.  Use that as your guide.  Really listen to your character’s voice in your mind — if you don’t hear it yet, this exercise could help you find it.

Interview the character’s mother and father separately about her childhood.  This could include some history about how they got together and got married.  Their relationships with their own parents.  What were their goals and expectations for the character when she was a child?  Did they like her or dislike her?  Parents love their children, but don’t always like them.  Were there any problems when the character was a child?  What kind?  Other questions will come as you develop the interviews.

I have a series of questions that I ask myself about how I see the character I’m creating.  The answers change every time I go over the questions, as I get to know the character.  I’ve also interviewed characters to find out who they are.  With Evan Quinn, I knew certain things about his childhood up front: where he was born and grew up, the situation in which he lived as a child, his mentorship with his father’s best friend, and that he had a big childhood secret that affected the way he perceived the world and his relationship to it.

Another way to explore a character’s childhood is to talk with the other characters in the story — besides his parents if they’re in the story.  Did the character have a childhood best friend?  Has he known any of the other characters since childhood?  What do they remember about him as a child?

Children develop over 18 years (and beyond), and while they are not blank slates, what they experience and learn in childhood does affect them as adults.  For Evan, since he was an only child, it’s his relationships with his parents and his father’s best friend.  Adults have complete power over their children until at least middle school.  How the adults exercise that power affects their children profoundly, which I discovered was exactly the case with Evan.

Characters are not hard to get to know, although they will try to hide things from you.  If you spend  quality time with them, however, they may just decide to share their stories with you……

Really, REALLY Good Author Interviews!

The March 2011 issue of The Writer has a brief article about The Paris Review posting its famous author interviews online.  The archive is complete to date, and includes interviews with such famous writers as Ernest Hemingway, Joan Didion and William Faulkner, among many others.

According to the article, the literary journal, founded by a group of editors in 1953, lacked the money to attract top writers to contribute, so they decided to interview the writers they admired the most.  They published the interviews in the journal.  What a creative way to interest potential contributors in your publication!

Find the archive of the interviews at The Paris Review.