SHE WROTE: PRO Bootcamp on Collaboration 2

This one is shorter. Thank God.

*Second Lesson for Bootcamp:*
*Choosing a Collaborator:*

The temptation to write with your best friend is probably strong, but fight the urge unless said pal fulfills the other criteria. You're looking for:

*Somebody you respect and trust.*
Jenny: You're putting a lot in her hands, make sure they're steady. Sometimes I want to kill Bob, but I always know that he'll be there for me in the book, that there won't be any end runs or business fraud or abandoning the project in the middle. That's crucial.
Bob: I think it's very important you work with someone who understands writing and the business of publishing. Who has experience in it. I co-wrote a non-fiction book with two amateurs and no matter how much I warned them about what was going to happen, they didn't believe me and their reactions were pretty nasty to the point where they pretty much robbed me of money due me, and in essence, stole from me. You do not really want to get involved in legal wrangling over a collaboration because the emotional cost is not worth it. Publishing is very much a handshake business and you have to trust the people you get involved with it. So if you do get involved with someone, you have to do it for the right reasons. In this case I was willing to walk away because I didn't get involved for the money.
In the same manner, working with someone who understands the craft of writing is important. Jenny and I always make decisions based on what's best for the book, not what's best for our egos. So we've never had a fight over our writing where one of us feels slighted in the end.

*Somebody who has complementary strengths.*
Jenny: I write romance and YEC, Bob writes action and hardware, you're looking for somebody who does well what you're not very good at. Maybe you're great at craft but not so good at language and your pal is great with the voice but couldn't structure a scene to save herself. Or someone you know writes historicals and you write paranormals and you've both always wanted to write a historical paranormal.)
Bob: I think this is true with regards to working with someone you respect as a writer. What really helped Jenny and I (her and I) was coming from such different genres. Because the genres were so different, we weren't stepping on each other's toes. It wasn't like I was going to critique her romantic scenes or she was going to tell me my sniper scenes were really off-base.

*Somebody who will do half the work and stay with you till the end.*
Jenny: If one or both of you hasn't finished a manuscript yet, run away. You need to know how you get to the end of a book on your own before you can get there with somebody else. Fortunately this is PRO, so if you're reading this, you've finished a book.)
Bob: Having around forty-five or so published books between us helped a little. I think. I'm a fanatic at finishing a book. On time.

*Somebody whose goal is compatible with yours.*
Jenny: Bob and I both wanted to try new genres so we were really open to experimenting. And we both wanted a bestseller so we both signed on for the hard work and sacrifice that meant. Neither one of us was looking for a "fun project." There's nothing wrong with trying this as a fun project as long as you're both thinking "fun project" and not "big bestseller."
Bob: There is no fun in writing. There is no crying in writing. There is no emotion in writing. There is no I in writing. There is no U in writing. There is no X in writing. Uh. What's left. Basically make sure you're both on the same sheet of music at the start. I really think even people writing by themselves have to be very sure of their writing and business goals right from the start. But it's even more important in a collaboration so that at the end there isn't a big disappointment and a blame game.

*Somebody who understands, as you must understand, that collaboration means
compromise and sacrifice.*
Jenny: You have to give up the "I'm Queen of this world and what I say goes" bit.
Bob: Yes, there is no Queen of the world. However, there's nothing wrong with being in the bow of the ship and and shouting at the top of your lungs "I'm King of the World." Unfortunately that ship tends to hit an iceberg and sink and the Queen then ends up with the big jewel and the king sinks frozen and dead into the deep dark Atlantic.
Jenny: You see what I put up with.


Question One, two ways:
>Thanks so much for joining us to talk about your process. It really is fascinating. In your first round of answers, you referred to keeping track of the master file of the manuscript, and you mentioned that you work in 4 acts. I come from a classical theater background, and I'm familiar with 3-act and 5-act play structure, and I've seen these both adapted to novels. Can you explain the 4-act structure you use?

*>Please tell us more about your four act structure. Is it like an outline? What components go into each act?

*
Jenny: The four act structure is from screenwriting's three act structure,and I'd been using it for awhile. I showed it to Bob, and we adapted it for the collab process because it breaks the book down into structural chunks that make it easier to talk about the plot. It's one of the things you really have to do when you collaborate: agree on a structural theory. In our case, we break the book into four acts or narrative sections. The first one is the set-up where all the characters are introduced, the mood and the tone are established, the main problem is introduced although not in all of its complexity, and the subplots are begun.
In a 100,000 word book it runs in the general neighborhood of 30,000 words,but that's a VERY general neighborhood. The second act builds the plot and layers the characters, working toward the midpoint of the book, by which time the protagonists should have changed so much that they can't go back to where they were when they started. The third act is higher stakes and faster build and ends with that going-to-hell dark moment, and then the fourth act resolves everything and ends with the Big Bang obligatory scene.
So when Bob and I talk about the book, we can say things like, "This scene would probably play better in the third act," or "we've got no build for this subplot in the second act." Instead of saying, "I think there's something wrong here, what do you think?"

*Bob*: We did four acts because Jenny wanted four. I'd be ok with three. Or
five. Or two. Or one. I'm easy.
I'm used to the five parts of narrative structure actually:
Inciting incident
Escalting conflict
Crisis.
Climax
Resolution.
I think if you look at all these templates, they all have roughly the same elements.


Question 2:
>I'd like to thank you Jenny and Bob for sharing your knowledge and experience with us. In day two lesson, Jenny had a line Bob agreed with. She said: And we both wanted a bestseller so we both signed on for the hard work and sacrifice that meant. She also said in another post that her career was so demanding she had to put her life on hold. Could you please explain more on what you view as the schedule and the demands on a best selling author?


Jenny: The great thing about collaboration is that you can share some of the pressures and demands of this kind of career. The bad thing about collaboration is that you have to share the pressures and after a while you look at each other and only see the pressures. And then you want to kill each other. I don't think Bob and I have ever had a conversation that wasn't about the book we were working on or our careers in some way, and that gets bad because neither one of us is exactly good at personal relationships anyway, so we sort of egg each other on.
Basically, any writing career, but a collaborative writing career in particular, has two components. One is the writing where you're trying to produce a great book, working on craft, discussing where the plot's going, etc. The other is the promoting which you have to do if you want to be a bestseller. You just have to. It doesn't come to you any other way. Which means book tours and website and blogs and interviews and public appearances and conferences and anything you can think of that will get your name and the book cover in front of people. As we noted before, neither of us is a people person, but you have to be an aggressive and entertaining people person to sell the book. So you give up half your time to do what you hate to do so you can afford to devote the other half of your time to what you love to do. It can take a real toll. The good thing about collaborating is that there's another person to share the load, somebody else to tap dance with you. The bad thing about collaborating is that you're stuck with that person on the road or whatever promotional hell you're trapped in, and there's nobody else there to blame. So it's Bob's fault.
We're doing the things that we like to do--the website, the newsletter, the blogs--because they actually add to the experience of writing the book, talking about the book and explaining it to people keeps it clearer for us. We also both love teaching, so conferences are easy for us. But traveling, booksignings, speeches, those are the toughies. We do them because we love Don't Look Down and want it to be a success so we can do other books together. But with the writing and the promoting, our personal lives get shifted to the backburner. There's always something that needs to be done now. And that makes us both cranky, so part of the collaboration that we're still working on is being kind to each other, not blaming each other for our own insanities, and trying to makes lives away from each other that don't involve a computer and the use of the words "plot" or "character."
Basically, you pay for your success. A good book is not enough to make a bestseller, people have to know about the good book so they can buy it. So you write for half of your life and then give up the other half to promote what you've written. And you promise yourself you'll get a life soon. Bob and I have made a pact that we're both getting real lives in 2007. That's only nine months away. It could happen.

*Bob:* I"m not sure what the question is after reading Jenny's answer which is typical.
I did read that thing Jenny said about the bestseller and it confused me also which is also typical. I don't think Jenny and I said anything about writing a bestseller when we decided to collaborate, although one of my suggestions to anyone who is thinking about collaborating is to make sure you do it with someone who is already a NY Times Best-selling author. It really helps.
Last weekend in San Diego I was standing in the back of the hall when Jenny was yacking about something-- collaging or revising or something-- and Catherine Coulter was standing next to me and she said we needed to mess with Jenny so when the talk was over she took my hand and we walked up to Jenny hand in hand and said we were going to collaborate. At which Jenny laughed and said you can have him. So much for loyalty.
Where was I? And what was the question?
Basically, Jenny and I believed in the book so much we agreed to do anything it took to promote. But the key for me was I really knew it was a damn good book. I just started re-reading it yesterday (because you do forget what you wrote) and I really like it. So Monday before I get on the plane to fly to New York City I have to stop at Skirt Magazine an have a photo taken wearing, you guessed it, to help promote the book. On my shield, or with it, as they used to say in ancient Greece.
Here's the thing about a break-out book (and I've written a lot of books) if you're a mid-list author. You've got to do the thing you don't want to do. You've got to slow down. We wrote the first draft of DLD fast. Five months. But then we did what I've never done before. We rewrote. And rewrote. And rewrote. For seven months.
The bottom line is. Write the best book possible.