Author Kimber An: How Blake Snyder Brought Order to the Chaos of My Imagination
Cover of Kimber An's "Sugar Rush"
Today’s Guest Blogger is Author Kimber An, whose ebook, Sugar Rush, was published in October. Kimber lives in Alaska with her husband and four children. She has lots of pearls of wisdom. Our favorites are: “Can’t count to five with my mittens on” and “The key to happiness is figuring out what you love most and then doing those things with your whole heart.” Needless to say, she fits in well with the Cat! family:
This is another novel success story, thanks to Blake Snyder.
Stories dump out of my brain like a ton of dirty and mismatched socks. No other human being on the planet could possibly understand or enjoy my stories like that.
Kimber An, sharing a story with the next generation.
I wrote my first book before I started Kindergarten, but I didn’t start my harrowing journey to publication until four years ago. Naturally, I read all the how-to books on novel writing. A few were extremely helpful, but none of them really tackled my major problem in a big way.
I was half way through the second novel I sent through Queryland when I finally got brave enough to email Jacqueline Lichtenberg for advice. She’d acquainted me with many helpful things, including Theme and the Intimate Adventure. She nailed my big problem right off the bat, of course, and then she sent me out to buy Save the Cat! I think screenwriting is very cool, but I have no interest in becoming a screenwriter myself. I do love movies, obviously, and so everything “clicked” inside my chaotic brain when I read the book. Obi-wan Kenobi and the “whiff of death” in the All Is Lost beat? Totally got it.
I immediately put the Beat Sheet to work on my stories, sorting through the dirty socks crammed in my imagination. Still, it took a while.
I beat out my stories mercilessly. The parts on trouble-shooting helped a lot too. Double Mumbo Jumbo was my constant downfall. Turns out, orcs with lightsabers only works on YouTube.
Dang.
Okay, I admit I fudged a little on the Double Mumbo Jumbo. Remember how on Page 126 Blake says, “You cannot see aliens from Outer Space land in a UFO and then be bitten by a Vampire and now be both aliens and undead.” I sputtered, “Why the heck not?” My baddies weren’t exactly that, but pretty darn close. Now, they’re alien/human hybrids with a serious sweet tooth.
Finally, I scored three ePublishing offers on the fourth novel I sent through Queryland and chose the one with the contract I liked best. Sugar Rush was released by Decadent Publishing in October. If it sells well enough, it’ll go into print.
So, I may not be on the New York Times’ Bestsellers List yet, but without Blake Snyder I would have certainly given up by now and gone into chicken farming instead. It was that frustrating. I’ve noticed that all the best writers never stop learning. I’m trying to follow their example. I have no doubt I will continue to rely on Blake Snyder’s wisdom. My copy of Save the Cat! is worn out, highlighted, marked up, and falling to pieces. Thank you, Blake! Your legacy lives on!
Next week’s blog: A long-lost interview of Blake by Russian filmmaker Alexander Volkov
on December 3rd, 2010 at 8:40 am
Thanks so much for letting me share my Blake Snyder story. It was a long, hard road and I still have a lot to learn. But, like I said, I would’ve given up by now.
on December 3rd, 2010 at 9:08 am
KimberAn:
It’s great to see you on one of my all-time favorite blogs!
Blake absolutely nailed the current audience’s structural preference, and everywhere I look, I see the print and e-book novel field converging into the visual media like TV, Film, online Video, graphic novel, etc etc.
To write a successful novel today, you must be aware of and take into account the structural tricks Blake codified.
Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com
on December 3rd, 2010 at 9:34 am
‘Stories dump out of my brain like a ton of dirty and mismatched socks.’ I love that sentence.
on December 3rd, 2010 at 1:00 pm
Yeah, Leanne, it’s a mom thing. I try to buy all-white socks for everybody in my family, but that method just doesn’t work for storytelling. Darn.
on December 3rd, 2010 at 2:20 pm
Great post, Kimber!
on December 3rd, 2010 at 3:20 pm
I admire your tenacity in learning your craft. I would guess where you live the opportunity to attend writers’ conferences are limited.
on December 4th, 2010 at 7:20 pm
Congratulations on conquering the imaginative beast of story structure! I am always curious at how novelists use the beat sheet for longer works, so much of it is geared toward that 110 page count, and with a novel, well there is no magic number… Could you comment on the placement of beats — how do you make it proportionate when you are confined by a page count?
Best of luck in matching up all those socks!
Laurie
on December 5th, 2010 at 6:13 am
Good morning, Susan and Laurie!
Laurie, I multiply 110 pages by 3 and get 330, which is the average page number for genre novels. Yes, I had to use a calculator for that! But, we use wordcount most often in writing novels, so I multiply 330 by 250, which is the average wordcount for a double-spaced manuscript page. Of course, I write Young Adult which is a little less and with editing, you know, the word count goes up and down. According to Blake Snyder’s Beat Sheet, the Catalyst is on Page 12. Fine, so I multiply 12 by three and put it on Page 36 of my novel. And for the original, I had to be that specific, because, like I said, my imagination is a dirty sock dump. With editing, it gets pushed forward or backward. One of the great things about signing a publishing contract is finally having professional editors to work with. The final is still pretty close to that formula though, especially because I also have to be very rigid with myself when it comes to scenes and chapters. Each chapter is three scenes long and each scene is approximately three pages long. I learned that from Jacqueline. I’m told I’m still a little choppy on it, but I am learning! I’m definitely still a student about this. Hopefully, one day this will all naturally flow, like it seems to for the pros.
on December 5th, 2010 at 10:15 am
Blake’s beat sheet notes page numbers for a typical 110-page script, but the beats can fall in the same ratio for any length screenplay or novel.
on December 5th, 2010 at 12:21 pm
Yeah, I figured it was like tripling a batch of chocolate chip cookies. If you need one cup of chips for one batch, then you need three cups for three batches. Dang, where’d I put those chips?
on December 5th, 2010 at 1:48 pm
Thanks Kimber for the detailed breakdown — I figured as much, but was curious as to how a novelist approached if they didn’t have a final page count in mind.
Sounds like you’re being modest about your progress!
Congrats, again.
Laurie
on December 6th, 2010 at 11:09 am
Wow! Great to hear that you’re applying the cat formula to novel writing. I thought about that but wasn’t sure I wanted to go “where no man had gone before.” Now that I’ve read this post, you’ve helped give me the confidence to do so, Thanks!
on December 6th, 2010 at 12:50 pm
You’re welcome, Laurie.
JC, there are a lot of things more difficult in life, childbirth, taxes, going for a swim in the Arctic Ocean in January. So, just go, learn, and do.
