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#213 - Lynn Buchanan
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Fantasy author, Lynn Buchanan is here chatting about her writing journey, the Odyssey Writing Workshops and being a part of Brandon Sanderson's team at Dragonsteel.
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Transcript
The Role of Writing Quality and Reader Expectations
00:00:00
Speaker
Ooh, a spicy question. I love it. Because the writing is sort of everything, right? Like, you could have fixed plot holes, but if the writing... So some readers love that, and some readers are like, but I wanted more of this. So it's kind of a gamble.
Introduction and Guest Lynne Buchanan
00:00:14
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to the Right Hand Wrong Podcast. On today's episode, I am joined from all the way across the Atlantic Ocean by science fiction and fantasy author, Lynne Buchanan. Hi. Welcome. Hi. Hi. Thanks for having me. I'm really excited to chat with you today.
00:00:31
Speaker
Thanks so much for coming on.
Inspiration Behind 'The Dollmakers'
00:00:33
Speaker
um Starting off as I often do, to get a sense of you as a writer and kind of, you know, as a creator, let's talk about the novel. Your debut, The Dollmakers, which came out last year, tell us a little bit about it. So The Dollmakers is an adult fantasy novel. um It's about a woman who spent her whole life learning how to make magical dolls to fight monsters that terrace her country. But when the time comes for her dolls to be assessed, she's told they're too beautiful and delicate to fight.
00:01:01
Speaker
So she sets out to prove everyone wrong, but spreading chaos and confusion as she does. So, um, it's really inspired by a studio Ghibli films. okay Um, that kind of like vibe has always really impacted me and really influenced my writing. And, uh, it's just about an awful person learning to be a less awful person.
00:01:24
Speaker
Yeah, that's, that's got Studio Ghibli written all over it. think It's such a cool concept. I love the marrying of like magic with construction and like building. Cause so often you see in fantasy, it's like the person has the powers within them, but it's cool to see the magical thing be transferred into like the skill of creation.
Art-Based Magic Systems and Artistic Influence
00:01:47
Speaker
Yeah. I had a really fun time with that. I really like making kind of art based magic systems.
00:01:52
Speaker
um It kind of goes back to that old writing adage of write what you know. um Since I am an artist, I feel like I can really speak to art and magic being together in my stories. So that's part of the reason I write about art so often, I think, in my stories and with dollmakers in particular. Okay. What kind of art do you do?
00:02:14
Speaker
Well, I write for one. well yeah um I also really enjoy, yeah, the writing thing. um I also really enjoy drawing. That's one of my favorite hobbies. I am a classically trained oboist. So there's music, lots of music in my life. um And someday I will write a book about like a music based magic system.
00:02:34
Speaker
Okay, yeah, very cool. Which will be fun. um But yeah, just
Working with Dragonsteel and Brandon Sanderson
00:02:38
Speaker
lots of art. I also in my day job, I work as a art assistant at Dragonsteel, which is Brandon Sanderson's company. And I work with the freelance artists that we work with for his books. So I just spend almost all day working with visual artists, which is really fun. Oh, very cool. And also specifically visual artists drawing epic fantasy scenes most of the time.
00:03:00
Speaker
yep which is okay Yep. Yep. And I had a lot of fun doing that for my own book um as well. Yeah. I noticed there's multiple illustrations with the book. Were you involved with those? Yes, I commissioned those myself and art directed them. Oh, okay. I did. Very involved. And HarperCollins were just cool with that.
00:03:23
Speaker
Yep. Um, I did ask permission. I didn't just go off. Um, it was tempting to just go off and do my own thing, but I did ask permission and they were cool with it. Uh, and yeah, I kind of preferred to do my own art direction on it since it's less go between, between like me, the artist and then an art director. It was just me and the artist working together, which was nice.
00:03:47
Speaker
Okay, that's really cool. So the book itself came out last summer, been out for about six months. Does it feel real to you that it's out and you're a published author?
00:04:01
Speaker
Yes. Yeah, I think it's finally sunk in. When the book first came out, it didn't really feel real. Yeah.
Journey to Publishing 'The Dollmakers'
00:04:08
Speaker
Just as a little backstory on the Dollmakers, I actually wrote it in 2020, like the beginning of 2020. I didn't have an agent at the time. um I signed with my agent at the end of 2020, and then we sold but Dollmakers to HarperCollins in 2022, and they told me at the time that I would have to wait two years for the book to come out. so It's been a really long process. no so It almost feels strange that we're finally ah like it's finally out, if that makes sense, from 2020 to 2024. It's a pretty long lead time even for traditional publishing. Yes. Did they say why it was going to be that long? Was it just because of the backlog on their schedule?
00:04:48
Speaker
Yeah, that's what it was exactly. and They'd already filled out the schedule for the upcoming two years when I had sold it to them. Yeah. I mean, I've spoken to people who signed their deals last year and their books aren't going to come out until 2027. Oh, that's awful. oh That's really bad. Okay. Now I feel slightly better. I thought I was the worst off, but three years, that that's pretty bad.
00:05:15
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, I guess it depends on the the publisher and then everything that's going on. I feel like the industry moves very quickly nowadays. So, um, ah well, I was going to ask how long the novel was in the making for it. So obviously you, you'd finished writing it in 2020. Did you, did you start writing it in 2020 as well? Or had you started it before that? Yeah, I started at the beginning of 2020 and it took me, I think about six months to write it. So I finished it about halfway through the year. Okay. That's pretty good.
00:05:43
Speaker
Yeah, that's kind of how long it usually takes me. If a book's taking longer than that, I am worried at that point. I'm like, wait, what's wrong? Okay. All right. That's like a red flag for you. Like there's something wrong with the concept or like the way I'm writing it or something. Yeah. Yeah. Six months is about average for me. And that usually includes drafting and a round of revisions. Uh-huh. How much had you written prior to the Dollmakers?
00:06:09
Speaker
I'd written six other books before I got papers, so it was my seventh. And had you submitted all of them? Had you given them all a proper go at finding an agent, finding a publisher?
The Art of Writing Query Letters
00:06:23
Speaker
Yeah, I queried all of them. um I sent them all out to agents. um Some of them I definitely shouldn't have in hindsight. I'm like, oh, why? At least I only embarrassed myself in front of agents that probably don't remember at this point because it was so long ago. um And they they see a lot of books, so I'm sure that too they forget. That too. Just buried under many, many other books.
00:06:45
Speaker
um But yeah, I've heard some authors talk about being scared to query, and I don't know if there's just like something missing in my brain. I've never been frightened of querying, so I just did it from like the first book I wrote onwards, which is ah I think in hindsight is good. like I'm glad I wasn't scared to just take the plunge, because it took me a long time to learn how to write query letters well.
00:07:11
Speaker
um And I feel like I needed all those books and all those very bad queries to get to a point where I could write good queries and good books. Yeah, I think it's i think it's good to have the courage to just put yourself out there. And also, ah there's a thing people say and and so not just in publishing across all sorts of things where it's like, make mistakes fast, because the more you do it wrong, the quicker you learn to do it right. Yeah, I'd agree with that.
00:07:38
Speaker
So you said you took a while to learn how to do query letters. Was that just from sending out lots of query letters? You just eventually figured it out? Or did you learn from like other people from courses or whatever?
00:07:50
Speaker
I did a lot of online research to learn the basics. Um, all of this was back in high school when I was a teenager. So I'm like struggling to remember specifics. I'm like, I know I researched it. I just can't remember where I found my information. Um, but I did that and then I still sucked at queries despite knowing the general form and how you should write them. And so it was kind of a combination of both. So researching, so I knew the basics and then also just writing a lot of queries and drafts of queries.
00:08:21
Speaker
Okay, do what was it specifically that, do you remember what you were doing wrong? I tried really hard to make my books sound like something they weren't. okay Honestly, I think that was the biggest problem for me was i I was so wrapped up in trying to make a query that sounded really like cool that often I wouldn't actually describe what my book was about. I just use really quippy, like pitchy things in the query. yeah And that's kind of the conventional wisdom is that you're supposed to do that and to some degree
00:08:54
Speaker
Yes, you are. But I did it to a point where I was pretty much lying about what my books were. So so that's that's a bad query when it's yeah misrepresenting your book. And i I remember one query in particular, I got a lot of praise on the query itself.
00:09:14
Speaker
And then looking back on it now, I'm like, that is not even what the book was about. you know like I was like, that what no wonder everyone rejected it, even if they asked for samples, you know like pages from the book, because it didn't even match the query. So that was one of the big problems with my my queries, were just me trying too hard almost.
00:09:35
Speaker
It's something I've spoken about with friends of mine ah who are authors who have been through similar things where they've said, yeah, when they, you know, they first got into query. Cause also no one, no one really, when you write a book, you you don't, most people don't necessarily understand how any of these systems work. So it's a whole new thing to be like, no, you have to write a query and I can cover the letter and you have to do this and that and that.
00:09:55
Speaker
And I think a lot of people that I've spoken to you have at some point whilst querying ah sort of looked at what's popular and then tried to sort of really shoehorn what they've written into describing it in a way that's popular, like a genre that it's just not. And they're like, oh, it's, you know, it's actually one of my friends. She won't mind me saying this, but she described her novel as, um I think she described it as science fiction. She went out of her way to not say dystopian because she'd read that dystopia was not popular at the time that she was querying it. It's 100% dystopia, but she just would not say it in her cover letter.
00:10:35
Speaker
Yeah. That's not wrong now because dystopian is coming back right now. Yeah, it is. It's all cyclical though, right? Like fashion. It is. Yeah. It's what been almost 20 years since Hunger Games. So the time has come. It's time. And there's a new Hunger Games coming out. I'm excited about that. I love Hunger Games. I'm a huge Hunger Games fan. So I'm like, cool.
00:10:57
Speaker
Okay. Okay. I think games was good. Um, I still, people keep telling me that vampires are on the way back, but I haven't really seen the, you know, the big wave yet. I've seen one or two, but yeah, not a huge wave yet. Maybe it's just that editors have been acquiring them lately. I don't know. Maybe maybe now I think about it. There's been quite a few vampire movies coming out. So maybe that'll hit first and then the books will follow. Yeah, I can see that.
00:11:24
Speaker
Yeah.
Mentorship and Influence of Brandon Sanderson
00:11:25
Speaker
So you've done some teaching bits within within writing. um You work at Dragon's Deal. Amara, I'm thinking that you also did Brandon Sanderson's class.
00:11:37
Speaker
Yes, and I actually still TA for him for that class. Okay. Okay, that's cool. um I've watched all of the lectures online. They're brilliant. He's a fantastic educator, as well as, you know, that other stuff he does, the writing or whatever. When you first attended his class, did you ever imagine it would lead to you publishing a novel with him doing a quote on the cover?
00:12:02
Speaker
um I definitely thought it would lead to me publishing a novel because that was my goal at the time. That's good. But no, I i never could have imagined that I'd end up like working at Dragonsteel or getting to know Brandon and his art director Isaac as much as I have. um I didn't expect Brandon to become as much of a mentor for me as he has. I think is it's a good way of putting it It was super cool to take his class and I definitely peppered him with questions every single class, which I'm sure he appreciated. ah But i yeah, I never could have guessed that I'd end up knowing him as well as I do now.
00:12:39
Speaker
That's, I mean, you, you chose well in a mentor, I would say. And I had a look at his, I do follow his YouTube channel. I saw that it was a really interesting as for anyone listening, if you want to check this out on Brandon's on his YouTube channel, there's a really interesting video that Lynn did with Brandon, where they were discussing, um, the differences between debuting a novel now versus back when he debuted Elantris, uh, I want to say 20 years ago, maybe almost exactly 20 years. Yeah. Okay, great. Perfect. It's cool. If anyone wants to find that, it's called Publishing Then and Now on his YouTube channel, so you can find that. um So as well as Brandon Sanderson's lessons, and obviously you're you're very much part of that team now, ah you also worked with the Odyssey Writing Workshop.
Odyssey Writing Workshop Insights
00:13:29
Speaker
What does that entail?
00:13:31
Speaker
So when I went to Odyssey, it was still in person. It was back in 2019. So we were actually the last year that went in person for the workshop. And so it's a little different now since ah Gene Cavellis, who runs the workshop, has moved it all online and kind of changed the structure. But when I went, it was a six-week long in-person workshop.
00:13:51
Speaker
just that did intense, intense dives into writing. Um, I say intense because like literally all of us, there was 15 of us who went and all of us had to break down at least once across the six weeks. Mine was like right at the midpoint. I remember I like just burst into tears at one of our dinners for no reason. It was great. Um, just cause of how it was just makes it sound like we were all traumatized. We were a little, um,
00:14:18
Speaker
But it was just very, very intense because we would get up in the morning, we go to class for like eight hours, and then we were expected to write. I think we had like a weekly word count we had to hit. I was hitting 10,000 words a week while I was there. um I can't remember if that was like something Gene made us do or if I was just imposing it on myself. So I was making it worse. But we did have like assignments and things like that. So it was kind of like taking a like a graduate level writing course in six weeks.
00:14:51
Speaker
okay so It was just very like intense. and Gene just taught us everything from like story structure to plotting to characterization to revision to things about the industry, um lots of firehose. and It was great. I feel like as I'm talking about this, I'm making it sound like it was awful in some way. It was not. It was it was fantastic. i I recommend Odyssey to everyone. I've heard only good things about the online version of the workshop.
00:15:17
Speaker
um So even though I don't have a personal experience with it, I've heard it's fantastic, which makes sense because Jean is fantastic. I've never gotten better feedback than what I got from Jean on my writing while I was there. Okay, do you feel like it it was quite instrumental in getting you to where you are now?
Finding an Agent and The Pitch Wars Experience
00:15:33
Speaker
Oh, 100%. That was that was kind of like the last big leap I can remember in my writing skill between Odyssey and then coming back from Odyssey. um The first thing I did after I got back from Odyssey was revise a book I had written before the workshop. And that book was what got me my agent.
00:15:54
Speaker
um about a year later. That book was the first time I had written a good plot because that was the big thing I needed to learn and the big thing I focused on at Odyssey was plotting.
00:16:06
Speaker
Oh, okay. Right. Um, I'd love to talk a bit about your agent, but just last thing on Odyssey writing, ah I had a quick look over the website. Couldn't help but notice other alumni include Rebecca Kwong. Wow. She's incredible. So I'm sold just based on that alone. Your agent, uh, Matt Biala is how he pronounced it. Who also represents Patrick Rothfors.
00:16:34
Speaker
There's a musical ish magic system in his books, right? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I don't know if the music has tied to the magic, but it's close. Yeah. If not, it's very close. Um, he also, I saw reps, British comedy icon, Eric Idol, but that's and another thing entirely. Um, so how did you, it wasn't with the doll makers. How did you and, um, your agent, uh, signed together? Was that open submissions?
00:17:06
Speaker
So this is a weird story. So I actually met Matt at a workshop called future scapes, which is held in Utah, which is where I live. um It's now all online as well. A lot of the things I did changed after COVID. And I always feel a little weird talking about them. So I'm like, yeah, this was a great networking thing. Also, you can't do it anymore. Because of COVID. um But yeah, so anyway, I went to future scapes. And Matt was one of the guests agents that came that year. And the way that Futurescapes is run is you're put into a workshop with a faculty member, which is an agent or an editor or a professional author, and then they critique your work. And Matt was my like the head of my workshop for that. And so he read
00:17:52
Speaker
part of a space opera I'd written. And afterwards, um he seemed to like it. So afterwards, I very ah gracefully and not creepily followed him out of the workshop room and cornered him and asked him if he wanted to read the rest of the book and he did. So that's how we started kind of communicating. um I sent that book to him. It was not good. He rejected it, rightfully so. And I then sent him the book I was talking about earlier, the one I worked on after Odyssey.
00:18:23
Speaker
Um, that one's called that's interesting. Yeah. That one's called the novice, um, which hasn't been published yet. I'm still hoping I can place it somewhere, but it hasn't come out yet. okay And I sent that to Matt the beginning of 2020 and you know, then the whole world exploded. Uh, and so I didn't hear from him for a while. Um, actually not until the end of the year when I entered a contest called, um, pitch Wars.
00:18:51
Speaker
which also doesn't exist anymore. Everything's gone. um But I entered Pitch Wars and I actually got selected for it. um And just a little thing about Pitch Wars, um kind of like summary of what it was. It was a pitching contest where you could submit a book to a like a published author, and they could pick you to be their men mentee for like, I think it was like six months, and then they worked with you on the book. And then at the end of that, there was an agent showcase where agents could go and like look at all the pitch war mentees books and decide if they want to read or offer and that sort of thing.
00:19:27
Speaker
yeah So I got into Pitch Wars and my mentor told told me that if I had queries out to anyone or like full manuscripts out to anyone, I needed to withdraw them to participate in Pitch Wars. That was just their rule. So I reached out to Matt and a couple other agents who had the full manuscript because I started querying it wide after I sent it to Matt.
00:19:48
Speaker
and um three of them offered representation. They, rather than have me go into pitch wars, they're like, no, we just want you. And I was like, cool. oh I will do that instead. um That's great. Yeah. And that's, and out of those three agents, I ended up picking Matt. Oh, right. Okay. When you, when you first submitted him after you ah not creepily followed him out of the room. Yes. ah did he When he rejected it, did he say, this isn't quite right for me, but I like the style, if you have something else, send it to me? Or did you just send it to him because you just felt like it would be a good fit? He invited me to send more. Yeah. He wanted my next book. so I think he was, I'd have to go back and look at my email, but I'm pretty sure he was the first one I sent the novice to, that book too.
00:20:41
Speaker
And then once you'd signed, presumably you worked together to do a couple drafts before you sent it out to editors. Yeah. Um, the novice, we only did one round of edits. It was pretty clean. Uh, we were pretty satisfied with it. Um, similar to doll makers. Actually, we didn't do tons of edits on doll makers either. And we sent the novice out end of 2020 and it died on sub rip.
'The Novice' and Publishing Challenges
00:21:07
Speaker
Um, I, but it died on sub specifically because, um, this is what pretty much every editor said that they liked it and it's well-written, but.
00:21:17
Speaker
It was too insular for a secondary world fantasy. At the time, cozy didn't exist. I feel like I need to point that out. Um, so the feedback I got that it was like too small, small of a scope for like a secondary world fantasy, I don't think applies anymore. Um, now that the boundaries have kind of been redrawn by cozy. So yes that's why I'm pre Travis. Yeah. And I mean, i know post travis I can't really call the novice cozy. It's more of a locker room horror story set in a fantasy world.
00:21:51
Speaker
um But locker room horror story is pretty small scope, you know, you're in like one place. yeah um But I still have hope for it. um Because I do think it now fits into the industry a little better now that like smaller scope fantasies have kind of come into vogue a bit. Yeah, smaller scope. And I know at least talking to a lot of people in the UK who were in publishing, crossing genres, like hybridizing genres is very popular now. So if you can do your like locked room horror, but set in a fantasy setting. That's interesting. That's people like that. I love that book. So I really hope I can find a place for it. Yeah, me too. I mean, it sounds cool. and Anything that's like a predetermined, just mixing genres. I just love that. I love mixing genres together. So, and it sounds like that's what, that's what the novice is.
00:22:43
Speaker
Yeah, it is. Yeah, very cool.
Favorite Reads and Influences
00:22:46
Speaker
We are at the point in the episode where I maroon you by yourself in the middle of the ocean and I ask if, Lynn, you were stranded on a desert island with a single book, which book do you hope that it would be? Can I say a series or does it have to be one book?
00:23:05
Speaker
Do you think that if I gave you glue and enough materials, you'd be able to bind the series together? Yes, actually. These books are small enough. So it's not Stormlight archives, then? No, it's not. Sorry, Brandon. Sorry, Brandon. Yeah. Oh, wait. Now I'm rethinking my answer. Okay.
00:23:27
Speaker
okay i'm gonna I'm just gonna say the most recent series I read that I adored because I am obsessed with it right now. So at this moment in time, this is what I would pick. Who knows? If like in a week I pick something different, but in this moment of time, um, I recently read the, what is the series even called? I know what the first book's called. Um, I read the winter King by Bernard Cornwell. Oh yes. Um, which is the Arthurian retelling. Is there like a name for the series? There's not, there is a name for the series. I just can't remember, but I take that trilogy, um, because it's a retelling of the Arthur myth. I just love it. I can't stop thinking about it right now. Um, I finished the last book yesterday.
00:24:08
Speaker
And I'm sad. I'm having a hangover, a book hangover. Like I might need to reread them all again. Okay. How many were in the series? There's three. So it's a trilogy. Okay. Right. Trilogy. I didn't realize, um, in my head, Bernard Cobalt only did historical fiction. I didn't realize he did Arthurian legend, which is more like historical fantasy folklore.
00:24:32
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, it is historical fiction because the magic, you're not sure if it's actually magic the entire series. um So I would call it historical. it is It's the Arthur myth as if like as if it was real, if that makes sense. like This is probably historically the closest it would actually have looked. Yeah. um So yeah, I was surprised too. I don't usually read historical fiction, but I mean, I'm a sucker for Arthur. So I'm like, I i will read any, okay, not any, but I will read a read retelling of Arthur without blinking. I'm like, yes. Yeah. I've read a couple of Bernard Caldwell's books and,
00:25:12
Speaker
He's an incredible writer. I've never felt so immersed in battle sequences or set pieces as when you you're in like a Bernard Cornwall in the thick of it gritty kind of grim dark vibes.
Experiencing Medieval Armor for Writing
00:25:28
Speaker
Yeah, I love the battle scenes in the series and I felt them on a ah new level and appreciation because um about a year ago I got to dress up in real armor, like period accurate medieval armor and oh gosh. I don't know how they fought in that stuff. I would have just died. At one point I fell down while I was wearing this armor and I just stayed down. I was like, yeah, this is fine. I'll just, I'll just die. I'm good. What was the occasion? Why were you dressed up like that?
00:25:58
Speaker
Um, so it was actually something that Brandon invited me to. There's a, he had some connection to some people that like are experts on this. One of them consulted on like the rings of power. Um, okay. And they invited him to come and wear real armor and experienced that. And he invited me to come as well as like, yes, I will come.
00:26:23
Speaker
But he's like built for that. He's like six foot something and like clearly a man born to wear armour. Yeah, I was very sore afterwards. But it was a cool experience. I'd imagine so. um Yeah. Learned a lot about just how that kind of fighting happened. And in summary, the main thing I took away was the goal was to knock your opponent over because then they want to be able to get up and you could slit their throats. So, yay. Okay. That's, I mean, that's good research for for writing if you're writing in a sort of medieval setting, right? Or just armor in general. Yeah.
00:26:59
Speaker
so oh my yeah yeah This is what armor's like. Reality check, everyone. Heavy. Very heavy. Heavy. That's why in fantasy we all have like mithril armor and things where it's dainty and light. Breatheable.
00:27:14
Speaker
Awesome. Bernard Cornwall, great choice. I think you're the first person I've had on the podcast to go with Bernard Cornwall, so I feel like he's been under underrepresented and you've you've saved him from that.
Conclusion and Where to Follow Lynne's Work
00:27:24
Speaker
There we go. Next up, ah we are going to get into some writing processes. I'd love to chat about world building, magic systems, and more of my favorite things. That will all be available on the Patreon.
00:27:39
Speaker
I hope it doesn't happen again, but I can at least recognize if it does. Yes, yes, exactly. and and And with that, I think we're at the end of the episode. So thank you so much, Lynn, for coming on the podcast and chatting with me and telling me all about um the Dollmakers and your kind of experience with writing and and debuting last year. It's been awesome chatting with you. Yeah, thanks for having me. This was a really fun chat.
00:28:01
Speaker
And for anyone listening, if you would like to keep up with what Lynne is doing, you can follow her on Twitter and TikTok at Lynne B. Wright, on Instagram at Lynne Wright, and you can find her website www.lynnebwright.com. To support the podcast, like, follow, and subscribe, join the Patreon for ad-free extended episodes, and check out my other podcast, The Chosen Ones and Other Troves. Thanks again, Lynne, and thanks to everyone listening. We will catch you on the next episode.