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Writing for TV and Books with Matt Goldman · WriterCon

0:00
Speaker 1: This week on the writer Con podcast.
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Speaker 2: I want piece of advice is be kind to yourself,
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Speaker 2: don't beat yourself up.
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Speaker 1: Welcome to writer Con, a gathering place for writers to
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Speaker 1: share their knowledge about writing and the writing world. Your
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Speaker 1: hosts are William Bernhardt, best selling novelist and author of
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Speaker 1: the Red Sneaker books on writing, and Laura Bernhardt, author
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Speaker 1: of the want lnd Files book series.
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Speaker 3: Thank you, Jesse Ulrich. Hey, they're writers. Thanks for joining us.
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Speaker 3: I'm just back in town from another of my mysterious
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Speaker 3: research trips. Will I reveal this subject to the research. Yeah.
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Speaker 3: Once I finished the book, which will not be this podcast,
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Speaker 3: we can celebrate the release of Like. In this two
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Speaker 3: week period, just before this podcast came out, not one
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Speaker 3: but two books have come from out written by writer
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Speaker 3: Con friends who have been on the podcas asked and
1:00
Speaker 3: come to the conference every year. I'm talking about John Woolley,
1:04
Speaker 3: been here many times. He just released Beauty in the Bund,
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Speaker 3: Lynette Bennett just released her memoir Broadway Dreamer, and Laura,
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Speaker 3: I think you edited both of those books, didn't you did?
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Speaker 4: Yes? Edited and designed? I sure did. And I'm so
1:21
Speaker 4: happy for Lynette. I've been working with her and watching
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Speaker 4: her progress for more than more years than I think
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Speaker 4: I'm willing to admit. And I'm so happy for her
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Speaker 4: to see that book come out.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, good news. Jossy.
1:37
Speaker 4: John's books are just always so much fun to read.
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Speaker 4: I love working with him too, So all all did
1:43
Speaker 4: things you think? You know?
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Speaker 3: The book Beauty and the Bund is basically typed. It's
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Speaker 3: an epistolary novel. To use my English major. It's people
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Speaker 3: typing letters back and forth to each other, one of
1:57
Speaker 3: whom is John, and one of whom is his co author,
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Speaker 3: Robert I mean, Jesse. Is there an audio book here?
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Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a great audio book here, them just ring
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Speaker 1: letters to each other, John.
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Speaker 3: Coley, you would have to play Robert because sadly Robert Brown,
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Speaker 3: whose co author has passed, but John can be John.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's actually jumping ahead in your own script. Yes,
2:21
Speaker 1: talking about Barry's new book. We've we've been constantly having
2:25
Speaker 1: conversations about how we can do an audio book about.
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Speaker 3: Even though he's in Portugal.
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Speaker 1: Well no, not even just himing in Portugal. It's just
2:32
Speaker 1: like books about his dad. Who's going to play his dad?
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Speaker 1: Who's going to play him? Because like he can't do both,
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Speaker 1: and I was like, what if I read you and
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Speaker 1: you read your dad?
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Speaker 3: So, because that's usually us the punchline, So that makes sense.
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Speaker 5: It's true.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, we're talking about the books whose titles we
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Speaker 3: can't mention or I have to check and adults only box.
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Speaker 3: But it's Jack and then there's another word, and it
3:00
Speaker 3: means that stuff written by Barry's father, Jack. Barry has
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Speaker 3: been on the podcast before talking about them. He's done
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Speaker 3: two and apparently there's going to be three and of
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Speaker 3: four in this incredibly incorrectly titled trilogy based upon his
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Speaker 3: sleeve father. Right.
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Speaker 5: I know I knew Jack my entire life.
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Speaker 1: I don't know if there's four books worth of his
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Speaker 1: uh fascinating wisdom.
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Speaker 5: But you know, Barry's a very good writer. He'll figure
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Speaker 5: it out.
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Speaker 3: He is a good writer and a good friend.
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Speaker 4: Following in the brilliant footsteps of Douglas Adams, there you
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Speaker 4: go and the four books in his Hitchhiker's trilogy.
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Speaker 3: So okay, five toward the end? Weren't there was there
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Speaker 3: a fifth?
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Speaker 1: Oh well, listen, listeners, make sure to correct us in
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Speaker 1: the rudest way possible.
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Speaker 6: I'll do anything, be it comments. Yeah, yeah, I just
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Speaker 6: want some feedback. Maybe I should start dropping intentional mistake.
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Speaker 1: Yes, we should. I mean that's the truly that those
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Speaker 1: are the people who like to respond to the mine.
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Speaker 4: Right, Well, so long and thanks for all. The Fish
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Speaker 4: was the fourth book in the trilogy. If more came
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Speaker 4: out to it, I know Samon of a Doubt.
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Speaker 3: Was part of Mostly Serious or something like that.
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Speaker 4: And that one wasn't finished. I don't think it was
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Speaker 4: part of that doesn't count.
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Speaker 3: Wasn't finished doesn't count if he didn't finish it, all right.
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Speaker 3: Our interview today is with Matt Goldman. Matt is a
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Speaker 3: New York Times bestselling author and a playwright, and an
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Speaker 3: Emmy Award winning television writer. He wrote for Seinfeld, wrote
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Speaker 3: for Ellen the sitcom, and a bunch of other shows.
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Speaker 3: Now he's written a novel, not his first but very goods,
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Speaker 3: called The Murder Show, which involves, you guessed it, the
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Speaker 3: making of a television show that goes bad in a
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Speaker 3: really big way. It's a really pulse racing novel about
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Speaker 3: secrets and old friends and how the past never really
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Speaker 3: leaves us. Is that a that's like a paraphrase of
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Speaker 3: Faulkner isn't the thing about the past is it's never
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Speaker 3: passed or something like that. Anyway, looking forward to talking
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Speaker 3: to Matt, But first the news news story number one.
5:30
Speaker 3: This relates to sadly the passing of a wonderful author.
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Speaker 3: Her name was L. J. Smith. She was the original
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Speaker 3: author of the Vampire Diaries books. She's passed away at
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Speaker 3: the age thirty seven. That's not actually what this story
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Speaker 3: is about. This is a story. Well it's not exactly Jesse,
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Speaker 3: your series of writers behaving badly. It's just let me
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Speaker 3: tell the story. So she wrote these ya now for
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Speaker 3: the Vampire Diary series, which of course became a hit
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Speaker 3: television drama and led to what the Wall Street Journal
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Speaker 3: called one of the strangest comebacks in literary history. Here's
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Speaker 3: what happened. Let me set the stage. Is a company
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Speaker 3: called Alloy Entertainment. They had noticed the popularity of the
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Speaker 3: Twilight books and they wanted a young adult version of
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Speaker 3: some supernatural romance things. So they asked LJ. Smith to
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Speaker 3: write what became The Vampire Diaries, a series centered on
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Speaker 3: this love triangle involving a girl named Elena and it's
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Speaker 3: vampire brothers, right, Stefan and damon. Yeah, so she wrote
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Speaker 3: the first three books for HarperCollins were published starting in
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Speaker 3: nineteen ninety one. A fourth was released. No, all three
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Speaker 3: of them were in ninety one, then a fourth and
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Speaker 3: ninety two. Let me give you a little background about
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Speaker 3: MS Smith. Her first agent was her type at Okay,
7:01
Speaker 3: the typist had never represented a client. She wrote the trilogy.
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Speaker 3: According to her and what she told the Wall Street Journal,
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Speaker 3: she wrote the original trilogy for an advance of only
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Speaker 3: a few thousand dollars, not realizing, probably because she didn't
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Speaker 3: go to law school, that the app made it work
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Speaker 3: for hire because they hired her to write this specific thing,
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Speaker 3: so she didn't ultimately own the copyright for the characters.
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Speaker 3: By two thousand and seven, the sales of the Vampire
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Speaker 3: dis had skyrocketed, and she was contracted to write another trilogy.
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Speaker 3: But it didn't happen. No, that trilogy did happen. It's
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Speaker 3: in twenty fourteen. By that time, the series had sold
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Speaker 3: more than five million copies, but Miss Smith was no
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Speaker 3: longer writing them. Alloy fired her over what they called
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Speaker 3: creative differences, and then hired a ghost writer. At first
8:02
Speaker 3: and later somebody used the pen name Aubrey Clark to
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Speaker 3: actually write the final six books in the series, and
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Speaker 3: she and that, and since Alloy owned it, they could
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Speaker 3: control who wrote it who didn't. And so LJ. Smith,
8:19
Speaker 3: the creator of this thing, could no longer write her
8:22
Speaker 3: own characters for a publisher. And so what did she do?
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Speaker 3: She retreated to fan fiction. So she's writing fan fiction
8:31
Speaker 3: about the characters she created. But because it was fun
8:35
Speaker 3: faction and not being a fan fiction and not being sold,
8:39
Speaker 3: you know, she could do it. And people came to
8:42
Speaker 3: her because they knew she was the original author of
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Speaker 3: this thing. And it's a cod convoluted story, but bizarre
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Speaker 3: that someone is creating successful series characters, even becomes a
8:57
Speaker 3: successful television series, but it ends up not being able
9:01
Speaker 3: to write their own characters, except maybe for free online.
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Speaker 3: I don't know, Laura, what are your thoughts on this.
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Speaker 4: We've talked before about how critical it is to read
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Speaker 4: your contracts, read them very carefully and watch for things
9:22
Speaker 4: like this. Bill has mentioned before. Publishers are out to
9:26
Speaker 4: make money. They are not there as the supporter of
9:33
Speaker 4: the arts, and they're they're not They're going to be
9:37
Speaker 4: looking at their own bottom line. So for them, this
9:40
Speaker 4: is an ideal situation. They paid very little and it
9:44
Speaker 4: was over and they got to keep everything else. But
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Speaker 4: it drives me crazy when the actual creators of content
9:53
Speaker 4: are tossed to the side like this, Yeah, ripped off,
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Speaker 4: ripped off.
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Speaker 3: I mean, I know it was legal, but that doesn't
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Speaker 3: make it any like it anymore exactly.
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Speaker 4: We're not suggesting that they did anything illegal. But that's
10:06
Speaker 4: why you have to be so very careful, pay attention
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Speaker 4: to your contract.
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Speaker 3: You probably knew, because for one thing, I always have
10:14
Speaker 3: to drop a Superman reference in every episode, and two
10:18
Speaker 3: this is not at all on that'll come later. Jesse
10:22
Speaker 3: covers that sometimes. But did you know that at one
10:28
Speaker 3: point Paramount offered to sell Star Trek back to Roddenberry
10:32
Speaker 3: for one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, but he said
10:35
Speaker 3: no because he didn't have it. Oh my gosh. But
10:37
Speaker 3: getting back to Superman, because that's another rights issue because
10:43
Speaker 3: as most people know, you know, they got Superman published
10:47
Speaker 3: and it was a huge hit, and they did make
10:49
Speaker 3: some money in the early years until they were fired.
10:53
Speaker 3: But the point is they weren't in control of their
10:55
Speaker 3: own character because of an agreement that they'd had to
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Speaker 3: sign that I had to sign. That's how they got
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Speaker 3: the thing published, but it meant they didn't own Superman
11:04
Speaker 3: anymore and eventually got cut out of it. Jesse, you
11:10
Speaker 3: look like this is not pleasing you, but.
11:12
Speaker 1: No, I did very upsetting and Telsa has its own.
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Speaker 1: The woman who created Strawberry Shortcake and Rainbow Bright, I believe,
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Speaker 1: lives in town and also doesn't control the rights to
11:22
Speaker 1: her creations.
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Speaker 3: Does not create it. Wow. Why how something she signed?
11:28
Speaker 5: Yeah?
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Speaker 1: Probably, And I'm just like you know, like again, legality
11:32
Speaker 1: and morality are two different things, and just because people
11:36
Speaker 1: didn't do anything more legally wrong doesn't mean it's not
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Speaker 1: morally corrupt. And stealing people's inventions and then not giving.
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Speaker 5: Them the ability to continue to make money off them
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Speaker 5: is just wrong.
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Speaker 6: Yeah, that's a good for legally legally right, but morally
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Speaker 6: wrong corrupt is more dramatic, though.
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Speaker 5: I'm throwing some flair in there for you.
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Speaker 2: Yeah.
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Speaker 4: No, I didn't know Strawberry Shortcake creator was right right
12:02
Speaker 4: here in Oklahoma.
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Speaker 5: Yeah.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, we met her at an event she was doing
12:08
Speaker 1: like a like I mean it it was technically just
12:10
Speaker 1: a signing because she doesn't I mean, I think maybe
12:13
Speaker 1: she did write a book. Or someone wrote a book
12:15
Speaker 1: about her and she was just you know, people were
12:17
Speaker 1: bringing care bearers and strawberry shortcakes and she was signing
12:19
Speaker 1: them and taking pictures and she was dressed up like
12:21
Speaker 1: strawberry shortcake. She's a delightful woman. So wow, to support
12:28
Speaker 1: her somehow.
12:30
Speaker 3: Bottom line writers.
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Speaker 5: Look at them contracts.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, good, get somebody else to look at it.
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Speaker 1: Run the contract through AI, be like, do I still
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Speaker 1: own write to my characters?
12:40
Speaker 5: That's a good use of AI.
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Speaker 3: If you have an agent, your agent should be able
12:44
Speaker 3: to help. But even if you if you don't, get
12:47
Speaker 3: a lawyer to look at it. Seriously, it's like an
12:49
Speaker 3: hour of her or his time, and it's worth.
12:53
Speaker 4: It, and they can let you know. And don't get desperate.
12:55
Speaker 4: Don't get so so excited that you're being offered a
12:58
Speaker 4: contract that you're just desperate, and sign it and go.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, all right, news story number two. You can file
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Speaker 3: this under I never thought I'd be saying these words,
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Speaker 3: but here's the headline. According to a recent study, AI
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Speaker 3: generated poetry is indistinguishable from human written poetry, and furthermore,
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Speaker 3: is rated more favorably by humans not by a this study,
13:31
Speaker 3: they took AI generated text which obviously is involving evolving
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Speaker 3: over time. But they used and this may be key,
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Speaker 3: I'm using the words from the study itself non expert readers.
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Speaker 3: Take that to mean what you will, and gave them
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Speaker 3: samples of both AI generated poetry and human generated poetry
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Speaker 3: and asked whether they could tell the difference. They could
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Speaker 3: not with any reliable consistency. They couldn't. And according to
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Speaker 3: the people running the study, the poetry came from well
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Speaker 3: known human poets, but still nobody could tell the difference.
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Speaker 3: And furthermore, when they came to rate how much they
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Speaker 3: liked a particular poem, you know, focusing on particular qualities
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Speaker 3: like rhythm and beauty, and you probably already know where
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Speaker 3: this is going, AI poetry generally was rated more favorably
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Speaker 3: than human written poems. Maybe the computer programs have learned
14:40
Speaker 3: how to imitate something people like, I don't know, Jesse,
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Speaker 3: would you read a poem written by AI program?
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Speaker 5: I mean it depends on how long it is.
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Speaker 3: Read a poem written by anyone.
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Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, Here's here's the thing.
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Speaker 1: Like other than like free form poetry, right, poetry has
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Speaker 1: set rules, and that I think makes it easier for
15:02
Speaker 1: AI to fake human poetry because it's like, Okay, I
15:05
Speaker 1: have to have this many words with this many syllables, right,
15:08
Speaker 1: Like it can intuit the rules of poetry faster than
15:13
Speaker 1: a human being can. Doesn't mean it's good even though
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Speaker 1: these people judged it. So Also, poetry is like wine
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Speaker 1: in the sense that people think good the bad, the
15:23
Speaker 1: bad version of it is better than it actually is.
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Speaker 5: Right, So I don't.
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Speaker 1: Trust these people, Like Lara, what were they asked? Where
15:34
Speaker 1: they asked is this good poetry? Like if someone asked
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Speaker 1: me read this poem, is it good, I'm gonna be
15:38
Speaker 1: like yeah, sure.
15:39
Speaker 3: Like yeah? And who are these non experts? I mean
15:43
Speaker 3: what does that mean? Does that mean they're not poets themselves? Yeah? So,
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Speaker 3: I mean, Laura, I'll pose this to you because what
15:53
Speaker 3: they were speculating in the report was that AI poems
15:57
Speaker 3: were simpler and more direct, and thus it might be
16:02
Speaker 3: easier for non experts who aren't accustomed to poetry to understand.
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Speaker 3: And of course if it's if something is easier to understand,
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Speaker 3: you're going to like it more, and that might be
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Speaker 3: why AI was rated better by a significant margin. I
16:19
Speaker 3: don't know what do you think.
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Speaker 4: I think you're probably right. But I also I like
16:27
Speaker 4: Jesse's point that people who know wines are probably going
16:34
Speaker 4: to pick something very different than an average consumer. I mean,
16:40
Speaker 4: don't drink a lot, but when I have a little
16:42
Speaker 4: bit of wine, it's usually super cheap, like bottom end.
16:46
Speaker 4: Nobody would rate that great wine. But if I open
16:49
Speaker 4: the bottle and I like it, I like it. So yes,
16:52
Speaker 4: it's very possible that it was simpler, easier to understand,
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Speaker 4: or maybe it came across an algorithm. What was going
17:03
Speaker 4: to make people happy? What would make it easier to read?
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Speaker 3: I mean, when you're in the English department, part of
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Speaker 3: what you're taught, not exclusively, it's not the only way
17:13
Speaker 3: to analyze a poem, but part of it is looking
17:15
Speaker 3: for author intent. You know, what is he or she
17:19
Speaker 3: trying to get across? Why have they left out some words?
17:22
Speaker 3: Why have they broken the line there? Why does this rhyme?
17:25
Speaker 3: But not that? What hidden or subtraineing meanings are there?
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Speaker 3: Can you do that when it was generated by or
17:33
Speaker 3: does that just mean we were just making all that
17:36
Speaker 3: stuff up to begin with.
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Speaker 4: I think that's that's what I was wondering. Can any
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Speaker 4: AI has it adapted to the point to actually reach
17:47
Speaker 4: that level of nuance yet because obviously when we're using
17:51
Speaker 4: similarly in metaphor and analogies, and I think, but maybe
17:57
Speaker 4: that's that complexity that gets lost on some people or
18:00
Speaker 4: or just didn't just didn't resonate with the people that
18:04
Speaker 4: they were asking.
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Speaker 1: Well, a human being will know when to break the
18:09
Speaker 1: rules of the thing they're writing for effect.
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Speaker 5: I don't. I don't think we're there.
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Speaker 1: With AI and is never going to be able to
18:15
Speaker 1: come up with a weird you know Faulkner quote.
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Speaker 3: Probably might but who knows whatever.
18:21
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, if it does, we're going to think it's AI.
18:24
Speaker 5: Because again, you know, the.
18:26
Speaker 6: Difference is if you tell me a I wrote that
18:29
Speaker 6: quote about the thing about the past is it's never passed.
18:32
Speaker 6: I would have if you said that was A I
18:35
Speaker 6: would have thought that's just stupid words salad. But if
18:38
Speaker 6: you tell me it came from Faulkner, I'm like, oh.
18:43
Speaker 1: Are we are we AI racist?
18:47
Speaker 5: Think about it?
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Speaker 3: Possibly?
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Speaker 4: Well, I don't love it. I would have expected this
18:54
Speaker 4: poetry to also have the like the word version of
18:59
Speaker 4: having a third arm or money fingers.
19:02
Speaker 3: Experience like that, But fifteen lines.
19:06
Speaker 4: On it, it's adapting. Look at what Ralph was was
19:09
Speaker 4: creating when he was here last.
19:13
Speaker 3: Week, when he was creating those great short stories about
19:16
Speaker 3: our cats. Yeah, did you was to go with them
19:20
Speaker 3: and they were good.
19:21
Speaker 4: I'm obsessed.
19:23
Speaker 3: Did you understand why I put in our notes Ralph's
19:26
Speaker 3: jazz music? You know that little gizmo that he was
19:29
Speaker 3: playing jazz, our favorite form of music, not all weekend long.
19:36
Speaker 4: I felt like I was felt like I was in
19:38
Speaker 4: like a peanut special, you know, dance.
19:43
Speaker 3: Here's what we probably didn't know that was all AI
19:46
Speaker 3: generated music. He wasn't streaming anything. AI was making it
19:50
Speaker 3: up as we went along.
19:52
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, I didn't know that. I thought it had
19:54
Speaker 4: just tapped into a jazz station. Yeah no, Oh so
19:58
Speaker 4: I'm just as bad as these people. Like the poetry
20:01
Speaker 4: is what you're telling me, I'm on this stode.
20:03
Speaker 3: Or the weird thing is why was Ralph playing it?
20:06
Speaker 3: Because he thinks he's, you know, young twenties. He thinks
20:09
Speaker 3: it's cool. Woo a. I made music and it's enjoyable.
20:13
Speaker 5: Whatever gets kids in the jazz, I'll take it.
20:19
Speaker 3: Are you going to be our senior jazz correspondent from now?
20:22
Speaker 1: I would love to be your jazz correspondent so I
20:24
Speaker 1: love ja.
20:26
Speaker 3: Oh, come on, nobody really likes jazz.
20:28
Speaker 5: I like Jazz. I'm weird, Okay, I'm a weird person.
20:31
Speaker 4: I love Charlie Brown music, Miles.
20:34
Speaker 1: Davis, kind of Blue Delicious.
20:37
Speaker 3: And on that note, let's segue to Craft Corner. Today
20:41
Speaker 3: we are going to wrap up this fantastic series we've
20:44
Speaker 3: been getting from Desiree Duffy of Black Chateau and Books
20:48
Speaker 3: that Make You. She's been talking about reviews and different
20:52
Speaker 3: kinds of reviviews, but today's focus is on getting reviews
20:56
Speaker 3: from consumers or in other words, you know reader. This
21:00
Speaker 3: is the people who buy your book, and she knows
21:04
Speaker 3: what she's talking about. Take it away, desire a Craft Quarter.
21:12
Speaker 7: There are three types of book reviews, editorial endorsements, and
21:17
Speaker 7: number three what we're going to talk about today, consumer
21:19
Speaker 7: and reader reviews. These are reviews that are written by
21:23
Speaker 7: everyday readers on platforms like good Reads, retail sites, Amazon, Barnes,
21:28
Speaker 7: and Noble Cobo. In some cases, they even include the
21:32
Speaker 7: verified review check mark to let the reading community know
21:37
Speaker 7: that this is a real, honest review from a reader.
21:42
Speaker 7: The purpose social proof This can help influence the potential
21:46
Speaker 7: buyers because they're reading real reader opinions, unlike an editorial
21:51
Speaker 7: reviewer or celebrity endorsement that might not carry as much weight.
21:56
Speaker 7: The volume of these types of reviews can improve visible
22:00
Speaker 7: and algorithms on retail platforms. Again, Amazon will lift up
22:05
Speaker 7: books that have a lot of positive reviews to other readers.
22:10
Speaker 7: Real consumer reviews are still one of the most trusted
22:13
Speaker 7: forms of marketing. Think how you might go and look
22:18
Speaker 7: at reviews of products when buying that refrigerator or when
22:23
Speaker 7: checking out a new car. It's the same kind of mentality.
22:26
Speaker 7: Readers love to read reviews from other readers to see
22:30
Speaker 7: if that book is right for them, and it can
22:32
Speaker 7: even help with advertising and other types of marketing. For example,
22:37
Speaker 7: a substantial number of reviews is often needed to get
22:41
Speaker 7: a book bub promotion. So there's a lot of ways
22:44
Speaker 7: that these types of reviews can help you out. The
22:46
Speaker 7: big question, though, is how do you get them. I
22:50
Speaker 7: have a few ideas. First of all, include a call
22:52
Speaker 7: to action in the actual book. Enjoy this book, Please
22:56
Speaker 7: leave me a review. Use your own news lige, letter,
23:00
Speaker 7: your email, marketing, and social media to ask readers for
23:04
Speaker 7: honest reviews. Some authors do giveaways or offer incentives in
23:11
Speaker 7: exchange for honest reviews. Two things there I always recommend
23:16
Speaker 7: asking for honest reviews. Also, be aware that some platforms,
23:21
Speaker 7: like Amazon's terms of services don't allow for incentivized reviews
23:28
Speaker 7: or paid reviews. Also, be careful because there are a
23:31
Speaker 7: lot of companies out there that will offer you paid
23:33
Speaker 7: reviews on Amazon, verified reviews on Amazon. But sometimes these
23:38
Speaker 7: companies are a little less reputable and it really isn't
23:43
Speaker 7: something that can help your ratings on Amazon, and it
23:46
Speaker 7: could actually lead to some really bad things with Amazon
23:50
Speaker 7: if you're violating their terms of service. However, there's lots
23:54
Speaker 7: of benefits that go along with getting authentic consumer reviews,
24:00
Speaker 7: high ratings, the review volume, well, it can help drive
24:04
Speaker 7: your sales. It can also give you as an author,
24:09
Speaker 7: some real valuable feedback. You get into the head of
24:13
Speaker 7: your readers. You can find out what they think of
24:15
Speaker 7: your characters, which can help improve or offer you ideas
24:21
Speaker 7: or give you some insights in what you're going to
24:23
Speaker 7: be doing with the next book in the series or
24:26
Speaker 7: with your writing in general. So go out there and
24:30
Speaker 7: get those consumer reviews. There's lots of ways that they
24:33
Speaker 7: can help you as an author and your book to succeed.
24:37
Speaker 7: A big thank you goes out to William Bernhardt and
24:40
Speaker 7: the team for making me a part of Craft Corner.
24:45
Speaker 3: Thank you so much, Desiree Duffy. Now let's talk to
24:48
Speaker 3: Matt Goldman. Matt Goldman, welcome to the podcast. Thank you.
24:59
Speaker 3: All right, you have a traditional first question. If you
25:02
Speaker 3: could offer writers one piece of advice, what would it be.
25:07
Speaker 2: My one piece of advice is be kind to yourself.
25:11
Speaker 2: Don't beat yourself up. It's hard. Everybody has days that
25:17
Speaker 2: go badly. Everybody gets stuck, everyone gets frustrated. Even no
25:21
Speaker 2: matter who your favorite author is, how popular they are,
25:26
Speaker 2: what a mega million bestseller they are, their first draft
25:30
Speaker 2: probably stinks. Everybody's done. There's work to be done. So
25:36
Speaker 2: if you spend a day writing and you look back
25:41
Speaker 2: over it and you think, oh, why did I think
25:44
Speaker 2: this was good? That's normal. So go easy on yourself
25:48
Speaker 2: and just know it's a process.
25:52
Speaker 3: That's great advice.
25:53
Speaker 6: I'm not sure we've had that one before. I like
25:55
Speaker 6: it in my case. And you know, I've.
25:58
Speaker 3: Written over sixty books, and still you finish your first
26:00
Speaker 3: draft and I think, when did I forget how to write?
26:03
Speaker 3: This is terrible? And then you go back. Yeah.
26:10
Speaker 5: Yeah.
26:10
Speaker 2: So my analogy is your first draft is like shoveling
26:15
Speaker 2: the driveway in a blizzard. Like, when you're done, you
26:19
Speaker 2: still have a lot of work to do, but you
26:20
Speaker 2: can kind of see where the driveway is, so it
26:22
Speaker 2: makes it a little easier for the next past.
26:24
Speaker 5: Oh.
26:24
Speaker 3: I like that. That's right, because yeah, you can see
26:27
Speaker 3: the driveway. All right, Well, let's talk about writing. How
26:31
Speaker 3: did there are many things you could have done? I
26:33
Speaker 3: bet what inspired you to enter the world of writing.
26:40
Speaker 2: Oddly enough, you probably haven't got this answer either. It
26:44
Speaker 2: was stand up comedy. I was in college. I was
26:52
Speaker 2: a chemistry major. I was planning on going to medical school.
26:56
Speaker 2: At the end of my junior year, some friends invited
26:59
Speaker 2: me to see the stand up Comedy live, which I
27:02
Speaker 2: had never seen before. I'd always been a big fan,
27:04
Speaker 2: but never actually seen it live. And I went and
27:07
Speaker 2: saw it live, and for some reason that I cannot
27:10
Speaker 2: explain to this day, I thought I should be doing that,
27:14
Speaker 2: And so I started doing stand up and I really
27:17
Speaker 2: fell in love with the writing part of it, the writing,
27:20
Speaker 2: the writing, the writing, and then once I moved into
27:23
Speaker 2: narrative stories on television shows as a writer, I started
27:27
Speaker 2: to get more interested in character, more interested in story,
27:31
Speaker 2: and that was really my.
27:35
Speaker 5: Entry way.
27:36
Speaker 3: Yeah, and as you've already said, you very successful. You
27:40
Speaker 3: wrote for a number of television shows, like what give
27:43
Speaker 3: us a list? What are some of the shows you've
27:45
Speaker 3: worked on?
27:45
Speaker 2: Seinfeld? I've heard of it, Ellen, Yeah, Ellen, Ellen, the
27:50
Speaker 2: sitcom not the talk show, the New Adventures of Old Christine.
27:55
Speaker 2: A lot of shows, some good, some not so good.
27:58
Speaker 2: But yeah, I did it a long time, you were there.
28:02
Speaker 4: Very cool. You've already mentioned that you're living in Minnesota now,
28:09
Speaker 4: and is that why you shifted into books. Did that
28:12
Speaker 4: make it difficult to work in television or are you still.
28:17
Speaker 2: That's not why I moved to Minnesota. I've always loved
28:22
Speaker 2: being in Minnesota, and I have had a presence of
28:24
Speaker 2: some kind here since the year two thousand. Well, I
28:28
Speaker 2: grew up here, and then I was in la for
28:31
Speaker 2: fourteen years full time, and then I started to started
28:36
Speaker 2: to build part of my life back here again. I
28:39
Speaker 2: had always wanted to write books my whole life, really,
28:43
Speaker 2: and just stumbled in the other direction and it took
28:48
Speaker 2: me a while to come back. But it does make
28:52
Speaker 2: you know when you write books, you can live anywhere
28:54
Speaker 2: you want so, and I much prefer for my personality
28:59
Speaker 2: and my temperament, writing books is a much better place
29:01
Speaker 2: for me to be. I'm not. I have not been
29:05
Speaker 2: in production on a television show since twenty seventeen. I
29:09
Speaker 2: did consult on one by zooming into the writer's room
29:15
Speaker 2: in twenty twenty, because everybody was on zoom back then,
29:19
Speaker 2: so it didn't matter where I was. But I haven't
29:22
Speaker 2: worked in television since, and I've been so busy with
29:26
Speaker 2: books that I have not even thought about it. Yeah.
29:31
Speaker 4: Interesting, How did you transition? How did you make that
29:34
Speaker 4: transition from television into the busy but quieter world of books.
29:42
Speaker 2: I there was a change in the television landscape, and
29:50
Speaker 2: what happened was television got very good with shows like
29:53
Speaker 2: The Sopranos and The Wire and Breaking Bad. There's a
29:56
Speaker 2: long list of shows really that kind of created the
29:59
Speaker 2: second Golden Age of television and TV became very cool
30:03
Speaker 2: all of a sudden. It had always been you want
30:06
Speaker 2: to work in film, and if you can't work in film,
30:08
Speaker 2: then work in TV. But those shows change that, and
30:12
Speaker 2: it was all the talk. Everybody was talking about the
30:14
Speaker 2: shows they were watching, but they were all dramas and
30:17
Speaker 2: so the people in charge of comedy, the studios and
30:20
Speaker 2: the networks, we want to make comedy cool too. But
30:24
Speaker 2: comedy is not a cool thing. If you look at
30:26
Speaker 2: the great comedic characters, you know, Jackie Gleeson, is Ralph Kramden,
30:31
Speaker 2: Lucille Ball, Fraser Krane, George Costanza, They're not cool people.
30:36
Speaker 2: They're idiots. But we love them because they showed that
30:39
Speaker 2: side of us. We can relate to them. That's why
30:42
Speaker 2: we can watch those shows over and over again. And
30:47
Speaker 2: when they tried to make comedy cool, they made it
30:50
Speaker 2: joke here slicker, less human is what they did. They
30:55
Speaker 2: made it less human, and I started to lose interest
30:57
Speaker 2: in writing it. So I thought, I'll write drama, do
31:00
Speaker 2: my homework to be a drama writer. I started reading
31:02
Speaker 2: crime fiction because I thought, oh, I'll have to work
31:04
Speaker 2: on a TV show and a cop show or something.
31:07
Speaker 2: And so I'd always been a big reader, but kind
31:10
Speaker 2: of a literary fiction snob for no good reason.
31:13
Speaker 4: You know, none of fiction it's okay, you don't have
31:16
Speaker 4: to make expense.
31:17
Speaker 2: Yeah no I'm not. I mean, I still love it.
31:20
Speaker 2: But i'd see crime fiction books in the airport, like
31:24
Speaker 2: I call them big font books. Because they were the
31:26
Speaker 2: Da Vinci code and go on girl and there are
31:29
Speaker 2: and now I have a big font book. But anyhow,
31:32
Speaker 2: but so I started reading it and fell in love
31:35
Speaker 2: with it because it had what I was missing from comedy,
31:39
Speaker 2: which is in a different way. But when you have
31:42
Speaker 2: a crime at the center of your story, there's a
31:45
Speaker 2: dead body, a missing person, there's kind of a built
31:47
Speaker 2: in engine to the story. Your characters don't have to
31:50
Speaker 2: carry the whole weight of it. And so because you
31:53
Speaker 2: know things are going to move along, the phone's going
31:55
Speaker 2: to ring and someone's going to say we got the
31:57
Speaker 2: prints off the gun or whatever it is, things move forward,
32:00
Speaker 2: and it frees up space for your characters to just
32:03
Speaker 2: be people and you could look focus on them and
32:07
Speaker 2: their relationships. And it was exactly what I was missing.
32:11
Speaker 2: And so I had this break after kind of devouring
32:14
Speaker 2: the genre for a few years. I had a four
32:17
Speaker 2: month gap between shows and I just sat down and
32:21
Speaker 2: started writing with no real plan. And that book became
32:25
Speaker 2: gone to dust and it changed my life.
32:28
Speaker 3: Yeah, huge great review from Lee Child. What a deal.
32:33
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, very fortunate to me.
32:35
Speaker 3: The big different I mean, I know what drew me
32:38
Speaker 3: to writing books. You can do it by yourself. I mean, yeah,
32:42
Speaker 3: you got to get a publisher and all that, but
32:45
Speaker 3: you can do it by yourself, whereas in television it's
32:48
Speaker 3: the writer's room and it's almost always collaborative, isn't it.
32:52
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, And I'm not saying one way is better
32:58
Speaker 2: than the other. I happened to be quite introverted. I say,
33:02
Speaker 2: I'm an introvert with social skills.
33:04
Speaker 4: But exact I think there's a rum for that. I
33:07
Speaker 4: think they call it an extroverted introvert, Like we can
33:10
Speaker 4: oh really end for a while. Yes, we're friendly an extroverted,
33:14
Speaker 4: but then it's really draining and we have to go
33:16
Speaker 4: away and recharge for a while.
33:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, And that's what it's about. It's recharging. So when
33:21
Speaker 2: I was in a room full of writers for sixty
33:23
Speaker 2: seventy eighty hours a week, as funny as they were
33:27
Speaker 2: and as smart as they were, it was exhausting for me.
33:31
Speaker 2: And so I do much better by myself as a writer,
33:36
Speaker 2: I mean, just as a my person does much better.
33:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, that makes sense. So after that then came Carolina moment.
33:43
Speaker 3: Is that right? Well?
33:45
Speaker 2: I know, I wrote four books featuring a private detective
33:50
Speaker 2: named Nil Shapiro, gone to Dust, Broken Ice, the Shallows,
33:56
Speaker 2: and Dead West. Then I wrote my first standalone on Carolina.
34:01
Speaker 2: Moonset is the name of that moonset?
34:03
Speaker 3: I'm sorry? Yeah, And I'm the one that got the
34:06
Speaker 3: great blurb from Harlan Cohen Cob.
34:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, it got. I can't remember which book Harlan blurb,
34:14
Speaker 2: but it's received. Actually, that book has a blurb on
34:18
Speaker 2: the cover from William Kent Krueger, which is nice.
34:24
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, So okay, enough about the past. Tell us
34:28
Speaker 3: about your new book, The Murder Show.
34:30
Speaker 2: The Murder Show is about a television show runner, which
34:35
Speaker 2: I know something about. I've done that job before. It's
34:38
Speaker 2: about a television showrunner who gets involved in a real
34:43
Speaker 2: life murder investigation. So how it happens is he has
34:48
Speaker 2: a show called The Murder Show on a Netflix like
34:51
Speaker 2: platform and it's been on for three seasons, and it's
34:56
Speaker 2: on the bubble as to whether it's going to come
34:58
Speaker 2: back for fourth all backstory, right, and he goes in
35:02
Speaker 2: and pitches.
35:03
Speaker 4: Similar to the setup from my series. Sorry, I'm just
35:06
Speaker 4: oh really okay, sorry, but please mine has ghosts. Please continue?
35:12
Speaker 2: Sorry Okay, I have no ghosts in mind. That's just
35:15
Speaker 2: there's not one.
35:17
Speaker 3: Thank goodness, no competition here.
35:19
Speaker 2: Yes, and he pitches his fourth season. The network hates it.
35:25
Speaker 2: They say come back, or you know, you got to
35:28
Speaker 2: come up with something better. So he's at that age,
35:31
Speaker 2: he's forty years old. He's at that age as a
35:33
Speaker 2: television writer that he's feeling he's too old to be
35:39
Speaker 2: a staff writer on someone else's show. He has to
35:43
Speaker 2: have his own show or his career is over. So
35:45
Speaker 2: he kind of has that desperation which I also know
35:50
Speaker 2: that feeling, which is not pleasant, and he's gonna he's
35:55
Speaker 2: trying to come up with that new storyline, and the
35:58
Speaker 2: strike happens, the writers guild strike we had recently I
36:02
Speaker 2: used in this book, and so he has time. Now
36:08
Speaker 2: he goes back to Minnesota because that's where he does
36:11
Speaker 2: his best thinking, which is something that was always true
36:14
Speaker 2: for me too when I worked in television. And while
36:18
Speaker 2: back staying at his parents' house, he runs into his
36:21
Speaker 2: whole old high school friend, Rosalie, who's now a police
36:27
Speaker 2: officer with Minneapolis PD. When after they graduated high school,
36:31
Speaker 2: a friend of theirs that summer was killed in a
36:34
Speaker 2: hit and run and it was never solved. No one
36:38
Speaker 2: came forward, They never found out who did it. They
36:40
Speaker 2: don't know if it was on purpose or if it
36:42
Speaker 2: was an accident. And Roe now believes for reasons I
36:50
Speaker 2: can't get into that their friend Ricky was murdered, and
36:56
Speaker 2: it's outside the jurisdiction of Minneapolis way out, so she
37:00
Speaker 2: can't investigate it officially. No one's she's talked to is
37:05
Speaker 2: really paying any attention to her. They're not going to
37:08
Speaker 2: look at that old crime. But since Ethan's home, she
37:12
Speaker 2: talks him into investigating it with her, under the guys
37:18
Speaker 2: of you can use this for your show, this can
37:20
Speaker 2: be your storyline. Something will come from this, And so
37:23
Speaker 2: the two set out to investigate it together. And the
37:28
Speaker 2: more they learn that kind of the deeper and darker
37:30
Speaker 2: and more just it gets sounds fantastic.
37:34
Speaker 3: Now, all the pr for this book talks about how
37:37
Speaker 3: you wrote this from quote personal experience, which is clear
37:41
Speaker 3: personal expertise, actually expertise, which is clearly true. But you know,
37:46
Speaker 3: I want the dirt. Are there secrets being buried in
37:49
Speaker 3: this book?
37:50
Speaker 2: Or oh well, there's not secrets, But there is a
37:54
Speaker 2: lot about writing in this book. Because Ethan he's better
38:00
Speaker 2: professional writer his whole life and in real life situations.
38:04
Speaker 2: He draws on what he knows as a writer. So
38:08
Speaker 2: there is some writing talk in this thing. Yeah, there's
38:11
Speaker 2: no There is no like gossip about real life people
38:16
Speaker 2: or anything like.
38:17
Speaker 3: The sequel could be the Seinfeld murders.
38:21
Speaker 4: Yes, maybe I'm interested how you approach a new project.
38:28
Speaker 3: I was.
38:28
Speaker 4: I was definitely hearing some some threads from this book
38:32
Speaker 4: that you've I think pulled from your own life and
38:35
Speaker 4: woven in there.
38:36
Speaker 2: But I'm sorry, everybody just went away. Hold on a second, Okay,
38:41
Speaker 2: Oh wait, I might have.
38:44
Speaker 3: Hold on. We can still see you.
38:49
Speaker 2: Okay, that's why I can't see you, but as long
38:51
Speaker 2: as you can see me. Okay, what is the question again?
38:55
Speaker 4: So I'm hearing from from what you were just telling us,
38:59
Speaker 4: I hears some threads. I think that you pulled from
39:02
Speaker 4: your own life and wove through this book yours, And
39:06
Speaker 4: I'm just interested how you approach a new project. Do
39:08
Speaker 4: you outline, take a bunch of notes? Do you take?
39:13
Speaker 2: Don't outline? I know very little.
39:15
Speaker 4: Would you call yourself a panser?
39:17
Speaker 3: Oh?
39:17
Speaker 2: Definitely extreme extreme, And sometimes people have a hard time
39:23
Speaker 2: believing that happens in genre fiction. But it has been
39:28
Speaker 2: my experience working on over five hundred episodes of television
39:32
Speaker 2: in which we had to outline. There was a whole
39:36
Speaker 2: process of outlining and getting approvals to move forward, and
39:44
Speaker 2: you know, the writer's room would develop a story in
39:48
Speaker 2: great detail. The writer would take those notes away and
39:52
Speaker 2: write an outline faithful to those notes and think it's
39:56
Speaker 2: pretty good. Bring it to the room. Invariably, the room
40:00
Speaker 2: say this doesn't work. We need to fix it. We
40:03
Speaker 2: spend a few days fixing it. We'd all think it
40:05
Speaker 2: was good. We take it to the studio, they'd say,
40:09
Speaker 2: this doesn't work. Same thing would happen with the network.
40:13
Speaker 2: We'd rewrite it twenty times until we all thought, like
40:19
Speaker 2: fifty people thought it was a great outline. The writer
40:22
Speaker 2: would write a script faithful to that outline, and it
40:24
Speaker 2: wouldn't work. And the reason it wouldn't work is because
40:28
Speaker 2: the part of your brain you used to outline is
40:31
Speaker 2: a very logical this happens, that happens, this happens. It's
40:36
Speaker 2: the same part of your brain you use to make
40:38
Speaker 2: a shopping list. It makes sense in an outline. But
40:43
Speaker 2: if you create characters who are three dimensional and behave
40:49
Speaker 2: true to what you created, they're complicated. Real people are complicated,
40:54
Speaker 2: it's messy, and they don't fit into that outline all
40:58
Speaker 2: the time, and it gets weird. You start to compromise
41:02
Speaker 2: your characters. If you've ever heard a character say, if
41:06
Speaker 2: you've read this or seen it in the show or
41:09
Speaker 2: in a movie, if they say, I can't believe I'm
41:11
Speaker 2: going to say this, But there's a good chance they
41:15
Speaker 2: do that because they're acting out of character, and the
41:18
Speaker 2: reason they are is to fit a predetermined story. So
41:24
Speaker 2: I would rather let it be a little messy, get
41:28
Speaker 2: stuck once in a while, and just do it from
41:30
Speaker 2: the inside out.
41:32
Speaker 3: Well, the story is gotta come out of the character
41:35
Speaker 3: at least fit the character, right, Yes, yes, well that
41:41
Speaker 3: sounds fantastic. Can I ask what's next? We've got the
41:44
Speaker 3: Murder Show now, but what are you working on after that?
41:48
Speaker 2: This is gonna sound weird, but so much as next
41:53
Speaker 2: after the Murder Show. Five more books are coming out
41:56
Speaker 2: in the next two years that are written or four
42:01
Speaker 2: of them are four of them? Three of them are written,
42:06
Speaker 2: The next two will be written in the next year.
42:15
Speaker 2: So my first four feature private detective named Nils Shapiro,
42:19
Speaker 2: and then Nils has gone away. The number one email
42:24
Speaker 2: I get is when's Nil's coming back, And that's what
42:27
Speaker 2: people ask at book events, and so.
42:30
Speaker 4: I can relate to that.
42:34
Speaker 2: A lot of series writers can write. So I Nils
42:40
Speaker 2: does appear in three chapters of the Murder Show. He's
42:45
Speaker 2: back in a limited capacity, but it does set up
42:49
Speaker 2: his return. That book has written. It's called Dark Humor,
42:53
Speaker 2: and it'll be published in December. So it's coming in
42:57
Speaker 2: amazing ten months or seven. But whatever, whatever the math
43:01
Speaker 2: is somebody else doing, that's happening out a time.
43:05
Speaker 4: But you're so prolific, I just look quick, Can I
43:08
Speaker 4: know what your typical writing day looks like for you? Like,
43:11
Speaker 4: what's your process that's keeping moving? And much so quickly?
43:16
Speaker 2: I treat it like a full time job. It's my
43:20
Speaker 2: only job. I'm lucky, and and so I start pretty
43:27
Speaker 2: much right after I wake up and pretty much work
43:31
Speaker 2: till five o'clock or so. That can be a twelve
43:36
Speaker 2: hour day, it can be an eight hour day sometimes
43:39
Speaker 2: if I go by word count, if it goes great,
43:42
Speaker 2: one day, I could be done in three hours. It
43:46
Speaker 2: doesn't happen that often, but it can. It does happen
43:48
Speaker 2: once in a while. And I do it seven days
43:51
Speaker 2: a week. So if I mean, if there's a big
43:56
Speaker 2: something on a weekend, I will, you know, maybe cut
44:00
Speaker 2: in half. But I do it all the time. One
44:04
Speaker 2: of the reasons I work seven days a week isn't
44:08
Speaker 2: because of worth that work, ethic, or lack of any
44:11
Speaker 2: other kind of life. I do it because I don't
44:15
Speaker 2: outline and I need to keep that story moving in
44:18
Speaker 2: my head. I don't want to lose the thread.
44:22
Speaker 3: Yeah, that makes sense.
44:24
Speaker 2: So, and then a year from now, my first book
44:29
Speaker 2: with Minotaur will be out. It's called Liar's Creek. I
44:33
Speaker 2: think it's going to be the start of a new series.
44:35
Speaker 2: They're very happy with it. Fantastic that's in production. And
44:43
Speaker 2: then next fall I have two books coming out. One
44:47
Speaker 2: is another Nails book, which has not been written, and
44:51
Speaker 2: one is a historical novel that I wrote in twenty eighteen.
44:56
Speaker 2: My publisher made an offer on it turned it down,
45:00
Speaker 2: not because of the money. I just thought there's not
45:03
Speaker 2: very much crime in it, and that's not really the
45:06
Speaker 2: point of that book, and I didn't know if they
45:10
Speaker 2: were the right publisher, and my agent said, we'll get
45:12
Speaker 2: another publisher. It took a while to make all these decisions,
45:16
Speaker 2: and by the time we went back out the pandemic started,
45:20
Speaker 2: and then it was just nothing was going on for
45:24
Speaker 2: a while. But now that book is being published. It'll
45:28
Speaker 2: in the fall of twenty twenty six, and then spring
45:33
Speaker 2: of twenty twenty seven will be I think the second
45:37
Speaker 2: Liar's Creek book fantastic.
45:39
Speaker 3: Well, we've got a lot to look forward to. Then.
45:41
Speaker 3: That's wonderful. Matt, thanks so much for being on the podcast.
45:45
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having me. I've enjoyed it.
45:48
Speaker 5: Bye bye.
45:49
Speaker 6: Now just a few parting words. The Writer Con Cruise
45:59
Speaker 6: is still coming up May thirty first to June seven,
46:02
Speaker 6: leading from Seattle for an Alaskan cruise. Go online and
46:07
Speaker 6: check out our itinerary. It's fantastic and I'm excited because
46:11
Speaker 6: I just lined up an agent. We we had somebody
46:16
Speaker 6: before who had to drop out, but.
46:19
Speaker 3: The first and I got to take her place, is
46:21
Speaker 3: a superstar. And not only is she going to be
46:23
Speaker 3: speaking on this cruise, she has committed to if you
46:28
Speaker 3: want to meet one on one with every single person
46:32
Speaker 3: on the cruise, I mean with our group, not everybody
46:35
Speaker 3: on the cruise boat, but everybody in the Writer Gone group.
46:39
Speaker 3: Plus you're gonna get twenty hours of writing instructions scheduled
46:42
Speaker 3: when the boat is at sea, not when it's in port.
46:46
Speaker 3: And if you want more information, please visit our website
46:50
Speaker 3: which is writer con dot com. I'll leave a link
46:53
Speaker 3: in the show notes. Laura, are you coming on this cruise?
46:57
Speaker 4: Yes, I want to see some whales.
47:01
Speaker 3: I think that might actually happen. And of course, then
47:04
Speaker 3: if you want all small group workshoppy on your work progress,
47:10
Speaker 3: we're going to have the retreat that's in July. It
47:13
Speaker 3: came break all right, until next time. Hey, everybody, keep
47:18
Speaker 3: writing and remember you cannot fail if you refuse to quit.
47:24
Speaker 3: See you next time.