Improving by Leaps and Bounds

By James M. Jackson

I recently had an operation to stabilize abdominal aortic and iliac artery aneurysms. Part of the solution to that problem resulted in blocking the artery that provides much of the blood flow to my right buttock and hip. Fortunately, blood also flows to these areas from other places. The result is activity that uses those muscles (like walking—don’t even think about running) leaves those muscles screaming for more oxygen. Pain is what we call that screaming for O2.

Over the years, many people have told me I was a pain in the butt. Turns out they were prescient.

While researching how to improve my situation, I realized there are many similarities between revascularization (the process of bringing new blood vessels to supply the oxygen-deprived muscles) and learning new skills.

The purported “10,000-hour rule” for mastering a skill suggests that to excel, we must spend 10,000 hours working on that skill. That makes for great headlines but is too simplistic to benefit us in practice. First, the 10,000 hours was an average. Some people became extraordinary with many fewer hours, and others took considerably longer.

Second, it obscures the factors that determine how and at what rate we improve. What you do matters as much or more than how long you do it. Consider practicing “Mary Had a Little Lamb” on the piano for 10,000 hours. Assuming you are still sane, that practice may make you a master of that piece, but it doesn’t make you a concert pianist.

For tasks that require pure muscle memory (shooting basketball free throws, carving perfect figures in Olympic skating competitions (in olden days), or keyboarding without looking), repeating the same task over and over again can develop it—provided we receive periodic feedback to spot problems with our form. We need to practice the correct move, not master a flawed technique.

The most efficient way to natural revascularization of my butt muscles is to exercise hard enough to be quite painful, but not so much that the muscles cramp. Then allow the muscles a brief rest and subject them to another period of stress. Repeat for at least 30 minutes, preferably more. After each session, allow the muscles to rest and recover. If there are no residual problems the next day, do it all again. If the exercise  becomes “too easy” to elicit the pain response, increase the interval stressors.

While that process results in gradual progress, from time-to-time the training results make a significant improvement jump. In revascularization, the steady process is evidence of the muscles becoming more efficient at dealing with their decreased oxygen supplies. The leaps and bounds occur when new and improved artery systems deliver more blood to the muscles.

If my butt muscles were a city, the steady improvement would result from the civil engineers figuring out better traffic light timing, replacing some traffic lights with roundabouts, thereby allowing cars to more easily move from A to B. The leap occurs when a new interstate comes online, replacing clogged two-lane roads with four lanes and higher speed limits.

A similar process occurs while we master a complex skill, like writing novels. Continuing to write the same types of stories may incrementally improve our skills. To make significant leaps, however, we must purposefully stress ourselves with new challenges and give ourselves recuperation time to allow our bodies and brains to recover. Then one day, we realize we have grown to a new level of expertise.

Has that been your experience when learning new complex skills?

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James M. Jackson authors the Niki Undercover Thriller and Seamus McCree series. Full of mystery and suspense, these thrillers explore financial crimes, family relationships, and what happens when they mix. To learn more information about Jim and his books, check out his website, https://jamesmjackson.com. You can sign up for his newsletter (and get to read a free Seamus McCree short story).

September 16 is the release date for Niki Undercover.

Everything I did wrong . . .

By James M. Jackson

Everything I did wrong with my first crime series would take too long to enumerate. I got a few things right. The Seamus McCree series encompasses eight novels, two novellas, and several short stories. The average of the 700 Goodreads ratings for books in the series is about 4.4.

I’m starting a new series (the Niki Undercover Thriller series) and want to continue writing stories that people enjoy and rate well. But I don’t want to make the same mistakes I did with the Seamus McCree series.

Mistake 1: Inconsistent subgenre

The first two books in the Seamus McCree series (Ant Farm & Bad Policy) are traditional mysteries featuring Seamus as an amateur sleuth. While the rest of the series all involve mysteries, the third (Cabin Fever) is primarily a thriller. The fourth (Doubtful Relations) leans into suspense. The remaining novels (Empty Promises, False Bottom, Granite Oath, & Hijacked Legacy) are thrillers. One novella (Low Tide at Tybee) is a standalone mystery; the other (Furthermore) immediately follows False Bottom and is a thriller.

A reader does not need to read the series in order. But if they do, the flexible subgenres might jar them as the series moves from traditional mystery to thriller to suspense to thriller. And if someone reads one of the later thrillers and goes back to the beginning to catch the entire series, Ant Farm might not meet their expectations.

Lesson learned: The Niki Undercover Thrillers remain consistent: thrillers with a healthy dose of mystery and family drama mixed in.

Mistake 2: Inconsistent book covers

I like the individual covers for the Seamus McCree novels and novellas. They do not, however, project a common theme. The color scheme is variable; the font sizes and placement for title, author name, and series tag are not consistent. Yes, if a reader examined the book covers, they could figure out they were part of a series. But it is not obvious, and certainly not at thumbnail size.

Lesson learned: The Niki Undercover Thrillers covers will have consistent elements, while still allowing each cover to express elements of its story.

Mistake 3: Use a main character name many people mispronounce

I did not know how many ways people could and would mispronounce Seamus. Early in each of the first books in the Seamus McCree series, I created an opportunity for someone to mispronounce Seamus’s name, giving him the chance to provide the correct pronunciation (Shay-mus). For many people, the connection from eyeball to brain to long-term memory did not work. In conversations, they’d tell me they’d loved the books and couldn’t wait for the next “See-mus” novel.

Plus, Seamus’s name ends with the letter S. Should the possessive be Seamus’s or Seamus’? I went with Seamus’s and vowed never again to give a major character a name that ends with S.

Lesson learned, almost: The main character in the Niki Undercover Thrillers is Ashley Prescott. Her most frequent undercover name is Niki (last name Foster, but she rarely uses it). Common names, easily pronounced, neither first nor last names ending in S. Terrific—except for spelling Niki with one K, not two.

There is a reason she spells it with one K, which was explained in Cabin Fever. At that time, I didn’t know she’d be a continuing character in the Seamus McCree series, let alone that she’d be the lead in her own series. Many people reflexively spell her name with two Ks, which is a problem when it shows up in reviews or social media praise for the stories she is in. But I’m stuck with one K and will make the most of it.

Mistake 4: Multiple base locations

My novels use actual cities and towns, mostly places I know well. I was living in Cincinnati when I started writing, and that is where Seamus had his home. The first two novels in the series focus on Cincinnati and locales in southeastern Ohio. Cabin Fever takes place in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, where I have a home (and Seamus has a camp). Then, we moved our winter home from Cincinnati to Savannah. Doubtful Relations is a road trip, with the action starting in Cincinnati, moving to Savannah, working up the coast to New Jersey, with a brief foray to Boston, where Seamus grew up. The novella “Low Tide at Tybee” allowed Seamus and family to visit Savannah for a winter vacation. Empty Promise, Granite Oath, and Hijacked Legacy all returned to Michigan’s U.P., but in the middle of those, False Bottom and Furthermore took place in Boston.

Readers needed an atlas to keep it all straight, and it was hard for those who enjoyed reading books set in (say) wilderness areas when I switched to urban settings.

Lesson learned—sort of. The Niki Undercover Thriller series revolves around Washington, D.C. and the twin city area of Minneapolis-St. Paul, with forays into the surrounding country.

Mistake 5: Killing off a beloved character

 It made sense to me that the character had to die. It fit the series arc and, because she was close to Seamus, helped shape his character in future stories. All good reasons, except many readers had grown fond of her and hated (yes, it’s a strong word, but it’s correct) that I killed her. The read-through from that book to the next one in the series was lower than the read-through between earlier books. As I said, many readers hated it.

Lesson learned: I do not intend to kill (or have killed—characters are doing the killing, after all, not me) any well-loved characters close to Niki. That’s not to say good people won’t die, but none to whom readers have become emotionally attached.

I’ll stop after these five. Writers, what “mistakes” have you made that you hope to avoid in the future? Readers, what “mistakes” have authors committed that made you much less likely to pick up their next book?

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James M. Jackson authors the Niki Undercover Thriller and Seamus McCree series. Full of mystery and suspense, these thrillers explore financial crimes, family relationships, and what happens when they mix. To learn more information about Jim and his books, check out his website, https://jamesmjackson.com. You can sign up for his newsletter (and get to read a free Seamus McCree short story).

Major Changes in the Last Year

By James M. Jackson 

Three years ago, I agreed to create and teach a course on Indie Publishing for the Guppy Chapter of Sisters in Crime. This Sunday, I’ll welcome my third group of students. In order to give students time to do the reading and suggested homework, we cover the material over six weeks.

I designed the course to provide students with hands-on experience with all aspects of Indie Publishing other than writing/editing and marketing. We discuss the pros and cons of Indie Publishing compared to more traditional publishing paths, business formation, business financials, sales and income taxes, the process of physically creating, perfecting, and publishing print, eBooks, and audiobooks, and much more.

To prepare for this new session, I reviewed the twenty lessons. Some required only minor changes from last year. Changes in four areas, however, required significant reworking of the lessons I used for last year’s class. Three relate to so-called Artificial Intelligence, AI for short. The fourth is the increasing opportunity for selling direct and using bespoke books.

The more I thought about it, the more convinced I became that I needed to create a lesson that provides information on how Indie and Hybrid authors are using AI. With a topic so large, the lesson can only skate the surface, but my sense is that writers who consider becoming Indie or Hybrid authors cannot make a reasoned decision without understanding how AI might affect that choice.

Besides the broad AI overview, my lessons on cover design and audiobook creation required extensive revisions to reflect the significant improvements in AI over the last year. I also needed to reflect information about the increased acceptance of AI technology-assisted narration and cover creation and processes an Indie author might use.

The topic of AI use by writers is fraught with strong emotion. But ignoring it in a class for writers learning the inside skinny on Indie Publishing seems to me a disservice.

Your thoughts?

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James M. Jackson authors the Seamus McCree series. Full of mystery and suspense, these thrillers explore financial crimes, family relationships, and what happens when they mix. To learn more information about Jim and his books, check out his website, https://jamesmjackson.com. You can sign up for his newsletter (and get to read a free Seamus McCree short story).

Learning from my Students

By James M. Jackson

When I graduated college with a math degree and a secondary school teaching certificate, I planned to be a secondary school teacher. I’d bless the unwashed masses of hormone-laden teenagers with my love of algebra, and geometry, and trig, and calculus, and probability and statistics. Best of all, I would imbue them with a love of that sublime universal language of numbers called mathematics. Yeah, right.

Mr. Genius-at-Numbers sometimes loses the practical answer in pursuing the theoretically correct answer. For example, I convinced my parents it was less expensive for them to let me go to summer school (where I took two courses and played tennis all day) and I could graduate a semester early, saving them that tuition, room, and board. I neglected to consider that the only teaching jobs available in January are to fill vacancies caused by death or disability (of which, visibly showing pregnancy was the most common one back in the Pleistocene era of 1972). Long story short, I became an actuary, not a high school teacher.

Over the years of teaching various classes in actuarial science and contract bridge for intermediate players, I learned I love teaching people who want to learn. But if you don’t care; I don’t care. I would have made a lousy high school teacher. So, in the end graduating a semester early was a good thing.

When teaching high school math or actuarial sciences, I acted as the expert. There were right answers and wrong answers. If I learned anything from the students, it was to discover different ways to present material so people with different learning styles could “get it.”

Contract bridge has its factual aspects, but much of learning to play well involves sharpening judgment skills. I always learn new aspects of the material when I teach it. Often, if I haven’t taught a class in some time, I rediscover things I had forgotten. Student questions often require me to look at a situation from a different perspective, allowing me to gain a deeper understanding of the game. I have the privilege of learning from my students—even if they don’t realize it.

After nearly fifteen years of writing novels, a friend asked me to develop a class on revision and self-editing for the Kiss of Death chapter of Romance Writers of America. I’ve continued to update and improve that month-long course and am currently teaching it for the Guppy Chapter of Sisters in Crime.

There are rules, of course, in writing fiction—but not very many. For every purported “rule,” we can find a classic or bazillion-dollar best-seller that vaporized it. When it comes to writing processes, absolutes are meaningless. I provide guidance and share my experiences and learnings from others, but they are only intended as suggestions. The lessons I provide are certainly valuable, but the real learning for students occurs in doing the homework assignments and receiving feedback on their work.

Invariably, students complete homework in ways I had not expected. Occasionally, their technique is something I want to try myself. More often, their novel approach does not work, and I must help them see that. Knowing something doesn’t work is not the same as being able to understand why something doesn’t work. Preparing the explanation often leads me to deeper insights and understanding of the issue. When that happens, I feel like I should refund their tuition because I’ve received such a marvelous bonus.

I pay them off in thanks and look forward to the next opportunity to teach and learn.

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James M. Jackson authors the Seamus McCree series. Full of mystery and suspense, these thrillers explore financial crimes, family relationships, and what happens when they mix. Furthermore, a novella is the most recent addition to the series. You can sign up for his newsletter and find more information about Jim and his books at https://jamesmjackson.com.