the holy grail of writing
I'm talking about your – Unique Selling Point.
Simple. E L James, hit it right with a unique selling point. Porn you could read on the tube without feeling dirty.
So how easy is it to find this magical thing?
It's not. If it were, us writers would all be multi-millionaires making regular trips to checkout our piles of money sitting in Swiss bank accounts.
That's the thing about a USP. It's unique.
Whilst it's true, in a lot of cases, success came purely because the author was a talented writer.
That can't be said, for Fifth Shades of Grey, and a few other best sellers I've read.
E. L. James, is not a great writer, certainly not in the same league as, Harper Lee, Virginia Woolf and the more contemporary writers, such as Myra Angelou, and Danielle Steel.
That hasn't stopped her from becoming seriously wealthy from Fifty Shades. How much money the sequels have made her, I don't know – probably not as much as the first unique book. The one that everybody became obsessed with reading.
I've actually seen her books in the, buy one get one free sections of books stores – why?
The books are no longer unique.
Now's the time for all you writers out there in wonder-world to take the challenge, and write that uniquely desirable best seller.
So how do you find this holy grail?
What do you write about? World events. Predicted catastrophes. The supernatural. There's always climate change, that's usually pretty good for a dramatic story.
It's not the topic, after all there is nothing new about S & M and bondage sex. What was new about Fifty Shades of Grey was that it brought into the open, what is quite frankly perverted sex, in an acceptable way to read pornography by stylising it into a romance.
The story had a twist, or was twisted, depending on your point of view. No matter whether the book was universally slammed by many of the literary critics as badly written, which I think it is, the sales of the book made it's author too rich to give a damn what anyone says about it.
The point I'm trying to make, is not that E. L. James, is a good writer, and had new subject matter. The book hit a certain mood at the right moment in time. Why? Because she approached her subject in a unique way. She took a rather seedy subject line, and gave it a Mills and Boon angle.
Young impressionable girl meets wealthy guy, becomes obsessive about their relationship. He's a basic nut job with lots of issues, and sex with him is like nothing she's had before.
The Unique Selling Point, is that coupling the two, no pun intended, gave the story a new edge. The public, whether reading or film buffs, are always looking for something they have not seen or read before.
It can be argued that she hit lucky, which up to a point, she did. All success stories have to have a slice of luck in them somewhere. It wasn't luck though that made the book a sell out success, it was because it was different to the usual run of the mill, sexually explicit novels.
That was E.L. James's - USP.
Search for a difference in your story, take a new approach to your subject, and maybe you will be the next E. L. James.
Jane Austen - said - "Write about what you know." She lived in an era where there was no internet, no public libraries, very little education for women and the masses in general. So it made sense to write about what she knew. The world today is very different from 18th century England. If we want to know something - we simply Google it - and there it is, the answers to any and every question we have.
So, if there is nothing new to be discovered when it comes to book plots, because it's all on the internet - how do we find the Holy Grail of writing - the USP? The million dollar question? Not really.
Andy Weir - author of The Martian -
didn't write about an unheard of subject - space travel to Mars. He just came up with a new idea. Or did he? Maybe Daniel Defoe came up with the idea long before he did. Robinson Crusoe was about a man marooned on an island - same with Andy Weir's character. A man maroon on a planet. Only it's in the future. Not the past. Nothing new about the idea - but the way the author presented the plot - was. It was a modern novel for modern people - with a story idea that wasn't modern. Whilst the concept wasn't unique - the presentation was. The book appealed to a reading public that had most probably never read Robinson Crusoe. Space travel is the future's exploration of the high seas.
I've read the book. It's very good. The science well researched, and that is Andy Weir's - USP - his in-depth, and sometimes funny, description of how to survive being marooned on a distant planet.
So how do you discover your USP?
Like, Andy Weir's novel, it's got nothing to do with the subject matter you chose, and everything to do with the original way you write about it.
Take any genre. Comedy, crime, fantasy, erotica - the most successful of writers, come up with a style of writing that although there is nothing new about their subject matter, the way they write about it, is completely fresh.
Although, it takes a lot of time and dedication to write a book, it also takes imagination. If you have all of those things - then injecting into your story a new and unique idea shouldn't be all that difficult.
The difficult part comes in finding the right new idea - but then, if it's been done before, it can be done again. Be critical. Ask yourself - what's new about my book. Does the story line stand out from the crowd? If it doesn't, and this is where being critical comes in, be honest with yourself, put that wonderful imagination of yours to work in finding the missing element that makes your manuscript different from everybody else's. And if you give yourself enough time to allow your imagination to work it's magic for you. You will find your own USP.
The reading public is avidly waiting for the next E. L. James to explode on the writing scene.
So what are you waiting for. Good luck - in your quest to find the holy grail of writing. I'm looking forward to reading your book.
So, if there is nothing new to be discovered when it comes to book plots, because it's all on the internet - how do we find the Holy Grail of writing - the USP? The million dollar question? Not really.
Andy Weir - author of The Martian -
I've read the book. It's very good. The science well researched, and that is Andy Weir's - USP - his in-depth, and sometimes funny, description of how to survive being marooned on a distant planet.
Like, Andy Weir's novel, it's got nothing to do with the subject matter you chose, and everything to do with the original way you write about it.
Take any genre. Comedy, crime, fantasy, erotica - the most successful of writers, come up with a style of writing that although there is nothing new about their subject matter, the way they write about it, is completely fresh.
Although, it takes a lot of time and dedication to write a book, it also takes imagination. If you have all of those things - then injecting into your story a new and unique idea shouldn't be all that difficult.
The difficult part comes in finding the right new idea - but then, if it's been done before, it can be done again. Be critical. Ask yourself - what's new about my book. Does the story line stand out from the crowd? If it doesn't, and this is where being critical comes in, be honest with yourself, put that wonderful imagination of yours to work in finding the missing element that makes your manuscript different from everybody else's. And if you give yourself enough time to allow your imagination to work it's magic for you. You will find your own USP.
The reading public is avidly waiting for the next E. L. James to explode on the writing scene.
So what are you waiting for. Good luck - in your quest to find the holy grail of writing. I'm looking forward to reading your book.
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Great article. Thanks for taking the time to write it.
ReplyDeleteGlad you enjoyed the article.
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