02:19I'm not talking genres, although I've written in different genres.
02:25I'm talking writing styles.
02:28Now, by way of example, my first international book, Terror Strikes Coming Soon to a City New You, is more traditionally written style-wise.
02:45I hired an editor that indeed was very much Oxford English kind of trained, right?
02:54And I made, I allowed him to impose and force upon me the stricter Oxford styling guides, outlines, rules, regulations.
03:10They're not laws, you could break them, right?
03:12But suggested rules.
03:15And also, you recall, I did a show, I'm not Shakespeare, right?
03:20Even in Terror Strikes Coming Soon to a City New You, if you're looking for Dickens, Hemingway, or Shakespeare, you're barking up the wrong tree.
03:31And that's true of most authors these days, though, indeed, we generally all hire editors to keep us, at least, from going completely off the rails of either the AP Chicago or Oxford writing styling guides.
03:53So that there's, at least, in most books, formal English, for the most part, to a degree, right?
04:05It's not completely wild.
04:07Although, like in the book of Kennedy, Project Carpe Diem, I use words, again, a little more loose writing style, by way of example, within my own bodies of works.
04:22I use gonna and wanna.
04:26Why?
04:27Because Kennedy, the female lead, is a young lady in the modern world.
04:33And frankly, language is looser these days.
04:38And those words generally are used.
04:40So I wrote in a modern way, for the modern times, about a modern girl figuring out her place in this world, as it is, not as it was, not as it may be, although there is a degree in the book of Kennedy, Project Carpe Diem, about, indeed, trying to sow good and more positivity, hopefully how it could be better.
05:07But I think you understand what I'm saying here.
05:10Right?
05:11The here and now times.
05:14But indeed, a lot of writers, indeed, do still, even though they clearly aren't Shakespearean, they're not writing in Shakespearean prose, they do want to still try and adhere to the letter of the rules.
05:32That's why they have an editor to enforce them, either the AP, Chicago, or Oxford style guides.
05:41I, in my more recent books, let my style flag fly a little more, so to speak, right?
05:50A little more loose than the formality from Terror Strikes, coming soon to a city near you.
05:58And the next fiction book, now, Terror Strikes, historical fiction, right?
06:08That's genre-ish, or as I say, aka, faction, part fact, part fiction.
06:13And beyond that, I did how to write a book and get it published to help others write, or if you don't intend to ever write your own book and publish your own book, how to write a book, let me grab that and hold it up.
06:31It helps you to understand what authors go through.
06:35So you have a copy of Terror Strikes coming soon to a city near you.
06:41What did Joseph M. Leonard go through to put this book together and you be able to buy it, right?
06:51And beyond that, I did my Constitutionalist Politics series, now up to four, is nonfiction.
07:00So that's a whole other thing, and a whole other, at times, potentially writing style.
07:08But back to style, like Terror Strikes again, I got a review from a woman who said, not enough dialogue.
07:18Well, never in any of the interviews had I ever given, or does it say in the description, hey, there's a lot of dialogue in here.
07:26I didn't mis-sell it, she misunderstood what it was she was buying.
07:31She made an assumption, I don't know why, but she made an assumption, and she preferred a lot of dialogue, and there was not enough to her liking in it.
07:43But there was dialogue in it.
07:45Narration style was some dialogue.
07:48A writing style, right?
07:50That book was that kind of style.
07:53Another woman, thankfully, kind of came to my defense and wrote a competing review, and indeed said, where did he ever say it was full of dialogue?
08:05And she mentioned The Great Gatsby and other books.
08:09Like, some books have, one she mentioned, I don't remember who was The Great Gatsby, frankly, I didn't read that book, so I don't know.
08:21But a book that is all dialogue, now, to me, that would be dialogue overload.
08:27I wouldn't, I don't like that, I don't like a ton of dialogue.
08:33But that's just me, that may not be you.
08:35And I don't want to sell you a book that isn't what you're looking for.
08:40And that's to understand the writers and the different stylings, though I'm making the point here, my various books are all different writing styles, even within my own works.
08:52Terror Strikes Narrative with some dialogue.
08:56But the competing reviewer said, yeah, he never said there'd be a ton of dialogue.
09:01So that, sorry, that was kind of on you.
09:03And, you know, I'm sorry, I wish you would have gotten what you wanted, but what did you think of the story?
09:11What about the substance of the story?
09:14That's, you know, a valid critique that I preferred a lot of dialogue and there wasn't.
09:22Okay, legitimate criticism of your opinion so others understand what they're getting.
09:30Valid point to make, but what did you think of the substance of the story?
09:37Like, the book of Kennedy, and I even say it on the back about my Terror Strikes book, does not have one line of dialogue in it, period.
09:50That's another writing style, right?
09:51It's a traditional narrative style, tale telling.
09:59Not one lick of dialogue in it, though.
10:02That's a little unusual.
10:05Usually a book has some dialogue in it, but this has none.
10:09And I want people to know what they're getting up front.
10:12Another type of writing style, like a short story, a lasting legacy, and the title itself is a bit of an oxymoron.
10:27It says a short story right there.
10:30For those looking behind the scenes on the video, it says right on the cover, I'm holding up a short story.
10:37It's a novelette.
10:39So is the book of Kennedy.
10:41These are both novelettes.
10:44Why?
10:45Because I wanted to keep the word count down, the page count down, and therefore, most importantly, the cost to the consumer down.
10:55I understand after four years of double-digit inflation that no one's cost of living adjustments or work employer raises kept up with that.
11:09We've all lost buying power.
11:12We've all lost disposable income to be able to spend on things like books, entertainment, or, you know, entertainment.
11:21So I wanted to keep the cost down.
11:23But the point I was getting at, a short story, a lasting legacy, a novelette, not a short story, right?
11:33There's novella, there's short stories, and I'll get into that later.
11:37Novellas, novelettes, full novels, like Terror Strikes is a full and complete novel.
11:48And then I even invented the term novel-ext, E-X-T, for extended, bigger than a novel, like War and Peace, to me would be a novel-ext.
11:59It's an extended novel, above and beyond the regular sizes of a novel.
12:05But A Lasting Legacy is written in yet another style.
12:12Not, it's still narrative, and there is dialogue, but not till the very end.
12:18Very, very little, next to none, in, let me hold up the hardcover, this is the hardcover copy look.
12:29A short story, a lasting legacy, again, a short story, it's a novel, that is a bit of a misnomer, is written in journal entry style.
12:39By which I mean, in here, each chapter, except for the end, is as if Ryan, the lead character, has written a journal or a diary entry, and that is shared with you to tell the tale.
12:59That's another writing style.
13:03And you may not like, you may love that, you'll love this book.
13:08You may not like that style, don't buy that book.
13:12I don't want to sell you something you're not going to be potentially happy with.
13:18Right?
13:18So I've written different things, in different styles, different ways, on purpose, in order to introduce their works, books, works of writing, in the different styles to attract different audiences.
13:38If you love one book, doesn't mean you're going to love every book.
13:43And if you hate one book, like you buy A Lasting Legacy, not reading the description that says it's journal entries and you hate it, doesn't mean you're going to dislike all my other books.
13:56You may love terror strikes coming soon to you, because it's completely different writing style.
14:03And then lastly, a short story, another type of size.
14:10Again, short stories, novellas, novelette, novels, and then my invention, novel Xs.
14:18Reflects, right?
14:19Those are varying word count page sizes defined, and you can Google it.
14:27And it'll tell you, generally, a short story is up to this many words and pages.
14:32A novella is this many words and pages.
14:35A novelette is between this many words and pages.
14:38And a novel is above that.
14:41And I dare say now, if you're over 500 pages, you're into novel Xt, novel EXT territory.
14:50But my last book, my latest is, and it says it right in the title, A Really Short Story.
14:58Is E.T. Really Here?
15:00Actually, that's kind of backwards on the cover.
15:02The title is, Is E.T. Really Here?
15:06The subtitle is A Really Short Story.
15:09And it's in a very weird writing style.
15:16Way, way out of the norms that books and stories normally come.
15:24I wrote it in a strange fashion to tell a strange tale.
15:32So, the style matches the strangeness of the story.
15:39So, I just wanted, as part of, or later following up, Books, Authors, Weeks on Constitutionalist Podcasts,
15:50running three weeks in October, or, if this runs later, ran back in October for three weeks,
15:59Books, Authors, Weeks, Monday through Friday drops for three weeks,
16:04to explain how a little bit more, a little more behind the scenes of writing and publishing.
16:14So, those who are not normal, avid readers understand this maybe now a little more
16:23and might be interested in particular books of a particular writing style over another
16:30and now know the difference.
16:33And you probably knew the difference.
16:37You probably just never really thought that long and hard about it.
16:43And this episode is going into all that to, indeed, verbally get the details out there.
16:53And I was going to say in print, but unless I do a Before It's News story follow-up to this,
17:01yeah, just verbally out there about written styles.
17:07Okay, I hope I covered everything, because I didn't take notes.
17:13And I wanted to use my books, and again, I hope,
17:18josephmleonard.us slash shop, or josephmleonard.
17:23It's not French.
17:26It's Leonard without an O, but I have to go with the middle initial,
17:30josephmleonard, because there is a josephmleonard, who is also a Christian author.
17:37And that's the other thing, right, kind of a genre.
17:40These aren't all pure Christian books.
17:43I have no intention of beating anyone over the head with the Bible,
17:47but yes, I consider myself a Christian writer.
17:50And josephmleonard out of South Carolina is absolutely more traditional Christian writer
17:59than even I am.
18:01And obviously, I'm a Christian writer.
18:03If I've got four books, I'll call it Constitutionalist Politics.
18:07It's about Christian-based, biblical community understanding
18:15of our Judeo-Christian foundations as a nation.
18:19I wanted to explain all that.
18:22So, different writers write different ways.
18:26Find one or two you like, or again, like me, know the difference in the styles of the books.
18:34You may or may not like one or the other.
18:36josephmleonard.us slash shop, or I was getting to Joseph M. Leonard, of course, on Amazon.
18:45Joseph M. Leonard, Leonard without an O.
18:47You'll find all my books on Amazon, or if you want autographed copies,
18:53hey, Christmas is coming.
18:55If you want autographed copies of a book, maybe you're not a big reader,
18:59but you know someone is.
19:01Hey, John loves to read books.
19:03I'd like, my name is Frank, but I want to buy books that Joe autographs personally for John
19:12so I can give them for Christmas.
19:15At any rate, again, the point and purpose is not for me to try to push all my books on you,
19:25but they are great examples.
19:28They really are, because, again, they're in all different styles,
19:33and that's the point of this show, writing styles.
19:39A follow-up.
19:41I've got four pieces on Before It's News.
19:46Free tips and techniques outside of how to write a book and get it published,
19:50tips and techniques, where you can get some free hints, tips and techniques.
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