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Michael: “Hi there, Michael Palmer here with what I think is the week six Q&A. This is really a lot of fun for me—I could just keep doing this indefinitely because I love the immediacy of connecting with people who read my books. So, without further ado, let’s see what questions have come in.”

Davina: “How intense is your research for your novels? How did you get your first novel published? Do you have any degrees in literature?”

Michael: “I’ll answer the last one first. No, I never wanted to be a writer or ever thought I would be a writer—my degrees are in biology from Wesleyan and a degree in medicine from Case Western Reserve in Cleveland. My research is very, very intense. I work countless hours on the internet mostly, I read books, I send off to Amazon and get books. I try to become as expert in a field and an area that I write about as possible—and I follow up on things. That’s the biggest part of my writing: preparation to write. I got my first novel published just purely by luck. I contacted an old high school friend in New York, he sent my work to an agent, and the agent liked what I had done and helped me write it.”

Gina: “About how long does it take you to finish an average book? Also, do you have any tips for aspiring fiction writers and their search for the perfect publishing company?”

Michael: “It takes me a yea to write a book. There are various parts—the research, the decision on what to write about, the first draft, the re-writes—but altogether, it takes about a year. As far as the other thing, unfortunately no fiction writer can go directly to a publishing company or house. You really have to get an agent. Now I will refer you to my website where I have a number of ‘writers tips‘ and in there is quite a large section about finding an agent. I recommend you go and look at that. Trying to get through to a publishing house is technically impossible.”

Jason: “When getting drafts reviewed, the most common feedback I get is to spill the beans and reveal everything. How do you negotiate getting the right details in place for a vivid picture of what’s going on without giving the story away?”

Michael: “Jason, my suggestion is to write what you feel and don’t let people tell you what to write, unless it’s somebody you really trust or have faith in. There are as many different ways to write a book as there are people who write. Certainly, I’m not looking to pace out what I call ‘a reveal’ throughout the course of a book because that’s what pushes people to keep turning the pages. So you don’t want to give away everything at once. You want to as slowly as feels comfortable and I would look to make your chapters each have some sort of ‘reveal’ in the chapters as you move along. At three quarters through the book, most of the reveals should be out except for the big ones. That one comes during the choreography and the conclusion of the book. I wish you good luck with your writing and I hope that I answered that for you.”

Jaimie: “How did you get your agent? How long did it take?”

Michael: “I’ll just reiterate that: please check my website and the section on finding an agent in there. I got really lucky very quickly and found an agent who was interested. But most people it’s going to have to be a full-time project writing query letters to the agents. You need to have your book done or the agent’s not going to be very interested. So I think you need to start writing the book an then find an agent. There’s lots of books on how to do it, there are many, many courses that you can go to where you can actually make an appointment at the course with an agent. Sometimes it costs like $30 or $40 for fifteen minutes, but it’s well worth it. You get to sit there and pitch your book.”

Mary: “Do you ever find your characters taking over while you are writing and notice that you are writing things about them that you hadn’t really thought about?”

Michael: “It doesn’t happen as much as a lot of writers I’ve heard talk, but once in awhile a character, a minor character, suddenly becomes interesting and fun for me and they get bigger and bigger. I’ll give you a quick example from my book “Critical Judgment.” I created a hermit to come into the emergency room ward after being beaten up in the town. The reason I created him was so I could show what a good doctor the heroine is. He became so interesting to me that I gave him a whole persona and he became I would say the second main person in the book as I went along and he was great. He was fun to write about and I wish I could think of some more business for him.”

Michael: “Hi there, Michael Palmer here again with the fifth go-around with Q&A and I’m very pleased with the response and the number of people who are watching and sending in questions. I’ll do my best to get through the ones that I have here. If I don’t make it then I’ll carry some of them over. So let’s look at the list.”

Shirley: “How long does it usually take to finish a book?”

Michael: “That’s actually an answerable question. I’m under a contract, the same as many many successful commercial writers to write a book a year. I don’t expect to never honor that contract. So I work as hard as I need to, to get a book done each year. That means about maybe about two months of getting ready to write, four to five months of writing and then the rest of the time fixing the book. After it’s sent in, while I’m waiting for the edits, I’m already working on the next book. So I do a book a year, and there’s a carryover– I’m just about done with another one.”

Nancy: “Michael, I read about the McGuffin for the first time on your website. Could you explain it and how writers can use it effectively in creative nonfiction as well?”

Michael: “The McGuffin is not an easy concept. When I teach, sometimes it takes hours to explain it. It’s a word that Alfred Hitchcock coined and I’ll give you a quick example and then you’re going to have to go on Google and check it out. And also there’s a large section on my website. Basically, the McGuffin is the answer to the ‘what-if’ question, like in the case of ‘North by Northwest’ by Alfred Hitchcock. He started with ‘what if a man had a mistaken identity while he is on a train and people try to kill him for reasons which are not clear.’ That’s the question he asks when he wrote “North by Northwest’ and when you ask Alfred Hitchcock ‘why are they chasing him?’ he would’ve shrugged his shoulders and said ‘I don’t know, I’ll figure it out.’ What he’s figuring out is the McGuffin. It could be almost anything, but in this case it had something to do with spies. So I encourage you to read about it. It’s fun and you can use it fiction– I’m not sure about nonfiction, I’d have to give that some thought.”

Nancy: “Michael, you seem so comfortable in your videos. Do you have any tips to help writers get over their fear of public speaking?”

Michael: “Toast-masters is a great way– I didn’t do that– I’ve always been comfortable. I’ve done a lot of community theater and I embarrass very little now as I get older. So the truth is, I just do my best. I don’t care, I love talking to people and right now I love talking to all of you.”

Dorothy: “Do you think Twitter is a useful networking tool for connecting with new readers and generating interest? Do you have any creative ideas for new writers to use in jumpstarting their careers (using social media)?”

Michael: “I’m not an expert at social media by any stretch and I certainly feel like I’m connecting with a large number of new readers, but time will tell because I haven’t really had a book up for sale since I’ve started more and more to get tips from my publicists and to connect with people over Twitter and Facebook. So I can’t answer the question except that it makes perfect sense to me that the more I can connect with people, the more books I’m ultimately going to sell. I don’t completely know how Twitter even really works, but I’m trying my best to interact with people and until it becomes more work than it’s worth I’m going to try to keep doing it. As it’s sort of fun and it’s a great break for me.

Kimberly: “How did you decide which new media (Twitter, Facebook, etc) to pursue and do you plan to follow the crowd, adopting new social media sources as they become available? Have you noticed an effect on your sales or is it too early to tell?”

Michael: “I have publicists who advise me on what I should be doing and I keep in close touch with them and they’re terrific. They’re sort of ‘new media publicists’ who really understand this stuff and what they tell me to do I do, and I’m gradually catching on and soon I’ll be able to do more and more of this stuff by myself, because it seems like a natural way to connect with people.”

Nicoleta: “What’s your favorite book and by whom? What country do you want to visit that you have not had the opportunity?”

Michael: “I have a lot of favorite books, I really do. I loved, most recently, I really loved ‘The Curious Incident of The Dog in The Nighttime.’ I couldn’t put it down– I read it twice and I loved the book. It’s about a kid with Asperger Syndrome investigating the murder of dog. It was a wonderful, impressive book. I recently read a couple of books by my friend Lee Child who created Jack Reacher and he’s just good—he’s a really good writer. And I put him in a class with John D. McDonald– another one of my favorite writers. As far as where I want to visit, I’ve never been to Africa and I really expect that I’m going to go there someday.”