American Idol Concept of Writing

As I watched thousands of people stand in line waiting for the chance to take on stardom- I learned a valuable lesson from the television show, American Idol. The sequence of events leading up to the American Idol finale, parallels the life of a writer striving for publication. When the writer is given a chance to actually see their book in print nationally, it’s a phenomenon. Only a few get the chance to actually succeed with their book in print by a large national publisher.

For those writers who never bothered to watch American Idol, it is important to understand how the process works. The Early auditions; they are screened by preliminary panels to be selected for singing talent, humorous potential and human interest. This process is rather long and tedious with thousands of candidates. They are eliminated before being individually auditioned by the show producers.

After they are skimmed down , the contestants appear before three judges:
Simon Cowell, Paula Abdul, and Randy Jackson – In selected cities across the United States. Sometimes a celebrity fourth judge may be added. These are generally held at large convention centers where thousands of people wait in line for auditions. Contestants are required to sing a short one-minute a cappella snatch. Those who impress the judges enough move on to the second-round auditions, which take place in Hollywood (typically only several dozen out of the thousands in each city move on).

By now you are asking yourself, what in the world are you talking about?

The Publishing Industry, is very similar. There is about 17 million writers out there, who dream about seeing his/her manuscript to climb up the New York Times Best Sellers list, the same way “The Da Vinci Code” remained on the list for over 500 weeks.

As a writer, the key opponent in to getting on to the next round, finish the manuscript, produce a plot line and develop characters. (Remember what Cindy said, your manuscript is not complete until you write the end and have a finished script , free of grammatical errors).

The very next step is to get your story red, by a panel. The panel isn’t your family ,it is time for critique group or find a critique partner. Listening to them will send you to the next round.

What happens next?

Once in Hollywood, the three judges narrow the initial field of a few hundred down to twenty four. the semi-finalists were split into two groups separating the male contestants from the female contestants, promoting an equal number of each sex to the finals. The judges, from this point on, serve almost entirely in an advisory capacity, with no direct influence on the results. Once in Hollywood, the three judges narrow the initial field of a few hundred down to a group of 24 semi-finalists).

The semi-finalists were split into two groups separating the male contestants from the female contestants, promoting an equal number of each sex to the finals. The judges, from this point on, serve almost entirely in an advisory capacity, with no direct influence on the results.

Many times after a performance, the “wow” factor plays a key opponent in standing out and stopping them from elimination.

So what is the “wow” factor?

Remember your first book, the one that you couldn’t put down and even if you had to you used every spare moment to get a paragraph, a page or a chapter in. Even after you finished the book, one read isn’t enough so you go back and read it again:

That is the wow factor.

Although in American Idol, the judges opinion stop at the twenty four finalist and America takes over. There are many agents, editors and reviewers who are very similar in constructive criticism:

Randy Jackson knows talent and always gives the contender the benefit of the doubt.

Paula of the world-goes a little easy saying “it wasn’t that good” and breaks down why. (that is why many love her).
Last but not least, The Simons of the writing world – He is crude and it takes a lot to impress him. He is demanding and wants to go beyond the “wow” factor. He is searching for uniqueness.

However, if you impress him you have a fighting chance!