Money for Nothing

Writer J. A. Konrath has an interesting blog. His favorite hobby-horse is the need for authors to promote themselves; he loves to ride that one. Last week he had an entry all about the need for hard work in order to achieve success:

Let's talk for a moment about successful people.

They have a commonality, whether they're Brittany Spears or Michael Jordan or Bill Gates or Nora Roberts. It isn't genius, or talent, or luck, though they may have some of that.

No, the thing that most success stories have in common is: Hard work, perserverence, and sacrifice.

Nobody gets handed a successful career.

Really? Two words: Paris Hilton.

Not convinced? Try Johnny Knoxville, Kelly Osborne, Jessica Simpson, Sienna Miller (what does she do, anyway?) I know, these aren't writers, but if Konrath is going to bring Britney Spears into the debate, anyone is game. I work my butt off, and I'm sure Konrath does too, but Hayley Duff doesn't have to get a job.

I can see where Konrath is going - his whole point is that you have to work hard and write a good novel - but his logic is naive. Writing a good novel will not guarantee you success. Writing a good novel and promoting it also will not guarantee you success.

What guarantees success? Nothing, sorry. Even I know that.

When I read Carla Kelly's books, I'm tempted to quit writing, but Carla Kelly is without a contract. I'm not being cynical here. I'm sure Carla Kelly is frustrated or disappointed at the state of her writing career, but she never says so. She writes articles, raises her kids, whatever. Life goes on.

Success isn't everything, and this is where I fundamentally disagree with Konrath. Every word he writes on that blog is about how to be successful, how to make a successful career. Lots of people find it very valuable, but for me I'm not sure. Even the writing is a means to success, not an end in its own. Why can't writing be an end in its own?

I write when I'm down, I write when I'm stressed, I write to keep myself sane. I write because by doing so I get to open the door to another world and go visit. It's awesome. Can Paris Hilton say that?

Abby

X

I saw X-Men 3 the other night. I enjoyed it, because I was in the mood to enjoy it. It's one of those movies that depends on your mood.

At the risk of being pilloried, I have to confess here: I just don't get the whole Hugh Jackman as Wolverine thing. Why is it sexy? His hair... egad. I'm just not... it just doesn't do it for me. More of him to go around for the rest of you, ladies.

I usually have to have my boyfriend translate these movies for me. "What's the deal with Wolverine?" "He has a skeleton made of adamantium." "Huh? Does that exist?" "No. Oh, and he heals really fast." "Can he be killed?" "They can all be killed." "How come the magnet-guy wears that hat?" "Ssh, be quiet."

There was one scene - no, I'm not spoiling anything, relax - where another mutant is levelling this destructive power at Wolverine. He's resisting it, trying to walk forward. The destructive power starts to sort-of disintegrate him (No, Wolverine doesn't die in this movie, take it easy) and his skin starts pulling and his clothes are flapping and his shirt disintegrates. Just his shirt. He's still fighting this power, and his pants are still on. His pants do not disintegrate, even when his skin does. So, this is a mutant power that also has a sense of modesty and hinges on whether Hugh Jackman agreed to take off his pants in this movie. See, that's the kind of thing I get hung up on. I wanted to shout: "Hey - lose the pants!" Even though I don't want to see Hugh Jackman without pants, unlike the rest of the female population.

While I'm confessing: I hated the Da Vinci Code. I couldn't get past chapter two. I need characters, or I'm dead in the water. Cardboard cutouts running around the Louvre aren't good enough. Boring, boring, boring!

Sigh. Back to deeper stuff tomorrow, I promise.

Abby

Questions from Megan

I volunteered for five questions from Megan Frampton. My answers are below. If you post a comment saying "Interview me", I'll ask you five questions in turn. (I'll also be shocked, 'cos I never get comments on my blog.)

Here goes:

Are you as insane about Clive Owen as I am (I spotted his picture on your blog)?

Um,




Yes.

Ever since Croupier. Yum. I've seen most of his movies, even the meh ones like Derailed and King Arthur. (Inside Man is great, by the way.) Favorite Clive line of dialogue is from Sin City: "I'm Shelley's new boyfriend, and I'm out of my mind." Gives me the shivers. It's EMBARRASSING.

You’re writing in the Victorian period; what about it interests you? And have you read any Victorian porn?

Everything about the Victorian period interests me. Nothing was as it seemed on the surface; the entire society was based on appearances. You weren't supposed to say, do, or live anything real. Everyone was completely messed up. It's a writer's dream.

I have not read Victorian porn but I'll try anything once. Where the hell would I find it? I'm guessing my local library doesn't have any. Now you have me curious.

For God’s sake, why do you write in longhand?

Necessity, mostly. I don't have a laptop and I do have a full-time job. I write longhand on my morning commute, my quietest time of day.

I like it, though. Writing longhand makes you see your words differently, feel them differently. They're more yours. But it's hard on the hand.

How would you describe your writing ‘voice?’

Er, um... complex. Sensuous, though I don't write erotica. Sometimes a little too serious. I use lots of complicated sentence structures and long words like the Victorians did. It's not for everyone, but it's fun.

What is your favorite kind of nut? And why?

Why, cashews, of course. Aren't they everyone's favorite?

Back to Reading

I've been doing a lot of writing, which is great, but it cuts into my reading time. What to do, what to do?

It's hard to balance the two, since both are so important. You have to be careful about reading when you're writing. You can't read too much, and you can't read stuff that's going to derail your own writing or influence your voice. But if you write in a vacuum, you get stale. I've found that this time around I'm reading stuff that's completely unlike what I'm writing, like mysteries and thrillers.

I also just read Libba Bray's A Great and Terrible Beauty, which is historical Young Adult. This is a cool concept - Victorian teens. Who would think they're interesting? What did teenagers do before they were called "teenagers" and just went straight from child to adult? The mindset didn't exist, but all the hormones and doubts sure did. That's what this book is about.

And damn, it's dead good. This book is all about young women growing up, finding themselves, experimenting, making mistakes, forming friendships and enmities, but it's all set on the backdrop of the repressive Victorian era. Well, you know I love my Victorians, but I'm picky about my Victorian books. They have to be just right. Beauty is just right.

The language in this one walks a fine balance. It's got an overlay of historically-correct vocabulary and idiom, but you can't go too far or you'll turn your teenage reader off. It's essentially written in a language teens can understand, and if the odd modern phrase slips in there ("give the boot") it's no big deal.

The only thing I wonder is if any actual teenagers will read it. Adults will love this book by droves, but I'm actually not sure about teenagers. Maybe just the brainy ones will read it. Then again, only the brainy ones read at all.

It's the first of a trilogy, too. I'm off to find the next one.

Abby

Read recently on the net...

" I dont' trust ppl who don't read. What are they thinking about??"

Hehe.

One Smart Bitch

If you get me started on Laura Kinsale, I'll bore you.

I'll tell you about how she should be widely acclaimed as a writer, instead of well-known only within her own genre. I'll tell you how fascinating it is that someone who started her career in geology ended up so gifted in the art of literature. I'll tell you how her acknowledged period of writers' block, brought on by an industry flogging her into production, is a cautionary tale for all aspiring writers, including myself.

She has written a great post on Smart Bitches about the relationship between writer and reader. It's started a lively (though smart and respectful, so not painful to read) debate in the comments thread. Basically, Kinsale maintains that writing is a solo act, one that even the writer is rarely in control of, and one that essentially does not contain readers in the equation:

A book is a magic thing. It has a life of its own. Do you doubt it, in the small hours of the night when you sit up in bed reading and reading, living in a world you never made, unable to bear to leave it until the last page closes and it vanishes into thin air?

And:

It’s not out there. It’s in here [...] I serve a different master. I serve this art, whether you buy it or not. I began to write because I loved to write. That is still the only way.

Even when she's blogging, she's a better writer than most of us.

There are a good number of people, both readers and writers, who disagree. Publishing, they say, is part of this equation. Reaching readers is part of the equation. There is no point to writing if no one ever reads it. That's their opinion, and that's just fine, but I couldn't, couldn't disagree more.

Great books are written when the author doesn't give a shit. Great books are written when all the crap is stripped away and the writer is sitting alone, pen in hand, confronting her humanity like thousands of writers before her, the same pose that Virginia Woolf sat in and Jane Austen sat in and Anne Frank sat in. Every one of them sat down to a blank page because they were compelled, and for no other reason. Woolf could have written capers if she wanted to be rich. Austen could have written potboilers. Frank did not have to write anything at all. Every one of them wrote because they had to, because these words and no others came to them, demanding release.

Incredibly, there are people in the comments debating whether books are art. Who are they kidding? If we're generous, given his times, Homer lived to be maybe 40. We have been reading his work for centuries. Longer even than he could have imagined in his wildest, wildest dreams. It is art, folks. It is bigger than you, than me. Yes, lots of fiction is entertainment. Lots of fiction is also art.

Kinsale has the last word:

Every single book that ever really rocked the market was something new and strange and wonderful and individual. Maybe it was simple, even clunky in execution, but there was something in it and about that that sang so loud everybody could hear it for miles. Knock-offs don’t sing that kind of solo. Knock-offs sing the background chorus. There’s nothing wrong with that, but when it’s all background chorus, then “the market” starts complaining about how blah and pedestrian and boring it all is. And they wait…

What they wait for is the art, and unless one of them happens to sit down and start writing it themselves, which has happened many and many a time, then they just have to wait. That’s why it’s not a service industry. ;) Readers don’t control it. Writers don’t control it. It’s not in service to anybody. We are in service to it.

It comes or it doesn’t.

Happy reading.

Abby

Conference Envy

Okay, some of us are going to have to deal with this.

There is a huge readers' and writers' conference in Florida next week. There is another huge romance writers' conference in Atlanta in July.

I cannot remotely afford to go to either of these, and probably won't next year, or the year after that.

Lots of people are going, and they're going to blog about it endlessly, and we're going to see a lot of "Waves to xxx and yyy!!" and "Drinks at the bar next year with aaaa and bbbb!!" by all the people having fun, likely accompanied by dark and/or blurry pics. There's going to be lots of play-by-play about who met who and who said outrageous things and even the blogging agents are going to be on about it. (Except for Miss Snark - she doesn't do romance, so she'll still be sane.)

I can't be the only one who can't afford it. After all, writers are always talking about how little they make. So there have to be lots of us sitting home. Maybe we're feeling envious; maybe not. Depends on the writer. I think we should band together so we won't all feel like we're the only ones.

For me, I plan to read Paperback Writer to stay focused. PBW hates conferences - she's darned nasty about them, in fact. But she has a point - you don't have to get caught up in the hype. To wit:

Be frugal, pay off your debts and credit cards, and save your money and/or invest in yourself. Rather than financing your writing org's next big con luncheon, save your money or spend it on your writing needs. That $1000.00 you waste on airline tickets, con fees, widgets to hand out to other writers and your hotel room at the national conference could be spent on a better web site, or new computer and printer, or postage for the next year of submissions. If you've got all you need, put that money in the bank and save it for a dry spell. *

Even though it isn't by choice, I actually do live by this. While all those guys are networking, I'll be writing. Writing is more important. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it. And I'll be sticking to it next year, and the year after that.

*By the way - the whole post is awesome - check it out.

Abby

Beginnings

Okay, it's been a while. Life sort of took over there.

I've been thinking about the beginnings of books lately. Specifically, the advice that your first page - your first sentence - has to have a hook to have a chance of getting published.

Most of the RWA contests are all about the first 30 pages. Submissions are about the first 30 pages. Everyone agrees, an agent or editor can tell by the first two sentences whether they are going to read on or not. So those first few sentences better be good.

Jump into the action; start with a gripping bit of dialogue; an unusual situation; a killer first line. Et cetera.


Here are the first two paragraphs of Anne Stuart's The Devil's Waltz (excerpt posted on eHarlequin):

The Honorable Miss Annelise Kempton did not suffer fools gladly. Unfortunately it was her lot in life to suffer them far too often, and to maintain a relatively polite mien in the face of idiocy. It came from being penniless, almost thirty years old, unmarried, not a beauty and far too bright for a woman.

She'd accepted that lot long ago, with her usual lack of self-pity. Her profligate father hadn't been able to arrange any chance of marriage, but her godmother, Lady Prentice, had managed to provide her with a season when she was seventeen...

Here follows the longest, most egregious case of info-dump I have ever seen. We learn everything about the lifespan of this character that we utterly don't care about yet, without even the faintest attempt to put it into a scene. It goes on, and on.

Okay, I know. Anne Stuart is a bestselling successful author and can get away with things a hopeful can't think about.

Still.

If I wrote that in my manuscript, it would get tossed in the garbage pronto. People would be crabbing about rookie writers who don't know what they're doing and haven't learned their craft well enough before submitting. I mean, doesn't she even know you're supposed to a) start the story with action and b) avoid infodump? No one says this about Anne Stuart.

Here is the beginning of Stephen King's Firestarter:

"Daddy, I'm tired," the little girl in the red pants and the green blouse said fretfully. "Can't we stop?"

"Not yet, honey."

He was a big, broad-shouldered-man in a worn and scuffed corduroy jacket and plain brown twill slacks. He and the little girl were holding hands and walking up Third Avenue in New York City, walking fast, almost running. He looked back over his shoulder and the green car was still there, crawling along slowly in the curbside lane.

Hey. What's going on? I found my tattered copy of Firestarter on my bookshelf and I can't put it down, even though I know what happens in the end. Damn, he's good.

How about this: There is no rule. You can start however the hell you like. How does that sound? Start however the hell you want and see if it works. Rules will drive you absolutely crazy if you let them. You got a fast story? A slow story? Good for you. Write the story you want to write.

And if it doesn't win a contest, who cares?

Kill Me, Please

A lot of times, romance readers on message boards show their militant sides. They get so sick of being treated like stupid children because of what they read, and every once in a while it all comes out in a big spate of bile after some poor reader posts the helpless question: "What do I say to someone who insults what I'm reading?"

There are always a lot of angry suggestions. And it's tempting to say, "Jeez, what is everyone so worked up about?"

Then you read this:

I have a soft spot for readers of romances. I once worked at my local library and found the women quite jolly, in a yearning kind of way.

And this:

M&B has got rid of the orangey covers and introduced sex. Its sister imprint, Silhouette, goes even further, with racy tales of drug dealers, kidnappings and undercover missions in Iraq. Readers still buy them by the dozen, as I discovered when I went on a tour with the poet Malika Booker.

Malika is alternating Margaret Atwood with M&B romances. When she finishes a romance, she passes it on to her friends. I told her about Rochdale market and she grew quite excited. In a yearning kind of way.

What year is this guy in? "introduced sex?" Silhouette is racy? Undercover missions in Iraq? Romance readers are jolly? There's just too much here and OH MY GOD WILL THIS PERSON PLEASE STOP WRITING COLUMNS BECAUSE HE HAS NO IDEA WHAT HE IS SAYING AND HE IS WRITING OUT OF HIS ASS.

That poor poet, stuck on a tour with this pipe-stinking, clueless idiot. She probably never heard the end of it. I wonder if he left out the part where she took her M&B romances and SHOVED THEM DOWN HIS THROAT TO MAKE HIM SHUT THE HELL UP.

Ah, that's an image that makes me feel better.

Don't fuck with romance readers, people. We're not as jolly as you might think.

Abby

Querying Thoughts

In wandering through Agentquery, I found an agent that specifies: "Only interested in potential blockbusters".

Not that any agency cares about my opinion, but that is a little off-putting. It's like saying only the pretty girls need apply.

Personal aside, though, isn't it an accepted truth in the publishing industry that no one knows what the next blockbuster is even going to be? I mean, what if I was a single mum querying my offbeat story of a boy going to wizard school? And saying it was going to be a series? Man, those guys would be kicking themselves.

(As an aside, I don't know what writers did before the existence of JK Rowlings. What did we talk about, and who did we measure by? We're at a loss without her.)

I guess my point is that I'd like an agent that's open-minded. One that doesn't think the next book has to look exactly like all the others already out there. If I had an agent, that is.

Oh, and am I the only one petrified of querying Sterling Lord Literistic? That is the scariest name ever. Oh, and Jack Kerouac was their freaking client. "Dear Jack Kerouac's agent, please look at my romance novel." Maybe it's just me.

The agent search is hard - don't let anyone tell you it isn't. You're supposed to know all the inside track on who might be "right" for you by a two-line listing that agents admit they rarely update and sometimes don't even know exists. You're also supposed to go by their websites, except that "some great agencies don't have websites". I put that in quotes, because I've heard it but I don't know if it's true or not. The reason I don't know is that I'm not an agent and I can't get my answer on the web.

Agents don't have some sort of obligation to writers. If they don't want a website, that's their business. But it seems a little unfair to flog writers for not knowing what they're doing when you give out either no info, or wrong info. We're just people - introverted, socially-challenged people who can't master the SASE, but people nonetheless.

Later,
Abby