Ugly Is As Ugly Does

First, a link: the article below addresses the all too common problem of brats in public, why we all hate them, and how you really aren't doing them any favors by letting them get away with it.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/07/05/granderson.bratty.kids/index.html

LZ Granderson, Contributor to CNN News, I salute you and your sentiment. I think you should also be on CBS news, NBC news, ABC News, Fox News, USA Today, Sesame Street and the Disney channel. Maybe NBC and CBS don't realize what they're missing, but thank goodness CNN is spreading your pithy gospel.

I also thank anyone who's reposted it for the rest of us; in particular, my bud Ben Baker, whose post is (for me at least), even better.

http://porkbrainsandmilkgravy.blogspot.com/2011/07/not-rassling-smackdown.html

It's all about respect, being fair, and doing what's best for everybody even when it's not particularly easy or convenient. Maybe Ben isn't on CNN.com or USA Today, but I bet is Sesame Street got a good photo they'd be happy to make him a muppet...

But I digress. *Ahem*:
<soapbox>What all of this boils down to is that it isn't the screaming brat that's to blame. It's the lazy, careless, or maybe just horribly misguided parent.  Overly Draconian is as bad as overly permissive, but too much of anything is a Bad Thing.</soapbox> 

 So...you do realize that this is still a blog about writing and getting published, acquiring fame and fortune and glory and immortality, right? Right. Thought so.  Accordingly, in the tradition of the past eighteen posts, I will freely mix my metaphors into what I hope to be an alchemist's Elixir of Entertainment while delivering some bit of pithy prose with value to someone.  For all the lead-in, today's chosen topic of pompous pontification is in fact the raging debate over e-books and self publishing.

E-books, and self publishing; a combination like cake and ice cream, and we all know how well those go together.  This wonderful option is commonly touted as the perfect alternative to traditional print publishing through an agent, which is (to stretch the food metaphor just a little further because I'm hungry and I love food in all it's wondrous diversity) the steak and potatoes of the industry.

For the record, I want the steak and potatoes for supper, and the cake and ice cream for dessert, and please don't make me choose. For those of you who want a little more info on the debate, take a look at Nathan Bransford's lovely and insightful breakdown.

http://blog.nathanbransford.com/2011/03/self-publishing-vs-traditional.html

Nathan, you rock.

So, you ask, what has one to do with the other? I'm glad you asked. What? You didn't? Well you should have, but don't worry, I'll tell you anyway.

The one thing Nathan didn't address in that awesome post was marketing.  Published doesn't mean sold. Unsold means unread, unloved, and of course, un-sold, as in, no money.  If you can't get the copies moving, it doesn't matter if you have an ISBN.

I have on a few occasions gone surfing for good new authors on e-book self-pub sites.  Ok, I did it twice.  I lost heart; so very, very much of what I saw struck me as clumsy electronic masturbation that I was embarrassed for the authors, and the signal to noise ratio was so bad that I never did find a good new author to read that way. Of course, a publisher might not market you much either...

Remember, the best marketing is word of mouth.  Get someone to tell someone, and hope it spreads.  That's the Holy Grail, right? The light at the end of this long, dark tunnel is that a certain minimum critical mass of readers will be talking. Someone will notice and blog about you; nearby radio stations will want to interview the local boy done good; reviewers in the papers will notice and tell people what they think.  Readers who talk breed more readers, and you try to hit the point where there are enough readers that some of the ones with media platforms will be among the talkers. Okay, maybe you aren't Kevin Bacon, but if you get people talking, maybe someday you could be Kevin Bacon, or at least someone who knows someone who wants to read your stuff, and who knows Kevin Bacon. After all, Kevin Bacon rocks. <nodnod>

No one will want to talk about your baby if it's really ugly.  If your book is the little hoodlum running about screaming in the restaurant and playing with the light switches, anyone who does talk will be warning off people they like. That's not the kind of publicity you want.

What kind of book is that ugly baby? It's usually the ones with the predictable, classic blunders.

• Poor grammar.
• Poor punctuation.
• Poor spelling.
• Clumsy sentences. 
• Clichés.
• Redundancies.
• Thin plot.
• Overly predictable or undeveloped characters.
• Trend chasing (please, if you're writing another book about vampires or werewolves or wizards, have a little pity on your potential agent and just try something else?)
• Hubris.

Hubris, you say? Yes.  Just because you think NASCAR is the coolest thing since the invention of the sparkplug and happen to like pie, don't assume a book about a pie chef who races is going to be popular.  What makes a book is story, characters, and the telling of it. As a story, Piérre the Pastry Chef who wins a chance to race with the big boys might actually be a good yarn if you can spin it with some wit and panache, but you, the writer, need to make it interesting. Don't just assume it is.

Too many books are published these days by people who pin their hopes and dreams on the POD market without doing the gauntlet at all.  Querying an agent is a pain, but it does inspire you to get your little duckies in a row. Let me assure you that while we are diligently querying agents for representation with a traditional print publisher, we also hope to make the work available on Amazon.com's kindle, and B&N's nook.

Don't get me wrong.  I personally know some self-publishing authors whose books were quite good. I just hope they market well, because otherwise they're putting their brainchild into the rank and file of all the really ugly kids, and they may get lost in the crowd.

But then honestly, isn't that true of the bookstore shelves as well? The only difference is that all those books have already been vetted; they've all already won at least one beauty contest.  If you're out to find a good looking kid, wouldn't you consider looking at the pageant before you scan the alley?  Honestly, when browsing for a book, don't most of us search the shelves? Unless we already have one in mind; then I usually go straight to the net.  

And that's kinda the point.

It's All in the Delivery

Mothers can tell you there's no pain like labor. Mothers with grown children can tell you they might have been wrong, that raising them is worse. They can also usually tell you that the reason it's worth it all is much more than just the payoff of a grown and respectable offspring.  If they're honest, some will even admit that one of the best parts if just trying to get the whole thing started...

"Hey, I've got an idea..."

Something has to inspire one to spend hours on end writing something that might never make it anywhere. Face it, the average doctoral thesis is over two hundred pages, where a common first novel is three hundred.

And no matter what your idea, it's always easier to make it sound stupid than to make it interesting. Every asteroid apocalypse story could be sold as Chicken Little. The hard part is telling your idea so it isn't lame, and then talking about it in synoptic brief for queries in a way that doesn't make it sound lame.

I just put our first draft synopsis (read "query template") for CADAGAR'S JUSTICE in the right margin. Comments and suggestions welcome, but one of the biggest issues is that it's a cultural piece. All the characters are from one of a few cultural backgrounds, and none are Earth-"normal". Most of the main cast are Pellans; though there's a great deal of history behind it, someone will call them "star werewolves". A couple of important players are Ptokariat clergy from a world where total personal responsibility drives a purely agrarian lifestyle, but someone will boil them down to "hick neo-Catholic atheists". All I can hope is that the crass oversimplifications are belied by the quality of the writing.

As of this July 4th, 2011, CADAGAR's is over 20k words and climbing swiftly.  Watch for updates, and happy 4th.

Love The One You're With

And there's a rose
 in the fisted glove,
And the eagle flies
 with the dove,
and if you can't be
 with the one you love,

Love the one you're with.

Love the one you're with.

(Du-doot, doot, doot,

 doot, doot, du-doot!)

I like the song.  I always thought the sentiment was a little vague, though.  Personally, I tend to think that way; polyamory makes sense to me. The problem is that so many men use it to excuse cheating. I don't condone that; if your spouse grants you leave and license to do as you please, then well and good, all is right in the world, but most don't think that way. What she doesn't know won't hurt me is criminal thinking, and you deserve to lose the house and have to pay alimony.  You asked for it.

Fortunately, books are more forgiving, at least for me.  Some people don't work that way, I understand, but personally, I like a harem.  My wife doesn't mind that, as long as it's books, so we have an accord.

That's also why "her" book is done, while all of mine are still in various stages of development.  Her pen is more of a serial monogamist, with the exception of an occasional flirtation with a short story, where mine is a total slut. I currently have more than a half dozen titles in process (one of which is always whatever she's working on), all with scores of thousands of words and significant research and planning for plot, character, setting, etc. Sounds like I'm just a love 'em and leave 'em type? No agent would want to pick up someone so flightly, who never finishes what he starts.

It isn't so. I love them all, and hope to get every one on a shelf. The few that were just flirtations are still only notes in my phone, but I have hopes; they're like names in my little black book that I occasionally linger over and consider calling, but no, I have too many in the harem already, and can't give them all the love and attention and devotion they deserve.  Yes, I will freely admit that they all suffer from slower growth because they don't get dedicated attention.

But very soon I'll get synopses and wordcounts in the sidebar for a few of them.  They're all my ugly babies, and I love them, every one.  I believe in them, have faith they can grow up to be proud books with Michael Whelan covers, even.

Ok, to be realistic, I do tend to focus on one at a time for a while. My day job interrupts, but then that's why we're hoping to sell a few books.  This is a career change.  My goal is to retire from life in cubeville and write full time, if we can just get the first few out the door. Accordingly, we prioritize, and focus primarily on whatever is most promising, but then NaNoWriMo comes around and I crank out the frame for another one. Then we go back to our best bet and polish some more.  

But I still sneak away for a few thousand words of tryst with one of the others pretty often, and when we get stuck on one, when writer's block or stubborn characters or sudden realizations of gaping plot holes with no obvious fix bring one work to a grinding halt, we can always shift for a while. We maintain productivity and get our time off from the offending work to let the subconscious chew the contentious bone for a while, both at the same time. So far, it's kept us busy, and we should have a flood of books becoming available for release in the next few short years.

Because, you see, when we can't be with the one we love, we love the one we're with. =o)

Twilight Fireflies

I walked out into the yard this evening with my family and watched the shadows darken beneath the trees as my twenty-one month old son danced in grass still wet from the afternoon rain.  Our eleven year old daughter ran through the yard in a cat mask, a string for a tail, catching fireflies and letting them go.  I watched the little black dots vanish into the darker shades behind, then blink like shooting stars for our amusement. The geese grumbled by the henhouse, and the goats stood watching us watch the show, stiocally chewing their afternoon forage.

In moments like that, a writer finds all he or she needs to build a world.

HUSH began on just such a walk through the yard in mid-2008.  My son was still a discussion, but the honeysuckle was in glorious bloom, and the sun and the breeze and our daughter playing were enough to inspire my wife.  She imagined a simple vignette, a dusty, well armed cowgirl-soldier sitting her horse to watch over the children at play.  A Catcher in the Rye, quiet and tired but ready to do battle for the welfare of her charges.  Everything else grew out of that moment.

Even if it never makes a dime, an eventuality I find hard to believe, though it's always possible - even then, it will have been worth it. I am a better person for having read the tale that she started, that we finished and polished together. May my own ideas bear that sort of fruit.

Because It Was There

"So what's up with  this blogging thing, anyway? What's the point?"

Ok, so it isn't exactly climbing a mountain, but why do we blog? Let's face it, at this point we're mostly talking to ourselves.  I know a few other people are reading, but we only have one registered follower (thanks, Ben. :)  So what's it all for?

No, we're not just stroking our egos.  The reason it looks that way is because we're liberally applying salve.  The truth is less glamorous; one of the main reasons we bother is to whip our confidence into performing shape. We're giving ourselves pep talks in open letters to the public.  We just hope that the contents might someday also be of value to other writers.

We do sincerely apologize to those of our friends who find the subject matter less than stimulating.  I know that not everyone wants to be a writer or cares about our attempts.  We try to make entries sufficiently entertaining, but the point of the website is really moral support for those trying to break into the market, such as ourselves.

Yes, we try to offer valuable advice, useful links, and consistent encouragement, but all these things are really not the only reasons. There are more mercenary thoughts behind this.

It's a public exposure.  On the right, I have arranged a query-ish blurb about the book currently being shopped.  If some agent happens to see me posting on Twitter and follows my link here, maybe they'll read the pitch and ask for pages.  Hey, it could happen.  There's no law that says they can't actively seek out a good story when the breadcrumbs lead to where it was carefully placed on the sidewalk for them to find. As we manage to get the pitch text for other books we're working on in the margin, the effect should improve. No, we're not betting little Jonny's college fund on it, but optimism has its place.

Likewise, there is always the possibility that some honest citizen who peeked at a page once and thought it was cute might remember that when a book hits the shelf, and say "hey, I like their writing.  Lemme see that..."  If he picks it up and talks himself into a sale, then it's working.  Do I think this blog will drive thousands of sales my way anytime soon? Well, no, and not only because we aren't published yet, but it's one more straw on the proverbial camel's back.  Nothing sells a book like word of mouth, but a link one can share sometimes makes that effort a little easier.

But in the final analysis, I blog because it's fun.  I love to write.  I love to put together witty phrases, and navigate logical reefs to an obscure point, and think about how the meter and rythm and content of a sentence might affect a reader toward the emotional end that I wanted.  I don't usually try to make people reading the blog cry (yet...), but a chuckle is as good as money.

We're not taking our eyes off the summit.  We plan to plant that flag; but for now, the climbing is good practice.  See you at the top.

Doing your homework

Before we started sending out queries, we did a good bit of research.

We looked up templates that stated a clear formula. There's a good example of the sort of examples you find at http://www.charlottedillon.com/query.html:

Date

Editor or Agent's Name
Publisher or Agent's Address

Dear Ms. Name, 

To start off, give the name and length and type of manuscript you are sending...

Standard fare. Ok, we started building a template.

Once we had a general description of the book that fit the formula, we started scanning sites that gave more in-depth examples, preferably lots of them. For example, my personal favorite, Janet Reid's Query Shark. Wow, what a goldmine...

But then, we realized how utterly inappropriate our query was, precisely because we were doing what so many other sites had said to do. How could that be? I mean, these were examples from experts, in writing, on the WEB for goodness' sake...

And the Peanut Gallery says "Ah."

Even I, the monumentally dense classic example of the charming nerd, eventually came to realize that this is not computer science.  There is no query-reading machine spitting out punch-cards stating YES WE WILL TAKE THIS BOOK (beeeeep), or NO THIS ONE IS STUPID (buzzzzz).  The people to whom we were sending queries were people, human beings with lives and moods and prejudices, who drink coffee and miss breakfast and have arguments with spouses or bosses or idiots on the freeway.

Oh, my.  How could we ever write a query that would work in this chaotic morass of humanity?

Well, the simple answer is, you get incredibly lucky, and just happen to send the query to the person who likes them the way you've done it and likes the idea, the voice, and the prospects of the sale.  Personally, I think you'd have better odds to just drop two years of your life on Black 13 at a roulette table.

Skip the simple answer. That's not the way real life works.  Stop trying for an easy solution.  You've spent months and months of effort developing characters, plot, setting, tension, rising action and reader rapport, researching details and honing dialogue...now you're going to balk at having to do a little more homework?

Yes, more homework.  If you're planning to send your query to Janet Reid, then for God's sake read the Query Shark blog - ALL of it - and customize your query to something that truly represents your work in the way most likely to garner her interest. Even if you aren't going to send it to her, read her blog anyway, but understand not every agent thinks the same way.  Others will dismiss your query for not doing something that she will possibly reject you for including, but you should still look at everything she has to say, because a lot of it is just good sense, and even where her tastes differ, reading it will help you find your own voice for the query itself.

If sending to an agency that always wants genre and wordcount up front, rewrite the query for them.  Put the genre and wordcount up front. Try to find out what that agent wants.  Sarah LaPolla (Big Glass Cases) says she hates prologues; if you're sending pages, consider renaming it to chapter one, or dropping it altogether for her. (Though if the book stands without it, should it really have been there anyway?)

Sending queries is stressfull. My wife and I both laugh about the send-button blues, where we sit with the mouse pointer hovering near SEND but don't click yet, giving ourselves just a few more minutes to think of that mysterious something we have inevitably forgotten.

Yet the work has helped.  We finally have a request for a manuscript, though not an offer of representation yet.  We're optimistic, but not counting chicks. We're also still working on the query, just in case.

Now if only every agent had a blog like Ms. Reid's. But then, she is the top of the food chain. ;o]

Passing the rod

Sabrina has handled the query process for Hush since we first began shopping it, but is suffering rejection fatigue, so wants to hand off the baton for a while.  I prefer to call it "passing the rod", as in "spare the rod, spoil the child".  We've been none too sparing with the rod of correction on the ugly baby, and the manuscript has prospered because of it, but apparently the regular return of "thanks, but it isn't what I'm looking for right now" from agents we really wanted eventually feels like a beating.

This is to be expected. An agent is looking for low hanging fruit, and may well pass up the fat, ripe, and juicy if it involves too much climbing and going out on a limb for a new author.  This is particularly hard on Sabrina, who was the primary contributor of the underlying idea as well as word count.  This particular ugly baby was a labor of love, and hearing professional agents say over and over "it isn't for me" is disheartening.  I do understand.

I also understand, perhaps more viscerally, that these rejections aren't telling us the work is unworthy.  That may be hard for most people to hold in mind when getting another "no, thanks," but though I've contributed quite a bit, including chapters written, plot revisions, lots of technical consulting, and editing, editing, and yet more editing, I've always thought of this work primarily as Sabrina's.  It began as a vignette in her mind, and expanded through NaNoWriMo.  Yes, we've both worked on it for over two years where we could steal a few hours here and a weekend there, but I never tire of it.

I understand why an agent might be hesitant.  If I want to be a little facetious, it's true enough with just a sprinkling of hyperbole to call it a literary post apocalyptic dystopian science fiction horror thriller with strong elements of social commentary.  That makes it a little tricky to pigeonhole.  We've been shopping it as horror, but decided we should be calling it science fiction.  I think that it might even qualify as a psychological thriller, but you have to pick a single, simple genre.  Agents don't want complicated decisions; where do we put it on the shelf?

But it's not that complicated.  The stress is all caused by the effort to artificially categorize it.  Call it sci-fi and toss it on the shelf with Zelazny and King. "Under the Dome" isn't exactly horror. Sci-fi readers are used to browsing through disparate styles and types of content. What should matter is the quality of the story.  This book, as yet unpublished, has already made its way to my top shelf of favorites.  We wrote it, and I still can't read some scenes without getting choked up and teary eyed. Admittedly, I cry at some commercials (I love that bulldog with the sign that says he's not gonna cry...), but I've been having this reaction on these same scenes for two years, and it still makes it tricky to work together on them because I try to be the tough guy, and then my throat closes and I squeak.  My wife graciously ignores it (thank you , love), and we manage to correct a word here and a phrase there.

We're not heating, hammering, and quenching anymore; we're applying oil and slow strokes of the smooth stone to get the edge clean. To switch back to the overarching metaphor, the labor and delivery are done; now we're just breast feeding and changing the occasional diaper.  It's done.

It's not the best book I've read, but if it were published, I'd give it away and buy another, as I usually do with my favorites, to people I like and think deserve them. Maybe I'm just smitten, but I think it's as good as a lot of Stephen King's work.  Better than most of Dean Koontz, Michael Crichton, Philip K. Dick or any of several other authors on whom I've spent worthwhile money. Unfortunately, you can't actually say that in a query if you want to be taken seriously.

Bragging? Meh. Bree did all the best parts. I just helped a lot.
Well, maybe, yeah, bragging a little, on her.

So I took over the query process.  I took the same general query and synopsis she's been using, and the first few agents she suggested.  We now have a request for the manuscript.  It's not a sale, but it is a much needed boost in our self confidence.

Sometimes, you just have to believe.