I sit back and grin, listening to the self-appointed pedagogues, do my own work, write as I will, yet feel a distinct sorrow for the earnest beggar who has the balls to plead the question ‘why?’ to his/her critics because s/he desires a certain voice/tone/POV/style (select one or more) to come to fore, and reducing his/her writing as suggested seems to utterly destroy it.

Well, here’s why: Because those self-appointed pedagogues have heard somebody, maybe an agent, editor, or author, say it, and they and others like them repeat it until it becomes “common law”.  That’s why.  What’s funny is when some debut author’s book comes out whose writing flies totally against all the faddish advisement of this sort.  I grin.  My advice?  Do your own work.

Authors–most of them, anyway–work very hard to promote their books and enhance their sales. They go to events around their community, their region, and, sometimes, nationally, travelling cross-country in planes, trains, or cars, boxes of books in tow. They hold readings and book signings at stores, in their churches (if they belong to one), virtually, and at every “dog and pony” show they can get into. In short, they promote, promote, promote…for pennies on the dollar if one measures time as money, never mind the cost, which usually far outweighs the income gained…if any. This goes for both traditionally published authors and self-published authors, and, personally, I think it’s an exhausting, life-sapping set of activities: authors as sales-persons, marketers, and promoters.

Is this why authors began writing? Because they wanted to become a marketeer? I don’t think so. So why do they do it?

They do it, of course, because they want to be successful: every book sold is another feather in the cap and money in the royalty jar; every new reader is a potential fan (they hope).

Unfortunately, most good writers are not cut out to be salesmen/women, marketers, or promoters. They are gifted at writing, not persuasion. And, of course, devoting themselves to sales, marketing, and promotion takes time and energy away from life responsibilities to family, never mind writing and the required solitude needed to create a good book.

Perhaps the new definition of “author” is, in fact, marketeer. And, of course, the same can be said for artists, musicians…any creative endeavor.  It isn’t the talent or genius…except where it really matters now: genius and talent for promoting. So, the new definition of writer/author is? Successful marketeer and promotional maven.

Guess I don’t qualify. Oh, well.  Back to the keyboard.

Writing a novel based, even in part, on true events or real people is a very tricky affair.  If a novel is based on facts, the facts are never good enough as they stand, simply because the motives behind the acts that made the facts rarely make sense, at least to rational people. And the people who made the decisions, whether spontaneous or premeditated, that brought those facts into being can get really upset if they suspect they might have proved a role model for a character in a book.

Of course, every person in the world could suspect themselves as a role model for some novel’s character, given, A) the number of people in the world, and, B) the number of novels published, especially today.  Somebody somewhere will, should they read the right novel, identify themselves as a character portrayed.  The trick for the author is to make sure that notes and records are kept, their clippings, their research, and their resources well-documented, whether their novel characters are, in fact, based on a real set of incidents and real people, then modified to fit a completely fictitious story, or whether the entire novel is a completely fictitious creation. That way, if someone somewhere reads the novel and decides, “Hey, that’s me,” the author can prove that, “No, that isn’t you.  This story used no facts at all, and was complete fabrication, and here’s my drafts, outlines, and plot maps to prove it,” or “the facts and incidents came from these newspaper stories, these psychological profiles, a framework based on completely contrived posits jotted by me in a plot scheme here, and work-throughs conceived after a critique or brain-storming session here.”

“But that’s me in that news article,” sputters the accuser (in the case where the author used real life incidents rather than complete fabrication).

“But this isn’t you in this news article, is it?” responds said author.

ACCUSER: “No.”

AUTHOR: “And this one?”

ACCUSER: “No.”

AUTHOR: “And what about these?” (Author waves another thirteen articles in front of the accuser.)

ACCUSER: “No.”

AUTHOR: “Well, since my character and story is a sifted composite, not just of these fifteen non-related newspaper articles, along with anonymous psychological profiles compiled in [research book titles], as well as a completely contrived time, setting, and set of circumstances, how can you claim that this character and story is all about you?”

…In short, they can’t.

Nothing seems to get writers butting heads so much as suggesting that they might need to brush up on proper grammar and punctuation.  Mention the “right” way–traditionally speaking, of course, as per The Elements of Style–and the fight is on. On one side, you have those who know enough about good grammar and punctuation to be able to use it to advantage, breaking those rules when appropriate. On the other side, you have those who don’t know the rules and don’t want to be bothered with learning them–individuals who break out in fervent, even vitriolic, tempests on how and why traditional grammar and punctuation should be ignored and abandoned, condemning those who use it as anal-minded remnant perversions of the 19th Century.

I used to get into arguments with these anti-good-grammar/anti-good-punctuation radicals, but, over time, I’ve come to the conclusion that they’re only defending their ignorance and laziness, and, since there are more of a majority of those who don’t know good grammar and punctuation than there are those who do know it, to even engage them in conversation is like inviting attack by a mob of rabid rats. So now, when a battle begins to rage, I might drop in a relatively neutral comment, but I mostly just watch and titter at the antics displayed by the ignorant as they parade their stupidity with oh such puffed-up pride.

Am I alone in considering this an extremely disturbing phenomena?  To me it seems, if they can write this sadism/masochism, not with condemnation, but with such a sense of acceptance, delivering this as if it were a just and normal, approved and even satisfying, state of being and living, that we have a very large proportion of very disturbed psychopathic and sociopathic individuals populating our nation.

Now, I’m sure that conservatives and fundamentalists, especially the sort who embrace Limbaugh and Palin, might point and cry out that this is the fault of the decline of family values, the decline of religious influence, and the influence of liberal perspectives.  However, many who are creating these startlingly gruesome treatises embrace both the neo-conservative perspective and Christian fundamentalism.  Not all, but certainly a provable great many.

Fiction carries its author’s overt or sublimated perspectives, views, philosophies, and ideologies.  If gruesome treatment of others and self is considered acceptable behavior, not condemned, but expected and delivered as normal, what does this say of our culture? I shudder to think what it means to our future.

I do not understand people who enjoy reading gore, explicitly violent, and visceral novels–graphic cruelty, gore, sex, or perverse violence. I mean, okay, graphic scenes are part of a book when needed, as is the intimate sex scene…when the story calls for it. But this stuff was uncalled for, in my opinion, because the violence wasn’t an integral part of the plot and story, but rather added for titillating the reader’s senses…if one can call gore and cruelty titillating (which I can’t).

If something happens in the violent scene that is key to the story climax or subsequent crises, then the scene belongs. But does the scene–any scene–belong when nothing happens in it other than graphic incidents, incidents that don’t have any pertinence to anything later in the story?

I don’t think so.

So, when applying the rule of “Cut everything that doesn’t forward plot and story” in writing and editing fiction, why are these scenes populating so many books? Are readers that hungry for blood, gore, and perversion?

I really don’t think so. Those who do aren’t the fiction reading majority, else these sorts of books would top the best sellers lists, and they don’t.

(…And, no, Liz, I’m not talking about Under the Bridge, which is very tame by comparison to some of this stuff.)

One week in, and the relief is palpable. No longer must I sit on manuscripts and stories, no longer must I think about pleasing editors, marketeers, and literary agents, no longer must I suffer spending an entire day composing yet another query letter, only to have a literary agent say, yes, they’d love to read it, then turn around and tell me that, yes, it’s very well written, intense, engaging, riveting…BUT. But what? But they can’t figure out how to place it or market it.

I’m FREE. I can write for readers, not traditional publishing moguls.

This is the very best thing to have happened to me when it comes to my career as an author.

Why? Because I call the shots, now. And that’s a pleasure. It means I can say what I want, how I want, when I want, and, if someone doesn’t like it, they can say so, but it’s not going to come back to me via frowns from my literary agent or house editor.

Thank you. And apologies to all you independent authors out there who are worth your salt as novelists and short story writers. To you I own a bow and beg your forgiveness for my previous attitude. HOWEVER, to those independent “authors” who write tripe and trash and stuff that should never see print, I wish you’d all go play with your cell phones and your various sex toys instead of pushing your pulp on the fiction world.

So I’m done.  I’ve quit the game.  No more Blind Man’s Bluff with literary agents anymore.  Now I’ll simply write and publish, write and publish. 

I’m also pretty much done with magazine submissions of short stories, as well.  The only reason I write a short story is when one “pops” into existence on its own, so to speak — the creative Muse dictates, in other words.  Submitting them, though, is always a pain…because it requires I steal time away from other things…like novel writing.

I’m tired of all of it. I’m just not interested in literary blind man’s bluff with me the blinded and them twittering as they evade me finding “the right niche:, be that an agent or publishing venture.  You want to read me, come and get it.  My stories and novels will be availabe through The Deepening, from me here, or from various other websites around the Net.  

If you want it from the library or a book store, ask at the desk.  If you want it from Amazon.com, you’ll have to wait till the hard copy releases.

There really has to be a way to sift out the dross (‘dross’ means worthless material that should be removed). There really does.

Help. We’re drowning in sewage.

Now, it is true that traditional publishing requires a lot of marketing effort from the author. Compared to the work a self-publishing author has to do, though, it is relatively painless.

It seems to me that self-publishing requires way, way too much effort and time devoted. A self-published author not only has to write the book, but s/he also has to:
1) create the book (typesetting, cover art and design, etc.)
2) create or contract for creation of the promotional materials,
3) place the promotional materials,
4) negotiate openings for marketing the book.

Only then can the author take advantage of those marketing opportunities, doing the interviews and appearances that will hopefully sell the books.

Then we come to the distribution and bean counting, all basically on the author’s shoulders, as well. It takes effort to even get your book listed in Amazon, or on B&N, never mind onto the shelves of chain and independent bookstores.

The established big publisher already has a means to create the book package and promo materials, has a good reputation among the media that matters, owns all the gateways to getting the book into distribution chains as well as coordinating marketing opportunities with the book’s release. All the author has to do is help, and then show up and do a good job presenting themselves in a charismatic way to the audience.

The very thought of having to write letters or make phone calls, much less do walk-in sales pitches designed to convince a radio station, a book store, or even local television to feature a self-published author and their book is summarily unattractive to me. This is the work of a publicist.

So the author who self-publishes wears all the hats normally worn by a team of people, normally paid experts in their fields who are very good at their jobs. I can’t possibly do the same kind of justice to those jobs, and the time required is at least as much it took to write the book in the first place.

Then there’s the income problem. If all I’m going to sell is a couple thousand copies of this book as a self-published author, the time and money laid out to publish and market, then distribute the book just isn’t going to give me a return worth sneezing at. In fact, it is probably going to cost me money.

So, nope. I don’t think self-publishing fiction is a good investment, unless I’ve already got an audience and a production and promotion team at hand.

That said, I can say that what I will do is allow The Deepening to record the audio of any book I write that doesn’t net me an agent and, ultimately, a publisher after submitting it for a year or two. If I can develop an audience for that book, then, I’ve got more ammunition to convince someone to take a hard look at that book as well as my other work — someone who counts in the real world of literature, that is, agents, editors, and big publishing.