Author's Note

It never fails.  Whenever I’m in the same space with another writer for any length of time, we always start to talk shop.  Just this past weekend, I was at a party and there were some other writer friends of mine there, and of course we started talking about writing as we hung out in the pool and dodged sugar-hyped kids.  We talked about our current projects, we talked about upcoming conventions, and we talked about the process of writing – in particular, when/how often do you write? 

The leading wisdom these days is get your butt into the chair every. single. day.  Don’t take a day off, or else you’re a naughty writer.  Bad writer, no cookie (or publishing contract).  Immediately one of my writer friends said, “Ooff, I just can’t do that!”  And this brought nods from our little circle.  I certainly understand her point. 

Like many writers, I’m struggling to balance a day job, trying to keep my creative career going and grow it, being a homeowner and being a wife.  I have to appease my boss at the day job since the creative writing career hasn’t grown enough to cover the bills.  Laundry and dishes won’t wash themselves (stupid, lazy socks and cereal bowls), and really, there’s only so much of the burden I can ask my husband to shoulder.  He signed on to be my mate, not my maid.  And then what about having a life outside of work?  Where do you get the grist for your writing mill if you don’t read, interact with people, experience things, and just get out there and live?

But if you’re not applying butt to seat – then when does the writing get done?  Words won’t type themselves (much like the socks that refuse to haul themselves over to the washer.  bastards). 

If you don’t hold yourself to writing every day, what’s the other plan?  Some writers swear by settling down for a large block of time all at once.  And if you think about it, this can be very effective.  Camping in front of the laptop for 8-10 hours on a Sunday gets you more writing time than putting aside an hour an every day of the week (7 hours) like the every day writing gurus advise.  But can you really do that?  I know I’m not the only writer trying to juggle all the aforementioned tasks.  When was the last time you had 8-10 hours uninterrupted? 

Personally, I don’t think any advice can be applied across the board.  You wouldn’t ask a sprinter to run a marathon or ask a marathoner to run a sprint and expect him/her to perform up to his/her top potential, so why expect all writers to follow the same writing rules and perform at the top of their games? 

Whether a writer is a sprinter (daily writing) or a marathoner (large block), all that really matters is that the work gets done.  Pick your pace, pick your schedule, but make a plan and stick to it.  Words don’t write themselves.

It is the eternal conflict of the writer – one must be sure of one’s talent and skill, but not arrogant.  This came to me last night as I was working on a new anthology submission for Soylent Publications. 

When I get close to the end of the story, it’s common for me to be assailed with self-doubt.  I hope and I pray that I will be so deeply immersed in the story creation that I’ll type “The End” before this happens, but sadly, it’s not often the case.  Instead, I’ll be typing along, following the mental sign posts in my head (turn left for plot twist, emotional dip ahead), when the all important “The End Is Near” sign shows up.  And self-doubt creeps in with ninja-like stealth.  I start to think that maybe this is going in the wrong direction entirely, maybe I need to go back to the beginning, oh here’s some recurring symbols I should have been sprinkling in all along.  Let me go and do that.  Then the siren song of delaying the inevitable begins in the form of laundry/dishes/cat box. 

Self-doubt tells me the story isn’t good enough, so why even finish it in the first place?  Why set myself up for inevitable rejection by finishing the sucker, then starting the rounds of magazine and publisher submissions.  I could be kibitzing on Facebook, you know…

And here is where the writer must find that well of confidence in his/her soul and forge on ahead.  If I did not find that confidence, then my hard drive would be littered with the half-finished remains of stories that never quite finished the birthing process.  Sure, I have a few like that, but the number that I’ve seen it through with outnumbers the ones that have fallen by the wayside, half-finished.  But once that reserve of confidence is breeched, a writer has to be careful not to go too far in the other direction, because an arrogant writer does not believe that there is anything else to learn and that his/her prose is always perfect. 

But no one, not even the greatest luminaries of the literary constellations, is perfect.  It is the dichotomy of the writer – confident enough to send stories out into the world believing someone will want to read them, and full of enough self-doubt to constantly strive to be a better writer.

One of my favorite authors, Neil Gaiman, has become the political football du jour, caught in the middle of a firestorm of criticism.  What happened was this – Neil was asked to speak at a library function in a small suburban area and they offered his usual speaking fee.  He asked who was actually paying the fee and found that the library itself was not, but rather a foundation designed to pay for these types of events and, on top of that, if the money was not used soon it would go away per the structure of the foundation.  So Neil agreed to speak and promptly set it up for the entire speaking fee to be split between two needy charities.  He did the event, which by all accounts went off swimmingly, the charities got their much needed funds, and all was well, right?  Not so fast…..

There are some who seem to believe that Neil should not have taken his fee from a library/his fee could have been better spent on librarian salaries/buying books/what have you.  There are others who feel his fee is outrageous.  There are those who feel he’s a “douche” for even charging at all, that he should be giving back because he already has so much.  Let’s take on a few of these points, shall we? 

1) Neil should not have taken his fee from a library, etc. –
He didn’t.  They offered funds from a separate foundation to pay the fee.  The library’s operating funds were never touched.  The foundation money is also structured in such a way that those funds could not be used to pay librarian salaries, or buy books, or for anything other than special events, and it was about to go away.  The money had been awarded the previous year and if the library didn’t use it soon the money would be lost.  

 
2) Neil’s fee is outrageous –
Neil Gaiman’s fee is in the neighborhood of $45,000 for an engagement, which he readily admits is high.  He does to keep the volume of speaking requests at a manageable level, because  he’d rather be writing not working the lecture circuit, which makes sense given that he’s a writer.  And really, compared to other speakers, his fee is not all that high.  Many political and business speakers demand, and get, in excess of six figures.  Personally, I think Neil is worth the fee he asks for.  I’ve heard him speak and he’s brilliant. 

 3) Neil’s a “douche” for charging, needs to give back, etc. –
To begin with, Neil already gave all the money he earned from this engagement to needy charities.  I’d call that giving back.  Also, he frequently does do pro bono speaking engagements for worthy groups like libraries and schools, and in fact, earlier that week had done two pro bono engagements, one to raise funds for charity. 

 But what really gets under my skin about this whole kerfuffle is the overarching assumption that Neil should not be making those kinds of fees.  Why?  He’s a talented writer.  His imagination is amazing.  His books regularly make best seller lists all over the world, and get optioned to be made into movies (several are already done – Stardust, Coraline, et al.).  Fans wait in huge lines for hours just for the chance to have him sign something and get their picture taken with him.  In the scifi/fantasy world, the man is quite the rock star. 

 So what’s the problem with him earning a lot of money?  He’s extremely good at what he does, one of the best.  There are legions of fans eager to buy his work.  He works hard and puts out a lot of “product.”  He gives back to the community on a frequent basis (going at least part of the way to show he’s a stand up guy, and not douche-y at all).  Why shouldn’t he earn a big payday? 

 Oh, that’s right.  He’s an artist.  He’s not a movie star or an athlete or any other type of person our culture readily accepts as getting huge paychecks.  For the most part our culture seems to believe that artists should be grateful for being paid at all, especially if they are earning more than a subsistence level.  And that, my friends, is what I think there should be a kerfuffle about, not that Neil Gaiman earned a large fee and gave it to charity.

The opening page has a long list of books to click on and download and the express instructions that users cannot “borrow” more than 5 e-books in a 2 week period (violation will result in banning from the site) and that after the user is finished with the e-book, he/she is on the honor system to delete the book from his/her e-reader. My first thought was that this is not so different from what I do when I buy a hard copy book and then loan or pass it on to a family member or friend who I think will enjoy it. It also follows closely to the absolutely legal brick and mortar library model. But as I cruised through the website I noticed a few things –

1) The size of the list – it’s huge. I find it really hard to believe that this man has purchased and read every single one of these books since the advent of e-readers. Not impossible, but hard to believe.

2) Throughout the website there is inflammatory rhetoric about the “thieving publishers.” All publishers are thieves? Really? While I don’t defend or condone any shady business practices on the part of any business, and publishing is a business, I don’t think that we can paint ALL publishers with such a broad brush. There are plenty of snakes in the grass out there, but there are also a lot of editors and publishers who are honestly in love with the written word and who just want to get good books into the hands of eager readers.

This was all starting reek of scam, not someone who was just trying to share the joy of reading. Then came the part that got my hackles up…. He begs for donations to keep the website up, citing having to pay for bandwidth because of all the downloads and also spending so much time sourcing the e-books. And then he lists different donation amounts and what extra perks come with those amounts, which pretty much amounts to buying a membership in the site – And for 90 euros you can receive a DVD of the entire collection. WHAT?!?!?!

This now goes way over the line, my friends. A blank DVD does not cost much, and while postage (depending on where it’s going) can be more than a pittance, the cost of both of those together is not even close to the 90 euro mark. He does not write the book; nor does he participate in typesetting, editing, or proofing the book; nor does he bear any of the cost of promoting or distributing it, and yet he’s making money off it. And that, my friends, in my humble opinion, amounts to thievery.

The man is a thief and a scam artist. He’s not just magnanimously spreading the joy of reading and helping people in 3rd world countries have access to literature. I hope he gets shut down.

I’m all for making sure people have easy access to books. As a writer, it’s in my best interest to increase the reader culture, not do things that prevent it from growing. But at the same time, I want the people who are doing the work – the writing, editing, proofing, promotion, distribution, etc. – to be fairly compensated for that work. I don’t want some lazy, unethical jerk to ride on their backs and make an easy buck (or euro).

I’ve included a link to the website so you can decide for yourself. But count me among those who are angry and have their hackles up.

http://www.truly-free.org/

It’s funny where a random conversation can take you.  I’d intended today to write a blog about Virginia’s Woolf’s famous piece about a room of one’s own and how things have changed (or not) in modern times, but instead I found myself woolgathering about the subject of genre after a random hallway conversation with a work acquaintance. 

It all started with the subject of pen names and how many authors have them.  She remarked that she had been amazed to find out that some authors have two or three pen names, and write different types of books under each name – like Snuggie Lovelace for romances, Jimmy Lasersight for science fiction, and L. P. Mystereo for mysteries.  My coworker thought that the writers should be proud of their versatility and have a single name that stretched across the genres.  But it’s not really a lack of pride that keeps writers from using the same name no matter what they write; there are other forces at play here. 

I rolled out the usual explanations to her.  Readers like to know what to expect when they pick up a new novel by a certain writer.  Booksellers like to know where to shelve things.  The marketing departments of publishing houses like to know where to spend their advertising dollars.  It would be awfully silly to buy advertising space for the latest fantasy blockbuster in a magazine aimed at mystery enthusiasts.  Having clear genre boundaries and everyone settled down into neat little boxes seems to make everything run a little smoother in the publishing industry.  But smoother doesn’t necessarily make for great books…. 

In fact, the really great books seem to be the ones that break past these boundaries and defy the neat, orderly boxes of categorization.  One of my favorite books, “The Time Traveler’s Wife” by Audrey Niffenegger, does this.  It’s a romance.  It’s science fiction.  It’s a carefully crafted literary character study.  It is a wonderful book that makes me laugh and cry every time I read it.  I think publishers should publish more books like this in spite of the shelving and categorization confusion it might cause. 

Thank goodness the Powers That Be in New York seem to be catching on.  Cross-genre seems to be latest buzz word on literati circles – Romantic Mysteries, Urban Fantasy, Science Fiction Thrillers, the list goes on and on.  So perhaps one day my coworker’s vision will come true and writers will only need one name, no matter how many different kinds of books they write.

“Before us is the empty page, the deep o’er which, like God, though modestly, we brood.” 

~ William Gass

Next to asking where story ideas come from, I think the most popular question I get asked by non-writers is whether or not what’s happening in my real world shows up in my writing, but most especially, do real people I know show up as characters.  And the answer is – yes and no.  I know, I know, another slippery, weasel non-answer.  But here’s how it works….

Situations show up a lot.  If I get lost and get panicky while trying to find my way out of an unfamiliar part of the city, you better believe that’s showing up in my work.  That kind of true, visceral emotion is too good to waste.  But it gets changed a little.  If I’m panicky about being lost, then my protagonist might be panicky about being chased or shot at, or if he/she is lost, he/she does it in another dimension of time or space.   But because of my own real life situation, all I have to do is reach into my own memories and describe my own feelings for my characters. 

Broad ideas also show up pretty regularly.  One idea I’ve been working on for a while is that of sleep, or lack thereof.  I don’t have all the kinks worked out yet, but it should be a lovely scifi story when I’m done.  And why does my mind keep wandering back to the thought of lost sleep and the hunger, the ache, for a good night’s sleep, which is dangling  just out of reach?  Because like most working Americans, I’m regularly sleep deprived because of the demands of a day job, a family, a home, and trying to make my creative dreams come true.  As a writer, if I passed up the chance to write a story that would ring so true with the hearts of so many people – well, I might as well turn in my pens and notebooks, I wouldn’t be a real writer at all. 

But characters, what about the characters….  Can anyone who meets a writer assume that he/she might find themselves in the pages of a future novel or short story?  Yes and no.  I’d be silly to cut myself off from such a rich source of inspiration for characters.  But dropping a real person, whole and unchanged from real life, into my work just doesn’t work.  I’d have to be true to that person.  I’d have to warp storylines to get every nuance of that person just so.  I’d have to risk a libel and slander lawsuit if that person didn’t like the character.  So, I borrow pieces.  Some deep family loyalty from over here, an obsession with groan-worthy puns from over there, and a soul questing for love from over here.  Not only does that free me from being true to one person, and potential story-warping and lawsuits, it allows me to create characters that everyone can find a little piece of themselves in.  And if my readers can find themselves in a character, then they can identify with that character. 

But do you want to know the real secret about who goes into making my characters?  It’s me.  Every character I create carries a little piece of my heart inside.  Even the darkest, most damaged villain has a little piece of me.  How could I write a believable character if I couldn’t identify with him/her? 

So there you have it, the real truth about whether or not the people, places, and situations a writer experiences in real life show up in the work.

I haven’t yet been tempted to write anything with time travel in it.  But I can see the allure it has for my fellow authors that have.  It can be an oh-so-handy tool for fixing plot errors, especially in a series.  You don’t like where things have gone? No problem!  Just have one of your characters time travel back, by magical or scientific means, and change a pivotal action or decision.  Voila!  Plot re-boot!  Time travel can also be highly attractive from the perspective of righting a wrong.  Don’t like that Hitler got to choose his death instead of having it handed to him by his enemies?  Have a character time travel and get the job done.  While doesn’t change anything in our space-time continuum, there is a certain satisfaction to seeing a really bad guy get what’s coming to him at the end of your pen.  And from an author’s perspective, it’s awfully handy to be able to get your character crucial information to ensure survival/solve the crime/save the world by having a character from the future show up and share the necessary tidbit.  Sounds like fun, doesn’t it? 

So, how come I’ve never been tempted to write time travel?  It’s a simple thing, really.  I’ve always had the staunch belief that everything I’ve lived through up until this point has contributed to the person I am.  If I changed anything, I’d be someone else.  And I like who I am.  I know I’m far from perfect, but, in my humble opinion, I’m a pretty fun and likable person.  I’d be my best friend if I were someone else.   And if it goes for me, it goes for my characters too.  For example, if Judy goes back in time to warn her mother about the rogue ice cream truck that runs up on the sidewalk and kills her, then Judy and Joe’s mom survives and goes on to live to a ripe old age.  Without losing his mom at 17, Joe never sinks into the deep depression that shapes him into a dark and broody adult.  Since he’s not a dark and broody adult, he’s no longer attractive to Melanie, who likes her guys dark and broody and unavailable.  Joe and Melanie don’t have a baby from a drunken one night stand, so that baby does not grow up into Tim, who saves the world because he feels like he needs to do something spectacular to get the attention of the father who was never there as he was growing up. 

So from my worldview, any time you change the timeline, all your characters are at risk for a radical personality change.  As an author, it’s my responsibility to mark sure that I capture this and give my reader a true story, with no excuses or shortcuts.  Can you imagine how complex that could get in a novel with multiple characters?  There would be personalities and relationships changing in the blink of an eye (in book time).  And what about echoes?  What I mean is, do the characters truly have no memory of what happened in a different time stream, or will Suzy feel a pull toward Billy because they were lovers prior to the time event that changed everything, even though she’s married to Frank in the now and has no recollection of why she should find Billy attractive?

Working out all those characters and plot lines would be really complicated.  But it does sound like fun, doesn’t it?  You know something, I think I just talked myself into writing a time travel story.  Now all I need are a few good plots….

This is a quote I need to tape to the side of my monitor, memorize, and/or paint on my wall.  We writers should not forget this. 

“All considerations of language, of ideas, of symbols and metaphors serve only one function: to convey the soul of a living being to the soul of other living beings and in that process break us out of our isolation and loneliness and put us in touch with the universal spirit.”

~ Floyd Salas

I’ve always known that when it came to stories, to read or to write, I was a fantasy kind of girl.  It’s all because of my dad.  My father was a voracious reader (and fast too!) and because of his job he had to fly a lot.  So he would come home from his business trips with big paper grocery sacks full of paperback books, and he’d spill them out over the coffee table for me and my older brother to squabble over.  Dad was pretty evenly divided between fantasy and science fiction, but early on I showed a preference for fantasy and my brother for science fiction, not that we wouldn’t read the other genres, we just knew what we wanted to go for first.  Because of my dad, I soared with Anne McCaffrey’s dragons, I skulked through the dirty alleyways of Robert Asprin’s Thieve’s World, I rode along for Garion’s epic adventure in David Eddings’s Belgariad, and I loved every single minute of it.  So it only seemed natural that I would write fantasy when I figured out that being a writer was all I ever wanted to be. 

But heroic (or high) fantasy, which is what made up the bulk of my dad’s fantasy reading, wasn’t quite the genre for me.  Sure, I’ve done a few pieces that worked quite well in that genre, but it’s not quite “home.”  Every writer has a genre that for him or her is home base.  I found my home in my late 20s, courtesy of a co-worker at my dayjob.  I’d already been writing in this genre for a little while because I’d figured out in grad school that stories without some kind of supernatural or mythical twist didn’t suit me.  But I didn’t know what to call it, it’s just what I did.  Then Sarah told me I should read Charles de Lint.  I was stunned.  Here was home.  Here was someone with enormous talent, and quite a bit of success, doing exactly the type of stuff I yearned to do.  I was completely hooked.  Welcome to urban fantasy, my genre of choice.