Do it yourself, for yourself

Tweet

By Clark Brooks

I published a book last week. What's that? Why, thank you! Yes, I'm very pleased. It's on sale at Amazon.com and at the on-line store at my personal web site among other places. Again, thank you very much. What's that? Oh, I decided to go the self-publishing route. Hey wait! Where are you going?

Are you one of those people who still attaches a stigma to self-published books? Aw, come on, don't be that way. Listen, I know there are stereotypes out there:

• Self-published authors are lazy: They lack the ambition necessary to get their works published "legitimately"
• Self-published books are vanity projects: Some authors just want to be able to see their name on the cover of a book.
• Self-published books aren't good: A self-published book was probably rejected several times by "real" publishers, because it didn't stand up to standard quality control processes like editing or proof-reading and/or it just sucks.

As is the case with all stereotypes, there's some truth there. However, I can assure you, at least in my case, my book was thoroughly scrutinized by professionals (they cashed their checks, that's for sure) for quality control purposes. Whether it's any good or not is for the reader to determine, but it went through extensive edits. Vanity? Not to brag (honestly), but between my blog, my sportswriting and various other published works, the novelty of seeing my name on something has pretty much worn off. Okay, it's still a thrill to see it on the cover of my book, but that's not the reason I did it. And as far as being lazy... well, all right, I'll cop to that, to a degree. I simply didn't want to go through the whole query letter-rejection-find an agent-more letters-more rejections procedure. Not because I have thin skin and fear of rejection but because that stuff just doesn't interest me. I don't care about it. Writing query letters takes time away from writing content and days are too short as it is. I didn't want to do it so I didn't do it. Just like so many writers conferences and workshops that focus on How To Get Published (ie: navigating the quirks and perils of an archaic system designed to stack the the odds heavily against you even if you do everything exactly correct) instead of How To Write More Gooder, it's a waste of time.

Personally, I wanted to put my material into a traditional format (a book) that I could put in people's hands. I wanted to work with people (editors, illustrators, etc.) with whom I wanted to work. I wanted complete control over what the final product would look like. I wanted to retain full ownership of every piece of it. I wanted to be actively involved in the marketing and distribution of it, on schedules set by me. I wanted all of that and very little of it would be afforded to me by submitting to the traditional publishing process. In exchange, I might have gotten my book on the shelves at Barnes and Noble for a year, maybe. For me, that trade off wasn't good enough.

Someone who gets their hands on a lump of clay is a sculptor. Someone who puts paint on canvas is a painter. Someone who can get sounds out of a guitar or a piano is a musician. Yet when it comes to writing, someone who doesn't follow the one long-established path from point A to point B doesn't deserve to be considered a legitimate author? That's nonsense, but writing is the only creative discipline where that provincial mindset still holds sway. One need look no further than the crumbling remains of the music industry to see that not only is it not necessary, it's probably not even sustainable.

The gatekeepers of the traditional publishing process still serve a purpose for those who feel it suits them, authors and readers, and that's fine for them. But if you think there's still just one way to get things done, you're simply not paying attention. After all, why should anyone wait to be let in through a gate when there are so few walls to keep them out?

An Understructured Rant on Book Reviews, Critics, And Why You Should Write Anyway

By Jody Aberdeen

"The Artist makes culture, not the Critic." - David Bowie

In the Acknowledgements section of my debut novel Convergence, I ended up including the following passage: "I hope you enjoy it, and if you don't, well, I'll just write something else".  Admittedly, it was a bit of pre-emptive insecurity on my part, but in a way, it's really the only strategy I have to face one of the worst fears that plagues many authors, especially new ones: a negative review.

Any fan of AMC's The Walking Dead knows that the recent finale was, at best, mixed in terms of audience reception.  I got into a small Twitter debate with one of my fellow Toronto Wordslingers about one of the characters (The Governor) being true to himself versus the viewers wanting the kind of "Wham!" ending that they didn't get. And I found myself being a complete fanboy about the whole thing, which is odd, considering that the advice I usually give writers is to just write your real story, screw everyone else's thoughts about where you take it.  In most cases, I at least give lip service to the writer's discretion of taking a story where their instincts and inspiration take them, but this time, I couldn't get past my own dissatisfaction with the ending as a fan and a viewer.

But that's the thing: how much consideration to a reviewer or a fan are we obliged to give when writing our work?  It's definitely not limited to novel or screen writing, but to any artistic expression, in any medium.

(Then again, it's not like the writers behind The Walking Dead are going to care about what I have to say about it per se).

It's not exactly a new debate, but there are always new writers, so the question remains valid: at what point does a desire for artistic integrity stop you from connecting with your audience?  Do you write for the market or write what you have to say, even if it bucks a trend?

How much credence do we give to people who make it a living to criticize content versus creating it themselves?  I think by the way I phrased the last one, you can tell where I stand on the question.

Opinions are cheap, really, especially when it comes to the arts.  There's little else that bugs me quite like a so-called patron of the arts who himself does not create the content, has not ever been bit by a creative impulse in her life, but who nonetheless can say, with conviction and a measure of credibility, that this book stinks.

If it was just a matter of some random person playing armchair quarterback with an author's labour of love, then it would end at mere irritation, but because of the sheer plethora of books available in 2013 and the ever shuttering windows of time available for people to read them, critics have never had more power to make or break the career of any storyteller, and they are necessary.

That being said, the math just seems really unfair at times.  Maybe it's the newbie in me, but it just plain sucks that I could spend countless years and ungodly amounts of coffee working on a manuscript just to have one bad review in a major paper or blog site destroy my book's success before it starts.  This is especially true when the critiques are almost purely academic: Stephen King notes in On Writing that one critic panned The Green Mile because his lead character and martyr, John Coffey, has the same initials as another famous figure who died for the sins of ordinary people.  "Really, guys?" is how King puts his own reaction to that particular literary critique.

I suppose it's that very same hipsterish impulse that I'm sensitive to, the idea that a new piece of work is crap if seems too much like a comparable mainstream story, or if it's too "derivative", a critique on which I call "bullshit" quite frequently because, to paraphrase Fight Club author Chuck Palahniuk, we're all basically the aggregation of the sum total of ideas and experiences we've consumed in our lives. Great storytelling often involves using those familiar patterns and archetypes that have been done thousands of times before. Originality can only take you so far, but it's a familiar repost of the self-satisfied critic.

I'll end my understructured rant by saying this: every storyteller has the opportunity to connect with the audience.  Audience connection is the only real external concern that an author should have, but the real shiny part about it is that the works with the greatest resonance with people tend to happen when the author is being real with herself and the story she wants to tell.

Greatest recent example I can think of:  Matthew Quick's debut novel, The Silver Linings Playbook.  No, I'm not about to review the book for you in the midst of my anti-reviewer rant (my hypocrisy only goes so far), but I'll say this much: Quick told a story from a position of such authenticity that you can almost smell the barbecue at the Eagles tailgate parties he portrays, and did so in a voice and style that resonated enough with enough people to generate an Oscar-winning screenplay adaptation.  And the film and the book had enough people who nonetheless didn't feel too highly about it, but look how much that mattered in the long run.

Regardless of whether you end up with a movie deal or continue to write in obscurity, the point is this: tell your story, tell it well, and tell it with reckless abandon and deliberate blindness to the eyes and voices outside your creative process.  Create something that makes you feel good, enjoy the feeling of accomplishment when it's done.

And hey, if people don't like it, do what you were going to do anyway, and write something else.

Forging Relationships With Other Writers

Tweet  

by Kelly DeBie

For as much as writing is a solitary activity, requiring us to dig deep within ourselves and tap our inner resources, I’ve found that in many ways it is also a community.

A strange and beautiful community.

That community is the reason that I’m writing here today, at the urging and recommendation of Molly Field, a fellow writer that I’ve never met in person but seem to have more in common with than most people I’ve ever known in real life.

In the past year, I’ve reached out to other writers more.  Many writers have reached out to me.  The nature of blogging is, at it’s core, social.  Blogging is a platform for me to write, usually daily, and immediately share that writing with the world.

Due to the nature of the medium, it seems almost mandatory that a blogger utilize social networking sites.  It’s through these sites that I’ve established, fostered and grown the relationships that I now hold dear.  Those relationships are with the writers I now consider my kindred spirits.

These connections, the ones that often leave me nodding my head in agreement, are ones that I cherish more than I can say.  We aren’t just writers, we often share similar journeys in life.  We’ve known heartache and turmoil.  We have a depth of character and a level of experience that often seems unique to this tight-knit world.

We understand each other in a way that most people don’t.

I know that I’ve made some connections in this past year that have changed my writing.  Tested my abilities.  Pushed my limits, both in terms of subject matter and personal investment.  These friends have encouraged me to try new things, to take risks, to hold myself accountable when I set goals.  

They understand more than anyone how emotionally draining the act of writing can be, and at the same time realize that the therapeutic value of doing so often surpasses the pain.

They see the inherent value in vulnerability.  In revealing the things that we hold closest.

Often, I find myself running things by them before I’ll hit that *publish* button, partially to affirm that I’m doing this all for the right reasons, partially for the moral support, but most often to confirm that I’m not the only one floating around in the ocean of life with this experience.

When it comes to the actual writing, it’s me and my keyboard pounding it out.

Knowing that there are other people out there, typing away in the confines of their isolated worlds, yet wanting to be understood, is what keeps me going.

To my fellow writers, thank you.

Are You Ready or Not? New Beginnings

By Molly Field

As a writer, nothing brings you greater satisfaction than penning that crisp sentence, flowing with the prose you not only create yourself, but with excellent writing offered by other authors.

Because we fancy ourselves a complex species, the opposite side of the same coin proposes that as a writer, nothing brings you greater senses of defeat and challenge than the words of other authors.

Spring is coming. The cherry blossoms on our neighborhood trees are pinking and peeking; the cardinals and robins are chatty, looking for wives. The sun is shining a little stronger and a little brighter every day. Spring, brings Macy's white sales and thoughts of purging, spring cleaning, new beginnings. I believe that many "New Year's Resolutions" should really be made on the first day of spring because in the winter, it's still too cold (at least where I live) to begin training for a marathon outside. (Yes, I am aware that not all NYRs focus on fitness.)

So for this month, we are encouraged to talk to you about new beginnings, fresh starts... This is a challenge for me because I am in the throes of a mental reorganization myself. But no time like the present, eh?

I didn't know what I was going to write about today. I get my prompt from our fearless leader, and sometimes I gnaw on a bone and other times I just bang one out. This time, I did a little of both. 

Without boring you to tears, I gave up Facebook for Lent. I'm not terrifically Catholic, but the opportunity was so well-timed and I wanted an out anyway, that I couldn't resist. It had all become too much for me.

My intention was to spend that time working on my book's drafts and edit it, which I have done, but not with the attention I paid to my Facebook "career." So clearly, I've got some work to do. The thing is though, that yesterday, my cousin sent me the cover art for her friend's new book, Flat Water Tuesday, a story about competitive rowing and young love. As an adult rower who hails from a renown rowing town, whose extended family rowed, whose parents met because of rowing, and whose brothers and cousins and now son row, the book has a no-brainer appeal for me.

It is not ironic (rather I consider it cosmically inspired) that when that cover art came to me, I was also on the phone being wooed by an exiting board member of my novice son's rowing club to be... yeah: president. I have attended one general membership meeting. They do have their ducks in a row over there, but my "pedigree" was undeniable and most of the board members are land lubbers. I said yes. (D'OH!) We'll see how it goes. It could be great. New beginnings, right?

The energy of these new starts, beginnings, etc., theme is intoxicating; it reminds me of when That Boy looked at me for the first time. The theme for today's post is coursing through me like whisky. I am simultaneously totally psyched and utterly petrified. 

It was one year ago this week, that I sat on my cousin's micro deck beneath the unseasonably warm sun in Buffalo where we talked about her friend's book. He'd just signed on with an agent; a publisher was totally interested. The energy was ramping up. They were talking contracts, money, real business. A part of me died inside when I heard all this. I thought, "I'll never be there... this guy's amazing..." and yet a part of me never died, because that summer I wrote my book. The one that needs the editing and the love I need to give it. I can't blame Facebook; I blame me.

I'm stuck now, just a little, but stuck enough to say this about new beginnings: I am considering writing my foreword now. However, I have this sense that I'm going to end up writing a whole new book, in fact the feeling that I will end up writing a whole new version of that book is undeniable. Is that so bad?

I am an Adult Child of Alcoholics, plural. We ACOAs don't have much luck or experience finishing things, but I know this: if I get started on something that I love, I never give it up. I push and push and push. And while I know that writing that first version of my book was cathartic and amazing, the next revised version, the one that spawns through this foreword, is going to be even better, even clearer. I just need six uninterrupted weeks. Why did I say yes to the rowing club?

But I have to be careful. As an ACOA I am constantly doubting myself, my intuition, my gut. I question the enthusiasm I have for something, I wonder if what I'm doing is enough or valuable. I get so caught up in the questioning of the act that I seldom act. It seems the only thing that fuels my fire to get up and keep going is a silent rage that is borne of the frustration that constant second guessing yields.

People who don't know the world of an ACOA look at us when we talk about it as if we have three heads. "What do you mean you hid under your bed for hours listening for your angry parent to close their door for the night?" or "What do you mean you cooked your own food when you were five? Who does that?" or the other ACOAs in your life will nod knowingly. Either way, you end up talking about that stuff for hours until you can't anymore; you're either sharing stories with people who also survived it, or your busy trying to convince people that those memories were real. It can be taxing.

I'm writing about all this here, so candidly, because I can. It's my literary place under the bed. I'm 45 years old and I'm still worried that my parents will be mad at me if I write about my life. The spiteful kid inside me, my Peter Pan, says this, "Do you think for one minute they considered your anger feelings?" and I think for a moment, sigh, look into the distance and tell Peter, "I have no clue."

Just to be clear, I didn't grow up in tatters under a shanty on a mountainside; we had no want for anything material. My parents were well-educated, connected and intelligent people. I was constantly reminded of my potential, that I could be a concert violinist if I wanted, but I didn't want that. Because they are also ACOAs, my parents knew the damage that negative talk can do. However, it can sound cliché, but it was what they didn't say that spoke louder than anything they did say.

Right now, I can feel the energy ebb a smidge, but the passion is still there; the nagging thought that this foreword can be the jack to "unstuck" me must be attended to. It must be honored.

New beginnings are here for all of us. You don't have to be an ACOA to have them. You just have to be willing to leave the past in the past and if you can summon any ounce of courage from those crushing days that kept you going to today, use it to move you to tomorrow and get that book published.

We are writers. Let's do this.

come out come out, wherever you are. photo credit: me

   

TweetTweet

Do You Fear Success or Failure?

Tweet

by Carrie Bailey

When I was younger, my mother told me that my father - though a talented artist - never finished anything he started. And if he did, he finished it too quickly. Over the years her words grew into a phobia that has clung to every creative endeavor I've started. Because she considered him a failure, I quickly developed the fear that I too would be incapable of knowing how and when to finish a project.

Cover art of Bungle of Oz
Can't believe I forgot to put
my name on it...

Flash forward twenty years, one kid, two degrees and one thousand different hair styles. This week I'm doing the final edits for a book I will release this month called Bungle of Oz. I am paralyzed by doubts. I know. It's not normal, but it happens to me sometimes and not even a half a dozen cups of coffee will fix it.

First, let me tell you everything I've done to avoid finishing the novel. After a few months without contact, I finally wrote a letter to my ex-boyfriend telling him off for putting alcohol before our basic needs last year before I left him and New Zealand...for good. I had a good cry. I ate a few donuts. I chatted with Winonah, my sister, about our deep dark old musty smelly family issues. I tweeted. I posted on Facebook how awesome my sister is. I cried again. I thought about eating more donuts, but I used my last shred of will power to avoid it. Then, I ate a pineapple. I got hugs from my son and my roommate. I put on Harry Potter and had a cry at the part where Harry accepts that he, like Jesus, must sacrifice himself for the sake of humanity.

I can't blame hormones. I'm not imbalanced. I'm not stressed. I've been eating well and exercising. My life is pretty good. So why am I having a total meltdown?

For the same reason I feel bad when I end unhealthy relationships, eat the last donut in the box or move to a new city. It's hard to let go especially if the donuts have coconut on them. I'm even sad that Voldemort died. I got used to reading how he was defeated, passing the book to my kid, and holding my breath for two or three days until I could talk to the kid about the story without spoiling it for him. That will never happen again.

The end of a project, however exciting it may be, comes with new beginning - transition from being a writer to being a bookseller. Ah, now we come closer to the real source of my fear. Things change now. Though I realistically don't expect to sell many copies of Bungle of Oz, because Oz books in general aren't in high demand, I am now free to work on writing project that have more potential.

It's okay if you quit reading now - nobody has to dive into my neuroses with me - but, be warned - that's where I'm heading.  

Nothing wrong with being a hobo and a writer.
There's a lot of perks that come with the territory.
Like riding the open rail and camping.
Also, everyone already expects
you to drink and act inappropriate in public.

FAILURE

Why is it scary? Because I'd probably be comforted by all the gleeful people who never tried anything difficult themselves. I'd have to work in a library or bookstore for all time - actually, that's not so bad. I would never get to prove wrong certain people who made my life more difficult. I might lose confidence. My writer friends might reject me. My son and sister might stop admiring me.

SUCCESS

Honestly, I don't fear success. I fear yachts.
Because, that's where successful people hang out.
The day you've arrived is when the
success committee comes to issue you a yacht.
Then, if you're me, the yacht catches fire. 

How could that possibly be something to fear? Well, I'd lose the fantasy that everything is better when you achieve your dreams, because I'd still get pimples, I'd still have to fill out forms and I'd still loose friends to disease and accidents. I'd have to manage more responsibility. Even more people would envy me and not refrain from being pricks about it.

But, here's what is great about being a writer. I can't fail. Only not writing at all is failure. And there is no true point when a writer can say they have arrived. Until I sell as many copies as the authors of the Bible - a popular anthology with a few thousand years head start on me - I can always just set the bar higher. Success is a process. So, why have I been crying when deep down I know this?

My meltdown does not have its roots in a fear of change or success or even failure. It started with a belief that I was introduced to at a young age unwittingly by my mother. I believe that finishing a project is not as easy as starting one. I believe that screwing things up at the end is how creative types operate. It's amazing how a simple idea has taken hold in my mind and caused me so much anxiety. It's preventing me from enjoying the process. It's not my mother's fault either. It's not mine. It's not an issue of who is responsible. It's just a fact that raises an important question.

Why don't I open up my book, do the final edits and enjoy it as much as I did when I first started the project?

All I have to do is take a few deep breaths, open the files for my final chapters and edit. Focus on how much fun it is to write - I can't lie to myself about editing. Remind myself that I love sharing my books and getting reviews.

My sister gave me some good advice when we talked this weekend. She told me to take a break. Seriously, it was wise like only an older sister can be. All I need to do is wrestle my neuroses into submission and then resume the writing. This is a good time to watch Dr. Who and read Alex M. Bright's book TRIsocialization. And just because I have to start a new project soon, doesn't mean I cannot relish the end of this one and give it the attention the readers deserve. I can, because I believe I can.

My mom also read me The Little Engine that Could.
I loved that book. Of course, the train didn't have an artistic temperament.
Could the little engine finish a painting or is this just a story about physical labor?

***

Why wasn't it The Little Typewriter that Could?

***

I think I can.
I think I can.
I think I can.

***

Nah, it's not working.
Maybe I'll just reward myself with donuts when I finish.
That's motivation.