Perils of the Writer: The Writing Game and the "Big Money"

On one of my OryCon panels-- "What I Wish I Had Known Then"-- one of the other panelists made the distinction between a writer "getting paid" and "getting paid money".  Which confused me, because what would you be getting paid in, if not money?  His answer was "exposure".  And it's true, there are several publications of lesser repute who will offer this "payment" of "exposure". 
But that's not payment, any more than handing someone an issue of Saveur is making them dinner. 
Now, if you're at a stage in your writing where, to you, there's value in your work getting seen without monetary compensation, hey, that's your business.  But don't call it "payment". 
But beyond getting actually paid-- which is a lovely thing-- there is the next level of "money" which is the Big Prize. 
King/Rowley/Grisham Money.
I'm not going to fool myself into thinking that's going to come, at least not quickly or easily, if at all.  I'm not doing this with stars in my eyes.  Well, maybe a little bit. 
The truth is, there are several ways to make the "big money" that are far more lucrative-- at least in terms of yielding said big money-- than writing fantasy and sci-fi books.  If I were only concerned about making money, I'd do one of those things.  But doing this-- writing these books-- that's what drives me. 
So if the big money comes-- a film or TV deal based on Thorn and what follows, for example-- I'd like to think I'd mostly keep doing what I'm doing: writing the next book.
And travel more, of course.  Those aren't mutually exclusive, after all. But in the meantime, I'll be digging away in the word mines.  See you down there.

OryCon and Separating the Work from the Person

So, I had a wonderful time at OryCon, which was my first Con outside of my usual "circle of influence", as it were.  I mean, when I went to FenCon, it was my first time at that Con, but I knew plenty of people there.  At OryCon, not so much, but that didn't matter.  I enjoyed myself on all my panels.  If you saw me there, I hope you found me charming and eloquent, or at least moderately competent.  I do have a tendency to keep talking to the point of blathering on. 
Fortunately, I was not aware of any harassment or bullying at OryCon.  Of course, my lack of awareness is hardly proof of it not happening, or not even being reported. 
Bullying, on an online level, has been an issue of late, of course, as evidenced and compiled in this post by Laura J. Mixon.  This is the sort of contentious thing I tend not to dip my toes into, in no small part to it not having affected me.  Yet. 
So here's the thing, at least from my point of view*: negative reviews, especially and including ones pointing out problematic aspects with regard to gender, race, sexuality, etc., are a necessary and valuable thing.  I know that personally I've made mistakes along those lines, and done my best to learn from those mistakes, and will in all likelihood continue to make more mistakes that I will hopefully learn from again.  Hopefully, my awareness will improve.
But part of that means I need to be called on it. I honor and value that, and will strive to listen do my best not to be all, "but you see..." or otherwise act defensively.  I'm certain that Thorn of Dentonhill has problems along those lines which I'll need to do better on in future books.  Let me make it perfectly clear that I welcome having that dialogue so that I can learn and improve.
HOWEVER, there is definitely a line between a harsh, even angry review of a work, and angry, hate-filled vitriol aimed at the artist themselves, and while some reviewers seem to think that line is fuzzy and easy to cross, it's really quite clear.  Attacking and bullying the person, even someone whose work is systemically problematic, is not acceptable.  I don't care who you are, what "side" of things you are on, whether you've faced actual or perceived marginalization for who you are or what your beliefs are: No.  Do not do this.  Shred the work all to hell, but treat the person behind it with something resembling decency. 
It really is just that easy.
--
*- Which is, of course, Full Privilege Bingo of White, Straight, Presumed-Christian, College-Educated, Right-handed Male, so: apply as large a grain of salt as you feel in necessary.

Thoughts on My Online Presence

There's something strangely meta about writing about my online presence here, as this is part of my online presence.  My blog-writing is more or less the centerpiece of it.

Managing one's online presence, especially as an author (or any other creative-type-promoting-oneself) can be a full-time job in and of itself.  No one has time for that.  I'm actually quite surprised when I see big names constantly blogging, tweeting, facebooking, etc.  But, hey, if they can make it work, good for them.  There's no way I can do that.

Here's a piece of advice I received on the subject a few years ago: Pick one aspect of on-line presence to be your center-of-gravity.  This is the primary place you'll put original content.  For me, it's my blog.  Every other bit of social media or online presence should be designed to direct back towards that central presence. 

That means that my Twitter, Facebook, Google+, etc. are all designed to be a public face, and lead you back toward the blog, which is where you'll see new and interesting things from me.

I even linked my blog to my LinkedIn and Goodreads page.  Those update automatically when I do.  And that way I can put most of my online-presence energy into writing creative and interesting content here, and still have energy to also write books. 

And that's important, because what's the value of having the online presence if it isn't in service of your books?

AND SPEAKING OF... over at Goodreads you can enter to win a free copy of Thorn of Dentonhill.  Head over there and sign up!

And that was FenCon

So, I've returned from FenCon, up in the Dallas/Fort Worth area, and it was quite an excellent time.  This is my first non-homebase con that I've attended since selling The Thorn of Dentonhill and A Murder of Mages.  However, many of the people at FenCon are also ArmadilloCon regulars, so I wasn't in unfamiliar territory.  It made it a very good environment to get my travelling-to-a-con sea legs, just the right mix of comfortable and new, and plenty of people to talk up Thorn and Murder to.  Though I've learned I do need to polish my pitch to "what's the book about" a bit.  Someone suggested I start saying "Magical fantasy adventure meets 'The Wire'.", and that's not half-bad.

I drove up first thing Saturday morning, giving me just enough time to get checked in and get the lay of the land before my first panel on "Getting the Geos Right", using geology and geography in one's sci-fi and fantasy writing and worldbuilding.  The panel was interesting, but since my main focus was how geography affects your worldbuilding, and other people on the panel were actual geologists, I mostly yielded to their expertise.

After a bit more settling in and hanging out, my next panel was on "Technobabble and Handwavium", where things like Star Trek and unobtanium and reversing the polarity of the neutron flow were all discussed.  The main point I came away with was that you can get away with those things to some degree, but only if the characters and the stakes hold true. 

The evening then moved to the Room Parties and BarCon portion of the evening, which is always fun.   Down in the bar, a large group ended up putting several tables together, and it became one of those moments where several conversations are going on at once, and you wish you could listen to and participate in all of them, but that's just impossible.

The next morning I had a reading from Thorn of Dentonhill, which was decently attended for a 10:30 in the morning panel on a Sunday.  I read the first chapter, talked a bit about craft and process with the people in the audience, and was pretty pleased with the experience. 

The final panel for me was on "When Will It End?", about series that go on too long, and why they hold on when they seem to have worn out their welcome, and strategies for writing them in general.  That panel included Guest Of Honor Eric Flint, so naturally he was the primary focus of that panel, talking about how his book 1632 started as a stand-alone novel but became a series, including anthologies of short stories with several different authors.

All in all, an excellent time, and I'm ready for the next con.  Which, for those of you keeping score at home, with be OryCon in Portland, Oregon, November 7th-9th.

Perils of the Writer: Putting Yourself on the Market

More than once, I've had people speak to me of "marketing" like it was something separate from "promoting".  I'm a writer, not a marketer or promoter or advertiser, so I did the most sensible thing.  I went to the dictionary.

marketing |ˈmärkitiNG|noun
the action or business of promoting and selling products or services, including market research and advertising.

Well, that's no help.  I mean, "promoting" is right there in the definition.  Pressed, I'd argue that "promoting" is about awareness, and "marketing" is about sales.

With the books coming out next year, at least at the moment the main thing I have to market is myself.  To actually sell something, I more or less have to convince people I'm someone worth noting.  So I've got to rely a lot on charm and personality, and being able to use those traits in a public venue with a suitable target audience.

Fortunately, I've got a venue for such a thing this weekend.  I'll be at FenCon!  You can check out my whole schedule right here.  If you have the opportunity, come on over.  I'll be on panels on geography, technobabble and series that go on too long, all topics I should be able to say clever and intelligent things about.  Plus I'll be reading from Thorn of Dentonhill.  Hope to see you there.

In the meantime, I've got to get down in the word mines.  Always more to do down there.

The Very Different World of Literary Fiction

Literary Fiction is not my world.  And on some level, it totally boggles me.

Case in point, this weekend I just heard about the book The Goldfinch by Donna Tarrt, which came out last year and won the Pulitzer.  Now, I haven't read it, of course, and can offer no meaningful comment on either it or Ms. Tarrt's body of work.  As evidenced by the fact that I only heard about it this week, what's going on in literary fiction (and especially with the Pulitzer) simply is not in my usual circle of information.

But here's the thing that I honestly do not understand.  The Goldfinch is Ms. Tarrt's third book.  Her other books, The Secret History and The Little Friend, came out in 1992 and 2002, respectively.  So that's three books in 21 years, with a decade between each one.  How exactly does one maintain audience, let alone the interest and patience of one's agent or publisher, with that kind of gap between each work?  It would strike me that in this day and age, one could hardly build a writing career like that.

I mean, I get the literary once-and-done, like Harper Lee with To Kill A Mockingbird.  The lack of follow-up makes it stand out all the more.  But I would think that, say, around 2010, there wouldn't be anyone sitting around saying, "Remember the person who wrote that book eight years ago, and that other one eighteen years ago?  When's the next one coming out, because I can't wait!"

Now, it could be that Ms. Tarrt is an extraordinary talent-- each book was lauded with praise, including the Pulitzer, so I can accept that she is an outlier.  Maybe each of those books stay with the readers so strongly that no amount of time would fade interest.  But it strikes me that the path of "great' literature usually follows along these lines: three or four novels written over the course of a lifetime.  That this is almost what is expected of those authors.

As counterpoint, consider the current leading Grand Poobah in SFF circles: George R R Martin.  With just Songs of Fire and Ice books He's written almost twice as much book (by word/pagecount, not number of books) as Ms. Tarrt in almost half the time, in addition to other writing projects... and yet there is an underlying narrative of George needs to write faster.* And in general, if someone in genre had their last novel in 2002, on the whole the narrative in 2013 would have been that their career was dead.  Heck, I know of one who, because she waited a few years between publishing Book Two of a series and finishing Book Three, was completely unable to sell Book Three, and ended up self-publishing it even many more years after that.

So, is this part of the nature of Literary Fiction?  Does its audience expect their writers to deliver a masterpiece, then vanish for many years while working on the next one?  In those circles, is that the pace of writing they aspire to? 

Now, I'm not saying that genre writers need to be machines, where cranking out product is more important than craft.  But it seems within genre a pace of, say, a novel per year is a lot more common than out in the lit field.

But since I do have a pace to maintain, time to get back to it.  So you in the word mines.

---
*- And, as they say in the song, in the time George has had, William Shakespeare churned out 35 fricking plays.  Because he needed to pay his bills.

Perils of the Writer: The Beast that is Promotion

Promotion is a challenging thing for a writer to get right.  You want to get word that your book is out there (or in my case, that it's available for pre-order), but you don't want to be that person who's just "BUY MY BOOK!"  Because that person is obnoxious.

Seriously, that person isn't just hypothetical.  There are people out there like that, and they are obnoxious.  I once knew someone whose twitter feed would auto-tweet one of ten different "BUY MY BOOK HERE'S THE LINK" messages every few hours, like clockwork.

I never bought that book.

But you have to do something, of course, else no one knows the book is out there.  The trick is getting the word out there without annoying the people you want to be enticing.  Of course, the best way to do that is for someone else to be the one talking about your book.  That way it's not you doing obnoxious self-promotion.  It's someone who's genuinely excited about your work and wants to talk about it!

And sometimes you get blessed with a bit of serendipity.  In my case, it tied to Book Country.  See, I was one of the initial beta-testers of the writing-critiquing community, which was designed and owned by Penguin.  Thorn of Dentonhill was one of the first books available on the site for critique-- at least, its first few chapters.  So when Thorn was bought by DAW-- part of the Penguin group-- the folks at Book Country were eager to talk it up. 


Of course, I'll still be talking it up plenty in the months to come.  Have no doubt about that. 

All right, off to the word mines.  See you all down there.

Chasing the Numbers

So, I'm not at the point, obviously, where I'm tracking book sales.  Occasionally I'll go and look at my Amazon rank for Thorn presales and wonder what that might actually mean.  I honestly don't know.

But here's what I do know: once I can track sales numbers, I will probably be a bit obsessive about it. 

Because lord knows, I already google "Marshall Ryan Maresca" and "Thorn of Dentonhill" to a surprising degree.  Especially now, since new things are popping up on a regular basis.  That's how I discovered an article pointing to me as an example of marketing one's work using Google Plus.  (What?  Really?)  That's how I found out that Thorn has a Goodreads page now.   Which gives me another thing to check obsessively, as I can keep track of the complete strangers who have added it to their "to-read" list.  For some reason that's incredibly exciting to me.

What I'm saying is, if I have something I can track, I'm probably going to keep my eye on it.  If it's something I can quantify, perhaps even put in a spreadsheet.... oh, I'm going to be all over that.

Maybe at some point, I'll be more zen about all the how'm-I-doing data out there.  But right now, I'm making the most of it.

Speaking of things you can learn by Googling me, I'll be at FenCon in Dallas September 25-27!  Come say hello!

Saturday  12:00:00 PM  - 1:00 PM   Getting the Geos Right   Description: Geology and geography and how they should shape your fictional society. Panelists: R. Acks , L. Carl , Mi. Finn , M. Maresca , M. White , K. Murphy *

Saturday  6:00:00 PM  - 7:00 PM   Handwavium And Technobabble   Description: Where do writers come up with all those terms, anyway? Do they have roots in the real world, or does someone just throw a D20 and see what they come up with? Panelists: P. Black , S. Cupp , J. Mandala , M. Maresca , L. Antonelli *

Sunday  10:30:00 AM  - 11:00 AM   Reading

Sunday  1:00:00 PM  - 2:00 PM   When Will it Ever End?   Description: How long is too long? When should a series hang it up, or is there no limit to the number of books an author can or should write in a specific setting? Which well-known series have done an excellent job of holding our attention across multiple books, and which have jumped the proverbial shark? E. Flint , M. Maresca , R. Rogers , S. Swendson , B. Wright , L. Donahue *

Metrics of Success

I'm in the early stages of my writing career where the measure of "success" can be marked with easily notable milestones.  The big ones along the path still stand out.  Actually finished a novel! Full request on my query letter!  Offer of representation! Really nice rejection letter!

And, of course, those stood out because those were the things I could grasp on to in the moment.  They were little things that represent huge victories.

But they were also victories that were challenging to really talk about or celebrate, as they lacked tangible benefits.  When I talked about this to an actor friend, he likened it to getting a third callback on a major movie role.  Yeah, it shows you're getting there, that people notice your work... but it's not really anything beyond the humblebrag.

I think those are vital toeholds as you work your way up the wall.  You need those little things.  You need those few encouraging words you might get along the way. 

Even now, with the initial trappings of "making it"-- I've got the contract, the publishing deal, the gorgeous cover, the release date-- it's hard to call myself a "success".   The book hasn't come out yet, no reviews, that lingering voice of doubt whispering in my ear that no one is really going to like it. 


I don't let myself listen to that voice.

"Success" is always over the next horizon.  I mean that in the best way-- I don't think it's some ephemeral thing that can never be reached.  I mean that the act itself of progressing toward it is, in and of itself, the real success.  It's reaching a new plateau, taking a brief moment to savor that, and then looking up at the next one and saying, "Yeah, that's where I'm going to go."

All right, off to the word mines.  See you in there.

Perils of the Writer: Picking Your Battles

So the big news in writerly circles this weekend involved the current salvos in the Amazon/Hachette fracas, with writers remaining caught in the middle*.  I honestly haven't been talking about it mostly because I really don't have a dog in this fight, not directly, but also because people like John Scalzi and Chuck Wendig are saying the sort of thing I'm thinking, and saying it far better than I probably would.  And in the case of Chuck, with more profanity and bushier beard.

What I find fascinating about all this is how some people who don't have a dog in this fight are turning the whole thing on its edge to give themselves a dog.  To twist distribution contract negotiations into something about THE FUTURE OF PUBLISHING: BIG 5 PUBLISHERS VS. INDIES.  And, you know, I tried to see it, and I looked at it sideways and squinted... and I still didn't see it.  Closest I could see to it was Indie writers-- who use Amazon to distribute their work, and may or may not have a beef with Big 5 publishing-- see this whole thing as a chance to take one of the Big 5 down a peg.  Or something.  If you want to see it that way, if you want to frame it as a David And Goliath Fight... that's your business.  Frankly, it's far more of an Ali/Frazier, as I see it.**   But how I see it doesn't really matter, because... I'm not really in it. 

Sooner or later, though, there will be one of these writerly rows in which you will firmly be on one side or another.  That might be because things are happening that affect you, or it's a situation you feel passionate about.  Or it might be because you hold one kind of politics and said something in favor of those politics, and people who hold another kind of politics have decided you are now a punching bag.  Sometimes you come to the fight; sometimes the fight comes to you.  Sometimes the fight is an angry mob; sometimes it's just a few mosquitoes.  Both don't require a flamethrower response. 

You've got to decide how you're going to handle it.  You've got to decide if you're going to handle it. 

Because not every fight is worth it.  Sometimes you should just focus on your own writing.  Which is, frankly, what I'm going to go do.

---

*- Someday we'll all be grizzled old veterans.  "I was there for the Amazon/Hachette Wars!  Fought in the great Blog Battle of August 9th!"
**- I won't comment which is which, though.

Convention Panels and Expertise

So, this was a response I got to the last blog on ArmadilloCon, specifically in response to my self-admitted lack-of-expertise in the subject of the panel I was on:

I keep pushing the idea that participation in convention panels should be open to the public, and the panels pitched SXSW-style: that is, a group of panelists puts together a panel proposal, and then members vote on the panels they want to see. All too often people in the audience (at least some of them) know more about the subject than those on stage. 

It's an interesting idea, but for a volunteer organization to implement successfully... pretty challenging.  The sausage-making of coordinating the schedule of some several dozen programming participants into a cohesive set of panels, readings and events is an undertaking, especially when done almost entirely out of love.  Adding another layer of democracy to that undertaking is not something I would wish on anyone.

That said, the underlying complain has validity.  Lord knows that at the conventions I've attended, I've seen some panels where the members really didn't have much business being on it.  Hell, I've been on panels where I didn't have much business being on it.  At least this time around, my two more problematic panels were subjects I had an interest in, and had done some research on the subject beforehand. 

Even if you line up participants-to-panels perfectly, however, any panel that isn't just one person giving a set lecture (and thus... not really a panel) is going to be an organic thing.  Unless the moderator rules it with an iron fist, it's going to go where the people on it are going to take it. 

Not to mention, any given panel usually has its title and, perhaps, a sentences or two of extra description.  The programming coordinator might have had one idea of what a panel is going to be about, while the participants might-- each individually-- have another, and members of the audience something completely different from all of that.  Sometimes you just ride the wave where it takes you.

On top of that, when the context is a SF/F/Genre/Lit Convention, I don't think anyone in the audience is expecting or demanding of academic credentials from the panel.  They know that the panel consists of spec-fic writers who are mostly doing what they know best: speculating and story-telling.  Besides, in my Alcohol In Speculative Fiction panel, I don't think anyone wanted me to drone on about the history of development of beer, wine and distilled spirits. 

All that said, there's nothing wrong with just plain bowing out of a panel in which you would truly be out of your depth.  I was assigned one originally at ArmadilloCon that I was totally at a loss about, and immediately asked to be taken off it. 

Though, to a degree, if you're up on a panel, on some level you are presenting yourself as an "expert", and it's good to do your best to show yourself as one.  Or, if nothing else, be up front about your lack of expertise.  And be entertaining.  That's the thing I most want from a panel, after all.

My Final ArmadilloCon Schedule

 ArmadilloCon is this weekend, which means I'm in crunch mode.  I've actually tackled quite a bit of my to-do list for this month, but I still have a few big things to do before the conference.  Here's my schedule, and some more cohesive thoughts about each one.  This is all, of course, in addition to the Writers' Workshop, which is all day on Friday.

Protecting the Indigenous Tribes 
Fri 8:00 PM-9:00 PM Room E 
Maresca*, Compton, Wright 
Indigenous peoples confront a diverse range of concerns. What should be done to ensure their existence? 

I have to admit, this one gives me a lot of pause, if for no other reason than the very title is fraught with landmines.  This is an easy conversation to go south with, and I'll confess I do not have any sort of first-hand experience on topic.  I know one point I'd like to hit is how to apply this to SF/F fiction, since, you know, it's an SF/F Lit conference, not an anthropological one.

40 Years of D&D 
Fri 9:00 PM-10:00 PM Room F 
Benjamin*, Finn, Maresca, Marmell, Sarath, Wright 
How did D&D inspire authors? 

I haven't been playing D&D for 40 years, but I started within its first decade (and my own).  I know that my own experience with fantasy as a genre has a lot of roots in D&D.  This should be a fun one. 

Quetzaxuahuitzalochtlicueotl 
Sat 1:00 PM-2:00 PM Room E 
Richerson*, Maresca, Oliver
Discussion of Aztec mythology and why it isn't used in more genre stories. 

This is the other one that gives me some pause, though I'm a little more comfortable with the subject matter.  Nothing which would qualify me as an "expert" in any sense, but certainly bringing Mesoamerican and, in a more modern context, Mexican sensibilities to genre fiction is a topic I'm interested in.

Alcoholic Drinks in Fiction 
Sat 5:00 PM-6:00 PM Room F 
Maresca*, Acks, Allen, Downum, Renwick
Discussing the drinks mentioned in stories, movies and tv. 

I've long been a big proponent of using food in fiction as a means of showing worldbuilding and character, and alcoholic drinks are a key subset of that.  An entertaining subset at that.  So I'll do my best not to be dry and academic about the history of beer or something.

Reading 
Sat 8:00 PM-9:00 PM Southpark A 
Marshall Ryan Maresca

An hour all about ME.  So come to Southpark A and hear me read, probably from both Thorn of Dentonhill and A Murder of Mages.  And, depending, there will be some Q&A.  By which I mean, if someone asks me questions, I will do my best to answer them.

Best Cons from Genre Books 
Sun 10:00 AM-11:00 AM Room D 
Webb*, Blaschke, Maresca 
Not many people are good at writing capers. Which books do it right? 

 I love a good caper.  To an extent, Holver Alley Crew is a caper.  This should be fun.

Overhauling a Character 
Sun 11:00 AM-Noon Room F 
Maresca*, Bracken, Carl, Chang, McKay, Rogers 
Now that you have written a book, go back and rewrite your main character.

I have specific stuff to say here, about the revision process of A Murder of Mages from rough draft to sold draft.  I'm sure everyone else will as well. 


So that's it.  I hope to see some of you there.  If you come, say hello.  I know I'd greatly appreciate it.

Thorn of Dentonhill Available for Pre-order on Amazon

So, I wasn't sure what I was going to write about today.  There's a lot on my plate right now, including finishing edits to Murder of Mages, as well as finalizing other details for that (street map, acknowledgements, cover notes for artist), and on top of that ArmadilloCon and the Writers Workshop is in less that three weeks.

And that's on top of the things I have to do to keep the mortgage paid and the lights on.

But then, I discovered* something pretty amazing that I had to share:

Thorn Of Dentonhill is available for pre-order on Amazon! And it also has a Goodreads page! 

I'll admit, I completely geeked out when I saw an ISBN number.  Again, it's the little things like that which bring it home: this is a really real thing that is happening.

So that more or less made my week.

---

*- By "discovered" I mean "ego-surfed and checked my Amazon author page".

Picking Up the Gauntlet

So because of my post last week, I received a lot of spirited defenses of self/indy publishing, many of which struck me as missing the central point I was making: that agents and editors dig through a lot of crap to find the things they publish.  Several people argued that "people aren't waiting for publishers to tell them what to read, they're listening to reviews and recommendations from friends."  What this fails to recognize is that traditional publication is, in essence, a powerful form of recommendation: someone said, "I think this book is so worth reading, I'm financially backing it." 

So powerful that many reviewers and sellers take notice.  It is on that recommendation that most reviewers will accept the book to read.  (Most will not review self/indy books.)  It is on that recommendation that the sellers-- bookstores-- agree to stock it.  (Many will not stock self/indy books.)  And the individual people who work there will give their personal opinions to the customers.

So don't tell me that no one is listening to publishers for recommendation, because that is literally what the traditional model is.

The other argument I heard boiled down to, "Thanks to indy/self publishing, so many amazing books that wouldn't have seen the light of day are now available.  Readers can decide for themselves."

This may well be true.

I'm game.  I'd like to know what some of these amazing books are.  So, I'd like to hear some recommendations.

But wait!  I've got some rules.

1. You can't recommend your own book. The main reason for this is I think recommending your own book undermines the point of "so many amazing books are now available".  If you just tell me about your own book, what you're telling me is that you don't really care about all those amazing books, other than in the abstract sense of how promoting the idea helps your own book.  You're not telling me how indy/self helps readers "decide for themselves", you're telling me how indy/self helps writers sell their books.    If the system really is for the benefit for the readers, I want to know how it benefited you as a reader. 

2. No recommendations that started indy/self and then were picked up by a traditional publisher.  Because they've already received that recommendation bump.  I can find them in the traditional market, even if their path there wasn't entirely traditional.  Recommend something that I can't find on the traditional market.

So let's hear some recommendations!  Put my money where your mouth is.

Blessed are the Slushdivers

I don't want to bag on people who self-publish. There are good reasons to do it, and there are people who do it very well and have found great success doing it.  That's excellent for them.

That said,  I've got a big problem with the zealots who don't merely preach the gospel of self-publishing, but scream from the mountaintop how traditional publishing-- or "legacy" publishing, to use their attempt at a backhanded term-- is doomed to die.  That's it's already dead, and its proponents just don't realize it.

This is, of course, crap.

The big argument they like to make is that readers don't need publishers to make decisions about what's worth reading for them, they can find what they like for themselves.  That the people can be their own gatekeepers.

This is an argument made by someone who has never read through a slushpile.  Which is a shame, because it is something that every aspiring professional writer should do at least once.  To get a little perspective, if nothing else. 

So, for perspective, this is what agents and editors do:

Imagine a river of shit.  Roiling, torrential rapids of hot shit.  And careening through the eddies and currents of this river, there are diamonds.  And rocks.  Mostly rocks, but some diamonds.

And a few brave souls DIVE IN THERE and swim through that festering flow of feculence, searching for a couple diamonds.  They come out with what they find, sort out the rocks from the diamonds, and clean those off and sell them.  And by the nature of how things are, yes: some diamonds will not be found.  It's a shame, but that's a reality. 

This is a metaphor, but I'm really not exaggerating.

Really, really not.  I've read through slush submissions, and it can really be that bad.

Now, if you're game for diving in and finding your own diamonds: power to you.  Seriously. It isn't easy.  I'm pretty amazed that agents and editors are still constantly doing this to find new work. 

And I'm glad they do.  Because, on the whole, I'd MUCH rather go to the stand by the roadside with cleaned-and-polished diamonds then listen to the guy on the riverbank screaming that there's diamonds in the shit river and anyone can get.  He might be correct, but that doesn't change the fact that I appreciate the work that the divers do.  And if I resent anything-- as a reader-- its the assumption that I should want to dive in and find the diamonds myself. 

I leave that to the professionals.

ArmadilloCon Schedule

ArmadilloCon already has a schedule, which is a pleasant surprise.  Usually you get these things one to two weeks before, not nearly two months of lead time.  Still, it's nice to have a sense of what I'll be doing (besides the Writers' Workshop-- submission deadline is June 15th!), and which subjects I might want to bone up on so I know what I'm talking about.

So, here's my schedule, which I would presume is subject to change.  I'll talk more about it when we get closer to the actual event (July 25th-27th).

Protecting the Indigenous Tribes 
Fri 8:00 PM-9:00 PM Room E 
Maresca*, Compton, Wright 
Indigenous peoples confront a diverse range of concerns. What should be done to ensure their existence? 

40 Years of D&D 
Fri 9:00 PM-10:00 PM Room F 
Benjamin*, Finn, Maresca, Marmell, Sarath, Wright 
How did D&D inspire authors? 

Quetzaxuahuitzalochtlicueotl 
Sat 1:00 PM-2:00 PM Room E 
Richerson*, Brown, Maresca, Oliver
Discussion of Aztec mythology and why it isn't used in more genre stories. 

Alcoholic Drinks in Fiction 
Sat 5:00 PM-6:00 PM Room F 
Maresca*, Acks, Allen, Downum 
Discussing the drinks mentioned in stories, movies and tv. 

Reading 
Sat 8:00 PM-9:00 PM Southpark A 
Maresca 

Best Cons from Genre Books 
Sun 10:00 AM-11:00 AM Room D 
Webb*, Blaschke, Maresca 
Not many people are good at writing capers. Which books do it right? 

Overhauling a Character 
Sun 11:00 AM-Noon Room F 
Maresca*, Bracken, Carl, Chang, McKay, Rogers 
Now that you have written a book, go back and rewrite your main character.

My only comments right now are:

1. I'm moderating THREE panels.  That should be interesting.
2.  I have an hour for a reading.  I'll have to think of how to make the best of that.

Cover for THE THORN OF DENTONHILL

So, I received this in the mail today from my amazing editor:

This comes from Paul Young, of whom I am now a big fan.

You know, there's been plenty of "pinch me" moments where I wasn't sure this was really happening.  Despite contracts, first check, editorial meetings, etc., there's still this little voice in the back of your head whispering.  Telling you it's all some elaborate prank.

But seeing this, it really hit home.

This is really happening.

Perils of the Writer: All the "Rules" with a Grain of Salt

Every fledgling writer hears all sorts of "dos and don'ts", rules that you NEED to follow if you want to have ANY CHANCE of getting published.  Most of these things are nonsense, essentially trying to quantify something that is more gut-feeling than hard and fast rule.   Case in point:

I was just at a conference, where in the opening pages agent-author seminar, the agents stopped reading a participant's opener as soon as they hit an exclamation point, and stressed that shows lazy writing. There must be some other way to show the emphasis, or else don't emphasize the point where it is used. 

I have to admit, this one, in particular, strikes me as especially arbitrary. Exclamation points show lazy writing? Incorrect usage of exclamation points can certainly be problematic, but to exclude their usage altogether? Absurd. I'll say again with emphasis: Absurd! (Especially considering one of the events at that conference was titled, "The Power of Positive Writing!” Yes, with the exclamation point.)

But more to the point, there are only three punctuation marks that can end a sentence.  Why avoid one-third of them completely?  How is that lazy writing? I don't know.  It's a fundamental part of punctuation.  It would be as if someone said, "I never like seeing quotation marks.  There must be some other way to show a character is speaking."

The advice, as a reading rule itself, I find almost obscene.  It's a step away from saying, "If I see a sentence with two words that start with a 'k', I stop reading." I shudder to think of fledgling writers running to their manuscripts and slashing out exclamation points. Because THEY! MUST! GO!

I'm so glad neither my agent nor my editor follow such a silly rule.*

--

*- The first sentence of Thorn of Dentonhill is "Thief!"

Seanan McGuire and other heroes in the writing world

So, I've been doing deeper research into DAW over the past few months, for obvious reasons, and learning more about the other people who write for DAW.  It's a pretty good crowd to be associated with, I can tell you that.  Good people, good books.  I really couldn't hope for better. 

And as part of that, I checked out Seanan McGuire.  Let me tell you something about Seanan: she is a machine.   Since her first book with DAW in 2009, she has knocked out a novel every six months with them like clockwork.  That's 10 novels in five years, in addition to short stories & novellas galore, AND four novels as Mira Grant.

That's incredible. 

Seriously, that's something to aspire to. 

I mean, I don't think I'll-- at least at this point-- be able to match in terms of shorter works and works as Mira Grant... but two a year.  That's a goal I think I can hold up to.  Right now, I have two scheduled for 2015 (Thorn of Dentonhill and Murder of Mages), and I'm nearly done-- about 70%-- with the rough draft of Thorn II, and will get on Murder II right after that.  Plus I've got Holver Alley Crew and Way of the Shield in the wings. 

And that's the point, at least for me: work as a full writing professional.  That's a plan that involves volume.  Of course, as a planner, I have an outline plan for a full series for Thorn, Murder, Holver Alley and Way of the Shield.  And so far, it's working out. 

But to go back to my point: Seanan is my hero.  She clearly is going full throttle and that's exactly the sort of career I hope to emulate. 

Plus, it's always good to set another bar once you cross one.

All right, back to the word mines.

Fantasy Writing, and How It Looks from the Outside

So, the other day I was at physical therapy for my broken foot*, and at the next table the patient was trying to explain Game of Thrones to his therapist.  And, it was clear listening to them that the therapist just plain didn't understand it, and the guy explaining it also didn't fully understand it.  Phrases like "So, it's like Lord of the Rings?" and "So, it's in medieval times?" were often repeated, usually with the tone of voice reserved for discussing unsavory things.

That's not that surprising. 

I mean, I'm glad that fantasy, as a genre, has become mainstream enough that Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter and Game of Thrones are legitimate pop-culture phenomena.  Captain America is the top movie for three weeks running, and if you had told me that twenty years ago, when the best we had done for that character was the Matt Salenger atrocity**, I would have fainted dead away. 

I think it's important to remember that we're still on the fringes here.  Yeah, George RR Martin will now get on legitimate talk shows, but the rest of our rock stars don't get much notice outside of our own circles.  Most of what we do and write stays in our circles, and it's easy to get lost in the sense of how big that really is.  The things that cause twitter-sphere and blog explosions tend not to make much of a dent beyond the SF/F community. 

More beyond that, a lot of the things about our genre as a whole don't make of a dent beyond the community itself.  Despite it being at an all-time high in popularity, despite it being one of the top selling genres in literature-- it's still on the fringes.

Which is fine.  I'm comfortable with being on the fringes, being part of this community.  But it's good to have these little moments to put the things that seem like a Very Big Deal back in perspective.


---
*- It's pretty much healed and I'm back to normal, thanks for asking.
**- I could rant for a while about that movie.