Today I went to Barnes and Nobel to pick up a book I’d been meaning to get for some time, but also found myself browsing through “Fiction and Literature” once I’d picked up my guilty pleasure. The last few years it seems that all chick lit and thinly veiled erotica is being stuck in this section. Next to Tender is the Night was one of the many Darcy knockoffs that have become so popular. On the same shelf I found a tale of redemption, a memoir of addiction, and a story about a woman shopping for the perfect pair of shoes and a man. Now, it’s not that I don’t believe these books shouldn’t be published. Obviously they’re being read, and widely, but I just don’t think they should be catagorized with the Fiction and Literature. Yes, they’re fiction, but this is generally where one goes to find a different kind of book, and it’s made finding those books harder. I could not find a copy of Yakuza Moon or An Obedient Father at all. This is a minor annoyance, but as these forms of fiction grow more and more popular I think it’s time they had their own shelf. They already have their own catagory in querying, so I don’t see why it can’t trickle all the way down.
I know that everyone with any connection to the publishing industry has been up in arms and freaking out, writing their own blog posts about the layoffs going on at Random House. Like every other author (aspiring or actualized) I’ve been reading everything I can to make my own conclusions before freaking out. After a few hours, I decided not to freak for several reasons.
Yes, layoffs happen, and they’re awful when they do, but we’re in the middle of a horrible recession. I’m surprised that more people didn’t see this coming. The thought of having just acquired an editor only to find that they were no longer with the company fills me with a sick dread. The poor authors who found themselves back at the starting line have my sympathy. After I processed that, I realized that this could be a way to make some needed changes.
I believe Allison Winn Scotch put it best with her blog entry The Glass is Half Full. I couldn’t agree more. Advances need to be dropped. Economically they make little sense. As an aspiring author, I would prefer not to have to constantly worry about selling enough to pay out my advance. It makes better sense to give the author their percentage as the book sells. I don’t want my entire career ending over me not selling enough copies to meet the four grand they gave me. This could be an opportunity to switch, thus insuring that the publishing company isn’t losing more money than it’s making. It could also mean bigger budgets for publicity. What author couldn’t use a bit more publicity?
Like the rest of you, I’m just going to wait out and see what good can come out of this unsteady time. Eventually the market will turn back up. Perhaps this is the urging everyone needs to make sure they’re concentrating on putting out the best book they can. I know I’m going to take this time to get Triptych ready so that when the market goes back up I’ll have nothing to worry about.
(A bit of a warning. I hope this post made sense. I’m a bit under the weather, and when I am I tend to think something sounds great when it doesn’t.)
Very sad tidings
NaNo crashed and burned
wedding is looming.
words dragging today
am still ahead of the game
hope it stays that way
Have decided all
writing progress will be in
clever haiku form.
Finally happy
that I am writing something.
NaNo amazing?
Ten thousand words.
Aiming for thirteen tonight.
Bliss is creating!
First story boring.
Killed off my main character
with a lost shovel.
Second story weird.
A purity marriage? …’Kay.
Yeah, this will not do.
Word count is okay.
A new plot every day.
Can we stick to one?
Why hello story!
It’s about time you got here!
Now I will not cry.
I’ve just given in.
The story is going great.
Yes, it is Triptych.
NaNoWriMo begins in 9 hours. I’m so excited! It’s that christmas morning feeling all over again. I’ll begin November 1st at midnight with some fried pickles and the rest of the Houston WriMos.
(photo borrowed from suetlilanglz at deviantart.com)
NaNoWriMo is just around the corner (that’s National Novel Writing Month to those not in the know), and I had the entire story planned out. I had decided to write Triptych and have a draft ready by Christmas. This decision was made weeks ago after indecision on which story idea to flesh out. None of them really sat well with me. I believe that I’ve just been working on the same plot for so long that I need something incredibly creative to boost me out of this writing rut. I was terrified everything was going to become Ayn and Gabe all over again, and that’s the last thing I wanted. Then my friend Travis said I should come up with the last sentence. No matter what happens while you’re writing you have to make sense at the end. It has to work.
I thought this was brilliant and just the brain massage that I needed. For the last half hour I worked on coming up with something that could leave the world open, but end the story with a strong since of finality.
My sentence: “Outside a chill wind rattles through the trees, but inside they sit in the dark, slowly destroying themselves with silence.”
I can do so much with this, and I’m already twitching with a lack of control. That’s a good sign. It’s time to just let it flow.
Every day I’ll be posting my progress on twitter (I’m TheMoirai), so feel free to check in to see how I’m doing!
I know I’ve spoken about my love/hate relationship with TEL off and on over the course of this blog. Periodically I quit working on it, but I always come back. I’m obsessive about this story. It’s completely and totally unhealthy for a myriad of reasons. What’s gotten me to this point is that I’ve been working on this story for almost four years. I started it in April of 2005 just after I’d ended a relationship with someone I very much cared about. Throwing myself into a new story was a means of ignoring the issue and getting over it all at once. At the time I didn’t mean for it to change and evolve enough to become something lasting. I just wanted to get out what was inside of me. Beginning The Ephemeral Landing is one of my most vivid college memories, and I still long for nights like that when I’m writing. You feel the words burn and you can’t make your fingers type fast enough. This memory has somewhat worked itself into my attachment to the story. I don’t want to let go of it because I don’t want to lose the impact of that night, even if the story is crap.
TEL is also the first novel I ever finished. The last day I wrote almost five thousand words in one sitting. It was a write day you always hope to have, but again, this doesn’t make the story worth continuing. I will finish more things. I will have more great writing days (hopefully soon).
I will let The Ephemeral Landing go. I’ve said this a thousand times, but this time I really mean it. Tonight I’m giving every printed and digital copy to my fiance. Everything will be burned onto CD from my thumb drive. He’s then going to make me go walk the dog while he locks it away somewhere in the house for a year. If at that time I want it back, we’ll talk.
I needed him to do this for me. I needed to be free to work on other things. I don’t want Ayn hanging over me for years until my dreams die. It’s time to work on better stories.
I know I haven’t posted lately, but I haven’t had much to say. Instead, I’ve been doing a lot of reading, watching a good deal of movies, experiencing life. I’m amazed by man’s incredible capacity for both love and hate. How we try to confine each battle, be it a small argument or a years long war, into terms of good versus evil. Then I realized, every story is about these things: love, hate, good, evil, apathy, and passion. They are all the same story, just told from different perspectives.
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