This advertisement was in Variety yesterday (click on it for a larger image):
All Nick has really done with his $5000 is announce that he’s a clueless moron to all the entertainment industry executives enjoying their morning bowel movement.
But in his own way, he has performed a public service. His advertisement is actually a primer on how NOT to sell your novel, TV series, movie, game show, photography, music, or 1997 Honda Civic to Hollywood.
(Oh, and here’s a helpful hint to all the future Spielbergs, Camerons, Eastwoods and Nicks out there — before you set out to write your next book, TV series, movie, game show, song, or ad in Variety, you should know that an apostrophe S doesn’t make something plural).
I couldn’t resist checking out his site. Among his projects for future Spielbergs, Camerons and Eastwoods is a treatment for THE RETURN
FOR MAGNUM PI, which he registered with the WGA in 1994 despite the
fact he doesn’t own the underlying rights. Since then, he’s apparently changed his name from Nick Oliva to Nick Bold, perhaps to embrace the new boldness of his writing. I also read the first five pages of his important new book. Here’s one of my favorite passages (the italics are his):
I felt my heart pounding in an uncontrollable tidal surge of affection as we sat and laced up our skates.
And this:
She embraced herself and gracefully slid her hands down opposite arms, creating bountiful cleavage that she stared into before looking over to me, offering herself with an outward shrug of her right shoulder much the way a cat lifts its bottom.
He’s threatening to give this novel away free, but I think even that is charging too much. I wonder if Nick is a member of the Colonial Fan Force? If not, he should be.
UPDATE 11-20-06: He ran the ad again today…because there were typos on his website. He didn’t bother to correct the grammatical errors in his ad, though. What a moron.
I hate when I want to cheer somebody for taking a risk, but their stuff sucks.
You sound so angry, Lee.
“But since fiction being published is so difficult to accomplish.”
Oh yeah, I want to read more of this guy’s prose!
That’s because he stole my idea for the Return of Magnum PI.
The truth is, anonymous, that I get angry when I see such blatant displays of ignorance, stupidity and desperation.
Wasn’t there anybody in this guy’s life with the honesty to tell him that a) he doesn’t understand how the entertainment industry works b) that his ideas are truly awful and painfully derivative c) his writing needs LOTS of work and that d) spending thousands of dollars to announce to the world that he’s cluesless, his ideas are awful, and his writing is weak is a very very bad idea?
He would have been much better off spending his money on writing classes.
Some people just won’t listen, Lee. I’ve got a family member who, once he gets an idea, runs it to the ground no matter what anyone else says (we’ve stopped trying, because anyone who points out a flaw in his brilliant plan gets blamed for its failure, because they didn’t believe hard enough). And his ideas are no more practical than Nick’s. At least he hasn’t decided he wants to be a writer …
Someone also needs to tell him not to believe anything in a rejection letter except the word “no.”
my word, that’s hilarious.
someone should tell him to stick to fanfiction.net, where he’ll feel right at home.
When I saw that “Clueless Moron” title I couldn’t help but think that I had cluelessly done/posted something incredibly moronic.
I’m glad I’m not THAT cluelessly moronic.
Who knew that lacing up skates could unleash a tidal surge of heart pounding affection? Not I.
Or that there was nothing more seductive than a cat lifting its bottom?
Nah. The writers at fanfiction.net are WAY better than this guy. And those that aren’t at least have the excuse of being twelve-year-old girls. Mr. Bold, on the other hand… not so much.
His writing is so bad, it’s good. “…cat lifts its bottom” indeed! Only thing that could make that line better is if he used an apostrophe in “its”.
Hell, if he’d given me the 5 grand, I’d have reviewed his book and given it some publicity! 🙂
The gent also doesn’t know the difference between it’s, the contraction of it is, and its, the possessive pronoun or adjective.
Okay, I’m confused.
“extremely positive comments from agents in New York, but no one wants to chance a first novelist”
Ummmmm….isn’t that what agents DO? I mean, not everyone can have major best selling authors in their client list. Aren’t agents looking for gold, just as writers are?
That makes no sense.
But then, like Chadwick, when I first saw the heading, I thought “Christ, what have I done THIS time?” (laughing)
I would have visited the website…just out of curiosity, mind you…until I saw his unnecessary use of apostrophes to make plural proper names like Spielberg and Eastwood. That did it for me right then and there.
If you like this guy, you will positively love “Mark Paul” Sebar. http://www.sebar.com
He has personally undertaken to help struggling actors and voice over talent put his fun-filled adventure stories to life, and thumbs his nose at the publishing and editing establishment.
Carefully check the terms of use before you read his online manuscripts though. He expressly forbids “authors” from reading his stories, because he knows damn well we’ll steal his ideas.
I feel really sorry for this man. The things he says are all absolutely typical of a frustrated would-be writer – but imagine spending that much money on them. As I doubt it’s going to get him anywhere, I hope other people don’t follow his example.
I wonder if he’s hoping that his desperation story will get picked up, perhaps in the news or some talk show, and that he can use those minutes of fame to launch his writing career.
don’t worry. probably, some ‘agent’ from PubishAmerica or AuthorHouse or some such ‘publisher’ will be contacting him, if they haven’t already…
I suspect, given how much money the ad will have cost him, that he did it in good faith, and just didn’t realise that all the things the ad says are traditional warning bells to an editor. I find it hard to imagine that you’d spend five thousand dollars on an advert if you didn’t think the ad itself might have an effect.
Do we have to mock him? He’s already five thousand dollars out, poor fella.
I’m afraid this line of work is a public endeavor, thus anything one puts out is available for acclaim or scorn. Not learning in life is terminal.
Here’s another “local person writes book” story that repeats the same falsehood that Grisham was self-published. He wasn’t. You’d think a reporter could figure that out, or at least the features editor but no.
http://www.nydailynews.com/business/story/469494p-395148c.html
“offering herself with an outward shrug of her right shoulder much the way a cat lifts its bottom.”
He’d make a better living marketing his work as anti-Viagra…
Future Teenager’s-Take A Look! The end of embarassing arousal in class!
Well, I feel bad for him. I just hope he’s enjoying the rest of his life, as his writing aspirations aren’t going well…
You seem to be a very angry and hateful guy.
That cat-bottom-shrug excerpt could easily win the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction “bad writing” contest (http://www.bulwer-lytton.com/)
Enjoying your blog,
Kate
No need to feel sorry Red Coat Editor. I honestly am writing the way I like, and am satisfied with the status quo. Yes I had lots of fun publishing the audiobooks, and so did many of the voiceover actresses and actors. A lot of work went into every one of those…thousands of hours!
Yes it is by my own personal choice, that the products are not more commercialized, and I have many additional projects in the works to follow, for hopefully “God willing”, many more years to come.
Writing is an art form, and it will never in style or execution, appeal to any particular group entirely. But rather it will have a small following or even some large ones, and we merely need to be happy with our own work as Authors.
Bottom line is, if one enjoys creating their art, whether others accept or not, and one is happy with their work, than that is all that matters.
By the way, the sebar.com domain which has been around since 1996, and the site since 1994, offers many other things as well. It was the very first Manta Cars website on the entire internet in 1995, long before my good friend David Savage put up the mantacars.com domain, which is quite a neat place for sportscar enthusiasts. It is the only site currently that offers entire coverage for amateur ghost hunters of all of California. The Writer’s site has offered helpful links to “Literary” jobsites to help out others in that business, free software download link sites, so there is much more there, online flashed games too.
No banners, the site to this day remains pretty much banner free, nothing to buy there. The only real thing might be my personal endorsement of FinalDraft for filmwriters but there are no big banners, never have been, never will be.
Also those who are fans of the Roller Coaster Tycoon series can download everything from 3D historic southern california amusement parks to custom scenery for that game, again all free, and in fact I provide a home to Jonwil’s scenery importer for RCT3 and many other RCT3 3D scenerymakers, all free hosting and bandwidth for them. An article appears in the August issue of L.A. Magazine Page 48 on these parks. So I have endeavored to create and give a lot at the domain besides the poetry, e-books, streaming audio and some short streaming video stints.
While there remain many great sites worthwhile, I have given a lot to the general public and at no cost to them.
My current stories, and most likely my future stories, will continue to remain free of charge. Its what I like doing best as an artist which is creating. Whether people want to read the stories or not is their business and I reserve as the original artist of those, the right to set my terms to read them for free. Some people will agree and others may not, but I still stand by everything that is at the site that is my original work, over a quarter’s century worth of my work.
My first story “Contact of the Forestry Kin” I wrote back in 1978, and its not a bad piece for what it is. The second story in that series, “Idyllwild” was read by my good friend J.T. Walsh, Hollywood’s leading charactor actor. When I gave it to him to read, he said it would take about two months or longer. Next day, he called here at home and said he had finished it the night before, he said “I just couldn’t put it down.” So I know the worth of my work. JT co-wrote the filmplay based on the novel with me. Luckily “Idyllwild”, the second in the Wyler Scott series, and is available for free download to anyone who wants to read that genre, and no that is not intended to be a plug for the story. Just an example that it is availble and at no charge as is my entire site. My very point as it has been since 1994 and continues to be 12 years later, is it remains free.
I thank those who do take their busy time to read my work and hope they enjoyed it. But even if they didn’t, I’ll continue to write and post and if they want to continue to download great, if not, there are plenty of places to visit in cyberspace and no hard feelings, I wish all well anyhow, and still thank those who visited the site anyway.