On Other Blogs

So This is Why I Spent Three Hours Yesterday Organizing my iTunes Library…

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Author Donna Andrews is on deadline and procrastinating.

I'm only one day behind where I want to be on the book.  I'm
chugging along, slowly but steadily.  But my writing avoidance
behaviors are in full bloom.

One of the most common writing
avoidance behaviors is nesting. Cleaning, organizing, and tidying. 
It's not just me; a year or so ago, a writer friend reported a
bafflingly  sudden and uncharacteristic urge to clean her desk. . . her
office . . . perhaps her whole house.  Several of us asked if,
perchance, she was on deadline.  Of course she was.  You may tell
yourself that you can write better in a tidy office; you may claim that
you're thinking about your book while dusting, mopping, scrubbing, and
sorting; you may even be telling the truth.  But never try to fool
yourself that these sudden domestic urges aren't writing avoidance.

I know exactly how she feels. Last night I "cleaned up" my iTunes library and playlists and when I looked up again, three hours had passed. I've also been obsessive about trimming our trees. I think it's because I'm nervous about actually starting to write the "standalone" book that I've been noodling with in my mind for months…

I'd start to write it at this very moment but I have to Twitter somebody, make some more connections on LinkedIn, and clean out my office closet first…

Talking to a Blogger is Treason…

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…at least that's what the execs at the Los Angeles Times think about employees who pass info to the excellent LA Observed blog, which reports:

According to multiple sources at the Times, new publisher Eddy
Hartenstein has been calling it "treason" for employees to share
information with LA Observed. Now, it's easy to dismiss his rhetoric as
beginner jitters — history has seen plenty of media publishers who
naively try to muzzle the journalists who work for them, only to learn
that it can't be done. (Never mind that it's antithetical to why the
paper exists.)

[…]So take precautions — use your personal email, our PO box,
or pick up the phone — and don't presume they aren't watching. And be
assured that I will continue to report accurately on the Times with
your help and, as always, will never divulge my sources.

The Worst Spin-offs Ever

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AfterMASH tops Time Magazine’s list of the worst TV spin-offs ever. I don’t think they looked very hard. Yeah, BAYWATCH NIGHTS would certainly be at the top of any list. But how could they have over-looked FLO (from ALICE), CHECKING IN (from THE JEFFERSONS), SANFORD ARMS (from SANFORD AN SON), ENOS (from DUKES OF HAZARD) DIRTY SALLY (from GUNSMOKE), or GLORIA (from ALL IN THE FAMILY) or SONS OF THUNDER (from WALKER TEXAS RANGER)?

Why Reviewers Ignore Self-Published Books

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Chicago Sun-Times book critic David Montgomery explains why he doesn't review self-published books.

In my experience the overall quality level of self-published fiction
is not sufficiently high for the books to be given serious
consideration. This is not to say that all self-published fiction is
bad. The law of probability alone would indicate that at least some of
it must be readable. But the vast majority of it is not.

There are many reasons for this (e.g., self-published fiction has no
third-party vetting, most of it is not professionally edited, much of
it was already rejected by agents/editors for a variety of reason), but
the bottom line is that most self-published fiction just isn't very
good.

He's right, and although he's only speaking for himself, he might as well be talking for the majority mainstream magazine and newspaper book reviewers out there.

Inexplicably, I keep getting emails from publicists and vanity presses to review their self-published authors….even though a) I am not a book reviewer and b) I am a harsh critic of self-publishing in general and vanity presses in particular.

My Dark Past, the Sequel

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357 Vigilante 2
Not so long ago, I was surprised when a blogger reviewed my second book .357  VIGILANTE #2: MAKE THEM PAY. Now another blogger has reviewed it, too:

…if you're
familiar with Goldberg's TV work as a writer of middle-of-the-road
crime dramas like SPENSER: FOR HIRE, HUNTER and DIAGNOSIS: MURDER, you
may notice that the .357 Vigilante books are written in the same
glossy, straight-ahead style, albeit with slightly ramped-up sex and
violence that would probably not be too outrageous for today's
prime-time audience. I don't use "middle-of-the-road" in a disparaging
way above; matter of fact, I think television could use more shows like
HUNTER in a time when solving mysteries has become a grim pursuit,
rather than something fun (yes, I realize the concept that chasing
murderers should be "fun" sounds kinda weird, but that's what murder
mysteries are all about).

An Unethical Affaire

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The folks at Affaire de Coeur are blogging about the controversy I sparked by rejecting their positive review of my book and outing the unethical conduct at the magazine . They write:

I don’t know whether I like this blogging business. It seems that
anyone can say anything they feel like, whether it has an iota of truth
in it or not. And, if you have something to say, say it, but please own
it. What I’m finding, however, is some of the people who write on blogs
use noms des plumes because they don’t want anyone to know who they
are. I have to ask: How valid is a person’s comment if they’re not
willing to stand behind it.

For those of you who don’t know what I’m talking about, AdC was
attacked by a writer on his blog. Lee Goldberg accused AdC of selling
reviews and ratings vis a vis ads. He, himself, had received a five
star review from us, and neither he nor his publisher has ever taken
out an ad with us. He didn’t bother to explain this inconsistency.

I didn't say that all the reviews in AdC were bought…or that Penguin bought the rave review that the magazine gave me. What I said is that reviews and editorial content at AdC are for sale…and the price is an ad. This is from Affaire de Coeur's ad pitch:

To compliment your ad and review we also offer interviews or articles.
If you would like an interview let us know 3 months in advance so it
will go in the same issue as your review and ad.[…]Book cover ad.–This is the cover of the book that goes right beside (or above or below) the AdC review of your book.[…]We do not review books after publication unless it is done in association with an ad.

It doesn't get much clearer than that.  I also accused the magazine of a blatant conflict of interest. The facts speak for themselves:

Light Sword founder Linda Daly’s DOVES MIGRATION and REBEL DOVES both
got four star reviews, one from “Lettetia Elasser” and the other from
“Inez Daylong” . Linda also got a cover story. That sort of coverage is
hardly a surprise given that Linda’s partner Bonny Kirby, vp of sales and promotion
for Light Sword, is also Affaire de Coeur's advertising director (and a reviewer for the magazine). This conflict of interest was, of course, not disclosed to readers.

Patricia Guthrie’s book IN THE ARMS OF THE ENEMY was reviewed by
“Kimberly Swan,” who gave it five stars and made it a Reviewer’s Pick.

“Kimberly Swan” gave CJ Parker’s FUGUE MACABRE: GHOST DANCE four and a half stars.

And “Lettetia Elasser” gave Alexey Braguine’s KINGMAKER three-and-half stars.

So most Light Sword titles get four stars or better from ADC…only KINGMAKER got slightly less. But the favorable treatment doesn't end there. That's just the beginning.

A reader emailed me jpegs of four Affair de
Coeur covers in a row. Lightsword co-owner Linda Daly and/or Lightsword
authors were on three out of four of them.

Sept/Oct 2007 – The cover features the jacket of Lightsword author CJ Parker’s FUGUE MACABRE and a photo of Linda Daly.

Nov/Dec. 2007 – There’s another photo of Linda Daly on the cover.

March/April 2008 – Linda Daly IS the cover story and so is her book Lightsword book DOVES MIGRATION.

But I am sure all of this attention for Linda Daly, and the rave
reviews for Lightsword Books (four out of five of them got four stars
or better), had nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that
Bonny Kirby, the co-owner of Lightsword Publishing, is also the vp of
advertising and a critic for Affaire de Coeur. No sir. It’s just one of those happy coincidences when good things happen to good people.

It's clear that Bonny Kirby engaged in an unethical conflict-of-interest. But the ultimate
responsibility for all of this mess rests not with Kirby but with Sneed, who
is the publisher. She clearly has no respect whatsoever for her readers
or the journalistic integrity of her magazine. If she did, she would
have fired Kirby by now, issued an apology to her readers, and
instituted reforms to make sure such a blatant and unethical
conflict-of-interest never occurs at her magazine again. Instead, she misses the point…or pretends to:

To put this issue to bed, I ended up writing an editorial. I also did a
side bar on how we review for those who want fact rather than hearsay
and innuendo. Finally, I have a spreadsheet on the correlation between
ads and the number of stars a review received. (There is none). So
maybe read the editorial and the sidebar and scan the spreadsheet and
then, if you still have questions about how we review, shoot!

I'd love to read this editorial, and the rationalizations it contains for unethical behavior, but I can't find Affaire De Coeur on any newstands. So if you have a copy, please send it to me at PO Box 8212, Calabasas, CA 91372

The Wild Wild Ross Martin

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Aandj03
Writer/producers David Simkins and Marc Scott Zicree have teamed up for a  series of podcast interviews with writers, producers and actors. They came over to my house and taped one with me the other day. But I'm sure my interview isn't going to be nearly as unique and interesting as this one:  a recording of a 1978 interview Marc did with actor Ross Martin, who played Artemus Gordon on WILD WILD WEST (and, strangely, had a recurring role as a Hawaiian mobster on HAWAII FIVE-O).  Martin was also the star voice of the cartoon SEALAB 2020…you can hear his opening narration here.

Travis McGee’s Hollywood “Wounded Birds”

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Ed Gorman linked  to a very interesting article about John D. MacDonald's frustration with Hollywood's attempts to bring Travis McGee to the screen.

Almost immediately after the series began, the scribe
started receiving offers to transport the McGee character from books to
television. In 1965 MacDonald had his first meeting with a quartet of
Hollywood types who wanted to buy the television rights. They were so
confident about the match between McGee and TV that they had forged on:
scripting episodes, signing contracts with sponsors, and casting Chuck
Connors in the lead role. The chaps found that "it was extraordinarily
difficult to find the right approach to a writer who doesn't believe in
television," MacDonald wrote to friend Dan Rowan. "[They were] wrong. I
believe in it. One percent of it is very very good….and 99 percent of
everything is and always has been schlock. I don't want Trav to [be
simplified as] the series tube requires, nor do I want the angle of
approach wrenched this way and that when the ratings don't move and
everybody…starts trying this and trying that."

The two filmed McGees — Rod Taylor in the movie DARKER THAN AMBER and Sam Elliot in unsold TV pilot TRAVIS McGEE (aka THE EMPTY COPPER SEA) — were underwhelming to say the least.   It's no wonder that Robert Crais and Sue Grafton have refused offers from Hollywood to put Elvis Cole and Kinsey Milhone on screen…