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TV writer Paul Guyot continues his unflinchingly honest and informative chronicle on the development and production of  the pilot he wrote for TNT. The network subsequently brought in a big-name showrunner and Paul found himself relegated to the sidelines (despite assurances to the contrary). Sadly, this happens all the time in our business and Paul, being a pro, knows that. Even so, it still hurts when it happens.   

What has been the hardest thing for me to deal with is that the network has
completely supported the showrunner and his "tweaking" of my script. My story.
My setting. My characters. After telling me (in the beginning), that they wanted
something unique and edgy (sic), what they now have that they so dearly
love, is the very thing they told me specifically they didn’t want… a typical
TV show. And not a conference call goes by that someone doesn’t rave about how
much better the script is now.

Hey look, it may be better. The
guy has Emmys and I don’t. I just wish the network had given me a shot to do
this other version, and then brought in their high-priced Showrunner.

It’s like this – the network wanted me to hit a home run. So in my first
at-bat, I hit a double to left. But instead of getting another swing, they bring
in another guy and he hits a double to right, and they all cheer and say,
"That’s just what we wanted! A double to right!"

But again, nature of
the beast, folks. Don’t feel sorry for me – I already took care of that. No need
to post comments about how much they suck or whatever. This is TV. Ask Lee.
Happens all the time. As I said earlier – you have two choices in these matters
– quit or ride it out. I chose to ride it out. Though it’s being done
differently than how I’d do it, and I’m being basically ignored throughout the
entire process, I’m holding on. I want to feed my kids. I don’t have the luxury
of conviction. And someone much smarter than me once warned about the paralysis
of conviction. Especially when it wasn’t your story to begin with.

New Hope for the Dead

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If BookExpo is where new books and dreams are born, then the Chicago International
Remainder & Overstock Book Exposition (CIROBE). is where
they go to die. Bookseller Robert Gray talks on his blog about the big sales expo for
remainder, overstock, and damaged books that’s coming up this week:

I’ll think, as I always do, about the rampant optimism of BookExpo in the spring,
when all is new and every book on the list has the potential to sell through.
"We’re very excited about our fall list," they say. And they should
say that. They should be excited. Every book is a gem at BookExpo, every
book a winner in waiting.

Well, maybe not every book.

Still, nobody expects a book to die needlessly. And yet they do, every day, die ugly
deaths and pass through to the underworld, Hades, or, in modern English, The
Bargain Table.

Maybe it’s not a cattle drive at this stage, after all. Maybe it’s a boat trip across
the River Styx.

Charon, the old man who ferries the dead to the underworld.

CIROBE, the show that ferries dead books to bargain book world.

Writing Scams

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My friend author Joe Konrath has an excellent post today on writing scams. He discusses Fee-Charging Agents, Writing Contests, Paid Anthologies, Vanity Presses, and POD Publishers, among other things. It should be required reading for all  aspiring authors. Here’s a sample of his wise counsel:

PAID ANTHOLOGIES: Here’s another quick scam. You submit a poem, and it gets
accepted into an upcoming poetry collection. You get excited, tell all your
friends and family, and then get a letter in the mail saying that you can
purchase the anthology at $40.

Naturally you buy a copy, and so does Mom, and so does Aunt Grace and your
best friend Phil. When you get the anthology, you see it is 700 pages long, and
your wonderful poem is crammed on a page with seven others.

Do the numbers. If there are 3000 poems in the book, and each writer in the
anthology bought at least one copy, the publisher made $120,000.

Poetry.com was infamous for this scam. They’d also invite writers to awards
ceremonies, at staggering costs to the gullible writer, to receive a worthelss
award along with 1000 other ‘winners’.

Please pass the link to his post along to any struggling writers you know…they should print out his article and keep it handy. It will help avoid the temptation to pay an agent to read their books, pay to publish their book with iUniverse  or pay to enter one of those Writers Digest contests…

 

Breaking In

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Author Joe Konrath talks about the advice he gave to an aspiriing writer…and what happened next. It’s an inspiring story, not just for writers trying to break in, but for everyone who writes books. I wish more aspiring writers would find motivation from stories like this than from the get-rich-quick/get-published-quick come-on of  self-publishing.

The Cold Draft

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Yesterday, I shared excerpts from  some of the rejection letters I received for THE MAN WITH THE IRON-ON BADGE during its long journey to publication. Today, novelist Laurie King reflects on the uncertainty and rejection all professional writers face, regardless of their past successes.

There ain’t no guarantees in the writing business. It’s scary even to mention
the possibility, as if failure is a demon summoned by voicing his name, but it’s
very true, it’s waiting just outside. I’ve got sixteen books out there, sold a
couple million copies, had titles on the New York Times list, and still, every
day I feel the cold draft at the bottom of the door. My accountant talks about
SEP accounts, and I think, well, that may be necessary. My husband asks if we’re
going to have the money for some project or another, and I have to tell him I
don’t know.

Extra Features for Novels

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Perfectkillercoverfrontplustext_1DVDs these days come packed with extra features — commentary, documentaries, deleted scenes, bloopers, etc. Now author Lewis Perdue is experimenting with doing the same thing for books, starting with his novel THE PERFECT KILLER. To give his readers a sense of the people, places and details in the story, he’s created a page-specific online index with photos, videos, maps, links, and other information. You could read his book with your laptop open beside you and click along with the story. For instance:

Page 227, coast
snakes northward from the missile gantries of Vandenberg Air Force Base to Big
Sur’s relentlessly beautiful cliffs and surf south

Page 228, Dan
Gabriel jogged along Pecho Valley Road, south of Morro Bay (more pictures
here)

Page 229, He sprinted the dune
trail, south toward Spooner’s Cove, but the past matched his pace

Page 230, sight
of a man and a boy of maybe ten

Page 235, San Luis
Obispo

Page 243, Blackhawk returned and hovered
over the clearing, Armed men hung out the side door

 

It’s a cool idea. Will it catch on? Who knows…buttake a look and  let Lew know what you think.

Taming the Wild Cover

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The Smart Bitches Who Love Trashy NTameovels are at it again with another hilarious critique of horrible book covers…this week, they skewer books with "Tame…" in the title. Here’s one of my favorites:

Candy: Bitch, please. This is the cleanest-cut rebel I’ve ever seen. What’s rebellious about him? His unnatural love of Brylcreem?
His choice to use steroid cream AND shoot it up? His decision to use
SPF15 instead of SPF40 sunscreen? His weirdly offset nipples?

Sarah: Whoo. What a rebel. To throw off the expectations of
society, and insist, visit after visit to the hair salon, on sporting a
mullet. The mullet alone is worth the 300-page effort of taming him.

E-RING Lasts Forever

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Why one critic isn’t watching E-RING any more.

Last Wednesday I performed an experiment. I watched the latest episode of E-Ring
while applying a branding iron directly to my face, just to see which
of these two forms of torture I could stand the longest. I have deduced
that, while eventually the branding iron heat burns through your nerve
endings, the pain of E-Ring lasts forever.