On Other Blogs

Does Everyone Have A Book In Them?

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…not according to my brother Tod, the literary novelist who teaches creative writing at UCLA Extension, among other places.

It’s hard for me to say that I teach creative writing because I firmly believe
that talent cannot be taught. Either you can string two words together or you
can’t, and what I am able to do is either provide direction or try to foster
talent in a particular way. There are tools, certainly, that a writer needs, but
I don’t prescribe to the idea that everyone has a novel inside them, just like I
don’t believe everyone has a brain surgeon or a plumber or a lawyer inside
them. 

He also talks about some of his experiences as a teacher.

There are three things I try to suss out the first night:

1. Who is the crazy person (there’s always, always one).

2. Who is the person who will disagree with everything I say.

3. Who is the person who will be offended by my constant use of the word
"fuck" as a place holder for my thoughts, as in, "It’s hard to say whether or
not a first present tense story about a woman with an imaginary friend who
commits murders while the main character is asleep, but only kills the people
the main character dreams of, will sell. I mean, it’s like, fuck.  You know?"

Paperback Writer

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While some are proclaiming the death of the mass market paperback, at least one writer is still making a very healthy living writing them. Author Lynn Viehl (who also writes under five other names)  is interviewed on Book Angst.

LV: I’ve had my disappointments, but not many, and
they made me work harder. I didn’t know anything about the industry and
I never met another writer until after I was published, so that may
have something to do with it. My only expectation was simply to see my
name on the cover of a book, and I’ve done that twenty-six times in
five years.

M: You also seemed to be among the best paid of all of the respondents.

LV:
The reason my writing income is in six figures is because I write very
fast, I’m aggressive about finding work, and I’m willing to work 12 to
16 hours a day at the job.

M: If you don’t mind my asking, what’s the most you’ve ever been paid for a book? And how many do you generally write per year?

LV: The largest advance I’ve been paid for a single novel is $25,000.00. I write six to eight novels a year.

She writes in a variety of genres, including horror and romance, and mentions on her blog that she’s well on the way to reaching that total in 2005.

I’m 20K away from finishing the first draft of my first book of 2005 (some of which I wrote in 2004; I’m not that
fast.) I expect to polish it off today. I have two more books in
progress and hope to finish both of them by the first of Feburary.

Compared to her, I feel lazy.

Tod’s Got a Blog

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My brother Tod has joined the blogging world…

I swore up and down that I wouldn’t get sucked into this. That I’d watch from
the sidelines while the rest of the world blogged away. I’d spend my mornings
jogging, working out, reading Dostoesvsky, getting a handle on my Esperanto
lessons, really getting down to the basics as to why I just can’t get my
wireless router to work, throwing out all my old cassette tapes, flossing,
shaving the tuft of hair that growns on the base of my back, rectifying that my
mother moved in down the street three years ago and, seemingly, ain’t moving
out, learning to love The Wire and 24 because everyone else seems to, maybe
doing an odd bit of actual writing during the daylight hours vs. the hours
between 9pm & 3am, thinking about who might have dropped the gate on
Freddy’s head on last week’s Amazing Race (Bolo?
Jonathan? Hayden?) and generally spending more time not reading blogs whilst
killing time.

But he finally gave in. Well, to be honest, I kind of pushed him into it. I gave him a blog for his birthday. Not using it would have been rude, don’t you think?

I can’t wait to see who he offends first. I just hope it isn’t me.

Reach Out and Touch an Author

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The web has made novelists far more accessible to their readers than ever before. But, as author Alison Kent observes, there’s a downside.

I am often amazed that because authors choose to make themselves accessible on
the web, readers feel they can say anything to them in an email.

In my case, it means I get inundated with emails from people asking me to buy their series idea or read their scripts. I delete most of those (and occasionally post some of the best ones here). But I also get a lot of wonderful notes from readers and viewers… and those make me feel great, especially the flood of get-well emails I received after my accident last April.

It’s still amazing to me that I can read a novel and, in many cases, easily email the author directly and let them know how much I enjoyed their book.  And it’s still a big thrill for me to get a reply back. I hope I never become so jaded that it stops feeling special.

The Decline of Story

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Richard S. Wheeler certainly isn’t afraid of controversy. After laying the blame for the decline of the mass-market paperbacks on the quality of the novels, today on his new blog he makes much the same argument about the movie business.

fiction is not the only type of storytelling in decline. After
adjusting for inflation, Hollywood’s annual gross from feature films
had declined every year since 1970. As is true of novels, this decline
has occurred during a time of rapid population growth. Plainly, there
is a deepening disconnect between storytellers of all sorts, and those
who buy our stories.

In the case of the movie business, I’m not sure storytellers are to blame as much as aggressive creative meddling by non-writers… studio execs who "develop" scripts to death. Literally.

What are your thoughts?

Who Needs Religion If You Have Tivo?

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The multitalented Mark Evanier is a man who loves his Tivo.

It’s odd — and yes, I know it’s probably not healthy — to have an
emotional connection to a product. I think TiVo is the best thing to
happen to television since Chuck Barris retired. If nothing else, I
find it so liberating that I never have to fret about being home on
time to watch a certain show or to hassle with setting the VCR. I can
go about my life, comfortable in the knowledge that the latest
broadcast of The Daily Show will always be there to watch when
I’m ready to watch it…and I can pause it or rewind it or watch part
and then stop and go get lunch and watch the rest tomorrow. It makes
you feel like you own your TV instead of the other way around.

He offers users this link to get in line for the priority software upgrade that will allow you to  record a show on your TiVo and then transfer it to your PC. 

I look forward to this upgrade but a tiny part of me resents having to
wait in line. I owned one of the first TiVos made, and have continually
upgraded and purchased new models, and I think they should cater to
"charter subscribers" before they service Johnny-come-latelys to the
wondrous world of TiVo.

I’ve got my first-generation Tivo hooked up to a GoVideo DVD burner/VCR combo, so I can easily off-load whatever I record to DVD or video.  For the time being, that’s enough for me.

How I Write

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My next DIAGNOSIS MURDER is due in March. I have the broad strokes of the story…. but that’s it. The broad strokes. The equivalent of  book jacket copy. I’ve still got to come up with the actual story.  I’ve
been able to procrastinate by doing research on the period, which has given me some plot ideas, but I’ve still got to figure out the  murders, the clues, the characters and, oh yes, the story.

This  is the hardest part of writing… the sitting around, staring into space, and thinking. This is writing, even if you aren’t physically writing.  A lot of non-writers have a hard time understanding this. Yes, just
sitting in a chair doing nothing is writing. A crucial part, in fact.
It can be hell,  especially when you are on as short a deadline as I am.  Everyone has their own method… this is mine:

Want to find out more? Check out my article at The Mystery Morgue.

Ghosting

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Veteran novelist & ghost-writer James Reasoner weighs in on the Michael Gruber debate and, as it happens, has a point-of-view that I share…

I don’t know the details of the
contract(s) between Gruber and Tanenbaum, but if Gruber agreed that he
wouldn’t reveal he was writing the books, then he shouldn’t have
revealed it. I understand the frustration he must have felt — I once
ghosted a book that got glowing blurbs from big-name folks who never
would have blurbed a book with my name on it — but a deal’s a deal.

He also talks about the unspoken rules about writing series novels under the publisher’s "house names."

Of course there are varying
degrees of secrecy on these things. Some of my house-name Western
contracts say that I can’t publicly claim authorship but that I can use
the books as professional credits within the industry.

I’m sure it’s common knowledge in publishing circles that folks like Margaret Truman and William Shatner, for example, don’t write their own books and that editors are well aware of who really does do the work… but I doubt most readers know when, or if, they are reading ghosted books. I’m sure there are readers out there who think Don Pendleton writes all those EXECUTIONER novels…

Speaking of James Reasoner, mystery fan Aldo Calcagno raves aboutthe author today on Ed Gorman’s blog.

Reasoner may be one of the most underrated writers
around today. TEXAS WIND is a classic, but how many people have had the
opportunity to read it (Thankfully PointBlank has republished the book).

Exposition

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Screenwriter John August  discusses the perils of exposition on his terrific screenwriting blog.

Always ask yourself: Would the character actually say this, or is he
only saying it because you need the audience to know some fact or
detail? If the answer is the latter, you’re writing exposition and not
dialogue.

That’s not good.

The  advice he gives applies as much to writing novels as it does to writing scripts.

Wherever possible:

  1. Show the information, rather than having a character say it.
  2. Try to follow a natural line of thought:  A to B to C. 
  3. Simplify.  The reader may not need to know everything.
  4. Keep your hero active in learning the information, rather than passively listening.
  5. Balance natural speech patterns with efficiency.  People rarely say things as concisely as they could.

Avoiding exposition is hard, especially in plot-dependent stories.
But it’s one of the first things a reader notices, so spend the time to
deal with it.