My Blog

Tit for Tate

by

For some reason, I've received lots of emails lately asking about Tate Publishing. Here's one:

My daughter (14 years old) recently submitted (through her school) a children’s book that she wrote.   Surprisingly, she received a contract to publish her book from Tate Publishing.  However, they are asking us to invest almost $4,000.  I am simply trying to determine if Tate is a vanity publisher, POD publisher, or what?  I want to support my daughter, but I want to be educated first.  I cannot find much on the internet about Tate Publishing.  Any information you could provide would be greatly appreciated.

I can't imagine why any school or responsible teacher would submit student work to a vanity press, but that issue aside, here's what I told her (which will be familiar to any of you who read this blog on a regular basis):  Legitimate publishers pay YOU, not the other way around. Any publisher that asks you for money in return for "publishing" your book is a vanity press.  If you are intent on publishing your daughter's work in book form yourself, go to Lulu, you won't have to pay a penny out-0f-pocket, or you can create an ebook edition for the Kindle and sell it on Amazon absolutely free.

Here's another email I received about Tate:

What can you tell me about Tate Publishing Co? Unfortunately, I have already invested almost $ 8,000 in 2 books, both of which are now published. I visited their offices twice, met the staff and felt they were legit Christian organization.

I don't know what being Christian has to do with anything. What makes him think that a Christian won't rip him off? I guess he 's unfamiliar with most TV evangelists and their "send me your cash" brand of faith and spirituality. But that's a different issue. 

As far as Tate goes, I told him basically the same thing I told the other person: Tate is a vanity press. They make their money selling books to desperate, naive, and gullible authors, not to readers. You can self-publish your book, for now cash out-of-pocket, elsewhere. But if you are intent on throwing your money away, I'm sure you can find some Christians at another, far less predatory, vanity press who will print your manuscript in book form for much, much less money.  

Updated 2/10/2010

UPDATE 6/1/2012: Those lovely people at Tate are in the news again, this time for firing 25 employees and threatening others who dared to speak about the company's plans to outsource their sleazy vanity press operation to the Phillipines.

Tate Publishing President Ryan Tate said the company is opening an office in the Philippines, but denies there are any layoffs planned. He said the 25 workers who lost their jobs Thursday were terminated for breaching confidentiality agreements in their employment contracts after leaking rumors about the outsourcing.

[…]In a recording of an employee meeting held this week obtained from a Tate employee by The Journal Record, Ryan Tate threatened to sue staff members and file liens against their houses and cars if they violated their employee contracts by talking to the media or sharing information about the company on Facebook and Twitter.

In the recording, Ryan Tate said he would fire 25 production workers after no one came forward to take responsibility for the anonymous email sent out to employees on Sunday that decried the rumored layoffs.

“Good people are going to lose their jobs – it’s not fair,” Ryan Tate said in the recording. “It’s not right, but that’s the reality of the situation. Jesus himself is the perfect mix of mercy, grace and justice. I have probably failed you in that I have been a little too lenient and a little too on the side of mercy and grace and not on the side of justice.”

At the meeting, Ryan Tate then went on to say several employees had already been named as defendants in a $7.8 million lawsuit for breaching their employee confidentiality agreements. A search of state and federal court filings revealed that no such litigation has been filed as of Thursday, a fact Ryan Tate later confirmed. 

My Multiple Bookgasm

by

The friendly folks at Bookgasm, fans of my most recent DIAGNOSIS MURDER novel, like MR. MONK GOES TO THE FIREHOUSE, too. Among their comments:

Based on a character by Andy Breckman, Shalhoub plays Monk perfectly.
But there’s a little something missing in an hour-long show devoted to
both an intricate mystery and the character’s oddness. There usually
isn’t enough time to explore Monk and why he’s doing what he’s doing.
So enter Lee Goldberg and another excellent TV tie-in book, the first in the series, entitled MR. MONK GOES TO THE FIREHOUSE.
A book-length exploration of Monk is just so much more satisfying
because we get to see more of the detective’s odd little world.

Monk’s house is being fumigated so he must temporarily move in with
his long-suffering assistant, Natalie Teeger. The book is written from
her point of view, a clever shift that allows us to be a voyeur on
Monk’s behavior without the constraints that would come from having
Monk explain his own obsessions. Teeger has an adolescent child and
surprisingly, Monk and the child get along well, even though he notes
to the mother that children are “walking cesspools” of disease. The
child is upset because a local firehouse dog has been killed by some
ax-wielding maniac. Monk takes the case.

And from there, the
case gets progressively weirder, as do Monk’s habits. First, another
body is found, then Teeger becomes romantically involved with one of
the firemen, and all the while, Monk is slowly driving his assistant
crazy with incessant demands and whacked-out behavior. But there is
always a method to Monk’s peculiar madness, and the way he solves
crimes and deduces facts throughout the plot is thoroughly
entertaining. He sees more than we do, because he sees things that are
out of place. We might see a mess, but Monk sees a catastrophe, and
because of that vision, he is able to know when things are not only not
right, but downright sinister.

There’s nothing quite like a strong Bookgasm to start your day.

Kelley Goes to Mars

by

Variety reports that David E. Kelley is developing an American version of the hit BBC series LIFE ON MARS, about a cop who is in a near-fatal car wreck and wakes up in 1973. Has he really traveled back in time? Is he dreaming it? Or is he dead? Only the creators of the show and David Kelley know for sure. There was an interesting tid-bit in the article, though…apparently, BOSTON LEGAL is "on the bubble" for renewal.

The Worst of Ken

by

Emmy-award winning screenwriter Ken Levine shares some of his worst:

1. WHAT’S THE WORST THING YOU’VE EVER WRITTEN?

It’s hard to top (or bottom) AfterMASH. Take the three weakest
characters of MASH, put them in the hilarious confines of a Veteran’s
Hospital and you have a recipe for classic comedy.

For me, it would be a toss-up between the "Rookie School" episode of BAYWATCH (mob moll hides from hitmen in lifeguard training camp!), which I think tops our "Armored Car" episode, which Rolling Stone called the worst episode of television ever written. They must have missed our episode of THE HIGHWAYMAN.

Punishing Yourself

by

I leave the country for just a couple of days and the nation falls into anarchy. I got this email while I was away:


Your friend James Kosub has posted some damn fine — and damn patriotic —
PUNISHER fan fiction on his blog. I’ve read it and, well, it made me think
and it moved me on an emotional level.  And, of course, he mentions you in
the premamble to the post…

Jim is, afterall, the President of my fan club. So I took a peek at his introductory comments:

It isn’t the greatest thing I’ve ever dumped out of my brain and onto
paper, but it’s still a solid, post-9/11 action/commentary story.

[…]Coupled with my very positive
experience playing The Punisher on the Xbox, and finally seeing the new movie with Thomas Jane, I figured now was as good a time as any to share.

And already the critical raves are coming in…from his wife.

Still a powerful and effective piece, and it could easily be expanded beyond the "Punisher" main character.

I haven’t read the fanfic, but I doubt anything could capture the enormous cultural, political, and emotional impact of 9-11 quite as well as some of James Kosub’s fanfic stylings. But I’m with Jim’s wife on this one. It’s a crying shame that he chose The Punisher as his muse instead of Willy Wonka. 

Things not to worry about

by

Novelist PJ Parrish offers some very good advice to aspiring writers under the heading "10 Things  You Should Never Worry About." Among my favorites:

7. I’m querying an agent. Should I send my first chapter or my best chapter?
If your first chapter isn’t your best chapter, you’re in deep doo-doo.

8. Who should I dedicate my book to?
Geez…

9. Should I include my picture with my submission?
Only if you’re Brad Pitt or his wife old whatshername.

I’m Listening

by

I’m still out-of-town, so here’s another oldie-but-goodie from the early days of this blog…

I went into a meeting with a major TV producer with an over-all
series deal at a big studio. He brought his nine-year-old daughter into
the meeting. I was midway through the pitch when the producer got a
phone call.

“I’m gonna take this outside,” he said, heading for the door, “but please keep going.”

And he left me alone with his daughter.”Go on,” she said, her pencil poised on a notepad, “I’m listening.”

Is a Story Really Necessary?

by

While I’m away, here’s another golden oldie from the early days of the blog…


    

Not too long ago,
I spoke about screenwriting and breaking into television at a writer’s
conference in San Francisco. Afterwards, I mingled with the attendees and had some
bizarre conversations. Here’s a sampling…

"I’ve written a novel and everyone tells me it’s a script," one woman said. "How do I turn it into a script?"

"Well, you write a script." I said.

She stared at me. "How do I do that?"

"You get a book or take a course, learn the principles of screenwriting, and then you write a script."

"That’s too much work," she said. "Isn’t there software that can do all of that for me?"

"Yeah," I said. "The same way Microsoft Word wrote your book for you."

* * * * * *

Another person came up to me and asked me if I wrote for television. I said yes.  She then asked, "How do you do that?"

"You mean, how do I write for television?"

"Yes," she said.

"I write screenplays," I said.

"Which is what, exactly?"

"The story, the action, the words that the characters say," I replied.

She stared at me. "Somebody writes that?"

"Yes,"
I said, resisting the urge to strangle her. "It’s like a writing a
play, only for the camera instead of a theatre audience."

She shook her head.  "No, it’s not."

* * * * * *
"I’ve written  a book but everyone tells me it s a TV series," the man said.  "How do I make it into a TV series."

"You
can’t, " I said, and gave my standard speech about how ideas are cheap
and execution is everything, how networks go to people with TV
experience, or who have written hit movies, or who have written
bestselling novels, blah blah blah. And when I got done, he stared at
me. I got stared at a lot that day.

He said:  "How can I get around that?"

"You can’t," I said.

"Why not?"

"Because
you haven’t established yourself as a writer in any field," I said.
"Why would a network, studio or producer buy a TV series idea from you?"

"Because I’m smarter and more talented than they are," he said.

"It’s not going to happen," I said.

"Is it because I’m black?" he said. "That’s it, isn’t it. It’s because I’m black."

* * * * * *

"Did you have to sleep with a lot of people to get into TV?" a woman asked me.

"Just my wife," I said.

"You were lucky it wasn’t someone else," she said and walked away.

* * * * * *
"I
have a great idea for a movie," a woman said to me. "What’s the market
like for true stories about black lesbians in the 1880s?"

"I
don’t think studios are looking for scripts to fill that particular
niche," I said, "but there’s always a market for good stories that are
told well."

"Oh," she said. "That’s going to make it a lot harder to sell."
* * * * * *
"Mysteries
are hard work," a man said to me. "Could I write an episode of a
mystery show but leave out the mystery for someone else to do?"

"No," I said.

"But my talent is character and I’m brilliant with dialogue," he said. "I really don’t know how to plot a mystery."

"Then don’t write a mystery," I said.

"But that’s what’s selling," he said.

"Don’t try to write what’s selling," I said. "Write what you enjoy. Write the story you want to tell."

"The thing is, I don’t know how to tell stories," he said. "But I write killer dialogue. Is a story really necessary?"

"Yes," I said.

"You
people in Hollywood don’t make it easy, do you? That’s the problem with
the Industry. They are constantly creating obstacles so people can’t
get in."

   

A Book I’m Going to Be Reading

by

038551440901_sclzzzzzzz_
Reporter Bill Carter’s new book DESPERATE NETWORKS follows the 2004-2005 season from inside the network ranks. Apparently, leaked copies of the book are already causing controversy in Hollywood. Variety reports that, among the tidbits, the success of DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES sent execs at studios and networks scurrying to find out how they missed the opportunity to snag it:

  • Warner Bros. TV was on track to land the rights to Marc Cherry’s spec spec
    script     for "Desperate Housewives" via Tony
    Krantz    , who had an overall deal at the studio. Unfortunately,
    WBTV execs refused to give Cherry’s reps at Paradigm a packaging fee — so
    Paradigm set up the project at Touchstone.  Carter shows NBC U topper
    Bob Wright launching a fervent investigation to find out why NBC didn’t land
    "Housewives." At one point, Wright even calls Cherry to ask if NBC had ever had
    a shot at the script. (It did. The network passed.)

A Set of Jumper Cables for Your Script

by

Here’s some great writing advice from Jane Espenson:

                                                                                        SHADY GUY
                                            I promised you a half-ton of frozen fish.  That’s a
                                            half-ton of frozen fish.

When
we hear that, we know that the previous line was some kind of protest
about whether or not Shady Guy met his end of the bargain. We’ve
established the attitude of both characters by the end of line.

As
you look through your own writing, you may very well discover that
you’ve been doing this automatically, too. If not, try knocking off a
few opening lines, see if it doesn’t jump-start the scene!