I pulled this (not in its entirety) from the Editorial Anonymous blog, the July 19, 2009 post, for a damn good reason. This is a fine cut of circumstantial meat, with the sizzle and smell attached. Literary gold. An amazing bit of truth I just had to share. Editorial Anonymous is a children’s book editor, but I think (more like know from personal experience as a published and unpublished writer) this is a very good indicator of the reality behind some publishers, many editors, and all the documented-as-real agents out there today. To be fair, within my mind I removed the word kids (and the word child) from each line in the Consumer Interest in Topic portion, and substituted the word audience. I then held this candle up to my own writing, me writing what I feel most passionately about within my entire body of work, not thinking about trends, but writing what I myself as a reader would want to read, all six completed novels, and came up with a grand total of ninety-five (95) points, give or take. I was honest with myself, and my body of work. That Degree of Celebrity thing hurt the most. It was the Not recognized by anyone outside of books, but previously published -- 20 points thing. Even when I fudged on the lists I still couldn’t reach that 120 points level, so gave up trying. See you next week.

　

There are essentially three variables at work:

　



Quality of Writing

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Consumer Interest in Topic

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Degree of Celebrity

　

Editors want to weight things in terms of Quality of Writing. But editors also know that the Public -- the book-buying consumer -- cares a hell of a lot more about Topic and Celebrity than Writing. And yes, publishing is a business. So use this guide:

　

Quality of Writing

　



Transcendent -- 50 points



Excellent -- 45 points



Delightful -- 40 points



Good -- 35 points



Decent -- 30 points



Drivel -- 20 points



Culpable -- 10 points

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An abomination to anyone above the IQ of an orangutan -- 0 points

　

Consumer Interest in Topic

　



I WANT that! -- 110 points



My kid won't shut up about that -- 90 points



My kid likes that, and so do I -- 70 points



My kid likes that, but I'm pretty tired of and/or annoyed by it -- 50 points



Hmm. Maybe? -- 30 points



No, thanks -- 20 points

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Ew, really? -- 10 points

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You couldn't PAY me to expose a child to this, and I'm writing to my congressman -- 0 points

　

Degree of Celebrity

　



Hollywood royalty -- 120 points



Hollywood and widely recognized -- 100 points



[Other field] and widely recognized -- 80 points



Not widely recognized, but still a certain amount of celebrity -- 60 points



Not recognized by anyone outside of books, but with a good track record -- 40 points



Not recognized by anyone outside of books, but previously published -- 20 points



Unknown -- 0 points



Famous for something people actively want to keep their children away from -- 0 points

　

Anything over 120 points total is going to be published.

Anything under 90 points total is going straight to the recycling bin.

The stuff in-between has a chance, but may be a long shot.

Now a word or two on possible trends as I see them.

　

Of course, we have vamps. I talked about that last week. Next up are other creatures, like werewolves, angles and demons, and I just read something on Publishers Weekly about zombies and a six book deal with Pocket Books. Zombies solving crime now? Catch the criminals, and then eat their brains? Sex in the City meets Dawn of the Dead? What the hell is the world coming to? I can see vampires continuing, I can see angels and demons if done with a literary flair, possibly werewolves, but zombies? Though I do have an idea about that, which would work well as a series. And no, I’m not going to share, but it is a good idea that would work. Also, sports novels, but only if the actual sport played is secondary to the main concept. Think Field of Dreams. If all else fails, look at what has topped the bestsellers list for the last few months, but that really isn’t going to help. Chances are these listings have nothing to do with genre fiction like fantasy or horror. Got a mainstream literary fiction idea floating around in your head?

　

Michael Moorcock used to write potboilers by the dozens, and I can use those same techniques to push out more novels. It’s called making lists, which I have always done, and free writing. I have lists I’ve refined over the years, which helps me eliminate mistakes. His lists include concepts and props, and that’s something I’ve never done before. His lists are genre specific. Concepts found in sword and sorcery, and lists of props needed for everyday life, and freewheeling, asskicking battles or fun. Free writing is a basic but misunderstood writing tool that is barely used today. The idea is to explore ideas as you write, leading you to the eventual conclusion of the novel, with hardly a pause to catch your breath. Pound it out day by day, and then pound out more words. Don’t stop to take a breath, just write your freaking ass off. Problems are explored right there on the page until solved, not allowing the pace of the novel in progress to slow, or the pace of the novel itself. It’s always easier to overwrite and delete later, than to underwrite and add.

　

Now, to be fair to myself, I do use free writing, but not to the magnitude of Moorcock. Nor have I ever spent months writing lists of concepts or props. But, it is something for me to think about. I don’t like getting stuck on something, working on other projects until my problem works itself out, and then going back to my first project. It is nice that I can do that, but it takes a few days to get back into the swing of the novel. Most of the time I’ll edit myself up to where I left off, and continue with everything fresh in my mind. See you next week.

Bibliophile Stalker is an odd place to find a collection of almost everything publishing to read from some very reputable sources. I found it after I wrote last week’s blog entry, yet there was a lot I found to confirm just about everything I said. Isn’t that sad?

For some reason luck does play into publishing, more so than I thought. Some people are just luckier than others, hence the fall into a bucket of shit, come out smelling like a rose quip. But, luck can be made. How does the average writer hedge their bets? Make their own luck?

One thing I’m not, is boring. I have enough posted over at my Central Park blog to confirm that. And although I’m not perfect, I’m doing all I can to use proper punctuation and grammar, carefully editing myself into print, polishing my every last word, giving each piece a foot-deep shine. I work hard on this, believing I’m helping myself make my own luck. True, luck is still luck, but boring, bad, sloppy writers are not going to get the contracts . . . Most of them . . . One always manages to squeak by . . . You tell me how.

I’ve been told I can write by more than one agent, but I haven’t sent out a requested manuscript to any agents for some time, and small publishers are not offering me contracts. I’ve written much fantasy, a lot of horror, and one naughty fantasy I’m very proud of, and one crime thriller I’m just about to finish. I’m not hot. No vampires in the lot, yet it’s been said that vampire fiction will remain hot for some time to come. I did write a short story about a female vampire I can turn into a series of three books, but she’s a real vampire, not the cardboard cutouts that inhabit today’s novels. She soulless, evil, ruthless. She would just as soon kill you as kiss you.

Although the protagonist is a vampire, she’s not the type of vampire that the prevailing market wants to sell to consumers. Rather than being a "popcorn" read, this series of three or more books would be more literary in nature. Less dialogue, with more atmosphere and suspense. Would it be worth the time to spend a year or more on these three novels? That’s what I’m asking myself right now. I would be writing passionately about a hot topic, but would an agent or publisher want to buck the current or possible future trend? Their vamps are so soft-core, and mine would runt fuck them just for meanness. She does finally fall in love in book three, or what for her passes as love. She dies at the end, too, bucking yet another trend.

Herein is where the real problem resides. I could ask all the agents, all editors, and all publishers the same questions, and all they would tell me is to write it and see what happens. Hope for the best!

I don’t want to write it and hope for the best. I want to write it and get it published. Yes, I could possibly tone her down, some, but couldn’t pull her fangs, or make her camp fare. As a character I feel and know, she has her own life. I know her passions, and her cravings. She not, "We’ll just go out and solve us a bunch of crimes, hon. Okay by you?"

I don’t see a way of getting past that particular problem. Making my own luck by knowing the mechanics of writing well, writing about what I feel most passionately about, even within the current trend, guarantees absolutely nothing. I’m damned if I do, and damned if I don’t. See you next week.

I’m going to blog my heart out for a while. I’m not angry, but I am tired of all the bullshit I have to wade through, day in and day out. I need to give my brain a douche. Flush the clutter from between my ears. So, with that said: The state of publishing today, or, what’s wrong with this picture?

　

Today’s economy influences the decision making process, from publishers to agents. Quite a few are making bad decisions, from my perspective, and then they bitch about the consequences of those bad decisions. True enough said for agents as well as publishers, but to me as the outside observer, the whole symbiotic relationship between agent and publisher looks like one big, unsatisfying cluster fuck. Because of this confusion, writers like me are getting a lot of bad advice, along with the good. And it has nothing to do with the state of today’s economy. I can safely say that things have been building to a head for the last two decades.

　

As writers, we look at a hundred different sources of information, we’re supposed to put it all into perspective, and we almost never get it right. That’s not our fault. For the past two decades agents and publishers alike have been speaking to us with forked tongues. A good example of that would be: Publishing uses the mid-list to nurture unknowns into bestsellers, when us writers know the mid-list died twenty years ago, and publishing has yet to bury the corpse. I have the feeling that publishing will keep parading that sorry old cadaver around until the last shred of skin flakes off. Or, how about this little nugget: Write what you are most passionate about; then we’re told to know what is currently hot, and write something similar. The latter being the bad advice, but half of everybody jumps on that slow mule to nowhere and whips away. The latest I saw on an agent’s blog: Epic fantasy has grown cold, don’t bother with it, unless it is exceptional. Yet, publishers keep pumping it out, one series after the other. I would safely say that almost all fantasy today is (using the term as an umbrella) epic. Book One of the Whatever Saga, followed by several more sequels. I don’t see any stand-alone urban, high, modern, or whatever fantasy novels. A story that starts and ends with that one book. Do you? Can anybody name me one recently published stand-alone fantasy novel? Oh well, science fiction has their space operas.

　

Here is a classic "what the fuck?" I’ll share. I went to Publisher’s Marketplace, Association of Authors’ Representatives, and AgentQuery, giving each of their search engines only one parameter. Fantasy. Find me agents that represent Fantasy. I got a big list of possible agents back from each site. I weeded out the questionable agents, weeded out those who are more interested in selling me their books and shit than take my query seriously, and was left with an impressive list of about 70 names. I then went to their Web sites and very carefully read their Areas of Interest. Just over 50% didn’t want Fantasy. No Fantasy! You think they could update their listings. Now I’ll add another "what the fuck?" to my first "what the fuck?" I dug a little deeper. Out of the twenty-five names I had left, I took a look at their clients lists. Half seemed to only represent women writers. One male writer represented for every twenty to thirty female writers seemed to be the norm. I’m a man, hence the beard in my photo, so I’m interested in things like that. But, don’t take my word on it, look for yourself. And, between you and me, I don’t think I would stand a snowball’s chance in Hell with those agents, even if my every word dripped gold.

　

The business of publishing is all about the Benjamins. Publishers, agents, money rules their world. Everything they do has dollar signs attached. Don’t let them tell you differently, because they would be lying to your face. As writers, the gatekeepers to the publishers we want to publish with, are the agents. If they don’t think they can sell your project right here and right now, the answer with a choice few is a maybe, and 99.8% it’s a no. It all has to do with what’s hot. Right now it is everything vampires. I’d love to shove everything vampires up their overpaid asses and twist. Why? These vampires fight crime. They not only save the world, they have kind and compassionate souls. They fall in love, and angst just flows from the pages. WWBD? (What Would Buffy Do?) Kill them all and let God sort them out. Why do I feel this way? Simply because there are some fantastic books out there, literary masterpieces, which will never see the light of day. One or two of the bravest agents out there today, blogging their hearts out, even admit that what I just said is true. They will pass on a literary masterpiece, a potential Pulitzer Prize winner, if they think they can’t sell it, right now, today. That right there, that attitude, is so wrong, words cannot express how I feel.

　

As a writer I’m not sure what to think, or what I should do. My options are limited. I perfect a query and send it off to my agent list. Once at the agent’s office, I might have to get past the unpaid intern first, before the agent even reads my query. If the intern doesn’t like my query, I get a rejection slip, or I’m ignored. If the agent actually reads my query, but they can’t sell my book right then and there, today, I get a rejection slip. If I write what fills my soul with passion, but it’s not part of what agents consider a hot-market book, I get a rejection slip. After the agents, I can send my stuff out to various small publishers. There are only ten to twelve small publishers recognized by the industry as legitimate publishers, so again the overall market is small, there might be a little money made, very little money made, but that’s about it. Writers then turn to self-publishing their novels. That’s all they have left. Agents and publishers alike say that’s the worst thing a writer can do; self-publish their novels. But, you know what, I think that’s the best thing we could do. The agents didn’t want them, the publishers (the very few who might know of their existence) didn’t want them, so what’s the problem?

　

There is no problem. Readers expect a few flaws in self-published books, and they can tell when a writer has taken great pains to produce an exceptional read. They forgive us our faults. We make some money, not much, but a little, and I don’t see anything but good in self-publishing. We can and do correct our mistakes, and republish our novels, giving our readers only the best of us. We learn and grow from their feedback.

　

And, you know what? If a writer happens to sell a book through an agent to a big publishing firm, the last thing they’re going to care about is a few self-published novels. In fact, if you happen to pull in some good sale numbers, those same publishers will then buy that book, opening all the doors that have been slammed in your face in years past.

　

And, just in case you ever wondered about it, sequels serve a purpose. If you happen to buy book three of the Whatever Saga and like it, chances are real good you’ll buy books one and two of the Whatever Saga. Money. It’s all about the Benjamins. See you next week.