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All posts for the month October, 2011

NaNoWriMo: It Begins!

Posted by Lora Maroney on October 31, 2011
Posted in: NaNoWriMo. Tagged: , . Leave a Comment

It’s 11:23 on October 31st over here in Japan-land (fun fact: that’s one hour off from 1023, aka the identification number of stormtrooper Davin Felth, aka the guy who said “Look, sir! Droids!” — there, that’s a taste of what it’s like to live in my head).

Ever since 2004, Halloween for me ends around sundown. During the day I’ll wear a costume to work and have fun, but once I’m home, it’s time to get ready for NaNoWriMo. It’s great, because I actually hate Halloween parties anyway, and now I have a vaguely-impressive-sounding excuse (“sorry, I’m writing a novel”) rather than just being an antisocial shut-in. (Fun fact 2: this is also the excuse I use for not doing anything with my hair, other than washing it and letting it dry. “Would people recognise Neil Gaiman if he combed HIS hair? … well, probably, but NEVER MIND.”)

I’m going to try to post once a week during all this, giving an overview of the week’s progress, complete with word count, mood, and best Google searches, but we all know how it goes. Anything can happen during NaNoWriMo, but blogging may not be one of them.

For those joining me on this madcap literary adventure, I salute you! For those sitting out this round, watching enviously from the sidelines, or even changing the channel in a huff, I ask your patience on behalf of everyone taking on the challenge. I only wish that spray-on shampoo that made the rounds on infomercials in the 80s was a) still extant and b) actually worked.

My NaNoWriMo profile here, for you who haven’t seen it. Just for fun, here’s my novel summary again:

Synopsis

Between two worlds life hovers like a star,
‘Twixt night and morn, upon the horizon’s verge.
How little do we know that which we are!
How less what we may be!

– from Byron, Don Juan (1824) canto 15, st. 99

When a group of atavistic historical reenactors misuse Temporal Historical Society technology to travel back in time to 1806 and give themselves a new life in the past, they send four confused contemporaries into the future in their place:

LADY JOSEPHINE BRANSCOMBE, widow of Geoffrey Branscombe (killed in action against Napoleon in Prussia), who would rather have her husband here than honour in his stead. Tired of the war and its blind patriotism in 1806, she has no desire to be blindly pulled into another.

CAPTAIN HENRY FITZWILLIAM of His Majesty’s Royal Navy, currently on furlough after a traumatic incident in battle and avoiding the conversation with himself about what to do if he can’t take command again. Already facing an existential crisis,he finds himself at a loss as to how he can make himself useful in a society where he has no purpose.

LIEUTENANT ARTHUR BENJAMIN HARDING, upwardly-mobile cavalry officer and ladies’ man, recently distinguished in battle after a mad charge led his outfit to victory. Well used to the company and adulation of European women, he discovers that in the future he’s as aesthetically appealing to them as Neanderthals to him.

And …

LORD GEORGE BYRON, age 19, just published his first anonymous set of poems, and only beginning to set foot down the road to fame. Recently cowed into destroying almost all copies of his original poetry collection by a disapproving critic, he faces the knowledge of a lifetime of art and infamy he’ll never get to experience.

Thrust into the future with no way back, forced to assimilate new languages, cultures, technology, and biology, in a society embroiled in a war with echoes of the one they just escaped, the four must rediscover who they are, and on what side of the battle line they choose to stand.

Have fun this month, everybody! I’ll see you on the flip side.

Confessions of a Confused Tomboy – Gender Dysmorphia in Clothes

Posted by Lora Maroney on October 29, 2011
Posted in: Rants. Tagged: , , , , , , , , . 3 comments

I guess I was a tomboy as a kid, but I didn’t really think about it. Now, of course, I wear it like a badge of honour in feminist circles — “Yes, I was a TOMBOY, how GENDER PROGRESSIVE of me!” — but back then, I wore what I liked, and most of what I liked came from the hand-me-down pile I got from my dad’s friend’s son. It was there, it was easy to wear, and it didn’t rip when I climbed trees or made my church’s wheelchair ramp into an impromptu set of monkey bars.

I did get flak for it now and then — I remember a girl in 7th grade trying to give me a hard time for wearing camo khakis because “army isn’t popular anymore” — but I honestly didn’t care. I didn’t realise that clothes were an extension of self, not really, until high school. Besides, I did wear dresses sometimes — to church or weddings, on class picture day, and when I pretended I was an orphan (my favourite childhood game).

Somewhere around the middle of high school I became more conscious of gender identity, and made a personal choice to flaunt it. Girls were expected to wear makeup and spend time on their hair, so I did neither. (With thigh-length curls, this … was more difficult than you’d think.) Girls were supposed to wear clothes that set off their figure, so (smack-dab in the middle of a mild, puberty-related body dysmorphia crisis) I snatched my dad’s oversized t-shirts and wore those. I started wearing things I knew would annoy people (riding boots, cargo jumpsuits, an entire outfit based on Han Solo’s look in “A New Hope” complete with Corellian Bloodstripe down the slacks). Every time someone made a nasty comment about my clothes, I relished it.

At the same time I found the community of tomboys, and fell head-first into that. Tomboys didn’t wear dresses, at least, not unless they’re forced into it, so I made sure to complain loudly any time I had to wear something nice for special events. I got special dispensation from my voice teacher to wear pantsuits instead of dresses at concerts. I put aside my geeky desire for a green wedding dress (the tradition of Corellia — sound off if you knew that!) and vowed to get married in pants.

This is not, in case people are waiting for it, a post about how I later realised my silliness and returned to the world of skirts and girl-jeans. It might be easier if it was, but my own gender identity, as it relates to clothes, is more complicated.

Now I’m an adult (or so they tell me) — I’ve been out of schooling and working full-time for several years now, anyway. I’ve stopped wearing baggy jeans a million sizes too big, and attempting to hide my size-D chest under enormous t-shirts (spoilers: that doesn’t actually work!). I still own more guy-jeans than girls’, and my general wardrobe is made up of t-shirts from Thinkgeek or Threadless or Topatoco, with a smattering of cheap wife-beaters picked up from outlet stores. For special occasions I have snazzy suits and pantsuits, usually pinstriped, and I still refuse to wear makeup or do anything to my hair (now short) other than wash it and let it dry.

Dressing up, girl-style

What I dress like 90% of the time

Dressing up, normal-style (pose mocking the manniquin, mind)

 

 

 

However. For the first time since I was 8, I also have dresses and skirts in my closet; for the first time ever, I’m the one who bought them. Sometimes I’ll wear a dress and go outside — just for fun! This sounds like I’m being facetious, but it’s honestly a momentous change for me. Those close to me will know what I mean.

Every time I do, though, I face a huge internal struggle. I feel like I’m betraying my cultural identity as a tomboy, and by extension, someone who flouts gender expectations — which is still extremely important to me. I feel like I’m somehow letting feminism down. I feel like I’m dressing in drag — even though I am a woman — and that someone is going to jump out of the bushes and call me a fraud. Ever watch that Daria episode where she gets contacts? Her dilemma is pretty much mine in a nutshell, but with the added embarrassment that I’m not 17 anymore. I should be over this.

It would help if people didn’t make such a big deal out of it, but that’s partly my fault. In maintaining myself as a tomboy, I can’t expect to switch to girl clothes and NOT make a stir. It’s subverting of expectations. But what really gets me is the satisfaction in people’s responses. “See, I TOLD you …” or “Oh, good, you’re FINALLY dressing yourself!” or “I KNEW you’d change your mind about dresses one day!” The most dreaded are the “If you do this every day, you’ll get a boyfriend in no time!” because a.) not applicable and b.) pretty much affirms every one of my reasons not to dress in girl clothes in the FIRST place (that men will only want you if you’re a stereotypical girl — FALSE — and that this is a consideration you should take into account daily).

Sometimes I wish clothes weren’t so complicated. I wish we could just wear what we want, when we want to, as long as it’s vaguely appropriate for the situation. I wish that I could wear guy’s clothes without people telling me I’ll never find anyone that way (ha, WRONG, suckers!) or that I’d “look better” if I wore makeup and dresses. I wish I could wear a dress for a day, just because I feel like it, without people saying they KNEW I’d come to my senses one day.

This sort of fails as a blog post because I’m supposed to wrap it up with a thought-provoking solution, but I don’t have one. But I can’t be the only one with confused sartorial gender identity, so shout out! Let’s get some community up in the house!

Photo of the Day: Akashi Straits Bridge

Posted by Lora Maroney on October 28, 2011
Posted in: Japan, Photo of the Day. Tagged: , , , . Leave a Comment

The Akashi Straits Bridge, the longest suspension bridge in the WOOOOOORLD. Between Awaji Island and the mainland. It’s not actually part of Akashi, but they won the naming contest, so now everyone thinks it’s there rather than in poor, forgotten Maiko. Not a bad move on Akashi’s part.

Overcoming Stigma: Indie Publishing’s Biggest Mistakes, Part III – Word of Mouth Devaluation

Posted by Lora Maroney on October 26, 2011
Posted in: Books, Ebooks, Indie Publishing, Rants, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , , , . 9 comments

Part III in my series: Overcoming Stigma: Indie Publishing’s Biggest Mistakes.

Part II talked about the quantity-over-quality focus, and how in many cases it undercuts books and story in order to sell small chunks to easily-distracted readers. You can read it here.

The third thing indies need to do is change the nature of the community, because right now, it’s a snake eating its own tail.

Let me first say this: I enjoy being on the periphery of the indie author community, even if I want to be published traditionally myself. I enjoy talking with authors on Twitter, reading their blogs, engaging with them in discussions about writing on various social networking sites. I love the friends I’ve made in this community, and hesitated to post this series not because I thought it would explode the Internet (ha!) but because I didn’t want to lose those friendships. I’ve been unfollowed a few times already, and this makes me sad.

However.

The indie book community loves itself a little too much, and if it’s not careful, it’s going to go blind.

That’s not an off-colour joke, by the way (or, at least, not entirely). The indie book community, with its wonderful sense of inclusion and friendship and reciprocity, is doing something horrible every single day, and no one seems to see it:

5-star reviews.

Indie writers love their 5-star reviews, and indie writers love giving them to each other. If I peruse Goodreads, for example, a known haven for indie authors, I see a slough of indie books with ratings of 5 stars — checking the rating details will show a ratio of something like 35 5-star ratings, 15 4-stars, 2 3-stars, and no 2s or 1s. Checking the profiles of people who left those high ratings almost always reveals another indie author, complete with 5-star-rated books.

Indie authors love these reviews, and will post to their blogs or to twitter every time it happens. “I got a good review! Read it here!” And why shouldn’t they? 5-star-rated books have to mean the book is amazing, right? What a recommendation!

Not necessarily. Since I started noticing this phenomenon a few months ago, I started looking to see what indie authors rate other indie authors, and I have, not once, seen anything less than 5 stars. Not if they know each other.

The reviews and Twitter promotions are likewise gushing, even hyperbolic. I don’t know how many times I’ve been told a book will be THE BEST YOU READ ALL YEAR. THE BEST BOOK OF THE SUMMER. THE BEST BOOK OF 2011. THE MOST CHILLING HORROR YOU’LL EVER READ.

Now, when I see a book rated 5 stars on Goodreads, I think two things: 1) This book says nothing real, because otherwise it would attract negative opinions, or 2) This book was rated exclusively by the author’s friends and/or other indie authors. 5-star ratings are no longer an indicator of quality; they’re now expected, kind of like how even the most mediocre theatre performance will receive a standing ovation because audiences now feel like jerks if they don’t.

5-star ratings have become a devalued currency. Think of Syndrome from The Incredibles, and his plan to sell his superpowers to the public — “When everyone’s super? No one will be!” Or, if you want a more grown-up analogy, think of the photos of post-WWII Germany, where people lugged suitcases of money to the corner store to buy a loaf of bread.

Reviews aren’t much better. Where a good review delves deep into a book, talking honestly about its good points and its flaws and its impact on the reader, 5-star reviews often do nothing more than write a back-cover blurb of the book, with some marketing buzzwords — you get a summary, followed by some superlatives, and a promise that this book will BLOW YOUR MIND. It rarely does. In a climate where the quality of books is slowly decreasing — and is in fact encouraged to decrease, and to condition readers to expect that decrease — the praise of books is climbing dramatically to compensate.

The scary correlation to this relates specifically to indie YA,  a huge, booming industry at the moment. Unfortunately, many indie YA books are being bought, read, and reviewed by other indie YA authors, not by actual young adults. This is partly to do with the issues in Part I (many teens not having access to ebooks or Amazon), but also because the indie book industry hasn’t figured out how to market outside its own circle yet. Some writers have begun to discuss how to reach readers as well as writers, but not as many about how to reach teens.

And because of the stigma, indie authors can sometimes be defensive and attack ‘outsiders’ who ‘just don’t understand’, despite the fact that no one will understand if the circle doesn’t open. Indie authors often argue that the world of traditional publishing is an exclusive, gated community, but so, too, is the indie world.

Wrap-up:

I do think that the future of indie publishing is an exciting place, and I would like to see a time when books published through non-traditional means do not carry a stigma. I’m excited for a future where I can buy digital copies of any book to go along with my print copies, when ereaders and internet are not the hallmark of the economically privileged, when libraries carry ebooks and ereaders for people to borrow free of charge, when all authors are paid freely and fairly for their work, and when the biggest, most influential, most life-changing book of the decade comes from someone who published on their own.

Unfortunately, at this point, I think that the stigma on the community — not necessarily individuals, be that people or books, but the overall machine that is indie publishing — is partly justified. With the denial of privilege inherent in insisting on digital-only books, the focus on marketing over content, and the devaluation of honest feedback, the current indie book world still has a way to go.

I want to see indie publishing thrive, but not the way it is now. In order for it to survive, it needs to take a step back from the numbers and look, really look, at what it’s doing to the world of books that it professes to love so much.

Photo of the Day: Suburban Sunset

Posted by Lora Maroney on October 24, 2011
Posted in: Japan, Photo of the Day. Tagged: , , . Leave a Comment

Lots of photos of Japan (mine included) focus on the natural beauty, but the truth is, Japan is an industrial nation, and a lot of the populated areas can look like cities anywhere else in the world. That doesn’t mean it can’t be beautiful.

Sunset over the home centre near my apartment, next to where I go to the gym.

Overcoming Stigma: Indie Publishing’s Biggest Mistakes, Part II – Sales over Story

Posted by Lora Maroney on October 23, 2011
Posted in: Books, Ebooks, Indie Publishing, Rants, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , , , . 16 comments

Part II in my series: Overcoming Stigma: Indie Publishing’s Biggest Mistakes.

The first looked at the problem of an industry that claims to be “the little guy”, while ignoring and discounting an economic class made of billions of people. You can read it here.

The second thing the indie industry needs to do if it really wants to take off is make a choice: either admit that it doesn’t care about telling stories, or actually mean it when it says it does.

Before I get flamed, this series is not pointing fingers at individuals. It’s not actually about individuals at all. It’s about trends I’ve noticed in indie publishing, which aren’t necessarily dominant, but which still need to be eradicated in order for the indie publishing world to be respected in its own right.

Here’s the thing. Something scary happens when writers become their own marketers and publicists: they often lose sight of the story.

In this post, Cat Valente makes an excellent argument about the current climate of indie publishing, and why this is a problem: discussions about indie books — particularly ebooks — are not about story, they’re about sales. Amanda Hocking is amazing not because she writes stories that work their way into people’s hearts and twist something inside them; she’s amazing because she’s made a million dollars. People freely admit that her writing is not that good, not that memorable, but they don’t care, because she stuck it to the big guys and made the world work for her, and THAT’S what’s important.

This is, I think, a byproduct of what happens when creation and publicity are under control of the same person; wires get crossed. I’ve scrolled through a few guides to being a success in the indie world, and they’re all about marketing, all about finding your brand, all about selling yourself — because then people won’t care what you write, they’ll want to buy you, buy your angle.

The emphasis is on quantity over quality — and anyone who speaks up against this is instantly branded an elitist. Well, call me elitist, because I think this is a problem. Writing should not be about churning out book after book so your name is constantly on everyone’s lips — not because you’re good, but because you’re constantly producing, and you wow them with your prolificness. “Wow, ANOTHER book? They must be really talented!”

Time and time again I have heard people say, “I could spend a year writing and editing one book, sure, but why do that when I could publish TWELVE?” Those twelve don’t have to be amazing — they just have to trick people into buying more. Write cliffhangers. Redefine “novel” to mean 40,000 words, so you can split your book in three, call it a trilogy, and sell more copies. The idea is that if you only publish one book a year, people will forget about you; you have to keep producing, constantly, so that they don’t.

Well, yes. If you only produce one mediocre book in a year, people will forget you — and they have every right to. But the idea that a good author, who writes good books, will be forgotten after twelve months is absolutely ridiculous. Fans are happy to wait a year, sometimes more, for the next book when they know the extra time guarantees extra quality — and in the meantime, they’re recruiting new people. “Her next book isn’t out for another eight months, but it will be worth it!”

Craft is important. Yes, output is, too — not everyone can be Harper Lee, set for life after writing To Kill a Mockingbird. But there’s a reason why indie publishing is still not taken seriously by many, many consumers, and it’s not because “legacy publishing” afficionados are elitist monsters who think the path to “author” should be gated, with a membership card signed in blood. It’s because indie publishing champions the notion of producing more over producing better — and openly derides those who think otherwise. A writer is often a failure in the indie world if he spends 10 years trying to write a book — even if it turns into The Lord of the Rings, he could have sold 100 not-bad, almost-amazing books in that time and made more money, made a name for himself.

People want lots of books, yes. But people also want good books. The indie idea is that writing one amazing book is fine, but if no one buys it, you’re a failure. I see the point. But the paragon of success in the indie world is a man who sold a million copies on Amazon of books he openly, freely, unashamedly admits are not good books. And this is what people are trying to emulate.

In a world this obsessed with sales and branding and constant production, there is no place for a new Tolkien, a new Tolstoy; no place for a new book that will tear its way into people’s hearts and minds. Only a desperate, scrabbling world where you have to produce, produce, produce or people will forget you — because you’ve given them nothing substantial to remember you by.

Traditional publishing, as everyone knows, is not the mecca of quality. I know this. Everyone knows this. Bad books get published every day, good ones get bypassed, and new authors feel pressure to start on their next novel in order to maintain buoancy in the publishing world. As the world of traditional publishing is much bigger, it’s terrifyingly easy for authors to get buried and sink into mediocrity, never earning back their advances. However, with traditional publishing, the idea still exists that an author can take time and write a long, substantial book.

The way the indie publishing industry is moving, it’s creating a world where books are the equivalent of a fast-food hamburger — satisfying enough for now, but ultimately forgettable, and leaving you craving something more within the hour. And because the 99c price tag of an indie book comes piggybacking on a $50/month Internet connection and $300-or-more ereader, they can’t even use fast food’s excuse of being cheap and accessible.

This may be the future of books, but I really, really hope it isn’t. I believe that the indie world has possibility, and a glorious one — but not like this.

Photo of the Day: Tottori Sand Dunes

Posted by Lora Maroney on October 22, 2011
Posted in: Japan, Photo of the Day. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a Comment

I went to Tottori Prefecture a few weeks ago and spent some time paragliding on the sand dunes. After that I went for a walk out past where the tourists got bored and turned back. All I have to say is, if I were going to pick a place to become a reclusive writer, this is pretty high on the list. The sounds of the tourists faded until I heard nothing but the wind over the sand. Amazing.

Overcoming Stigma: Indie Publishing’s Biggest Mistakes, Part I – The War on Traditional Publishing

Posted by Lora Maroney on October 20, 2011
Posted in: Books, Ebooks, Indie Publishing, Rants, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , . 20 comments

I’m going to commit the blogging equivalent of suicide: I’m taking on the indie book publishing industry. I have seen the future of books, of reading, writing and publishing as championed by this industry, and it is not a nice one. In fact, it’s one that I would like to run away from — very far, and very fast.

As a disclaimer, I would like to say that I believe in the future of indie publishing as an abstract concept, but I do not support it at this moment. That is, I support indie publishing, the idea, the possibility, and I support indie authors, but I am not in support of a few of what I see as the core principles of the indie book industry as it stands right now.

This is not a post about business acumen, or marketing, or the legitimisation of indie vs. traditional. I have no business schooling, and no real understanding of marketing; this is merely a collection of some of the issues that I have with the indie publishing world as I see it — as a writer, a reader, and social activist.

That said, I hope that everyone — indie, traditional, whatever — can stay civil. I have a small readership, but this is the Internet — it’s gotten ugly before with only three people (me included), so let’s just toss that out there.

There will be three posts in this series: essentially, three things I think the indie book industry needs to examine about itself before it can be a real contender in the world of books.

First, the indie book industry needs to stop calling itself the David to traditional publishing’s Goliath, and — more importantly — needs to stop extolling the death of the traditional publishing industry.

Indie book pundits love to bandy around this image of the great “dinosaurs” of publishing — brick-and-mortar publishers, bookstores, even libraries — falling to their knees and crumbling to death, while indie publishing — the future, the next stage in evolution, Charles — stands triumphant. This image drives me crazy.

There is no reason to create a dichotomy between traditional and indie publishing; both are two sides of the same coin, with benefits and detriments on both sides, depending on what people (authors, publishers, readers) want. Traditional publishing does not “need to die” or “make way” for digital publishing. Many things — including the way authors get paid, particularly for electronic rights of their books — need a serious revamp, but the answer is not for it to disappear.

The good thing about traditional publishing, from an author standpoint, is that authors get paid to write, they don’t pay to write. Money flows toward the author, not away. With indie publishing, an author must fund everything themselves — sure, you could just plunk your un-edited, bad photoshop-cover novel into Amazon and go for it, bang, no overhead, but you’re not going to sell anything because your book will be terrible. Indie publishing takes money, and it takes work — to make your book up to standards, and to promote it once you’ve written it.

People in low income brackets, who don’t have $300 to shell out on an editor, on a copywriter, on a cover artist, who work several jobs to feed their families and can’t afford to spend all their time marketing their books, who may not be able to afford the Internet at all… In traditional publishing, these people have the chance — not the guarantee, mind, but the chance — to spend no more than time and postage and get a book and solid advance out of the deal. In the indie industry, these people “just aren’t willing to put the work in” and don’t deserve success.

However, my main point is about the industry’s effect on readers. Frankly speaking, indie publishing cannot meet the needs that traditional publishing fills, because it is not about readers at all. Readers don’t benefit either way from traditional or indie published books — they buy, they read, they move on. Indie publishing is all about the author; the reader is a means to an end — a way to pay the bills, to get well-known — but indie publishing does not care about the reader.

I’m not saying that indie authors don’t — I’m saying the industry does not. If indie book publishing cared about the readers, it would not be calling for the death of brick-and-mortar publishing. It would not be celebrating smugly when Borders goes bankrupt, when libraries close, when new authors have trouble getting agents and book deals. Because indie publishing can only reach — and is only interested in reaching — the smallest, most infinitessimal fraction of possible readers. Until that changes, indie publishing should not — and does not deserve to be — the top dog, and definitely not the only dog. Especially when indie publishing actually hurts many, many potential readers.

No industry that ignores millions of readers and dismisses an entire economic class — that is, in fact, so steeped in its own privilege that it refuses to acknowledge these people exist, or are important — should be allowed to set itself up as “the little guy” up against evil corporations.

Indie publishing is a rich person’s enterprise. Every person who argues that indie publishing is the future has essentially spat on the face of anyone with a low income. Whenever I hear someone say “Traditional publishing should die — digital is the way of the future!”, all I hear is, “Poor kids don’t deserve to read.”

Because here’s the thing: you can’t read most indie books without an expensive ereader — whether it’s a Kindle, a nook, an iPad, or even just a laptop. You can’t buy indie books without the Internet and a credit card. Even most physical-copy indie books (a rarity) aren’t found in stores — you need to use Amazon or something similar. You can’t find most indie books in a library or second-hand store.

I asked someone, once, how indie YA hopes to reach teens when most don’t have access to credit cards. The response was a baffled, ‘I can’t believe you’re asking such a stupid question’, “They can borrow their parents’.” I had to leave before I started strangling things.

The indie book industry apparently has no idea how many people in the first world live without reliable Internet (or any Internet at all), without credit cards, without the luxury of “impulse buys”. How many people have to choose whether they want to live without electricity, heat, water, or food this month. How many kids live in homes where “borrow your parents’ credit card” could be in an alien language, for how relevant it is to them.

The indie book industry does not realise how many kids cannot afford to buy ebooks because they’d have nothing to read them on — even if they bought an ereader, they’d be afraid to use it because someone would steal it. It does not realise how many kids cannot buy books, period — how many parents cannot afford to buy books new from anywhere, even at what the indie community calls a “steal” ($3.99 plus shipping on Amazon).

The indie book industry has forgotten how many children live for libraries. I did not come from a poor family, but we were not well off — if my parents had credit cards I didn’t know about it, because they never used them to buy things for us. We had dial-up Internet because high speed was not available in that area — and still isn’t, in 2011. Yet our house was filled with books — books we got at Christmas, birthdays, and once a year, when our local library had its 10c sale.

The rest of the year, we went to the library and devoured the books there. My town was extremely small and had no malls, department stores, or clothing stores, but we expanded our library when I was 10 because the town understood its kids needed it. If our library had closed, we would have had nothing to read. There were no bookstores available for almost an hour’s drive in any direction.

I am not an isolated case. Millions of people got their start at libraries, which are populated by traditionally published, “dinosaur” methods. Without these books, without this industry, millions — literally millions, and I am not referring to the deeps of Africa here — of children would not have books to read.

The indie book industry, as it stands, would rather these children not read, because they can’t afford to buy indie books. It may protest, but if it honestly thinks that traditional publishing deserves to die, then this is what it’s really saying.

If the indie book industry actually does care about kids, then it needs to change its attitude, right now. When indie publishing can put book after book after book in the hands of kids who can’t afford to buy one, then we’ll talk about levelling the playing field. But right now, indie publishing has some very, very big shoes to fill, to match its too-small britches.

To NaNoWriMo or Not To NaNoWriMo: A Post for the Fence-Sitters

Posted by Lora Maroney on October 18, 2011
Posted in: NaNoWriMo, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , , , . 4 comments

It's NaNoWriMo time!

November is the month where tens of thousands of writers — professional, amateur, devoted, casual, long-term, first-time — gather to pound out 50,000 or more glorious words into a single project within 30 days.

Of course, this is also the time of year when many writers start to pooh-pooh NaNoWriMo, saying that it produces nothing but garbage, that it makes normal people think they can be writers, that it's useless, that it's a waste of time, that it kills creativity, that NaNoWriMo is fine but REAL writers know about NaNoWriLife. To them I say: that's nice for you, but don't go urinating in someone else's swimming pool.

Today's post is not for the detractors, trying to sway them, and it's not for the defenders, championing for them: it's for the fence-sitters. If you scroll through tweets with the #NaNoWriMo hashtag on Twitter, you'll notice countless people saying "I'm thinking about doing NaNoWriMo, but …" and "Should I do NaNoWriMo?"

Those people, this is for you.

There are a few main "I want to do NaNoWriMo, but …" excuses. I'll do my best to help alleviate your fears.

1. I don't have any good ideas.

That's okay! Many, many people jump into November with only a concept, a character, or the faintest image. If that terrifies you — and believe me, I understand — then here are a few things you can try, to see if something sparks:

  • think of something you've always wanted to read, but don't see enough of. For me last year, that was girls, being friends and having adventures and NOT fighting over a boy. I decided to write that, and it was fantastic.
  • think of the most self-indulgent, happy-place things for you when you read — the sort of thing where, if a story includes it, you'll forgive a whole bunch else. A friend of mine loves winged horses. Another friend loves unnecessary steampunk. I love repressed Napoleonic-era British characters. Make a list of things that make you happy, then write a story with as many of those as you can.
  • what-ifs. What if cats were telepathic? What if South Africa were the world's dominant global power? What if movies became illegal? Play around with "what-ifs" and ask questions. Built a world from there. 
  • mergers. Take your favourite plot and transport it somewhere. Watership Down, my favourite book ever, is basically Odysseus … WITH RABBITS. David Drake's RCN series is Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin series … IN SPACE. Think of a story you love to watch and put it somewhere else, or switch the genre. Married with Children … WITH ROBOTS. The Shining … as ROMANTIC COMEDY.
  • "I could do better". Think of a story — book, movie, TV show — that you had high hopes for, but which fizzled out at the end. If you found yourself thinking, "Ahh, if only they'd done xyz …" then you have yourself an idea. Start with that and build yourself a whole new world.

Whatever you do, just make sure you're enthusiastic about the idea. A good idea is not necessarily one that you think you could see on a shelf of a prestigious person's home library; but it is one that you can't stop talking about, even when your loved ones' eyes start to glaze over. Even if you think it's silly or has no long-term merit, that's much better than the serious, literary, guaranteed-to-make-Oprah's-list bestseller that you're not really thrilled about. Guess which one you'll want to keep ploughing through in week two once the glow fades? Yeah.

2. I won't write anything good.

This DOES NOT MATTER. Many detractors focus on this point — better to write nothing at all, than to write crap, isn't it? Well, sorry, but they are DEAD WRONG. Writing anything, no matter what it is, is better than writing nothing. Bad writing can be fixed. No writing can't. The worst novel I'll ever write, as the saying goes, is better than the best novel you never did.

NaNoWriMo is not about writing garbage. The thousands of writers who churn out stories this month are not just vomiting onto their keyboards; they're plotting, and characterising, and everything else necessary to writing. The difference is that they're giving themselves the freedom to go crazy, to bypass boundaries and self-imposed limits, and just to create. For many, this means that instead of saying "One day …" they made the choice to write RIGHT NOW, when the community is strong, the pressure high, and the joy infectious.

Being afraid you'll write something bad is no reason not to NaNo. Part of the fun of NaNoWriMo is setting aside fear for those 30 days. If, for some reason, what you end up with on December 1st is 50,000 words of stinking dung, who cares? It's 50,000 words more than you would have written — and 50,000 words closer to honing your craft, to writing something good. Unless you're just banging away on the keyboard like the proverbial room of monkeys, you're actively working to improve — even if you don't think so. Even if you look at the end and it's terrible, you now have a good idea of various things that don't work in a story — and that puts you closer to finding the things that do.

3. I don't have time.

This is a tricky one, and I'm going to say something controversial: unless you're a parent with children too young to be in school, YES YOU DO.

The thing about NaNoWriMo is, it's sort of like the Misery Olympics. You know — "Man, today sucks. I lost my job." "Yeah? Well I lost my job AND my dog died." "Well, I lost my job, my dog died, AND I got evicted from my house." No matter how busy you are, there will be another person who's busier than you, and writing more. No one is going to sympathise with you saying you have no time; they're all going to tell you that they have it worse.

Competition aside, we always, always have more time than we think we do. We're just not willing to give it up. An exercise recommended by Chris Baty, NaNoWriMo's founder, is to track your habits for an entire week. Mark down every block of time when you're not doing something absolutely essential. You'll be shocked how much time you actually have, but you spend foofing around online, watching television, or just staring into space.

NaNoWriMo is about taking command of that time. Parents of young children know exactly how much can get done in a suddenly-free 15 minutes, or — joy of joys! — half an hour. Set your alarm an hour ahead. Turn off the Internet. Put your laptop on the treadmill. Don't check your work email when you're not at work. Unplug your TV. Bring your laptop into the bathroom. Bring a notebook on your commute. Buy a timer and set 15-minute breaks in the middle of your homework time, where you write until the timer dings, then go back to work. Whenever you find yourself flicking over to your favourite time-wasting website, STOP. Pull out your novel instead. If that sounds like a drag, then your excuse isn't that you have no time — it's that you have too many excuses.

If, however, you have small children, you're exempt from all of this. Honestly, I don't know how you people have time to dress yourselves in the morning, so hats off to you! In my world, parents who manage NaNoWriMo are like novelling superheroes.

4. I'm afraid of failure.

This is the only one where I'm willing to issue a real caveat. If you've never written substantially before and you're just afraid you won't make it to 50,000 — no time, no ideas, no talent — then give it a try. At worst, you'll wrote 0 words and be no worse off than before. At best, no matter how many words you write, you'll have more than you started.

However. If you're the sort of person who punishes yourself for perceived failure, then I do advise you a bit of caution. Even though NaNoWriMo is entirely voluntary, even though there are no penalties for NOT making 50,000 words, even though any pressure is entirely self-inflicted, there are people who, if they don't make it, will feel a disproportionate amount of failure directed at themselves.

There are people who can say "Oh, darn, I didn't finish — better luck next year!" or just "Ah well, guess it's not for me" and then move on. But there are also people who will spend the entire month in a stew of stress and depression, begrudging their friends every word count update and doubting every session of their own — not enough, could be more, what's the point. There are people who, if they don't make 50,000 words, will want to stop writing, or think that they can't, or shouldn't.

Some of my closest friends — fantastic writers year 'round — just aren't suited to the structure of NaNoWriMo. Having the deadline sucks the fun from their writing, and casts doubt on themselves and whether they're any good, just because they can't write fast during this particular month. If you're one of those people, be careful. This is the only time I'm going to tell someone that maybe NaNoWriMo isn't for them.

NaNoWriMo is, most fundamentally, insane. It's fun, but torturous; it's a rush, but exhausting; it's at once uplifting and soul-destroying. It's no accident that you'll see people posting in the official "This Is Going Better Than I Hoped" thread one day, then "NaNoWriMo Ate My Soul" the next. Some days, I'll pound out 8,000 words and finish feeling like I need a metaphorical cigarette; others I won't manage to add a single word to my draft. Some others I'll end up with fewer words than when I started. But I do it every year.

Some novels will get published; some novels will get shoved in a drawer or backup drive and never looked at again. And that's okay! NaNoWriMo is about the process of creating. It's about giving people who've always wanted to write a novel but…. the chance to throw off their excuses and just do it. It's about giving habitual writers a time to do what they always do, but to feel connected to others instead of isolated. It's about giving professionals an excuse to let loose, have fun, and not stress about marketability and agent deadlines.

Bottom line is, NaNoWriMo is not for everyone, but I do think everyone should give it a chance just to see if it is for them. As for me, this is my 8th, and I'll be ready and waiting, in my tiny apartment here in Japan, at 11:59pm on October 31st.

This is the Edit That Never Ends (Photo Post)

Posted by Lora Maroney on October 3, 2011
Posted in: Editing, Main Menu, Writing. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a Comment

I believe at some point I wrote a self-confident blog post about giving myself until June to finish the edit of my 2010 NaNoWriMo novel, but predicting I wouldn't need past April. Well, to quote Dylan Moran as Bernard Black: "Don't make me laugh — bitterly!"

To be fair, months went by when I didn't edit anything, during which I wallowed in despair over not knowing how to fix a few major hitches in the plot. At some point I wailed on Twitter that Past Me had bestowed too much confidence on Future Me when it came to untangling a particular problem. When you're zipping along, doing line edits and making a few changes, occasionally chopping out unnecessary scenes, it's a bit of a roadblock to come up against a whole chapter or two — let alone an entire arc — that needs a ground-up rewrite before it's possible to move on.

I'm slowly, slowly chipping my way through it; I think (knock on wood) I've worked out the plot kinks to my satisfaction, and fixed a huge hole that would've cropped up later on, so I can start editing. Of course, now it's almost time for NaNoWriMo 2011, but that's a different story.

To apologize for my absence (and to procrastinate a little), let's have some pictures of how I edit novels!

First, this is not how I edit short stories. With short stories, I print them out, then type up a new copy, bypassing the hard-copy edit stage. Novels, on the other hand, require something a bit more robust. I don't write terrible first drafts because my OCD won't allow it, but I do want the final version to be even better, so when I edit, I'm looking for plot, continuity, character, and whatever else on top of the usual grammar and typos.

My editing is two-fold: I write directly on a print-out of the draft, and I make notes in a separate notebook so I can flick through and look for changes later; after this, I look at my notes and type up the next version in Scrivener. This is so I can keep track; when I'm going through the next draft, I can make sure that the note on page 80 to insert a scene with the antagonist's partner actually happens. I also find that having physical evidence works better to motivate me.

My Writing Tools:

  • 1 hard-copy of the draft in a sturdy binder
  • cheap lined notebook for edit notes
  • Moleskine for brainstorming
  • multicoloured pens
  • 5 colours of post-its
    • pink: line edits
    • blue: continuity
    • green: plot
    • yellow: characterisation/dialogue
    • orange: major revisions
  • 5 highlighters (to match the post-its)

 

Hard Copy Editing:

I read through the draft and make changes as I go. Small changes — tightening, weak phrasing, grammar, typos, dialogue, description details, etc. — go right on the page. Larger changes get marked, with a note to fix them on the computer later.

Sometimes the changes are small:

Sometimes they're not so small:

And sometimes I mark entire pages, scenes, or chapters for rewrite on the computer:

 

Notebook — Chapter Overview:

At the beginning of each chapter, I make notes about general what I need to do in it. This helps me keep track later, when I want to make sure I've implemented all the changes I need to.

 

Notebook — Individual Pages:

Once I make a change on the hard-copy, I add a post-it to the notebook, to remind myself of what I just did. I do this for every single page in the entire draft. If no changes get made (note: this has never happened) I would still make an entry for that page, noting this.

What it looks like when changes are light:

What it looks like when changes are a bit more substantial:

 

The Brainstorming Notebook:

This is for when things go terribly wrong. An entire chapter needs rewriting; I find a plot hole that makes the entire third act make no sense; I have no idea what a character looks like at the end of a draft. Here's where I scribble notes to myself and don't show anyone else, because I whine a lot.

 

Progress:

This is the main reason why I prefer the hard-copy method — it looks impressive! Sure, I could pull up both versions of the document in Scrivener, but it doesn't have the same kind of visual punch. When I'm trying to justify ths time spent to other people — and as a writer, this happens a lot — it helps to have a big ol' binder chock-full of colourful notes to "prove" I've been working hard.

 

And there you have it! How do you edit?