Three authors, three different stories of publication

This past Saturday, I had a chance to attend the first ever Monroe County Book Expo hosted by the Eastern Monroe Public Library in Stroudsburg, PA. It was a fun opportunity to meet some local authors and to catch up with some I already know. I also had the opportunity to sit on a panel with two other authors.

One of the things I found interesting about my fellow panelists, is that each of them had a different story of publication, and that along with me none of us has had what might be considered the “traditional” story of publication. I don’t know if there is any one traditional publication story, but in writing circles the the most traditional publication story is that after completing and polishing a manuscript one goes looking for an agent. With luck, an agent represents you, sells your book to a big publishing house, and with a whole lot more luck you make gobs of money, quit your day job and spend your days crafting your next bestseller. Okay, so the ending part might not be too traditional. But for the most part the find an agent who in turn finds you a publisher story is pretty standard.

Gloria Mallette kept writing novels and filing them away, until her husband convinced her she had to do something about them. So, she published them herself, creating her own publishing company to self publish her book. More than just a writer she made herself into a savvy business woman and it paid off. She began to sell a lot of copies of her book and the big guys took notice. She found herself with a contract from a big publishing house and her first book was heavily promoted with a first class book tour, but as she continued to publish books with the big publishing house, she became disillusioned when the publisher chose to do little to promote her work. Eventually she decided to return to self publishing because she already knew she could be successful at it.

Jeff Widmer is a writer for hire.  He is the author of The Spirit of Swiftwater, which he wrote for a corporate customer and which was initially privately published, but later was published by a university press. Freelance writing and ghostwriting have helped Jeff to carve out a successful writing career.

And me? I bypassed the agent route and the big publishers, and submitted my manuscript directly to a small publisher. The Subrosa Semesters was picked out of a slush pile and is now well on its way to publication.

If you’re a writer, and you’ve had trouble going about things the traditional way, or if you just prefer to do things your own way, it’s good to keep in mind that there’s more than one way to become a published author.

My trip to Book Expo

Earlier this week I headed over to Book Expo America. This annual trade show is a book lover’s paradise, and though the few hours I spent there are hardly enough to do it justice I enjoyed everything I was able to take in.

Here Flux author Simone Elkeles signs copies of her book Leaving Paradise at the Llewellyn booth:

And even though champagne and chocolate were on hand, the folks on the long line were far more interested in getting Simone’s autograph.

Celebrities of all species were on hand for Book Expo

But of course the big draw is finding out about all the new books out there like titles from the Class of 2k10:

There were lots of giveaways available, and some bibliophiles had a hard time resisting the lure of so many free books. I had a view of the luggage check area while I ate my lunch

It was pretty busy as folks added to their stash. I didn’t go quite that crazy, but I did have an aching shoulder by the end of the day.

Of course, it was totally worth it to find some great new books and meet all sorts of other bookish types including fellow 2011 debut author Kathy McCullough who was already an online buddy, author illustrator Ann Koffsky who was my shuttle bus seat mate and audiobook narrator Heather Henderson while standing on one of the long bathroom lines.

So long, and thanks for all the fish

Douglas Adams would be 58 today, but sadly he left us too soon. I can remember as a teenager discovering Douglas Adams thanks to an omnibus collection of the Hitchiker’s Guide novels that I received as a birthday gift.

It was love at first page. I can distinctly recall sitting on our kitchen floor (I honestly have no idea why I was sitting on the floor.) forcing my mother (here, Mom, I’m writing something about you, and there’s no picture, but you won’t read this anyway since you are in Hawaii) who was busy cooking dinner to listen to me read passages aloud while tears of laughter streamed down my face.

It was a few years later when I accidentally discovered the Dirk Gently books in a bookstore. I hadn’t even known of their existence before. (Young people, information was not so easy to come by before the internet age.) I bought them at once, and was not disappointed.

Since I am busy being a back-in-my-day sort of geezer I’ll point out that there used to be no such thing as GPS or Mapquest and many people, Dirk Gently was one of them, used to get around by following someone who looked like they knew where they were going. I still pull the occasional Dirk Gently while driving.

Douglas Adams was not a super-prolific writer, but what he did write was awesome. I wish he could have hung around a bit longer. I, for one, really wish there were more books in the Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency Series.

Do you have a book that you wish one of your favorite authors had the chance to write?

New Jersey is a YA sort of state

Map found via Driko Land

A friend of mine alerted me to a book review in this past Sunday’s New York Times of Beth Ann Bauman’s YA novel Rosie and Skate. The novel sounds good, but that’s not why the review was pointed out to me. It’s because it opened with this line:

New Jersey is a teenage state: it looks awkward in places, has questionable ethics from time to time and plays perennial underdog to New York. Perhaps this is why it’s home to so much good young adult literature.

All along I thought that the reason I was drawn to writing and reading books for teenagers was because I was immature and really just a kid at heart, but perhaps it’s because like Beth Ann, I am a Jersey girl. These days, I am back in the garden state after living in Pennsylvania for the past seven or so years, excepting a six month stretch spent in Maine. It’s a weird and wonderful state in many ways, and although there may be nicer places to live there are few that are quite as colorful as New Jersey.

Has the internet killed the slush pile?

If you are writer, you are probably aware of the fact that many publishers will not even look at manuscripts submitted by unagented writers, and getting an agent can be a real challenge. My Wall Street Journal reading father, is always helpfully passing on articles he finds interesting, and the latest was this article on the death of the slush pile which appeared in yesterday’s paper.

Among other things, it makes the case that the internet, which was supposed to level the playing field, may have actually made it even more difficult for new writers to get published, because the internet itself is like one big, overwhelming slush pile.

That said, I know for a fact that the slush pile has not been killed off completely. There are still some publishers out there who accept manuscripts from unagented writers. I submitted my own manuscript for The Balderdash Semesters directly to Flux, a small publisher specializing in YA fiction who still accepts manuscripts directly from authors. Digging through that pile of slush, editor Brian Farrey found my manuscript and decided that it was worthy of publication.

So, take that Wall Street Journal article and any other advice that warns you that it’s next to impossible for a new writer to get published, with a grain of salt.

A small publisher closes up shop

I learned the other day that small publisher From the Asylum Books and Press is closing up shop. They were a publisher of speculative fiction anthologies, which is a tough market even for big publishers, and must be especially tough for little publishers trying to compete in the big bad book selling world.

I had a story accepted for their anthology Things Aren’t What They Seem, which was supposed to be out this fall, and I had a feeling that there might have been some problems, when the publication was delayed, and I didn’t hear anything. I received an email the other day letting me know the sad news.

I often wondered if e-books and the internet will put an end to new fiction anthologies and short fiction magazines and zines. I’m still not taken with the idea of reading an entire novel on a digital screen, but a short story seems like the perfect medium for electronic reading. I’ve read elsewhere that short stories are not something writers should expect to make money from any longer, but instead are things they should give away for free to help build an audience.

As the publishing world continues to learn from the mistakes the music world made with the advent of MP3s and looks for ways to still get folks to buy books, can short stories be used as some sort of hook to drive book sales? Perhaps only purchasers of the physical book will have access to the bonus short story at the end of the book.

What are your thoughts on the short story market and its future?

Women have better things to do than write important books

. . . because we’re all so busy cleaning the house, getting our nails done, [insert something stereotypically female here]. OK, just to be clear (because it’s not always apparent on the internet), this is sarcasm. I do not believe any of the above, and hopefully you don’t either, but there are people out there who do. For proof you need only read the comments to this blog post by Moonrat over at Editorial Ass and take note of a certain anonymous commenter that got into a little debate with Maggie Stiefvater.

This all began with Publisher’s Weekly posting their picks for the 10 best books of 2009. All 10 books are by male authors. The announcement of the list and it’s testosterone laden nature caused something of a stir in the blogging world. My own take on it was that it was just one list, by one group of opinionated folk and it’s getting to be the time of year when best of lists abound. I’ve never put much stock in any of these sort of things because I feel I’m fully capable of making my own opinions, and I’m so contrarian in nature, I tend to disagree with most picks anyway. It’s all very similar to big awards shows like the Oscars or the Grammys, which always seem very out of touch with reality. So, the all male review over at Publisher’s Weekly didn’t really get my blood boiling.

No, my blood didn’t start boiling until I read those comments by Mr. Anonymous. Yes, I knew that there were people out there who were of the opinion that women aren’t really capable of writing serious books because our minds are all concerned with womanly things. Who knows, maybe there is some correlation between the cleanliness of woman’s bathtub and her ability to write serious literature. If that’s the case, then I am pretty much guaranteed to win the National Book Award based upon the dirtiness of my bathtub. The thing is, while I know this sort of sexism still exists. I am a little bit shocked that someone like this is reading publishing related blogs, and is, apparently, literate.

Women can and do write serious literature, and have been doing it quite nicely, for years, despite many people saying they could do no such thing. The other thing that bugs me about anonymous’s comments is that he seems convinced there is some hard and fast rule that romance novels, books with protagonists under 18 or books with not-real elements can not be serious and important books. These, in his opinion are the things that women are good at writing. In fact I can name a few women who have written such books including Jane Austen, Edith Wharton, Louisa May Alcott, Mary Shelly and Margaret Atwood, just for starters. I think you would have a hard time arguing that their books are not serious and important, and it’s very likely that their works will still be read years after readers have forgotten the names of nearly every author who made this year’s Publishers Weekly list.

Growing up, when my sister and I would visit my grandparents, there wasn’t a whole lot to do. They did have the card game Authors and we would usually play several rounds while we were there. For those who have never had the sheer joy of playing Authors, I assure you, you are not missing out. Think of it as something like go fish. The deck at my grandparents’ house, which looked like the cards on the left side of your screen, featured something like thirteen authors in all, one of whom was a woman. Louisa May Alcott was the only female author deemed important enough to make the cut. To this day, I have no idea why her above any other female author. I do know that as a girl with literary aspirations there was something a bit demoralizing about that one lonely female in that pack of males.

Anyway, if you are a woman reading this I hereby instruct you to ignore your dirty bathtub, to let those dirty dishes sit in the sink, and to write something important, because, apparently, there are still some people out there who think you can’t.

Thank you, audio book inventors

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve spent a lot of time behind the wheel of my car, both for work (My job involves driving around visiting libraries, how cool is that?) and for family obligations (there was a round trip to Maine which included a traffic-filled ride up to Vacationland). I actually kind of enjoy driving with the exception of that trip up to Maine. The problem with spending so much time on the road is that it cuts into my reading time. Audio books are my salvation.

Over the past couple of weeks I’ve “read” Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows, The Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington and I am in the midst of Looking for Alaska by John Green. Of course, I’ve “read” all of these books without cracking open a single book. While listening to books will never take the place of actually reading a book (and there are some books that I must read the old fashioned way) having a book to keep me company on my driving is a blessing. I can’t imagine what traveling salesmen did before audio books.

I started wondering, just who this wonderful genius was who came up with the audio book. As it turns out, I cannot track down the name of a lone genius behind the audio book. It’s a collaborative effort that has built over time. There were early poetry recordings that predated radio and television entertainment. In the 1930s the Books for the Blind program came into being, and while this is similar to the commercial audio books of today, the program was limited to those unable to read physical books and recording quality lacked a lot of the production values that make commercial audio books such a pleasure to listen to. Caedmon, who continues to publish audio books, began the first true audio book line in 1952. Not until the cassette tape and later the CD came along would audio books become the friends of  road warriors of every stripe.

Of course, these days entire books can be easily downloaded to an MP3 player. I still can’t completely grasp the fascination with digital versions of print books, but digital audio books make perfect sense to me. Technology can be pretty cool sometimes.

By the way, behind the wheel isn’t the only thing audio books are good for. There are whole household projects that I might never have made it through were it not for audio books. Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig helped me to redo a kitchen floor. Frost on My Moustache by Tim Moore was my companion through a bathroom makeover, and thanks to listening to Tearing Down the Wall of Sound by Mick Brown while painting a bedroom I will always associate Phil Spector with a certain shade of blue paint.

And as for that whole debate about whether listening to an audio book counts as reading, Stephen King weighs in here. He also lists his top 10 favorite audios, which probably wouldn’t be a bad place to start if you were thinking about trying out an audio book yourself.

What about you? Are you an audio book listener? Why or why not?

Thoughts on School Visits by YA Authors

I’ve been flipping through a book called The Making of a Bestseller: Success stories from authors and the editors, agents, and booksellers behind them by Brian Hill and Dee Power. The book is something of a mish-mosh, and most of the information is not relevant to me, but something said by the only YA author quoted in the book struck a chord with me this afternoon, and prompted me to put down the book and get on the internet.

In the section on promotion authors were talking about in-store signings. Christopher Paolini said that in-store signings are not very lucrative for writers and can be real hit or miss affairs. He pointed out that he has always done much better with school visits. Paolini noted that at store signings he would be lucky to sell 40 books, but visiting schools he often sold 300 books or more.

My internet search brought me to this post at Author 2 Author that just happened to be posted today on school author visits. How’s that for timing? Anyway a little more hunting did turn up some more school author visit information at Cynsations, with this interview with picture book author Toni Buzzeo on her school visits. Finally here’s a video with some footage of a visit by Chris Crutcher (if you scroll down on Crutcher’s website there is a link under For Educators that has some information on his school visits) to a high school that I dug up on YouTube:

Because of my day job (I sell books to libraries.) I know more librarians than bookstore owners, and I although I am still more than a year away from having a book of my own to sell, it might be time to think seriously about this school visit thing. Especially for an author starting out, I don’t feel I would want to charge a lot of money for school visits. If they were schools that I could drive to within, say, 2 hours (and I’m lucky enough to live in an area where they are a lot of schools that fit this bill) then travel expenses would be pretty minimal. Obviously, for further away visits I would have to charge additional money. Well, it doesn’t hurt to start thinking about this now. Have you done school visits? What are your thoughts on this?

Is this what reading e-books is like?

I purchased a reprint copy of Crotchet Castle by Thomas Love Peacock some time back because it was one of those books that was on my to-read list for awhile. For those not familiar with reprint books, these are cheap, very bare-bones reprints of books that are out of print and, presumably, in the public domain, or perhaps so not in demand that the rights can be had for a song. I’ve seen these sort of books before, but never before actually read one. It’s not a pleasant experience.

First there are the covers. There’s this rumor that you can’t judge a book by its cover, but people do it all the time. My day job is pretty much based on the idea that you can judge a book by its cover. These reprint books tend to have the most boring covers imaginable. You would think these reprint publishers could simply find some halfway decent public domain artwork and slap that on the cover. While there are plenty of cover catastrophes out there as the Judge a Book by its Cover blog gleefully points out or as the recent flap over Justine Larbalestier’s book Liar has shown us, it seems that the least a reprint publisher could do is to make an attempt at creating a vaguely appealing cover.

The blahness, does not end there. It took me until the third chapter to realize that the strange beginning to each chapter was actually an epigraph. Because these weren’t italicized or set off in anyway from the rest of the chapter they just read as if they were the start of a perplexing paragraph. Similar lazy formatting in the book led to several points when the jarring “[Greek text]” would appear, just like that. I can’t even begin to read Greek text, but something tells me seeing it being printed there as opposed to this stand-in text would have helped the book to flow along just a bit smoother. I also kind of doubt that Mr. Peacock is to blame for the strange punctuation situations that periodically occurred leading to what appeared to be random emoticons in a nineteenth century novella.

All of this detracted from my overall reading experience and makes me think that this must be what reading an e-book is sort of like. I realize there are all sorts of improvements in the technology, but still I can’t help but feel that one must sacrifice certain standard book features when opting for a digital version of a book, and to me this takes too much away from the pleasant nature of the reading experience.

Are you an e-book reader? I am being stodgy and old-fashioned in thinking that good old fashioned books are still the superior medium?