What are you Writing?

[AmateisGal]

So far I have queried 6 Agents and 1 publisher. I’m not killing myself, as I have lost faith in the process. With the advent of the internet, agents are awash in thousands of unsolicited query e-mails and I suspect that the delete key is their best friend. (Shrugs.) When I’m in Honolulu this summer, I might drop by that Hawaiian Publisher’s office with a printed copy of my manuscript and a box of hot, sugar-dusted malasadas. Nothing says “read me” like goodies straight from the bakery. Yes, I have no shame.

Oh, six is barely scratching the surface! I'd go at least ten per round. It takes a lot of tenancity, but it's worth it in the end!

 

[Benzadmiral]

Dredged up an idea of many years ago for a "fun but sad" short story featuring a couple from a famous Sixties sitcom. My intention is never to name them, have their identities be clear just from their actions and references to their pasts . . . and do a more realistic, saddening take on their relationship. I've realized I need a third character to make it work. Fortunately there are plenty to choose from.

Long ago I saw this done in a short in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, with an unnamed character who clearly is Superman. The writer, whose name I've forgotten, showed us Kal-El's rather dreary life as a retired superhero, living in a tiny apartment and never flying any more.

 

[MikeKardec]

Dredged up an idea of many years ago for a "fun but sad" short story featuring a couple from a famous Sixties sitcom. My intention is never to name them, have their identities be clear just from their actions and references to their pasts . . . and do a more realistic, saddening take on their relationship. I've realized I need a third character to make it work. Fortunately there are plenty to choose from.

Long ago I saw this done in a short in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, with an unnamed character who clearly is Superman. The writer, whose name I've forgotten, showed us Kal-El's rather dreary life as a retired superhero, living in a tiny apartment and never flying any more.

If you're up for a laugh read Larry Niven's "Man of Steel Woman of Kleenex" or why Superman can't get a girl. it's kind of gross but amusing.

 

[HanauMan]

Gee, I really envy you folk here.

I have tried writing on and off since I was in my teens, but I really suck at it! Novels, tried 'em. Short stories? Yes, no luck. Poetry, don't even go there! But I had fun writing. There may still be a book in me, somewhere.

One project that I have stuck with has been a plan to write a little autobiography of my life as a army brat in West Germany. Not for publication but just for me. I always thought that there may even be a little novel buried in that subject. A EES PX worker foils a Soviet plot, that kind of thing!

In the meantime, lets all keep writing.........something!

 

[AmateisGal]

Gee, I really envy you folk here.

I have tried writing on and off since I was in my teens, but I really suck at it! Novels, tried 'em. Short stories? Yes, no luck. Poetry, don't even go there! But I had fun writing. There may still be a book in me, somewhere.

One project that I have stuck with has been a plan to write a little autobiography of my life as a army brat in West Germany. Not for publication but just for me. I always thought that there may even be a little novel buried in that subject. A EES PX worker foils a Soviet plot, that kind of thing!

In the meantime, lets all keep writing.........something!

You should give that autobiograpy a go! If writing is something fun for you to do, then go for it! To be honest, I sort of miss those days when I was just writing for the fun of it instead of for publication.

 

[niv]

I belong to a WWII-through-Indochine Foreign Legion renacting group. Working under the premise that anyone enlisting in La Legion is running away from something, we have all adopted our own nom de guerre, along with a corresponding "legend/back story." I have started a series of letters from my identity to home, to relatives, and friends & former associates, regarding my observations of life in the Legion and experiences (mostly from things that have happened at reenactments) and have been encouraged to compile them into a book.
Thoughts and/or suggestions?

 

[Fading Fast]

You should give that autobiograpy a go! If writing is something fun for you to do, then go for it! To be honest, I sort of miss those days when I was just writing for the fun of it instead of for publication.

That's one of the things that I like best about FL, it's writing for the enjoyment of sharing common interests. I can get paid to write (not a lot, but still, hard cash), but don't as I can do better working at other things, but I write for free here because I enjoy it. Like you, there are several successful writers on this site (meaningfully more successful than I) who do it, I'm guessing, because they enjoy it even though they don't get paid.

 

[HanauMan]

I belong to a WWII-through-Indochine Foreign Legion renacting group. Working under the premise that anyone enlisting in La Legion is running away from something, we have all adopted our own nom de guerre, along with a corresponding "legend/back story." I have started a series of letters from my identity to home, to relatives, and friends & former associates, regarding my observations of life in the Legion and experiences (mostly from things that have happened at reenactments) and have been encouraged to compile them into a book.
Thoughts and/or suggestions?

Reminds me of a book I read as a teenager. It was called, I think, the Devil's Guard and it was about German SS troops who had joined the Foreign Legion after WWII and ended up fighting in Indochina. It was supposed to be based on a 'true story'. Whatever, the book was brutal and savage but a good read.

 

[MikeKardec]

Writing what you want to write and writing what will sell and make you money are often different and mutually exclusive things. Most commercially successful writers start off writing what they "want" and then learning how to want to write what will sell. The early "wanting" is often the part that motivates them to stick with it long enough to learn what they are doing. They then mature (and I don't always mean as an artist) into writing what will pay the bills. Eventually, they learn to enjoy that too.

A good example from a career I know intimately: I have just finished rewriting my father's first, so far unpublished, novel. It will come out next Fall. It is significantly more artistic and personal in it's vision than material from the rest of his career, except for the short stories that were produced in the exact same era (the mid to late 1930s). That work never made him any money, though a good many of the short stories were published, and he made the shift to writing for the pulps, mostly adventure stuff. He was reluctant but they paid the bills.

After the war he transitioned to Westerns, again because they were popular and paid the bills. He didn't commit to the genre, just did it because it was popular, until he faced a career crisis; the need to transition to paperback originals. As luck would have it and just went he was about to have to live on the street, he was able to sell a short story that became a major motion picture with the biggest star of the day. Using that as a calling card he sold himself as the "Western Guy" to the paperback companies and revitalized his career. He tried several times to break away from doing Westerns over the next 30 years. Until the very end all were unsuccessful. He had to actually lead his audience through a process of reevaluating the entire genre in order to be able to break away and begin to write the things he had dreamed about over the years.

But he loved the Westerns. He found ways to love them even though they weren't the kind of complex, ambitious (and somewhat immature) writing he started out doing or the sort of complex (hopefully mature) and highly imaginative work he dreamed of doing. You can't always write what you want, but you can learn to want to write what you have to write. That said, I do believe what I started off saying, writing what you want is the best training ground ... but a professional also learns to move on to the things they can turn into a profession.

Any writer who can sell and/or survive off of what they initially wanted to write, with no compromise, is blessed beyond all imagination!

 

[Tiki Tom]

Mike, good points and true, as usual.
Recently I have been having conversations with several young high school graduates who are dreaming of going into creative careers. One wants to be a film maker, one wants to be a singer-song writer, another a writer. I am in a quandary as to what to tell them: "it is a suicidally tough business" on the one hand, or "follow your dreams" on the other. I find myself giving them the bland, boring, middle-of-the-road advice: "always have a plan B." To which they answer "if you have a plan B, then plan A will never happen."

As far as the money goes, I don't think anyone really cares about the money. We will all squeak by. It's really about getting a little recognition. Even if you are picked up by a b level publisher and have only modest sales, it still says you were good enough to get published via the old school route. I.e., that you have a little recognized talent.

In that sense, it shows that all our aspirations are just a window on our deep seated insecurities. All anyone wants is a little love and validation. A very tough road, indeed.

 

[AmateisGal]

Mike, good points and true, as usual.
Recently I have been having conversations with several young high school graduates who are dreaming of going into creative careers. One wants to be a film maker, one wants to be a singer-song writer, another a writer. I am in a quandary as to what to tell them: "it is a suicidally tough business" on the one hand, or "follow your dreams" on the other. I find myself giving them the bland, boring, middle-of-the-road advice: "always have a plan B." To which they answer "if you have a plan B, then plan A will never happen."

As far as the money goes, I don't think anyone really cares about the money. We will all squeak by. It's really about getting a little recognition. Even if you are picked up by a b level publisher and have only modest sales, it still says you were good enough to get published via the old school route. I.e., that you have a little recognized talent.

In that sense, it shows that all our aspirations are just a window on our deep seated insecurities. All anyone wants is a little love and validation. A very tough road, indeed.

My daughter will be a senior in the fall. All she wants to do is write for a living. I was in her exact same shoes at her age.

Unfortunately, writing for a living doesn't happen overnight, if at all. While I'd love to make a living writing my novels, I have no illusions that I will become the next J.K. Rowling or Stephen King.

So I've told her that this business is hard and that she needs to develop a thick skin (and she's a pretty sensitive kid, so this is going to be hard for her). I want her to go forward with her dreams but at the same time temper it with a dose of reality. Otherwise she'll fall, and fall hard. I hope she'll go to college, though she wants to take a gap year after she graduates. I don't have a problem with that.

 

[Fading Fast]

My daughter will be a senior in the fall. All she wants to do is write for a living. I was in her exact same shoes at her age.

Unfortunately, writing for a living doesn't happen overnight, if at all. While I'd love to make a living writing my novels, I have no illusions that I will become the next J.K. Rowling or Stephen King.

So I've told her that this business is hard and that she needs to develop a thick skin (and she's a pretty sensitive kid, so this is going to be hard for her). I want her to go forward with her dreams but at the same time temper it with a dose of reality. Otherwise she'll fall, and fall hard. I hope she'll go to college, though she wants to take a gap year after she graduates. I don't have a problem with that.

If it helps at all, what I learned along the way is that, yes, writing for a living is hard, but there are many writing opportunities away from the obvious ones. For example, many companies hire full-time writers for various purposes - yes, the obvious, such as marketing, but also for internal reporting, projects, promotions, etc. and - and I did this for awhile on the side of my main corporate job - speech writing for the most senior executives. I wrote speeches for the president of a major brokerage firm - it was interesting and intense but I enjoyed it.

My small point is that away from the writing jobs we all think about, there are several paths in Corporate America to write as well. To be sure, most people (your daughter, myself) want to write "what they want to write," but these jobs can be a decent way to get paid to write while you also pursue your writing passions.

 

[Benzadmiral]

If you're up for a laugh read Larry Niven's "Man of Steel Woman of Kleenex" or why Superman can't get a girl. it's kind of gross but amusing.

Oh, yes, one of my favorite Larry Niven pieces. He's said he used to tell the basic ideas around at parties, back when he had to tell a story aloud to determine whether it was worth writing. If people reacted favorably, he'd know it was a viable idea. Apparently people laughed their heads off at the notions he developed about Kal-El and his love life.

 

[AmateisGal]

If it helps at all, what I learned along the way is that, yes, writing for a living is hard, but there are many writing opportunities away from the obvious ones. For example, many companies hire full-time writers for various purposes - yes, the obvious, such as marketing, but also for internal reporting, projects, promotions, etc. and - and I did this for awhile on the side of my main corporate job - speech writing for the most senior executives. I wrote speeches for the president of a major brokerage firm - it was interesting and intense but I enjoyed it.

My small point is that away from the writing jobs we all think about, there are several paths in Corporate America to write as well. To be sure, most people (your daughter, myself) want to write "what they want to write," but these jobs can be a decent way to get paid to write while you also pursue your writing passions.

After I graduated with my master's degree, I landed a job (not in my field, unfortunately) at a self-publishing company and wrote back cover copy. So I was actually able to make a living writing - though as you said, it wasn't what I *wanted* to write. But I became a much better writer working that job.

 

[Fading Fast]

After I graduated with my master's degree, I landed a job (not in my field, unfortunately) at a self-publishing company and wrote back cover copy. So I was actually able to make a living writing - though as you said, it wasn't what I *wanted* to write. But I became a much better writer working that job.

Early in the days of the internet, I wrote a daily, end-of-day financial market recap that we sent out electronically which limited the number of characters to some number that I don't remember exactly, but I could get about 200 or so words in. That "annoying" limitation taught me to "pre-edit" my work down to the most critical information and, also, it forced me to say everything with the least number of words possible. It was absolutely great training for writing - even if I cursed its limitation daily. Twitter can feel like that sometimes too.

 

[AmateisGal]

Early in the days of the internet, I wrote a daily, end-of-day financial market recap that we sent out electronically which limited the number of characters to some number that I don't remember exactly, but I could get about 200 or so words in. That "annoying" limitation taught me to "pre-edit" my work down to the most critical information and, also, it forced me to say everything with the least number of words possible. It was absolutely great training for writing - even if I cursed its limitation daily. Twitter can feel like that sometimes too.

Yes, exactly. Twitter forces me to condense my words because I *hate* using text shorthand, i.e. "ur" and all those other annoying things.

 

[MikeKardec]

Recently I have been having conversations with several young high school graduates who are dreaming of going into creative careers. One wants to be a film maker, one wants to be a singer-song writer, another a writer. I am in a quandary as to what to tell them: "it is a suicidally tough business" on the one hand, or "follow your dreams" on the other. I find myself giving them the bland, boring, middle-of-the-road advice: "always have a plan B." To which they answer "if you have a plan B, then plan A will never happen."

Always have a Plan B. It doesn't have to be what you do if you don't make it, it more like what you do to survive while you put in the 10,000 hours that are minimal for competence. I lived with a father who had no Plan B and he had the steel spine to stare into the abyss every day, he taught himself to love it BUT he'd have given anything for a Plan B, or even a high school education. That all or nothing attitude is just misapplied BS. The answer is Never Give Up. In order to get away with that you need to have something to keep food on the table while you Never Give Up.

The film-maker dream is the most impractical. The singer and writer can follow their paths with a minimum of infrastructure and outside help. Film making is a profession where even the most sophisticated lie to themselves about the nature of the business ... it can be brutally hard to learn what the right moves are when all the possible mentors are mired in self deception.

My daughter will be a senior in the fall. All she wants to do is write for a living. I was in her exact same shoes at her age.

Unfortunately, writing for a living doesn't happen overnight, if at all. While I'd love to make a living writing my novels, I have no illusions that I will become the next J.K. Rowling or Stephen King.

So I've told her that this business is hard and that she needs to develop a thick skin (and she's a pretty sensitive kid, so this is going to be hard for her). I want her to go forward with her dreams but at the same time temper it with a dose of reality. Otherwise she'll fall, and fall hard. I hope she'll go to college, though she wants to take a gap year after she graduates. I don't have a problem with that.

These days college is not what it used to be but it's still well worth it ... more worth it (and maybe a better education) at some of the more intermediate level schools.

Not much help for a kid but just among us ... a big thing about taking criticism is that people always try to tell you what they think the solution is before they understand, or can articulate, the problem. It's always best to recognize their wisdom in identifying a problem area (people are actually amazingly good at that) then look closely for what you think could be wrong. I can't tell you the number of times I've realized that a reader was a complete idiot in his suggestion yet still precisely put his finger on the spot that needed work. Just always come up with your own solutions.

 

[MikeKardec]

A follow up on my own blather about film making: I used to teach and guest lecture about the film business. I was never the most knowledgeable guy in Hollywood but I did learn a thing or two. The most important is this: There is NO film business, there is only the distribution business. Anyone can "make movies", especially today with all sorts of reasonably priced equipment. However, unloading that film in a manner that allows you or your investors to just break even is where the bottleneck occurs. Books and music have always had less expensive distribution infrastructure ... to the point where now it's next to nothing. The massive bandwidth of films and the fact that there are few companies that are capable of collecting money for you means that those companies control the business utterly. This is even true on-line and it's the reason why it's still a walled castle. The walls are crumbing a bit and maybe more in the near future. When they do the world will be a more interesting place.

 

[Benzadmiral]

For your entertainment, a Man from U.N.C.L.E. fan story: http://www.mfuarchive.net/archive/6/thedeadly.html It's a complete short adventure based on the series, set entirely in 1964 Manhattan. It features an innocent couple (from a famous movie in *our* world) caught up in the action. If I've done my job right, I think you'll recognize them early on.

 

[Tiki Tom]

Thanks... now I will have the Man from U.N.C.L.E. theme music running through my head all day. The highest praise that I can give is that, as I was reading it, for a moment I was completely "in" the story and not just reading it. I completely "saw" Napoleon and Ilya from the TV show. And you captured a bit of the famous repartee between those two. As I'm a lifelong fan of the show, I liked the fact that it had all the U.N.C.L.E. bells and whistles (those pistols with all the attachments. The communicators.) However, I have no idea who the innocent couple are supposed to be. Probably says more about me than the story. I have perhaps been out of the country too long. Anyway, nicely done. Thanks for the visit back to a show from my childhood.