Mud and Money

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There’s a bru-ha-ha going on with Dorchester Press. Alas, still and yet again.

Really it’s a continuation of the same sordid story. For those not in the swim of New York publishing, Dorchester is a smallish publisher, but has been well-respected. They published a lot of romance, especially a lot of paranormal stuff. I have a number of friends who’ve published with them and have been very happy. Two Dorchester editors, Chris Keesler and Leah Hultenschmidt are well-known on the conference circuit, well-respected in the business and well-liked by pretty much everyone.

Used to be, Dorchester was a great place for a debut author.

That’s when the whole “struggling publishing industry” thing comes into play. As a smaller press, Dorchester doesn’t have the reserves and diversification of the bigger NYC publishers. Rumors have been afloat for some time that they haven’t been paying some authors royalties for years, though other authors say they’ve been paid on time. The first certifiable flag of warning was when Dorchester sold their backlist – the books that were published years ago but continue to sell – to Avon. These were their biggest name authors that they sold (the Avon folks aren’t dummies) and people wondered how Dorchester could afford to give up a bread-and-butter resource like that.

Well, they couldn’t. It was a desperation move.

Last summer, RWA withdrew its approval of Dorchester as a reputable publisher, because there were enough reliable reports that authors were not being paid. Then this fall, Dorchester made the astonishing announcement that they would no longer be a print publisher. The press intended to go to electronic publishing (much less overhead) and some trade paperbacks (targeted print runs for anticipated high-sellers). This included books that authors had anticipated would hit shelves a week or two later.

The company also slashed the staff, laying off Leah and leaving Chris the sole editor, with an assistant.

Many authors requested reversion of rights meaning that, since Dorchester had violated their contract that promised a mass-market print run of x copies, the author wanted the publishing rights back. Dorchester granted these rights-reversions.

Now it turns out that Dorchester is still selling those books. The story is here. What’s most disconcerting to me is how little recourse an author has when someone else is selling their books. Short of a civil action, which requires money, there’s little to be done until the wheels slowly turn.

There are also a lot of comments on the post, of varying levels of hysteria and reason. If you scroll down to 12:37pm, Chris Keesler adds a comment. I thought his explanation was dignified, well-reasoned and apologetic. I don’t envy his position at all.

And that’s my real point here.

It’s easy to point fingers at the big, bad corporations. Certainly they do crappy things in favor of the bottom line, but most of us have worked for corporations. We have all lived Dilbert lives in some way or another and we know how companies like that work. It’s easy for writers in particular to see editors as giant figures, flashing good-fortune lightning from their fingertips. In reality, I imagine Chris has very little power over Dorchester’s financial line. Just as, though I’m a reasonably high-level associate in the company I work for, I have no power over how they bill and when they pay. Many of us, too, have been in the position of being the surviving staff member of a larger department that was slashed. We’re asked to do the work of two or three people.

If we want to keep our jobs, we do it.

This doesn’t mean that Dorchester isn’t doing awful things to their authors. But they are also trying to stay afloat and continue as a publisher. It remains to be seen if they’ll succeed.

I met Chris at RWA National last July. He accompanied one of his authors, Leanna Renee Hieber to our big party. She was up for a couple of PRISM awards for her Dorchester debut novel, which she won. As her editor, Chris was there to support her. Being an opportunist, I asked Chris to be one of the “celebrity judges” for our Steampunk costume contest. Being a genuinely lovely person, he agreed.

What struck me about him then, was his concern that, as he and the other two judges weeded the vast field of candidates down to ten finalists, then four, then into prize-winning places, that I convey how difficult their decision was and to let people down gently. I almost thought he was silly about it. It was a party, people were drinking and eating. It was only a silly costume contest.

Then I realized, he had to do that all the time, choose from a field of people and pick the “best.”

Did Chris screw up by failing to take an author’s name off the list? Sure he did. He says he did. I’m impressed that he commented and owned up to it.

And I’m giving thanks today that the mistakes I make at work aren’t anything interesting enough to be posted on the internet for people to throw mud at.

The Lights Are Much Brighter There

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Two things reminded me of my maternal grandparents lately.

Which was funny, because it felt like I hadn’t thought about them much in a while. Both have been gone from us for quite a while now. Papa died about thirty years ago and Grandmother followed him not quite fifteen years later.

I’ve written about them some – how Papa educated himself in the public library and became the youngest movie theater manager in the country. How he was even younger than they thought, because he’d lied about his age to get the usher job in the first place. Grandmother left the farm in Texas and taught herself how to be a lady in all things. The stories are full of post-depression glamor. She was his secretary and they both divorced to be together, then fled the bright lights, high-roller lifestyle and the scandal, exiled to the backwater of Denver.

I have the book all outlined, in fact, though it’s been sitting in a drawer for a while now.

At any rate, someone on Twitter mentioned that she’d bought See’s Candies. I know the stores are all over the malls still, but somehow her mention brought back vividly how Papa brought Grandmother a box of chocolates every week, all soft centers, no caramels. It was a courtly gesture that I puzzle over now. In their later years, relations between them were strained. I wonder now if buying the candies were a habit or an offering of perpetual repentance. There was always that white box though – unless it was a special color for a holiday – sitting on the table between their armchairs.

I can’t recall now if she ever bought them for herself, after he was gone.

(Since the “gone” involved first a mistress in California and then death by drinking, perhaps not.)

Then, a day later, another friend asked if anyone knew anything about Galatoire’s Milk Punch, and I realized that I did. Galatoire’s is a wonderful old restaurant in New Orleans. Papa was stationed near the city during the war and Galatoire’s became one of his favorites. I’d always known that. I also knew that Papa made “punch” every Sunday after mass. I even described it in an early writing exercise – the vanilla ice cream and milk frothing in a blender. He’d pour some for me, the ice cubes clinking in the tall glass, nutmeg sprinkled on top, the sparkly gold cocktail holder. Then he added the bourbon for theirs. No luck for me if I wanted seconds.

I only realized years later that not everyone’s grandparents started drinking on Sunday morning.

But my friend’s question made me realize where he’d learned it, in the city of languor and partying.

We live in a more ascetic time now. A box of candy every week is over the top. Spending Sunday drinking bourbon questionable.

And yet, thinking of them, seeing those old logos, makes me think of how handsome they were. For a while they were stars of their own world, a place of movie stars and theaters that looked like palaces.

I miss them all over again.

Neverland

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The final dregs of a dark and dramatic sunset. Very all hallows.

I dreamed last night that Allison inherited an amusement park. Very Michael Jackson Neverlandish. I think the hidden meaning here is obvious.

This was probably stimulated our conversation yesterday when Allison asked what I was writing and I told her about this new novella and that it was fun to write. She said she remembered having fun writing. Being the sympathetic writing partner that I am, I replied “wah wah wah.”

After all, she’s got the amusement park. I’m still paying to ride the roller coaster.

But even an amusement park becomes work when you’re the one who runs it, instead of being just a visitor. You don’t get to come and go as you please. The rides have to be maintained every day. You don’t get to skip a day or a week, unless you really love nasty consequences.

The query process is a funny thing because it’s like an incredibly extended job hunt. You refine your resumes, send them out to all kinds of people. Hopefully some friends clue you in on opportunities, recommend you for a job. Of course, we’ve all heard of the person who just blanket-sends a resume to everyone in the phone book. If they like your resume, maybe you get an interview. Maybe you get six interviews, of increasing length and depth. At any point in the process, someone from HR or the marketing department might walk in the room, take one look at you and say no no no.

And you’re done.

It’s like being interviewed to take over as VP of Major Earnings. There’s no starting out in the mail room, or as someone’s assistant. No gradually building your clientele over the course of years.

Then, if you get hired, you’d better perform. Earn that corner office. Increase that profit margin.

No wonder that part isn’t so fun.

But never let it be forgotten that it *is* an amusement park. We choose writing for the wild rides, for the sweetness of the cotton candy, for the sparkling lights and the carnival music.

Oh yeah, sign me up.

You Mean, My 3rd Grade Teacher Was Right??

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See? Even if sunset wins out one day, there’s always another opportunity for the baby quail.

They look so rumpled, compared to their sleek parents. But in time they’ll work out the fuzzies and be more styling.

A question that seems to make the rounds of the genre writers loops from time to time regards how important grammar really is. Editors and agents will sometimes exhort querying writers to get their grammar, spelling, and punctuation straight before submitting a manuscript.

Yeah, I know. It seems self-evident.

But the genre writers frequently regard themselves more as storytellers than purveyors of the craft of writing. Unfortunately, this kind of attitude only adds to the sometimes deserved, sometimes not, reputation genre fiction has gained of being entertaining, but terribly written.

Sometimes the authors put it in terms of, which is more important, grammar or voice? Angela James, editor at Carina Press, Harlequin’s digital imprint, answered this question on her blog a little while ago. For some reason, it’s just now eliciting discussion on the email loops.

Quite indignant discussion, too.

It’s as if people have finally discovered that they *were* supposed to learn all those silly grammar rules in grade school and that there is real life application for them after all. Especially if one is, erm, trying to make a professional career out of it. By throwing “voice” into the argument, an author is trying to make the bid that the creative aspect is more important.

Of course the individual creativity a writer brings to her story is important, but without a solid foundation, art is simply a heap of stuff.

You don’t hear architects complaining that they shouldn’t have to learn structural engineering and the laws of physics, because the creativity they bring to design is more important. Even if the architect is only designing a pretty gazebo for the park instead of an office building, people still expect it not to fall down.

Musicians like to use discordant sounds from time to time, to create a particular feeling, whether it’s classical unease or a rock’n’roll wail – but the musician first must know how to play their instrument.

Painters like Picasso broke the rules. He messed with perspective, light, shadow and contrast to put a new spin on our way of seeing something. That was his art, his voice, as it were. It’s an unmistakable style. However, he spent his early years painting in a crisp, realistic way. He had to first know the rules before he could effectively break them.

People sometimes look at abstract paintings and say “my five-year old could have painted that.” A five-year old could possibly stumble upon something interesting, but only an accomplished artist can first, establish themselves in the community with the credentials of being able to paint well, and second, systematically break those rules in a way that opens our eyes.

To me, it’s key in all of these efforts is to know which rules you’re breaking and why. That makes it art and craft, not accident.

If the structure is good, then the voice shines through. Even if the voice uses a style that deliberately breaks grammar rules, that’s clear to the reader.

It just takes a bit of time and work to smooth out the rumpled bits. A mature writer who applies herself to learning craft will find she’ll gain an enviable sleek and smooth style.

High Functioning

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I was really torn this morning, between the sunset photo and the baby quail pic.

Yeah, I know. Not a whole lot changes in my little world.

I once read that consistency in the rhythm of days is a mark of a mature civilization, and that’s why each day in India is virtually indiscernible from the last. There’s certainly something to be said for a smooth daily schedule, as opposed to the frantic dashing from place to place, forever trying to catch up. I’ve done that and it’s not pretty. It does give you more “things” to mention, though.

This sunset was from Wednesday evening and the baby quail – now with tufts on their heads! – visited yesterday, so I chose prosaic chronology as my guide.

Ideally, if you slow your life down, so it becomes a pleasant cycle of sunsets and sunrises, then you can notice more about the world. I know about what time the quail are likely to come by. I see that the hummingbirds have gone, but the jerichoes have arrived. The bushtits sweep through in their delirious chorus.

There’s a pleasure in being part of their larger pattern.

Schedule is something we all struggle with – usually with the goal of creating a manageable consistency. For writers, scheduling the time to write becomes a major concern, especially if you also work a day job. And if you have kids. And if you have multiple other responsibilities. Even those with the luxury of writing full-time have to manage how they apply themselves, with no timeclock to punch, no supervisor to frown over the long lunch.

I ran across this bit some time ago:

Perhaps the finest writer ever to use speed systematically, however, was W. H. Auden. He swallowed Benzedrine every morning for twenty years, from 1938 onward, balancing its effect with the barbiturate Seconal when he wanted to sleep. (He also kept a glass of vodka by the bed, to swig if he woke up during the night.) He took a pragmatic attitude toward amphetamines, regarding them as a “labor-saving device” in the “mental kitchen,” with the important proviso that “these mechanisms are very crude, liable to injure the cook, and constantly breaking down.”

John Lanchester, “High Style,” The New Yorker, January 6, 2003

I know, right? I can’t get over what his liver must have looked like by the time he died at 66 in 1973. Which isn’t bad, considering how he treated “the cook” all those years. (No, mom, I don’t know what he died of.)

So, I suppose this it the other extreme. This isn’t the Annie Dillard, slow-down-and-observe-the-world approach. This is the fling-yourself-from-one-extreme-to-the-other method. Of course, more than a few people in the 40s through the 60s used chemistry for better living. Don Drake in Mad Men is the new poster child for this kind of thing.

We’ve entered a new era of teetotalling where the Mad Men style of office drinking is unthinkable. Anyone who keeps a glass of vodka by the bed to swill if they wake in the night would be labeled as having serious issues. On the other hand, we still tend to drive ourselves through a frenzy of ups and downs, sometimes with prescription medication, to try to meet all of our obligations and aspirations.

There are worse things than having a slow and quiet day from time to time.

Tee-hee

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The hot air balloon festival has been going on in Albuquerque. This photo was taken by one of my LERA (Land of Enchantment Romance Authors) chapter mates, author Sarah Storme.

I think it’s a fabulous picture.

Sarah is also a scientist, who has had a long time career with the Forest Service and is just now finding success as an author.

Success is a funny thing. First of all, it means different things to different people. A lot of us spend a fair amount of time defining personal success for ourselves. We have to break it out, too. There’s financial comfort, health, love, family, career and art. For some, career and art get to be the same thing. But it isn’t always, and doesn’t have to be.

For writers, it’s easy to focus on the big icons of success: the bestseller lists, the glossy bookstore displays, the admiring reviews. One big dividing line is whether or not one is doing well enough to be a full-time writer. Even this though, can be deceptive, because whether or not a high-earning spouse is involved can make a huge difference, or other, similar factors.

It is, of course, easy to succumb to that most unpleasant of disorders: jealousy.

There’s this young author I know glancingly. She’s on Twitter and is a friend of friends. By young, I mean mid-twenties. She’s enjoying the success of her first published novel, a young adult book that’s being received very well. I would be lying if I said I don’t envy her current literary fortune.

In fact, her name has made the rounds enough that a Big-Time Famous Author mentioned this gal on her blog. The Big-Time Famous Author linked to the young author’s blog, mentioned her book and how she planned to read it. I should add that this Big-Time Famous Author is also one of my all-time favorites, a personal hero and I might just have every book she’s ever written. I was thrilled for young author and mentioned it to her on Twitter. She hadn’t known and went to look. When she came back, she sent me the message “Tee-hee.”

Okay.

To cut her slack, maybe that’s her version of being modest. Maybe she didn’t know what to say. But I came away with the impression that this was just another mention, just another accolade, tra la, tra lay, tee-hee.

I also know she’s young and she doesn’t yet know that these really fabulous things don’t happen all that often. She’s tumbled into fame and adulation early; she maybe thinks things will always be this way. Who knows? Maybe for her they will.

But most likely not. Nobody seems to get the rose-petal path. The universe is forever giving us trials along with the blessings, just to keep it interesting.

It puts me in mind of Scarlett O’Hara’s character arc, and how she went from “fiddle-dee-dee” to “As God is my witness I’ll never go hungry again.”

It’s good to work hard for something, to struggle, to shed a few tears, to sacrifice some blood and flesh. The pain makes the reward all the sweeter. That’s where we grow and build character. It what makes us appreciate success all the more when we achieve it.

Tee-hee.

Feast & Famine

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David and I have started fasting once a week, just for 24 hours.

No – it’s not a religious thing, which is the first question another friend asked me in horror. It’s a health thing.

It’s interesting: we have this built-in cultural fear of going without food. The first question most people ask is if that’s healthy. Between our ancestral, and very real fear, of starving and our modern cultural icons of body-image psychosis that leads to anorexia, the idea of not eating is frightening to us.

But yes, it is healthy. A 24-hour fast once a week cleanses the digestive system and stimulates the immune system. It’s a good practice for warding off chronic disease, especially now that we’re middle-aged. We simply stop eating after dinner on Sunday night, then drink only water until Monday evening, when we break fast with a salad of red cabbage, beets and carrots.

Yeah, it was hard the first few weeks. My blood sugar dropped. I was headachey and dizzy, having a hard time concentrating. After that, my body got a lot better at unlocking the sugar I needed from my fat stores, which is what I want it to get good at doing. My body got a lot better at keeping an even balance, rather than demanding caffeine and sugar to keep going.

The best part is how good I feel the next day. The process leaves me feeling vital and energized.

The most interesting part though, is the food fantasies.

I’ll be working away and suddenly a daydream will seize me. I’ll want a cupcake, more than anything in the world. Or my mouth will suddenly flood with the taste of a baked potato oozing with butter. I’ll think I want food I never eat, or haven’t eaten in years. Sometimes, my brain will try to trick me, but inserting a random thought that I should just pop into the kitchen and grab a cookie. It’s not even being hungry so much as having little temper-tantrums of wanting.

For the first time in my life, I really understand now what emotional-eating is about.

It’s become almost a cliche now. “I ate my emotions” Reese Witherspoon says in defense of her teenage fat in Four Christmases – and it’s a funny line. (Yeah, I know I’m the only person who liked that movie. I laughed and laughed.) But it’s a truism, that much of our eating choices are driven by emotion, not nutrition. We eat to soothe ourselves, to ease the pain of whatever hurts us, to add to the happy.

I’m not saying that’s wrong either. I’m the first one to enjoy that chilled glass of wine. I’ll absolutely gorge on brownies with you to salve the pain of a rejection. Is spaghetti with meatballs one of my favorite comfort foods? Oh yes, yes, yes.

But I think it’s useful to know that. It’s good for me to know that I’m eating my big plate of pasta because it makes me happy, not because my body needs that kind of nutrition.

The other thing fasting does is break the habit of nibbling.

Once I overrule that little pop-up window in my brain that suggest grabbing a cookie, some nuts, a handful of chips, after a while that subroutine stops running. Eating becomes a deliberate choice rather than a habit. Since I work from home, with easy access to a kitchen full of enticing food, I’m pleased to break that particular habit.

Now if I could get people on Twitter to stop sending pictures of their treats…

The Pain Box

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I love the intensity of the color in these begonias, though it’s hard to capture. An ongoing effort to replicate what my eyes see.

In photography class, though, I learned that we can never make photographs that come close to what our eyes see, because our eyes are so much more sensitive and sophisticated. I suppose I knew that, but it’s important to keep in mind.

I was talking with a writer-friend yesterday about writers groups and people who’ve come and gone in our lives. She mentioned a gal who’d been in her group and had quit writing when she was “thisclose” to getting an agent.

I said I think that’s the most difficult time.

It reminds me of a scene in Dune, Frank Herbert’s classic science fiction novel. It’s been a while since I read it, so forgive me if I get the details wrong. As a test, the young hero has to place his hand inside of a box. He’s told he’ll experience excruciating pain in his hand, but if he can withstand the pain and keep his hand in the box, he’ll receive a reward he’s seeking (I forget what). If however, he tries to pull his hand out, a blade will slice his hand off at the wrist.

Most people can’t take the pain and give in to the desire to pull their hand out, losing it forever. Our hero, naturally, overcomes the fear that his hand is being destroyed as it feels, and emerges victorious.

It’s one of those scenes that makes the reader feel good about ourselves. We like to think we’d be like the hero. We would know that our hand is okay and why would you give in and yank it out, if the certainty is losing your hand? And yet, deep down, we all know how really hard it is to persevere when fear and pain become overwhelming.

This is why the “thisclose” is so difficult.

The proximity of great reward somehow makes the pain of rejections and setbacks just that much worse. It’s really difficult to stay there, with your hand in the box. At some point, losing the hand altogether, so you don’t have to wait and suffer a moment more starts to look really attractive.

That’s why people quit a lot of things. And yes, giving up on a dream is a lot like losing a hand. Oh, you’ll live, but you’ll be missing a vital piece of yourself. Something you could have used to do something special.

To all of us with our hands still in the box? Cheers and steady-on.

Low-Hanging Fruit

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We went apple-picking in Tesuque yesterday.

Some friends live on a fairly large property in Tesuque canyon, filled with apple trees. They invited a bunch of us to bring containers and fill them with apples. We shared a potluck dinner. Lovely activity for a golden fall afternoon.

Except apple-picking is hard work.

Lots of bending over to pick up windfall apples, ones shaken from the trees and ones cut off by the pickers. Lots of stretching up to reach the low-hanging fruit – a phrase that has entirely new meaning for me now – and getting tangled in the snarly branches. We only picked for a couple of hours, but it left me a bit tired and sore.

If anyone had asked me how I liked apple-picking, I was ready to say, “this is why my farming grandparents were so hot for all of us to get good educations.”

You guys do this, too, right? Prepare the witty remark, just in case someone asks. The only is, people rarely give you the correct set-up line and instead ask you something else completely unexpected that leaves you floundering for a response.

At any rate, I was thinking of my ancestors and how they spent their days. How apple-picking was probably a cake job for them. It kind of throws the whole writing and publishing business into a different light. There the labor is mostly mental and emotional. And yet, still strenuous for all that.

Last Friday I was chatting with Laura Bickle, whose really excellent book Sparks recently appeared here. We were talking about marketing books and publicity, what’s the most effective approach to spreading the word about your book, and whether the traditional publishers are falling behind. I told Laura about this, that I’d been meaning to post here, apparently since last January:

Tim O’Reilly, the founder and C.E.O. of O’Reilly Media, which publishes about two hundred e-books per year, thinks that the old publishers’ model is fundamentally flawed. “They think their customer is the bookstore,” he says. “Publishers never built the infrastructure to respond to customers.” Without bookstores, it would take years for publishers to learn how to sell books directly to consumers. They do no market research, have little data on their customers, and have no experience in direct retailing. With the possible exception of Harlequin Romance and Penguin paperbacks, readers have no particular association with any given publisher; in books, the author is the brand name. To attract consumers, publishers would have to build a single, collaborative Web site to sell e-books, an idea that Jason Epstein, the former editorial director of Random House, pushed for years without success.

It’s from this New Yorker article, if you care to read the whole thing. The article is on the long side (did I mention it was in the New Yorker?), but very interesting. What grabbed my attention in this bit is the idea that the traditional publishers think their customers are bookstores. I can see how that’s the case. Bookstores, and to a lesser extent, libraries, ordered the books and made all of the purchasing and return decisions. It was up to the bookstores to connect with the actual readers.

Now, however, I can vouch that I now buy almost all of my books electronically, from Amazon or directly from the epublisher or the author. As much as I love bookstores, I rarely go into one anymore. When I do, I usually don’t see what I’m looking for. I follow the recommendations of friends, book bloggers and other authors. Laura mentioned that Wal-Mart no longer will shelve books in the urban fantasy genre, which is what she writes. The big chain bookstores are failing as we see in the news.

It’s a new era. Which is not a bad thing.

Things change. I imagine a lot of us come from farming backgrounds, yet very few of us spend the day laboring to pull our food from the earth. We don’t need to. Why am I not going into bookstores anymore? I don’t need to.

In reality, the customers for books have always been the readers. Bookstores are the middle-man, taking a piece of the profit for the service they provide. As that service declined – you know what I mean, when you could walk into a bookstore and say “I don’t remember the author or the title, but it’s about an autistic kid who thinks he witnesses a murder…” and the lovely bookseller could hand you exactly the thing and recommend six others – we have less need for that middle-man.

The one thing I really miss is the fun of it. I loved spending an hour or two browsing the shelves. The smell of leather armchairs and fresh print. That’s the point of apple-picking, too, to spend an hour or two in the sunshine pulling fruit from the tree.

But the fastest, cheapest way for me to get an apple? Buy one from the store.

Trans-Genre’d

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This reminds me of hot summer afternoons, lying on suburban lawns and watching the clouds drift by. These are from sunrise this morning, though, thus the pink, and I was never up that early in my teenage summers.

Things change.

Irene Goodman, described as a “leading literary agent in New York who has has many New York Times bestsellers,” which means she’s one of the hottest agents out there, authored an article for the September Romance Writers Report. (RWA’s industry magazine.) She titled it “Common Mistakes by New Authors” and lists five mistakes. Of those, three are related to genre:

1. They don’t pick a genre and stick to it.
2. They choose uncommercial subjects.
3. They choose genres that are out of style.

(The other two are about plot and conflict/tension.)

This article immediately annoyed me. I can see her points, sure, but I think the article could be better titled “How to approach your writing like a product.” To me, this is something for the agents to think about, not the writers.

I could be wrong, but hear me out.

Genre is a marketing thing. It’s a false line drawn to give bookstores and libraries a way to shelve books. It’s intended to give readers a way to find the kind of book they love best. Music and movies are divided up the same way. And we have all had that experience, as readers or listeners, of vainly searching the shelves for a particular author or movie, only to resort to the teenage cashier with a slow computer.

“I think this movie is drama, but clearly you guys don’t.”

“Oh! That’s in comedy, actually.”

I have had this conversation any number of times. I’m sure you have, too. And who knows? Maybe the writer and director absolutely believed they’d made a comedy and I’m the odd one focusing on the drama. Or, maybe they made a drama and the marketers said, look! right there, someone laughed! and stamped the nicely selling “Comedy” label on it.

I’m seeing a lot of this from agents lately, that we as authors should know what genre our book is. They consider it fundamental. Irene says that we should pick a nice, fashionable and commercial genre and write exactly that book. This completely ignores the fact that most writers aren’t writing genres, we’re writing stories. Once we’re done, and we’re writing up our queries, we tilt our heads at it and say, “well, it’s got an urban fantasy premise in a non-urban landscape with high fantasy elements and also contemporary romance… I’ll call it dark fantasy.”

Yeah -all you agents out there (I fantasize that you read my blog – I have a rich imagination) are clutching your heads in despair. We’re sorry. We really are. But you knew we were doing this, right?

Fact is, I have two writer friends with books coming out soon, who were coached to revise their books towards one genre or another, after they had the publishing contract. I suspect this happens a lot. And really, both were fine with it. Shape it in this direction? I can do that. Plan it that way to begin with? That means you’re planning a product, not spinning a story. To me, as a writer, the two come from very different places in myself.

I’ve been president of the Fantasy, Futuristic and Paranormal chapter of RWA for almost two years now and a frequent topic of debate is which genre to sandwich a story into. We’re obviously a polyglot of a chapter, with writers of Science Fiction Romance, shape-shifters, time-travel, vampires, swords & sorcery, ghosts, everyday magic. Really, if someone writes anything kind of weird, they end up with us.

I absolutely understand that this is something that publishers, editors and agents have to think about. That’s their business. I suspect it’s an interesting aspect of the business for them. I would think they’d have to get really good at it, to succeed.

However, I think it’s a mistake to exhort writers to get on board that wagon.

And let me say, right here and now, that I do believe the agent/author relationship is a partnership. You have to work together for mutual success. Maybe it’s just me, but it’s very difficult for me to look at my story, which is this great swirling mass in my head of faces and feelings and conflicts and desires, and slap a label on it. If someone else looks at it and says, well, with a few tweaks, it would fit nicely here, I would be grateful.

To me, that’s part of what an agent brings to the relationship. You wrote it, now I’ll help you sell it.

Finally, the other day I watched Oprah’s interview of JK Rowling on You Tube. (It’s well worth watching and broken out into segments so you don’t have to commit to the whole thing at once.) At one point, Rowling talks about signing the publishing contract for the first Harry Potter and how her agent said, congratulations, but you’ll never make any money writing children’s books.

Of course, Rowling is now the only billionaire writer in the world.

I totally don’t hold this against her agent. Harry Potter could be slotted as a children’s book and they didn’t make money at that time. They were uncommercial and unfashionable. But if you walk into a store today, to buy a Harry Potter book – do you head for the children’s section?

Yes, I know Harry Potter was an unpredictable phenomenon. Like Twilight, like a bunch of others we could name. They broke new ground, because they were new stories. Genres lines are bent to accommodate them.

Things change.

I wonder, if those new writers had followed Ms. Goodman’s advice, would they have written those books? Of course, 99% of us will never become phenomena like them, so maybe it’s good advice for the working writer. And yet, I think most of us write, not to churn out a product, but because we become obsessed with a story.

Of course, we’d love to sell it, too. Have patience with us. Help us out here.

Maybe it’s really a High Paranormal Fantasy?