Unfortunately, my next book The Cradle has been delayed somewhat.
I’m doing my damnedest to have it available in time for Christmas. But it’s going to be tight. I’m not entirely sure I can make it.
Until things get sorted out, you can read or listen to the first twenty pages or so here.
Last week, a return by those dastardly Russian Pornspammers prevented me from recording the first section from my new book The Cradle for The Gospel of Thomas podcast.
Yблюдки.
However, it appears now that we’ve driven back the red (and slightly sticky) menace.
So the long-promised episode should be recorded and posted sometime tomorrow (Tuesday) evening. Heck, I might even turn on the Writer Cam just in case anyone wants to eavesdrop on the recording session.
Before the actual bloggery begins, I just wanted to give a shout out for my friends in New Zealand. You’re all in my thoughts and prayers.
And, to everyone everywhere else… you should all go make a donation to the NZ Red Cross right now.
Seriously. They need all the help they can get.
——-
Everything is slightly off-kilter these days. I’ve been finding it difficult to stay awake much past 10pm and, if I do manage it, all I seem capable of doing is staring at the television — whether it is switched on or not. In fact, a blank wall will do just as well.
As a result, my usually predictable writing schedule has been stuck in first gear, grinding and whining and producing inordinate amounts of psychological smoke to blanket my mind in thick, cloying fumes.
Mostly, I just want to sleep.
This is uncommon for me. All I can think is that, despite my deep and abiding love of winter, I’m somehow suffering from some mild seasonal affect disorder or a soul-crunching depression brought on by B-vitamin deficiency. This seems unlikely, as I have spent fifteen winters in the Midwest with no perceivable ill-effects. But perhaps it is cumulative.
Possibly I am only dying.
It was in this condition that I wrote a fairly long post that began I’ve been thinking about belief a lot lately… but after a week of poking these concept with the blunt stick that is my current mind, I gained enough lucidity to recognize it as the diseased offspring of a crippled animal and had it put down.
Why I was so fixated on this for a while escapes me. It had something to do with Scientology, though. And Science Fiction authors. And leaving people’s beliefs alone. I forget the rest.
Trust me, you have missed out on nothing.
I also wrote a long essay on the work of fanboy-favorite-who-will-one-day-be-exposed-for-the-charlatan-he-is Grant Morrison detailing why the rumor of him taking a crack at Captain Marvel fills me with nothing short of Jihadist-level rage.
That too was a post best left unpublished. Even mentioning it here is dodgy enough. Morrison fans can sometimes be a little aggressive in their preservation of the Emperor’s wardrobe.
And so, in the tradition of The Bloggess, I humbly offer the following Shit I Did When I When My Brain Wasn’t Here.
(It’s an homage, dammit. Be glad I didn’t use the picture of me in hair curlers.)
Meet Marshall
If you want to know what the by-product of my aforementioned mental condition looks like, check out the latest episode of The Gospel of Thomas. In addition to a thankfully brief audio version of my blog post on belief, you get a sneak preview from my forthcoming novel Pantheon. The episode was originally meant to be posted for the holidays late last year but, again, my brain betrayed me. It sat on my hard drive for a few weeks before I realized that it hadn’t actually been posted. By way of penance, I included a longer section from the book as well.
There’s plenty more where that came from, of course. So consider subscribing to the show via iTunes or RSS, won’t you?
“Dad? Are you famous yet?”
There’s been a fan page out on Facebook for a while now — which is really important and relevant these days, what with all that stuff in the media about those people revoluting and whatnot in the Mid East. Every time you click the “like” button, a dictator falls. At least, that’s what they keep saying on the news.
(My daughter asked me the question. Let’s not let the little lady down, folks…)
Neil Gaiman, Pirate
“You’re not losing sales by getting stuff out there. When I do a big talk now on these kinds of subjects and people ask “What about the sales you are losing by having stuff floating out there?” I started asking the audience to raise their hands for one question — Do you have a favorite author? And they say yes and I say good. What I want is for everybody who discovered their favorite author by being lent a book put up your hand. Then anybody who discovered their favorite author by walking into a book story and buying a book. And it’s probably about 5-10%, if that, of the people who discovered their favorite author who is the person they buy everything of and they buy the hardbacks. And they treasure the fact they’ve got this author. Very few of them bought the book. They were lent it. They were given it. They did not pay for it. That’s how they found their favorite author. And that’s really all this is; it’s people lending books.”
(Okay, not really. But I thought this interview was fascinating. More and more, these ideas — Free Economic Models, Independent Publishing, Crowdsourced Project Financing, etc. — are making their way into mainstream discussions. This is a good thing.)
Alan Moore, Hero
“I am very concerned about the kids today which might grow up without this access. I am very against taking literacy away from people. Education must not be a privilege for the well-off.”
Amen to that.
If only every endangered library had their very own magician to protect them, the world would be a better place.
(Yep. Definitely a hero.)
Reports of My Being Boring Were Greatly Exaggerated
I’ve been reading The Autobiography of Mark Twain — well, I’ve been listening to it — and I’m somewhat surprised to find that I’m enjoying it. After all of the faintly negative response on the publication last month, I was prepared for a real grind. But something told me that maybe, just maybe, all of the grumbling from critics had less to do with Twain and more to do with certain academic axes they had to grind.
What you’ve heard is true. Yes, the non-Twain introduction and textual explanations are fairly tedious. Yes, it’s a haphazard bundle of rough notes, dictation, and digressions that, in many cases, even Twain didn’t necessarily intend to publish. Yes, fine.
It’s also great.
The actual writing is, for the most part, electrifying. Even when mired in the mundane, Twain’s prose is startlingly good.* And he’s often laugh-out-loud funny. His ability to turn a compliment into an insult, like a trapeze artist effortlessly performing a mid-air flip, is amazing. I imagine that anyone on the receiving end of one of these would sit there with his mouth open and feel fortunate that the Great One took the time to even notice his existence.
I’m only about halfway through right now. The best part so far has been Twain’s response to a friend who did some edits to an essay without asking first. Twain spends a fair amount of time thanking him for his efforts and, with increasing venom, lambasting his audacity and ignorance.
It’s been a while since I mentioned it but…
…today is the Twenty-third of February.
Omnia mutantur nos et mutamur in illis, y’all.
And finally…
…I wasn’t kidding around. Go make a donation to the New Zealand Red Cross.
——-
* Opinions may vary. But I’m totally right about Grant Morrison.
Cool and quiet fish, that’s me…
It’s been a busy time. For the first year that I can remember, I find myself starting to get a little overwhelmed by all of the activity and bustle around the holidays.
Business trips, end of the year client deadlines, visits from grandparents, and the general craziness of life itself . . . and suddenly I want to go to bed at 9PM every night.
Sometimes, that’s exactly what I did.
Which is why I’ve been so quiet here and on Twitter and elsewhere.
Fortunately, things have calmed down a bit now. December is still hectic and busy . . . but I think I’ll make it from here on out.
Tea with Winterly
Woke up with Sophie this morning and came downstairs to find the air outside filling up with snow. Apart from a storm a few week’s back, we haven’t gotten very much this season. Yet.
But my baby daughter looked out at the whirling air and held out her hands, trying to touch the fat flakes as they drifted past the window. Later, we put out seeds and nuts for the squirrels.
The Winter Solstice is near. This is my favorite time of year, for so many reasons — not the least of which is how beautiful the world outside becomes. To me, there’s nothing lovelier than the face of Winter.
The squirrels got their treats today. And you might want to check back in here around teatime on December 21st. Winterly might have some more things to share in celebration of the solstice.
Just saying.
Filed Under “Yay.”
Good news last week. Matters of Mortology won the “Frightening Fiction” award at BookRix, after having been nominated as a wildcard along with the other finalists.
Most everyone said nice things, which made me very happy and grateful. And the judges were especially kind, both with their praise and their criticism.
You can read some of the community comments here. And, of course, you can get a copy of the book for your very own if you are so inclined.
Winning vs. “Winning”
Despite a few points where my word count seriously flatlined, I managed to complete my first NaNoWriMo.
What I enjoyed most (apart from the writing) was the friend connection, writing along with everyone else. It made me miss my old writer’s group a little bit.
I don’t know that it’s accurate or fair to say I “won” NaNoWriMo but I finished the two projects that I’d wanted to get done and made the 50k wordcount with a little bit of time to spare.
One project was an adaptation of my play The Red Boy. The other project was a push to finish a new short-ish story called The Cradle. That’s the one that’s got Jee in it, in case you were wondering.
So, I’m a little bit of a cheaterpants for the adaptation. Maybe next year I’ll start something from scratch.
They said it couldn’t be done, but…
…approximately ninety percent of my NaNoWriMo efforts were done on the iPad. About half the time, I used a wireless keyboard. But I also made good use of the onscreen keyboard as well. At no point was this a problem or impediment for me — if anything, it dramatically improved my ability to work. Anywhere.
And after a lot of trial and error with different software and methods for synchronizing, I decided Evernote was the only way to get a reliable sync between various devices (computer, iPhone, iPad). Although Scrivener is my preferred writing environment, the lack of an iPad version was a problem. And seeing data loss when I tested Dropbox as a hub for SimpleNote, I said phooey and went ahead with Evernote — which is probably what I should have done in the first place.
I still prefer Scrivener, though. Everything’s tucked safely away in there now, waiting for rewrites in January/February.
There’s been a lot of debate recently about whether or not the iPad is a consumption or creation device. From my perspective, both sides of that argument seem to be missing the point.
It’s both.
At least, mine is. Your results may vary. I tend to want to write no matter what I have to work with. I’ve been known to resort to post — it’s and the backs of business cards, when nothing else was at hand. One of the first sequences in Pantheon was written in crayon on a paper menu (and I’ll thank you to keep your smart-alec comments until after you’ve read it).
Just saying, you can write anywhere, with anything, if you’ve the mind to.
Coming Soon
Speaking of consumption, December is an Aurohn month — which is to say, a lot of my time will be spent getting things ready to be published.
At the top of the list is getting the 10th anniversary edition of Samantha Dunn’s Not by Accident ready for printing. As this is the first non-me book to come out from Aurohn Press, it’s pretty darn exciting. And Dunn’s memoir is outstanding. That she trusted us to bring it back into print is a genuine honor.
Time permitting, the iBook edition of Matters of Mortology will finally arrive as well. A lot of people have been asking for this one, so expect some special introductory pricing as a reward for your patience.
And I’m also laying the groundwork for both Assam & Darjeeling and Matters of Mortology to appear on a few other platforms like the Nook, Google Books, and more.
Stay tuned, more details to come.
The Cradle will Rock
When my daughter Julia found out that there was another Jee story in the works, she did her best to try and convince me it would be okay to let her read the first draft. I assured her that it wasn’t. My first drafts are pretty rough sometimes, and this one is no exception.
(I should say, this is not a sequel to Assam & Darjeeling by any stretch. It’s just that I know there’s more going on with Jee. And I want to tell those stories. This one has goats, for instance. And a lot of rain.)
That being said, I’m very happy with the story overall. It worked out pretty well and I’m looking forward to cleaning it up once it’s had a chance to hang and cure for a while. Not quite sure how I’ll share it with everyone once it’s finished. It’s definitely one I’m looking forward to reading aloud, so you can plan on it showing up in iTunes as either an addendum to the book or an episode of The Gospel of Thomas.
Speaking of which…
…I discovered this weekend that my Halloween episode got lost in the aether, apparently never showing up on iTunes or in the RSS feed. It’ll be fixed this weekend. And there’s a new one coming next week for the holidays — a sneak peek at a few pages from Pantheon, just to apologize for the technical problems.
From the Mailbag
This came in last week…
“My mother died very unexpectedly about three years ago. . . . Shortly after her death, I came across the Assam and Darjeeling podcast. At first I thought I was morbid for enjoying it so much, but as I listened I realized I was slowly working though saying good-bye to my mom. I have no idea how or why it happened, I’m just glad it did. When I think of where my mom is… what she’s doing… how she’s feeling… I almost always think of you and your book…”
Well. There’s no way to feel about that, except humble and grateful. And I am.
And finally…
Since it went on sale earlier this year, Assam & Darjeeling has sold about 145 copies (hardcover, softcover, and Kindle combined). While that’s not a staggering amount of books sold, over 3,000 people have downloaded the free PDF. As near as I can tell, the free audiobook version has seen about 24,000 downloads from all over the world (that’s a jump of ten thousand in the past month or so).
Lots of these people have written to me, to let me know what they thought of the book. Which pretty much makes my day, every single time.
I write for a lot of different reasons but, well, that e-mail from last week is about the best thing I could ever hope to do with one of my books.
I’ve been thinking a lot about this lately. In the span of about a week, someone very kindly nominated Matters of Mortology for an award (and it won), someone wrote me the e-mail you see above, and someone else called me an amateur.
I don’t know that I’m a particularly masterful writer, in terms of using the language or doing particularly good things with the words themselves. I have a lot of quirks and idiosyncrasies, I wander down tangents and overwrite everything to death, I don’t follow a lot of the accepted rules of grammar or vocabulary (chiefly because I’m rather ignorant of most of them).
If I do manage to put the right words together in the right way once in a great while, it’s just dumb luck or the gods lending a hand. Hard, long effort can sometimes nudge a few of them into the right place as well.
What I hope is that, underneath it all, there’s something there. An idea, a character, an energy that might resonate with someone. I take it on faith that this will happen from time to time — if I am lucky, if I work very hard, if the gods are kind.
It’s coming up on the year’s end. This has been a good one for me and mine — we end it weighed down with unexpected kindness and undeserved generosity.
Like I said, humble and grateful.
Put on your grass skirt and coconut brassiere, it’s time for another Link Luau.
From the How to Make My Day Dept.
Over at SFF Audio a few weeks back, three very nice people saw fit to devote a fair amount of time to heaping praise all over “Assam & Darjeeling”.
Click here to listen to the squee-worthy episode. They cover a lot of interesting topics in each show, so it’s well worth subscribing to.
Take Your Pick
It’s official. “Assam & Darjeeling” is now available for your iPad. Just search for it in the iBooks store. In case you’re keeping track: You can now read it in paperback, hardcover, on your Kindle, iPhone, iPad, or listen to the free audiobook. Hell, ask me nicely and I’ll pop ’round and act it out in your basement, den, or rumpus room.
A few people have asked and yes, there will be an iBook/iPad version of Matters of Mortology as well. Look for it sometime around Hallowe’en.
Correction
Apparently some crazy person snuck in and added a few lines of insanity to one of my recent posts, promising a new book this summer.
The aforementioned lunatic has been apprehended and is currently locked in the basement awaiting extradition to the attic.
So. No new book this year. We apologize for the inconvenience.
The Intermittent Wossname
For those of you who are wondering about the new baby, those darn eyes appear to be getting bigger and bluer by the day. It’s hereditary so there’s probably nothing to be done. She’ll just have to learn to live with ‘em.
From the Like I Don’t Have Enough to Do Dept.
I’ve never gone in for National Novel Writing Month. When it rolls around each year, I’ve always got a project in the works and don’t want to slow down or take a month off. Also, a month seems like a very short amount of time to, y’know, write a whole damn book. But it’s what all the cool kids are doing these days.
As it stands right now, I just might find myself in a spot to participate this year. It’s a hard call. I really ought to kickstart “Pantheon” once again — woefully neglected during all the new babyness of the past few months — but there’s a faint echo in the back of my head that could turn out to be a very nice little book, something that’s possible to crank through in a month. Especially if I break the rules a teensy bit, which I just might do.
And I very much like the idea of having something new this year.
(I know, I said no new book this year. But we’ll see…)
Spreading the Good News
But if you’re hankering for something new to read from Your Obedient Savant, might I recommend a semi-steady diet of short, easily consumed pieces from The Gospel of Thomas? Each episode is lovingly prepared and served up piping hot. And our handy downloadable PDF provides carry-out curbside service to keep pace with your modern on-the-go lifestyle.
We’ve already got a handful of episodes out there, with a lot more in the works: Everything from poetry to plays to short stories to odd little things that don’t quite fit anywhere else. In addition, I’ll be giving listeners sneak peeks (sneak listens?) at a brand new Jee story as well as sections from my new novel “Pantheon” in progress.
Exciting stuff.
Broadcast News
And speaking of Listening to Things That Sound A Lot Like Me, there’s been a big surge in listeners to all of my podcasts/audiobooks.
Since October of 2009, “Assam & Darjeeling” has seen over 14,000 downloads from all around the world. We’ve only been tracking for a year or so, but the book has been out there since 2007 — which is when it was first offered as a free audiobook/podcast download on iTunes. So it’s safe to assume that those numbers are potentially much, much higher.
Unfortunately, the data for “Matters of Mortology” appears to be corrupted and I don’t have entirely reliable data to share. I’m just going to say “lots and lots” of people have been downloading it since 2008 when it first launched. But don’t let that stop you from giving it a listen (iTunes or RSS).
My latest podcast is an anthology show called The Gospel of Thomas (which you should already know about from reading the blurb above, unless you weren’t really paying attention). It’s been running since May of this year, with approximately 1,000 downloads so far. You can subscribe to it on iTunes as well or listen via RSS.
Yay. Aren’t numbers fun?
The Book of Love
A few weeks back I had this idea that it might be fun to start up an online book club — just a little group of us getting together online to chat about a book or two. I put out a few feelers and enough people chimed in with some interest, so we took the plunge.
Our first book is Kij Johnson’s excellent The Fox Woman and the conversation’s just getting started over in our new Forums section.
Even if you’re a little bit behind, it’s not too late to pick up a copy of the book and join us. Glad to have you along.
(And we’re looking for other books to read in our next round, so throw one of your own favorites into the mix.)
“She is Theology in Flames”
Imagine you’re best friends with the reigning mad genius of comicdom, the author of seminal works that, twenty odd years later, continue to dominate best seller lists and inspire generations of new readers, artists, and writers… Best friends with a self-proclaimed magus who stages public workings, exploring and exposing the parallels between quantum physics and the Kabbalah, among other topics… And imagine he sets his sights on your life story, tracing your own winding path up the Tree of Life, eavesdropping on your (albeit a mad enterprise in it’s own right) wooing of the moon goddess Selene.
“Unearthing” — Alan Moore’s latest work (and possibly his latest working, I can’t quite say) employs all of his storytelling magic (literally) in the exploration of his boyhood chum Stephen Moore (no relation). A study in the evolution of a powerdork (not a pejorative term, I assure you), “Unearthing” moves through the strata of human existence — from the physical to more ethereal realms.
The piece hinges on a late-night invocation of the goddess Selene — a startling and puzzling episode late in the story that exposes more questions than it answers. Whatever might have happened on that night in Alan Moore’s Northampton flat, it’s clear from his account that something most certainly happened — a shared numinous experience that not even drugs or insanity can explain away.
It’s an amazing work, difficult to classify and certainly not something that every listener will find accessible. Like his other workings, Alan Moore so densely layers the images and language in “Unearthing” that a single listen leaves you with anecdotes and impressions, whereas repeated playings deepen the experience to the point where you occupy the mind of each Moore in turn — the lonely wandering in search of his goddess . . . and the acute observer chronicling the journey, even as he drifts from the role of spectator into that of participant.
“Unearthing” serves as the latest layer in Alan Moore’s exploration of the mystical levels of consciousness. Glimmers of it appear in his early work on Swamp Thing, complimented by brief flashes in Watchmen before he picks up momentum in his masterpiece From Hell. For a shorthand overview of his creative and magical mindset, there is the excellent “Mindscape” documentary (available on iTunes and Amazon).
But the purest expression of his mystic evolution and exploration is found in his “workings” — verbal performances to which the label “spoken word” does not do justice. Most of his previous workings are available on CD either through Top Shelf Publishing or for astronomically ridiculous prices on eBay.
Fortunately, “Unearthing” is much easier to get a hold of. You can either spring for the deluxe, limited edition box set from Lex Records or download the stripped down audio version from iTunes.
After my iPad post a few weeks ago, this picture cracked me up.
Is the phrase “T.M. Camp is mine.” either
(a) What the bill collectors whisper when I answer the phone late at night.
(b) The opening salvo in a cease-and-desist letter from the director of a Transcendental Meditation retreat.
(c) The start of a very, very, very nice compliment I received in a recent e-mail.
Answer below.
Last week people on Twitter fought and kicked and clawed to get their hands on free copies of Assam & Darjeeling and Matters of Mortology.
Well, maybe it wasn’t that violent. But thanks for playing along anyways, kids. The books have all shipped. Hope you enjoy them.
And if you weren’t one of the lucky ones this time around, we’ll do it again sometime. I promise. It was too much fun not to.
Don’t forget: If you really, really want to read one of my books you could always buy a copy. All you have to do is click on one of the covers over there on the right.
It’s worth noting that Lulu has free shipping all summer long, Amazon and Barnes & Noble are selling it with a big discount right now. And people are also ordering autographed copies directly. And there’s also a nice, crisp free-to-download PDF out there for each one, too.
Just saying…
Jay Garrick’s Lament, The SequelBack when my first child was born and I was supremely unprepared for the impact of a new baby in my life, I had a schedule that allowed for four to five hours of uninterrupted writing time every night. It’s almost sixteen years later and, boy oh boy, have times changed.
I have less time now, of course. And I’m way better prepared, having been through this a few times now.
Even so, Sophie is kicking the crap out of me.
She’s pretty darn cute, though.
Either the extremity of sleep deprivation utterly wiped out any memory of how hard these first months are, or she’s come to earth with powers and abilities far beyond those of ordinary mortals.
All of which is to say that the “forthcoming” joke on the Acknowledgements page of Assam & Darjeeling sounds less and less funny to me every day.
I started a short story just before Sophie was born — it’s the next Jee story, as a matter of fact — and the baby’s early arrival threw me off kilter for weeks. I did my best to chip away at the story a little bit here and there, but it wasn’t long before my momentum had flagged and I’ve been struggling to get it rolling again.
It’s driving me a bit crazy, to be honest. It’s not writer’s block. I’ve got it all together and ready to go. The story is right there, ready to be written. But it needs the full flood of effort and not the few rivulets I can squeeze out here and there.
(The delay hasn’t been a total washout, however. In the intervening weeks, I’ve made a few discoveries — minor things for the most part, little conversations and images scattered here and there. But they were worth the wait, so I shouldn’t complain too much. One bit in particular is something I’m very proud of, although I suspect I didn’t come up with it. Writing, for me, always feels like I’m eavesdropping on someone else, something Other. Metaphysical blog post on this topic to follow.)
Someone asked me about my process recently, specifically how I kickstart something that’s lost traction. Here was part of my answer…
“What works best for me is to start over. If I’ve been away from something for a period of time and find I can’t quite pick it up again — even though there’s no earthly reason why I shouldn’t be able to — I’ll read everything through as far as I’ve gotten and then do a quick sketch of the story: It’s overall shape, the sequence of events, an inventory of important things to include. Once I have that, I’ll start writing again from the beginning, transcribing my original draft and tweaking it as I go along, referring to my sketch whenever I have something new to incorporate. Usually by the time I get to the end of the previous text — the spot where it stalled — I’ve got a full head of steam built up again, and I can just keep chugging along.”
Hey, works for me.
Once the new story’s done, it’s time to wake up poor little Pantheon and get it rolling again. There’s a lot of work there, a big book waiting to be written — so it’s going to take a lot of work.
And, honestly, I’ve no idea how long it’ll take. I’d like to think I can have a first draft done by the end of the year. But there’s no way to know. All I can do is write as much as possible, as fast as possible.
Well. It’ll take whatever it takes.
Now that it’s Summer, my coworkers enjoy opening the office doors in the afternoon. This brings in the breeze as well as large black flies and even the occasional wasp. They buzz around my head, retreating to tap against the top of the tall windows next to my desk. Eventually, they come back to divebomb me again. It’s maddening.
I have a deep, intense, and slightly pathological dislike of flying insects.
As I type this, my skin is crawling. I’m like Matt Cable over here.
Speaking of which, I stopped drinking alcohol when Sophie was born. It’s not like I was a falling down drunk or anything, but I probably knocked it back more than most people usually do — typically late at night while I was writing.
So, faced with a unpredictable sleep schedule, an increasingly complicated set of priorities, and rapidly evolving stress levels… Well, the last thing I needed was “a psychoactive drug that has a depressant effect” (Shut up, Wikipedia.)
I haven’t really missed it at all. I find that I’ve got no desire for it. I’m not anti-drinking or anything like that. I’m just walking past that aisle in the grocery store now. And it’s become a little bit of an interesting exercise for me, even a challenge. I don’t have a set timeframe, so there’s a bit of “Let’s see how long I can go…” underlying it all. It’s also interesting to see how people react when the subject comes up. Some get a little twitchy and uncertain, as though I’m one Michelob Ultra away from becoming Montgomery Clift.
Really. I’ve just got a baby girl to take care of, after all. I pretty much did the same thing when her older brother and sister were born.
Recently, someone on Twitter mentioned they were reading Stephen King’s On Writing which led to an interesting conversation between a few of us about what we liked and/or hated about the book. I didn’t mention it at the time, but I’d already been thinking about King and his book. Parts of it are surprisingly personal and frankly confessional. I enjoy the memoir aspect of it most of all, and his revelation about his own addiction was startling.
However, one of my main points of irritation is King’s assertion that most (if not all) writers are drug addicts and/or alcoholics. He essentially claims that “we’re just wired that way.”
Call it denial, but I don’t buy that at all.
Tea on the other hand? Now that’s a drug I won’t be giving up any time soon.
“T.M. Camp is mine. No I’m not a stalker and definitely not insane..what I mean is…well, maybe it’s a little hard to put into words but just like you I have shelves dedicated to Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman and Dave Sim…but everyone…everyone knows them…at least now anyway with the success of movies. But I DISCOVERED “Assam and Darjeeling” on the iTunes podcast. I don’t care if you wrote it and created it…I found you…”
I love getting e-mail like that. Seriously. That sort of thing makes my day.
Assam & Darjeeling is just starting to get out there and the early response overall has been very positive. We’re seeing reviews go up on Amazon and Barnes & Noble, as well as sites like Goodreads and LibraryThing. But more wouldn’t hurt. So don’t be afraid to put your own out there, if you’re so inclined.
And if you really want to help out, go into your local bookseller and ask them to order you a copy. Do it three or four times, tell them how much you like the book and that you’re buying copies for all your friends. Don’t forget to mention how much you wish I’d come to your town for a signing/reading.
You never know what might come of it.
Copies are going out to bloggers and reviewers as well. If you fall into one of those categories, you can request a review copy directly from Aurohn Press.
Some very nice people have asked me when my next book is coming out. Having blown through Assam & Darjeeling and Matters of Mortology, they’re reduced to subsisting on The Gospel of Thomas and whatever clever things I manage to say on Facebook or Twitter.
As I said above, the next novel is a ways off. If you listen in to The Gospel of Thomas, you’ll probably hear excerpts over time. And eventually it’ll have it’s own free audiobook/podcast. But we’re easily a year away from being able to buy a copy. Unfortunately.
However, it occurred to me recently that I actually have a few older books that are just a few steps from being ready for the world. I haven’t talked about them much here. In fact, very few people have even seen them. In all honesty, I’d forgotten about them until late last night when I was moving a few things around in my office.
Through no fault of their own, I don’t think about these stories much in the context of the rest of my work — although, upon reflection, they fit in rather well. I created them for very personal reasons, as one-off gifts for people over the years.
But a few of you had been asking for new work and I’ve been thinking about that. I read comics, after all. I know what it’s like to wait for the next thing to come out, and wait… and wait… and wait…
And there they were: Two books sitting on the shelf all polite and patient, just waiting for me to remember them.
So. That being said, Aurohn Press has tentatively added them to the 2010 schedule. If all goes well, the first “new” book will be released this August.
I should mention that it’s a children’s book, of sorts. A picture book.
It’s called The Jupiter Egg.
“The enemy of most authors is not piracy but obscurity.”
— Dave Charest
About a year ago, I experienced what some might describe as a moment of clarity, one of those points where your perspective changes and you find yourself unable to go back to the way it was before.
Sometimes these are small moments, a sudden flash of intuition in a situation reveals a whole level of understanding you didn’t previously possess. Other times it’s something more profound, an evolution in your perspective that forever alters how you view the world.
Last year I asked myself a question and, without meaning to, I nudged myself into a different mode of thinking that completely re-framed how I thought about my writing.
Simply put, the question was “What do I want?”
The answer came almost immediately: “I want people to read my work.”
Ultimately, my goal as a writer — my reason for writing at all — is not to be famous, to get rich, to go on Oprah, or land a movie deal. I know plenty of writers who want those things, who write in order to achieve them. And while I would not shy away from those opportunities if they were given to me, they are not why I started writing and they’re not why I’ve kept writing all these years.
Mostly, I just want people to read what I’ve written.
And so I asked myself another question: “How can I make that happen?”
“Refine my synopsis yet again” was not the answer…
“Write the perfect query letter” was not the answer…
And even “Find an agent” or “Get a publisher” was not the answer…
Oddly enough, the answer wasn’t any of the conventional things that the industry traditionally tells all authors — things that I’d been doing for years in the hopes that I might get lucky.
No, the answer was a lot more obvious: “You want people to read it? Share it with everyone. Put it out there as far and wide as you can, make it easily available and free to anyone who might want to read it.”
That’s actually not a big a stretch — at least, not for me. Since the earliest days of this website back in 1997, I’ve been putting my stories, poems, and plays out there for people to download. And both “Assam & Darjeeling” and “Matters of Mortology” have gotten a great response on the strength of their availability on iTunes as free audiobooks. As has my latest podcast “The Gospel of Thomas”.
So. That being said…
I get e-mails every few weeks from people who have listened to one of my free audiobooks, asking how they can buy a “real” copy of their own.
Well, now you can.
You’ve probably noticed already those links over there for downloading or buying my novels Assam & Darjeeling and Matters of Mortology.
Take a look. For each of them, there’s a link to download an electronic copy of the book free of charge. If you do, feel free to share it around, e-mail it to friends you think might like it, or post it on your blog. That’s what it’s there for. And if you really like it and want to buy a copy you can hold in your hot little hands, there’s a link for that too. Right now there’s free shipping if you buy it through Lulu Marketplace.
Or I’ll even sign a copy and send it to you. People seem to like that too.
However you choose, I’m grateful for your interest in my work and I hope you’ll drop me a line and let me know what you thought of it.
And if you like, take a minute to head out to iTunes or Amazon or Goodreads or Barnes & Noble or anywhere else — give it a rating, write a review, let the rest of the world know what you thought of it. I’ll be very, very grateful.
Like the man said…
“I know books are as lively, and as vigorously productive, as those fabulous Dragons teeth; and being sown up and down, may chance to spring up armed men.”
— John Milton
(The weather has drifted down into the cooler temperatures, slowing everything down a little bit more each day — including this this blog post, which I’ve rewritten and added to three or four six times to reflect the changing reality over the past couple of weeks month. And so, I’m hurrying to post it before anything else happens again to force another rewrite.)
Sharing your work with people online produces a variety of outcomes. One of my favorites is waking up to fan mail from someone on the other side of the world. One of my least favorites is waking up to rejection notices, like I did a few mornings ago.
In related news, my “Chimera” project is on the market for anyone looking for a good science-fiction/action series. Otherwise, it’s going back in the file cabinet and will likely serve as raw material for the novel I’ll write after I finish the one I’m going to write after I finish the one I’m writing now.
Go ahead and try diagramming that last sentence, kids. But don’t blame me if your head explodes.
Speaking of recursive oddities: The advertising agency I work for specializes in differentiation — that is, helping our clients identify and promote the things that make them stand out in the marketplace. Our corporate tagline is “Exactly Like Nobody Else” and the company bought all of us very nice Land’s End shirts with the logo and tagline embroidered on them. The irony of everyone here having the same shirt reading “Exactly Like Nobody Else” wasn’t immediately apparent, but it’s now impossible to ignore — particularly on days like today, when seven out of the ten employees all wore our shirts. The atomic weight of such recursive irony could collapse around us and form a black hole. Of shirts.
In my last post, I mentioned I was finishing up a new play called “Drawing Away”. Well, it’s all done and you can find out more about it (and download a copy) on the Works page. If you do give it a look, let me know what you think.
With that out of the way, the next revision on my list was some long-overdue refinements to my adaptation of “The Odyssey”. A week or so back, someone who worked on the original production at Northwestern College contacted me to see if the script was available for production at a theatre in Illinois . . . which put just the right amount of heat under my efforts to get things cleaned up. I got everything done just in time to send it off to their selection committee last week and I’ve also put up a copy here for everyone else. As always, let me know what you think.
It was interesting, coming back to those scripts after such a long time. As I said in my post last week, “Drawing Away” is a reboot of the first play I ever wrote — taking the basic premise and reworking it around a slightly different plot and cast of characters. I ended up using much more of the original dialogue than I’d planned; through no grand planning on my part, it just seemed to fit better into the plot than I expected. All in all, I like this version better. But check back in another twenty years.
Tightening up “The Odyssey” presented a different set of challenges. By the time it got to the rehearsal process, I’d done nearly fifteen drafts on the script. The original text, of course, is a massive and wandering story — and I spent most of my time trying to figure out how to do it justice without getting lost forever among the twist and turns. Coming back to it now, I was pleasantly surprised at how well I’d managed on the whole thing. Here’s hoping the selection committee agrees.
(The production at Northwestern was a lot of fun. The music in particular has stayed with me. The composer did an excellent job with the score and I’ve always regretted losing touch with him before I could get a copy of it for myself. Reading back through the script again, I could still hear the haunting voices singing . . . fortunately, I have a DVD of a brush-up rehearsal and was able to pull the scene out and share it here. These, of course, are the sirens…)
mega kudos Achaiônn, nêa katastêson,
hina nôiterên op akousêis.
ou gar pô tis têide parêlase nêi melainêi,
prin g’ hêmeôn meligêrun
apo stomatôn op’ akousai,
all’ ho ge terpsamenos
neitai kai pleiona eidôs…
The next major revision will probably be an adaptation I did of Calderon’s “Life is a Dream” from a few years back. Once I catch my breath, I mean.
It seems strange to think of it now, but there was a time when I was convinced that I was only a playwright. With the exception of the occasional poem or short story, everything I wrote was meant to be performed by live human beings in front of live human beings. This wasn’t by design or even preference, however. Everything that took shape in my head naturally seemed to gravitate towards the stage. There were a couple of odd things here and there — good ideas I still haven’t figured out how to write in any form — but it was overwhelmingly obvious that I was a playwright, first and foremost. For whatever reason that was where my creative energy naturally flowed (some people have offered their theories about this but I won’t get into those here).
Somewhere along the way and 30+ plays later, the tide has shifted . . . well, broadened might be a better way to describe it. There are a lot of different tributaries branching off of that flow now. If anything, it’s the theatre branch that’s the weakest these days (the same theories mentioned above provide a compelling reason for this as well).
I’m not complaining. But it does leave me with a lot of work that’s never seen the light of day . . . yet.
Recently I went through my files and cleaned everything up, reorganizing forty years of detritus as best I could. There were lots of fun discoveries — plays and stories and poems I’d forgotten about, most of which were forgotten for a good reason. And there were plenty of little scraps from past lives that left me cringing — but like the bad writing, it’s all just prelude to where I am now. And here is good.
But there was some good stuff, too. As well as a surprising number of things that I just flat out don’t remember writing at all.
Which has left me wondering what to do with it all. Apparently I’m not the only one. My colleague Tony Delgrosso recently posted he was gathering up all his oddments at The Half Empty Moleskine and it’s pieces like this one that make me glad he is.
The regular (and patient) readers of this blog know I’ve been making noises for a while about a new podcast. The good news (pun intended) is that it’s out there and now you can hear some of those literary orphans that have been hiding in the back of the file cabinet.
There are a few episodes already, ready for download. If you want the fancy .M4V iTunes version, click here to subscribe. If you’re more interested in the RSS feed, you can get that here. If you want to get your grubby little mitts on the individual files or an MP3 version, they’re right here waiting for you. And if you want me to come to your house each week and perform it live in front of your closest friends and/or housepets, then make me an offer. No freaks.
Just for fun, each show comes with a free PDF download of the readings from that week — just in case you’d prefer not to have to listen to me all the damn time.
And if that weren’t enough…
A few days back I was sorting through a number of things and realized that I’d never been “between projects” during National Novel Writing Month before. Usually when NaNoWriMo rolls around, I’m balls elbows deep in something and can’t stop what I’m doing to participate. And although I’m currently hard at work on my next novel entitled “Pantheon” (at least, that’s what my bio says), the truth of the matter is that I’ve allowed myself to get distracted by too many side projects over the past few months and “Pantheon” hasn’t really gotten the attention it deserves.
Which leaves me at a crossroads. Do I keep “Pantheon” on the back burner and fire up NaNoWriMo? Or do I use November to work on the thing that I was already planning on doing, which was going to leave “Pantheon” out anyways?
Very difficult decision. I’ve got a couple of good concepts that could fit nicely into NaNoWritMo. But then there’s the matter of the other November project I’d been planning.
Who know . . . maybe I’ll do both. It’s certainly possible but, either way, it seems that poor little “Pantheon” might just be getting short shrift once again. At least until November has come and gone.
As I said above, winter is here. We haven’t seen snow yet, but I’m told by Girija that in Hindu culture you sacrifice two goats and leave their heads at the gates of the temple, making a stew to serve to the first two strangers who happen through the gate.
As much of a fan as I am of snow, it seems rather hard luck for the goats.
And besides, the snow will be here soon enough.
*******************
When I’m this busy, the first thing that invariably gets cut down is sleep. Next is reading. I can do without the first one but not the second.
I don’t get a lot of magazines (apart from the comics, of course) but a few years back I discovered Esquire at my older brother’s house and have been hooked ever since. Usually I spend thirty minutes or so with each issue some afternoon and then set it aside. But lately I haven’t had time enough for that. I finally caught up to the June issue and this photo accompanying the Stephen King story ‘Morality‘ took me aback.
I sat there staring at the page for a few minutes with an odd feeling at the back of my head, like someone’d snuck in during the night and burgled a few things and I’d just noticed.
I showed the photo to my wife and asked her what came to mind. She got it on the first try. It was like someone had taken a snapshot of the opening of my play ‘The Red Boy’ and I thought for a moment that my citizenship in Alan Moore’s IdeaSpace had been revoked.
However, once I got up the guts to read King’s story I was relieved. Not a bad story, overall. But from a completely different territory than ‘The Red Boy’ fortunately for my sanity.
But, boy oh boy, take a look at this picture and then go read the first few pages of this play. You’ll see what I mean.
Having a long daily commute has made it easier to listen to books, fortunately. I just finished listening to Scott Anderson’s “Free: The Future of a Radical Price” and, I have to say, I found it to be a fascinating (and inspiring) study. Highly recommended.
On the strength of a footnote in Anderson’s book, I picked up a copy of Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea, and am enjoying it a great deal as well.
And, here and there, I’m reading another book by my wife’s grandfather — the inestimable Ken Jones, that original Mad Men character I’ve mentioned here before. Like the last one of his I read, this one involves the Advertising business. Only this time around, it’s set in Singapore and somebody’s been murdered.
Ken just turned 90 this past weekend. Still writing every day, too.
I should be so lucky.
