I note, within struggling writer's make-up, apart from mandatory pet-ownership, is the ability to discuss matters of no consequence to the nth degree.
Opening lines, do they really matter? I think not. - In all the books I've read, I cannot remember a single opening line. In the twenty- two stories I keep in the folder named 'Authonomy' I cannot remember word-for-word any of the opening lines - and I wrote them.
I can remember the opening line of chapter 2 of Fib's Kid; "George chased Karen all through the curriculum." - I can only remember that because a reviewer claimed it made no sense. And on checking through the books to hand. I find that the opening lines are random, and instantly forgettable. There is no pattern, rhyme, nor reason.
When it comes to the opening of the book, rather than listen to contrived, convoluted, contrite nonsense. I prefer to look at things like age-old proverbs and stereotypes. Proverbs survive because within them there exists a knowledge and truth.
"Are you sitting comfortably? - Then we'll begin."
This statement for me contains the essence of a good opening, for I can think of two professions it applies to, and their mission is one and the same. - Fiction writer, hypnotist. Both attempt to take a person to another place. Would a hypnotist start with "You are feeling sleepy?" - I think not.
First the reader needs to be relaxed before you can work your magic on him.
To paint a 17th century battlefield from a standing start is a task too mighty for I, or indeed, most. It is difficult to relax in a strange environment. It is far easier to put your reader in familiar surroundings or mental state. It can be a simple as looking at his wife's shoes and wondering why she had so many, and he could not recall her at any time during the last year ever wearing more than three of the many pairs she has so neatly lined up.
Can you remember the point at which you ceased reading and were captured into the fictional world? No, because it happens with a single thought generating a single image. It is in this stage you describe items the reader has already seen, being careful not be specific. "Her brightly painted nails caressed the glass." The art is to get the reader to generate the image from his own memories rather than build the picture from your description. If your reader has had that same thought, he will see his own wife's shoes, or his secretary's hand on a wine glass at the office party. He has generated an image, he is now tuned into your channel, - you may begin.
Why paint images when you can get the reader to do the painting?
The dissolution of the publishing houses is well under way, and as with textiles and cars, the rest of the world will prove their superiority in a free market. With the death of 'English Literature' and the advent of 'literature' written in English – the market becomes free, and more simplified. Calls for quality on POD are the equivalent of Custer's last stand. As long as the writer writes in a language where 20,000+ people will get and appreciate it, the job's done and there's profit to be had.
The publishing industry reverts to true simplicity; regardless of race, colour, creed or education – Are there enough buyers on the globe to make this publication financially viable? That is the total sum of the publishing industry. It is no more than that. Asking Lee Sung Wong; "Have you read the classics?" May invoke the response: "Why, have you?" His classics and your classics are not one and the same. English structure, English grammar etc are no longer a priority. For example, many cultures tell stories in the second person POV. - It's a global market.
Having thought about the site and its problems. Undoubtedly it is the 'friendly' nature of the site that is the route cause of the problem. For thousands of years writing has been a solitary trade, and nothing has changed. Excepting now, we use a computer to replace the quill and paper.
Yes, it is good to recommend a book you've enjoyed but when 'we' enters the equation, the popularity contest takes over and merit of the work becomes a secondary issue.
On examination, let's get this one to the Ed's desk is a noble intention but more often than not the preferred candidate's work takes the place of something superior. The end result is the same; the work of the 'friend' is rejected by the Ed's desk and the other writer eventually leaves the site. Every month, there are mediocre books pushed past better books – it cannot be denied.
To add insult to injury there are those who have achieved their gold stars through dubious methods. All those friends and dummy user accounts idle. An army of sockpuppets fat from the ride on a gold star manuscript for which they were created lay waiting, to be passed to the next 'friend.' We notice the writer of 'the Jin Deception' offer his support to Chris Cross, and her book rapidly heads towards the top of the pile. Kfran, supports the stalled 'Spirit Prisoners' and overnight it heads the weekly chart.
Apart from to send other writers to other routes. What can be achieved? Harper Collins have no friends; present them with a mediocre manuscript, they'll just say no. (Again)
Where did literature go wrong, who, or what is responsible for its demise? I actually think I can answer that one for you. But only read on if you subscribe to the belief held by the majority of publishers, agents, and editors. - You have the ability to write, or you don't.
Historically, literature was for the upper classes, the educated. Epic complex sagas were written which only they understood. Those working in mines and cotton mills had no need to be involved They had other pastimes such as revolting, eating cake, and being sent off to war for no particular reason.
Then came the silver screen. Those uneducated, illiterate heathens could watch the stories. But they were simple-minded folk, for them, the stories [screenplays] had to be clear, structured and predictable.
All this time the UK education system taught English Literature and English Language. With globalisation and migration, the whole meaning of the courses involving the word "English" became confusing – it required re-branding.
The money men seized their opportunity. By cobbling together simple US screenwriting techniques with the redundant English Language course, business had a marketable product. Called "Creative writing," this new course was taken up by the millions who could not write. Somehow they believed this magical course would turn them into writers of great classics. The untalented millions graduated, and began to flood agents and publishers with manuscripts. Meanwhile, western education systems were providing improved education for all. The problem was, all the writers were trained to write simple stories in a clear and succinct manner with perfect grammar for the non-existent 'dumb reader.' The dumb reader no longer really existed, he was extinct, but the system had created a lot of dumb writers to cater for him. Such were the numbers of dumb writers, they dominated the industry. They declared anything that wasn't written according to the dumb standards as - shit.
The dumb reader, now c/w University degree reads old classics when looking for something to read. Modern literature? Well that's just a big kiddy comic,, with no pictures. - What fun is that? No. When he wants mindless entertainment, he watches TV. TV has pictures that move.
What I'm seeing (and calculating as my way forward), are changes in concepts in good story-telling. Thank God, anything to relieve us that dumbed down shit. Remember, times have changed, there are no big publishers, or film studios, or TV networks. Just huge media companies. Naturally, they would like to sell the story in identical formats on every platform.
Enter a generation of novelists who have grown up in front of a television, and the results are natural bias to exposition through dialogue and action, POV alignment to cameras, and careful attention to their method of 'telling' narrative. Their 'vision' of what they're writing has the detachment of always being seen through a lens.
They will have written story to be viewed, as opposed to a work where narrative is used to get expose character's thoughts. Hence, there is no difference between the book, and the film, and damned on-line interactive video game.
Death to the screenwriters and novelists?
Did I blog this before? Oh well. Fibonacci's Child sits at #10 in Harper Collins' slush-pile (Authonomy). I wonder how it got ranked so highly? I have no idea. From the publisher's point of view there are perhaps 6000 manuscripts which they peruse at their leisure. Leisure, is not strictly the right word. When it's raining of a lunchtime and they cannot go out to play, an editor may click randomly through the slush whilst munching cheese and onion crisps, as an apple and a bottle of mineral water look on.
In Authonomy game, the game where you attain a top 5 ranking and Harper Collins politely tell you, your book is shite and they will not publish it. In that game, there are only 500 books, even so #10 is pretty good me thinks.
Why do Harper Collins always say the books are shite? I hear you ask. Well, I answer. There are two recognised methods, of reaching the top 5.
Method 1: Read, vote for, and comment on, every active book on the site. This method is preferred by ex-school teachers who have developed a certain skill from marking 20 students essays per hour.
Method 2: Be nice on the forum. Hopefully, when it's your 'turn', somebody will announce that you're a 'jolly good chap' and henceforth are deserving to be voted in this month.
The methods can be summarised as 1) Hard-working, and 2) Popular. The main problem with both of these systems is none of them take into account whether or not the book is any good. The lack of quality is a detail that Harper Collins are concerned about. Silly buggers!
Anyway, the gems I've found are kept here.
I suppose I've been bad. I've been spending way too much time in Harper Collins slush pile. It's been a pilgrimage of discovery. For the most part? I've been discovering how not to write. I've discovered, in amongst some very nice people, the dregs of society - humanity. There's a thing called authorism, a parody of western society. Anything not understood, beyond the rabble's collective comprehension gets nuked. Those not knowing the correct usage of the m-dash, n-dash, and the gerund, are unskilled and suitable only for manual labour.
There is racism, born of ignorance. My proposal for This is how I walk; In my Black Shoes went down like a lead balloon. Despite the "anti" lobby - the work is still ranked in the top 100 on the site. There are probably 1000 active manuscripts, so #100 is a fair achievement.
Fibonacci's Child is even more interesting, the novel currently sits a #30, despite an old-school presence that refuse to read or vote for it.
The biggest discovery has been about me, my writing, and the realisation that I'm a fraud. 'Adult themes in simple terms' is what I claim to write. However, apparently I have a prose muscle, which I flex mightily in the short-haul.
I'll blog again tomorrow, and I'll try to keep up.
Reading and writing is simply encoding and decoding. I capture say an image in my head, convert the image to text. The reader receives the text and re-assembles the image, simple.
So, all the writers go on their creative writing courses and they read Swain or whatever. Their brains are fully upgraded with 'English Language for writers version 9.71." Using their latest software version, they begin to encode with 'tag delimited dialogue', 'anti-sentence fragmentation.' and 'embedded scene-goal enhancement.' The resulting work is nothing short of a masterpiece.
They show their work to their peers. In turn their peers say "This is a masterpiece." Next on to the editor, he exclaims. "'Tis indeed a most brilliant work."
The masterpiece is on the shelves and the readers intent is to enjoy. His joy is blighted by constant error messages. 'This page cannot be displayed', 'Your current software version is English Language for readers version 6.57. To receive the full value of this text, please read spend 2 years in further education upgrading your brain to version 9.71 for writers. Unless you install and run the 'Swain plugin', scene-goal enhancements may not function correctly.'
If you are truly a brilliant story-teller, then the lowly reader can still 'get' enough of the text to build a pretty picture.
What's this got to do with self-publishing? Cutting out the editor and the literary appreciation society enables the writer to stick a label on his book. 'Requires English Language for Readers version 6.57.' You may think this makes no difference but trust me. When the box containing the movie software says. 'Enhanced for Dolby 5.1 users', and you don't have it, you feel inadequate. There's a moment when you consider renting a different movie.
The fouler stench of the Grim Reaper lingers around the publishing industry as he prepares for a mighty cull. He doesn't wait for me, I am waiting outside. Surely after he has rampaged and created carnage, a wall will come down. And as is standard with these operations, applying to leaders of states and corporations alike, they will blame their advisers.
Once movies packed theatres and music was produced by those expressing their art. A time when albums such as 'Bridge over Troubled Water' and Thriller' had their time on the chart measured in years.
Then came the gurus and the coaches with the message. "You are welcome to express yourself as long as you do the way we say." Pop music turned into 8 bars of this followed 16 bars of that, and was crap; requiring so much promotion that even a #1 single represented a financial loss. All hope was pinned on album sales. Movies followed the same pattern, 18 minutes of this, followed by 54 minutes of that. They were crap, and required Sharon Stone and other actresses to show their beavers and other body parts in order to get people to watch the film. It seems paying Demi-Moore $20 million dollars to bare her breasts was preferable to using a decent original script.
They did not understand – Painting by numbers, is not art.
Two industries sunk. The publishing industry proved a tougher nut to crack, all that history and tradition. But they succeeded, and the Macdonald's paperback was invented. To be read, shelved and forgotten. Each the same story within certain parameters, the instant hook, the three acts and the positive end. As the mp3 came to destroy the guardians of Sony Music. The ebook will be the nemesis of Random House and Harper Collins. Take your laptop, turn it sideways – what does it look like to you? Soon a book will be an electronic facsimile of it's current form and publishers will be all those with an internet connection.
And as digital subscriber lines carry away yet more corporation profits will anarchy ensue? No Way. A time is near when the contents of your inbox will be listed on your tax return, probably.
It's been several days since my last blog. Nothing to report. The Devil's in the Details got a big remix. And Frank and Forthright is certainly a new direction.
Other than that the future's greyish, with some greenish bits in the corner.
In other news.
A man with a weakness for adverbs would write a story about his cat. After 32 submissions and 11 rewrites he does not realise 'cats' as subject matter are wholly unfashionable. Surely common sense would dictate he put the manuscript aside and write of a helicopter; a tale full of adjectives.
I fear he is obsessed with editing towards a moving target. As a man cutting off table legs to prevent a slight wobble; without a guide he will trim down to nothing. Does he not realise all he need do is wait for cats and adverbs to come into fashion? He may well learn during this process of editing but he is chasing a shadow. Between the time he puts his manuscript in the post and the editor begins to read, a rule or two will have changed. Cats are in, adverbs are good but third person is so last season (week).