It's Time For You To Grow Up (part 1) (an IWSG post)

Let's start with a story:

My wife is a data analyst. It's a job that requires some math skills. Not a lot. Not like calculus or trig or, even, all that much algebra, but it does require some maths. There's a lot of working with percentages and fractions. There are a few months each year when her job is really busy and requires lots of overtime. Last year, not long before the rush, one of the people in her department retired. Like any good company, to get through the busy time, they hired a temp. A temp with the potential to stay on. That was rather than hire someone permanent for the position at the point when they still had time to do that and provide adequate training, but that's another story entirely.

Now, the temp they hired seemed qualified for the job, which was not the full job, just some of the lower level routine stuff that required a lot of time. She looked qualified on paper, anyway, and got through all of the interviews and stuff. However, when it came time to do the job, she couldn't math. At all. It was almost immediately apparent that she wasn't going to work out, and there was still time to hire someone else. But, guess what, that's not what happened.

What happened is that they kept her on. The initial hope, I think, was that if they kept working with her that maybe she would "get it" and be able to do the job they hired her to do. But, no, that didn't happen. She never "got it" and, in fact, for a while, she made more work for everyone as she continued to not get it, because she would spend time doing a task (more time than it should have taken) and, then, someone else (usually my wife) would have to go back and re-do the task because it hadn't been done correctly. Eventually, after weeks of this, she became a kind of glorified filing clerk, because that's the only thing she could do.

I want to point out at this point that she was, as my wife put it, "a perfectly nice person, very sweet." She liked her. Everyone liked her. There was no one that thought she was a bad person or a dumb person or anything like that. But she couldn't do the job. And, yet, the people who should have told her that she couldn't do the job were unwilling to do their job of letting her know that she wasn't working out. Nothing positive came out of the situation.
1. It created more work for everyone involved.
2. It caused the marginalization of the temp as they looked for tasks to keep her busy because they couldn't give her any real work.
3. It created a false sense of hope in the temp as the message she received was, "you're doing fine," even though everyone knew that wasn't the case. But, you know, they kept her on, so she must have been doing something right, right? No...
4. It caused resentment toward the people who should have stepped in and said, "Hey, you're not ready for this work, yet. We need to let you go and find someone else." And, maybe, she never would be ready for it or, maybe, she just needed to get reacquainted with her math skills. No one will ever know, because no one ever told her that she wasn't doing the job. They just kept decreasing the level of the tasks given to her.
5. She was never told in what way she failed at the job. When the time was up on the job, they just didn't retain her. There was never any feedback on what she could have done to be kept on.

And, see, that's the real issue. No one ever told her what she was "failing" at, so she never knew what to get better at. Well, other than my wife explaining the same errors to her everyday, to which she would always reply, "Got it!" in a way that seemed the first few times that she really had gotten it. But that, having a coworker try to show you what you're doing incorrectly, is not quite the same as having your superior, the person who has the ability to tell you they need to let you go, sit you down and explain to you where you're not meeting expectations.

See, no one wanted to be the one to hurt her feelings.

Wow.

So I'm just going to say this:
Screw your feelings.
And, yes, that sounds more harsh than I really mean it, but, still, screw your feelings.

The problem is twofold:
1. Indie writers who hold their friendship for you hostage in order to get good reviews.

And, man, have I run into this one. I've lost count of the number of "friends" I've lost over negative reviews, but I'll just say this: If our "friendship" is conditional upon me saying that I like what you write, then we have no friendship. If I can't say to you, "You know, I don't like this one," without you yelling, "Well, you're not my friend," then we're already not friends. Or, likewise, if I can't say that about something some friend of yours wrote. It's the same thing. All I have for you is this:

It's time for you to grow up.

2. Indie authors who are unwilling to give honest reviews to their friends because they are scared of losing their friendships.

I know you "think" you're supporting your "friends" by giving them positive reviews of their not-better-than-average books, but, really, you're just making it harder on everyone, yourselves included. Every 5-star rating you throw out there that should have been a 3 or a 2 or, even, a 1 is destroying the credibility of the indie book market in general. You know how I know? Because I see it said repeatedly by book reviewers who refuse to review indie books and by readers who will not buy indie books (sure, they'll download free stuff because who cares if it's free). They see all the false positive reviews out there and have learned that you can't trust indie authors. I'm sorry, but the fact that you are out there lying (because you are lying) about the quality of your "friends'" books is making my job more difficult. And, you know, it's encouraging them to continue to write the same crappy stuff rather than working on getting better. What I have for you is this:

It's time for you to grow up.

 Here's the thing, people say it all the time, "If you want to be a writer, you better develop some thick skin," and that's true. Except it's not about having "thick skin." It's about learning separation. The things people say about your work are not things they are saying about you, and someone can very validly say, "I don't like this thing you made, but I like you." When you flip out about that and do the virtual equivalent of yelling, "Then, I'm not your friend," you're acting like a first grader. At best. And, well, if that's where you are developmentally, then you need to go find something else to do with your time, because, frankly, writing is not for you. Or, at least, writing for anyone other than yourself. You need to do what Dickinson did and store it all in a trunk and leave it for someone else to sort out after you're dead.

But here's the other thing about being a grown up, and maybe this comes from having spent so much of my life as a teacher, you have to be able to tell people when they haven't done a good job. If the only thing you can do is tell people "good job" because you're worried about hurting someone's feelings, you need to grow up, too. This is not a dinner party where you nod politely and tell the host that the substandard food is "wonderful" and "delicious." In fact, that behavior at a dinner party will lead people not to come back and leave the host wondering why. You know, since everyone said they loved the food the previous time. The problem here is that in this "dinner party," we're all responsible for the food and, when we go around telling each other "oh, I love that" when you actually want to spit it out then that's the food that gets served. But, see, we're not the guests. Readers are the guests and, when they keep coming to the indie writers' banquet only to find a bunch of crap food that the all the "cooks" are saying is wonderful, well, then, those readers will decide that ALL indie food is crap.

Basically, if you are unwilling to give a negative review, you shouldn't be giving any reviews at all. The whole thing where you opt out of reviewing the books you don't like and only giving reviews to books you do like would be like me only giving As and, maybe, Bs in my classroom and leaving all of the other kids gradeless. It doesn't help the situation.

So, no, when I read a book that I don't like, for whatever reason, I get to say I don't like it and, even better, I get to explain why I didn't like it. Other people can then come along and figure out if they want to try it. So, if I say, "This one is too sweet," someone who likes sweet things will go, "Oh! I like sweets! I'll try this one." Or, if I say, "This one was too salty for me," someone else has the option of saying, "Oh, yeah, I don't like lots of salt; I'll stay away from this one."

Honesty is important in reviews. Period. It's not about treating my "friends" like they're five and saying, "Oh, it's beautiful!" and hanging it on the refrigerator. So sorry if you think that's what this is all about. There comes a point when even parents quit hanging those things up. Usually right about the time the kid realizes the drawings are actually pretty crappy.

So, just to reiterate, if you're approaching this whole indie writing thing as if it's some weird support system of giving good reviews to your buddies so that they won't feel bad, well, just grow up. Actually, and excuse the language (or not, I don't really care), it's time for you to grow the fuck up.

[This post has been brought to you in part by Alex Cavanaugh and the IWSG.(But, mostly, this one is just me.)]

Exploring Personality: Part Thirteen -- What It All Means

So let's talk analogy for a moment.
If you could have any car you wanted, any car at all, and you could afford to maintain and drive it, what kind of car would you have? That car, that bright and shiny car with the engine that purrs, that's your plot. But guess what; that car isn't going anywhere without a driver, the driver being your protagonist. And it doesn't matter how cool the car is if your protagonist is a total ass (ass... now that's a word I think I need to use more often; it's so versatile) or completely stupid (remember, stupid is not a personality type). Have you ever been in a car with a stupid driver (and I don't mean a bad driver, although a stupid driver is also a bad driver)? It's not something you ever want to do again.

See, it doesn't matter how good (or great) your plot is if you have a protagonist that doesn't work on some level; however, you can have even a junker if your protagonist is someone your readers want to hang out with. As long as the car isn't going to literally fall apart around your readers (or explode), you can get away with a lot if you have good, engaging characters. Which is not to say that I believe characters are more important than plot... except that they kind of are. People (readers) are going to talk about your characters way more (in a general sense) than they are ever going to talk about how cool your dashboard is. Or your steering wheel. Or the heated, leather seats. Okay, they might talk about that, especially if it's cold out. But, in the end, for most readers, it all boils down to the characters.

Which is why it's so important to understand how people are different from each other and, more importantly, how they are different from you, the author. It's a common thing to ask yourself, "What would I do in this situation?" but you're going to end up with only characters who act just like you if that's all you ever do. That's okay once, maybe twice, but, eventually, your readers will get tired of books filled with just one character: you. What you need is for Bob to act like Bob and Jane to act like Jane and Fred to act like Fred and Gortuka from planet Xenon to not act human at all.

I think the only real way to make characters distinct, to make them individuals as opposed to paper dolls, is to make those characterization decisions before you start writing. You ask yourself the question, "What kind of person is Bob? What kind of person is Jane?" And "What kind of... thing is Gortuka?" If you know that stuff before you go in, you can make informed decisions about how your characters act. That way, if you get to a point in your story where someone needs to push the red button, you can have Bob do it, because you know that Bob is the one that can't resist being told not to do something whereas Jane and Fred do what they're told and it would be breaking character for one them to say, "You know what, I'm going to push the red button even though my boss said not to."

I know I frequently come off as someone who gets nit-picky over the details (plot stuff) but, honestly, that stuff only grabs my attention when the characters aren't engaging. It's like being involved in a conversation with someone at a party. If the conversation is good, your attention will be focused on the character but, if the conversation is inane, your gaze starts to wander, and you start to pick up the details of the plot you're in. If that is also lacking (like all the plants are dead or there's a big crack in the ceiling or there are cockroaches crawling on the furniture), the whole thing falls apart, and you want to go home. Or quit reading. Whatever the case may be.

At any rate, for those of you out there who are authors, I hope this series has given some perspective on how to make characters more "real" and more complex and, yet, an insight into why not every character will make the same stupid mistake you might need to happen to move the plot along. For instance, an Eight (the Boss) is never going to act like a Four (the Individualist) and have that heart-to-heart talk about how special he really is if only you would see it. That's just never going to happen.

And, maybe, all of this will enable some of you to see more of whom you are, so you can separate out yourself from your characters. That, I think, is the biggest trap writers fall into. So don't ask, "What would I do if a ravenous slug were crawling up my leg?" Ask, "What would Bob do if a ravenous slug was crawling up his leg?" Answer: He would scream bloody murder and run to Jane to save him.

Author Contrasts (Sort Of)

I have no deep thoughts today. Hmm... no. Wait. I have no deep thoughts today that have translated into words. Today, it's just a bunch of images. You can probably blame this man for that:

And maybe this man, although he doesn't actually appear in the post:

Anyway, it's all about the difference between reality and how we like to see it. Or something like that. Go find out over at Indie Writers Monthly!

Which Came First? (a review review post)

There is that age-old question, "Which came first, the chicken or the egg?" It's the great playground debate. Or, at least, it used to be. No, seriously, when I was in elementary school, we would argue over this on the playground all the time, sometimes switching sides several times in the same "conversation" about it. Okay, so it wasn't all the time, but it was often enough that I remember doing it. And it wasn't everyone; it was just a select few of us. I suppose the few of us that understood that there was a question even worth asking. As kids, we felt like this was the unanswerable question, because how can you have one without the other, right? But the question does have an answer or, rather, two of them, depending upon which stance you take:

1. The religious: The Chicken came first.
2. The scientific: The egg came first.

We authors have a similar kind of question: Which comes first, the sales or the reviews? Conventional wisdom says that reviews come first. Which, you know, is a difficult concept, because how can you have reviews without sales? Which is why there is such a push for early reviews generated by giving away copies of the book, etc. Those already existing reviews at the book's release are supposed to signal to the reader that the book is good. Of course, then, there are those readers that disbelieve those reviews as being fake whether they are or not, and I can't say they don't have reason to believe that.

Of course, the problem with this idea is that most people say that reviews don't actually determine whether they will buy a book. The number one reason that someone will buy a book is because someone s/he knows has recommended it to him/her. Other top reasons include general word-of-mouth (you hear people talking about the book a lot) and author loyalty. It's possible that reviews can fall under "general word-of-mouth," I suppose, but there has to be a reason the person is there looking at the book to begin with.

Which brings us back to the question of whether reviews drive any sales. Most data seems to suggest that reviews follow sales, not the other way around, which, honestly, is rather disheartening for those of us who have neither sales nor reviews. It leaves with the option of needing to "trick" people into buying our books to get everything started. Tricking or badgering in the same way that Sam-I-Am gets people to eat green eggs and ham or becoming the used car salesman. Yeah, I'm just not good at those things.

But, still, people insist that reviews are important; that's what conventional wisdom says, and, as much as I am usually against conventional wisdom, I do believe that reviews are important. I just hate asking for them, because that's as bad as trying to convince people to buy the book in the first place. Worse in some cases. And giving people copies of the books hasn't generated any reviews to speak of, either, so don't even suggest it. Seriously. After giving away dozens of copies of various things specifically for review purposes, I think I've gotten back, like, two. So the return is definitely not worth the investment from that standpoint.

BUT!

Yeah, you should have known I'd have a "but," because I always have a "but." And stop your giggling, we're not twelve here, you know.

You have to keep trying new things, so here is the new thing I am trying. Hopefully, it will generate some sales and some reviews. I'll take either or both. As I just announced, "Shadow Spinner: Collection 4: The Undying" is now available, and it's sitting there with zero reviews, which is not to say that my other stuff is

overflowing with reviews, because that's not so, either. Basically, everything could use more reviews. So here is how all of this works:
You review one of my books on Amazon (it would also be great if you posted it to goodreads, but that's not as important). You let me know you've reviewed that book so that I can go and see the review. Once I've seen the review I will buy for you a book of equivalent value. Specifically, I will buy you an indie book of equivalent value (indie meaning self-published or small press); you just let me know which one you want, and I will gift it to you on the Kindle. Yes, it has to be for the Kindle. Also, yes, you can review one of more than my books and add it all together. For instance:

Let's say that you review "Collection 1: Tiberius" and "Collection 2: The Man with No Eyes," both with a sticker price of $1.99, that would give you enough to have me gift to you, say, The House on the Corner, which costs $3.99. Not that you have to choose something by me. That was just an example. You could choose for the same dollar amount
Demetri and the Banana Flavored Rocketship
Eclipse
two of my personal favorites from indie authors.
Or
Temporary Anne (which contains a backup story by me)
"My Killbot Buddy"
"The Evil That Men Do" (which would go great with Shadow Spinner)
"Empirical Evidence: A Novelette" (which I haven't actually read, yet, but it's on my list)
And, see, I know a lot of you downloaded the free bits of Spinner as I released them, so you could just read those and review the collections based on the individual chapters, and that's like FREE! books!

Now, this isn't an unlimited offer. I'll let it run through the end of February. Or until my money runs out. I don't have an unlimited writing budget, so it's really a first come kind of thing for an unspecified amount of money which ought to buy more than a few books for people that leave reviews. I don't, though, want to cut anyone off that decides to read something of mine but doesn't finish it by the end of February, so, if that kind of thing happens, just email me and let me know you're working on it, and I'll hold that offer for you.

Here's to trying new things. It's useful information whether it works or not, right?

It's Buy-Stuff-Online Day!

The way things becomes "things" is often very interesting. Sometimes, it's because a thing needs a name, like at one time how a dog needed a name. And I don't mean Spot or Fido, either. Way back when around 25,000 years ago when wolves started hanging out with men, they had to call them something, and I bet "wolf" started out something like "wlf" and was related to the sound they made. [Yes, I'm making  this up.] Later, some of the wolves started living with the cavemen instead of just hanging around and trying to grab scraps and calling both groups, the in-camp group and  the out-of-camp group, wolves probably became confusing, so someone started calling the ones that never left "dgs," which is kind of like the sound my oldest son made, "dg!", when it was being his first word. Yes, my oldest son's first word was "dog," and we didn't even have one at the time.
[Remind me to one day tell you about his first Star Wars word.]

Anyway... the idea of "Black Friday" was one of those things that came about over time. It was a thing that was happening that needed a name, and, then, it had a name, and, then, people (stores) started having sales for it, because, sometimes, in our culture, all you have to have is a recognized name and there will be sales in your honor. Like "President's Day." And I'm waiting for stores to realize that they can name sales after celebrities, and, then, we'll see "Cyrus Twerking Day" sales or something.

But that's not today. No, today is "Cyber Monday," a complete made up marketing name so that we could have sales. And convince people to shop online. No, really, Cyber Monday was not actually a thing until some company decided to call it a thing and hope that it would become that thing, and, well, it did. It's like if you started calling your car a rocketship and, one day, you woke up and it was a rocketship. Dude! Now, I'm totally going to have to try that!

At any rate, today is the day where we try to get people to buy stuff online, so I'm going to give you some suggestions of things you should buy online that will help out some people that need it more than say, Target or Toys R Us or Best Buy. And, not to start with myself, but I'm going to start with myself, but only because it's

"Christmas on the Corner"

And what better time of the year is there to read a Christmas story, right?

And, just to say it, I'm only suggesting things I've actually read.

The best bargain on the list:

Temporary Anne by Briane Pagel -- Not only do you get a pretty horrific horror story (that's, like, horror squared), you get additional stories from some other pretty great authors! And, well, there are cookies! But not cookies you want to eat, and you'll just have to go read "The Magic Cookies" to understand what that means. And it's just $0.99!

Eclipse -- Also by Briane Pagel and my favorite (so far) of his novels. If you want a book that will leave you wondering what actually happened when you get to the end, this the book for you.

Demetri and the Banana Flavored Rocketship by Bryan Pedas -- This was the best book I read in 2012 and there has only been one, so far, from 2013 to beat it. Yes, it's got a strange title. Yes, it's quirky. Yes, it's a great read.

"My Killbot Buddy" by Rusty Carl -- This is an intact story but only a glimpse into a world I hope Rusty goes back to.

"Augurs of Distant Shadows" by Briane Pagel. It can be found in "Shadow Spinner: Collection 2: The Man with No Eyes." And, honestly, this has nothing to do with the fact that it's in my Spinner collection and everything to do with the fact that this is my favorite thing of all by Brian (so far!). More people need to read his story, so buy Collection 2 just for that if you need to.

There are plenty of other independent authors out there that could use the support, and this a perfect time of year to do it. I'll be mentioning other authors as we progress through December, but these are the indie things I've read that I've really liked (as in, these works stand out in my mind without me having to go back and look through what I've read; if something I remember without needing to think about it, it's pretty darn good), so this is where I'm starting. Seriously, support quality, independent works by supporting these guys in a way that's tangible. AND LEAVE REVIEWS once you've read the work in question! That's tangible, too, and, hey, it might just be me, but reviews make great gifts!

Note #1:
Just in case any of you missed the announce last week because of the holiday, "Shadow Spinner: Collection 3: The Garden (Parts 13 - 21)" is now available!

It has a backup story by Rusty, and, if you don't know who he is by now, shame on you. Pick up your copy today!

Note #2:
Also in case you missed it, I have a short story, "The Tea Kettle," up over at Out of Print. Stop by and read it and let me know what you think.

Vintage Revivals pt. 2: A Certain Whimsy (a local color post)

After finding out about the opening of Vintage Revivals, as I mentioned in part one, my wife and I drove down to have a look see. What a wonderful place. It's full of... well... it's full of all kinds of quirky originality. As I said last time, it's full of found art.

Some of it makes my fingers itch to make it my own.

But most of it just makes me think, "Cool!"

And, "I want that!"

The above piece is called "Merlin's Muse," and it's pretty cool. And here is another view of my favorite piece, "Nightwatch":

But it's not all birds:

Wait, no! No, really, it's not all birds:

No, stop looking at the bird. Look at the green liquid. Not to mention this stuff:

And the earrings! Last time, I showed you the earring that I bought my wife, but this is the pair I almost bought:

They had a whole wall of earrings made from old typewriter keys, which is just a cool idea. I would have bought them if the keys had been on the dangly end. I was, however, ambivalent, because I wasn't 100% sure my wife would agree with me (I was probably 87% sure), but she did, so, at some point (as soon as I get a chance to go back), we going to custom order a pair with the keys at the bottom, because, yes, they do requests. And, really, how cool is that?

Local places like this are really cool. I encourage all of you to go out and find some local artists and shops to support. I mean, what chain store can you walk into and request custom-made earrings? Or custom-made anything? Wal-Mart? Target? Macy's? Not a single one of them. In fact, the only thing you'll find at a chain store is the same thing that someone on the other side of the country will find. Something... homogeneous. If you want cool and unique, you have to go to cool and unique. And these kinds of places always have cool and unique people, too. People with great stories about what they're doing and why.

And, well, in a lot of ways it's like being an independent author. It's making something that's not quite like everything else already out there and having the courage to stand behind it. I respect that. I hope you do, too.

(And those birds are just too cool!)

The Danger of Desperation (an Indie Life post)

For those of you who haven't noticed, there's been a big to-do in the publishing world in the last week or so. But, before that...

It can be difficult to be involved in artistic fields. There's so much angst over whether you're good enough, whether people will like your work, whether people will like you. It creates a huge drive for recognition. Confirmation. Validation. The desire for validation can be... distracting. The desire to be validated, to be told, "yes, you are good," can become the goal rather than doing the art. The need for an agent, for a publisher, more important than doing the writing and just making it available.

This need, this desperate grasp for someone unconnected to you to tell you that you're good, that you do good work, that your writing (art, music, whatever) deserves to be seen can make us do, well, stupid things. It can make us agree to things that our sane, rational minds would have us run away from. But, in that moment, that moment of someone saying to you, "we want you," you can forget to look at the situation and, instead, just say "yes! yes! yes!"

I've kind of lost track of the number of authors I've seen that have signed with some small publisher that said "we want you" but, then, left them to do all the work (editing, cover, marketing) only to keep a large part of any money that was made. And all of that with no advance. But the validation has been so important that many of them don't care. Or they do end up caring and regret the decision to go with the small publisher. It's a hard thing to deal with. And many small publishers count on that. Some of them even demand money from you.

But, then, most of us are at least somewhat aware of vanity presses and know to stay away from them, right? Right? Well, let's just be safe: if any publisher ever asks you for money to publish your book, don't just say "no;" run away as fast as you can, too.

Which brings us to the whole "to-do."

Just recently, Random House has established some new digital-only imprints. These imprints have been designed to take advantage of the new digital era but, from all appearances, at the expense of the author. The imprints seem to be specifically targeting new authors and pre-published authors. Authors who don't know their way around the publishing world. See, the big publishers almost never take unsolicited manuscripts; that means you have to have an agent if you want to get published by someone like Random House. But these new imprints? No agent needed. Anyone can submit to them.

And that one thing is going to be a huge draw for unpublished authors -- the chance to be published by one of the "big 6" without the need of an agent.
And Random House is set up to accept as many takers as possible, because, why?, it's digital only, remember?

You know that saying about when something is too good to be true...?
Yes, there is a catch... actually, there are a lot of them. All of them designed to squeeze the unsuspecting author like a grape.

1. No advance.
2. They charge back to the author all of the production costs. No, you don't have to pay anything up front, but all of the costs of editing, cover design, marketing; it all comes out of the pocket of the author.
3. They get to own your soul. Seriously. They own all rights to your work in every possible format in place you can think of. Well, at least, any place on Earth. They own all licensing options. AND they own the crack at any sequel you may ever write.
4. If your book is successful enough that they decide they want to do a print version of it, you get charged for all of that, too.

The whole thing is horrendous. If you really want to know the whole story, I suggest you read the following posts by John Scalzi, who also happens to be the president of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America:
1. Hydra
2. Alibi
3. The direction?
4. The Letter
5. The Response
6. Why advance are important
7. You have more power than you think

Look, I understand that it can seem a small thing to take terms that don't include an advance or any of these other things when you're trying to get in the door. After all, you're already not making anything, right? What can it hurt, and, at least, this way you have a chance. Right? And with a big publisher, too! But don't let your desperation lead you down the path of foolishness. Don't feed the big parasitic organism that's seeking to drain you of all of your creativity. In the end, it's just not worth it, no matter how "necessary" it may seem at the time. Desperation... it's a dangerous thing.

I strongly suggest that you go read those posts by Scalzi. Yeah, that's a lot of reading, but you'll be glad you did.

Update:
Random House, due to the huge outcry against the terms they were offering through these new imprints, has responded by amending  the terms they're offering in their contracts. What they're offering is still not great, but it's better than it was. You can read about the changes here and Scalzi's thoughts on them here. Again, this is strongly suggested reading.

This post has been brought to you by Indie Life.

Something funny happened on the way to the forum...

Okay, well, I was going to say it wasn't actually a forum, but, technically, it is. Well, it's supposed to be, because the definition of forum includes "place for open discussion" (stress is mine), but this was clearly not such a place. It was just supposed to be.
And what happened definitely wasn't funny. Except, well, it kind of is; it just also made me really angry. Who says there's not humor in anger?

Let me explain. All back story is so that you will understand the surrealism of the actual event.

Several months ago, I was invited to join an authors' group on facebook. Against my will. Let me re-phrase that: I was added to an authors' group after I told the person that added me that I did not want him to. The group was the Author's Think Tank. I didn't want to be added, because he just wanted me in there so that he could flame me as he had already done in that forum once before and on his page once before and who knows where else. All of this was over a bad review. This incident where he added me was many, many weeks after the initial review, but I had posted about reviews, and, for whatever reason, he took my post about my view on reviews as a personal attack and added me to the authors' group so that I could see the "discussion" that was going on about reviews.

Mostly, that discussion included a lot of people calling me names, the most popular of which was "douche bag," because only a douche bag would leave someone a bad review. Or something like that. [If you want to go back and read the posts about reviews, they are here and here.] I want to point out that at no time during this thread of calling me names did anyone ever say anything about it. No said that the Think Tank was not a place for being negative; no told anyone to stop behaving in the manner they were behaving; no one took the thread down. It was, you know, "all good." And, honestly, everyone is entitled to their opinion. I have mine regarding the leaving of reviews, and that's that being honest about the review is the way to go. [But, then, really, if you want to know more, you should go back and read those two posts.]

Just to be clear, I did not get involved in that "discussion." In fact, I didn't say anything at all in there for a couple of weeks. I almost removed myself from the group, but I didn't. I mean, it was a group of 500 other authors, so I figured it might be worthwhile to stay. It really wasn't, not for me. Mostly, it was a bunch of people asking things like, "What's the difference between 'lay' and 'lie'? I can't figure it out," and watching people argue over it and coming to no conclusion. That's why you look things up.

Needless to say, I didn't say a whole lot in the group other than, occasionally, answering someone's question about something or pointing them at a source if no one else had responded. That and posting links to what I felt were applicable blog posts and links for when my Shadow Spinner pieces were available. In that sense, I did get a benefit from being in the group, because I know there were some people downloading my pieces.

All of that changed last week when I was unceremoniously kicked out of the group. Not just kicked out but not even notified. I just hopped onto facebook, and the link to the group was missing from my groups. I thought it was a facebook problem. At first. But, wait! Let's go back...

Here's what happened:
Someone posted something about how Stephanie Meyer had written Twilight with a screaming toddler in her lap while watching Barney, so, maybe, that was the way to go, because look at how awesome Twilight is. [I'm paraphrasing, but that is the gist of what she posted.]

I couldn't resist, so I responded with, "I don't know. I think Twilight screams Barney."
1. It was a joke.
2. I haven't read Twilight (and I don't intend to), so it was just a joke.
3. People thought it was funny and said things like, "I like Twilight, but I thought the Barney comment was funny."
4. I stated after several other comments that the comment had been meant just to be funny.

But here's where the problem started, I guess:
Some other guy stated that he didn't like Twilight and gave legitimate reasons as to why he does not.
[I want to add that this is what it means to be a forum: having an open discussion about something.]
A can of worms ensued and there was a huge back and forth between this guy and, well, I lost count, a lot of women about the merits of Twilight. Evidently, he was a bad person for saying he didn't like Twilight.

He and I were kicked out of the group for being "negative," and the thread was taken down. Neither of us was informed of what was going on. In fact, as I said, I thought there was some problem with facebook for about half a day, then I asked in another group that has some overlapping members if anyone knew what was wrong with the Think Tank. It was fine for everyone else, and that's when I started asking around about what was going on.

Finally, there was an admission that I had been kicked out of the group, but the admins wouldn't say why. And, then, finally, someone who is friends with one of the admins was able to find out that it was because I was being "negative" and that <other guy> had also been kicked out for the same reason. So much for the idea of an open forum. Instead, what we have is a group of Meyer fascists where it's okay to call someone that's basically in the room lots of degrading and mean names, but it's not okay to say, "I don't like Twilight."

I find the whole thing just wrong. The whole situation makes me angry, because it is just wrong. It's screwed up. And the thing that angers me most is that everyone else was just okay with it. Not that it was advertised, but there was a thread brought up about it in the group as one person was trying to find out what happened. The response was definitely a "ah, well, tough luck for you" response. If I had been in the group and this had happened to someone else, I would have raised all kinds of hell over it and probably been kicked out to. BECAUSE IT'S WRONG BEHAVIOR. If one of my kids had behaved like this, there would be consequences and forced apologies, long discussions and reparations. Seriously, I'm not entitled to my own opinion? (Although it's perfectly okay for me to call someone IN THE GROUP a douche bag.)

And, as Bryan from A Beer for the Shower said to me about all of this, "If they can't take someone not liking their favorite book, imagine how they'll take it when they get a bad review for one of their own works." [paraphrase] No kidding.

Which brings us to our two hands:
On the one hand, I'm not upset about not being in a group that's run like this. If I had known, I wouldn't have participated in their little Meyercult to begin with. I would have left all on my own if this had happened to someone else and nothing was done about it.
On the other hand, it cuts off an avenue I had been using to promote my work, especially my Shadow Spinner serialization. Probably, it won't have any discernible impact, but I won't really know for a while. That part kind of sucks.

But the main thing about all of this is that the behavior is too indicative of a screwed up cultural mind set we have right now. A mind set that says it's not okay to express any opinion that says "I don't like that" or "That's not good." A mind set that says that is okay to actually be mean to someone that says something isn't good, but that's the only time it's okay to be "negative," because, for some screwed up reason, that's not being negative. And I'm not saying we should go out of our way to leave bad reviews or anything, but I do believe we shouldn't say something is great or awesome or whatever if it's not true, and I do think it ought to be okay to say "I don't like that" if we don't, especially if we actually have reasons for why we don't like it. And <other guy> had solid reasons why he doesn't like Twilight.

So that's my rant. I see the funny in it, but I'm too busy being outraged to laugh.

Guns and Adverbs: Part 2

What is the big deal with adverbs, anyway? I mean, they teach kids in elementary school to use adverbs liberally, to spice up their writing. If they teach kids they should be using adverbs, why do we, as writers, take the stance of "No Adverbs!"?

In a lot of ways, using adverbs can be like taking a shotgun and shooting your manuscript with it at point-blank range. And that's why everyone goes around saying, "Don't use adverbs!"

Everyone would be wrong.

There's nothing actually wrong with the adverb. If you learn how to use them effectively.

However, I'll give you the top three ways people like to use adverbs, and, maybe, you can see why there is the temptation to banish them:

1. in dialogue tags
The problem with using adverbs in dialogue tags is that they frequently become a way to tell the audience what is happening rather than to show the audience. For instance, you might use, "he said quietly," when "whispered" would be better. Or you might say, "he leaned close and said into my ear," which would be even better. Or you might say, "she said excitedly," which is just telling me that she was excited, but "she squealed and jumped up and down before saying" shows me that she is excited, which is far more, well, exciting. Basically, adding those adverbs to dialogue tags can be a lazy way of getting around showing what's going on.
And, of course, using descriptive dialogue tags distracts from the actual dialogue, which you don't want to do. The dialogue tag should fade into the background as much as possible, which is why we don't want to draw attention to them by tacking adverbs on. There are few "rules" of writing I believe should be followed unilaterally, but the one about keeping dialogue tags to a simple "said" is probably the one I believe in most. Heck, I think if I could get away with not using them, I would (which is kind of odd considering how much I dislike Hemingway for that very reason).

2. to create redundancies
Unfortunately, the other way we want to use adverbs is to reinforce verbs that don't need reinforcing. In effect, we make a redundant word combination. We like to say things like "he ran quickly" or "she screamed loudly" or "he whispered quietly." We don't need adverbs in any of those circumstances. If he's running, we know that he's doing it quickly, and, if she's screaming, we assume it's loud. In most cases, there are better verbs to replace those combinations anyway, like "he sprinted" or "she shrieked" or "he murmured."

3. really and very
Yeah, people really, really like to use these adverbs very, very much. Frequently, these cause writing to become boring due to word repetition, and, as with any word, you don't want to use them too much. Usually, there are better words.

With all of this going against the adverb, it can be difficult to see legitimate uses for them. It's rather like taking out a sub-machine gun to hunt a deer. The only good reason for that is if you want to save some time in making venison burgers. The trick is knowing when to use the adverb gun and which adverb gun works best.

Personally, I like the adverb as an adverbial phrase. See what I did there? "Personally" is an adverb. In point 3, so are "frequently" and "usually." In point 2, I have "unfortunately." Adverbs in those positions are useful and give a clearer meaning to the sentences. And that's the catch, when we're going to use adverbs, they should provide a clearer meaning; they should provide more focus. Not the same focus. You don't want them to just re-say what you're already saying.

Another good use of the adverb, which provides a greater meaning to the sentence but is not as an adverbial phrase, is to contrast the word you're modifying. Going back to the examples I used earlier, you could have "he ran haltingly," which provides a completely new dynamic to that sentence. You could also say "she screamed hoarsely" or "he whispered loudly." Those adverbs are useful and good and provide new depth to what is being said.

All of this to say that, although I understand the temptation to tell people "don't use adverbs," it's a better solution for people to learn how to use them effectively. There's no real reason to deprive authors of the adverb tool just because some people use them incorrectly. It's not the same as when I was a kid and was given a tool kit one year and proceeded to use the hand drill

something like this

to woodpecker the furniture. Needless to say, it got taken away. However, it would have been better if my parents had taken the time to teach me what to use it on.

Is It Better To Be "Nice" Or Honest? Part Two

I'm guest posting today over at Arlee Bird's Tossing It Out on the topic of reviews for "Indie" authors. We agreed that the topic was big enough for more than one post, so I'm continuing what I started over there over here. You should really pop over and read part one, first, though, before reading this one.
[One a completely separate note, I also have an interview up today over at the A to Z Challenge blog, stop by and check that out, too.]

To bring the impact of the “nice” review down to a more personal level, when the the independent market suffers the effects of undeserved good reviews, so do you.

Let me put this another way: The only way you can ever become successful as an independent author is if the larger audience of readers begins to buy your books. It's all well and good for your blogging friends and a few of their friends to buy your book, but, really, that's just a handful of sales. To make it, to really make it, you have to break through the “friend” barrier out into people that don't know you. That is a hard thing to do.

You want to know why it's a hard thing to do? Because the larger audience of readers doesn't trust the independent market. They don't even really trust the small publishers, so how do you expect them to trust you, some anonymous author with a sign saying, “Buy my book! It's really good!”

See, when we just do the “nice” thing and give good reviews to our peers, the independent market suffers, as I said, but, also, you, specifically you, as an independently published author, suffer. You are not immune to the overall perception that people will have of a market place full of good reviews that don't mean anything.

 You want to know how I know this? Because I don't buy independently published books except from people I know or that have been strongly recommended to me by people whose opinions I trust. Why? Because I can't tell what's good and what's not. And, even then, half the stuff (and I'm being generous here) I've read from people I know or has been recommended to me shouldn't be out there available for purchase, anyway, so why would I expect that other stuff is any different. But, yet, I can browse through the "indie book shelf" (yes, I just made that up) and find plenty of books with a stack of good reviews (on Amazon or on blogs) that I know to be... dishonest, for lack of a better word. In some cases, I don't think the person giving the review even read the book, because the review is about the author not the work.

A review beginning with “this is a great guy” or “I went to high school with this guy and he wrote a book” or “this girl spends all of her time writing” does not inspire me to buy the book or give me any faith in the independent market. If you didn't read it, don't go click 5-stars on it! Just don't do it.

To make this as clear as I can, it doesn't matter if you genuinely have written a great book, the best book ever, even, if no one can find it. It's like being the one apple tree in the middle of a forest of crab apple trees. The only way to be seen in all of that other mess is if reviews, all reviews, are honest reviews and are clearly labeled “crab apple” instead of “apple.”

So far, we've been pretty self-centered and only talked about how all of this stuff affects ourselves, but let's look at how the “nice” review affects the author in question. Does the “nice” review actually help him/her? Again, I'm going to say “no.”

Sure, as I said in Part One, getting the “nice” review may gain the author a few sales, but, if the book is really not good or not ready or not whatever, it's going to hurt the author more in the long run.

First, people buying the book are going to find “oh, this book sucks” and decide to never buy another book from that author again. It doesn't matter if, later, the author does put out something good, why would a buyer (that doesn't know the author) come back and try again after getting burned once? Most people are just going to remember to not buy anything from him/her again (like I won't buy any more Goodkin or Hamilton, I don't care how good people say they are).

But what's the likelihood that the author is going to improve if everyone is just being nice? The author, at that point, believes that the work is fine and s/he can continue in the same manner. I've seen a lot of this out there, too. Authors that whip out some 40,000 word "epic" in a couple or few months, get some nice reviews and continue on doing the same. Over and over again. Their friends are all giving them good reviews and telling them how great they are, so they never bother to actually look at the work or how much (little) time they're spending on it. They don't edit beyond spell check or have anyone with any kind of skill read the manuscript before they hit the publish button.

These authors think everything is just fine. “Look at how all my friends love what I'm doing!” But no one is buying their books. Why? Because they're no good. But no one is brave enough to tell them that. No one wants to damage the friendship by saying, “Hey, you need to work on this some more.” Again, it's a short term gain, but it's kind of like allowing your friend to walk around with a huge booger on his/her face. Sure, s/he'd be embarrassed if you told him, but how mad at you is she going to be when she finds out that you didn't.

Doing the “nice” thing doesn't help anyone. It doesn't help the market, it doesn't help you, and it doesn't help the author in question. Not in the long run. Yeah, I know, it can be really difficult to see past the short run to the long run, but, if we want independent publishing to survive, we have to do that. Right now, the big publishers are out there banking on one thing, that this lack of quality among independently published books will drive people back to only buying from them. The sad thing is they may not be wrong. Until we, the independent authors, have the courage and fortitude to be honest about what we're flooding the market with, people will continue to orbit the big publishers as their main source of reading material.

Publishing and the Real Estate Market

Everyone knows that the real estate market is a mess. The collapse of the real estate market has been, in many ways, the central issue in the economic crisis in the USA. Banks are now involved as the seller in 50% of all housing transactions. Especially in the lower end of the housing market. That number may still be growing. The problem with the bank being involved as the seller is that the bank doesn't care about anyone other than itself, and, since it's not a person, it cares for nothing more than getting the most money it can at the expense of anyone else involved.

Anyone paying attention to it knows that the publishing industry is a mess. Its infrastructure is collapsing due to technological changes and the growing demand by authors to have more control over their work (When someone like Dan Brown switches from a major publisher to a POD (print on demand) model, it's about control). The publishing industry, so far, refuses to change. It continues to cling to the way it's always done things, and, since it's not a person, it cares for nothing more than getting  the most money it can at the expense of anyone else involved.

My wife and I have been trying to buy a house for a number of months, and this is the thought that occurred to me this morning (This is only a thought, a parallel; there is no real point beyond this. I just found it interesting.): the real estate market and publishing are a lot alike, at the moment. In our price range, virtually all of the houses are bank owned or soon-to-be bank owned (short sales (that's when the owner needs to sell the house for less than what they owe on it (usually because they're going into foreclosure))), so we've been dealing with banks more than we've wanted to.

We had an offer accepted on a house a few weeks ago. It's a short sale, so there's a lot that has to happen between the bank (the actual owner (because banks do actually own most everyone's homes)) and the seller (the person (family) living in the house) before anything actually happens with  that. The problem is this: one of the inspections shows extensive dry rot in the siding on the house. It may have affected the structure of the house, but they don't know, because they'd have to remove the siding to find out. Will they do that? No. And why not? The current price is a fair price if the structure is intact; however, it's much too high if there's structural damage to the house. Does the bank want to have to lower the price? No. Does the bank care about anything beyond how much they can get? No. It's better for them not to know about structural damage. At some point, someone will come along and either not know to check that stuff or not care about it.

We've run into this problem over and over again looking at houses. Bank owned properties come as they are. Period. In short, they don't care about the actual product they're selling as long as someone buys it. As an aside, the thing I'm finding morbidly amusing is the investors that are buying these houses from the banks, fixing them up, and, then, finding, because the housing market is still in a decline, that they can't sell them for more than they paid for them even after pouring in thousands of dollars to fix them. Sometimes, they have to sell them for less. The publishing industry mirrors this lack of care for their products. They do this by what I'll call marketing genres. Vampires are popular, right now, so, they say to their agents, find us some people writing about vampires. No, we don't care if they're any good, vampires sell. Until everyone gets tired of vampires because of all the crappy vampire books that are coming out. But they'll just move onto whatever replaces vampires.

Then there are the agents. We like our real estate agent as a person. We often have doubts about her as a real estate agent. She keeps wanting us to buy the house she wants us to buy. Insisting that we should look at houses that don't fit the parameters of what we're looking for. And she's always pushing us toward buying at the high end of what we've been approved for instead of the range we keep saying we want to purchase within. And why not? The more we spend on a house, the more she makes. We understand her motivation, and we try to work around it as best we can, especially knowing that that is what we will have to deal with no matter what agent we have.

Likewise, literary agents are, also, interested in their paychecks. It's understandable. However, when you're working for an organization that's collapsing, it can make you kind of desperate. Oh, and if you think agents work for the authors, you really need to look, again, at the structure of the industry. The money stream is from the publisher, to the agent, then, finally, to the author. If it wasn't that way, there would not be various scandals in recent years about agents syphoning money away from their authors to themselves. At any rate, agents are clinging more and more tightly to the publishers and the publishers demands rather than working for the author and/or looking for new things. Publishers don't want new things; they want what's already proving to sell.

I know these parallels aren't exact, but, when I have a bank that wants to unload a house on me that may have structural issues, I'm reminded of some of the books I've read. Here's the thing, though, what's good for me is not what's good for someone else. Most people don't have the standards I do for books, and that's fine for them. Just like, I'm assuming, most people don't have the standards my wife and I do for a house. After all, the house with the special pot lab in the garage sold soon after we looked at it. Different people have different needs. And, well, if the buyer was planning to set up a pot lab, he was getting just what he needed. Cheap!

There is a positive, though, at least on the publishing side: there are alternatives. And, maybe, the publishing industry will evolve itself to meet the changes that are occurring in society (although, I don't really believe that). Authors do have other avenues they can use rather than trying to get on board a leaking ship. Unfortunately, in home buying, there aren't a lot of alternatives.