Racheline Maltese's Blog, page 12

Max Perkins: Man of Genius

Yesterday I cut out of work early to go see Genius, the movie about Max Perkins, the editor who shepherded the works of Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Tom Wolfe into the world. I’d been looking forward to this movie, not just for two hours alone in the dark after two frankly miserable weeks, but because it seemed to be about two things that are important to me: Writing, and the collaborative relationships writers form while writing. Below are some spoilerific thoughts about the movie:

1.) The first ten minutes of the film are perfection. There’s no dialogue, just the text of Tom Wolfe’s manuscript — what becomes his first novel, Look Homeward, Angel — while Max reads it with an expressiveness that destroyed me. And the little moments we see of Max’s life — his office, his commute, his home, his interactions with his daughters — are evocative and delightful. I got the sense of this successful man with a wonderful life who is struggling with some unfulfilled desire and also his own mortality.

2.) None of which was ever followed up on, at least not in a meaningful or satisfactory way. Because this movie was based on a book, it’s clear to me that they took the good scenes — rightly so! — but that all the connective tissue got left out of the script or on the cutting room floor. The whole thing has a serious telling-not-showing problem. Max and Tom have a great friendship, clearly. But time hops, Jude’s first book comes out and they’re suddenly besties after the last scene we saw them in together was them just slowly getting to know each other, and I was left going “Wait but what a year went by? What happened? Tell me more?”

3.) A big part of this movie is about how terrible things happen to the women of successful men. Zelda Fitzgerald’s in an insane asylum. Aline Bernstein (Tom Wolfe’s lover) goes to distraction and threats of suicide because of how badly Tom treats her. And Louise, Max Perkin’s wife, is left to the inevitable state of raising five daughters with a husband at the office more than not. This was the thread I wanted more about. And the movie doesn’t spend enough time on it to do the issue justice and I’m not even sure they knew they were doing anything with it at all. Max’s wife is the most stoic and sympathetic and, after he realizes he’s fucked up, Max makes things up with her and gets his act together. At least, I think that’s what happens; so little time is spent on this that that conflict really gets no conclusion, which is criminal. In part because the chemistry between Max and Louise is stunning.

The Fitzgeralds’ situation was the most well done, even though the least amount of time was spent on it, because what was done was so literary and understated. Guy Pearce as F. Scott Fitzgerald is stunning.

Unfortunately for the story, Tom Wolfe and Aline Bernstein, his lover, have zero chemistry. Which is strange, because I love Nicole Kidman and Jude Law separately in this movie and in other things. But it was so noticeable as to be off-putting. Tom Wolfe is horrible to her, and she has a period of suicidal threats and bringing a gun to the office and  generally being unhinged. Kidman plays it beautifully, I think no other actress could have pulled it off. But the script does not do her or the character justice, and I was left deeply uncomfortable at times at the way she was portrayed. Grotesque was the word that came to mind, and not in a good way.

4.) So the point I was most interested in about this movie, where it is about two men who have a working relationship with each other and have conflicts with their romantic partners and families about that, doesn’t hold as much water as I wanted it to. There’s one fantastic montage of editing that sells Max and Tom’s relationship but then hardly anything else to support it, just them declaring after the fact how important they are to each other.

5.) What this movie ends up being isn’t so much a testament to one friendship, though it tries to be. What it is is a testament to how difficult life as a person who works with words can be, when one has things in life that aren’t words, too. It’s clumsy in places, ill-supported in others, but it still works. And what it really, really is, is a love letter to editing, and taking words and making them the best they can be while never being able to shake the doubt that what makes us the judge of what is best? It’s well timed for me, as Racheline and I are about to go into overdrive editing The Art of Three and A Queen from the North, and it makes me eager to tackle those pieces again with a fresh appreciation for editing and the process of writing.

Hi there. How are you holding up?

It’s been a pretty difficult week in the world, and we’ve been quiet. While we’ve continued to engage in life as usual with our writing and our partners, we haven’t really been chock full of nonfiction words.

Lots of other people have though, and if you’re up to it, we hope you’ll read some of the excellent work out there related to both the Orlando mass shooting at a gay club’s Latin night and the murder of a British MP by a neo-Nazi sympathizer. There is, we believe, no way not to politicize these killings, because these killings were inherently political.

As always we encourage people to research, register, and vote their conscience wherever and whenever they can. We also hope everyone can and does take whatever time for self- and community care available to them.

We’ll resume with the usual business about here sometime tomorrow.

Best,

Racheline & Erin

Torquere sale… especially on Snare preorders

Snare is going to retail for $3.49 when it’s released on June 22, 2016. But right now everything on Torquere’s site has been marked down 20%, which means it’s $2.79.

And then you can use the code preorder15 for another 15% off the sale price, which means you can get it for $2.37.  Preorder will be up on Amazon and other distributors soon, but this is the biggest discount we currently know about being scheduled. It will remain in place through Tuesday, May 31.

NYC: Death. Taxes. Vampires.

When Elliot Iverson, a municipal employee responsible for paperwork pertaining to New York City’s vampire population, knocks on the door of the Gramercy warren, he wants only to resolve a clerical error. But a sudden snowstorm, a new friendship, and an ill-advised threesome force Elliot to make some big choices about his own life and death.

More info on Snare: https://avian30.com/2016/04/30/cover-reveal-and-content-information-for-snare/

To buy Snare: http://www.torquerebooks.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=4690

(Also all our other titles with Torquere can be seen here: http://www.torquerebooks.com/index.php?main_page=index&manufacturers_id=550

Kids, book fairs, and queer fears

Yesterday, Erin and I attended a book fair. We do a lot of book fairs, both special interest (i.e., LGBTQ or romance genre specific) and general interest (i.e., The Brooklyn Book Festival). We enjoy them, and we are, as a rule, very good at them.

Our tables can be slightly incongruous. In addition to our romance titles, we often also display other books I have work in — including the Harry Potter trivia book I wrote in 2007 (it’s all ages appropriate, but aimed at older teens and adults), and several non-fiction essay books about various fannish subcultures from queer or female perspectives. All books are always labeled with price and content information. Additionally, no book has a cover any more sexual than the images you see in public marketing seen on bus shelters and billboards in any major city. Think perfume ads.

This never, ever causes a problem. Often, it helps start conversations. And we’ve long delighted in explaining our publishing careers, talking about being big queer nerds, or letting people know that while the lesbian werewolf anthology wasn’t written as YA, it is suitable for teens, and providing recs for queer romance that has been written specifically for teens, since ours simply isn’t.

And it’s just fine.

And yesterday, it just wasn’t.

I want to take a moment here to say this was not in any way the fault of the book fair. They welcomed our booth, knew about our content going into it, were friendly, well-organized (the most well-organized of any event we’ve been to), and came to make sure we were okay when I tweeted about some of what happened.

A tween was at our table with his mother looking at the Harry Potter trivia book. We keep that book at the far end of the table so that readers who are only interested in that book do not have to engage with our other titles.  The tween was not aware of any of the other books on the table, he had the focus of obsession that Erin and I, as fans, are more than familiar with.

And then his mother saw the rest of the table, slapped her hand over his eyes and tried to pull him away from the table. He had no idea what was going on. He was still trying to keep his eyes on the Harry Potter book. So with her hand still across his face, this mother grabbed the child’s head with her other hand,  and wrenched his neck around in a way that discomforted me for its violence. She then put an arm around his shoulders and dragged him away as she shot nasty glances at us.

This wasn’t the only incident of its ilk yesterday, but it’s the one I’m having trouble letting go of, and the one that shocked me. It’s also the one I feel guilty writing about. Because maybe I’m wrong. Maybe I’m overreacting. Maybe I, as a queer person, have no right to be upset. Maybe I should have expected this. And shouldn’t I, always, think of the children? Speaking of which, maybe I should have told her not to assault her son.

I lived in the DC area from 1990 to 1995. For some of that time I worked in a gay book store where we occasionally garnered drama over a labia-focused coloring book that was a strong seller. The people who bought it ranged from people looking for gag gifts, to women interested in the line art of it, to people educating their children on and trying to normalize the female body.

But every once in a while someone would wander in, not realizing it was an LGBTQ bookstore, then get a clue, then look around until they found the thing that most offended them most, and then start screaming about how we were recruiting children. It was then that that damn coloring book — which was never aimed specifically at children — was the bane of my existence. Every. Single. Time.

Growing up queer meant that there were some jobs I knew I could never do. Childcare, teaching, camp counselor — for a queer woman born in 1972, I came of age knowing each and every one of those professions were unsafe for me, just as it was unsafe for me to smile back at a child who might stare at me on the subway because of my glasses, or jewelry, or (at the time) pink hair.

Children, and the work of seeing people into and through this life, was barred to me by our cultural bigotry. In the host of reasons I write about death themes and engage in death work, my life as a queer person is central to it. AIDS happened; children didn’t. Like a curse laid upon my flesh, there were only certain types of witch I could ever be.

As my friends – straight and otherwise – have children, I remember that past, and I feel as if I am supposed to absent myself from their lives. To turn mute. And to keep my eyes downcast in the presence of their little ones. Despite the fact that I love kids, I’m good with them, and am not so shabby at teaching them things.

So Erin and I spent most of yesterday apologizing for our books. Our usual conversation openers were instead reassurances and admissions of awkwardness. And over and over again, we had to listen to people at our table and others insist that at a general interest event, all words in all books must be appropriate for all ages. This is not the world I live in. Nor is it the world I want to live in.

Other things also made the book fair uncomfortable. These included a man coming up to our table to tell a limp-wrist joke and the people who would stand twenty feet from our table and stare at it for long periods of time. Were they angry? Or were they simply interested in queer books and didn’t feel safe approaching us? I’ll never know, but it sure did break my heart either way.

I know I’m privileged in my out life by where I live, my skin color, and sometimes even my gender (queer men often face more hostility than queer women re: the child safety issue; and we all know about the appalling trans bathroom panic currently sweeping the nation), but I didn’t expect to have it underscored in a place I think of as culturally similar to New York, where I once lived, and where I worked in an LGBT bookstore 25 years ago.

I should note Erin and I also witnessed rude/inappropriate behavior towards another (differently than us) marginalized writer, which doesn’t feel like my story to tell.

We kept not packing it in because we’re not quitters, and because while we never view our books as activism, I know what it meant to me growing up to see people who looked and felt like me, to know lesbian wasn’t a dirty word, to know girls could have short hair, to know queer could be a word of pride… of saying another person and I were two of a kind.

So in the sea of all that, props in the end to the mother who stood patiently by her as tween child perused our covers, who smiled at me kindly as she asked her kid if he had any questions, and then who took his hand and asked him if we wanted to get popcorn.

You made my day.

Join us at the Gaithersburg Book Festival, May 21, 2016!

This Saturday, Erin & I will be at the Gaithersburg Book Festival vending and signing our titles. The weather promises to be moderately tolerable (always a dicey proposition in the DC metro area), and we would love it if you came to say hello.

The event, which had over 20,000 visitors last year, takes place from 10am – 6pm at the Gaithersburg City Hall Grounds. There’s food, readings, events, workshops…and us!

 

You can find out table in Exhibition B with help from the handy map below.

Whitehall launches May 18, 2016!

While I’m hard at work on season 2 of Tremontaine as both a writer and producer, I’ve also been producing (no words from me on this one) Whitehall from Serial Box Publishing.

Created by Liz Duffy Adams and written by her, Delia Sherman, Barbara Samuel, Madeleine Robins, Mary Robinette Kowal, and Sarah Smith, Whitehall is set in the 17th century court of King Charles II and focuses on his queen, Portuguese princess Catherine of Braganza.

Her journey to find her place as the foreign wife in a court riddled with political and religious intrigue – not to mention the many mistresses of Charles the “Merry Monarch” – is a tale of perseverance only a true queen could endure. Love mingles with betrayal before a sensual renaissance of art, culture, and sex in this lush historical serial.

She who would be queen must win the love of a king—and a country.

For obvious reasons, I love this — romance, examination of relationship structures, formal manners, politics, and the endurance of women. If you’re obsessed with the stuff I’m obsessed with, you’ll be obsessed with Whitehall too.

You can read an exclusive excerpt at Romantic Times and subscribe at SerialBox.com. The serial’s 13 episodes will also be available in ebook and audio from all the major online retailers you probably tend to shop at.

“Where’s a ‘Downton Abbey’ fan to go these days for serialized doses of historical drama? Dear Reader, consider ‘Whitehall.’ With each new installment, this grandly entertaining serial will tighten its hold on you. Irresistible!

– Louis Bayard, author of The Pale Blue Eye and the “Downton Abbey” recaps for The New York Times

“Richly detailed, with real-life historical characters who leap off the page, Whitehall is compulsively readable and thoroughly addictive.”

– Megan Chance, author of Inamorata

“Whitehall’s English King Charles II is the kind of Bad Boy we all want: a walking sex god with a heart of gold and a secret grief . . . Fans of everything from Dorothy Dunnett to Hilary Mantel will love this witty mix of sex, scandal and intrigue.”

– Ellen Kushner, author of Swordspoint and creator of Tremontaine

“Deftly balances the pleasures of glamour and intrigue with insight into these fascinating people, most of all Queen Catherine.”

– Gordon Dahlquist, The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters

“Sweeps the reader back to a time when the fate of kingdoms hung on royal subterfuge that was carried out as much within bedrooms as within the court… a captivating and suspenseful tale.”

– Mark Tompkins, author of The Last Days of Magic

A Queen from the North finds a home!

So, ages ago, Erin and I wrote a really weird book for really weird reasons. It’s an M/F low-heat contemporary royal romance, and for that, is super super mainstream. Twenty-something girl whose life is a disaster meets heir to the throne. Yay!

But it’s also set in a not-so-United Kingdom where the wounds of the War of the Roses have never healed; features Anne Boleyn’s great great (etc) genderqueer granddaughter as the court witch; and contains raven prophecies, a state visit to Canada (and accompanying relationship meltdown in a Tim Hortons), lesbians in the House of Lords, a hot gay bodyguard, and a best friend who defends the princess-to-be from the paparazzi with her flipflops. Also lots and lots of horses.

It is the weirdest thing we’ve ever written.

And because we really really want to do a related book about George (said genderqueer great great (etc) granddaughter of Anne Boleyn who is a supporting character only in this book) and want to do something incredibly nervy with the world-building as the series goes on, it’s going to Torquere, because they’re willing to let us do all those things.

So…

A widowed prince in need of an heir,

a not-so-United Kingdom in need of healing,

and an ancient prophecy that still lingers in the modern world

… are about to conspire to make Lady Amelia Kirkham A Queen from the North.

Coming 2017 from Torquere Press.

I posted the above on Tumblr, and got lots of enthusiasm (unexpected! delightful! yes!) and people want to know how they could be notified when the book comes out. My suggestion is you join our mailing list (either fill out the little box at right or go to http://eepurl.com/65dMz).

You will get email from us once a month, but that’s all. We won’t give your info to anyone else. And you can always sign up with a pseudonymous identity – we don’t need your real name, just an email address that works! We have a few other titles coming out before AQftN, but the response has been so significant that we’re going to put a sneak peak of it in our newsletter that is going out June 1; we hope to have release date news by then too.

Sales for May 8, 2016

At Torquere you can get 40% off on everything using the code MOM2016. 

All my and Erin’s titles are here: http://www.torquerebooks.com/index.php?main_page=index&manufacturers_id=550

And this includes the preorder on Snare (the death, vampires, taxes book – find out more (including content advisories) here: https://avian30.com/2016/04/30/cover-reveal-and-content-information-for-snare/ ) which is here: http://www.torquerebooks.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=4690 – with the coupon, it’s $2.10.

Meanwhile at AllRomance everything is 30% off, but they also have a program where

you get a free book for every 10 you buy.

So if that works for you, you can see all our titles here: https://www.allromanceebooks.com/storeSearch.html?searchBy=author&qString=Racheline+Maltese – Snare preorder is not yet available.

How to survive vending at a book fair… and actually sell a few books

There’s been a lot going on — all of it good even if some of it not quite the way we envisioned it going — but while we deal with manuscripts with publishers and agents and in submission and in our own edit process while also trying to write new stuff, we’ve also been preparing for the Gaithersburg Book Festival.

The Gaithersburg Book Festival is just one of several in person events we do each year, where we meet readers, sign books, and hopefully make a few sales. Despite being strange awkward people, the fact is, we’re actually pretty good at this. In fact, I actually really really enjoy it, even if I have to stare at the wall for days after I do one of these events. Some of the things that work for us include:

Give readers a chance to browse in silence. Book fairs can be exhausting and everyone is trying to get their books in readers hands and earn back their table fees. Interacting with people can help boost your sales, but give them a moment first.

In a similar vein display your prices prominently. Not everyone wants to converse with you to find out a price. Not everyone wants to have to react to your prices to your face. And make sure people know you take cash and credit (you can take credit easily and with minimal fees using Square). Have a lot of small bills on hand (A LOT, someone always pays with a hundred), have something to write a receipt on (someone will always ask), make sure you know the sales tax laws and filing requirements where you are vending, and always have a pen. Many many pens.

Similarly, label book content. On our price stickers, we also label books for the genre, sexual/gender identity of characters, and whether the romance elements are monogamous or polyamorous. This helps people see what we do quickly, and find what they want even if they don’t want to talk to us.

Staff your table appropriately. Two to three people are ideal staffing levels for a table. Having someone else to talk to will keep you energized, allow you to do more business during crunch periods, and give readers a choice of people they feel more comfortable interacting with. Too may people can scare a reader off. Too few drops the energy level and puts more pressure on the interaction.

Cast yourself in the movie of the book fair and then play that role. Who you are at a book fair is a public you, not a private you. Be yourself, but be a version of yourself that reflects your work and that your readers can get a handle on quickly as they interact with you. Are your books quirky romantic comedies? Bring your quirkiness and embrace your awkwardness. Are your books about billionaires? Dress up just a bit. Write darker stuff? Erica Kudisch wore handcuff earrings when she visited with us at the NYC’s Rainbow Book Fair; that was a great accessory choice I’d also recommend to crime writers.

Remember that you are there to solve a reader’s problems. Their problems are that they don’t have the right book to read yet. Your books, may not be those books. So don’t start talking to them about what you write out of the blue. Ask them what they’re looking for today, how the book fair is going for them, or what they are reading right now. And be prepared to recommend books by people who aren’t you. For example, Erin and I often get asked about YA books, books with low levels of sexual content, and books with asexual lead characters; we’re able to quickly point to where some of our titles can fit in with those requests, but are also always ready to recommend authors who focus on those particular story elements and styles, since our work mostly doesn’t. You’ll earn friends and fans that way and sometimes make a sale in the process.

Never be defensive about what you write. Be understanding when readers are defensive about what they read. This can be hard. When you’re a genre writer and/or when you write queer characters, you’ve probably heard a lot of crap from people about what you do and are tired of it. Similarly, you may also encounter readers who have reasons to feel awkward about their reading preferences. Let them know that they are safe at your table and with your books by not being defensive about what you write, but also being discreet about what they read. Match your volume, tone, and packaging to your reader’s needs. If someone wants to whisper to me about their need for lesbian werewolves (true story!), I’m happy to whisper back… and sell them a book.

Avoid the hard sell. Or the obvious sell. If you’re at an LGBTQ bookfair, you don’t need to ask people if they like LGBTQ romance; engage with more nuance.  (Again, say hi, ask them how they are enjoying the event, what they’re looking for, or what they’re reading). Someone’s dithering about which book to buy? Confess to them that you always have trouble making decisions too and then try, “If you flipped a coin and it came up [book 1] would that work out for you?” Most of them time, they’ll make a choice or even buy both.

You’re only allowed to be desperate if you’re funny. Sometimes we all have bad sales days. In general, though, you don’t want the buying public to know that. If you’re good at comedy, you can play with this a bit more and sometimes even drive sales that way. Also, we recommend never displaying more than 10 copies of any title on your table at once. People need to feel like your book has been selling and that they have to buy your book before it sells out. It’ll also look less cluttered.

Have an elevator pitch.  Know how to describe each of your books in one sentence. Know how to describe the general themes of your work in one sentence. If there are certain hard questions your work tends to provoke at events, know the quick, cheerful answer for that too.

Have a takeaway handy. I’m on record as saying I have reservations about the arms race in swag (I think authors use it to compete with each other more than it actually brings new readers on board), but do have a postcard or a business card you can hand people so they can remember you and your books.

Have a way for people to sign up for your mailing list. A book fair isn’t just about making sales in person. It’s about getting you on people’s radar going forward for both paperback and ebook sales.

Visit the other booths. See how they do things. Make friends. This is called competitive research, networking, and remembering the good writers are good readers. Also, taking that walk around will definitely help your energy levels.

Smile even when you want to die. Look, I get it. Book fairs are long days. You’re an introvert. Selling your stuff feels weird. You just want to make some money at this damn writing thing, and everyone feels farther along in the game than you. If you’re having a really bad day, you’re also menstruating, have a cold, and forgot to eat breakfast after staying up all night binge watching the 1995 Pride & Prejudice. But smile. Laugh at yourself. Tell your tale of woe when appropriate… while smiling! And you will get through the day and sell books. Promise.

Now, readers, it’s your turn. What do you wish book fair vendors would do when you’re browsing at an event? What makes you more or less likely to buy? What makes you have a good time? How can we help?

Cover reveal and content information for Snare

New York City’s only constants: Death. Taxes. Vampires.

We now have a cover for Snare, which will be out from Torquere Press on June 22, 2016. To my utter delight, we’re seeing a lot of interest in it from all sorts of different readers and placces. But, since it’s such a strange novella (it’s just under 30,000 and while we hope to compile it with some other material into a paperback edition eventually, this release is ebook only), I wanted people to know a little bit about what’s in it, so it’s easier to decide if it’s the right book for you.

Snare is definitely a love story. It is probably not a romance. The ending is somewhat ambiguous and may not be viewed by most readers as our protagonists making the best choices.

While plot-heavy, it has a lot of sex between men driving that plot. Not more than the recent shifter anthology story, but definitely on a level with Starling and Phoenix (not on a level with Doves, which we tend to get “oh my god that scene” emails about).

While the sex is initially consensual, there’s some vampire biting that isn’t that happens during said sex – and then there’s even an argument between later in the story consent and what consent even means. Please be aware. There are definitely going to be characters in this story who don’t share your values or definitions.

This story is also non-monogamous.

And yes, this story really is about paperwork and bureaucracy. Yes, it’s really inspired by a single historic apartment building on Grammercy Park. And yes, it’s my favorite, favorite world-building I’ve ever been involved in, because it’s strangely, strangely personal to me.

It’s not overtly horror (I mean, other than vampires) but I recently described this story as slow, creeping horror wrapped in a warm fuzzy blanket. If we did our jobs right, this story makes a lot of things seem super charming that are actually the stuff of nightmare if you sit with them.

Also, hey, it’s written in the present tense, which I know irks some readers. About half our stuff is present tense. If we’ve written something in the present tense, that’s usually because it’s actually about death.(Go freak out, Love in Los Angeles fans, because yup, death death death). Sometimes our stories have death in them, but they’re not about death. But yo. Vampires. About death. Present tense.

Snare is also kind of funny. Because hey it’s us. We like farce.

If you have any questions about Snare, do just let us know. I just don’t want people to be surprised by the consent issues, the level of sexual content, the lack of a traditional HEA, or all the paperwork.

Pre-orders on the Torquere website will be available soonish, and then pre-orders on other sites will happen a bit closer to the release date.