Stella Atrium's Blog, page 4

Girl Heroes in Current Fantasy Novels: A Lament

Back to my first complaint.  I was making a case that women characters are cheated in sci-fi / fantasy stories.  A reader countered my assertions and claimed that several current writers present the young lead hero as a girl.  So I decided to look into this trend that is a common trope for the 2001 -2011 decade.  

[image error]I read The Bone Doll’s Twin (the trilogy) by Lynn Flewelling where a boy/girl named Tobin starts out as a boy due to magic, because the girl heir would have been killed.  She fights the last battle, though, in full armor on horseback wielding a sword AS A GIRL.  The ambiguity of gender confusion was interesting, but the forest witch was a more fascinating character.  This book, at least, presents the troubles of other women who want to join the fight, or who serve fighters.

I read the Poison Study series by Maria V. Snyder where a girl named Yelena is trained by a mean minister named Valek who later admits to sexual interest and becomes her savior when her foolhardy trust in his lessons get her in trouble.  They succeed together, but he has all the real power.  There’s another female character in this story named Star, but she serves only as counterpoint.  

I read The Book of Deacon, which is the first in a series by Joseph R. Lallo.  This female lead character, a too-naïve girl named Myranda, is always alone and persecuted until she reaches hidden island where everybody has magic; a cloying feast of description and little plot.  She also bonds with a mean, mysterious character older than her and with sexual interest.  She sheds all the security and friends in this paradise to follow him into trouble.  Do you see a pattern yet?  [image error]

I read The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold and enjoyed every paragraph.  This female character has a brother who should be heir, and a teacher who is more than he seems.  However, she has a mother and grandmother, a BFF and ladies-in-waiting.  Within the feudal society where the bad guys have no redeeming qualities, she makes decisions to side-steps the fate that only a woman would face – marriage to the wrong man as a pawn in court politics. The solutions were too easy, but the character of Cazaril was a delight in his fatalism.  A fun romp into formula writing.

I’m currently reading Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson because of the buzz on GoodReads about the next upcoming book in the series – and something about a video game based on the series.  Here the primary character is a guy named Kelsier with specific powers based on real physics. I can see the appeal to sci-fi readers who are mostly guys.  The female lead, since his wife is long-dead, is a street waif named Vin who…  wait for it…  has special powers she knows nothing about because she was orphaned from her noble family.  

[image error]Another big surprise…  in Mistborn there are NO OTHER WOMEN.  Oh, yeah, there’s a cook who cuts Vin’s hair so she looks more like a girl. Where are her sisters, aunts, cousins, BFFs, younger girls she persecutes?  

Guys…  Women live in a world of women.  Women solve problems differently than how men solve problems.  Women don’t act on inflamed anger or rush into danger like Keifer Sutherland in 24 – so not believable (even for a guy).

Where are the stories where women solve the kinds of problems that women have using the kinds of resources that women can gather?  Unwanted births, little access to wealth, no voice in the public square, the demand to follow custom, submission in a confrontational situation, secret revenge, and more.  Stop putting a sword in their hands and look around.  

How do women succeed in adversity?  Here’s a hint…  They work WITH other women.

Aaahhh, I feel better now.  Got that off my chest.

 

Self-Publishers: Beware the Dreaded Comfort Zone

 

[image error]I sometimes talk with an artist friend who has a studio in the same building as my writing studio.  He shows his works at the storefront gallery below us.  The gallery owner expends considerable effort in the Chicago market to draw an audience into his openings, and the paintings sell well.

Except now the painter wants to market his works to regional galleries and has picked a few favorites to approach.  His paintings have all sold, though, so he needs a not-for-sale cache to request an opening at other galleries.  He also needs a press kit and ready responses to interview questions.

“I first began painting because…  The biggest surprise in my career so far was…  My favorite color is green, thank you for asking, but I’m in my blue period now…”

I asked yesterday how the plan for the gallery tour was coming along.  His greatest fear is that the paintings will sell out at the first gallery and the tour will have to be canceled.

Oh, the trials of success.  [image error]

He gave me a soulful look and said, “I wish I hadn’t started with the gallery tour idea. The expense of travel. The need to sell myself into each market.  The constant glad-handling and repeated questions.  I’m dreading the whole adventure.”

It’s terrible that he’s so successful.  Just terrible!

Paintings are like fashion in a way.  Once Michelle Obama wears an outfit to a public event, she cannot be seen in that dress again.  Self-published books, however, are more like a stand-up routine at a comedy club.  Since the jokes work only on the people in the room, they can be re-used with a new audience.

An agent once told me that the market for books is limitless, once you tap into a national press release vein for marketing.  Unfortunately for self-publishers, that avenue is NOT Twitter.

[image error]I love Twitter and spend hours with writer friends there.  We retweet obsessively and provide space on each other’s websites for interviews.  We “Like” each other on FaceBook fan pages and post weekly digests of activity for our favorite writer-tweeps.  We give klout and gold and karma and hugs.

 

But we don’t read each other’s books, and we certainly don’t BUY them.  Twitter is not a current that leads to national reputation and SALES.  Twitter is a comfort zone where we count the number of retweets as success without a thought that they are only a return gesture for my retweet of his tweet about his book.  None of this activity has reached a reader who BUYS BOOKS.

Are you a writer on Twitter?  Do you have a blog or website where only fellow writers visit?  Do you count yourself as successful and ignore the sales numbers on the 1099-misc? [image error]

What is your next adventure to burst out of the comfort zone and market to regional bookstores and online READER sites?

Have you enabled RSS feed on the blog? Have your added "Like" buttons to the website that link to a fan FaceBook page?  Have you submitted topical articles to Tumblr or Helium?

Leave some suggestions here for that first step off the cliff.

Also visit me at http://www.librarything.com/er/giveaw...

For a GIVEAWAY of 20 copies of fantasy novel SufferStone through March 26.

My Beach is the Best Beach, Bar None.

We had a mild winter here, followed by the earliest spring I can remember.  Wisteria bushes are about to display yellow starburst flowers, and even the honeysuckle is sending out hesitant shoots.  Chicagoans are so conditioned, we just know there’s another arctic blast coming our way, often expressed as “waiting for the other shoe to drop.”

[image error]No complaints are allowed on this cloudless March day that’s worthy of June.  So I took a walk to the beach that faces Lake Michigan east of Lake Shore Drive. The water has no salt and no tide.  The temperature will chill your bones into August, but only tourists and children think you visit the beach to go in the water.  

My beach is North Avenue, four blocks north of Oak Street Beach.  Navy Pier is six blocks south of there.  NAB will accept a million people on some days, depending on the fireworks schedule at Navy Pier, Wednesday and Saturdays all summer.  There’s kyacking and skip-jacking and wind-surfing and sun-bathing.  Through the season there’s the Cancer Walk and Chicago Marathon and Regalia for drunken people on boats they don’t know how to drive.  

People in all walks of life come here – old and young, rich and poor, over-healthy and over-fat. Today I saw people dressed for summer, and some dressed for kick-boxing (go figure).  People dressed for work were stripping down and rolling up to exposed skin to the sun.  There were kite flyers and dog walkers and chatty women pushing baby buggies.  Ipods with earphones and ereaders for Twitter.

For a bike rider, the path is contiguous going south past the Yacht Club, Grant Park and the fountain, the Aquarium and Planetarium, the Field Museum, McCormick Place and all the way south to the Museum of Science and Industry. The Chicago skyline shimmers on your left for the entire ride.  [image error]

But today I turned north walking four blocks to Fullerton.  I shuffled past the baseball diamonds and rowing lagoon, past the volleyball nets and Theatre by the Lake building.  I skirted the grounds for Lincoln Park Zoo and the Nature Museum that has a room of live butterflies that settle on your arm and drink your sweat.  

[image error]I cut across the Drive to walk north four more blocks to Diversey past the empty moorings of the harbor that occupies the four block to Belmont Harbor that spread north to… (you get the picture) all the was to Evanston.  Chicago has the largest Park District of any urban setting in the USA. When winter releases its grip on Chicago, the whole lakefront turns into a garden. Thank you Mayor Daley Sr. & Jr.

I cut inland at Diversey, ogling the statuary at the Elks Museum, past a slew of world-class Irish bars and juice bars and sushi bars and oyster bars, and picked up a bucket of KFC before I took the train home (practically door-to-door) for a two-hour nap.

My beach has no entrance or exit fee.  I paid no parking fee and bought no $4.29 a gallon gas to get there.  Nah, nah, nah.  

I'm sure you think your beach is better.  You can make that argument in reply, but please supply a full description with images. 

Why I Embrace Self-Publishing

I saw a solicitation for a tenured position at my alma mater for which I will apply.  Professors seldom leave this department, and competition for vacancies is fierce. I experienced sudden anxiety as though my whole future depended on submitting a stellar letter with quality documentation.  I recognized that tense feeling as the same I felt when approaching agents and publishers.

And then I had an epiphany, not unusual for a spring day in windy Chicago. [image error]

As a self-publisher, those feeling of anxiety are mostly absent. In fact, I just completed a round of letters sent with review copies that were requested in response to a press release that I wrote.  I jotted off the letters citing connections with the group through a PR service (cost: $175), and good reports about my fantasy novel launched in January 2012.  While I completed the “shipping and handling” exercise, I considered getting an assistant for this busy work. That’s how low the work was on my scale of importance.  

I have skills for promoting, and for creative writing. So why was I so anxious about traditional publishers and the agents who lunch with them?

I was victim to no fewer than three (count them 3) printers who called themselves publishers, including the infamous Publish America.  I never received positive results from any of their promised marketing efforts.  Nada, zip, zero.

[image error]Here’s an analogy. I was raised in the country, and each spring we had to clean the slough of debris.  We opened a trap that served as a bottleneck and flushed fresh water through along with the sticks and leaves and earthworms. Soon the fresh water ran clear.

Maybe the same is true with self-publishing.  Sure, some writers should take more classes, and some self-promoters should take a breath.  But the new shape of the publishing industry sorts the quality (and ambitious) writers from the sticks and earthworms.  Soon enough books from the fresh writer who lived with frustration all this time will flow freely to readers, so that great characters and original work find an audience.

I will continue with a small publisher because the quality of the product is better than I can weave together on the laptop. I will avoid Smashwords and offering books for free because I believe reviewers who work with magazines find that level of publishing repugnant.

But here’s the question…  If I can make a website and blog, connect with writers and readers on Twitter, GoodReads and LibraryThing, and grab press release leads for $175, then why were writers willing to pay $4500+ to agents (or marketing executives) for less response?[image error]

All those self-important agents and publishers and advisors and naysayers can go fly a kite on this windy spring day.  

Best Practices for Self-Publishers

Promoting an ebook on Amazon is a business, even for self-publishers.  I found a plethora of online articles for how to apply business principles to self-promotion, almost like gaining a BA in Business Management, I suppose. [image error]

These structures build a brand (online persona):
•    Maintain a focused and fresh website
•    Select areas for connections (Reddit, OpenSalon) and be supportive in comments
•    Build a platform for a diverse online presence
•    Blog regularly – but not too often – about real experiences
•    Link to colleagues, critics, and consumers
•    Learn habit patterns of followers and fans, and adjust behavior to serve them

Additionally, I found that a certain daily discipline is needed to avoid wandering off the path and to use my time productively.  The Best Practices listed below largely follow business principles for promoting any brand name product. The list is derivative and works for me.  Your list may shape differently.

1)    Channel my efforts – With new social outlets popping up each day, the writer must select those that drive traffic into the blog and drive sales for the book.  I have found success on GoodReads more than LibraryThing, on Reddit more than Linked-In. I have to develop a presence on social sites where visitors add comments and where readers make choices for purchasing the next trilogy in fantasy.

2)    Don’t get distracted – I love Harry Potter fans who are energetic and loyal, but I’m done with that series now (even Rowlings is done with that series now) and want to move on to readers who have moved on.

3)    Respond to comments – When traffic reaches the blog(s) and comments are posted, my timely responses are essential.  The visitor wants to feel acknowledged.  This principle has caused me to pace the timing for placement of guest blogs and interviews, along with questions posted to Reddit, so I’m not always chasing my tail.  

4)    Add genuine responses – If the visitor chooses to comment, then my reply should address her ideas, not a promotion for more links.  

5)    Get to know colleagues – On Twitter especially, I learned to stay within my genre and not wander into groups for romance or detective stories (well, some detective writers).  When I explore websites of loyal retweeters and get to know their interests, I can feel confident when I retweet fresh posts from them to my followers.  

6)    Be generous – The world doesn’t revolve around my book on Amazon (big surprise). Look into more shared interests for music, writing advice, publishing advice, funny images in the news, global causes to support.  Present the whole person on social media.  

[image error]7)    Develop a consistent message – How does this imperative jive with number 6? I return consistently to my primary focus of developing real female characters in my stories.  Which causes, blogs, interview offers, fellow writers reinforce the message of global women rights and stories that feature women as lead characters?  These social advocates become my friends.  

8)    Dress the blog with links to friends – Sometimes links overwhelm the presence of the blogger.  Sometimes the blogger neglects links, even “follow on Twitter”. I have remade the blog page many times to reach current friends and reinforce the central theme.  

9)    Assess sources of traffic – I have been surprised with how traffic works on the blog(s) and home website.  Overall, content drives traffic as much as placement.  Fair-weather friends are soon absent, while friends with similar interests linger and retweet.

10)     Be patient – Building relationships takes time.  When I see traffic for a successful blog, I want more traffic – the definition of an addict, I think.  Some social media groups allow for comments that are more negative, so I learned to take the good with the bad.  Colleagues comment to build stronger platforms.  Consumers (who buy our products) comment when they object to assertions.  I must learn to serve both groups.  [image error]

These guidelines have focused my hours devoted to promotion online, and outcomes are mostly positive so far.  What additional Best Practices have you embraced that may also serve my efforts?  Any suggestions?  

By What Measure Success for Self-Publishers?

The first book of my fantasy series titled SUFFERSTONE received a couple 5-star reader reviews on GoodReads (reported on Amazon).  Since I blog about female characters in science fiction, I was gratified that one reader (thanks, Frank Hicks) identified with the lead male character Brian Miller.

So, I had brief and troubling feelings of success. I immediately wondered what was next, so vain.

[image error]Joseph Heller said in an interview with Playboy (many years back) that he delivered Catch-22 to the publishers in 1961 and received a $2,000 advance (today’s equivalent is $20,000), then went back to adjunct teaching with few expectations.

Catch-22 went viral by word-of-mouth and was made into a movie.  Over the decades, Heller was a cult personality and hippies wore khaki jackets with Yossarian emblazoned on the breast pocket. The term catch-22 became a concept in the American mythos for frustration with a system stacked against the regular guy.

I would call that success.

So… there’s a lag time for the creative stage, the publishing stage, the famous stage, and the American classic stage. The writer must measure what stage she’s currently experiencing and how long is the wait. [image error]

Andy Warhol once told Jean-Michel Basquiat that the audience for his street art wasn’t born yet.

Basquiat famously said, “I don't listen to what art critics say. I don't know anybody who needs a critic to find out what art is.” (Brainy Quotes) Of course, once he received some money for his work, he killed himself with drugs.  The starving artist stance has some benefits.

But, back to the writer. The creative stage counts.  Many writers once they start with promotions have the urge to push aside today’s work and return to the solitary gestures of creation.  Delicious.  

I suppose the best approach is to tolerate each spike within each stage with patience, and manage expectations.

[image error]Art critic for Time magazine Robert Hughes in 2002 wrote a classic review titled "Goya’s Women" about an exhibition of paintings by Goya. As you know, as a young man, Francisco Goya was a portrait painter for the Spanish court in the 1780s. Later he was an impressionist who captured the horrors of war in his country.  Goya lived into his eighties and continued to paint and draw until his death in1828.  

Robert Hughes pushes aside Goya’s long history with the leaders of Europe and focuses on the many images of women that Goya painted over the decades, and the artistic quality in those images.  The ART remains after the shouting subsides.

That’s success.  

See Robert Hughes famous TIME article here.

 

Women in Community in Fantasy Stories

There's a quick test circulating on the blogosphere, especially for sci-fi feminists called the Bechdel Test that asks how many of the female characters for any story are in scenes where they speak to each other.  Surprisingly, these scenes are absent even when the women have business together. 

Throughout literature, men have presented women as objects of interest that must be kept ignorant of each other.  Therefore, male writers offer the assumption that each woman is queen of her own island. This idea is as old as the Greek classics. Odysseus while trying to return to his wife Penelope in Ithaca visited many islands ruled by women and was continuously "captured" by them.

[image error]Calypso ruled on Ogygia and kept Odysseus 10 years, the same length of time he was in Troy. He met the sea nymph Ino on Scherie, and the witch-goddess Circe on Aeaea where she turned his sailors into animals. And we cannot forget the island of the Sirens. In each case, the woman was blamed for keeping him from his purpose. And the various queens were unaware of rulers on other islands, apparently unconcerned with treaties or trade pacts or warnings of which sailors to avoid.[image error]


The island queens all fear Hera or Athena or Venus, however. Athena sent Mercury to force the release of Odysseus and, through Mercury, chastised Calypso for detaining him, sounding much like a mother-in-law or a Pastor's wife. The female gods of Olympus spent no time championing the island queens or capitalizing on their strengths (such as location on trade routes) to improve commerce in the Mediterranean.

Odysseus met one woman who had family named Nausicaa, but that adventure was just an excuse to show his legend had grown large in his absence. She was from a ruling family and was waiting for the right match in marriage, so Odysseus couldn't stay since he was already married.

A modern version of separating the women takes place in Mo' Better Blues where Denzel Washington was a trumpet player and Spike Lee played a bookie.  Washington had two women who troubled him, and many scenes were devoted to keeping the two women unaware of each other. 

[image error]One night both girls, Clarke and Indigo, show up at the same club (wearing similar dresses) and comedy ensues while the Spike Lee character tries to hustle them out.  I wondered again — don't Clarke and Indigo live in the same neighborhood and share cousins, hairdressers, call trees for the PTA, etc.? And why does each go to the blues club alone? Women go into clubs in packs for safety's sake.

The queen of her own island structure is a gender bias phenomenon that is pervasive in modern (and ancient) stories.  You will notice the blind spot more often now that its source is identified.

What movies can you name where the female characters operate separately and never interact? 

 

Rise to the Challenge: Female Character Types for Fantasy

In the stream of blog posts, I have been asking for more variety in female characters in fantasy stories.  The challenge came back to me that I should provide some examples.  Below is my list of 30 possibilities: who did I neglect?

The procrastinator who makes you wait an hour because she did no planning to get ready for a night out.

The shopping addict who beg you to go along while she buys items she cannot afford and often returns them the next day so she can re-spend the cash.

The femme fatale who thinks every man in the room wants her, even though most would not look at her twice.

The daddy’s girl who refers to her father’s opinion on each choice and cannot form an idea of her own.

The “I’m okay, you’re okay” commiserating bud who only wants to share with someone who’s as miserable as her.  

The new girl who wants to belong but keeps messing up because she’s afraid of what the others might think about her.

The judgmental germ-aphobe who’s only repeated line in the story is “Ouh, that’s gross.” (cliché)

The practical plain girl who always gets it right.

The flirt who is best friends with the practical plain girl – go figure.

The protégé who’s afraid of her music teacher but too shy to say something about his abuse.

The light-fingered tattle-tale who becomes a confidant of the bad guy (cliché)

The outdoors girl in competition with her three brothers and has a booming laugh, chums with the fat girl.  

The girl with a boyfriend who’s always trying to keep secrets from him, but wants to tell you those secrets.

The smart but lazy older girl who is jealous of the flirt and her loyalty to the plain girl.  

The fixer who has a way with machines even though the boys don’t let her work on the expensive models.

The sneak who steals tokens from others and tries to build a secret hoard.

The know-it-all who wants to be the leader and doesn’t understand why the plain girl always puts her down.

The nurturer who gathers the weak girls around her, not because she’s strong, but because she’s scared.

The dissatisfied bully who thinks she can hide her acts and hangs with the nurturer. There’s a natural pair.

The aesthetic who sees each problem clearly and acts on her own without confirmation from anybody, even the plain girl.

The sexual deviant who tries to lead the younger girls into trouble with the boys.

The co-dependent needy girl who is easily led astray and brings the tattle-tale and new girl with her.

The snide stand-offish observer who gives each girl a mean nickname, but the plain girl still talks to her as an equal. What’s up with that?

The watch(wo)man who takes the late shift and has skills the others envy but don’t ask to learn.

The fearless fat girl who thinks it’s funny the other girls are afraid of snakes, the only one the watchwoman allows near her.  

The girl with heart but a dark background who wants to sacrifice herself to a higher cause, but is avoided by the watchwoman as the most dangerous in the group.

The purveyor who does all the work and delegates tasks that the other girls resist until the plain girl or watchwoman tell them to get busy.

The sugar-sweet empty headed girl who cannot focus on the task at hand, but the flirt takes her underwing, making the watchwoman roll her eyes.

The off-key ditty singer who thinks she’s turning work into play, the favorite target for punishment from the watchwoman, until the aesthetic tells her to lay-off.

The girl with honest talent and a self-deprecating manner who we all know is going to a larger arena, but we feel honored that she spent time with us.

The worrywart who manages the finances and is a confidant to (guess who?) the plain girl.

I got a million of these.  Along with the aunts, cousins, teachers and mothers.  Maybe so many female characters live in my head because I only had brothers as a kid.

What's with All Violence for Girl-Heroes in Fantasy Stories?

So I was thinking about how female fantasy writers connect the girl-hero with violence. I was seeking a quote to start this blog entry, but I came up short.

Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent – Isaac Asimov

Violence is the last resort of the ignorant – L. Ron Hubbard

Both are a mis-reading of a post-war Roosevelt speech. I guess everybody borrows.  [image error]

I like that we have chosen to empower women by giving the girl-hero choices and weapons and treasure and magic and the ability to talk to horses. These are exciting additions to her personal power, and I wish the stories had existed when I was young. (My comfort was A Wrinkle in Time where one of the travelers was a girl.)

I recently read a couple trilogies in fantasy where the girl-hero wields a sword, leads an army, and grown men twice her age follow her.  In history,  there was a queen named Matilda (we need a biopic here!!) who put Henry Plantagenet on the throne of England. But Matilda was a grown woman who took advantage in a fractured system where the heir apparent was weak, and the King of France had died leaving Eleanor (Henry’s wife) with a larger kingdom.  Matilda’s victories on the battlefield were few.

[image error]Other queens featured in history ride at the head of armies as inspiration (a young Catherine the Great, for example), but none of them were commoners. Rather, the queen had resources a man usually claims such as treasure and blood rights to squander on a bid for the throne. Mostly these examples from history acted through diplomacy and deceit when the monarchy was weak.

So where is the precedent for all the violence for girl-heroes in fantasy stories?

What girl kills without remorse?  What 14-year-old kills a man who outweighs her by 80 pounds? So sometimes the girl-hero has more magic than the opponent’s magic. Sometimes she was trained in the use of poison to level the contest.

But there’s still the kill stroke – the coup de gras.  

Why are we turning girl-heroes, who are written to serve as liberating role models for our younger generation, into killing machines?  When did this trend start?

So the three possibilities for female roles in fantasy are still warrior, sweetheart/victim, or harlot – right? We have no better/different roles for women? Really? I can think of a few, but they depend on adding additional characters to the story; a pantheon of aunts, school mates, teachers, cousins, young sisters and BFFs. Listed are a few examples of character types:

Jealous sister like in the movie The Bodyguard

Buddies like in Thelma and Louise

Friend who turns on you like in Bridesmaids

Long suffering steadfast friend like in Bridesmaids (hence the popularity)

Narcissistic nemesis like in You Again

Overbearing boss like in Working Girl

Friends bonded to improve conditions like in Nine to Five

Friends bonded by community like in Steel Magnolias

[image error]Mentoring from an expert like in Bones on TV – Why do we never see this structure in fantasy stories? The girl-hero is always mentored by an older man who admits, much later, to sexual interest.  In real life, older women teach younger women. It seems that when a woman reaches age 40, she suddenly goes mute and the girls she mentored erase her name from history.

And another thing – I’m warmed up to it now!! A woman as the bad guy gets the short shrift. The male characters who serve as bad guys in fantasy stories are often deftly drawn with a back story for how they started down a dark road.  But the female bad guys are usually stuck in the “Mirror, mirror, on the wall” musky old motif.  What happened in her background that twisted her sense of doing good?  

A bad guy who serves to drive the story thinks he is doing what’s best for the future, and he offers every justification for why he is right.  A female bad guy never gets that speechifying moment to justify her choices before somebody throws a bucket of water on her.  

Come on, ladies…  We can do better than this. 

Better than "Used to Be" for Self-Publishers

Last week a self-publisher complained to me that the lag-time between a GoodReads giveaway and posted fan reviews on Amazon was three weeks.  I turned away to hide my smirk.  I supposed it's true that we're so spoiled by the internet, we don't remember how it used to be. 

A decade ago I trusted a small publisher to produce a paperback fantasy novel I wrote. Turns out, he was really a printer masquerading as a publisher with no press release plan or distribution plan.  The weight fell on me to get the word out.[image error]

I did research and surfed the web for compatible sites and posted articles about writing and even a "glass bead game" that asked readers to buy the book.  This was before FaceBook in the days of listserv — remember listserv?

I attended sci-fi conventions and traveled to bookstores in the Chicagoland area and staged and attended author appearances.

I begged friends to lend support at my author appearance at the local and famous bookstore where the proprietor could boost my contacts inside the industry.  Except it rained cats-and-dogs that night and I felt sorry for the four friends who did make it to the event, late and drenched.

[image error]My efforts went nowhere.  It used to be that a self-promoter expended time and treasure and never reached the intended audience. Listed are a few memories that are burned into my mind.

1)    Introvert at Tradeshow — Did you ever see a booth at a trade show inhabited by a painfully shy writer who spoke to three people the whole day?  I have.

2)    Author Appearance with No Fans — Did you ever see an author at Borders seated alone at a table with stacks of her books and a blank expression of defeat? I have.

3)    Retail Marketing to Bookstores — One writer told me he boosted sales by driving up the California coast visiting bookstores for a personal pitch to owners to place 4 books on the shelves of each stop. An E for effort, but the price of gasoline makes this adventure prohibitive — even if the retail stores are still there.  A hit-or-miss method at best.

4)    Book Signings at Conventions — Writers hate this duty and function like turtles out of the shell. I count Kurt Vonnegut and Robert Jordan in this number. Writers often drink to get past the dread, so they function like hungover shell-less turtles at the morning signing, drinking copious amount of water.[image error]

5)    Regional Conventions — Did you ever attend a regional convention where you negotiated a giveaway of your book as part of the "fan appreciation" bag, only to discover the 80 attendees preferred stories about zombies and were really there to get laid?  I have.

6)    Listings on Industry Websites — These were accomplished using a form with no personal contact and no acceptance of connected blogs or Amazon listings.  Some of these still hover online, static and aging and misleading. [image error]

7)    Fan Websites — These genre lovers accepted articles and shameless self-promotion to boost traffic by adding your fans.  Except your fans and hers together came to five, including your mother.

8)    Getting into the Pipeline — Used to be... All promotion was accomplished with paperbacks, so each event included shipping a case of forty books to the hotel that hosted the convention, and then shipping them home again. 

9)    Managing Remainders — Did you ever work with a printer who wanted to be certain the check cleared before he shipped the books, even at 40% off?  Did this same printer dump remainders on the market so they hung around for three years at $1.89 sold by resellers on Amazon?  I have. 

10)     Tardy Reviews -- Did you ever find a complimentary review of your novel three years later by a respected reviewer on LibraryThing who must have picked up a remainder book?  Guess what...  that happened to me too![image error]

So don't bring your complaints here that GoodReads or Twitter or LibraryThing aren't working for you.  Industry connections today are accomplished without shipping cases of books to neighboring states, and without leaving the house. 

Spoiled, spoiled, spoiled.