Arthur Slade's Blog, page 8

The Scorpion Rules: book review

 


 I love this book and I want to marry it. Okay, that's how my six year old has taught me to express my feelings. But this really is a wonderful novel. Science fiction that is poetic, thought-provoking, gentle and at times perfectly action-packed. Oh, and there are moments of absolute horror. The premise is that an artificial intelligence has taken over the world and to prevent war is has gathered together the children of the world leaders and if a country goes to war then the children from the warring countries are executed. The book is told from the point of view of one of those children. And to top it all off, the book is mostly set in Saskatchewan. Bonus points for that.

Art

The Pressure of Being Creative

 Sometimes being creative is not all it's cracked up to be.

Often if I'm meeting someone new at a party or in line at the police station or at the supermarket the conversation invariably turns to: "What do you do for a living?" My answer: "I write books." If I'm not met with stunned silence (or even confusion) I will often get the next statement: "That must be so much fun!" And it is fun. Creating characters and wrapping stories around those characters has been my dream since I was sixteen. And since the age of thirty I've been living that dream (eighteen years and counting of living off my creativity). So, all things being equal, I have no right to complain.

 And yet...  And yet...

Yes, there is a pure joy to creating a book. Most of that joy is at the very beginning when you get that first idea for a novel (Something I call ohmygodofchoicethisisanamazingidea euphoria). The joy returns again about a year or two later when you are holding the book in your hands. In-between is the actual process of writing. The endless research. The first draft. The second draft.  The third draft. And fourth. The first public viewing for the editor. The edit letter that appears in a sheet of flame and burns your mistakes into your eyeballs. And so on. That is all part of the grunt work of writing and though it is not always joyful, I do enjoy it (if that makes any sense). I like the challenge.

 But the pressure comes from different levels of the creative process. Can I solve this plot problem that I've created in the novel? Can I make this character more realistic? This situation? And those "small" questions lead to larger questions like does the book suck? And, if it doesn't, am I doing anything new with this book? Is it better than my last book? Have I improved as a storyteller? And, finally, will the book be a success?

 That last one is important. Obviously you want your book to do the best it can. To find its place. Both in the minds of readers, but also it's great if the book finds a proper financial place. Success also means that it will earn back its advance and make more money so that more writing can be done. Often people get upset when we talk about artists and money as if the idea of cash being paid should never come into the creative equation. But, and this may surprise some people, writers need to eat. To drink. To see the latest Star Wars movie.

 There is also the pressure of picking the right idea for the right reasons. I have a multitude of projects that are waiting in my "idea" bin but am constantly asking myself which one will both be pleasing to my creative side and commercial enough to add to the bank balance. Last year I released a graphic novel called Modo: Ember's End . It was a continuation of my The Hunchback Assignments series as a comic book. I chose to use crowdfunding to create the book because I wanted to test how this "new" way of getting ideas to paper worked. And on nearly every level the book was a success. Artistically, I was pleased with the story but especially pleased with Christopher Steininger's artwork (we had been talking about doing a graphic novel together for nearly ten years, so we finally fulfilled that dream). We raised over 20,000 dollars on Kickstarter and Indiegogo and received a $10,000 grant from Creative Saskatchewan. So again, the book was a success financially. Over 1000 copies have been sold around the world (we were/are hoping to find a publisher to do the softcover version, but so far have not been successful). The problem is that by the time all of the expenses were tallied (artwork, printing, shipping) my take of that money was around $4000. My best guesstimate at the time spent on the project is six months (that includes learning how to crowdfund, doing promotion, packaging, writing the script, etc.). Now in six months I can usually write a few drafts of a novel and could, in theory, make about ten times that amount for the book. So did I make the right choice to create the graphic novel? Artistically, yes. But my kid takes piano lessons and gym and...well you get the picture.

 I don't have a list of five things to take the pressure off of you creatively (and I don't think pieces like this always need to come down to a fix). These words you've just read are an admission. And commiseration with those experiencing similar pressure in their lives (be it creative or otherwise).

 And a chance to let off a little steam. Thanks for that.

  Art     

Space Adventure! MINRS review

Ah, this book had me at hello. That is...if hello means space adventure. I grew up reading Heinlein and Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke and still love to expand my mind with the latest science fiction. But I just haven't seen enough of this type of writing for younger audiences. Well MINRS by Kevin Sylvester fills that void. Or space. Or black hole. A wonderful sense of action, science that's interesting (yet doesn't slow down the plot) and a great variety of characters. The characters are the children of miners who work on Perses, a planetoid that earth is mining. Just the whole idea of living on (and inside) a planetoid is interesting enough but then the bombs begin to fall from space and... ...anyway I don't want to give away too much. Just hold onto your space helmets. It's a wild ride...

 Art

My Copy Editor found a pair of pants in my novel...

I'm in the middle of doing copy edits for my novel Flickers. And a pair of pants just showed up out of nowhere:


 



Copy editors do enough work. They shouldn't have to do the laundry, too!   Art

Book Review: We Are All Made Of Molecules

Me holding a book that's made of molecules. Well, I'm late with this review. I mean the book has already been nominated for a Governor General's Award and been sold into a bazillion countries. Plus, I read it a few months ago and have finally got off my duff to offer you a review. Susin Nielsen is one of my favourite writers and this book is a great addition to her growing list of excellent titles. It's the story of Stewart, an academically brilliant but socially clueless main character, who is struggling to adapt to the death of his mother and he's experiencing the massive adjustment of moving in with his father's new girlfriend and her fourteen-year-old daughter Ashley. Written from Stewart and Ashley's point of view, the book is spot on in terms of voice. Susin is a screenwriter (along with being a novelist) and I think that natural ability to structure a script comes through with this book. There are no wrong turns. Plus the book appears deceptively simple on the outside but the deeper you dig into it the more you discover is there. Nielsen has a gift for comedy that somehow reaches into your soul and plucks your heartstrings (I copyrighted that last sentence BTW). I laughed out loud several times. And may have had to wipe away a manly tear once or twice. Don't worry, I used my work gloves to sop...err...I mean wipe the offending tear(s) away. Anyway, two thumbs and a whole bunch of molecules up for this one. Art

Review: The Nest by Kenneth Oppel

Today I turn my mind to The Nest, Kenneth Oppel's latest opus (I like the ring of that). I am a friend of Ken's but, more importantly, I'm a fan of his work (Skybreaker and Silverwing being two of my favourites along with Half Brother). I'm often late to the bandwagon and this book definitely has a bandwagon: starred reviews galore, a glowing NY Times review, and general accolades and buzz (forgive the use of that word considering the book features magical wasps). It's completely deserving. It's one of those books that sneaks into your subconscious word by word and before you know it you are feeling those palpations of fear that you thought only Hitchcock could produce. Young Steve is the narrator of the story. His family is dealing with the arrival into the family of a child with an unknown cognitive disability. There are hospital visits and severe health complications to deal with. At about that same time Steve, after being bitten by a wasp, begins to be visited in his dreams by a wasp queen who promises to "help" with the baby. I won't say much more than that--other than you probably shouldn't accept the help of a wasp queen. This is spine tingling and skin crawling at its finest. But the book asks important (and disturbing) questions about what is normal. What would you do to "fix" a child with disabilities. As a father of a child with disabilities, this book nails those first weeks of angst and fear and not understanding why all of this happened and how to deal with it bang on. Read The Nest. Not just for the chills. But for the way the book makes you think. What would you do if the queen of wasps offered help? Art

My Most Popular Youtube Video is Cheesy and Involves a Treadmill Desk...

It's curious what one becomes semi-famous for...
What I don't mention on the video is that if you walk backwards on the treadmill desk you go back in time. The '80s weren't as cool as I remember them...    

Art

The Perfect Editor

My publisher, HarperCollins Canada, is looking for a new editor. But they forgot to add a few qualifications. So I helped them out:  

The Canadian Adventure Prize Pack

Well, here it is! The Canadian Adventure Prize Pack. Trains! Zombies! Zeppelins! Magicians & Masterminds! My publisher, the honourable HarperCollins Canada, has generously offered this package of books to help promote my nearly famous newsletter. In order to win the amazingly adventurous books above all you have to do is enter here:

  a Rafflecopter giveaway

But if you want to double your chances of winning then sign up for my newsletter in the contest form above!

My gluten-free monthly newsletter is titled Arthur Slade's Somewhat Clever Newsletter. It's jam packed with news, writing tips, humour, and lettuce and bacon. It has everything! And there's also a prize every month (because it's fun to give away things). The prizes range from author Skype visits to books to critiques, to....it's endless. As you can tell I have a lot of fun with it.

 FYI: The adventurous books are Zomboy by Richard Scrimger, Saving Houdini by Michael Redhill, Masterminds by Gordon Kormon, The Boundless by Kenneth Oppel and The Hunchback Assignments by some guy who writes things sometimes.

Have a gloriously adventurous day! Contest closes Oct. 31st, 2015.

This is what happens when someone with 1.34 million followers retweets you...

The short story: A heavy metal fan gets retweeted by his favourite band and experiences a modicum of fame.

The detailed story: So, I'm an unabashed heavy metal head. I know. Several people have stopped reading this already. But the rest of you, please read along--there will be no gushing about "the 1980's was the greatest metal decade ever!" Yesterday, Iron Maiden released its new album The Book of Souls and to celebrate I decided to tweet a picture of the Iron Maiden jean jacket I painted back when I was in Grade Eleven. This is my tweet:
   

 Funny, eh? I was amazed I could still almost fit into the jacket (as long as I didn't try to do the buttons up). The official Iron Maiden twitter account kindly retweeted my nostalgic tweet. Here's a screen grab of their twitter page:
 

As you can see they have 1.34 million followers. That's million with an M. I was both over the moon that some tiny portion of the Iron Maiden machine had noticed me and really curious what would happen with my tweet. So here are the official stats of that tweet:
  Of those 1.34 million people who follow Iron Maiden on Twitter 52,671 of them looked at the tweet (or at least it appeared briefly on their screens). But 4860 engaged directly with it. That is they clicked to see the larger photo or  expanded the "details" about it. 275 of those people "favorited" the tweet. 177 clicked on my profile. And 70 retweeted my tweet. And you can see by the number of replies that it led to some conversations with fellow fans (one even said, "up the irons" in solidarity). And 5 of them began to follow me.

5 new followers? Out of a possible 1.34 million? I wasn't surprised by that. After all only a small portion (or should I say a smidgen) would be interested in a YA writer.

I think this does show the level of engagement on twitter. Only a small percentage of the Iron Maiden twitter followers looked at my tweet (I'm sure a good portion of people just tune in every once in a while so the tweet vanished on their feeds). As an author, I wasn't expecting to sell books to these people, I just wanted to have fun. And it was fun. And it only took me a few minutes to take the pic and tweet it, so no "work" time was lost. Plus, did I mention that @ironmaiden retweeted me! If only I could tell my 1984 self that this was going to happen. His head would explode.*

Art 

 *of course I'd have to explain what Twitter was first, oh and the internet and mention that Iron Maiden inconceivably put out two albums without Bruce Dickinson and...well...it's a long list.

 PS. This last photo is for those who are not faint of heart:
    See. It almost fits.