Sam Wiebe's Blog, page 8

Blog Hop

Dietrich Kalteis, author of RIDE THE LIGHTNING, has invited me to take part in a blog hop. The idea is for a writer to answer four questions, then tag two more people. You can read Dietrich's entry at his website. 

It's an honor to be tagged by Dietrich, and at the same time as John McFetridge, a really great crime writer from Toronto. In turn I've tagged Jameson Dash and D.B. Carew, whose entries you can see next Monday. Here we go.

What am I working on? 

Promotion for my novel LAST OF THE INDEPENDENTS, published by Dundurn Press on August 30th. It's a crime novel set in Vancouver, about a private detective named Michael Drayton who's hired to locate the son of a local junk dealer, a guy who specializes in selling secondhand goods.

As he proceeds, Mike comes up against institutions and individuals who do not want the child found, and will go to any length to prevent it. Unable to drop the investigation, Mike finds out how far he's willing to bend and break the law to uncover the truth.

I was influenced by the classic crime fiction writers, Hammett and Chandler and MacDonald, and later Walter Mosely, Sue Grafton, Ian Rankin and Dennis Lehane. But I also wanted to write about Vancouver, the changes going on in the city, and how it is to be a twentysomething person at the start of your career, in an openly hostile economic environment.


How does my work differ from others of its genre? 

I could say, “My book has regional specificity--it’s set in Vancouver.” Or “My book has a compelling protagonist and cast of characters.” Or “My book has already garnered rave reviews and won a Crime Writers of Canada award--before publication.”

Which are all true. But these are the attributes and accolades every author trots out about every book. LAST OF THE INDEPENDENTS is not every book.

So here’s what I’ll say, what few could boast about: my novel has a soul. That is what makes it different. That is why you should read it.

What I hope is that it's a crime novel, that lovingly employs the conventions of the crime/detective genre, to tell a story you haven't read before.

How does my writing process work?

I write by hand, pen to paper. It’s a colossal pain in the ass--especially transcribing, I really hate that part. But it helps to eliminate distractions, and you can do it anywhere.

Why do I write what I do?

I don’t like hockey, and there’s only so much professional wrestling you can watch.

Why do I write crime novels, you mean? It’s not just because I like crime fiction. It’s because I like what crime fiction can become.

Strip away all the b.s.-- the witty banter, the gore, the stereotypical victims and killers and sidekicks. Underneath the surface of crime fiction beats a heart that is in touch with our world, our nature, in a way that sci-fi, fantasy, romance or the western just can’t be. 

I think you can write honestly about complicated people, and you can write to entertain, and that those are not conflicting but rather complementary drives.

Introduce the next two authors.

D.B. Carew’s debut novel THE KILLER TRAIL was shortlisted for the CWA Debut Dagger award. It was published earlier this year, and has a hell of an awesome book trailer, which you can view at his website.

Jameson Dash is a successful writer of romance, who regularly publishes through Torquere and Dreamspinner presses, and also someone who's really figured out the internet game--promotion and publishing using the web. We've known each other since college, and we hang and talk shop on a regular basis. 

Giveaway! Win a free thing!

How would you like to win a free copy of LAST OF THE INDEPENDENTS? 

[Redundant, I know. You've probably already pre-ordered your copies. One for the bookshelf, one to kick around the house, and two or three to lend out to friends. Maybe you've ordered another couple to hermetically seal as an investment--it is a first edition, after all. But don't let that stop you from winning a free copy!]

For a limited time, Dundurn Press has sponsored a book giveaway through Goodreads. Details on the LAST OF THE INDEPENDENTS Goodreads page.

[But seriously, still pre-order and buy lots of copies.]

The Summer of Book Promotion Begins

I have a copy of my book on the corner of the table that serves as my desk. An acquaintance generously gave up their review copy. I'm thrilled with the cover and very proud of the novel. And that's why I want to apologize for what comes next.

Look. If you know me, you know the last things I want to do are public readings, incessant self-centred postings on Facebook, and hawking stuff to strangers, let alone friends.

But I am going to spend the next three to six months shilling the shit out of this book. Doing everything I can to make you buy and read a copy and tell your friends to buy and read copies. I will be the high-pressure commission sales guy at Future Shop or The Brick, following you around the showroom with Gollum-like persistence.

And the ONLY reason I'm comfortable doing that is because I believe in the book. I'm a pretty harsh critic, and I think LAST OF THE INDEPENDENTS is a funny, touching, interesting, profane, profound piece of writing. It's a novel I'd want to read. I think fans of crime fiction will take to it, and I think people who don't like crime fiction, but enjoy a good contemporary story if it's well-told and entertaining, will find much to recommend it.

I think it's honest, and I'd do a disservice to the book, to myself, and to the many people who helped me get here, if I didn't work my fat ass off hyping it.

So I apologize in advance for transforming Facebook, Twitter, etc into a one-man one-product Antiques Roadshow. I won't be upset if you ignore or unfollow me. After the first hundred posts, the sane response is, "We get it, asshat, you have a book coming out."

If you do get it, then you'll understand, and you'll forgive me for being as repetitive and obnoxious as a Mezmerize-era System of a Down song.

Of course, anything you can do to help me get the word out is deeply appreciated. The book arrives August 30th and is available for pre-order now at Chapters and Amazon. The first reviews are very positive, throwing around superlatives like "literary achievement." It's already won a Crime Writers of Canada award.

There will be a release party, and readings, and you are all invited to all of them. Please come. And bring friends. Preferably ones with money and short-term memory loss.

Thanks,

Sam

Beams Falling

"...an evocation of evil all the more powerful for its understated style...a literary achievement."— Don Crinklaw's review of Last of the Independents in Booklist Online. 

This will be a big month, followed by an ever bigger month, followed by the biggest month. LAST OF THE INDEPENDENTS drops August 30th. Before and after, I'll be doing signings and promo to get the word out.  

June 5th is the Crime Writers of Canada awards ceremony; I'm nominated for my short story "The Third Echo."

June 10th I'm reading with Robin Spano, E.R. Brown, Dietrich Kalteis, Linda Richards and Owen Laukkanen at the Irish Heather for "Noir at the Bar." That should be fun.

There are some other things in the works. You'll hear once I've confirmed.

I'm three days into writing the first draft of a new novel. It's going to be different than anything I've done before, and it's somewhat daunting. But daunting is good. We should be daunted every now and then, lest we grow complacent. One of my big peeves with college is that it's become so competitive it gives you zero chance to try something completely out of your element. An A+ physics student is better taking unchallenging physics courses than sojourning into history, or women's studies, or literature. If a student wants to go into economics or business, they can't afford to fail. And because we learn by failing, ergo, they can't afford to really learn. The negative incentive against curricular experimentation is very high.

Speaking of school:

This semester I have a chance to teach two of my favorite novels, the inimitable Maltese Falcon and Charles Portis's True Grit. Teaching the "Flitcraft story" from Falcon is a lot of fun, as it's one of the best-known philosophical episodes in crime fiction. If you're not familiar, it's about a man who, narrowly escaping catastrophe, makes a clean break with his life, and then unwittingly reconstitutes that same life in another city. "He adjusted himself to beams falling, and then no more of them fell, and he adjusted himself to them not falling." Dashiell Hammett: what a writer.

In the Line of Duty

 

 

This bookmark fought valiantly. It never shirked its load. It never complained, even when it was right in the thick of it, with four hundred pages of Anna Karenina bearing down from either side. Through Hemingway and Ian Rankin, from Cornel West to the darkest edges of Harold Bloom, through Team of Rivals and countless pro wrestling biographies, I've been honoured to call you bookmark, place-saver, friend. You can rest now, brother.

Noir at the Bar

It's official: NOIR AT THE BAR will hit Vancouver on Tuesday June 10th. It'll be held in the Shebeen Whiskey Room in the Irish Heather, 212 Carrall Street. The lineup includes E.R. Brown, Dietrich Kalteis, Owen Laukkanen, Linda L Richards, Robin Spano, and myself. Should be fun.

I haven't done a ton of readings, and definitely not with so many established authors. The last one I did was in college: I read an anecdote about voiding my iPod of all the shitty songs I'd downloaded and learned while playing with cover bands. Big Sugar, Sheryl Crow, etc. ["Don't you miss playing the drums?" people sometimes ask. I think about having to learn three Big Sugar songs for a rehearsal at Bully's jam space in New Westminster, for a band that would ultimately lead nowhere, and then I smile contentedly and go back to doing research on forensic accounting or Jonestown.] 

I'm excited to be a part of this--please stop by!




I read Tana French's novel In the Woods last year. French writes beautifully about sociopaths. As does Scott Snyder in his graphic novel The Black Mirror. Both of those books involve sociopathic killers. But non-violent sociopaths are relatively common, and dealing with them is stressful for a number of reasons. 

If you've ever been bullied, you know that a bully is never placated by receiving the thing he (predominantly but not limited to 'he') wants. No bully in the history of bully-dom ever took your lunch money and said, "Thank you kind sir, that will be sufficient." Now, not all bullies are sociopaths, but a similar mechanism seems to be at work. Equivocation and compromise are seen as weaknesses to be exploited. I was talking about this recently with a friend. A person pestered their supervisor for something they didn't deserve, didn't receive it, went up the ladder to the supervisor's supervisor, and eventually got what they wanted. Everything they wanted. Wouldn't it be lovely if you got everything you wanted? But that was only the beginning. The next week, this same person had a new set of demands. And will probably receive them. Being a sociopath doesn't just allow you to treat human beings as chess pieces, it allows you to treat yourself as a chess piece. You can actually create a different self, or an alternate set of facts, for each social experience. There is no perfect system, and therefore there's no system that can't be exploited.

Anyway, both Snyder and French are great writers, and I look forward to reading more of their work. I'm also looking forward to cracking the two Derek Raymond novels on my shelf, He Died With His Eyes Open and I Was Dora Suarez. I've heard nothing but great things about Raymond: James Sallis, the author of Drive, wrote the forward.

In Folly of Praise

I am what could be termed a ‘negative Nelly.’ Praise is pretty much lost on me (though greatly appreciated), while one negative comment is fodder for weeks of dwelling, mulling, moping, and other unpleasant-sounding gerunds.*

Which is why I haven’t updated in a while, even though there have been quite a few cool developments. An ugly situation at work has sidetracked me. Without going into detail, I’ll briefly vent before moving on to the good stuff.

A few weeks ago I had a student approach me outside of the school. He was worried, on my behalf, because he’d learned another student was planning on lodging a complaint against me. I reassured the student that I’d be fine, that the complainant had a history of exaggeration and prevarication that admin wasn’t likely to ignore…and then over the next few weeks I watched as everything this student informed me about came to pass, leading to one of the most negative experiences of my teaching career.

I care a lot about my students. I want them to walk away from my class better writers, or at the very least, aware of what they have to do to become better writers. To have that commitment questioned was very hurtful. To have the complainant’s interpretation of events taken as truth, and my own side of things ignored, well, it sucked ass.

I have a lot to learn as a teacher, and I absolutely could have handled things better. No buts about it. I do believe that in this case, I’m more sinned against than sinning.

Oh well. Better people than myself go through worse all the time. Dostoevsky was marched blindfolded to a mock-execution for his involvement with the Petrashevsky Circle. I have nothing to complain about. And at least now I can say that my classroom has been compared unfavourably to Stalin-era Singapore.

Moving on: 

The Arthur Ellis Awards shortlist is out, and my story “The Third Echo” was nominated for a Short Story Arthur. This is exciting! The shortlist event was a terrific experience. I got to hang with Robin Spano, Dietrich Kalties, Don Hauka and E.R. Brown. E.R. was also nominated for an Edgar for his Vancouver novel “Almost Criminal,” sharing the nomination pool with Stephen King, among others. Pretty exciting stuff.

I also got a nice email from the agent of a very famous author, praising “Snow Fall,” which appeared in Yellow Mama. That was badass, and meant a lot to me.

Finally, I’ll be joining Robin, Dietrich and E.R. in an event called “Noir at the Bar” on June 10th at the Irish Heather’s Shebeen Whiskey Room in Vancouver. Details to follow.

Other than that…I’ve been doing research for my next book, reading up on alternative religious movements. I’m excited to get started on the first draft—when I’m not writing, I’m not at my best. I’m also planning out the Last of the Independents book launch, looking for venues, comparing prices…good problems to have, as my friend Mercy would say.

Thanks for reading this.

 

*Participles? 

 

Snow Fall

"She opened her eyes to see a white world bearing down on her, and she knew she’d been thrown from the helicopter."

My story "Snow Fall" is out now, in the April 15th edition of Yellow Mama. 

Check it out for free here.

And how badass is the artwork?

Immortal...

"Every man's heart one day beats it's final beat. His lungs breathe their final breath. And if what that man did in his life makes the blood pulse through the bodies of others, makes them bleed deeper, for something deeper and larger than life...Then his essence, his spirit, will be immortalized by the storytellers..."

The Ultimate Warrior is dead. Long live the Ultimate Warrior.

April

April in Vancouver--any more beautiful and it would have the superfluous em-dashes of an Emily Dickinson poem. 

I am now on Goodreads, which is exciting. In promoting my book--an activity which involves cultivating new skills, skills far outside my comfort range, like 'talking to people'--I've found certain social media easier to get into than others. Twitter is by far my least favorite. I don't like the shrill tone of Twitter discussions, the misprision and miscommunication. Also, trying to read a twitter stream is like staring at Matrix code. Also, the term 'followers' is creepy. I'm not Jim Jones. Not yet, anyway. 

But Goodreads looks fun. We'll see how it goes. 

This is the second-to-last week of classes, the time when every assignment is due, every student wants facetime with you, and all your well-wrought plans start to go ass-over-teakettle. Between teaching five classes, book promotion, and trying to get some new writing done, it's been hectic. It's also when you realize all the horrible mistakes you've made, all the ways you could do things better next semester.

Anyway, there are some interesting projects in the works. I'll be updating more frequently once I'm on the other side of exams.

TTFN.