Writes of Passage
I don't mean for this blog to be all about bellyaching; it's just that there are various things out there I feel I should comment on from my perspective as an indie writer.
As I think I've mentioned before, when I first "got serious" about my writing (that is, sending stories out and collecting rejection slips, which I held onto for years until I unfortunately lost them, or my ex threw them out, perhaps?), I was 18 or 19. I'd send to big-name magazines like OMNI and PLAYBOY, etc. Ones that had story sections and paid well.
My young man logic was straightforward -- go for the big ticket venues, see if maybe I can get published by them. One could look back on that and see both innocence and hubris -- I know now I was nowhere near ready at the time to get my work out there that way. I just did it out of my love for writers like Ray Bradbury, Richard Matheson, Michael Moorcock, Kurt Vonnegut, and many others. They had done it, so I was going to try to do it.
From 19 - 32 years of age, I just concentrated on reading and doing journal-writing. I didn't send more stories out in that time. I just didn't do it.
Again, hindsight kind of nags at me a bit. I should have continued to send stories out back then, instead of spending 13 years honing my craft. I should have done trial-by-fire and kept slinging stories out back then, while I still had the chance to get a foothold.
The reason I say that is because the publishing landscape evolved (or devolved?) over that time -- magazines folded, or got rid of their story sections, and things just changed for the worse for writers.
By the time I got some stories published (I'll always be grateful to Ireland's ALBEDO ONE for actually publishing a couple of my stories, and even nominating one of my stories for one of their Aeon Awards -- I'd gotten second place, itself another story), the publishing world was beginning its slow slide as a waning industry.
Yes, stories were still appearing, but it became far harder to actually get published anywhere, somehow. At least for me, it did.
I found myself writing story after story, building up inventory, and finding only rejection after rejection. It began to get unwieldy, tracking those constant rejections and futile submissions.
And, sure, I could have simply kept on that route, but while that was going on, it became "publishing-perilous" to be a white male writer in many ways. There was a groundswell of resentment as other groups pushed (successfully) to the table and garnered the acceptances. I wasn't part of the problem, aside from being a straight white male writer.
Being a white guy became a bad thing -- never mind that I wasn't a rich white guy, wasn't an asshole white guy, wasn't a fascist white guy. As a progressive white guy, I accepted that. I didn't recoil from it. Others should have a chance to get their stories read -- it's only fair.
However, the net effect is that it's even harder for me to get published today than it ever was. Nobody will admit to implicit bias existing in the still very, very, very white industry of publishing, so the tendency is to overcorrect and attend to make amends through publishing.
I'd point out that white women still get published a lot, since their whiteness is somehow negated by their gender and sex. Maybe a topic for another day, if I really want to get myself in trouble for speaking openly....
Others would (rightfully) point out that white men are still prominently represented in publishing (the names are plentiful, you know who they all are). And, at the top, sure, yeah, I see that -- those dinosaurs still rule the land. But they're slowly going extinct.
From my perspective, how'd I get to find it so difficult to get published? Do I suck? Am I a shit writer? Something I always entertain as a possibility (honestly, it's a usefully masochistic tendency for any writer, in that it at least forces you to try to do and be better at writing if you beat yourself up about your words instead of just thinking what you write is just fantastic).
Over time, however, I walked that back. Based on the stories I was reading, I *was* writing good stuff. And I knew that stuff wasn't getting picked up anywhere by anybody.
My reasons for self-publishing (*gasp*) were simply that I was building up too much inventory -- too many heavily-rejected stories languishing on my laptop, piling up, going nowhere. No prospects, no venues, with only my desire to write and dedication to it sustaining me.
And I wanted to write novels, and I despaired of those novels ever getting picked up anywhere. I dutifully slung out stories and novels to publishers, and still racked up the rejections. I used to joke that my stories were dosed with "editorbane" -- sure to repel editors. And "agentbane" as well -- as no agent would pick me up.
Now, I could have spent another 20 precious years going that route, accumulating the 10,000 (or 100,000) rejections I'd need before someone might (stressing *might*) deign to publish one of my books.
However, the trad publishing world was starting to become a swamp. The cultural cachet of publishing was diminishing. Writers themselves, always on the margins, were pushed even further out into the realm of the obscure. "Bestseller" status continued to lower the bar as fewer books sold.
I could simply do it myself. I worked with my partner, who's a fantastic graphic designer, and she and I started Nosetouch Press.
It was partly born out of my own frustration with the lack of publishing credits I'd accumulated, as much as it was a resentment of the trad publishing infrastructure that seemed to hobble even writers who'd cleared the gatekeepers.
From my POV, I could get my books out there, they'd look good, and my partner and I could actually make money directly from our efforts, versus getting whatever pittance might come from trad.
There's a good line I remember from the NEW YORKER that still stands out to me:
"Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one” (New Yorker, May 14, 1960)"
The capacity to get published is guaranteed only to publishers. That can be for better or worse, depending on the publisher. I strove to always try for the better, while rejecting the worse.
Some of you have read my books. You be the judge, Gentle Reader. Are my books worth reading? I think they are. I think I made the right call. I also know that none of my books would have seen the light of day if I'd tried to go full trad with them.
My personal ethos is "trad quality, despite being indie" -- and I've stuck to that.
More on this to come, as this post has gone on long enough....
As I think I've mentioned before, when I first "got serious" about my writing (that is, sending stories out and collecting rejection slips, which I held onto for years until I unfortunately lost them, or my ex threw them out, perhaps?), I was 18 or 19. I'd send to big-name magazines like OMNI and PLAYBOY, etc. Ones that had story sections and paid well.
My young man logic was straightforward -- go for the big ticket venues, see if maybe I can get published by them. One could look back on that and see both innocence and hubris -- I know now I was nowhere near ready at the time to get my work out there that way. I just did it out of my love for writers like Ray Bradbury, Richard Matheson, Michael Moorcock, Kurt Vonnegut, and many others. They had done it, so I was going to try to do it.
From 19 - 32 years of age, I just concentrated on reading and doing journal-writing. I didn't send more stories out in that time. I just didn't do it.
Again, hindsight kind of nags at me a bit. I should have continued to send stories out back then, instead of spending 13 years honing my craft. I should have done trial-by-fire and kept slinging stories out back then, while I still had the chance to get a foothold.
The reason I say that is because the publishing landscape evolved (or devolved?) over that time -- magazines folded, or got rid of their story sections, and things just changed for the worse for writers.
By the time I got some stories published (I'll always be grateful to Ireland's ALBEDO ONE for actually publishing a couple of my stories, and even nominating one of my stories for one of their Aeon Awards -- I'd gotten second place, itself another story), the publishing world was beginning its slow slide as a waning industry.
Yes, stories were still appearing, but it became far harder to actually get published anywhere, somehow. At least for me, it did.
I found myself writing story after story, building up inventory, and finding only rejection after rejection. It began to get unwieldy, tracking those constant rejections and futile submissions.
And, sure, I could have simply kept on that route, but while that was going on, it became "publishing-perilous" to be a white male writer in many ways. There was a groundswell of resentment as other groups pushed (successfully) to the table and garnered the acceptances. I wasn't part of the problem, aside from being a straight white male writer.
Being a white guy became a bad thing -- never mind that I wasn't a rich white guy, wasn't an asshole white guy, wasn't a fascist white guy. As a progressive white guy, I accepted that. I didn't recoil from it. Others should have a chance to get their stories read -- it's only fair.
However, the net effect is that it's even harder for me to get published today than it ever was. Nobody will admit to implicit bias existing in the still very, very, very white industry of publishing, so the tendency is to overcorrect and attend to make amends through publishing.
I'd point out that white women still get published a lot, since their whiteness is somehow negated by their gender and sex. Maybe a topic for another day, if I really want to get myself in trouble for speaking openly....
Others would (rightfully) point out that white men are still prominently represented in publishing (the names are plentiful, you know who they all are). And, at the top, sure, yeah, I see that -- those dinosaurs still rule the land. But they're slowly going extinct.
From my perspective, how'd I get to find it so difficult to get published? Do I suck? Am I a shit writer? Something I always entertain as a possibility (honestly, it's a usefully masochistic tendency for any writer, in that it at least forces you to try to do and be better at writing if you beat yourself up about your words instead of just thinking what you write is just fantastic).
Over time, however, I walked that back. Based on the stories I was reading, I *was* writing good stuff. And I knew that stuff wasn't getting picked up anywhere by anybody.
My reasons for self-publishing (*gasp*) were simply that I was building up too much inventory -- too many heavily-rejected stories languishing on my laptop, piling up, going nowhere. No prospects, no venues, with only my desire to write and dedication to it sustaining me.
And I wanted to write novels, and I despaired of those novels ever getting picked up anywhere. I dutifully slung out stories and novels to publishers, and still racked up the rejections. I used to joke that my stories were dosed with "editorbane" -- sure to repel editors. And "agentbane" as well -- as no agent would pick me up.
Now, I could have spent another 20 precious years going that route, accumulating the 10,000 (or 100,000) rejections I'd need before someone might (stressing *might*) deign to publish one of my books.
However, the trad publishing world was starting to become a swamp. The cultural cachet of publishing was diminishing. Writers themselves, always on the margins, were pushed even further out into the realm of the obscure. "Bestseller" status continued to lower the bar as fewer books sold.
I could simply do it myself. I worked with my partner, who's a fantastic graphic designer, and she and I started Nosetouch Press.
It was partly born out of my own frustration with the lack of publishing credits I'd accumulated, as much as it was a resentment of the trad publishing infrastructure that seemed to hobble even writers who'd cleared the gatekeepers.
From my POV, I could get my books out there, they'd look good, and my partner and I could actually make money directly from our efforts, versus getting whatever pittance might come from trad.
There's a good line I remember from the NEW YORKER that still stands out to me:
"Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one” (New Yorker, May 14, 1960)"
The capacity to get published is guaranteed only to publishers. That can be for better or worse, depending on the publisher. I strove to always try for the better, while rejecting the worse.
Some of you have read my books. You be the judge, Gentle Reader. Are my books worth reading? I think they are. I think I made the right call. I also know that none of my books would have seen the light of day if I'd tried to go full trad with them.
My personal ethos is "trad quality, despite being indie" -- and I've stuck to that.
More on this to come, as this post has gone on long enough....
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