I had the good fortune of attending DragonCon this year. For those of you that don’t know, DragonCon is one of – if not the – largest sci-fi fantasy conventions held annually.
In truth, I never planned on going. I’d never been to a convention before and didn’t have any plans on going. However, one of my brothers lives in Atlanta and had the foresight to invite me and our oldest brother over to attend the convention. A bonding experience in the epicenter of all that can be defined as, “Nerd.”
At first, I didn’t know what to expect, but I had a blast. We spent hours each day going to panels and talks, mobbing around through the throngs of costumed convention-goers, and trying to get autographs from some of the celebrity attendees.
A lot of the Battlestar cast was there. I managed to score a signature from Mary McDonnell and Michael Hogan, two of my favorites from the show. They were the first autographs I had ever gotten, I shuffled on my feet like a nervous fan boy and told the actors how much I enjoyed their performances on the show. They were both very gracious.
I also got to meet – however briefly – Jay, Grant, Tango and Steve from TAPS. I told them how much I liked their scientific approach to the paranormal. They were all very nice people. Steve and Tango made a point to shake my hand.
The last event I went to was a talk hosted by Kevin J. and Rebecca Anderson, who spoke about writing. The discussion was titled something like, “Things I Wish I Knew When I Started Writing.” It was a great talk, highlighting a lot of information about the business of writing. Some of it was concepts that other writers had brought up before, like Heinlein’s rules. But most of the information came straight from their personal experiences as writers, which was very refreshing to hear.
One pearl of wisdom I really liked: Kevin and Rebecca made an offer to the aspiring authors in the room. If anyone can produce eighty rejection letters and not have one single published work – not an article, short story or novel – then they offered to buy them dinner. It’s an offer they’ve been making to fellow writers for years, and have never had to cash in.
Rejections are a part of writing, which is common wisdom. But it was the illustration that spoke to me. Eighty rejections. I quickly counted up how many I had – nowhere near that many. Kevin told us that he had more than eighty rejections under his belt after a few years of writing, but he also had several published works. Their point was simple: Just keep writing. If you’re not getting rejected, then you’re not submitting, which means you’re not being a writer.
All in all – a great trip. I got to see family, and I got a dose of writing wisdom.
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Books - Check 'Em Out!
I’ve written a few more short stories. They’re making rounds on the “let’s try to get published” circuit as we speak. Normally, I would’ve just posted them on my site, but lately I’ve been thinking that it would probably help me if I get at least a couple publishing credits under my belt.
Naturally, short stories seem like a good way to do this. The conventional wisdom has always been that if you want someone to publish your novel, you’ll need to show them that you’re publishable, or in other words: That you’ve already been published. Sort of reminds me of the old saying, “In order to get a loan, you must first prove that you don’t need one.” I suppose it does make sense though, that a writer would be taken more seriously for a large project if they have a few smaller ones already under their belt.
Unfortunately, the market for short stories just isn’t what it used to be. At the time many of our modern powerhouse writers were cutting their teeth on short stories, there were a lot more printed publications specializing in just that; printing short stories. Thankfully, we do have the internet, and many sites still look for original short fiction. There are a few printed magazines out there too, but competition is fierce. Competition is fine, I’m not afraid of a few more rejections. For me, the problem is that I just want to share my work, so I’m itching to post it on my site.
I know, I know… What’s stopping me? Back to the whole “publishing credit” thing, I really would like a couple of those, so I’m going to try it out for a while. Hell, what’s the harm, right? Among many new writers there is a school of thought that trying to get a short story published anymore may be more trouble than it’s worth. I’m not sure what the right answer is, but I think that at least seeing something I’ve written published would be pretty sweet, so like I said, I’ll give it a whirl.
Lately I’ve been doing a lot of reading, which has been great. During the semesters I go to school and work full time, so I don’t get much chance to read for enjoyment, which is a shame. Now that I’m on a break for a few weeks before the fall semester starts – well, working full time but no school, so close enough to a break – I’ve been sucking down the novels. My fiancé commented the other night on how quickly I read. I hadn’t thought about it before, but I suppose I do.
It made me think about being a kid. I was in the forth grade, I want to say. Could have been the third, but that’s not totally important. Our class participated in the Book It program, so there on the wall was a huge construction paper poster with every kid’s name on it, and a big paper star for every book report that they turned in. It was getting close to the end of the year and I remember having a conversation with a kid I sat next to. I told him that I didn’t see why anyone would voluntarily write a book report and turn it – for fun. The kid let me know that it wasn’t all for fun, in fact, if you did twenty book reports, you got a free pizza from Pizza Hut.
What. The. Fuck. Why didn’t anyone tell me this before? We’re talking about pizza here, people! That night, I was on a mission. I pulled out every supermarket paperback I had bought with my meager allowance, every book of my mom’s that I had read, and struggled to jog my memory about every library book I had read over the course of the year. Some, I couldn’t remember the author, others I couldn’t remember the title, and still others just weren’t good enough to remember at all. So, I couldn’t get credit for all of my reading.
The next morning, I turned in over forty book reports.
Needless to say, teacher was a little suspicious. So, that afternoon I stood in front of her desk, rubbing my hand, cramped from a night of feverishly summarizing every novel on paper. The teacher – I can’t remember her name for the life of me, sad – stood behind her desk with a coworker. They each held a pile of the reports I had turned in. At random, they began to quiz me on the book reports; asking me details about the stories, characters, the number of pages and where I got the book from.
The first one, I did have a little trouble remembering. It was a young adult book about some kid growing up, blah, blah. The teacher got a little knowing smile and looked at her coworker. She picked another report and asked me about it.
“Tell me about Windows on a Lost World.”
Now that was my shit; she was talking about Star Trek. I think I was five minutes into recapping the story of how ancient alien technology had turned many of the ship’s away team into giant crabs when she stopped me. Then her coworker asked me about a Robotech book. Midway into my explanation about who the Zentradi were and why they were hell bent on the destruction of mankind, I was once again, stopped. I was actually kind of pissed that I didn’t get to finish, it was a great story and I wanted to tell them about it.
We went on like that for a few more minutes. In the end, she completely believed me, and I made it rain pizza, y’all. On a couple of glorious nights, I actually contributed to my family – providing a meal.
In hindsight, I think the teacher was right to be suspicious. After all, some kids may cheat and lie to get things they want. But in the end, she had to believe me. Many kids may tell a fib for a free pizza, but there are very few who will gladly drag themselves through the mud of self-proclaimed nerddom to do it.
Just thought I’d share that with you. Keep reading, your pizza awaits.
-A. Michael
Naturally, short stories seem like a good way to do this. The conventional wisdom has always been that if you want someone to publish your novel, you’ll need to show them that you’re publishable, or in other words: That you’ve already been published. Sort of reminds me of the old saying, “In order to get a loan, you must first prove that you don’t need one.” I suppose it does make sense though, that a writer would be taken more seriously for a large project if they have a few smaller ones already under their belt.
Unfortunately, the market for short stories just isn’t what it used to be. At the time many of our modern powerhouse writers were cutting their teeth on short stories, there were a lot more printed publications specializing in just that; printing short stories. Thankfully, we do have the internet, and many sites still look for original short fiction. There are a few printed magazines out there too, but competition is fierce. Competition is fine, I’m not afraid of a few more rejections. For me, the problem is that I just want to share my work, so I’m itching to post it on my site.
I know, I know… What’s stopping me? Back to the whole “publishing credit” thing, I really would like a couple of those, so I’m going to try it out for a while. Hell, what’s the harm, right? Among many new writers there is a school of thought that trying to get a short story published anymore may be more trouble than it’s worth. I’m not sure what the right answer is, but I think that at least seeing something I’ve written published would be pretty sweet, so like I said, I’ll give it a whirl.
Lately I’ve been doing a lot of reading, which has been great. During the semesters I go to school and work full time, so I don’t get much chance to read for enjoyment, which is a shame. Now that I’m on a break for a few weeks before the fall semester starts – well, working full time but no school, so close enough to a break – I’ve been sucking down the novels. My fiancé commented the other night on how quickly I read. I hadn’t thought about it before, but I suppose I do.
It made me think about being a kid. I was in the forth grade, I want to say. Could have been the third, but that’s not totally important. Our class participated in the Book It program, so there on the wall was a huge construction paper poster with every kid’s name on it, and a big paper star for every book report that they turned in. It was getting close to the end of the year and I remember having a conversation with a kid I sat next to. I told him that I didn’t see why anyone would voluntarily write a book report and turn it – for fun. The kid let me know that it wasn’t all for fun, in fact, if you did twenty book reports, you got a free pizza from Pizza Hut.
What. The. Fuck. Why didn’t anyone tell me this before? We’re talking about pizza here, people! That night, I was on a mission. I pulled out every supermarket paperback I had bought with my meager allowance, every book of my mom’s that I had read, and struggled to jog my memory about every library book I had read over the course of the year. Some, I couldn’t remember the author, others I couldn’t remember the title, and still others just weren’t good enough to remember at all. So, I couldn’t get credit for all of my reading.
The next morning, I turned in over forty book reports.
Needless to say, teacher was a little suspicious. So, that afternoon I stood in front of her desk, rubbing my hand, cramped from a night of feverishly summarizing every novel on paper. The teacher – I can’t remember her name for the life of me, sad – stood behind her desk with a coworker. They each held a pile of the reports I had turned in. At random, they began to quiz me on the book reports; asking me details about the stories, characters, the number of pages and where I got the book from.
The first one, I did have a little trouble remembering. It was a young adult book about some kid growing up, blah, blah. The teacher got a little knowing smile and looked at her coworker. She picked another report and asked me about it.
“Tell me about Windows on a Lost World.”
Now that was my shit; she was talking about Star Trek. I think I was five minutes into recapping the story of how ancient alien technology had turned many of the ship’s away team into giant crabs when she stopped me. Then her coworker asked me about a Robotech book. Midway into my explanation about who the Zentradi were and why they were hell bent on the destruction of mankind, I was once again, stopped. I was actually kind of pissed that I didn’t get to finish, it was a great story and I wanted to tell them about it.
We went on like that for a few more minutes. In the end, she completely believed me, and I made it rain pizza, y’all. On a couple of glorious nights, I actually contributed to my family – providing a meal.
In hindsight, I think the teacher was right to be suspicious. After all, some kids may cheat and lie to get things they want. But in the end, she had to believe me. Many kids may tell a fib for a free pizza, but there are very few who will gladly drag themselves through the mud of self-proclaimed nerddom to do it.
Just thought I’d share that with you. Keep reading, your pizza awaits.
-A. Michael
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