progress

Man Bites World Revise-down!

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Today I am a dumb person.

I started late this morning–waking at 6 am–and caught a bus to the Starbucks. I worked until 11, had a quick lunch, then hit the library at 11:45. I worked there until they closed at 6 pm.

How much work did I do? I was five pages from the end of the stinking book when they threw us out. I couldn’t wrap up for the day so close to the end, so I went *back* to the Starbucks, bought a little food, and finished writing the new (much less dark) ending.

Success! Finish! All I had to do was note the changes I made in the change file, and cross off the notes I’d accomplished in my revision file, and I could call it done!

Except I opened the revision file and found one last note I need to address. One huge note. It’s not something I can fix in one scene; it’s spread throughout the whole book.

This shit wasn’t almost done. I still have an assload left to do. And I worked nearly 14 hours today. Jesus. I don’t mind having work to do on the book, I just wish I hadn’t convinced myself I was almost at the finish line when I came around the bend and saw a long stretch of road ahead. That shit is demoralizing.

I’ll try to post something interesting tomorrow.

And I’m back

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Thank you, Mac Freedom! At about 8:45 this morning, I set it to block internet access from my laptop for 6 hours. Then I got down to work.

With interruptions, of course. My local library branch is closed on Fridays due to budget cuts. I ended up working at home instead, which was fine because I’m still not feeling so hot. And for once, my family let me work relatively undisturbed. Also, the Mac Freedom timer stops when the laptop goes into sleep mode, so I get a genuine six hours of temptation-free work time. :D

Also, our local atm no longer uses envelopes when making a deposit. Who knew? You slip the check into the machine, it scans the numbers and asks you to confirm the deposit amount. Easy, right? Except that it’s slow as hell and completely annoying.

Anyway, I tore off a big chunk of the end of this book. I also rewrote 8 critical pages that my agent told me weren’t working (and she was so very right). I kept a lot, changed a lot and generally wrote a spookier, crazier scene than what I had before.

Tomorrow, the ending. Well, as much of the ending as I can manage. I have a bunch to change there, too.

Obsessive behavior

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I’m at the library, working on my book at the moment. (I just couldn’t stay in my apartment any longer). The guy sitting at the table with me is apparently concerned about hanging boogers, because he has been exhaling sharply ever 5-20 seconds.

And he’s been doing it for 45 minutes oh I am so not even joking. Time to get the hell out of here.

(NB: I had a productive day.)

Not day-jobbing today

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In truth, I feel like crap. Yay! The sun is bright, though, and I’m told it will be warm later. I’ll try to spend a little time outside in it.

Instead, I’m plugging away at Man Bites World. Why not? What else am I going to do with my time, read Facebook?

Let me put a question or three to you before I log off: How do you guys feel about a book that has the same title as another book? Does it matter if they’re in different genres? If the previous one is out of print? Still in print? And how would you go about judging the popularity of that older book to determine how well-remembered that title is?

Ugh. Not braining well today, but it’s time to log off and get back to my revisions.

Progress

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I mailed the galleys for Game of Cages back to Del Rey this morning. Done!

… until I get a call to go over the pages one more time. this time I was less dumb and I scanned the whole galley before I mailed it, so if when the call comes, I’ll be looking at the correct text. By the way, individually scanning every page on a flat bed scanner? Takes a while. Yeah, I realize they make home scanners with automatic document feeders, but I’m pinching pennies at the moment.

What that means is that I got to spend this morning working on Man Bites World again. At this point, all the easy stuff is fixed along with some of the not-so-easy stuff. The really hard stuff? A couple of those decisions still have to be made.

Oh! Just writing out this post made me realize how I can fix one of those broken plot points. I’m going to take some notes and then head home.

Whoa. Also: Sheesh.

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Things have been mighty busy this week. I’m way behind on my blog reading, and we all know how important it is for a writer past his deadline to read blogs, yes?

I’m making good progress on my latest revision to Man Bites World, though. Of course it’s taking me longer than I would like, but it’s also more straightforward that I’d originally thought. It’s amazing how different things look when you think them out, yeah?

Which means, naturally, that my galleys for Game of Cages arrived yesterday. Tomorrow will be galley day. Fun!

Also, (to expand on a comment I wrote yesterday) I’ve been seeing a lot of people treating the Macmillan/Amazon.com conflict as the first step in the collapse of “Big Publishers.” I’ve also seen a number of people say that writers will soon be able to break away from their publishers and Do It All For Themselves! Hire an editor, pay for cover art, pay for a copy edit, buy a program that lets people design their own books.

Interestingly, there are very very few established writers who are eager for this to happen. A couple, but very few. Most established, professional writers don’t want any part of this business model.

Take me, for example. Do you think I could do this kind of revision to commissioned cover art?. Hell, no. I don’t have the skills or the talent. I’d have to hire an expert, which I can’t afford.

Consider also: After my agent (a former editor at Penguin) gives me notes, I send my book to Betsy Mitchell, editor-in-chief at Del Rey. I get two rounds of fantastic notes before the copy chief and copy editor even gets near it.

If Betsy were freelance, do you think I could afford to hire her? Do you think she’d have a window in her schedule for me, Newbie McFace-PunchingBook? Hell no. She’d charge a fortune for her services, and the people who could afford to work with her would be the doctors, lawyers and stock brokers of the world–people with high-paying day jobs who could afford to shell out the bucks for their hobby.

Besides it seems to me that ebooks are not the poison pill that will kill Big Publishing. Not when BP does so much that “indie” authors–even indie authors with a pro track record–would never be able duplicate all the things a big-time publisher does.

Doesn’t anyone remember when POD publishing was going to be the death of traditional publishers? Did Stephen King jump ship and start his own press, with editors and publicity staff he paid out of his own pocket (to keep the profits for himself!). He could certainly afford it. James Patterson has three people at his publisher who work exclusively on him and his books–has he hired them away to Patterson Publishing to run his own shop? Has J.K. Rowling, who could afford to pay her staff in six figures, including the receptionist?

No, they haven’t. NY Publishers add value. Maybe people want books to be cheaper, and maybe they hate rejection letters, but that doesn’t mean the companies themselves are going to fail.

Back to work.

As far as the writing goes…

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… today was a very productive day. I didn’t have very much internet time, but I guess that’s why it was productive.

I did end up consigning one character to the lonely limbo of my memory when I cut her completely from the book. Too bad. I liked her very much.

I also ended up with a net loss in words, despite adding a couple short scenes. Revising the sequence without the character sped things along quite a bit, although I personally still feel her loss.

The book will be better for it–simpler and more unified.

Five things make a post, again

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This isn’t a randomness post because it’s mostly about me.

First: This is an interview with me over at Sci-Fi Bookshelf, a new book review site. Check it out.

Second: You know that trick where people add absurd sub-titles to the scene of Hitler having a tantrum in DOWNFALL? The first person who did it had a brilliant idea. Subsequent versions were mildly funny and a good way to mock other people’s sense of entitlement. Now, though, it’s played out. Let’s stop, okay?

Third: Amazon.com is pulling some major bullshit once again, this time in their dispute with Macmillan over ebook prices.. No, I don’t want to have a discussion about what price points are “fair” for ebooks. I’m not even all that interested in hearing what you’d be willing to pay. However, Amazon.com is using the 9.99 price to push their $400 Kindles, and if they achieve the market dominance they are aiming for in the ereader device market, they will be able to set the price as high as they like, and dictate revenue splits to the publishers. This isn’t about holding down costs for readers; it’s about being the one who sets the price.

Amazon.com is looking at long-term benefits, which is why I’m looking more and more at Indiebound.org. You order the book and have it shipped to you at home–or if you want to avoid shipping costs, you can pick the book up at your local independent bookstore.

Fourth, via Laura Ann Gilman: Google founders plan a stock sale that will surrender their controlling interest in the company. Whether they have lived up their company motto of “Don’t be evil” or not (and with the Author’s Guild book settlement, I say most emphatically not), they’ll have to change the motto to “The shareholders have certain expectations of short-term profitability.” Even if you think Google can be trusted with the IP they’re confiscating now, can you trust the shareholder-led company they’ll shortly become?

Fifth: After three days of waking early (and starting my writing early) due to morning nightmares, I was finally tired enough today to fall back to sleep after a bad dream at 4:30. Damn. And I’d been so productive, too.

Five things make a post

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1) The changes my agent has asked me to do have turned out to be surprisingly simple. Not easy by any means, and certainly not quick, but not terribly complicated, either. What she’s asked me to pare away, unify and change are pretty self-contained as far as the overall plot goes. Except the ending. I’m still thinking about the change to the ending.

2) Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Silk Stocking was a revelation. Rupert Everett’s performance in the lead was startling and affecting. The murder plot–wealthy young girls kidnapped from their homes and strangled–wasn’t terrifically original, but the performances were wonderful.

3) Some weeks ago, I posted links on my main blog/website to let people pre-order Game of Cages if they wanted. I went to every site I’d listed for Child of Fire and dug up a link for all of them… except for Barnes & Noble, because the book wasn’t listed yet. It’s still not listed.

Sure, the publication date is seven months away, but it ought to be listed by now, yeah? If, that is, B&N plans to stock the book at all.

4) I really do not need to be distracted by the idea that B&N might not be carrying my book, along with everything that implies. Not when I have a novel to finish.

5) Isn’t “pre-order” kind of a ridiculous term? Some friends pointed this out to me a while ago, but the “pre-order” happens when I’m planning a purchase. Even if the product isn’t available yet, I’m still ordering it, right?

I think I’m going to spend my time thinking about #5 and #1 instead of #4

I have one beta reader

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That would be my long-suffering agent.

While I’ve been going through Man Bites World, polishing it up, she’s been reading the first draft.* Yesterday, her notes arrived just as I finished my morning revision, and I read through them all.

Well, once the pouting and foot-stamping was over, I have to admit that they’re damn good notes. Almost all of them either make the work more commercial without cheating on the intent of the book, or they address elements that I’ve been uncertain about.

Mainly, they deal with unifying the book. Currently, there’s a “front plot” and a “back plot.” I’ve tried this before, but not in a long-form story that will ever see the light of day. It follows the two-antagonist[2] rule [3], but in this instance the first plot problem that the protagonist faces (ie: the “front plot”) eventually turns out to be caused by a plot problem (the “back plot”) which doesn’t appear until past the mid-point and is so much more important that it overshadows the front plot.

I hope I can make it work this time.

Anyway, the two plots are connected–which they need to be–but the connection is too tenuous. I need to make them more of a web than a strand; the disparate character goals make the novel too diffuse, at least until the last 70 pages or so, when it all dovetails.

Most of the other notes she’s given me are straight-forward enough: punching up this or that character, clarifying a relationship, hanging on to so-and-so’s essential appeal. There are also a few moments that break the tone. I’ll have another look at those.

There’s only one note that genuinely troubles me. One of the notes I got on Game of Cages was “too many secondary characters”–and I don’t mean that I got it once. I revised and combined and trimmed that book, but pretty much every set of notes included something like “I’d forgotten X by the time she reappeared.”

So, in writing MBW, I needed to a) delineate the secondary characters better[4] and b) have fewer secondary characters. Which I thought I did, but garsh, there’s that note again. I believe I need to start making character lists for books like mine, to gauge the point at with no amount of a) can make up for a failure to b).

Anyway, I’m on my lunch break, which means it’s time to take out my (paper) notebook and copy down her notes in my own words. I have lists to make and graphs to draw. Fun!

[1] Which means she’s been enduring my weird, semi-random paragraph constructions and word repetitions. Embarrassing for me, but I think it will help make me more conscious of the way I lay out my sentences as I write. I learn well through shame.

[2] Or more, obviously.

[3] Which I learned by watching endless episodes of DR. WHO.

[4] But god, I thought I already did this. I work really, really hard on this every time.