reasons i suck

Auctorial Constructs

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A while back on Twitter I told this joke: “How is Google Analytics like a pair of tight jeans? Both make me feel inadequate.”

Both Elizabeth Bear and John Scalzi spent part of their weekends talking about “auctorial constructs” or, as they put it, the tendency that people have to create an image of the author based on their books and blog posts– a fictional character, in other words, with the author’s name and face–and how difficult that can be to deal with.

Luckily, I don’t have to deal with it. Most (all?) of my interactions take place online and I have a very low profile. Daily hits on this blog? About 32 people per day. LiveJournal gets about five times that. I have twice that many followers on Twitter but many of them are marketbots.

In other words, my online footprint is vanishingly small and that’s okay. Pretty much the only people treating me as if I’m the pretend person in their head are my wife and son.

For me, this is the problem with going out and meeting people in person. I’ve avoided readings and only do one signing (at the local shop) when each of my books comes out. And I’ve been putting off things like conventions. This is because I know myself well enough to know that I do not do well in large groups of strangers. I struggle to figure out people’s body language, I get overwhelmed by too much input, I can’t think what to say and end up staring at people instead of answering their questions.

But that’s not the real me, either. I’m not like that with people I know (or when I have a very close RL friend nearby). I can also psyche myself up to deal with strangers pretty well, but this is iffy.

That’s why I’m seriously tempted to be one of those hermit writers. Not to be, you know, weird about it, but to basically stay at home and write, hang with friends (must start hanging with friends again), and avoid going out to do those promotional things that so many writers do.

Date night

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Last night was “date night”, the biweekly ritual in which my wife and I suddenly realize, at about three in the afternoon, that our regularly scheduled baby sitter will be there in an hour and a half and what the hell are we doing to do together all on our own?

My wife wasn’t keen on yet another restaurant trip and I couldn’t blame her. Instead we went to the Henry Art Museum in the U District: The PanOptos exhibit was pretty damn cool. This is one of the photos I took. I’m not sure why, except that I like the imperfections.

And James Turrell’s Skyscape sculpture, Light Reign, was wonderful (and I immediately tried to think of a way to build it in Minecraft, which only shows you what a saddo I am). I would have spent much longer in there if it hadn’t been so chilly (it’s installed in the courtyard).

Dinner came immediately after (and, since we had it in the U. District, the less said about it the better) and then we hopped over to the UW Bookstore to catch Cherie Priest’s reading of Bloodshot. I’m dubious about vampires, but her excerpt sounded pretty good, and when she talked about the book afterward she tempted me even more. Still, vampires. Hmm.

From there we took the crosstown bus to Ballard for dessert in a nice Italian place we found. My wife’s cannoli (she loves cannoli) had a chocolate coating on the shell, unfortunately, but my tiramasu was pretty dang good. Then it was home to watch the Lego animation my son had worked on.

In short, fun. And of course we spent a good deal of time talking about Important Things. For instance, we have a trip to Lisbon that we’ve been wanting to take forever, but when I bring it up it turns into a flight to Amsterdam, then a train trip to London, followed by a tour through Barcelona and Madrid and finally…

Me, I just want to go to Lisbon and check it out (we have family there). My wife thinks she’s being restrained because she’s ready to put off Paris and Rome until the next go ’round.

On top of that, I’ll be going to Readercon this summer (Hello, convention-going people. I’ll be at Readercon this July. If you’ll be there too, please introduce yourself. It’ll be my first sf convention and I’m not entirely sure how I’ll do). For my wife, this is a chance for all three of us to fly out early and check out historical sites. While I’m at the con, she and the boy would tour around the city, learning about the American Revolution and so on.

Nevermind that I’d miss out on those tours. Nevermind also that she’d like to immediately fly from Boston to Amsterdam, etc. Jeez, give that woman a transcontinental flight and she takes a month-long international jaunt.

Norwescon, I guess

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In 2009 at the beginning of December, I received an invitation to Norwescon. For whatever reason, my response to them wasn’t received and it’s very likely that was my fault. I interpreted the lack of response as a “Never mind,” and by the time it was straightened out I had family plans and couldn’t attend. Next year, I told myself.

Well, next year is here. I sent an email to the same person (at the same address) who contacted me before, inquiring about attending the convention, but so far I’ve received no response (again). It wasn’t one of these official contact addresses, though; it’s someone’s personal email address.

I plan to try one more time, but I’m not sure which of these addresses I should use. To be clear, I’ve attended the San Diego Comic-Con but I’ve never been to a “real” science fiction convention, and everything I know about how they work has come from skimming other people’s LiveJournals. So I’m turning to you good folks, because I know many people reading this have much more experience than I do: Which address, if any, should I contact? Or should I just take the hint?

Thanks.

Added later: Email sent! Thank you, everyone on my blog and LJ for the advice.

An advantage of being the stay-at-home parent

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My knee has improved to the point that I can sleep through the night with only occasional twinges of pain-that-wakes-me-up. As a result, I’m sleeping like a narcoleptic, crashing at odd hours and inconvenient times.

And, I hate to say, the muscles of my injured left leg look atrophied, even though it’s only been a week and a half. I know it comes quickly, but it always surprises me. Time to start up the rehab exercises–as long as the pain stays bearable. And maybe some walking tomorrow.

Sorry that the blog has become so much about my leg pain. I usually try not to write about it very much, but it’s been a big deal in my life lately and has taken over everything, including my blog.

Something interesting to read.

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Death to novel-writing workshops! Check the comments, too.

I took a novel-writing class way way back in the day. You wanted to learn how to do something, you took a class, right?

Well, it wasn’t what you’d call useful. The teacher taught an odd, artificial system and workshopping a six- or sixteen-page chapter outside the context of the book was useless. Before printing up pages to hand out, I’d search the document for the word “eye” because it was a huge deal there if you made a mistake like “His eyes went around the room, searching for a face he recognized.” Sure, it’s bad writing. It’s also an extremely easy critique to make, and they would make it, every time, even if the word didn’t appear in the document.

What did help my writing was: smart critiques from smart people, and studying good novels.

State of the Self Address

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It’s been a week since I screwed up my knee. Things are much improved, but I’m still a bit hobbled. I can bend my knee now, but not all the way. It also feels mostly swollen rather than deeply painful. It’s not a miniscus tear, since I can put weight on it. In fact, I can walk pretty well on it as long as I don’t get too ambitious and try to leave the apartment. In essence, it has improved to the point that it is back to the usual pain/impairment levels, although at the “bad” end of those levels.

In other news, the basic shape and structure of the fourth Twenty Palaces book fell into place over the long weekend, and like most revelations of this sort it looks so obvious in retrospect that I feel stupid for not putting it together sooner. As I said on Twitter, it’s all uphill from here but at least I know what hill I’m tackling.

And yeah, the new tag below is the working title for book four.

A brief interlude from work

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My wife and son have just left me here alone while he gets an eye check up. Wish we had vision insurance, but what can you do? The boy can’t see.

I just finished listening to Nancy Pearl on our local NPR affiliate, KUOW. She recommended Jo Walton’s new novel along with Gail Carriger’s SOULLESS. I sent them an email mentioning Cherie Priest’s BONESHAKER, but Nancy Pearl brought up her name before they had a chance to read it on air.

They didn’t mention my books.

Which disappointed my wife, but I didn’t expect it. I don’t think the Twenty Palaces books are quite up her alley, to steal a cliche. Too dark, I think. Even if she had read them (and as a fan of hers, I wrote a personal note for the folks at Del Rey to send with her review copy–I even have a Nancy Pearl Action Figure but it’s an older, less flashy version) I’m not sure I would have passed her Rule of 50. Which is fine; no writer should expect that their book be loved by every reader everywhere. In fact, god forbid.

Anyway, the fam is out and Warren Olney has been turned off (I like his show, but his voice has a quality that’s hard to ignore) so I can dig in to the copy edit of Circle of Enemies. I lost the whole day yesterday dealing with my blown knee, but I’m less than 60 pages from the end, and I’d like to finish tonight.

Then, finally, I’ll be able to write a post or two about some of the things that have come up lately, like putting a direction behind the word “stand” and on the need to figure theft of your product when setting price points.

Back to it.

Obligatory copy editing post

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Boy is this humbling!

Why is that paragraph at the bottom of the page instead of where it belongs?

How many times can I cram the word “look” into a sentence? You’d be surprised!

Apparently, there’s some rule for using “anymore” and “any more.” Who knew?

Honestly, I should just repost my last copy editing post. It’s the same stuff (except that I’m more prepared to deal with it now).