All right, I’m disgruntled. I know some people think I’m too upbeat, but today I’m just out of sorts, irked, annoyed.
The con I’m going to this weekend has been having an epic explosion of out of control chaos, and it’s been unpleasant all around. I keep having to take a deep breath and remind myself that they are volunteers, they are students, it will be all right, it will be fun. I will get to talk about Firefly and I’ve been put on a panel about how nerd girls rule.
Yeah, I know all that, but you know what? I don’t like chaos, I don’t like having to deal with crap, and this has been an epic fail at conrunning on their part. I think all the guests are wondering what the hell is going on.
My bestest writing partner and dear friend doesn’t think I’m making a wise career decision about my work. Well, you know what? He’s right, yes, but there’s a time where it’s not about the goddamned market. Sometimes you have to write the story that wants to be written, and fuck the industry. And I’ll be damned before I write to market, because we all know that means vampires. Fucking vampires. I’m not going to do it.
And I might not ever sell again, and it’s making me really irritated! Okay, yes, I have a book coming out this year but I want the one I’m working on to wow the world too!
My dayjob deleted my work blog. WTF? I cannot believe it. I still don’t know what that was about. The blog was about the Atlas Shrugged movie, and the connection to Alan Greenspan (and Ayn Rand acolyte). So it was completely relevant to the business world. And! You guys, as soon as I posted it, it got a comment in like five minutes. It must have been a record!
Honestly, I hate objectivism as much as the next liberal business writer, but there are people who think it’s a valid economic system!
My neighborhood has been experiencing a crime wave of house break-ins. I swear to God, any petty thief who comes around this house had better hope I am not at home, because I am NOT IN THE MOOD for this shit.
I emailed an agent on Monday, and she hasn’t emailed me back. Look, even I know that one is utterly ridiculous, but I’m still annoyed. And the agent I was going to email next is closed to queries, and now I don’t know if that means me, or if because I have a track record I can cut to the head of the line, or what.
And the industry is changing all around me, and I just want it to stand still so I can catch my breath. The Google settlement, the shift in the balance of power to self-publishing, it’s all going too fast. Come on, just stop so I can sell books, okay? That’s all I want.
This day has just sucked all around.
15 Comments
Troyce · March 23, 2011 at 8:22 pm
Well of course Objectivism is a valid economic system. So is shooting anyone who disagrees with you, oh wait, that’s still Objectivism 😉
I think I know the con you’re talking about. Sigh. I was involved heavily with it many many moons ago, when it was the largest annual SF convention in the country. It’s sad to see how these kids over the last 15 years have been so clueless in running it.
And rethink Vampires. No one has ever done a book about phlegm vampires yet 😉
Patrice Sarath · March 23, 2011 at 8:58 pm
Troyce, it has been a trainwreck. And no, I’m not doing a book about phlegm vampires. Although, Matthew Bey wrote a story called Phlegm Planet, I believe.
NicoleMD · March 23, 2011 at 11:20 pm
Aw, sucks! I say it’s time to call on your inner chobo!
game writer guy · March 24, 2011 at 12:17 am
You might be able to scrape the blog post off the web someplace. If anyone’s subscribed to it via email, they can email you the text so you can re-create it. 🙁
Dave Gullen · March 24, 2011 at 2:35 am
I can’t see the point in writing something you don’t want to write, and can’t believe in. If you want to spend a year or two doing something you’re not that wild about just for the money, hell, that’s what the day job is for.
Phlegm Vampires? Phlegmpires? The Phlegmpire Strikes Back, now there’s an idea…
Also, Vikings would laugh at all this, then drink beer.
m_bey · March 24, 2011 at 6:26 am
Dammit, I swear I already had the idea for phlegmpires! Well, there’s two humors left (although it’s odd that blood vampires are more melancholic than sanguine you know?).
As long as someone remembers to organize a party, the con will be fine. Everything else is just window dressing. =]
Rie Sheridan Rose · March 24, 2011 at 9:05 am
The con in question fluctuates wildly these days…still wish I was going, but now feel better that I can’t.
Write for you, Patrice. You will find the people you need to publish because you are a great writer. Vampires can be fun, but if you don’t want to create them, don’t give in.
Hang in there!
Katharine Eliska Kimbriel · March 24, 2011 at 9:05 am
I sure hope today goes better, woman! I sympathize on the “will the market like this?” business, because I’m shipping the last e-book out the door, and I have to get back to what I hope I can sell, and to the ones I don’t know if I’m going to sell, but I’m going to try.
I’ve been at this longer than I like to think, allowing for ten years of my brain being off-line, and I will tell you something a wise bird once told me about a book that demands to be written. Write it. You may not sell it, but set it aside — it’s time will probably come. And if the same world keeps pushing at you — that’s what a pseudonym is for. Yes, Robin Hobb and Kate Elliott wanted to write under their own names, but that’s not when lightning struck.
I did not do that, except for a huge project that stalled when I got sick. So I only have 1 and 1 1/2 projects, instead of several I’d now be selling because I think the market would buy them. I’m tired of people telling me there’s no market for something. I should have done the Merlyn book I wanted to — I should have done the superheroes book I wanted to.
Now I have a couple of ideas I am going to pursue hard this year (as hard as recovery allows) and if I have three pseudonyms, well, there you are. Like is too short not to write the books that speak to you. I nearly died in 2009, and without finishing the third Allie book, which is wrong. Or without finishing any of the other books I want to write. I want them all more than a high salary, so that’s now the first priority, other than getting well.
Write what you want, Patrice. And go to a gun range, shoot up a target, paying special attention to the groin area, and post the target on the inside back door with a magic marker arrow to the groin area that has Lady of the House written next to it. I can’t prove that’s what kept anyone from ever breaking in through our garage, but it didn’t hurt, and it helped me a lot! ;^)
Patrice Sarath · March 24, 2011 at 10:19 am
Thanks, you guys! Katharine, you made me laugh! I just might do that.
J. Kathleen Cheney · March 24, 2011 at 2:09 pm
::hugs::
Sorry it’s snowballing on you. The ‘no market’ mentality is part of what underpins the trend toward self-publishing, sadly. MArketing doesn’t want to take a risk on anything different….
But you’ve gotta write what you’ve gotta write.
Bethe Ann Bugbee · March 24, 2011 at 8:41 pm
Hang in there! I know the mood, have been there myself (though for me it often involves a sudden understaning of why some species eat their young and others kick them out at a very early age.) I highly recommend really dark chocolate and a glass of a nice red wine. They don’t solve the problems, but they can push them to the background for a bit.
Patrice Sarath · March 24, 2011 at 8:54 pm
Dark chocolate, good wine, man. They do soothe a multitude of ills.
Kimberly Frost · March 25, 2011 at 1:18 pm
Patrice,
Sorry so many sucky things converged all at once! The world will probably not stop spinning wildly out of control any time soon, but I agree with Bethe that wine and chocolate make the spinning more tolerable.
I was just organizing tax receipts and found some from ApolloCon, which was well-organized and fun and a great opportunity for us all to connect. And I know you know that more good times are on the horizon!
Prescription from me: hug the loved ones, get massage, dose self with liberal amounts of chocolate & wine, then rest. We can slay the dragons tomorrow.
Hugs,
Kimber
Patrice Sarath · March 27, 2011 at 1:38 pm
Annnnd…just came back from Aggiecon and had a great time. So the world is righting itself, and I’m looking forward to ApolloCon and ArmadilloCon and even, probably, FenCon this year.
Sell The Story or the Storyteller? | We Put Words On Paper · March 28, 2011 at 10:26 am
[…] Sarath, a local Austin writer, ranted in a recent blog: “My bestest writing partner and dear friend doesn’t think I’m making a wise career […]