Category Archives: Editing/writing life

About doing this stuff for a living.

Editing/writing life

Armchair Reader: Fascinating Bible Facts

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Word has filtered my way that the abovementioned book will soon be distributed.  I’m very glad of this, because I did a lot of work on it.  Some months ago, I blogged about it, but there were evidently delays.  As I look back, I feel very optimistic about its reception because I believe the editors commissioned excellent content (and I am not talking about my own, specifically, but their overall topic selection philosophy).  Can’t wait to get my comps.

I am not sure if you can yet pre-order it, but I will keep an eye out.  Given that most of my friends and family are Christian (some are very avid Bible readers), I’m probably going to order quite a few to give away.  Kudos to PIL for getting this one moving!

Editing/writing life, Homeownership

Okay, I’ve learned a lesson.

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Never follow any rule off a cliff.

Put another way:  for people to be interested in the everyday mundane about one’s life, even if infused with some comedy, one has to be more famous than I am.

My readership isn’t enormous, but it is steady and doughty, and it’s way down this week.  Clearly the concrete saga, which I thought might have some interest, isn’t all that interesting.  I say that without the slightest sour grapes; rather, I am thinking, “Well, I’m glad I did the experiment.  Didn’t work.  Learn and move on.”

So, there will not be a continuance of the concrete saga, or those like it, unless they produce something I think someone besides me would find interesting.  I will return to eclecticism and variety, which my dearly appreciated and valued readers (that would be you) have shown that you prefer.  And honestly, I’d prefer to write eclectically anyway, so this is a happy learning experience.

Speaking of which, if there is a type of blogging you prefer/enjoy, by all means leave a comment telling me what you would rather see.  I am of the philosophy that says:  be kind to the reader.  I will be glad to be influenced to write what you do want to read.

Editing/writing life, Technology

Container of bubbles

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This feels very weird.  I’m writing on a netbook from a hotspot in a Starbucks in Renton (that’s south of Seattle).  It is noisy in here, and 80% of those present here have their faces buried in computers.  This isn’t a coffee shop; it just looks like one.

It feels so Seattle.  It’s even cloudy outside, with rain threatening.  Air’s humid, though it’s not cooking hot.  And not a single person in this Internet terminal that happens to serve coffee would voluntarily have a conversation with any other person, unless they met here on purpose.

This is what I do not like about cities.  I understand wanting to have one’s bubble of not dealing with random people; I really do.  But if you look at this situation right now, this place of ass-numbing hardwood chairs and crappy music, it is all just a container of bubbles.  There is another human being three feet from me on the right, and if I tried to have a conversation with him, I would absolutely shatter all the social rules.  I would be marked as fundamentally odd, probably dangerous, and quite irritating.

Technology may be connecting us with people far away, but it is isolating us from people who are close enough they could grab each other’s junk without leaning.

Editing/writing life

When one is not on an assignment

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Just because I’m not on a writing assignment doesn’t mean I get to goof off all day.  That wouldn’t be good for me anyway.  What to do on such a day?

  • Read.  Authors must read, as must editors.
  • Respond to a business query about editing work.
  • Find nephew guilty of leaving boxcutter in shorts put in washer.  Criticism–much stinging criticism.
  • Do some financial stuff, since I’m also the $ manager around here.
  • Think for a while about the Ireland book and what needs to happen to it to improve it.
  • Watch Big Brother.
  • Drop off wife’s prescription refills.
  • Blog.

Not an arduous day, though I will pay for it another time when I’m writing for fourteen hours a day seven days a week.  I’ll take the more relaxed days when I have them, remembering the ones where it felt like my eyes would bleed–and a few that left marks.

Adventures, Editing/writing life

Live from Spocon

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It is fairly obvious that if you have a blog, and you are at a SF convention in which you were actually on a panel about blogging with the very person who urged you to begin a blog, and you do not actually post anything while there, you Missed The Point.  Okay.

Friday was arrival day and no obligations but to check in (hour and a half in line…better than Radcon).  Much oohing and ahing over costumes.  I was elated that the homespun Rasputin costume I ordered from Jane Campbell arrived just on my way out of town.  The drive up was the usual Spokane trip:  two hours of freeway gliding, half an hour of Spoconstruction getting into town.  Spokane is a pretty nice place, but the city pastime is road repair and delay.

My local con-pal Sharon was present, but would not be for the entire con (had to fly somewhere), so to a large degree this would be winging it not knowing many people.  At the same time, plenty of at least familiar faces.  One great thing about Spocon this year:  half an hour between panels, so no mad rushes akin to college when you had ten minutes to get to your next class and a long distance to hike.  Patricia Briggs is author guest of honor this year (famed for the Mercy Thompson books set in the Tri-Cities, where I live).  I hit CJ Cherryh’s reading from the new Foreigner hardback, always a pleasure.  Decided to bag out of opening ceremonies, which never really attract me, and dine on a sumptuous meal of Coke plus whatever muffins and scones the coffee stand had remaining at 7 PM.  Then off to the Mad Marmot Asylum (a Spocon staple) for about six Marmot Juices and good fellowship with con-friends.  Left before becoming plastered (good move).

Rarely do I sleep well in hotel rooms, and this was the same.  With a 10 AM Saturday panel on Research for Search Engines, I got up, put on the Boer costume in which people seem to find me dashing, pounded a large coffee with about seven shots of espresso, and showed up on time.  Two panelists and only two panel-goers!  I wasn’t sure whether to be relieved or to get more nervous.  An okay brunch afterward at the hotel breakfast restaurant, then a very interesting panel on voices and accents in writing and roleplaying.  Then came the panel on blogs/podcasts/ezines, and while I had the sense not to talk a lot–it was called ‘Maggie and CJ understand this far better than I’–it went all right with a small but interested attendance.  Directly afterward, the one that had me a bit rattled, Steampunk through history…and I think none of us were vastly well prepared, but we all chimed in:  the artist, the tinkerers two, and the history guy.  For not being quite sure how to approach the topic, I thought we acquitted ourselves admirably.

Decided on a quiet dinner alone at nearby Shenanigans, a steakhouse and brewpub; very nice.  This is Spocon’s first year away from Gonzaga (Jesuits and SF weirdos not being subject to RC tenets against divorce), so the area around the convention center is getting used to the influx of strangeness for the first time.  Shenanigans isn’t cheap, but neither is it outlandishly priced, and I’d go back.  Took in some music back at the con by the Seattle Knights, went up for a Marmot Juice, then decided that a sore knee and hip entitled me to come back to my hotel room for a bit of relaxation and blogtime.

I have to give Big Chris and Spocon credit for doing a good job here; they have grown the con since it began about four years back, and the many volunteers were pleasant.  One should always be kind to the volunteers, especially when things are going wrong, and this was not really put to a trial this year.  If there were significant catastrophes, they were remedied out of my sight, which means that they didn’t impact me.  That has to stand to the credit of ConCom and volunteers alike.  Sunday will be a short day, really a half-day, as I have to be out of here by noon and things begin to wind down.

What is amazing is that despite Spokane’s size (double the Tri-Cities), the con is half the size of Radcon (Pasco, Tri-Cities).  Surely it’s a longevity matter, as Radcon has been around much longer.  If I had to characterize Spocon in one word, I would say ‘enthusiasm.’  It is still building a name, but they work very hard and their dedication shows.  I suppose I have months to decide if I’ll come up next year, and if so, do I want to do this panel stuff again.  (Radcon doesn’t want my services, which used to affect me a bit; now that I have done it, I see benefits in being able to just attend without obligations and prior study.)  The dealer room was perhaps my main disappointment, being rather lightly presented, and this is likely a matter of the economy (and the lack of stuff I happened to wish to buy).

Your (reasonably) faithful correspondent, signing off from Spokanistan.

Editing/writing life, Technology

Check out the paneling

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So last night I get word from the SpoCon folks about what panels I’m on.  Good to know in advance (another month would have been better, but still, three weeks is ample time to prep).  Nervous, I admit it, but looking forward.  I’m on:

Research for Search Engines on Sat, 08/13/2011 –  10:00am.  This should be pretty comfortable for me because it’s right in the wheelhouse of what I do.

Create a Zine, Blog or Podcast! on Sat,  08/13/2011 – 1:00pm.  Well, the zine I can probably talk about, having published my own long ago.  Blog, no problem.  Podcast? I’m helpless. Irony:  I’m on a panel with the author who enjoined me to start this blog.

Steampunk Throughout History on Sat, 08/13/2011 –  2:30pm.  My inclination is that it tends to begin with Jules Verne and such, but this will take a lot of reading to get up to speed on.  At least I’ll be in costume for it.

Thinking Machines in Alternate History on Sun,  08/14/2011 – 10:00am.  Hmm. Well, we can certainly start with mechanical computers…

I’d have preferred panels on the craft of writing and editing, but we get what we get.

One of the most important things will be to remember my fellow panelists’ names.  Imagine wanting to make reference to ‘what the other panelist said’ (the cards face forward) and forgetting her name.  So awkward.  Cannot let it occur.  This is a good time for a lot of listening, not too much talking, just be the quiet one who keeps his trap shut unless he has something pretty intelligent to say (and very briefly).

Editing/writing life

Rivers of Ink

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This is a local event where authors get to connect with readers, sit on panels, sell books and other such activities.  I got contacted it when I was stopping by to sign the Armchair Reader:  Book of Incredible Information copies at my local Barnes & Noble.  (To me this seems a basic duty, help out your work and help your local bookseller.)  The manager asked me if I’d like to participate, and I said “sure.”

I confess to being a little nervous about it, as I am about all public events, but it’s part of the whole gig.  One resolves to just bull ahead, do one’s best, and be glad such events exist.  I’ve wanted to do more to help the community in my professional capacity, and now’s my chance, so…Leeeroyyyyy Jennnnkinnnns!

Editing/writing life

Writers’ groups

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Always been on the fence about these.  I live in an area where interest in the written word is minimal, so there aren’t that many local writers and there are fewer capable ones.  At the same time, one can possibly gain from critique.  And if there aren’t that many of us, should we not at least be acquainted? Most of the time my answer is sort of ‘meh,’ but I realize that’s kind of a cop-out.  So I gave one a try tonight, brand new one, formed and organized by a very quiet young mother.

The organizer feels we should pass our material around for review online first.  While I can see the logic in exchanging critiqueable material offline and bringing one’s impressions to the group, it seems that if we are going to just do that, we could do this on Facebook and not bother worrying about a face-to-face meetup.  It also seems like the idea is to intersperse our comments into that, print it and bring it to talk about.  They are talking about a 5000-word limit, which would be about 15 pages.  I could end up expected to print 40 pages of other people’s stuff.  I am not sure I think that’s a good idea.  I am definitely not sure I’m willing to do that at all.

I have about talked myself into at least sending some material out and going through the motions for a second session, just to see if all is redeemed by some serious insight.  Or if my insight helps someone.  Or something else happens to make me think this is worth doing. One participant writes exclusively screenplays, in which I have less interest than even Harlequin romances.  The other two write young adult fiction, about which I know little and care rather less.  I don’t feel any camaraderie there, so there isn’t that draw.

What would make a good writers’ group? In my view, intelligent critique without soul destruction is the first step.  I personally have no problem having someone rip my work apart in intelligent fashion, but I keep hearing that a lot of people in writers’ groups think it’s like boot camp, where you have to break people down before they can be remolded–that brutality is a virtue.  I don’t think it is, and I think that’s a viewpoint of big-fish-small-pond hotshots.  I don’t like it and I don’t like them, by and large.  Fortunately, there aren’t any in this group or I’d just go somewhere else.

I guess we’ll see how it goes.

Book reviews, Editing/writing life

Laura Miller on Spamazon

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Here’s her article.

The emptor must caveat real well these days.  While I think that the advent of e-readers has a lot of benefits (though I don’t currently plan to obtain one), any new technology signals that it has become popular and mainstream when it is invaded by crooks, garbage and advertising.  (Okay, sorry, that was triply repetitive.)  Anyway, do keep an eye out when buying, so you don’t get sucked into the Great Internet E-Trash Vortex of these sorts of books.

Over time, having moved from writing into editing, I have also seen this evolve. For example, I used to get tons of book review requests, but one day they just ground to a halt. What replaced them? Seriously irritating spam trying to bribe 5-star reviews out of people. I’ve had to change my whole guidance to editing clients with regard to marketing, because I once knew how to generate book reviews, and it no longer works.

Editing/writing life

Trolling Craigslist for work

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This is what ‘lancers do, troll around for assignments.  But how to winnow out all the crap from the legitimate opportunities? The former outnumbers the latter.

First, you can throw away anything where they don’t even give you a hint of what they want you to write, nor who for.  They aren’t professional.  The less they tell you, and the more hype, the more likely it’s spam.  For example:

Do you love writing???
Do you love making money???
Then this is the opportunity for you!
Internet companies are looking for fresh, new writers to create original content for their websites, blogs, and newsletters. The more articles you write, the more money you earn.
Write about almost and topic or subject you want. Write from the office, from home, or wherever…

This is obviously crap.  No specifics, no idea who it’s for.  Just ignore these.

If you are willing/desperate enough to write search engine optimized stuff, a lot of online writing leads there.  SEO essentially means marketing writing, which is probably the largest market out there for online writing.  What you are doing is writing something, but you are following some rules to work in the right keywords.  This will help the article float to the top of Google (and the other 15 search engines no one uses).  Companies get a big wood when their marketing floats to the top of Google.  If you are at all a competent writer and present yourself well, you can probably find SEO work (if you learn what it is and how it works).

Is there anything wrong with the literary prostitution of SEO? You’re asking me, the literary mercenary? The only things I won’t write for money are those which I a) am too incompetent at to even understand much less write, b) find too morally disgusting even for my rather unconventional moral code, or c) don’t get paid enough.  Most of what I turn down, that’s the reason.  The work sounds fine, but $3 an hour doesn’t cut it.  A lot of opportunity out there is designed to attract those desperate for exposure, which I am not.  I like to work with professionals who have high standards and clear expectations, with reasonable compensation for quality work promptly done.

However, I confess I got my start writing marketing stuff.