Well, it's been a while since I last posted, and it's because I am a lazy bastard. Sorry. I don't know how many people actually read this, but it doesn't really matter. I would like to build an audience, but it is a slow process since I am working on finishing up my main selling point, my novel, Outside the Garden. I also have around six or maybe seven short stories, some essays, and even some poems to publish, but I would like to get them published in legitimate literary journals, whether online or in print. This is also a long process since I have to have high standards with my writing, and literary journals won't publish garbage -- any ones worth getting published in, anyhow.
Since it doesn't need to be a secret, I do have a strategy to build an audience, so, if you are one of the five or so people reading this (??), you heard it here first. If I am merely just delusional and I never go anywhere with my writing, then this will be entertaining in a train wreck sort of way. Either way, I hope I inform or entertain whoever happens upon reading this blog. Anyway, back to the point: my strategy.
First of all, I am going to finish rewriting/editing everything. This is the hard part -- I think. Next, I am going to start fishing for literary journals, using the handy dandy tool Duotrope's Digest, which is like the Writer's Market, only free. It's really great, if you are a writer, you should give it a try. They have a lot of different publications listed, more than I have ever been able to go through. You can search through them, enter your criteria, find a journal compatible with your writing style and all that.
After I find journals that I match my criteria: ones that publish literary fiction and satire, essays, or poetry, have a decent-sized audience, and also do book reviews* (this is key for the latter part of my plan, folks), then I will read them to figure out what fits where, follow the individual guidelines, and send them my work and whatever else they require. Then I wait, either get letters of acceptance or, more likely, rejection, and, if rejection, try again in another market, until I get everything published that I seek to get published.
For those of you who are writers, this whole process -- I am sure -- is not a mystery to you. Sorry if this is redundant.
Once I get some work published, and my book is finished, I will seek an agent to help me find a publisher, preferably a mid-sized one that will give me adequate attention as a writer, will take my ideas into consideration, will allow me to design the look of the product, and so forth, and will help me promote it. I also want a publisher that will focus on ebook promotion as well as print, since ebooks are a growing part of the industry, and I seek to embrace technology rather than dismiss it and want a publisher that is as progressive on the topic as me.
If it just sucks and no one wants to publish it or if just no one wants to publish it because it is too risque or controversial or "not right at this time" or whatever, then I will publish it anyway, on my way, on Amazon, Barnes and Nobles, sell it as an e-book. Then I will move on to the next one and the next one and the next one. And more short stories. And whatever the Hell else I feel like writing, however the Hell else I feel like writing it. I will put it out there and see what happens...
...Which is probably what Paul Rubens was thinking just before he...
Thursday, August 30, 2012
Gradumacated, Eduicized, and What Not
A wise friend recently told me that if I can gain readers by any means available, whether it's publishing short stories and/or poems in online literary journals, posting fan fiction on sites for such, publishing my book, then I can do whatever I want with this blog, because fans will read it either way. I suppose that is probably true.
However, I do kind of feel like I need a specific format of some sort. The problem is I can't decide what that format should be. I have more or less always just done as I please so maybe I don't need to change it. I did mainly publish short stories on here but, I am seeking other venues for future stories, so I need to put something else here.
I could write about my life, which is what I generally do anyways, in-between random blurbs of nonsense. I do like the nonsense. Maybe it is too much, at times. Okay, so most of the time. It keeps it random, anyways. I do like an aspect of randomness.
Maybe too much randomness is a bad thing. I mean, it gets old after a while, and eventually, inevitably, it will cease to be random, no matter how hard I would try to avoid it. I guess , is the chaos theory at work, or at least my fourth-grade understanding of it. I first read Jurassic Park in the fourth grade, and that is where my basic understanding of chaos theory comes from, so that is how I can justifiably say that it is a fourth-grade understanding of the subject.
Maybe letting it develop into some kind of pattern is a good thing. I mean, I don't want to force it. At least this way it will be natural, or, at least, seem natural. I like the nature of nature, in general. I know people probably think I'm stoned, and, honestly, if I had any, I would be, but I don't, so I am not. Such is life, I suppose.
I know I use commas in places where I could and probably should use other punctuation, but I don't care. This isn't academia, for Christ's sake, and, honestly, I like the fluidity of commas as opposed to dashes, parentheses, and semi-colons for parentheticals and other breaks. I do use colons, but only when it is necessary. I am no Cormac McCarthy, though. I do used quotation marks. While I do appreciate his style, it is not for me. I did love The Road, but I didn't like No Country for Old Men. Well, it was okay. Maybe I will eventually re-read it. I have other things I need to read first...
Like my school work. Although, I am not talking about that. That is a given. I am referring to the ever-increasing library of books literally exploding off of my shelves. I can't buy shelves fast enough to keep up with the volumes of books that I amass. I swear there is some sort of portal from some library or bookstore that directly transports books from there to here, and it only works the one way. Oh wait, there is a portal like that. It's called Amazon.
I need to at least read the books that people have lent me and/or recommended to me. I am currently working on finishing Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson, recommended to me by a very good friend. Another good friend lent me Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson, and, although I am not a fantasy person, normally, I am excited to read it. I also borrowed book 2 of Anne Rice's erotica series about Sleeping Beauty, Beauty's Punishment. That was so I could get some idea of what erotica is like so I could maybe venture into it at some point, probably under a pseudonym, or pen name, just to do it. Ha! Who doesn't like sex, I mean, come on, right? I also have The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and it's sequels that I borrowed from my sister-in-law. Then, after I have worked my way through all of those, I can start reading my own books!!!!! Huzzah! Fuck yeah!
Anyways, I have come to the conclusion, as I always do at the end of these things, that this blog will continue to be what it is and always has been, and I won't seek to define it any more than that, until such a time when I do, then I will, and it will be done, and that will be all, like this is all for now!
However, I do kind of feel like I need a specific format of some sort. The problem is I can't decide what that format should be. I have more or less always just done as I please so maybe I don't need to change it. I did mainly publish short stories on here but, I am seeking other venues for future stories, so I need to put something else here.
I could write about my life, which is what I generally do anyways, in-between random blurbs of nonsense. I do like the nonsense. Maybe it is too much, at times. Okay, so most of the time. It keeps it random, anyways. I do like an aspect of randomness.
Maybe too much randomness is a bad thing. I mean, it gets old after a while, and eventually, inevitably, it will cease to be random, no matter how hard I would try to avoid it. I guess , is the chaos theory at work, or at least my fourth-grade understanding of it. I first read Jurassic Park in the fourth grade, and that is where my basic understanding of chaos theory comes from, so that is how I can justifiably say that it is a fourth-grade understanding of the subject.
Maybe letting it develop into some kind of pattern is a good thing. I mean, I don't want to force it. At least this way it will be natural, or, at least, seem natural. I like the nature of nature, in general. I know people probably think I'm stoned, and, honestly, if I had any, I would be, but I don't, so I am not. Such is life, I suppose.
I know I use commas in places where I could and probably should use other punctuation, but I don't care. This isn't academia, for Christ's sake, and, honestly, I like the fluidity of commas as opposed to dashes, parentheses, and semi-colons for parentheticals and other breaks. I do use colons, but only when it is necessary. I am no Cormac McCarthy, though. I do used quotation marks. While I do appreciate his style, it is not for me. I did love The Road, but I didn't like No Country for Old Men. Well, it was okay. Maybe I will eventually re-read it. I have other things I need to read first...
Like my school work. Although, I am not talking about that. That is a given. I am referring to the ever-increasing library of books literally exploding off of my shelves. I can't buy shelves fast enough to keep up with the volumes of books that I amass. I swear there is some sort of portal from some library or bookstore that directly transports books from there to here, and it only works the one way. Oh wait, there is a portal like that. It's called Amazon.
I need to at least read the books that people have lent me and/or recommended to me. I am currently working on finishing Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson, recommended to me by a very good friend. Another good friend lent me Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson, and, although I am not a fantasy person, normally, I am excited to read it. I also borrowed book 2 of Anne Rice's erotica series about Sleeping Beauty, Beauty's Punishment. That was so I could get some idea of what erotica is like so I could maybe venture into it at some point, probably under a pseudonym, or pen name, just to do it. Ha! Who doesn't like sex, I mean, come on, right? I also have The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and it's sequels that I borrowed from my sister-in-law. Then, after I have worked my way through all of those, I can start reading my own books!!!!! Huzzah! Fuck yeah!
Anyways, I have come to the conclusion, as I always do at the end of these things, that this blog will continue to be what it is and always has been, and I won't seek to define it any more than that, until such a time when I do, then I will, and it will be done, and that will be all, like this is all for now!
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