John Scalzi

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My Hugos Anger Is Soothed

Posted on July 21, 2009 in: Fantasy and SF|Post Comment

Tags: adam roberts, cheryl morgan, hugo awards, hugos, john picacio, john scalzi, nick mamatas, stream-of-consciousness yay!, wisdom of scalzi

Thank you, Cheryl Morgan, for your grace and frankness under fire when responding to some of the, shall we say, tinfoil hat fans in the comments.

Thank you, John Scalzi, for your wisdom and humor and also your very succinct reprisal of Adam Roberts’ little note to fandom.

Thank you, John Picacio, for your wonderful rebuttal of Roberts’ rather feeble attempt at art critique.

Adam Roberts, I knew your name was familiar from somewhere. I actually don’t like your writing, but I always thought, maybe I’ll give wossname another try after a year or so.

Now I’ll remember your name a bit better so as to avoid it in the future.

Update:

Thank you, Nick Mamatas, for making me laugh about some of the ensuing wankery. I already ponied up for you to review G.I. Joe, though! So I’m not namin’ the perceived father of stream-of-consciousness writing here.

I actually do like the dead dude’s writings, as emo as they sometimes are, and would toss some of his classics into the YA section.

Update 2:

Contrary to perceptions of some folks, me and my card-carrying fan friends actually aren’t a group of Midwestern Conservative White Males.

Most of us are pretty liberal, one of us is an out and out libertarian, one of us is actually a Buddhist (it’s not me), half of us are atheists, and while over half of us do come from the Midwest, we left it for various reasons that tend not to, um, pool us into whatever the “Generic Middle America” taste is, which by the way, tends not to touch upon SF/F very much.

Half of us are women. And many apologies, but a quarter of us are non-white.

Most everyone has a college degree, and one guy is so wise he should’ve had one in philosophy long ago.

All of us hate Sarah Palin. None of us are interested in the elitist-versus-non-elitist game. If an “elitist” writes a book we like, we read it. My general sense of fandom is that it’s mostly like us, small sampling that we are.

So, sorry about nominating for the novels that we did, but you can’t blame it on us being Conservatives-with-a-capital-C.

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Money, Writing, Etc.

Posted on July 3, 2009 in: Writing|Post Comment

Tags: harlan ellison, john scalzi, lobbying, lobbyist feeling conflict of interest!, money, nick mamatas, wapo, washington post, wisdom of scalzi

For the past couple of weeks I’ve been keeping tabs on pragmatic Writing for Money articles on le web, and these are the must-reads I’ve come up with.

Of course, I always go for the snark.

Three from Nick Mamatas:

Freelance Writing Money, Part I: How To Find Freelance Writing Work:

Look for it.

In 2005, for the Prattshaw project Flytrap, I wrote an essay about freelance writing and suggested that if you could not make a living as a freelancer it is because your standards were too high, both for what counted as writing and what counted as a living. A couple of years later, a new science fiction writer (he’d debuted in Baen’s Universe) wrote me a letter of thanks. He happened to be reading the little zine in a hospital hallway while on the other side of the wall his wife was giving birth. At that moment, he decided to get together a few pieces of writing he’d completed in the hope of getting out of the job he had in a warehouse. He wrote to say that he credited my article with his new gig writing computer software manuals, which meant more money for his family.

(Continue reading…)

Freelance Writing Money, Part II: Writing For Non-Publication:

Be the writer in your social circle.

If you spend a lot of time hanging out with other writers, going to your little writer’s group, and not talking to anyone who isn’t fascinated with writing, writing, writing, you can stop reading now. Sucker.

Remember that our goal here is fast money for writing, not a living doing technical, business, or commercial writing, which is great and pays a lot (I have friends who bill $85-$125 an hour for pamphlets and such) because it just takes a long time to break in. And speaking of suckers, people have degrees in this dumb crap sometimes these days. Though, like a lot of computing gigs, business writing is one of the highly paid jobs that one can snag without a degree.

(Continue reading…)

And, of course, Freelance Writing Money, Part III OR Shocklines Post of the Day!, which is probably one of the better examples of “ads” you should avoid.

Here’s a recent post from John Scalzi’s Whatever:

Dear Writers: For God’s Sake, Don’t Assume You’ll Get Paid:

An interesting and frankly alarming thing in the comment thread of the last post. I noted in the last post that a major issue I saw with the proposed F&SF online writing workshop, which offers the chance that work in the workshop could get published in the magazine, is that there was no indication that those chosen stories would then be paid for. To which several people in the comment thread said something along the lines of “oh, well, that wasn’t a problem for me, because I just assumed there would be payment.”

Jesus, people.

Never assume as a writer that you’re going to get paid.

(Continue reading…)

And now for something not quite completely different: the Washington Post recent scandal about WaPo canceling their plan to get funding from, um, lobbyists.

Addendum:

From Mark Tisdale’s comment on the Whatever thread, here’s a YouTube clip from Dreams with Sharp Teeth, wherein Harlan Ellison talking about getting paid:

Addendum 2:

For people looking for much linked coverage of the WaPo scandal, Politics Daily has the scoop.

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Pragmatic Writing Books for Many Occasions

Posted on June 20, 2009 in: Writing|3 Comments

Tags: dave king, dwight v. swain, e.b. white, john scalzi, lists, recommendations, renni browne, william strunk, william zinsser, wisdom of scalzi

In a previous post I stated that the only writing book I pay attention to is John Scalzi’s You’re Not Fooling Anyone When You Take Your Laptop to a Coffee Shop.

Which is not the whole truth. The truth is that before my reductionism came some books that laid the land for specific terrain relevant to writing. Like lots of other writers, I’ve read a number of books on the topic. I’ve found that my tastes, and the most useful books to me, were by very pragmatic writers. The kind of writers who are really serious about making money from writing—but not gimmicky books. If it was pragmatic craft, it made the list.

So this is a pragmatic list. Some books not listed here that you possibly should read, such as Donald Maas’ Writing the Breakout Novel, I would highly recommend.

But after you get the basics, as it were.

The Elements of Style (4th Edition) (Hardcover) by William Strunk , E. B. White

Buy: Kindle • Amazon • Feedbooks [free]

Every writer will tell you to buy this, except for a few academic linguists who want you to ~~buy~~ consider The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language instead (only $170 with Amazon’s discount!).

There’s a certain coolness associated with being so anti-Strunk, but dude, it’s all about minimizing the amount of words you bore your damn reader with. When you learn that, then you can play around with the decor without reading like someone who thinks that Victorian claustrophobia¹ is all the rage of modern decorating.

On Writing Well, 30th Anniversary Edition: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction by William Zinsser

Buy: Amazon

I think all writers should try writing non-fiction, including those who are committed to writing the Great American Novel (or the next 20-book successor to The Wheel of Time). And non-fiction can more easily get you money, and even encourage you to explore fields you might not have otherwise, or at least without pay. A point that’s made a few times in the Coffee Shop book.

Zinsser gives you tips and advice on non-fiction in general, as well as the different types of non-fiction (interviewing, business versus sports versus technical writing, memoir, critique/reviews) and common sense attitudes for writing (“The Tyranny of the Final Product”, for instance).

Also, Zinsser’s introdution is partly a nice way to de-romanticize writing. My experience of writing is, these days, very much like his: painful, but addictive, which is a little sick if you think about it properly.

I need to review this particular book again, in light of recent events.

Techniques of the Selling Writer by Dwight V. Swain

Buy: Amazon

In many ways, Swain is the pragmatic double of Zinsser, except this time in the arena of fiction. His advice fits any type of fiction, as opposed to specific genres. This is the book I wish I’d had in my high school creative writing class. (And one that doesn’t cost over $100 at that.) Also, his advice assists with narrative non-fiction (think immersive memoirs, written like stories rather than like, well, memoirs).

I also think all writers should try to write at least some fiction. Fortunately, and possibly unfortunately, many already do or very much desire to.

Self-Editing for Fiction Writers, Second Edition: How to Edit Yourself Into Print by Renni Browne and Dave King

Buy: Amazon

Because I know of so few fiction writers who want to self-select themselves out of the slush pile and into the permanent circular bin. This is short, easy to read, has interesting examples, little exercises of dubious but okay natures. A little cost to improve your readability and chances by quite a lot, and help you get over the first bar.²

You’re Not Fooling Anyone When You Take Your Laptop to a Coffee Shop: Scalzi on Writing (Hardcover) by John Scalzi

Buy: Amazon • Webscriptions

And of course this. I consider this the king of the heap, and the others to be well-tried advisers.

But that’s just me.

The Victorians apparently hated the idea of leaving plain space on the walls. Even Sherlock Holmes, reportedly, who filled his walls with pictures of criminals, although most Victorians preferred more refined, but no less numerous, mounted clutter. [↩]
The second bar is, naturally, much higher, to the point where there are few, if any books that will help you get there. Some complain that there’s nothing but beginner writing books on craft out there, which is not exactly how I’d classify all of either Zinsser or Swain, but anyways: there’s a reason for that. [↩]

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Blast from the Past for Writers: Myths About Blogging and Freeity

Posted on May 11, 2009 in: Blogging|Post Comment

Tags: fantasy and science fiction magazine, gordon van gelder, john scalzi, teh Internets are killing print, tor.com, wisdom of scalzi

The Cart Before the Horse

Or, why I’m writing this:

a Tor.com interview with Gordon van Gelder, wherein he discussed print versus the Internets;
the discussion in the comments of said interview, including Ellen Datlow, Nick Mamatas, Jason Stoddard, and more;
and John Scalzi’s response.

Yes, it’s a bit of a stew.

One of the topics touched upon by van Gelder and Scalzi involve what it takes to make providing free online fiction work, and how marketing at various publishing houses have been a bit clueless about it with respect to new authors, in that they think this will garner instant accolades and eyes.

The problem is that this doesn’t work when said author has no audience. Even before Agent to the Stars and Old Man’s War were put online for free, Scalzi was already building up an audience of readers—and a large body of non-fiction work as well. I’d say the same for Stross and very much for Doctorow. But conversely, that’s when it does work.

Something I Don’t Talk About Anymore

Dirty secret time.

I used to study blogging. Not so much about the art of blogging, but the art of blogging that sells; in other words, online marketing and brand-building. This used to get me some serious amount of hits, a lot of Stumbles, and so on. (Moving to SF/F really tanked that, which should tell you something depressing.)

But this is not something I want to talk about in writer circles ever again, because people suddenly get these weird ideas about online marketing.

Rather than bore you with a summary of some of the discussions I’ve had about this, here are some posts I’ve written in the past, that may be of interest to you, dear writer who wishes to speed your fame through teh Intertubes.

Back to the Past

6 Myths about Blogging, Glory, and Fame.

Know what blogging doesn’t get you. If you read nothing else at my site ever again, read this one.
Where Seth Godin is Coming From: Re: Free Content and Publishing.

If you’re going to and/or put free content up there anyways, you need to think about the philosophy of free in relation to brand-building. This is not simple at all.

I never thought about it until recently because I had a day job. These days I do get paid for some of my writing, and this definitely has caused me to think more about this kind of thing.
4 Principles for Packing a Punch with Unique Content.

If you’re going to try to go down this path, you need some kind of methodology to hit big numbers; this is one simplified template, and likely needs serious tweaking before being applied to fiction. This is the skeleton of Internet marketing and, frankly, is what a lot of traditional publishing marketing guys are missing, much less the heart and other important internal organs of Internet marketing.

Success stories using this method:
- The article itself. Over 15,000 hits.
- Looking for Love in All the Wrong Bounce Rates. Over 8,000 hits.
- Getting the Most Out of Entrecard. Over 5,000 hits, 59 comments.
- HTML for Dummies, Part 3: Effects with Borders, Padding, and Replacing Tables with Divs. Due to the last part, over 20,000 hits.
My failures are all sub-2000 hits, sometimes embarrassingly so, but always because they don’t hit the 4 principles, one of which is more or less out of my control.

In Four Little Words

Build an audience first.

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Kindle Spotlight: Novels on the Locus 2008 Recommended Reading List, Part 2

Posted on February 7, 2009 in: Fantasy and SF|Post Comment

Tags: cory doctorow, daryl gregory, dave mckean, doug dorst, felix gilman, jo graham, john scalzi, kristin cashore, margo lanagan, marie rutkoski, neil gaiman, nick harkaway, robin mckinley, spotlight, terry pratchett

Previously we covered the science fiction and fantasy novels on the Locus 2008 Reading List; next up are the first novels and Young Adult novels (both SF and fantasy).

Note: if a Young Adult novel was also the first published novel for the author, it’s usually placed in the first novel category instead. But sometimes it’s not (such as Tender Morsels).

Yes, it would have been simpler to just have Fantasy/Science Fiction, except for all the ones that are between (like An Evil Guest), but then we wouldn’t have recognition of first novels or Y.A. Or something. I don’t know.

I think it would have been better to tag novels as first, Y.A, and/or SF/F, and then list the lot by author last name.

Anyways! Moving on.

First Novels

Graceling by Kristin Cashore

Tag Archive: john scalzi

The Cart Before the Horse

Something I Don’t Talk About Anymore

Back to the Past

In Four Little Words

First Novels

Young Adult

Part of a series

Tobias S. Buckell

Peter David

David Drake

Mercedes Lackey and James Mallory

Jane Lindskold

L. E. Modesitt

Brandon Sanderson

Robert Charles Wilson

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