On reviews, and receiving them, and the reader's right to expression

About a year ago, I wrote this post on feelings and the problem when our expressing of them steps over a line. It's still one of my most 'popular' posts, traffic-wise. This year, there's a similar firestorm happening, but in the reverse. It started with this article (that's a no-traffic link, btw) from an author who, frankly, stepped over the line. Way WAY over the line.

As authors, we write books, and if we're brave and crazy enough, we share them with the world. And here's the thing: the world is allowed to hate them. Publicly and loudly. That's just how it is. Readers are perfectly within their rights to hate every single word of what they just read and, also, to tell people about it. Know what else? So long as they're not actively threatening or condemning the person, the one who wrote the words they hated, readers can express their hatred for a book however they want. Really. However they want. With swears, with anger, with gifs and pictures which may or may not be rude.

Negative reviews are a bummer when it's your book on the receiving end, but that's part of this deal. Not everyone will love your book. Not everyone will be nice about it either. I don't love every book I read. And while I'd not personally choose to write an angry or caustic review, I respect a reader's right to do so.

There are many ways to deal with the pain of negative reviews. Cry, email friends, look at puppy pictures, bake, exercise, channel your emotions into something productive, like more writing. Just for a few examples. The top best way would be not to read reviews at all. Now that takes a willpower I don't possess, though I wish I did. So I do read reviews, even the negative ones. (I posit it's just as bad to read only positive reviews, but that's an entirely different issue.)  I also respect an author's right to engage a critic, respectfully and through established channels, though I don't recommend it.

What's never, ever, ever, ever an okay way to deal with anything, including negative reviews?

Stalking someone.

Seriously, what this author did is not okay. It is not even sane.

I'm equally horrified that a major news outlet gave her a platform to flaunt the insanity and even, just as ludicrously, gain (some) support for it.

Unlike my post a year ago, there is no complexity about this issue. None, zero, not a smidge. There is no gray here whatsoever.

Stalking a reviewer--anyone--is not okay. Not if you meant no harm, not if you just wanted to talk, not even if you wanted to thank them or give them a cake. Just no.

To all the bloggers and reviewers out there, no matter if you loved or passionately hated my books: thank you. I'm so desperately sorry that today some of you have reason to feel afraid.

Friday Five 05.16.2014

5 things I read this week ending 5/16/14, or since the last Friday Five...

• This truly fabulous post from Brigid Kemmerer (whose Elementals series I LOVE, btw) on expectations vs. reality for the published author. It's so honest and open and not blowing sunshine and rainbows. It's realistic. I wish she didn't have to repeat something along the lines of I'm not complaining! but I understand that she did--literally, she had to. Without the disclaimer (or even with) it's pretty much impossible to be published, even for super small time me, and talk about the non-magical aspects of publishing without hearing, either from real voices or the perfectly self-defeating ones in your head, how every single unpublished author ever would happily trade places with you and not complain at all. So often we shut ourselves up out of fear of sounding ungrateful. But you can discuss the realities, even the occasional negatives, of something without being ungrateful. Takeaway: "Regardless of whether you publish traditionally or on your own, it generally stands to reason that writing and self-editing the book is the easy part."

• On the more pep-talk side of the spectrum, Christa Desir's blog post on backing away slowly from the Amazon ranking. Takeaway: "But then, after that first day, that first month, those first six months, you wake up to the morning when your book is ranked 700,000 on Amazon. So basically the world wants to read 699,999 books more than yours. Perfect.... At the end of the day, writers need to remember that they created something and it is a thing that some people will love and some people will hate and some people will never know even existed and really that's okay. Go about the business of being you."
  
• One of a million "life-hacks" lists, which was not what I'd call genius overall, except that Imma try the popsicle trick. Takeaway: Gelatin in your popsicles will make them less melt-y.
  
• This TOTALLY GENIUS confirming-once-again-how-I-totally-adore-teenagers where a 16-year-old shows us mainstream/counter-culture styles through the decades. Takeaway: Just look at it.
  
• The WSJ article on John Green and this sort of rebuttal from Anne Ursu. For the record, I don't think John Green in any way asks to be elevated to this savior status, and I respect that he doesn't tend to comment after the fact on how the media portrays him. He seems like a genuinely good human. The takeaway, however, from Anne's piece: "Jacobs is talking with a lot of authority for someone who has no idea what he’s talking about. He’s not alone, though—lots of people who have no idea what they are talking about believe that YA is two genres: Twilight and its imitators and John Green and those he supposedly inspired. Guess which one they think is better?... These articles about YA are based entirely on accepted truths from people who live entirely outside the field; they keep getting perpetuated, and everyone nods sagely as someone else proclaims John Green is saving poor teenage girl readers from those silly silly vampire books." And much more.

What do you think? What have YOU been reading?

Friday Five 05.02.14

5 things I read this week ending 5/2/2014:

• This great advice to young critics by Matt Zoller Seitz, pretty much all of which works for writers too. #9 especially. Takeaway: "Nobody wants to read a piece that's structured that way. Even if they did, the form would be more a hindrance than a help to the writing process, because it makes the writer settle on a thesis before he or she has had a chance to wade around in the ideas and inspect them. So to Hell with the outline. Just puke on the page, knowing that you can clean it up and make it structurally sound later."
  
• Kate Messner telling it straight: if we want more diverse children's/YA literature, we must also BUY IT. No one likes to talk about money, but it is a factor here. Employ all your means to effect change. If dollars are one of your means, spend them to encourage diverse books. Takeaway: "At the end of the day, publishing is a business that needs to make money to survive. Given that reality, the best way for readers to ask for more diversity in children’s literature is not with words and tweets and blog posts alone but also with dollars."
  
• M.G. Buehrlen on ebook piracy. This is not a diatribe; it's a story. A good, honest one about how we make mistakes or tell ourselves little justifications...and how sometimes NOT getting everything you want leads to the things you REALLY DO. Takeaway: "So I get it. That urge and sudden need to HAVE THIS ART RIGHT NOW OR OMG I’M GOING TO DIE. I totally get it. But that didn’t make me any less of a selfish douche. My lack of money was just a fact of life, and I was in the same boat as pretty much every other college kid. It was a fact of life that wouldn’t have harmed me in any way. NOT downloading or listening to that music wouldn’t have killed me, even though it felt like it now and again.It may have even made me better."
  
• One more honest post (do you see the trend?) from Stefanie Gaither on how sometimes it's not so simple as just loving writing. And it's not. There's a lot of spin out there, people. It's hard to make our private doubts public because we're conditioned to pretend we don't have them. But we do. We really do. Writing is a hard business and it's not always easy to say (or pretend) "I'd do this for freeeeeeeeee, foreeeeeeeever, because I just looooooove to write!" I never say that, actually. It's not part of my personal narrative, and I don't have it in me to pretend. Takeaway: "I am ETERNALLY grateful to know that I will have a book on the shelves in September, even if it's the only one that ever makes it to said shelves. But ...The warm-and-fuzzy feeling that writing gives you may not always be as warm and fuzzy as it was when you first started. Sometimes it will be downright cold and prickly and you'll probably wonder if it was ever there in the first place, or if you were just fooling yourself. I personally don't think that makes you less of a 'real writer'; it just makes you human."
  
• Annnd a late addition here at posting time: Smart Bitch Sarah Wendell on the dreadful coverage of the Harlequin to HarperCollins deal. In short: a whole lot of everybody, including the media, still treats romance, and their readers, like shit. It's gross. Don't be gross. Takeaway: "You'd think that this was enough of a story with very wide reaching ramifications that business reporters would be able to take it seriously. But instead of examining the differences between the two companies, how Harlequin has often led the way in digital transitions in romance, how readers perceive the different publishers as brands, how each publisher has markedly different approaches to reader cultivation, library relations, and community building, and how each has followed very different timelines for all of the above plus many other initiatives in digital and print publishing, it's much easier and a well-worn path to just make sex jokes and call it a day."

What else have YOU been reading?

Friday Five 04.18.2014

5 things I read this week ending 4.18.14:

• Sweet little article from TeenVogue with popular authors explaining how to become a published writer. Takeaway: It's hard work, and there's no perfect path. Nothing in this article was new to me, but I just love reading things directed at teens telling them how to pursue their dreams--realistically.
  
• Sarah Negovetich on writing a newsletters that is actually interesting to readers. Takeaway: It's not all about you! Also, get a mailing list. I'll get working on that. :)
  
• This really amazing post from YA Love on are teen girls seeing themselves reflected in what they read--for themselves and for school. Read this. Takeaway: The short answer is yes, in what they choose, and NO, a big, fat, glaring no, in school. I accept the limitations, that this is one survey from teens at one school, BUT, having been both a teacher and a teen girl, once upon a time, it all rings true to me.
  
• A really great (old) article from the LA Times on how the musical acting was acheived in The Red Violin. I adore--adore--this movie. I've watched it a billionty times. If you have any interest in music and the interweaving of tragic stories, watch it! Takeaway: "The story is more concerned with the violin itself than any of its transient caretakers, and [the director]'s  challenge was to make his audiences care deeply for an inanimate piece of wood." And you do!
  
• Another stop at Cynthia Leitich Smith's blog for a post by Michele Weber Hurwitz on comparison. For the second time in two weeks, comparison is the thief of ... (a brill little quote from Teddy Roosevelt) caught my eye. Because it is, and I am as guilty of it, while trying not to do it, as anyone. Takeaway: "While glowing reviews and awards are certainly wonderful, I've come to realize that rewards arrive in many forms, and often the best are the most heartfelt, touching, and personal."

What have YOU been reading?

On feelings, and expressing them, and being stuck between being a writer and a reader

There’s a book firestorm happening this week around a conclusion to an incredibly popular series that was incredibly unsatisfying to a large portion of an already huge group of readers.

That’s a tough place to be, and that’s an understatement.

As an author, this is an intensely uncomfortable situation to watch. It is. I won’t pretend otherwise. Because here are two things that are okay:

1. To write the book you want to write
2. To hate the book you just read

It takes courage to write an ending/plot point/whatever that feels right to you, but that you know will be unpopular. And you do know. Writers deal in emotions. We know. There will be backlash. It takes fortitude to deal with that as well.

It’s gut-punchingly terrible to read a book you wanted to love with characters you already love and be dissatisfied. The worst. Even worse than the worst when you throw in lengthy anticipation and having paid for something you end up hating. Readers know this, and since writers tend also to be readers, we know that too.

There’s not really a way to reconcile those two things. It’s tricky, this situation, so so tricky. There are emotions and expectations and feelings involved. There’s the freedom—necessity—for artists to take risks and follow their vision. There’s the extra-tricky complication of the fact that this art isn’t free—it’s sold to readers for cash money.

Because this situation has all these variables that are at odds with each other but also not wrong, it inevitably leads to some wrongness. Here are two things that are not okay:

1. Threatening a person
2. Denigrating a person

Except I don’t think rational people do those things. But humans, even ones who are generally good and nice and any number of positive traits, aren’t always rational. When emotions—and what are fandoms or content creators but people with intense emotions and investment in a thing?—are involved, you’re even more likely to encounter irrationality. This is not an excuse. It’s just a fact. There will be irrationality. On BOTH sides, which just fuels more irrationality until the situation devolves into inevitable ugliness. No one enjoys this, yet it happens again and again. Because feelings. It all comes back to feelings.

But what to do? I don’t know. There is not a satisfying ending to this situation. Authors want fans and to be true to ourselves. Readers want to be surprised and to be satisfied. These two and four things won’t always come together. There's so much more, too, so many nuances I haven't mentioned, that we could talk about in relation to this conundrum.

I guess the bottom line is to remember we’re all people, writers and readers. Have feelings, intense ones, be they good or bad. Express them even. But not with threats and/or insults directed at people. Please.

Shiny!

Blog! Did you see how pretty you look? Just a little scrub here and outfit change there and you're all shined up for fall. Finally updated my What I'm Reading page with the last few months' worth as well.

So what else is new?

Yesterday, I turned old. I know age is just a number and all that, but I don't like the new number. It's one year closer to the year when really, finally I'm supposed to be/feel like a grownup. :/

A few days before that I FINISHED MY LATEST DRAFT. And I don't totally hate it. Kind of like it, really. First reader didn't hate it either! Nervously biting finger nails until Agent A and other readers weigh in.

The day after that I started obsessively writing a totally different book I totally didn't plan for. So, I'm obsessively working on that now. Oops.

Annnnd it's SEPTEMBER! That means: PUMPKIN EVERYTHING!!!! In honor of that, I opened today with pumpkin coffee and am closing it out with pumpkin beer. Win!

I hope all of you closed out your summer with all the sun and fun you deserved. Vive l'automne!

Another YA opportunity- Agent Dinner!

Here's another heads up, YA writers! If you are in or around the Claverack, NY area (ie. the incredibly lovely section of Eastern NYS between Albany and NYC, near the MA border), your library is hosting a YA AGENT DINNER on 6/13.

Details here:
http://claveracklibrary.org/2012/04/03/dinner-with-an-agent-june-13-2012/

For $40, benefiting the library, you get to dine with fellow YA enthusiasts and FOUR YA AGENTS:
Wendy Schmalz
Miriam Altshuler
Jennifer Laughran
Liza Pulitzer-Voges

Could this evening get more awesome? I don't see how.

Registration starts 4/15 and seats are very limited. Here's the catch: you must be a library patron OR AN SCBWI MEMBER.

YA Spec Fic Open Submission Opportunity!

Heads up, writers! Do you write YA speculative fiction? Are you unagented and unpublished*? There's a fantastic opportunity for direct submission at Strange Chemistry, a new YA imprint from your friends at Angry Robot launching this fall! The doors are open April 16-30.

Read the details here:
http://strangechemistrybooks.com/opendoor/

I'm not involved in this process (though you bet my agent has already submitted our proposal!), but think it's awesome. All I can say is follow the instructions to the letter, make sure your MS and first 5 are in tip-top shape, and GOOD LUCK!

Not YA? Don't despair. Angry Robot says they're doing another open call this spring, though they don't have details online yet.

Not Spec Fic? Sorry, Charlie.

*This includes self-published. Unpublished for them means not published in any way.

When can I buy it? And other hard-to-answer questions...

When you tell people you've written a book, the most common response is something like, "Oh, how nice for you," with or without a discreet (or not) eye roll. But for the rare few who are actually interested, the inevitable response is, "When can I buy it?!"

Sometimes that's harder than the eye roll. Because then you have to explain, and the publishing industry makes little sense to the people involved in it, let alone an outsider.

The real answer is: Possibly never. Maybe even probably never. After that it's: well, if my agent and I are lucky enough to sell it, you can buy it approximately two years from now. And it will undoubtedly have a different title and not be exactly the same story I just described to you, so you'll have to remember my name.

And that's when you lose them completely.

This is a waiting game. You query and you wait. Your agent queries and you wait. And wait and wait and wait.

You have to hope readers are still waiting when it's done.

If I wrote literary, atmospheric kinds of things

which I don't, I'd be all over this bizarre (by which I mean kind of awesome) winter we're having in the Northeast for inspiration. I'd call it something like...

A Winter of Springtime
or maybe
Winter of Spring's Content

Poetical like.

And yes, I'm talking about the weather. Secretly, everyone likes to talk about the weather. I believe this. It's why we do it so often, why there's an entire TV channel devoted to talking about it, and why it's a cliché that sort of isn't.

It's called FUN

Or, Why I Bother.

I write romances. With some other stuff mixed in.

For teenagers. Or anyone.

With girl characters I hope you'll love and guy characters I hope you'll fall in love with too.

And it is FUN.

I'm not trying to change minds or the world and I don't expect my stories to. I don't expect them to win awards or garner critical praise. I expect they will receive some derogatory remarks and turned-down noses along the way. And that's all A-O.K.

'Cause I do this for fun. And it is. A LOT.

I <3 fun and you should too.

Blank pages are scary, or, My Kingdom for a Plot!

Characters, check.
Story world, check.
Plot? Um.

All stories start with ideas. Mine usually start with a sentence or a fragment of a dream or characters I fall in love with before I even know what's special about them. As inspirations go, those are fine. But just once I wish a story would come to me in the form of a plot I need to populate with people, instead of the other way around.

That hasn't happened this time, so Plot, if you're out there and can hear me, March is waiting. What happens to her?

When you're not a good self-motivator...

When you write, you spend a lot of time by yourself, in your own head. That's not always a helpful place to be, even if you enjoy the company of yourself and your characters. When you're not a good self-motivator, it's even harder. I like concrete deadlines because without them, here's a typical self-conversation:

Self: If you write 500 words, you can have an Oreo.
Conscience*: Food is not a good motivator. Pick something else.
Self: But I really want an Oreo.
Inner-demons (myriad): do laundry... hey, what's on facebook...
Conscience: You're wasting time.
Inner-demons: do dishes... it's nice out, you shouldn't waste it... make jewelry...
Self: Let me just get a cup of coffee and read what I wrote last time.
Conscience: You don't need more coffee!
Inner-demons: you should probably shower at some point, you know... or take a nap... or go play fetch with your poor dog... hey, what's on facebook...

Time spent self-arguing: 20 minutes
Words written: Er, does the blog count?
Oreos eaten: 1

Okay, now it's really time to get writing :)

*Also known as the leader of the Inner-demons.

Muses are funny things

I firmly believe writing produces writing. The more time spent writing, the easier the words will come. But this post isn't about that. It's about muses.

Thinking, listening, looking, dreaming... all of those things that lead to the ideas which lead to the writing. I wouldn't say I have a specific one on which I rely. Any of the sisters muse can provide inspiration at one point or another. It's when they appear that's the challenging part. Almost invariably it's when I'm doing something not just not anywhere near the computer or the notebook we're all supposed to carry (which I do), but not in any position to record my ideas anywhere but in my scattered brain... driving, showering, taking a walk. I suppose those are the times I actually have to muse. You too, right? I know we all face this problem.

Last night it was while brushing my teeth for bed. And which is why instead of climbing into said bed like I so very wanted to, I forced myself to walk past it, straight to the computer I'd shut firmly for the night, to write feverishly just five lines. Because it's not what the muse is, or when it strikes, but capturing the thoughts before they're gone that matters.

So what's the point? Nothing. Just musing.