All of These Things are Just Like the Others.

A long time ago I got sick of the wave of post-apocalyptic horror and thriller novels. Like the endless vampire novels that preceded them, I kept waiting for the fad to vanish, but somehow it hasn't quite done that. As with the vampire novels, these apocalypse-inspired things are all now almost exactly the same as the ones that lumbered out before them. They do seem to appeal to an audience that is obviously addicted to them and the mainly politically Fascist crowd who absorb each, one after the other. So they keep the idiot neo-Nazis happy and reaffirm their almost mindless beliefs.

So here is a fill-in-the-blank form that can serve as blurbs for any such novels that seem to endlessly sprout out of the right wing scumpile. Have fun.

After the _________ apocalypse, join _________ as he/she travels across ________ in a desperate journey against ________ to rescue his/her ________. Will he/she find the ______ to battle against the _______ and reach his/her ________?

Find out in Wanky McWankerface’s latest novel, __________!

(Wanky McWankerface was a ______ who served in the ________, and is now a ______ when not writing novels about _______.)

Fill in the blank.

In the Short Term.

There is one thing for which I can thank ebooks and self-published writers:

Real books are stupidly cheap right now! Not only have independent bookstores been shutting down, not only are chain bookstores vanishing, but even used bookstores are going under. And the few used bookstores that are left won't even buy books anymore. So, guess what? People donate the shit out of books! They're in every donation shop you see, and packed into every flea market you stumble upon.

I discovered some time back, as traditional publishers began to wilt and fade at the assault from Amazon and Smashwords, etc., that I can walk into any second-hand shop and buy used books for next to nothing. I'm talking cheap. Cheaper than ever before. Yes, you could always find good books at a discount in such places, but not like this!

Last week when Carole and I were on a jaunt we stopped at an antique mall. Back in the day whenever I would find used books in one of these joints they would be prohibitively expensive for my cheapskate ass. But not now! I found an enormous selection of fantasy and science-fiction books from the 60s through the late 80s that ranged between 25 cents to a buck. Yes, I loaded up.

Today we visited a Goodwill store and I located more good stuff, nothing over a dollar.

So, for now, the self-published assholes and the emerging monopoly of Amazon have handed me a vast treasure of extremely cheap reading material. Cheaper by far than I could find online. Less expensive than anyone could purchase in even the most economy-driven used bookshop.

As you creeps destroy English literature you have given me cheap access to more books and more reading material than I could possibly read within a lifetime.

Thanks, you filthy, no-talent fucks (and your grinning monopolistic creep of a master). As you destroy literature, you have done something of value in the short term.

"Self-publishin' ferever!"

No Crow for Me, Thanks.

Holy crap. I can't wait to get all of my computer stuff set up in the new office space I have in Huntersville. Then I can get back to a regular writing schedule and return to posting on my blog.

I am hoping to have the new writing space set up and dedicated in a few days.

Until then, I just wanted to post some musings on writing.

*

In the past--and for very good reasons--I have been extremely critical of the self-publishing game. I had sworn never to do it again after my brief flirtation with following along those lines. (I did self-publish one novel and quickly withdrew it until I could sell it legitimately.)

But then, over the past year or so, editorial doors have chambered closed to me, mainly over the fact that I am often politically vocal. And my politics are not popular, especially among the liberal self-described "Social Justice Warriors", among whom are many anthologists, editors, even some publishers who all refuse to consider my work out of hand. They won't even look at my manuscripts or respond to queries, not even from my agent.

Thus, I had begun to lean toward eating some crow and move into the self-publishing field.

However, after discussing the scene with some of my good friends who do self-publish, I decided against it. The market is just way too crowded. And not crowded with good writing, but with the inept and hollow shit that is indicative of the scene. Added to the task of producing work, you also have to commission cover art, format the manuscripts for publication, employ a professional editor/proofreader, and advertise. If you want to do it right you have to spend a fair amount of money. And then you have to struggle to try to get your work noticed over the vast flood of literary turds that dominate self-published novels.

Therefore, I opted not to self-publish. A couple of my friends who do publish their own books encouraged me, but the word I got from most of them is that it's almost a lost cause and that few of them can make any money at it. Yeah, your work is published...but alongside crappy tomes about woman-on-lizard bestiality and racist gun-porn parading as zombie fiction.

No, thanks.

I'll continue to try to find traditional publishers. It will be hard to do and I'll have to seek out some honest editors who aren't blinded by crazed politics.

Otherwise, I'll just write and be unpublished. And for now I won't be eating any crow.

"Git some! Git some!"

I Give Up!

One thing that I long ago noticed about ebooks in general and self-published ebooks in particular is that they have a very, very, very short shelf life. Generally the ones that make a little money do so for just a few weeks to a few months. Then they are completely forgotten and stop selling.

Some of my friends who got into the self-publishing game claim to have made money at it. (Very few of them--a couple.) I've met a few self-publishers who made what I would call a killing at it. They sold enough copies of their books that they were able to quit their day-jobs and create self-published content full time. Of course most of those people later came to regret that decision as it was a short-lived phenomena. I've spoken to more than a few such who found themselves unable to pay their bills after a few months when those impressive sales dwindled to nothing and could not be rekindled. Lightning rarely strikes twice, they say.

But one guy I met (I refuse to call him a "writer" because he can't write) continued to do well at it for some time. He was able (somehow) to build a clientele of people who kept going back to his poisoned well to dip into his shit volcano for a continuing serving of his extrusions. Why? I have no idea as I would never develop a taste for such. But there are all kinds of people out there, some of whom will pay a self-publisher $3 or $4 every so often to read crap that would never make it beyond a slush pile in the old days.

In addition, I'm convinced that Amazon artificially creates some of these "success" stories just to fuel the fires of the self-publishing scam. Where would a pyramid scheme end up without a few people making money at it? You have to show someone making a few shekels or else you can't generate a steady stream of suckers.

Today, for instance, I got an ad in my email box from Amazon suggesting a new science fiction novel. I looked at the graphic. It looked to be the cover of a very crappy self-published ebook. But I was curious--not even Amazon would promote the kind of shit that I see in the world of self-publishing...would they?

I clicked on the ad. It took me to the book's spot on Amazon. I'd never heard of the author. The cover was pretty awful. Military sf. I then decided to at least "look inside". I read a couple of paragraphs...

Oh. My. God.

Indeed, Amazon had sent me an email promoting a self-published  pile of shit. As with every self-published novel I have ever tried to read, this one was a stinker. It smelled. The stench was overwhelming. If I needed any more proof that Amazon feels bound to promote crap for the sake of furthering the destructive scam we know as self-publishing, this was it: all the proof I needed.

For the love of English literature, cut it the fuck out. 

Still Searching...

One of my old acquaintances (a writer) used to tell me not to criticize other writers. He never quite explained just why, but what I took away from his position was that writing is a tough enough task as it is without having fellow writers on your back.

And, I agree with that.

Despite what some people may say or think, I go out of my way to avoid specifying any writer whose work I dislike. On the one hand it's as my old pal hinted--the job is hard enough without being hamstrung by another writer pointing out the obvious. Second, it's just often cruel.

And the cruelty aspect of it lies in the fact that some work is so overwhelmingly awful that to bother criticizing the author in question would be akin to turning a paraplegic out of his wheelchair and kicking him in the teeth. Yeah, attacking some of it is that bad and that plain. What's the point?

For years now I have been tasting self-published books from time to time and looking for one that is well written. These days I don't even bother to look at the so-called "five star" reviews they garner, most having been bought and/or written by the close friends and relatives of the morons who self-published. Sometimes I will allow myself to be suckered into reading one of these travesties by someone--usually that someone being a self-published writer, or someone who inexplicably supports the self-publishing (crime) scene.

This week I located a self-published book on my own and downloaded it. I'm not even sure how I happened upon the author's website, but his blog seemed mildly amusing which hinted at a certain level of intelligence and perceptiveness on his part. And he was offering a free download to one of his books via Amazon. So, I bit.

I found that the book had a good hook. The first few pages were decent. He showed the level of humor and insight that I had figured from his commentaries at his website. The first chapter had some problems, but I have read traditionally published novels with similar quibbles that I enjoyed despite the flaws. Thus, I continued to read. Maybe, at last, I'd found a self-published novel that at least measured up to a competently written traditionally published book.

Alas, it was not to be. After a few more chapters the writing began to fail, as if the prose was suffering from some kind of cancer that was causing it to waste away, along with the logic of the plot. I struggled on to the mid-point before I finally gave up, skipped ahead to the final chapter and realized that I had not, in fact, located my first well written self-published novel. This one was garbage like all of the rest of them, even if I didn't encounter the stench and the rot until I'd unwrapped the unspoiled layer.

So it goes. I don't actively search for good self-published novels, because I realize that mathematically I'd hit the Powerball lottery before I'll find one. But I'm still willing to take a look now and again when I find myself in a good mood and with the necessary time to risk the whiff of shitty prose.

In closing, two examples of writing that I've actually read recently in self-published fiction:

"She was gladder and gladder that she'd met him." (That's actually a line from a self-published crime novel I tried to read. I got two pages in. It got worse.)

And the self-published science-fiction novel that had an evil alien race called "the Caca-dasians". (You can't make this shit up. Or, you can, but you have to be a dumb-ass shitty writer to do it.)

"I'm gone self-publish my novel. You c'n read it."

A Brief Conversation.

Writer: "You're going to do what with that?"

Self-pubber: "I'm going to self-publish it."

Writer: "Really? I always flush those down the toilet."

Dump it! Don't publish it!

Good News

My long-time readers here know of my complete distaste for self-published ebooks. I have been hoping that the fad would fade and that things would get back to normal in the business of books and book publishing. The main thing that I kept thinking would come to pass is that the complete flood of poorly written, self-published shit would finally so completely disgust the collective reader that they would finally--FINALLY--stop downloading and supporting that most hideous of creations: the self-published ebook.

And, it looks as if the tide may at last be turning. I hope this bodes ill for the self-published ebook fad and that real talent and skill will once again hold the day.

We'll see.

Kindle sales plummet.

Duh! We self-published our books! Duh!

Bookstore Musing

I love to go to bookstores. They are my favorite places to shop. I'm going to miss them when they're gone.

Two nights ago I hit a couple of bookshops on my rounds. I've found that not only are they great places to spend my money, they also almost always spur me to think and to write. Just being among the stacks of books makes me fool good and seeing all of the stuff in print spurs me to wonder about what I want to write, how I want to proceed with what I am currently writing, and force me to consider what kind of writer I want to be.

This latest trip especially had me dwelling on that last point.

What kind of writer do I want to be?

When I was younger all I wanted to do was write for a living. I didn't want to get rich doing it, but I wanted to be able to work full-time as an author. Frankly, I didn't care what kind of work would get me to that point--all I knew was that I wanted to produce prose for a living.

Initially, I wanted to write pulp fiction for a living. This meant that I'd create fantasies of one type or another. I'd generate worlds and outlandish characters and oversized plots. And there's nothing wrong with that. It's what some of my favorite writers did and it's no surprise that I wanted to follow along those lines. My initial modest successes were in producing and selling this type of thing. For a while--a brief while--I figured that I was on the right path and that soon I'd be able to sit behind a keyboard all day to make my daily bread.

I figured wrong, of course.

I've had a lot of writer friends over the years, and I honestly have never known anyone who wrote full time for a living. I've known people who wrote and didn't work, but most of those cats were being supported by someone else--usually their parents. And I've known people who were squeaking by on the starvation sums they were gathering from their fiction while their families suffered because of their stubbornness. But absolutely none of my friends have ever done well enough from writing to pay the bills and keep the debt collectors away and the lights on and the table supplied with food. It was never easy to do for anyone and I've always had to maintain a day job, even in the years when I did relatively well with writing.

And now it's even more difficult than before.

After selling scores of short stories to dozens of markets and hundreds of pages of scripts to many comic book publishers and a number of novels to several book companies, I knew that I'd likely never make the transition to full-time writer. Only a very few folk make that kind of dough from their prose.

But standing in those shops and peering over the thousands of titles always makes me wonder again what kind of writer I need to be. Should I continue to pursue the path of pulp fiction? Should I change direction and pen mainstream work? Or do I toss fiction aside and work on non-fiction? All of these thoughts have occurred to me.

Likely, I'll stick with the weird fantasies and hard-boiled fictions that have always fascinated me and spurred me to action. I'll continue to gravitate to the sections of the bookshop shelves that hold such volumes.

But, man, I am going to miss the bookstores when they're gone.

Like the glaciers, they're melting away.

And soon they'll be a fading memory...

Bookstores!

I buy a lot of books. Unless I'm really short of funds (I put a lot of money into my 401k, so I do run short of money from time to time), I only buy new books from living authors (to make sure they get royalties). And, since I am not a fan of ebooks and I don't care for the looming publishing monopoly of Amazon.com I tend to purchase my books in bookstores.

For many reason I prefer bookstores and real books. I like browsing the shelves and I enjoy being able to pick up a book and leaf through it, making sure that it's the kind of book that will satisfy me.

This past week I was in one of the few remaining bookstores in my area. Yes, it was a superstore, but there are only a few independent booksellers remaining in my city and I wasn't near one of those. And I like Barnes & Noble bookstores anyway. I get a charge out of just being in a bookstore like that. I can pretend that publishing is not on its last legs and that the industry is dying and that soon there won't be any bookstores.

Walking around the stacks like that I get a sense of delight. I was not alone and the place was crowded and I was not the only one in there buying books. In fact, I had to wait in line to make my purchase. The couple in front of me spent almost $200 on books. I spent $36 and my wife spent $20 and I wasn't around to see how much the people behind me were spending. It felt good. I liked seeing that there is still a place where skilled authors can appear in print and people will stand in line to buy their work. It's going to be sad to see that all come to an end.

My take at the bookstore Friday night: REDSHIRTS by John Scalzi, and THIS BOOK IS FULL OF SPIDERS by David Wong.

Writer versus Self-Publisher.

Self-publishers are not writers. They type, but they're not writers. They are a completely new critter on the face of business, but they are not artists and they are not creators in the classic sense of the term.

What they are, is exactly what they call themselves: Self-publishers. A lot of them like to use the hideous term "Indie Writer" to self-identify. But that description--while it conjures an overwhelming stench--doesn't really do justice to what it is that these folk do.

They self-publish.

That's all that they do.

Everything about them revolves around this one thing: self-publishing.

It doesn't matter what it is that they're self-publishing. Everything takes a back seat to the fact that they are pushing a button and sending out their poorly rendered crap onto the Internet and into the marketplace and hoping against hope that they'll make a buck from this dissemination of garbage.

They live to self-publish. They exist to clog the book business with a blockage of sewage that no plumber can dislodge. I doubt anything short of a thermonuclear detonation could clear the backlog of stink that they have forced on us all.

A self-publisher does not write. They do produce words, but they do not strive to make anything of worth by doing so. Self-publishers are shills for Amazon.com and Apple and the various companies who sell applications for tablet devices and the portable computers that people call phones. These scumbags don't care that their so-called 'work' is completely lacking in anything that might otherwise be worthy in fiction or non-fiction. That doesn't matter to them. They are here to sell a pyramid scheme, not a book.

Self-publishers are the worst of the worst. If they were writers (and they are not), then they would be the least talented and the least deserving to see the light of print. Instead, they are salesmen. And the lowest order of salesmen. These weasels strive to ensure that there is a sucker born every millisecond. Their job is to create victims and not something of merit.

Some time back I swore never to spend a penny of my money on self-published work. I swore never to waste an instant of my time trying to struggle through self-published fiction. So far, since that moment, I have stuck to that oath. And this is the only thing that will put an end to what another writer has termed "the shit-volcano" that is self-publishing. I'm hoping that at some point the avid readers will boycott anything tainted with the stench of self-publishing.

I do hold out hope that the fad will come to an end. That the millions of self-published novels will wither and die on the Internet vine and that the scumbags who make their livings promoting the self-published Ponzi scheme will find themselves tending the counter at the nearest equivalent of the Kwik-E-Mart.

"I was once a successful self-published asshole."

Indie Crapper!

There's a term around these days that quite actually makes me ill. It's "indie writer". What it's supposed to mean are authors who have decided to self-publish their work, rather than go through the traditional method of publishing (hard work).

But what the use of "indie writer" tells me is that the author has no talent and has added another turd to the already clogged pipeline of the fiction marketplace.

There was a time when I actually supported "indie writers". I would let them promote their books on my various online community home pages. I'd link to their books if they requested it. I'd "re-tweet" their promotions for them. If it looked like they needed it, I'd give them a pat on the back and a word of encouragement.

Enough of that crap.

If you are a self-described "indie writer", what you truly are is either a misguided idiot foisting your putrid attempts at prose onto an already burdened marketplace, or you are an ego-mad dishonest asshole out to victimize both the customer seeking quality work, and the authors who actually deserve notice who are working hard to create decent fiction.

Indie Writer. Wearing that title with pride? Whenever I see anyone brag about their status as such, I see a jackass wearing a cap of turds on their skull.

Fuck the lot of you. And whatever you do...don't ask me to help you promote your indie piece of shit.

Remember this? ATLANTA NIGHTS by Travis Tea. It was created by a group of writers to show that anything would be offered a contract at PublishAmerica. It was intentionally awful and meant as a statement to expose a worthless outfit. Now...compared to what "indie writers" produce by the thousands every day, it's a sparkling work of art. Self-publishing has wrecked English literature and the legitimate fiction marketplace.

One More Time?

I've been quietly and respectfully communicating with various authors who self-publish. Mainly what I've been wondering about was how they were doing, sales-wise. All of them are having problems. Some of them blame Amazon for changing the way the books are listed, but most of them blame the flood of self-published books that are hitting the ebook market.

I'll write more on this later, but for now will have to leave it at that.

As I'd hoped when I wrote my first essays on the self-publishing fad, it finally seems to be fading. Not the number of self-published books...that's worse than ever. But even some of the people who had been doing well at the rigged game are now finding that their crap no longer sells--the reading public has realized that it just stinks.

For now, I take a short break until tomorrow. I have work to do.

The intentionally awful "novel" written to expose PUBLISHAMERICA. Now works far worse than this are published by the hundreds every few hours via Amazon and Smashwords, Kobo and Apple, etc. I wish someone could come up with a way to "expose" the flood of self-published garbage...but it's just too obvious to ridicule.

On Writing: Oh, joy.

I love to write. I can't help myself. Sometimes the urge to create stories and novels is so overwhelming that I literally cannot stop. There are times when it's not only not a labor, it's so easy and comes so naturally that it's almost like breathing, or having a heart beat. And, of course, when the inspiration runs out and it becomes a job, I push on until the project is complete.

It has been almost three decades since I actively began to pursue selling my stories to real editors at real publishers. I did what any other writer did in those days, I found a list of active markets and submitted by work. Some writers are so frightened of rejection that they won't submit their work. I've never understood this kind of cowardice, but it's there, in spades.

Today, so-called "writers" don't have to submit anything. They can self-publish their crap and claim to be "famous writers". The days of running the editorial gauntlet and refining one's craft seems to be a dead issue.

One thing that I have never gotten from selling my work is a sense of joy. Yes, I want to sell my work. I want to make money. I want people to read the material that I spent so much time and effort creating.

But I've never gotten much of a sense of pleasure from seeing it in print. I'm not one of those people who freaks out and jumps up and down with excitement and a false sense of inflated ego when the books arrive. I leave that for other people. If that's what floats yer boat--yer welcome to it.

I did not freak out when I sold my first short story. That was to a major publisher (Tor Books) for a

hardback anthology (SCARE CARE) edited by a best-selling author (Graham Masterton). It was nice, but I did not feel any great pleasure and my brain was not flooded with dopamines.

So I figured maybe it would feel different when I sold some comic scripts. I finally did that, too, selling hundreds of pages of scripts to all sorts of comic book publishers, including Marvel Comics. Eh. It was okay, and I enjoyed cashing the checks...but I didn't run around rending my clothes and screaming about how great I was or how good it felt.

Then I figured, maybe I would get excited when I sold my first novel. That was something that had eluded me for long years. Despite having at one time a very high powered agent I just couldn't sell that first novel. So I kept writing novels and I kept submitting them (sometimes with an agent and sometimes without). I just knew that when I finally sold my first novel I would be filled with joy. When I sold THE FLOCK, I was pleased, but hardly filled with ecstasy. It was just part of a difficult process that had begun when I was in my mid-20s, and when it finally happened I couldn't generate any sense of euphoria over getting a paycheck for something that was, essentially, hard work--years of it.

I've now sold many, many short stories--I long ago lost count, but it's over 70, I think. I stopped counting when it became a rather pedestrian occurrence for me.

I've sold hundreds of pages' worth of comic book scripts (and learned, in the process, that the comic book industry is the nastiest of the various arms of publishing). Being in the industry never thrilled me and I drifted away from the format.

There have been just a few exceptions to the rule. I did get a big kick out of conceiving and selling an anthology to Arkham House Books. And I got a thrill from having a short story in THE BLEEDING EDGE and being allowed to do a signing event with the other authors, who included one of my idols, Ray Bradbury. Plus, my sale to Weird Tales completed a childhood dream, so that one actually pleased me no end. However, those were, as I say, exceptions to the rule.

I've now sold eight novels, two to a major publisher (Tor Books--the same folk who, ironically, published my first short story), and for me it's not a big deal. It's just something that happens after I've completed a work. It's cool...but those who are filled with a false sense of greatness...I just don't get it. All I want to say to them is "get a fucking grip and take the ego back about ten notches". I get my joy from writing by writing. And I get a sense of accomplishment when I sell the words I wrote. But I don't understand these jackasses who strut around bragging about their books--especially when their books and stories are self-published and generally don't deserve to be seen (the folk one of my pals calls the "self-pubbers").
 

Books as Oil Wells

One thing that hit me when I was studying the self-published ebook fad is that many authors came to the conclusion that their books were meant as paydays. This is okay. Unless you're trying to produce something that is solely a work of art, you need to keep a commercial eye on the ball. It's unfortunate that the self-published market is more like a produce store filled only with rotten fruit, but that's not the point I'm trying to make today.

What the more successful of the self-published writers (for some reason they like to call themselves "indie writers", even though they're all fodder for Amazon.com, a burgeoning monopoly) have learned is that their books are like oil wells. An oil well can make you a lot of money. Or it can make you a decent amount of money. It can make you no money at all. It can even break you (too bad this doesn't happen more often with self-published books).

One thing about oil wells is that they are not perpetual. That pool of oil or lake of oil or even sea of oil will run out at some point. Most successful ebooks will explode out of the gate like a newly tapped gusher. It will then subside just a bit and then begin to taper off and eventually cease selling altogether. This is the way of book sales in any market, but it's compounded in the ebook market.

It's a rare author who can pen a book that keeps on selling month after month, year after year, decade after decade. I like to use Richard Matheson's seminal paranoid fantasy I AM LEGEND as a good example of an excellent book that just keeps...on...selling...year...after...year. Deservedly so, I must add. (It's a classic of apocalyptic fiction.)

But almost all ebooks have a short life-span. And what the most clever of the so-called "indie" writers have done is to just keep drilling. Well after well. They churn out one book after the other, spilling their literary bowels onto the marketplace and trying to hang on to the fans that they have inexplicably earned. When one well runs out, go to the next. On and on. As long as they can keep this oil well strategy making them a living, they're not going to stop. Hell--we live in a free enterprise system and we shouldn't begrudge them their little success stories (save for the fact that, ultimately, they're harming the book market).

"Give us the ka-chunk ka-chunk!"

So, if you're going to start into that game of self-publishing, do what the more clever of the ebook fadsters have already learned: churn that shit out. Keep it coming. Drill that next well. Frack every reader out of the substrate. What I'm hoping you all eventually do is drain that lake completely dry and go extinct. No more wild-catters in the writing biz. Then literature can return to the world.

Self-publishing Ebook Advice.

Even though a hefty portion of my own book sales are via ebooks (but not self-published), I am not particularly happy with the form. Small press publishers are one thing. However, I see self-published ebooks as the end of literature. For that reason, I am listing the following advice for writers who wish to self-publish.

1: Don't do it. That's right. Don't self-publish your ebook. This is because, chances are, your book sucks Holy Roman Ass. And, yes, I'm talking specifically about YOUR book. Uh-huh, I've read your self-published ebook. Or, tried to. The thing is, they all suck, as I said, Holy Roman Ass. I don't care if your mom told you the book was great. It doesn't matter if your pal who lives two blocks over thinks it's the best thing he's ever read. And even if your third-period English teacher told you that you show talent...well, that teacher's lying to make you feel better...that's part of her job. In fact, though, your book or short story SUCKS!

2: Don't self-publish your books because we all know that you are an ego-mad and pretty much bothersome asswipe. And, yes, once again I'm talking about YOU. The market (such as it's called) is currently flooded beyond all hope of redemption with self-published garbage. I realize that there are a few among your number (but not YOU) who do know how to write. But what you're doing is adding to the shitheap that keeps anyone from finding those one or two novels in there with your muck that might be worth reading.

3: Avoid poisoning the book market; because you did nothing whatsoever to earn a place at my reading desk. Nothing. You never sold a story. You never went through the winnowing process that parted the wheat from the chaff. Your prose is like the extrusion from a bear's ass after it has been eating carrion and huckleberries. Yeah, it's runny, smelly shit. Keep your finger off of that publish button at Amazon and Smashwords. You suck. Your so-called "work" sucks. Your mom sucks for not spontaneously aborting you when you were just newly fertilized genetic material. You never should have fucking been born. I'm talking about YOU (if you're thinking of self-publishing).

4: Don't inflict the world with your awful prose by reasoning that because some self-published books are well written you think yours is one of them. Yes, I fully understand that there are exceptions to every rule. There have been--on EXTREMELY rare occasions--self-published books that won't make me vomit. But not YOUR book. YOU can't write worth a dingleberry on the anus of a 500-pound man whose ass has not been properly wiped in six years.

5: Bottom line, don't fucking self-publish. If you can't find a publisher willing to shepherd your work through to the light of print...then keep your puking awful prose to your puking self. And, yes, I'm talking to YOU.

"I'm self-publishing my great romance nove...BLARGH!"

"I just read your self-published novel and...BLARGH!"

OCCUPATION: WRITER

Yesterday while going through my shelves of books, I stumbled upon a volume that I had thought was lost to me. Years ago, when I used to give some of my books away to friends I thought would be educated by them, I had recalled passing this one on as a gift. But I must have only considered doing this and thought better of it. I'm so happy that I didn't act on the impulse, but kept it.

One of the most influential points in my world as a writer came when I read OCCUPATION: WRITER by the great author, Robert Graves. Graves is best known today for his novels, I, CLAUDIUS and CLAUDIUS THE GOD AND HIS WIFE, MESSILINA, and his memoir GOODBYE TO ALL THAT. I had read a number of his novels and was casting around for more of his work. In a used bookshop in Roanoke VA I stumbled upon an old paperback copy of OCCUPATION: WRITER.

My copy of OCCUPATION: WRITER. Pure literary gold.

This book is a collection of various pieces of his shorter works. Short stories, essays, articles, and plays. It was Graves' intention to showcase the fact that he was a professional writer and to indicate the breadth and reach of his abilities in various forms. I was attracted, of course, to the short stories. Two of the stories within this book hooked me like nothing I had ever read. From that moment on I looked at the creation of a short story in a different light and I don't recall ever allowing the influence of those two tales to fade away.

The stories were probably published as mainstream fiction in the 1920s when they first found the light of print, but they are both very definitely horror yarns of the first order. When I read "The Shout" I was impressed at the power of the work, and if there's a better lesson in how to slowly build tension and terror, I've yet to encounter it. In "Old Papa Johnson" he introduces the reader to a pair of soldiers recovering from severe wounds in a hospital. One--the Old Papa Johnson of the tale recounts an Antarctic adventure to the much younger soldier, referred to as Graveyspoons by the older man and who is obviously supposed to be Graves himself. I assume the yarn was inspired by something similar that happened when he really was in hospital during the First World War. As the story progresses as one of mainly historical interest and character humor, it slowly degrades into a very dark incident ending, at last, in an act of pure, cold-blooded monstrosity. I've yet to see any author equal it for power.

It's sad to think that in today's world of self-published garbage, sub-normal TV scripts, and the degradation we experience as the ebook fad, that we may now be looking upon the end of the days of the true professional writers. Gone are the skills and the powers of writers such as Robert Graves. Now we have a new normal of bad writing, self-publishing, and circle-jerks parading as literature. Alas.

The Self-Published Psychology:

Just when you thought that the world of self-published books couldn't get any slimier or more disgusting, you read this.

And on a light note, this is what happens when the same psychology that gives us the self-published novelist is transferred to the world of fresco restoration:

The world is awash in retarded amateurs who think they're creating something worthwhile. Alas!

Why, O, Why?!

Self-Publishing Plague

If you're self-published, you're not an author. You're part of a disease that's running through the world of publishing. It could be that you're the plague, in which case you'll run your course and subside. It could be that you're terminal cancer, in which case the industry and literature itself is doomed. Or you could be HIV and we'll have to find a way to subdue the effects and just live with you. Hopefully, though, you're more something like diarrhea and a healthy flushing will finish you off.

Rattus Self-Publishus.

The Self-Publishing Scam

In the old days self-publishing was an appropriately difficult proposition. There was, of course, no shortage of awful writers ready and willing to self-publish their equally awful work. But distributing the crap was a problem.

Enter epublishing, Amazon.com (monopoly-in-training), and suddenly self-publishing becomes as easy as wiping one's ass. Unfortunately, the results are about the same. Both need to be flushed, but only one finds that fate.

Writers can fool themselves into thinking they're fighting the good fight by circumventing the traditional methods of publication. But by and large the reason for self-publishing is simple: their work is so bad that no one other than themselves would seek to put that crap into the light of print.

I hope to see it end. Diminishing sales and slowing monetary returns are the only things that will eventually shut down this flood of idiots. They can give away as many Kindles as they please. They can tweet and post on Facebook to their heart's content. But the fact is that their work is terrible stuff and the reason they self-publish is because the work doesn't deserve to be published.

I've compared the tidal wave of fecal fiction now flooding the markets to the crap that hit comic book sales when suddenly people with no talent to write or illustrate discovered that it was relatively simple to self-publish their horrid little comic books. For a while, a lot of those people made out like bandits. But, eventually, the party ended. Today, there are still self-published comic books, but it's no longer a fad and there are not stacks of the crap on the stands at comic shops gathering deserved dust. And those no-talents went back to their jobs at Kwik-E-Mart.


Your self-published novels suck. Yeah, you can get your mommy and daddy and siblings and cabal of self-published circle jerks to leave you five-star reviews. You can get your pals and co-workers to pump up the sales and fool the public for a while. But in the end your work is shit and no one likes to smell shit.


Do us all a favor and stop smearing it around.

"My self-published pals will do anything I tell them to do."