Suzanne Blom <sueblom@execpc.com> wrote:

> Yeah, but I think there is a real difference between saying "I can only
> write an average of ten words a day--It's going to take me at least two
> years to finish the first draft of the novel" & saying, "I can't write
> because I can do only ten words a day." The first gives one a lot more
> options.

Ten words a day, 365 days a year.
Two years gets you 7300 words. That's a short story, not a novel.


--
Michelle Bottorff -> Chelle B. -> Shelby
L. Shelby, Writer http://www.lshelby.com/
Livejournal http://lavenderbard.livejournal.com/
rec.arts.sf.composition FAQ http://www.lshelby.com/rasfcFAQ.html

>>>>> "MB" == Michelle Bottorff <mbottorff@lshelby.com> writes:

MB> Suzanne Blom <sueblom@execpc.com> wrote:

>> Yeah, but I think there is a real difference between saying "I
>> can only write an average of ten words a day--It's going to
>> take me at least two years to finish the first draft of the
>> novel" & saying, "I can't write because I can do only ten words
>> a day." The first gives one a lot more options.

MB> Ten words a day, 365 days a year. Two years gets you 7300
MB> words. That's a short story, not a novel.

I think what's implicit here is something that I know I suffer from,
and I don't have CFS. If I wait until I feel READY and PREPARED to
write something, I never get started. The way to get going is to sit
down and write 100 words of crap. Some days, it doesn't seem like
crap, and I get momentum, and I get a couple thousand words out; other
days, it really is crap, and I stop after 100-150.

The thing is, we know that Dorothy has a functioning brain, because
she writes interesting, on-topic, and frequently funny posts here. We
know she can write more than 10 words a day, because we see more than
10 words a day that she has written. I understand the idea that it's
important to realize that she *may not* be able to write fiction
because of the CFS, but I think you're going way too far in concluding
that she *can't* write fiction because of the CFS.

(It may be the case that she *prefers* not to write fiction because
she has limited energy and prefers to spend it on Usenet, Hal, and
cats, but that's also a far cry from being *unable* to write fiction,
and it's also not what she's been complaining of.)

Charlton


--
Charlton Wilbur
cwilbur@chromatico.net

Charlton Wilbur <cwilbur@chromatico.net> wrote:

> I understand the idea that it's
> important to realize that she *may not* be able to write fiction
> because of the CFS, but I think you're going way too far in concluding
> that she *can't* write fiction because of the CFS.

Dorothy says she can't write right now, and I believe that she knows
what she is talking about.

I have explained why my belief in her statement is so profound.


I'm sure that by telling her she is wrong, you think you are being
helpful in some way.

I hope you are right, and that it is helpful.


--
Michelle Bottorff -> Chelle B. -> Shelby
L. Shelby, Writer http://www.lshelby.com/
Livejournal http://lavenderbard.livejournal.com/
rec.arts.sf.composition FAQ http://www.lshelby.com/rasfcFAQ.html

"Michelle Bottorff" <mbottorff@lshelby.com> wrote in message
news:1i9cxbe.1serpkyyshrwgN%mbottorff@lshelby.com. ..
> Suzanne Blom <sueblom@execpc.com> wrote:
>
>> Yeah, but I think there is a real difference between saying "I can only
>> write an average of ten words a day--It's going to take me at least two
>> years to finish the first draft of the novel" & saying, "I can't write
>> because I can do only ten words a day." The first gives one a lot more
>> options.
>
> Ten words a day, 365 days a year.
> Two years gets you 7300 words. That's a short story, not a novel.
>
You're right. Don't tell my tax clients, please. Yeah, that makes it ten
years which I admit is really, really slow. Locus tho recently had an obit
of some famousish writer who'd only written books about that often.

In article <4960cf05-cfc6-49c4-8267-2e95939ae478@w56g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
Nicky <nicky.matthews@btinternet.com> wrote:
>On Dec 19, 7:57 pm, djhe...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:
>> In article <87tzmevj6u....@mithril.chromatico.net>,
>> Charlton Wilbur <cwil...@chromatico.net> wrote:
>>
>> Considering
>> that the last several things I've written haven't been good
>> enough to make it in that environment, even after they'd reached
>> the Schroedinger's-cat stage where they were simultaneously the
>> best I could do and so awful I couldn't stand to touch 'em any
>> more.... by now every sentence, every phrase, comes up against
>> "wait a minute, that isn't good enough, that wasn't good enough
>> LAST time," and it gets tossed back into the stewpot and I try to
>> fish around for something better and don't find it.
>
>This does sound a very strong case for murdering your internal critic.

If I murder him, and if I then produce lots of verbiage, and then
that verbiage doesn't sell because it's lousy, I am no better off
than I was. Worse, in fact, because now I'm perceived as
somebody who writes lousy verbiage, like wossname with the
Rockoids.

>Didn't you write a lot when you did that online thing? Was that
>because it wasn't published in the formal sense? Maybe you could do
>that again or publish on a web page until you get your confidence
>back?

Writing _Coda_ was in a sense like writing for Usenet. I didn't
have to try to sell it, and it had a small but guaranteed
audience. I can't write any more AC2 fanfic now; AC2's gone and
its audience has dispersed. As for writing to put on a web page,
that would be acknowledging that I KNEW the stuff wasn't good
enough to sell. If it isn't good enough to sell (even for a few
pennies a copy, as on Fictionwise), it isn't good enough to see
the light of day.

Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djheydt@kithrup.com

On Wed, 19 Dec 2007 20:55:50 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
<djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtBE52.5A6@kithrup.com>
in rec.arts.sf.composition:

> In article <4960cf05-cfc6-49c4-8267-2e95939ae478@w56g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
> Nicky <nicky.matthews@btinternet.com> wrote:

[...]

>> This does sound a very strong case for murdering your
>> internal critic.

> If I murder him, and if I then produce lots of verbiage,
> and then that verbiage doesn't sell because it's lousy, I
> am no better off than I was. Worse, in fact, because now
> I'm perceived as somebody who writes lousy verbiage, like
> wossname with the Rockoids.

Not by those of us who have no trouble recognizing lousy
verbiage and unsalable (or at least unsold) verbiage as
distinct categories. There are of course stories that are
in both categories at once, but I can readily name stories
that in my view prove that neither category is a subset of
the other.

[...]

Brian

> On Wed, 19 Dec 2007 20:55:50 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
> <djhe...@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtBE52.5A6@kithrup.com>
> in rec.arts.sf.composition:
>
> > In article <4960cf05-cfc6-49c4-8267-2e95939ae...@w56g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
> > Nicky <nicky.matth...@btinternet.com> wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> >> This does sound a very strong case for murdering your
> >> internal critic.
> > If I murder him, and if I then produce lots of verbiage,
> > and then that verbiage doesn't sell because it's lousy, I
> > am no better off than I was. Worse, in fact, because now
> > I'm perceived as somebody who writes lousy verbiage, like
> > wossname with the Rockoids.


Well, it may not sell because it's lousy, but that is not the only
reason work fails to sell. I was talking with a few agents and writers
last night and we agreed that some stuff doesn't get published through
bad luck - nothing more. Tastes change too or what publishers think
the reading public wants changes. I don't think that means that you've
got worse and I don't think that 'saleable' necessarily means 'good'.
( There are a scary number of celebrity books out at the moment which
aren't good by any usual measure but sure as hell are saleable)
If you want to write fiction again, doing some stuff for your regular
audience via your site might just be a way of making you comfortable
with it again. It doesn't mean its rubbish, it just means you're
letting your friends see some free stuff that you could later rework
for sale if you got good feed back. I would see it as a training
exercise rather than an admission of defeat; an experiment aimed at
breaking your block rather than a sign of permanent retirement from
the submission process.

I don't think evaluating every word in terms of its saleability is a
helpful way to go. I can't imagine being able to write a word under
those conditions.

Nicky


>

In article <b4ee7e87-cb1a-4c40-953e-3045c043d5df@v4g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
Nicky <nicky.matthews@btinternet.com> wrote:

>If you want to write fiction again, doing some stuff for your regular
>audience via your site might just be a way of making you comfortable
>with it again.

Wait a minute. Which site? The AC2 site is gone, along with its
audience.

If you mean on my measly little webpage, no way. And what
regular audience? Do you mean the kind people here on rasfc, all
twenty-five of them or so?

> I don't think evaluating every word in terms of its saleability is a
>helpful way to go. I can't imagine being able to write a word under
>those conditions.

I have no other way of evaluating it -- and of course I can't
evaluate it on the spot, the agent has to take it around and get
it rejected. *I* can't tell whether it's any good or not, since
things I've thought were pretty decent have gotten bounced without
a sentence of explanation. It's not that I have an internal
critic; I have an internal critic I can't trust.

Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djheydt@kithrup.com

On Wed, 19 Dec 2007 20:55:50 GMT, djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
Heydt) wrote:

>In article <4960cf05-cfc6-49c4-8267-2e95939ae478@w56g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
>Nicky <nicky.matthews@btinternet.com> wrote:
>>On Dec 19, 7:57 pm, djhe...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:
>>> In article <87tzmevj6u....@mithril.chromatico.net>,
>>> Charlton Wilbur <cwil...@chromatico.net> wrote:
>>>
>>> Considering
>>> that the last several things I've written haven't been good
>>> enough to make it in that environment, even after they'd reached
>>> the Schroedinger's-cat stage where they were simultaneously the
>>> best I could do and so awful I couldn't stand to touch 'em any
>>> more.... by now every sentence, every phrase, comes up against
>>> "wait a minute, that isn't good enough, that wasn't good enough
>>> LAST time," and it gets tossed back into the stewpot and I try to
>>> fish around for something better and don't find it.
>>
>>This does sound a very strong case for murdering your internal critic.
>
>If I murder him, and if I then produce lots of verbiage, and then
>that verbiage doesn't sell because it's lousy, I am no better off
>than I was. Worse, in fact, because now I'm perceived as
>somebody who writes lousy verbiage, like wossname with the
>[redacted]

This is why you write and send it to some of us, not out to the
public. After we read it, and you decide how to make changes, *then*
it goes to the publisher.

You know, I still have a folder here on Agent for _Pastures New_, and
I never got to read it. It got lost somewhere on the way.
--
Marilee J. Layman
http://mjlayman.livejournal.com

On Wed, 19 Dec 2007 22:08:26 GMT, djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J
Heydt) wrote:

>In article <b4ee7e87-cb1a-4c40-953e-3045c043d5df@v4g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
>Nicky <nicky.matthews@btinternet.com> wrote:
>
>>If you want to write fiction again, doing some stuff for your regular
>>audience via your site might just be a way of making you comfortable
>>with it again.
>
>Wait a minute. Which site? The AC2 site is gone, along with its
>audience.
>
>If you mean on my measly little webpage, no way. And what
>regular audience? Do you mean the kind people here on rasfc, all
>twenty-five of them or so?

Oh, I'd guess there's about 100 people who post. And in my
experience, there's at least seven times the posting number that just
read.
--
Marilee J. Layman
http://mjlayman.livejournal.com

In message
<b4ee7e87-cb1a-4c40-953e-3045c043d5df@v4g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
Nicky <nicky.matthews@btinternet.com> writes
>> On Wed, 19 Dec 2007 20:55:50 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
>> <djhe...@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtBE52.5A6@kithrup.com>
>> in rec.arts.sf.composition:
>>
>> > In article
>> ><4960cf05-cfc6-49c4-8267-2e95939ae...@w56g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
>> > Nicky <nicky.matth...@btinternet.com> wrote:
>>
>> [...]
>>
>> >> This does sound a very strong case for murdering your
>> >> internal critic.
>> > If I murder him, and if I then produce lots of verbiage,
>> > and then that verbiage doesn't sell because it's lousy, I
>> > am no better off than I was. Worse, in fact, because now
>> > I'm perceived as somebody who writes lousy verbiage, like
>> > wossname with the Rockoids.
>
>
>Well, it may not sell because it's lousy, but that is not the only
>reason work fails to sell. I was talking with a few agents and writers
>last night and we agreed that some stuff doesn't get published through
>bad luck - nothing more. Tastes change too or what publishers think
>the reading public wants changes. I don't think that means that you've
>got worse and I don't think that 'saleable' necessarily means 'good'.

Yeowch tell me about it. Two of the agent-rejections I've had recently
have said:

'It's good but publishers aren't buying good, they're only buying
spectacular.'

and

'No one sells telepathy any more except Anne McCaffrey.'

So does this mean I may have to abandon something I've spent a long time
on (and something which I had hopes of being reasonably commercial) and
plough ahead with new stuff?

Or does it just mean I haven't yet been lucky enough to land my
manuscript on the right desk at the right time?

Jacey

--
Jacey Bedford
jacey at artisan hyphen harmony dot com
posting via usenet and not googlegroups, ourdebate
or any other forum that reprints usenet posts as
though they were the forum's own

In article <JtBH7B.987@kithrup.com>,
Dorothy J Heydt <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote:

>Hm. You would have to give me some examples. From where I sit,
>if it hasn't sold (after repeated attempts on the part of a very
>patient agent), then it's lousy.

I detect a double standard here. You're trying to predict the
value of potential future work. You note that some of your
previous work did not sell, and take that as evidence about
the future work not selling. But you're discounting two
published novels and forty published short stories! (I wish
I had a publication record like that....)

In any case, it is too early to decide whether work will sell
when you have not yet written it. That's not helping you
write at all. (Hardly anyone finds that it helps them write.)
Let's try to get something written, shall we? and then
worry about that.

You may want to enlist someone else to do the Submission Hat
thing for you--I am 100% sure you could find volunteers here--
so that it doesn't distract or demoralize you.

I appreciate that publication is an important validation for
you, but you have to look for publication *of stories you
write*, not of hypothetical stories you might write--that's
way too early in the process. No one, no matter how good
their judgement, can say whether an as-yet unwritten story
will sell.

Do you still have an agent?

Mary Kuhner mkkuhner@eskimo.com

In article <bmh5481NuaaHFwW1@parkhead.demon.co.uk>,
Jacey Bedford <lookinsig@nospam.invalid> wrote:

>So does this mean I may have to abandon something I've spent a long time
>on (and something which I had hopes of being reasonably commercial) and
>plough ahead with new stuff?

>Or does it just mean I haven't yet been lucky enough to land my
>manuscript on the right desk at the right time?

Once you have a written manuscript, submitting it elsewhere is
not a huge investment--you might as well! If money is an issue,
prioritize places that take e-submissions.

It's pretty clear that no one person, be they editor or
agent, can really know what everyone else in the field will or
won't buy. Agents take on projects they then can't sell, and
pass on projects that someone else turns around and sells--even
the best agents. Ditto editors.

If you are thinking of writing a sequel to the thing which
didn't sell (I just did that....) it's a tougher call. But
resubmitting an already written story that got good reviews is,
in my opinion, better than shelving it. If you shelve it you
*know* it won't sell.

Mary Kuhner mkkuhner@eskimo.com

On Dec 19, 10:08 pm, djhe...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:
> In article <b4ee7e87-cb1a-4c40-953e-3045c043d...@v4g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
>
> Nicky <nicky.matth...@btinternet.com> wrote:
> >If you want to write fiction again, doing some stuff for your regular
> >audience via your site might just be a way of making you comfortable
> >with it again.
>
> Wait a minute. Which site? The AC2 site is gone, along with its
> audience.
>
> If you mean on my measly little webpage, no way. And what
> regular audience? Do you mean the kind people here on rasfc, all
> twenty-five of them or so?

A web page can be expanded can't it? No I was talking about those
people who read your fan fic who might be interested in other
material. I don't purport to know the answer, Dorothy, I'm just making
some suggestions. If you can write in an rasfc kind of forum on line
and not otherwise and you still want to write going the on line route
seems to make sense. If it doesn't appeal to you, then it doesn't. <
shrug>

> > I don't think evaluating every word in terms of its saleability is a
> >helpful way to go. I can't imagine being able to write a word under
> >those conditions.
>
> I have no other way of evaluating it -- and of course I can't
> evaluate it on the spot, the agent has to take it around and get
> it rejected. *I* can't tell whether it's any good or not, since
> things I've thought were pretty decent have gotten bounced without
> a sentence of explanation. It's not that I have an internal
> critic; I have an internal critic I can't trust.
>
Everyone gets rejected some time.
I always thought I'd stop when I couldn't sell but I'm not so sure I
will. Fashions change and the great hope is always that the next book
might be the ONE.
YMMV

Nicky

On Dec 19, 11:38 pm, Jacey Bedford <lookin...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
> In message
> <b4ee7e87-cb1a-4c40-953e-3045c043d...@v4g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
> Nicky <nicky.matth...@btinternet.com> writes
>
>
>
>
>
> >> On Wed, 19 Dec 2007 20:55:50 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
> >> <djhe...@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtBE52.5A6@kithrup.com>
> >> in rec.arts.sf.composition:
>
> >> > In article
> >> ><4960cf05-cfc6-49c4-8267-2e95939ae...@w56g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
> >> > Nicky <nicky.matth...@btinternet.com> wrote:
>
> >> [...]
>
> >> >> This does sound a very strong case for murdering your
> >> >> internal critic.
> >> > If I murder him, and if I then produce lots of verbiage,
> >> > and then that verbiage doesn't sell because it's lousy, I
> >> > am no better off than I was. Worse, in fact, because now
> >> > I'm perceived as somebody who writes lousy verbiage, like
> >> > wossname with the Rockoids.
>
> >Well, it may not sell because it's lousy, but that is not the only
> >reason work fails to sell. I was talking with a few agents and writers
> >last night and we agreed that some stuff doesn't get published through
> >bad luck - nothing more. Tastes change too or what publishers think
> >the reading public wants changes. I don't think that means that you've
> >got worse and I don't think that 'saleable' necessarily means 'good'.
>
> Yeowch tell me about it. Two of the agent-rejections I've had recently
> have said:
>
> 'It's good but publishers aren't buying good, they're only buying
> spectacular.'
>
> and
>
> 'No one sells telepathy any more except Anne McCaffrey.'
>
> So does this mean I may have to abandon something I've spent a long time
> on (and something which I had hopes of being reasonably commercial) and
> plough ahead with new stuff?

I think it means keep submitting the old stuff and keep writing new
stuff. You always have to write new stuff whatever is happening to the
old stuff. Once it's done it's back list whether it's dead in the
water or on the best seller list.

> Or does it just mean I haven't yet been lucky enough to land my
> manuscript on the right desk at the right time?
>
Probably. If you don't get an agent submit to publishers yourself. If
it's YA
quite a lot of writers don't have agents- at least not to start with.
I don't think it's worth expending too much angst and emotional energy
on work that is doing the rounds. It is always better to focus on the
next one. It isn't easy, but it is the only way to stay half way sane.

Nicky
>

In article <fkcb6u$rs7$1@gnus01.u.washington.edu>,
Mary K. Kuhner <mkkuhner@kingman.gs.washington.edu> wrote:

>I detect a double standard here. You're trying to predict the
>value of potential future work. You note that some of your
>previous work did not sell, and take that as evidence about
>the future work not selling. But you're discounting two
>published novels and forty published short stories!

Over a period of twenty-two years, mind you.

(I wish
>I had a publication record like that....)

But it consists almost entirely of sales to one person, whose
standards (as I've said) were rather bizarre and not very high.

>In any case, it is too early to decide whether work will sell
>when you have not yet written it. That's not helping you
>write at all. (Hardly anyone finds that it helps them write.)
>Let's try to get something written, shall we? and then
>worry about that.

If wishes were horses, beggars would ride. I was looking over
the abandoned Chapter Ones last night and thinking, it would be
really nice if I could write the varvel story. But it's got to
be told in multiple viewpoints and somewhere along the third or
fourth one I broke down ... can't remember now ... I think maybe
I couldn't get inside the character's head.

>Do you still have an agent?

Oh yes. But he, of course, handles novels, not short stories.
He's still got _The Witch of Syracuse._ He's still, for that
matter, got _The Interior Life_ and _Pastures New_, and he's
shopped them all around the landscape and nobody wants them.

Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djheydt@kithrup.com

In article <JtBHI2.9qo@kithrup.com>,
djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:

> *I* can't tell whether it's any good or not, since
> things I've thought were pretty decent have gotten bounced without
> a sentence of explanation.

Which might mean that you were correct and the editor who bounced it was
wrong. Or that the editor didn't want that particular sort of work at
the moment.

Going, again, to the world I know better, I had one academic article
which I first submitted to a third rate journal. They rejected it. Then
I submitted it to a second rate journal. They rejected it. Then I
submitted it to a first rate journal. They published it.

I don't think it was accidental. I was told, whether correctly I'm not
sure, the name of the (rather distinguished) referee at the first rate
journal. The article was a somewhat odd one, and seeing why it was
interesting may have required a better referee than the first two
journals sent it to.

--
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/ http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/
Author of _Harald_, a fantasy without magic.
Published by Baen, in bookstores now

In article <ddfr-96CC26.21333919122007@sfo.news.speakeasy.net>,
David Friedman <ddfr@daviddfriedman.nopsam.com> wrote:
>In article <JtBHI2.9qo@kithrup.com>,
> djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:
>
>> *I* can't tell whether it's any good or not, since
>> things I've thought were pretty decent have gotten bounced without
>> a sentence of explanation.
>
>Which might mean that you were correct and the editor who bounced it was
>wrong. Or that the editor didn't want that particular sort of work at
>the moment.

Couldn't she have just said so???
>
>Going, again, to the world I know better, I had one academic article
>which I first submitted to a third rate journal. They rejected it. Then
>I submitted it to a second rate journal. They rejected it. Then I
>submitted it to a first rate journal. They published it.

DIFFERENT WORLD, David. Works entirely differently. Please do
not assume that your experience in academe has anything in common
with fiction publishing ... now that you've published some
fiction, you should have noticed some differences.

Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djheydt@kithrup.com

In article <JtC30G.BDG@kithrup.com>,
djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:

> In article <ddfr-96CC26.21333919122007@sfo.news.speakeasy.net>,
> David Friedman <ddfr@daviddfriedman.nopsam.com> wrote:
> >In article <JtBHI2.9qo@kithrup.com>,
> > djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:
> >
> >> *I* can't tell whether it's any good or not, since
> >> things I've thought were pretty decent have gotten bounced without
> >> a sentence of explanation.
> >
> >Which might mean that you were correct and the editor who bounced it was
> >wrong. Or that the editor didn't want that particular sort of work at
> >the moment.
>
> Couldn't she have just said so???

She could have, but might not have, especially if she was busy.

> >Going, again, to the world I know better, I had one academic article
> >which I first submitted to a third rate journal. They rejected it. Then
> >I submitted it to a second rate journal. They rejected it. Then I
> >submitted it to a first rate journal. They published it.
>
> DIFFERENT WORLD, David. Works entirely differently. Please do
> not assume that your experience in academe has anything in common
> with fiction publishing ... now that you've published some
> fiction, you should have noticed some differences.

I don't think it "works entirely differently"--or entirely the same. The
most obvious difference, in comparing journal articles to short stories,
is that the main incentive to submit the former is to improve one's
marketability in the academic market. The main incentive to submit the
latter, I suspect, is the satisfaction and status one hopes to get from
having one's stories published--although, unlike journal articles, one
does also get paid. Both incentives result in lots of people submitting
things that are not worth publishing, which results in editors having to
try to filter out the good stuff and not always being successful--in
either direction.

--
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/ http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/
Author of _Harald_, a fantasy without magic.
Published by Baen, in bookstores now

In article <ddfr-7A085A.22080119122007@sfo.news.speakeasy.net>,
David Friedman <ddfr@daviddfriedman.nopsam.com> wrote:
>
>.... The main incentive to submit
>[stories], I suspect, is the satisfaction and status one hopes to get from
>having one's stories published--although, unlike journal articles, one
>does also get paid.

Payment is the only incentive I can see. Maybe it is just me.
The idea of getting thrilled at the promise of having something one
wrote appear in print never got to me, probably because the first
two or three times I sold something, it didn't get published after
all -- the magazine folded; the book editor realized that she didn't
have the whole book in her hot little hand, she had the portion and
outline, and the entire book was much longer than her rather
rigid format called for. So "You've made a sale!" doesn't get
the response "Hooray!" but rather "Oh yeah? I'll believe it when
I see the check."


Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djheydt@kithrup.com

In article <JtC4G0.D2p@kithrup.com>,
djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:

> In article <ddfr-7A085A.22080119122007@sfo.news.speakeasy.net>,
> David Friedman <ddfr@daviddfriedman.nopsam.com> wrote:
> >
> >.... The main incentive to submit
> >[stories], I suspect, is the satisfaction and status one hopes to get from
> >having one's stories published--although, unlike journal articles, one
> >does also get paid.
>
> Payment is the only incentive I can see. Maybe it is just me.
> The idea of getting thrilled at the promise of having something one
> wrote appear in print never got to me, probably because the first
> two or three times I sold something, it didn't get published after
> all -- the magazine folded; the book editor realized that she didn't
> have the whole book in her hot little hand, she had the portion and
> outline, and the entire book was much longer than her rather
> rigid format called for. So "You've made a sale!" doesn't get
> the response "Hooray!" but rather "Oh yeah? I'll believe it when
> I see the check."

My guess is that you are atypical in this respect. For some people the
thrill is the status of being "a pro," for some it's that they have a
story they have told and are proud of and want other people to see and
enjoy, but my suspicion is that a large majority of the people who try
to get sf published have substantial incentives other than the payment.

And if so then, even if it doesn't apply to you, it affects you, because
it means that publishers will get a lot of stories submitted by people
who aren't very good, and have to somehow sift through them to find the
good ones.

--
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/ http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/
Author of _Harald_, a fantasy without magic.
Published by Baen, in bookstores now

Brian M. Scott <b.scott@csuohio.edu> wrote:

> On Wed, 19 Dec 2007 20:55:50 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
> <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtBE52.5A6@kithrup.com>
> in rec.arts.sf.composition:
>
> > In article <4960cf05-cfc6-49c4-8267-2e95939ae478@w56g2000hsf.googlegroups.co
m>,
> > Nicky <nicky.matthews@btinternet.com> wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> >> This does sound a very strong case for murdering your
> >> internal critic.
>
> > If I murder him, and if I then produce lots of verbiage,
> > and then that verbiage doesn't sell because it's lousy, I
> > am no better off than I was. Worse, in fact, because now
> > I'm perceived as somebody who writes lousy verbiage, like
> > wossname with the Rockoids.
>
> Not by those of us who have no trouble recognizing lousy
> verbiage and unsalable (or at least unsold) verbiage as
> distinct categories. There are of course stories that are
> in both categories at once, but I can readily name stories
> that in my view prove that neither category is a subset of
> the other.
>
> [...]

I want to reply to at least four people here (having read 20 to 30
related posts).

AFAICT, there are three /good/ main reasons to write:
(a) because you want to, i.e. to please yourself by writing a story
(b) to make money
(c) to tell a story, i.e. you want people to read your story

and there are some /bad/ reasons to write - but let's forget those.

Not many people here are motivated /only/ by (b) because there is
a general consensus that it's (nearly always) easier to make money doing
something else. I can think of a couple of regulars who sometimes give
the impression that (b) is their main motivation, but many more "pro"
writers - who actually make a living at writing - say that (a) is their
main motivation.

I'm fairly sure that (c) is the motivation for someone like DavidF - he
has said he likes to tell stories. I don't believe he is writing fiction
to make money. I can't remember if he said he would put a novel on the
web if he is unable to sell it, but doing that would be perfectly
reasonable for someone whose main motivation is having people read his
stories: the reason to go first for conventional publishing would be to
reach a larger audience.

But there is a separate issue here: and that's validation. Getting
published is a form of validation; it proves that a small number of
"professionals" think your work is saleable to a large audience.

But, as Brian points out, above, saleable is a different categorisation
from good v. bad verbiage.

Suppose you (one, the non-specific you) write a story with only a
minority appeal? Well, sometimes there is the possibility of validation
by getting published by a speciality small press. Suppose one writes a
brilliant novel about trilobite sex - this may be unsaleable except to
trilobite fetishists ...

There's another reason why a good novel may appeal only to a small
audience:

I'm reminded of Anne McCaffrey's _Dragonsinger_ novel. The heroine,
Menolly, writes catchy tunes which are universally popular, but she is
studying under Master Domick, who writes "music for musicians". They all
acknowledge that his compositions are technically superior, and enjoy
playing them - but they are not music that can be properly appreciated
by non-musicians.

So, I don't know whether this will motivate Dorothy, because I don't
know why she wants to write. But suppose an oracle could predict that
exactly 699 people would love her next novel, would it be worth writing?

What's the threshold?

I know I write /some/ stuff simply because I want to. That's (a). I'd
like to get published as a form of validation, that I'm not wasting my
time (the money would be nice - but I'm certainly in the category of
people who could make more money doing something different). So very
little (b). But for me, personally, I could be content under the (c)
heading with a very small number of people reading what I wrote - unless
I was actually aiming at a large audience.

So, how many people need to read, and like, a novel before it was worth
writing? For an (a) motivation, the answer is none (or one, if you count
the writer). For (b), it has to be enough to pay for your time and
energy. But for (c) it could be fanfic, and if just a few fellow fans
read it, that's enough. Or it could be you have a Message for the world,
and any less than a billion readers is not enough!

To be honest, if Dorothy's /only/ motivation for writing is to make
money, then I probably /don't/ want to read it, even if it becomes a
bestseller!! (I've bought, but still haven't read _The Da Vinci Code_)
But I don't think that's the case, even if money is required as
justification.

Jonathan

On Thu, 20 Dec 2007 01:51:53 GMT in rec.arts.sf.composition,
djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote,
>Over a period of twenty-two years, mind you.

I'm not going to try to tell you what you should do. I only hope
that you can find a way to accomplish what you want to do.

It's possible that you have learned something in those twenty-two
years that might make that difference! And maybe external
conditions are different now.

I believe that J. K. Rowling found a market niche that seriously
needed filling. If so, is there another now? What might it be?

..

In article <fke8lb$cn1$2@gnus01.u.washington.edu>,
Mary K. Kuhner <mkkuhner@kingman.gs.washington.edu> wrote:
>In article <JtBruH.MC7@kithrup.com>,
>Dorothy J Heydt <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote:
>>In article <fkcb6u$rs7$1@gnus01.u.washington.edu>,
>>Mary K. Kuhner <mkkuhner@kingman.gs.washington.edu> wrote:
>
>> (I wish
>>>I had a publication record like that....)
>
>>But it consists almost entirely of sales to one person, whose
>>standards (as I've said) were rather bizarre and not very high.
>
>Meh. For how many years did she run a successful magazine?
>Magazines fold like napkins every month; if she made it work,
>she had tastes that clicked with enough readership to make it
>work.

Ahhh, but here's the secret. She never ran it in the black. She
had money from _The Mists of Avalon_ and other stuff she'd written,
particularly from the film rights for _Mists_. She told herself
that she'd run the magazine till the money gave out, and she did,
until it did. Rachel Holmen, who edited it, told me that toward
the end it was *almost* in the black.

>>If wishes were horses, beggars would ride. I was looking over
>>the abandoned Chapter Ones last night and thinking, it would be
>>really nice if I could write the varvel story. But it's got to
>>be told in multiple viewpoints and somewhere along the third or
>>fourth one I broke down ... can't remember now ... I think maybe
>>I couldn't get inside the character's head.
>
>Why don't you tell us a bit about it, and see if we can find a
>point of entry?

Okay.

>What's a varvel, anyway?

OK, here on earth a varvel is a little decorative (frequently
silver) ring, frequently engraved with the owner's ID (which
could be name or armorial bearings, I suppose) attached to a
hawk's jesses. I found that out after I'd come up with the
in-story meaning, and said Oh the heck with it.

In the story, varvel is a plant. It's a lot like bamboo. It
grows in northern latitudes, in near-tundra, ordinarily not
inhabited by humans. But once every nineteen years, in the
spring, it grows up from its roots, flowers, and goes to seed. It
seeds so copiously that creatures, including humans, come from
all over the place to eat it (it's starchy, with a nice protein
content, tastes like almonds sort of). This happens all across
the subarctic zone of at least one continent.

But there's one particular patch of varvel that's different.

I have now to explain about the life-forms on this planet.
They're Terran in origin, and appear to have been planted here
about ten thousand years ago. By whom? Damn good question. By
some kind of space-going intelligence, we presume, about which we
know that they transplanted whole Terran ecologies to several other
planets, and absolutely nothing else. This doesn't prevent
people from making up wacky stories about them. You can tell on
first hearing whether someone believes the wacky stories: they
call these long-ago whoevers Movers, while sceptics call them
Transporters.

So here's this one particular patch of varvel, and every nineteen
years it sprouts, flowers, and seeds like the rest, but also
(when the first seeds are forming) something else sprouts from
the roots. They're people -- maybe fifty to a hundred of them, I
haven't decided yet -- and they are always the same people. They
arise as young adults (I don't mean teenagers, I mean early
twenties), with their personalities already formed. And they
enact, cycle after cycle, a variation on the same story. What
variation they run this cycle depends on who rises out of the
ground first, who meets whom first, and probably other factors
that are unclear at present.

The story is, at bottom, a romantic triangle, with an Arthurian
flavor to it. (If ever this thing got written and made it to
print, a good back-cover blurb would read, "What if Arthur,
Gwenivere, Lancelot, and all the knights of the Round Table came
back -- every nineteen years?" There's an alpha male figure
and an alpha female and a beta male and a batch of other people,
and the primary variation usually feeds on whom the alpha female
meets first. Whoever it is, she will later betray him with the
other one.

Part of what the book is supposed to do is to explore whether
character, once established, is destiny: whether the leopard can
change his spots, so to speak.

The terrain in that part of the world is like the basin-and-range
country in the western United States, between the Sierras and the
Rockies: long parallel ridges of land running north-south with
valleys in between. It's customary that when your people go
north every nineteen years to harvest the varvel (which you haul
as much away of as you can, and it's a food supplement over the
next several years), you just go north in your own valley and
harvest the varvel at the north end of it. Thus, it's one
particular (small) nation of humans that go north to where these
people sprout. They've been doing it for a couple millennia at
least -- they've kept records for that long, anyway, first oral
and then written, of how the story played out for each cycle.

Explorers from Earth discovered this planet just in time for the
previous cycle, and one scientist went north with the locals to
observe. He's been living on the planet ever since, while slowly
a Terran presence built up in some of the larger population
areas; now it's time for the next cycle and a larger scientific
team is going north, including the original researcher, and
including a news team -- remember that a lot of people on Earth
are curious about anything that might give a clue about long-ago
Transporter times, and a good many are fanatical about it.

So I've gotten as far as introducing a couple of the main
characters: the Terran priest who's been missionizing in the
area, one of the locals (a young man who is FRANTIC to get out
from under his father's authority), and a brief introduction to
some of the newly-arrived survey team. And then I bog down.

I think it would be a fun story if I could only put it together.

Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djheydt@kithrup.com

In article <JtD1A5.BpH@kithrup.com> djheydt@kithrup.com "Dorothy
J Heydt" writes:

> In the story, varvel is a plant. [...]
>
> I think it would be a fun story if I could only put it together.

I think so too. My feeling is that you have described the main
info which should be conveyed over the first 10Kww or so, 20Kww
if you are weaving the feed properly into the plot. Next, we'd
like to know what deviates from this simple understanding: does
the presence of Earth observers trigger any latent behaviour in
the varvel-people, causing them to "complete" the show they try
to put on each cycle; why is the cycle 19 years (coincidence is
it, that this matches an important Lunar cycle); is the purpose
of the Movers/Transporters benign/malign/instructive/cautionary
or what; why did the arrival of human settlers not affect these
varvel-people way back -- or did it without anyone realising...

There are a bunch (yes, pun) of questions awaiting answers.
--
Andrew Stephenson

On Thu, 20 Dec 2007 18:13:17 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
<djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtD1A5.BpH@kithrup.com>
in rec.arts.sf.composition:

[...]

> Part of what the book is supposed to do is to explore whether
> character, once established, is destiny: whether the leopard can
> change his spots, so to speak.

_`You see. You can progress.'_

Brian

In article <1i9f6vx.cvk7wjbthcfqN%spam@sofluc.co.uk.invalid>,
spam@sofluc.co.uk.invalid (Jonathan L Cunningham) wrote:

> I'm fairly sure that (c) is the motivation for someone like DavidF - he
> has said he likes to tell stories. I don't believe he is writing fiction
> to make money. I can't remember if he said he would put a novel on the
> web if he is unable to sell it, but doing that would be perfectly
> reasonable for someone whose main motivation is having people read his
> stories: the reason to go first for conventional publishing would be to
> reach a larger audience.

I'm pretty sure I said that at some point. It isn't limited to stories.
The (non-fiction) book I have coming out this summer--which may be of
interest to some here, being about the future--was on my web page for
years before I had a publisher.

--
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/ http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/
Author of _Harald_, a fantasy without magic.
Published by Baen, in bookstores now

In article <JtD1A5.BpH@kithrup.com>,
djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:

> The story is, at bottom, a romantic triangle, with an Arthurian
> flavor to it. (If ever this thing got written and made it to
> print, a good back-cover blurb would read, "What if Arthur,
> Gwenivere, Lancelot, and all the knights of the Round Table came
> back -- every nineteen years?" There's an alpha male figure
> and an alpha female and a beta male and a batch of other people,
> and the primary variation usually feeds on whom the alpha female
> meets first. Whoever it is, she will later betray him with the
> other one.
>
> Part of what the book is supposed to do is to explore whether
> character, once established, is destiny: whether the leopard can
> change his spots, so to speak.

Reminds me a little of Adrienne's _The Dragon Rises_, which I rather
liked.

--
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/ http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/
Author of _Harald_, a fantasy without magic.
Published by Baen, in bookstores now

In article <1aw2f33bfvrxn$.1nqq78ev0z4gj.dlg@40tude.net>,
Brian M. Scott <b.scott@csuohio.edu> wrote:
>On Thu, 20 Dec 2007 19:45:34 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
><djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtD5Jy.I1C@kithrup.com>
>in rec.arts.sf.composition:
>
>> In article <1rzku4cg68hjj$.a3ta85qwty1b$.dlg@40tude.net>,
>> Brian M. Scott <b.scott@csuohio.edu> wrote:
>
>>>On Thu, 20 Dec 2007 18:13:17 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
>>><djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtD1A5.BpH@kithrup.com>
>>>in rec.arts.sf.composition:
>
>>>[...]
>
>>>> Part of what the book is supposed to do is to explore whether
>>>> character, once established, is destiny: whether the leopard can
>>>> change his spots, so to speak.
>
>>>_`You see. You can progress.'_
>
>> Ah, bah! What's that from? I recognize it but I can't place it.
>
>You were the one person I thought *might* recognize it.
>It's spoken by Lady Silver Wheels, the charming hostess of
>Glass Castle who none the less sets a very spare table.

Bah! You're right!

Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djheydt@kithrup.com

Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
> OK, here on earth a varvel is a little decorative (frequently
> silver) ring, frequently engraved with the owner's ID (which
> could be name or armorial bearings, I suppose) attached to a
> hawk's jesses. I found that out after I'd come up with the
> in-story meaning, and said Oh the heck with it.
>
> In the story, varvel is a plant. It's a lot like bamboo. It
> grows in northern latitudes, in near-tundra, ordinarily not
> inhabited by humans. But once every nineteen years, in the
> spring, it grows up from its roots, flowers, and goes to seed. It
> seeds so copiously that creatures, including humans, come from
> all over the place to eat it (it's starchy, with a nice protein
> content, tastes like almonds sort of). This happens all across
> the subarctic zone of at least one continent.

Right now, a google search nets Varvel as the name of an Italian gearbox
company, a cartoonist, and a musician in St. Louis. I think if I find a
word or a name that sounds like a word or a name, it usually is one.

I don't worry about this too much. It's probably how words end up with
multiple meanings anyway.

Bill

>>>>> "DJH" == Dorothy J Heydt <djheydt@kithrup.com> writes:

DJH> In article <1aw2f33bfvrxn$.1nqq78ev0z4gj.dlg@40tude.net>,
DJH> Brian M. Scott <b.scott@csuohio.edu> wrote:
>> On Thu, 20 Dec 2007 19:45:34 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
>> <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtD5Jy.I1C@kithrup.com> in
>> rec.arts.sf.composition:
>>
>>> In article <1rzku4cg68hjj$.a3ta85qwty1b$.dlg@40tude.net>,
>>> Brian M. Scott <b.scott@csuohio.edu> wrote:
>>
>>>> On Thu, 20 Dec 2007 18:13:17 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
>>>> <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtD1A5.BpH@kithrup.com>
>>>> in rec.arts.sf.composition:
>>
>>>> [...]
>>
>>>>> Part of what the book is supposed to do is to explore
>>>>> whether character, once established, is destiny: whether the
>>>>> leopard can change his spots, so to speak.
>>
>>>> _`You see. You can progress.'_
>>
>>> Ah, bah! What's that from? I recognize it but I can't place
>>> it.
>> You were the one person I thought *might* recognize it. It's
>> spoken by Lady Silver Wheels, the charming hostess of Glass
>> Castle who none the less sets a very spare table.

DJH> Bah! You're right!

(fx: furiously waving )

Charlton


--
Charlton Wilbur
cwilbur@chromatico.net

In message
<f7c55d27-b23e-4e5b-98f3-1e6f02e6a827@x69g2000hsx.googlegroups.com>,
Nicky <nicky.matthews@btinternet.com> writes
>On Dec 19, 11:38 pm, Jacey Bedford <lookin...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>> In message
>> <b4ee7e87-cb1a-4c40-953e-3045c043d...@v4g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
>> Nicky <nicky.matth...@btinternet.com> writes
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> >> On Wed, 19 Dec 2007 20:55:50 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
>> >> <djhe...@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtBE52.5A6@kithrup.com>
>> >> in rec.arts.sf.composition:
>>
>> >> > In article
>> >> ><4960cf05-cfc6-49c4-8267-2e95939ae...@w56g2000hsf.googlegroups.com>,
>> >> > Nicky <nicky.matth...@btinternet.com> wrote:
>>
>> >> [...]
>>
>> >> >> This does sound a very strong case for murdering your
>> >> >> internal critic.
>> >> > If I murder him, and if I then produce lots of verbiage,
>> >> > and then that verbiage doesn't sell because it's lousy, I
>> >> > am no better off than I was. Worse, in fact, because now
>> >> > I'm perceived as somebody who writes lousy verbiage, like
>> >> > wossname with the Rockoids.
>>
>> >Well, it may not sell because it's lousy, but that is not the only
>> >reason work fails to sell. I was talking with a few agents and writers
>> >last night and we agreed that some stuff doesn't get published through
>> >bad luck - nothing more. Tastes change too or what publishers think
>> >the reading public wants changes. I don't think that means that you've
>> >got worse and I don't think that 'saleable' necessarily means 'good'.
>>
>> Yeowch tell me about it. Two of the agent-rejections I've had recently
>> have said:
>>
>> 'It's good but publishers aren't buying good, they're only buying
>> spectacular.'
>>
>> and
>>
>> 'No one sells telepathy any more except Anne McCaffrey.'
>>
>> So does this mean I may have to abandon something I've spent a long time
>> on (and something which I had hopes of being reasonably commercial) and
>> plough ahead with new stuff?
>
>I think it means keep submitting the old stuff and keep writing new
>stuff. You always have to write new stuff whatever is happening to the
>old stuff. Once it's done it's back list whether it's dead in the
>water or on the best seller list.
>
>> Or does it just mean I haven't yet been lucky enough to land my
>> manuscript on the right desk at the right time?
>>
>Probably. If you don't get an agent submit to publishers yourself. If
>it's YA
>quite a lot of writers don't have agents- at least not to start with.
>I don't think it's worth expending too much angst and emotional energy
>on work that is doing the rounds. It is always better to focus on the
>next one. It isn't easy, but it is the only way to stay half way sane.
>
>Nicky
>>

Thanks, Nicky. I think I did spend too long on it but I am almost to the
end of the magic pirate adventure quest novel,,, which is very different
from anything I've written before and will be heading in different
directions.

Jacey
--
Jacey Bedford
jacey at artisan hyphen harmony dot com
posting via usenet and not googlegroups, ourdebate
or any other forum that reprints usenet posts as
though they were the forum's own

In message <JtD1A5.BpH@kithrup.com>, Dorothy J Heydt
<djheydt@kithrup.com> writes

<snip varvel outline>
>
>I think it would be a fun story if I could only put it together.
Oh YEAH!!!

Sounds great.

What happens to the varvelfolks after the betrayal? Do they kill each
other? Die? Live on sadder but wiser and watch the next generation go
through it again nineteen years later?

I think it sounds fascinating... and definitely original.

I would be very sad if I never got to read a finished version of this,
so I hope you can work towards finishing it one fine day. Thanks for the
outline.

Jacey


>

--
Jacey Bedford
jacey at artisan hyphen harmony dot com
posting via usenet and not googlegroups, ourdebate
or any other forum that reprints usenet posts as
though they were the forum's own

Dorothy J Heydt <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote:
<snip>
> If you mean on my measly little webpage, no way. And what
> regular audience? Do you mean the kind people here on rasfc, all
> twenty-five of them or so?
<snip>

We are not Kind. We are Hungry.

--
Mary Anne in Kentucky

On Thu, 20 Dec 2007 18:19:16 -0500, mastout@mindspring.com (MA Stout)
wrote:

>Dorothy J Heydt <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote:
><snip>
>> If you mean on my measly little webpage, no way. And what
>> regular audience? Do you mean the kind people here on rasfc, all
>> twenty-five of them or so?
><snip>
>
>We are not Kind. We are Hungry.

Oh my. I'd like to read the story where that was the concluding
line...


A,

On 20 Dec 2007 16:50:17 -0500, Charlton Wilbur
<cwilbur@chromatico.net> wrote in
<news:87tzmdrq7a.fsf@mithril.chromatico.net> in
rec.arts.sf.composition:

>>>>>> "DJH" == Dorothy J Heydt <djheydt@kithrup.com> writes:

> DJH> In article <1aw2f33bfvrxn$.1nqq78ev0z4gj.dlg@40tude.net>,
> DJH> Brian M. Scott <b.scott@csuohio.edu> wrote:
> >> On Thu, 20 Dec 2007 19:45:34 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
> >> <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtD5Jy.I1C@kithrup.com> in
> >> rec.arts.sf.composition:

> >>> In article <1rzku4cg68hjj$.a3ta85qwty1b$.dlg@40tude.net>,
> >>> Brian M. Scott <b.scott@csuohio.edu> wrote:

> >>>> On Thu, 20 Dec 2007 18:13:17 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
> >>>> <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtD1A5.BpH@kithrup.com>
> >>>> in rec.arts.sf.composition:

> >>>> [...]

> >>>>> Part of what the book is supposed to do is to explore
> >>>>> whether character, once established, is destiny: whether the
> >>>>> leopard can change his spots, so to speak.

> >>>> _`You see. You can progress.'_

> >>> Ah, bah! What's that from? I recognize it but I can't place
> >>> it.

> >> You were the one person I thought *might* recognize it. It's
> >> spoken by Lady Silver Wheels, the charming hostess of Glass
> >> Castle who none the less sets a very spare table.

> DJH> Bah! You're right!

> (fx: furiously waving )

As in a request for enlightenment? Adrienne Martine-Barnes,
_The Dragon Rises_. Romance of manners meets space opera,
and a neat twist on the Arthurian triangle. Very high on my
short list of books that are just plain fun, right up there
with _The Witches of Karres_.

Brian

On 20 Dec, 23:13, Jacey Bedford <lookin...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>
> I think it sounds fascinating... and definitely original.
>
> I would be very sad if I never got to read a finished version of this,
> so I hope you can work towards finishing it one fine day.

Seconded.

Nicky
>

>
>
>
> --
> Jacey Bedford
> jacey at artisan hyphen harmony dot com
> posting via usenet and not googlegroups, ourdebate
> or any other forum that reprints usenet posts as
> though they were the forum's own

In article <rkulm3108a38ui0613mrrd762kvtdqpm1k@4ax.com>,
Alma Hromic Deckert <anghara@vaxer.net> wrote:

> On Thu, 20 Dec 2007 18:19:16 -0500, mastout@mindspring.com (MA Stout)
> wrote:
>
> >Dorothy J Heydt <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote:
> ><snip>
> >> If you mean on my measly little webpage, no way. And what
> >> regular audience? Do you mean the kind people here on rasfc, all
> >> twenty-five of them or so?
> ><snip>
> >
> >We are not Kind. We are Hungry.
>
> Oh my. I'd like to read the story where that was the concluding
> line...

"To Serve Man" comes close.

--
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/ http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/
Author of _Harald_, a fantasy without magic.
Published by Baen, in bookstores now

Dorothy J Heydt <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote:

> In article <fke8lb$cn1$2@gnus01.u.washington.edu>,
> Mary K. Kuhner <mkkuhner@kingman.gs.washington.edu> wrote:
> >In article <JtBruH.MC7@kithrup.com>,
> >Dorothy J Heydt <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote:
> >>In article <fkcb6u$rs7$1@gnus01.u.washington.edu>,
> >>Mary K. Kuhner <mkkuhner@kingman.gs.washington.edu> wrote:
> >
> >> (I wish
> >>>I had a publication record like that....)
> >
> >>But it consists almost entirely of sales to one person, whose
> >>standards (as I've said) were rather bizarre and not very high.
> >
> >Meh. For how many years did she run a successful magazine?
> >Magazines fold like napkins every month; if she made it work,
> >she had tastes that clicked with enough readership to make it
> >work.
>
> Ahhh, but here's the secret. She never ran it in the black. She
> had money from _The Mists of Avalon_ and other stuff she'd written,
> particularly from the film rights for _Mists_. She told herself
> that she'd run the magazine till the money gave out, and she did,
> until it did. Rachel Holmen, who edited it, told me that toward
> the end it was *almost* in the black.

On the other hand, she must have been doing something right on the Sword
& Sorceress anthologies, since I (and you, presumably) still get
occasional royalty checks from reprints or translations of the older
volumes.

Which reminds me -- do we have any Italian members of the group
currently who might be willing to do business with me in regards to
getting copies of the Italian translations of S&S 13 & 14? I happened
to luck into copies of the German editions with my stories, but no leads
yet on the Italian. (Since I only got the royalties this past
September, it's quite possible that the books don't exist yet, if it was
payment on contract rather than publicatioon.)

Heather

--
Heather Rose Jones
heatherrosejones.com
lj=hrj

Dorothy J Heydt <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote:

> In article <ddfr-96CC26.21333919122007@sfo.news.speakeasy.net>,
> David Friedman <ddfr@daviddfriedman.nopsam.com> wrote:
> >In article <JtBHI2.9qo@kithrup.com>,
> > djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:
> >
> >> *I* can't tell whether it's any good or not, since
> >> things I've thought were pretty decent have gotten bounced without
> >> a sentence of explanation.
> >
> >Which might mean that you were correct and the editor who bounced it was
> >wrong. Or that the editor didn't want that particular sort of work at
> >the moment.
>
> Couldn't she have just said so???

Various reasons why not, including lack of time, or that she's had
nastygrams from clueless authors rejecting the rejection and now finds
it simpler and less aggravation not to explain.

Rejections just mean "Not this particular one this particular time for
me in particular," nothing else.

Zeborah
--
Gravity is no joke.
http://www.geocities.com/zeborahnz/
rasfc FAQ: http://www.lshelby.com/rasfcFAQ.html

In article <1ivvf06dqswla.1s8nmzf4drgzx.dlg@40tude.net>,
Brian M. Scott <b.scott@csuohio.edu> wrote:
>On Fri, 21 Dec 2007 00:48:35 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
><djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtDJKz.C8C@kithrup.com>
>in rec.arts.sf.composition:
>
>[...]
>
>> I used to know Adrienne very well, and she was writing the
>> sequel, _The Lion Wakes,_ while I was writing _The Interior
>> Life._ Alas, _Lion_ never sold (I still have a copy in MS.), so
>> Adrienne never wrote the third book, _The Serpent Dances._
>
>Is _The Lion Wakes_ as enjoyable as _The Dragon Rises_?

I didn't find it so, but I haven't read it in years. As the
Dragon is Arthur, the Lion is Tristan, and I don't know what
archetype the Serpent was going to be. (I know what *character*
she was going to be: Alvellaina's head-blind cousin. But that's
all I know.)

Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djheydt@kithrup.com

In article <ddfr-FB89A8.00260921122007@sfo.news.speakeasy.net>,
David Friedman <ddfr@daviddfriedman.nopsam.com> wrote:
>In article <JtE1wF.95n@kithrup.com>,
> djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:
>
>> In the meanwhile, I have taken a look at what there is of Chapter
>> One, and I think I've seen what's wrong with it. It wants to
>> switch point of view here and there, and the rhythm is wrong.
>> I've got a segment with Fr. Michael, and then a segment with the
>> youngster who wants to get out from under his father's thumb, and
>> then a segment with Fr. Michael again with the abovementioned
>> father. And the transition between those two segments is really
>> bad.
>>
>> And then the next thing is just a mention of one of the Terran
>> research team, an engineer IIRC, and then Fr. Michael again talking
>> to the newly arrived Terrans. I presume that I wanted to include
>> something from the engineer's point of view, but I don't really
>> know what that is. I have the vague recollection that he's a
>> jerk, but of what form his jerkishness takes, I know nothing.
>> When first seen, he's standing with his head thrust up the
>> chimney of a fireplace (fortunately, the fire has not yet been
>> lit), examining its structure and comparing it to quite
>> independently invented Terran chimneys.
>>
>> And the scene with the Terrans stinks of infodump, and then they
>> all go in to dinner and it's not even infodump, it's just talking
>> heads. Feh.
>>
>> So I know some of the things that's wrong with it, but not how to
>> fix it.
>>
>> Anyone got suggestions?
>
>Your repeating people are so odd that the terrans might well take
>reports of them as a myth or metaphor or something. Could you introduce
>the idea in some conversation with Terrans and locals talking at cross
>purposes as a result?

Well, the *existence* of the Anhold (those are the varvel people)
is established; the reports writen by Dr. Rudel after the last
cycle, with photographs and DNA analyses of the varvel and of
some of the Anhold after they had died*, and so on, were published
some eighteen years ago. There may well be people back on Earth
who don't believe it, just as there are people on Earth now who
don't believe we ever landed on the moon; but none of them are
along on the expedition.

Now I'm trying to think about a situation where the Terrans could be
talking to some of the Baihold (those are the locals) immediately
on disembarking. Trouble is, at this point I can't think of
anything they would say except politenesses. They're supposed to
be gotten inside the King's house as quickly as possible, and the
conversation is going to be mostly polite variations on "This
way, please, keep moving, please, you will have weeks and weeks
to talk to everybody, starting tomorrow!" And there's too much
polite chat in that chapter already.

Hm, Fr. Michael catches up with them when they're already inside
the King's house; maybe I can have them talking to a servant or
somebody then. They all speak the local language fairly well.
Maybe once they're inside out of the chill, they'll settle in
front of a mural or something and not respond to hints about
moving along to Fr. Michael's study where they're supposed to go.

________
*Mind you, those were not very helpful. The Anhold DNA read as
human and as closely related to the Baihold as you'd expect after
ten thousand years' separation. The varvel DNA read like that of
every other stand of varvel on the planet: though the stuff seeds
so copiously every cycle, it reproduces almost exclusively by
rhizomes. Rudel's hypothesis is that whatever produces the
Anhold is down deep among the rhizomes, maybe in parasitic
nodules or something, but the Baihold, last time, wouldn't let
him dig them up lest it somehow injure the Anhold either on that
cycle or the next. He has better equipment now, that allows him
to analyze DNA in situ without the necessity of taking a sample,
and hopes for better results this time. *I* don't know what he's
going to find, but that's not my primary interest.

Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djheydt@kithrup.com

In article <6v3ha5TXu6aHFwSv@parkhead.demon.co.uk>,
Jacey Bedford <lookinsig@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>In message <JtDJnA.CCE@kithrup.com>, Dorothy J Heydt
><djheydt@kithrup.com> writes
>>In article <6PwhiwEIcvaHFwAG@parkhead.demon.co.uk>,
>>Jacey Bedford <lookinsig@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>>>In message <JtD1A5.BpH@kithrup.com>, Dorothy J Heydt
>>><djheydt@kithrup.com> writes
>>>
>>><snip varvel outline>
>>>>
>>>>I think it would be a fun story if I could only put it together.
>>>Oh YEAH!!!
>>>
>>>Sounds great.
>>>
>>>What happens to the varvelfolks after the betrayal? Do they kill each
>>>other? Die? Live on sadder but wiser and watch the next generation go
>>>through it again nineteen years later?
>>
>>They all kill each other. The remaining few may commit suicide.
>>This has happened over and over since the memory of man runneth
>>not to the contrary. This time, should I ever write the thing,
>>ONE person is going to survive.
>Yay!
>
>Only one?
>
>Jacey
>(likes happy endings, though not without price)

Only one. And he is left with some serious questions about his
identity ... is he the same man as all his predecessors? What
will happen nineteen years from now: will his younger self rise
from the varvel again, or not?

Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djheydt@kithrup.com

On Thu, 20 Dec 2007 16:38:29 -0800 (PST), Nicky
<nicky.matthews@btinternet.com> wrote:

>On 20 Dec, 23:13, Jacey Bedford <lookin...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>>
>> I think it sounds fascinating... and definitely original.
>>
>> I would be very sad if I never got to read a finished version of this,
>> so I hope you can work towards finishing it one fine day.
>
>Seconded.

Thirded!

jrw

On Fri, 21 Dec 2007 05:35:55 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
<djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtDwvv.41z@kithrup.com>
in rec.arts.sf.composition:

> In article <1ivvf06dqswla.1s8nmzf4drgzx.dlg@40tude.net>,
> Brian M. Scott <b.scott@csuohio.edu> wrote:

>>On Fri, 21 Dec 2007 00:48:35 GMT, Dorothy J Heydt
>><djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote in <news:JtDJKz.C8C@kithrup.com>
>>in rec.arts.sf.composition:

>>[...]

>>> I used to know Adrienne very well, and she was writing the
>>> sequel, _The Lion Wakes,_ while I was writing _The Interior
>>> Life._ Alas, _Lion_ never sold (I still have a copy in MS.), so
>>> Adrienne never wrote the third book, _The Serpent Dances._

>>Is _The Lion Wakes_ as enjoyable as _The Dragon Rises_?

> I didn't find it so, but I haven't read it in years. As the
> Dragon is Arthur, the Lion is Tristan, [...]

Now there's a mildly amusing coincidence: in the local Þing
we just started reading 'Saga af Tristram ok Isönd'.
According to the superscription:

Hér skrifast sagan af Tristram ok Isönd drottningu,
í hverri talað verðr um óbæriliga ást, er þau höfðu
sín á millum. Var þá liðið frá hingatburði Kristí 1226
ár, er þessi saga var á norrænu skrifuð eptir befalingu
ok skipan virðuligs herra Hákonar konungs. En bróðir
Róbert efnaði ok uppskrifaði eptir sinni kunnáttu
með þessum orðtökum, sem eptir fylgir í sögunni ok
nú skal frá segja.

Here is written the saga of Tristram and Queen Isönd,
in which is told of the unbearable love that they had
for each other. 1226 years had then passed since the
birth of Christ when this saga was written in Old
Norse according to the command and order of the
worthy lord King Hákon. And Brother Róbert made
ready and wrote according to his knowledge of these
words that belong to the saga and shall now be told.

We only just started, though, so we've not yet met either of
the title characters. So far we've met the knight
Kanelangres --

hinn fríðasti maðr á líkams fegrð, hinn vildasti ríkra
gjafa, öflugr ok auðugr ríkra kastala ok borga, kænn
til margrar kunnáttu, hinn röskvasti at riddaraskap,
hinn öruggasti at alls konar drengskap, vitr ok var í
ráðagerðum, forsjáll ok framsýnn, fullger at öllum
atgervum yfir all menn, er í þann tíma váru í því ríki

the most handsome man in bodily fairness, the best
in magnificent gifts [i.e., most generous], powerful
and rich in magnificent castles and strongholds, wise
in many kinds of knowledge, the doughtiest in
knighthood, the most dauntless in all kinds of courage,
wise and prudent in his plans, foresighted and fore-
seeing, fully accomplished in all skills above all men
who in that time were in that realm --

who will be Tristram's father, and the lady Blensinbil,
sister to 'Markis konungr', who will be his mother and who,
needless to say, is introduced in equally glowing terms.
They don't write like that any more -- thank goodness! It's
an almost disconcerting change of pace from the things that
we've been reading for the last 20 years, though in fact the
riddarasögur (knightly sagas) were apparently enormously
popular in Iceland.

Brian

Dorothy J Heydt <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote:

(snip)

> And the scene with the Terrans stinks of infodump, and then they
> all go in to dinner and it's not even infodump, it's just talking
> heads. Feh.

Despite the general antipathy expressed here and elsewhere, I like
talking heads.

I like good infodumps too.

And, strange to say, both talking heads and infodumps are used in
ultra-successful novels.

Picking _Small Gods_ by Pratchett off my bookshelf, it took me only a
few seconds to find infodumps. There aren't that many of them though
(he's not the best choice for finding infodumps at random) and they seem
to be about half a page, max. (150-160 words?)

It was easier to find talking heads - although most dialogue seldom runs
on for more than half a page, I did find some about four and a half
pages long. (I didn't count words - about 1300-1400 if it had been
solid, but of course it was dialogue, so it would have been a lot less.)

I'm including stage business, e.g. X smiled. Y sat down. etc., as still
talking heads, because it's easy to add it and it's still just
conversation. I'm not including where he drops into omniscient into the
middle of a dialogue, to explain something to the reader. That's two
separate "talking heads" sections sandwiching an infodump.

> Anyone got suggestions?

That wasn't a suggestion. It was some possibly encouraging observations.
Nicky's approach of making sure she alternates action, dialogue etc.
very frequently may work for her - and may even be a good thing for the
YA market - but it is by no means essential.

Similarly, every paragraph (sentence?) should do two or three of advance
the plot, reveal characterisation or develop background is only useful
as an ideal. At least, judging by what people actually like when they
buy books.

Of course, if your infodumps are boring and your talking heads are
discussing politics (or baseball), they should go. But it's not so
obvious (to me) that an interesting infodump or conversation has to go.

Jonathan
(If it's good enough for Tolkien, Pratchett and their ilk, it's good
enough for me.)

In article <1i9ja18.g3adl61xdf8n4N%spam@sofluc.co.uk.invalid>,
Jonathan L Cunningham <spam@sofluc.co.uk.invalid> wrote:
>Dorothy J Heydt <djheydt@kithrup.com> wrote:
>
>(snip)
>
>> And the scene with the Terrans stinks of infodump, and then they
>> all go in to dinner and it's not even infodump, it's just talking
>> heads. Feh.
>
......
>
>Similarly, every paragraph (sentence?) should do two or three of advance
>the plot, reveal characterisation or develop background is only useful
>as an ideal. At least, judging by what people actually like when they
>buy books.

Yeah, I know, that's an ideal to be striven for. A lot of these
characters really don't have much personality yet, but they've
got to acquire some; they're going to do things and they're going
to need motives. They can't ALL just fall in love with the
journalist, stunner though she is.
>
>Of course, if your infodumps are boring and your talking heads are
>discussing politics (or baseball), they should go. But it's not so
>obvious (to me) that an interesting infodump or conversation has to go.

They're mostly discussing cooking, as they sit down to eat the
bekrand, a meaty stew that's traditional before the journey
north, on which they will eat mostly waybread and root
vegetables. (It's early spring.) And there's a line or two
about seating at the High Table, on both sides of the King and
Queen: ambassadors to the King's right, the visiting Terrans on
the Queen's left. And the expedition linguist is jockeying to
sit next to the Queen, *because she came originally from another
kingdom* and speaks yet another language and is familiar with yet
another culture. Summarized like that, it doesn't sound too bad:
written out, it takes a couple of pages and reads blah.

Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djheydt@kithrup.com

On Dec 22, 5:51 pm, s...@sofluc.co.uk.invalid (Jonathan L Cunningham)
wrote:
> Dorothy J Heydt <djhe...@kithrup.com> wrote:
>
> (snip)
>
> > And the scene with the Terrans stinks of infodump, and then they
> > all go in to dinner and it's not even infodump, it's just talking
> > heads.  Feh.
>
> Despite the general antipathy expressed here and elsewhere, I like
> talking heads.
>
> I like good infodumps too.
>
> And, strange to say, both talking heads and infodumps are used in
> ultra-successful novels.
>
> Picking _Small Gods_ by Pratchett off my bookshelf, it took me only a
> few seconds to find infodumps. There aren't that many of them though
> (he's not the best choice for finding infodumps at random) and they seem
> to be about half a page, max. (150-160 words?)
>
> It was easier to find talking heads - although most dialogue seldom runs
> on for more than half a page, I did find some about four and a half
> pages long. (I didn't count words - about 1300-1400 if it had been
> solid, but of course it was dialogue, so it would have been a lot less.)
>
> I'm including stage business, e.g. X smiled. Y sat down. etc., as still
> talking heads, because it's easy to add it and it's still just
> conversation. I'm not including where he drops into omniscient into the
> middle of a dialogue, to explain something to the reader. That's two
> separate "talking heads" sections sandwiching an infodump.
>
> > Anyone got suggestions?
>
> That wasn't a suggestion. It was some possibly encouraging observations.
> Nicky's approach of making sure she alternates action, dialogue etc.
> very frequently may work for her - and may even be a good thing for the
> YA market - but it is by no means essential.

Nor would I ever suggest it is. There are no rules. Personally I'm
just terrifed of boring my reader. My first editor liked my first
novel because it read like it was intended for a hyper active ten year
old ( which wasn't very clever of me as they don't tend to
read.) I still find it hard to slow down and be expansive:
consequently I write short novels. I'll tolerate/enjoy info dump and
dialogue if its well done, but I don't think it is well done very
often.

> Similarly, every paragraph (sentence?) should do two or three of advance
> the plot, reveal characterisation or develop background is only useful
> as an ideal. At least, judging by what people actually like when they
> buy books.

I like tightly written books and I have a low tolerance for authorial
indulgence. I no longer read very long books unless Mary or someone
else I know I like has written them. It is largely a matter of
personal taste.

> Of course, if your infodumps are boring and your talking heads are
> discussing politics (or baseball), they should go. But it's not so
> obvious (to me) that an interesting infodump or conversation has to go.
>
Many books make a feature of infodump, extended dialogue obviously
works or there wouldn't be any plays. It is always a question of how
you do things and what effect you are wanting to achieve.

> (If it's good enough for Tolkien, Pratchett and their ilk, it's good
> enough for me.)

Yes - they go down pretty well with sizeable audiences : )
Unsurprisingly, I'm not a fan of either.

Nicky

David Goldfarb <goldfarb@OCF.Berkeley.EDU> wrote:

> In article <13mlocvehv00a6e@corp.supernews.com>,
> Bill Swears <wswears@gci.net> wrote:
> >Right now, a google search nets Varvel as the name of an Italian gearbox
> >company, a cartoonist, and a musician in St. Louis. I think if I find a
> >word or a name that sounds like a word or a name, it usually is one.
>
> Also a former bridge partner of mine, with whom I've lost touch.
> I should see if I can track him down again.

Completely off-topic:

One of the crit group's members invited me around for a glass of mulled
wine this evening.

None of the other people present was a writer, but one of them ran a
bridge club (with his wife/partner). And his /bridge/ partner in
professional tournaments turned out to be a neighbour of mine: the
neighbour lives in Flat 4, and I live in Flat 5 (in the same building).

That kind of coincidence is /always/ happening, but this was the first
time I've been in a "small world" loop where every link was different:

me -> fellow writing circle member -> former student -> bridge
partner -> same address = me again.

Normally that kind of loop happens when people have a common interest,
or work for the same employer or something. How likely is it in a town
of a quarter of a million people?

Jonathan

On Dec 23, 12:15 am, s...@sofluc.co.uk.invalid (Jonathan L Cunningham)
wrote:
> > Normally that kind of loop happens when people have a common interest,
> or work for the same employer or something. How likely is it in a town
> of a quarter of a million people?
>
The best coincidence I've heard happened to my sister.
When her second son was born ( in London) his life was saved by an on
the ball registrar who recognised early signs of heart failure and had
my nephew blue lighted to a specialist hospital. Years passed. My
nephew had a couple of operations, my sister had a daughter and they
all emigrated to Sydney.
One night my niece hurt herself in a fairly minor way and my sister
took her to casualty for treatment. The doctor who dealt with them
turned out to be the same registrar whose prompt action saved my
nephew's life. Small world.

Nicky

#TXT# : FROM OFF/BB : #CITE#

In article <1i9jrlw.l1l83bkwim4uN%spam@sofluc.co.uk.invalid>
spam@sofluc.co.uk.invalid "Jonathan L Cunningham" writes:

> Normally that kind of loop happens when people have a common
> interest, or work for the same employer or something. How
> likely is it in a town of a quarter of a million people?

#TXT# : ++UNGOOD : ABOVE DRAWN FROM PUBLICLY VOICED SUSPICIONS OF
TEST MATRIX JLC-70335 : ADVISE JOINT LIAISON COMMITTEE OF DEFOCUS
AND TRANSFER THIS HOST TO "MI-5 PARANOIA" USENET SPAM-MSG PROJECT
FORTHWITH : ARRANGE SUBSTITUTE WITH SUITABLE CONDITIONING TO TAKE
OVER W/O INTERRUPTS OF CONSCIOUSNESS SIMPLEX 70335 : END : #XMIT#
--
Andrew Stephenson