Conrad Zero

Automatic for the Tweeple

Welcome to 2010. Strangely, the things we’ve expected to be available like flying cars and holodecks… aren’t. Instead, we have the ability to communicate out to the entire internet-connected world and tell them what we had for dinner using Twitter.com. Yay.

For those who still don’t know the difference between Twitter and a tweet, read this post.

Believe it or not, Twitter does have uses beyond the obvious time-suck. For anyone wanting to cast their social network a little wider, Twitter is as simple as it gets. If nothing else, it offers more links back to your content. The act of sending tweets isn’t difficult, but who wants to deal with following/unfollowing people and cut-n-pasting blog post links into a tweet? Sounds like more upkeep than it’s worth for just another link back to your blog. If there was only a way to automate the process…

Well you’re in luck, because I have some tips that turn Twitter into your slave, and make it automatically administrate and update  itself with content for you!  Real content too, not the B.S. jokes and quotes the New Media Spambags are pumping out.

If you don’t do Twitter because you have no idea what to tweet about, take advantage of these simple tips to get some auto-tweeting working for you. If you are already a tweetmaster, these tips are an easy way to add some content and housekeeping to your existing regimen.

If you don’t have one already, set up an account at Twitter.com then follow these simple tips to make Twitter work for you:

1 – Automate Twitter Using SocialOomph

SocialOomph.com (formerly known at TweetLater) has a terrible name, but does some wonderful auto-administration of your Twitter account. It’s totally worth the [FREE] that they charge.

Set up an account at SocialOomph and add your Twitter account credentials. Yes, that means sharing your Twitter account username and password . Don’t worry, they’re good for it.

Once your Twitter account is added, click ‘edit’ and check the following options:

• Auto-follow people who follow you.
• Auto-unfollow people who unfollow you.
• Automatically e-mail you a list of Twitter replies. You’ll get a condensed e-mail of Twitter replies people sent to you, so you never have to check on Twitter to see if you’re missing anything.
• Automatically send a welcome message to new followers. Make sure to type in a short message which will be sent to everyone who follows you. Here’s mine:

Thanks for the follow! You can check out more of my dark-fiction-author-nonsense at conradzero.com

Tweet you later!
-Conrad Zero

Note: You can also use SocialOomph to upload a bunch of pre-written tweets and schedule them to post at certain dates/times, but that means you have to write tweets and upload them. I figured I would point this out because it’s a handy consolidation of work, but it isn’t exactly automatic.

2 – Automate your Blog Posts to Twitter using Twitterfeed

Twitterfeed is a service which takes the rss feed from your blog and automatically generates tweets with a link to your blog posts and posts them on Twitter for you!

To set up Twitterfeed, you will need the RSS feed address of your blog. Mine is http://www.conradzero.com/feed which is the default for self-hosted Wordpress blogs (just replace my website name with your own.) If you have a hosted site like Blogger or LiveJournal, look on your site for a Subscribe button or a graphic which looks like this:

Right click on the graphic on your site, and copy the address there. That should be your RSS feed. Paste it into Twitterfeed. Once you get your RSS feed entered and validated, then add your Twitter account information and… Bam! All UR blogposts are now belong to Twitter!

3 – Automate Youtube to Twitter

Login or create an account at Youtube.com. Under Account Settings look for Activity Sharing or AutoSharing. Here, you can configure Youtube to auto-post your video rankings, favorites and comments out to Twitter, Facebook and other social media sites.

Bam! Free content automatically generated for Twitter based on nothing more than trolling around Youtube! Hells, you were doing that already!

4 – Auto-tweet Myspace updates

Despite media to the contrary, Myspace is not dead. Furthermore, Myspace.com can also be automated to bounce your status updates out to Twitter.

See this link for more details: http://www.myspace.com/sync

5 – Automate Facebook updates to Twitter

I heard that if Facebook was a country, it would be the 6th largest country in the world. It would also look like the Eastern Bloc, and smell like Seattle.  I also hear it’s the only way you can get grandma online to look at pix of the grandkids.

Like tips #3 and #4 above, you can also have Facebook auto-post your updates out to Twitter (and back the other way…) using this app:  http://apps.facebook.com/twitter/ [Note: you will need to login with a Facebook account to access this page.]

6- Showcase your current Twitter posts on your website.

Adding a sidebar to your website that showcases your latest Twitter posts is an easy way to put fresh content on your website(s). Best of all it’s set-and-forget. Pick from the options below depending on how your website is hosted:

WordPress – There are many WordPress plug-ins which will show your latest tweets in a sidebar widget. I use the “Twitter for WordPress” plugin by Ricardo González, and you can see the results on my homepage at conradzero.com (Scroll down the right-hand side, under the header “Twittering”)

Blogger – Here’s a link to a Twitter widget you can insert into your Blogger blog: http://twitter.com/badges/blogger

Others (Javascript) – If you use LiveJournal or other pages which run old-school HTML, This site has a simple Javascript that can be added to your page: http://www.cthreepo.com/blogthis/index.html

Others (PHP) – If you aren’t afraid of a little PHP, then with some cut-and-pasting you can add this prebuilt code to your website: http://workbench.cadenhead.org/twitter-rss-to-html/

WTF? – If none of these options work for you, there are plenty of other coders and plugin-ers out there creating software to show your twitter posts as stocktickers, sidebars, banner ads, etc… My suggestion is to find someone who is doing what you want to do, and ask them how they did it. Leave a comment here if you find something useful!

Once you’re finished, every new Twitter post will be displayed on your website pages.

Living with Auto-Twitter in 2010 and Beyond

Once you’ve strapped Twitter into this auto-magical configuration, what next?  Simple. Go back to your business as usual! Update your blog, Facebook, Myspace, etc. Rate and comment on videos at Youtube. If you followed my tips above, all these actions will generate content for you automatically on Twitter.com, and your website sidebar will be updated with your latest tweets!

Add a blog post… Bam! There’s two extra links to your blog post with no extra effort!

Someone adds you as a friend… Pow! Your account auto-adds them back, AND sends them a thank you!

Someone unfollows you…  Zap! Your account auto-unfollows the fool! So Naygh!

Who knows, maybe you’ll even start adding your own random thoughts to Twitter, (and I’ll have more helpful tips about that soon) or you can ignore Twitter completely and let it work for you in the background, offering up links to your content.

OK so it ain’t a flying car, but unless you’re going to build one, you’ll just have to settle for these tips. For those of you worried this is all a bit too Big Brother, keep in mind this is 2010, not 1984. Feel free to share these tips with others, and link back to this post.

Do you know of  other great twitter automations? Anything I missed? Anything better than what I’ve suggested? Leave a comment!

Yours darkly,
-Zero

Stretching the meaning of “Bestseller”

What do these people have in common? They are all Bestselling Authors. But lately, there have been a plethora of authors claiming “Bestseller” status. The problem is that they are bestsellers – technically . But you should know that some authors are using a new-and-improved definition of the term that might not match up with what you think of when you use the term “Bestseller.”

There’s little argument that a Bestselling Author is the Author of at least one Bestselling Book. Once Upon A Time, a Bestselling Book was defined as a book that had made it onto the New York Times Best-sellers List. But the more generic definition is a book that sells the best out of a specific category in a specific time. With this more generic definition in mind, a little technical help from online booksellers like amazon.com, and a little ethical flexibility, we can manipulate the category and the time period to raise almost ANY book (and its author) to bestseller status.

The more generic definition of “bestseller” is a book that sells the most out of a specific category in a specific time… we can manipulate the category and the time period to raise almost ANY book (and its author) to “bestseller” status.

Best of…something-or-other

Ever since the birth of Consumer Reports, marketing people realized that the ubiquitous title of “Best” has a high impact with consumers. (Especially American consumers.) Car companies realized that a midsized car with average fuel mileage and average price couldn’t really be considered “best” at anything except being a “midsized car with average fuel mileage and average price.”

Add a dash of Evil Marketing Genius and the problem is solved. They narrowed down the specs to weed out their competition until their car was the ‘best’ within the specified sub-section. The term for this status is “Best in Class,” a phrase likely to be found in any car commercial.

This same approach can be taken regarding published works. If you break the market down to a sub-sub-subsection where your book is the best out of those remaining…then you’re the best! Best of Class, of course, but you’re still the best. It’s like being King of your own tree-fort. You get all the bragging rights of being “Best” but there’s a big disclaimer that comes with that definition of Best-ness.

Applying this approach to Bestselling books, Amazon and other booksellers allow authors and audiences to sort the list of best sellers to sub-categories. Authors can use this to their advantage.

For example, the list of bestselling books at Amazon.com can be broken down into some pretty questionable categories. Just find a niche that isn’t being currently dominated, and drop your book in. If Literature>Genre Fiction>Horror>Dark Fantasy is too crowded, how about fiction authors whose first name starts with the letter “C”?

The values are recalculated Every Hour, which leads us to the next piece of best-seller-ness, Timing.

Timing The Bum Rush

Because sites like Amazon measure sales instantaneously and the Bestseller lists are recalculated every hour, it isn’t hard to get your book moved to the top of the list by gathering your friends, and leveraging your social media connections (with added gifts, discounts and other time-limited offers) and launching a timed, all-out purchasing assault in an attempt to “best-ify” books or music This activity is nicknamed a “Bum Rush”

A famous Bum Rush was performed on 22 Mar 2007. A website called  Bum Rush The Charts planned the large-scale push of the independent band Black Lab up onto music charts worldwide. It worked. The band peaked at #11 on the American I-Tunes charts and in the top 100 of most other countries. An UNSIGNED band broke the charts using nothing more than a strategically timed social media event.

The theory behind a Bum Rush is simple. Get a large number of people to purchase your book on a particular hour of a particular day. It won’t take a lot to get your book moved to the “Best” of your selected category for that one hour. Collect your title and brag forevermore that you are indeed a Bestseller.

Sneaky? No doubt. But there’s also no doubt that the Bum Rush works. In fact, certain book publishers expect their authors to participate in a Bum Rush, (probably called a “Release Event” or some other legal-speak) and will even add a clause requiring author participation into their “Book Deal” contracts.

In Perpetuity

The beauty is that once achieved, the Bestseller title stays with the author for the rest of his/her lifetime, as though they had achieved a doctorate or a Nobel Peace Prize. All the author’s marketing materials will have the words “…by the Bestselling Author of…” and whether the new material is “Bestselling” quality or not, it still says “Bestselling” on it.

Like I said, Evil Marketing Genius.

Backlash

Because of the glut “Bestselling Authors” out there, you will see authors who became Bestsellers using the traditional method refer to themselves as “New York Times Bestselling Author” and their books as “New York Times Bestseller” or possibly other, more specified titles which gives more detail about where their pedigree comes from and how they differentiate themselves from the rank-and-file “Bestsellers”.

The Upshot

I didn’t write this article so you could run out and become a Bestselling Author. My goal was to inform you that the term Bestseller doesn’t hold the same meaning it did before online booksellers came into play. And nothing against those who have achieved their bestseller status the old-fashioned way. Unfortunately, the new definition of Bestseller does water down the prestige of the title.

From now on, you know to be wary of the term “Bestselling” Anything. When you see an author or book listed as “Bestselling” the first thought in your mind should be “Best What out of Which, exactly?”

-Conrad Zero, Bestselling Author (of all published dark-fiction authors over 20 years of age with 10-letters in their name, a last name beginning with the letter “Z,” and living in Minneapolis metro area)

“That’s it,” I said.

Four Hundred and some-odd slices of dead tree stood stacked up on the desk. Nearly One-Hundred-Thousand words that have taken me years to choose and arrange…

…and I was looking for lighter fluid and my lucky Zippo lighter.

I’d just read a Real book from a Real author, then I looked back at my own work, something I had the audacity to actually print out. I felt bad for the tree that was killed so I could redline the latest version of the Demonslayer’s Handbook manuscript. Turns out a red pen wasn’t enough. I was going to need a 12″ wide red paint roller. It would have been easier to highlight the sections that weren’t complete garbage. There wouldn’t be many.

There’s lots of names for this phenomenon, Burnout, Inner Critic, Self-Doubt, and more, but I call it “Hitting the Wall”.

What is “The Wall”?

Some who discuss this anomaly are quick to label it as a form of Writer’s Block. This gives them immediate access to the wealth of books, advice and ready-made solutions for that particular problem.

Unfortunately, hitting the wall is not writers block. It’s motivation block.  I’ve had both, and believe me, they are two different animals. Their only similarity is that when you have either of them,  you don’t get anything written.

Hitting the wall isn’t writers block. It’s motivation block.

Writers block is when you are Stuck For Something To Write (hence the name). When you hit the wall, You Don’t Want To Write Anything At All.

With writers block you stare at a blank page, desperate for some spark of creativity, or some muse to come flirt with your brain. You want to write.

When you hit the wall, you don’t stare at a blank page. You stare at the television, or a video game, or another book, or perhaps (ironically) a wall, because even that is preferable to wasting your time trying to be a writer when you know you are a hack who won’t ever amount to anything and this delusion of being a writer, this temporary insanity that anything you write will ever be read or is even worthy of being read saps all your motivation away, and not only do you not want to write ever again, but you’re compelled to cut your own hands off with a bandsaw as a public service….

Sorry.  I digress.

Let’s take a look at some likely de-motivators that can create a wall between you and  completion:

Brick in the Wall part 1 – Burnout or Overexposure

I think the reason I hit the wall with my story is because I spent too much time on it. It isn’t hard to do. Musicians do this all the time. You can keep working on a song or book forever, supposedly making it “Better”. But after working on the same thing for an extended period you will eventually get sick of it, like eating the same meal for lunch every day. Some people call this phenomenon “Burnout”.

If you run into Burnout or Overexposure, the cure is to minimize contact with your own work. Limit the amount of time that you allow yourself to work on a piece. (Especially the duration measured in weeks/months.) Put it away for a while and work on another section or better yet, another story.  Lock it away for a while, and come back to it later with a clearer mind and fresher eyes. Then, give yourself a deadline for completion. If you are your own publisher, start acting like it and make some deadlines and hold your author (yourself) accountable.

Brick in the Wall part 2 – Unhealthy Comparisons

What really lit my fuse was reading another author’s work that was an example of really good and inspiring writing. Then I read my own work…yikes! Nothing will taint your own work like comparing it to someone else’s professionally edited  (and proofread, and published, and bestselling… you get the idea) book.

To avoid this scenario, avoid comparing the perceived ‘quality’ of your work to the work of other authors. This is the ‘grass is always greener on the other side of the fence’ dilemma. It may be better than yours, it may not, but the fact that you’ll never write like someone else also implies that no one else can write like you. No one else can write your story but you. Know that when you’re done, someone else is going to look at your story and feel bad about their own. But this won’t happen if you don’t finish it!

Brick in the Wall part 3 – The Fear of Completion

One type of wall you might hit is the Fear of Failure disguised as Fear of Completion. This can make you doubt if not outright sabotage your own efforts, especially if it happens when your story is nearly finished. If you never complete the book, then it never gets judged. If you pre-emptively judge it as ’sucky’ and never release it, it spares you the possibility that anyone else might judge it as ’sucky’. It’s the same philosophy of people who don’t enter contests. They don’t want to lose, and if they don’t play, then they don’t lose, right?

Wrong.

To overcome this version of the wall, you have to change the definition of failure, and make it work in your favor. Realize that failure = You Not releasing the best book that you can at this time and place in your writing career. Re-writing the same book over and over won’t help you to become a better writer. At some point, you are simply changing the book, and not making it better, you’re just wasting your time. You won’t get better if you don’t finish your work and get it out there. If you don’t complete it, you Lose. Or better – you’re a Loser until you complete it. Success isn’t releasing the best book ev-ar, it’s releasing your book as the author you are now. Don’t worry about making this book better than it is, make it the best you can right now, and get it behind you so you can grow. Then you can worry about making your next book better than this one. Continuing to release better and better books is how you progress as a writer.  If you can get this mindset, it will help you to overcome the fear of failure and motivate you to completion.

Tear Down The Wall!

The way out is through.

It was a huge relief for me to recognize The Wall for what it is. Both a fantastic album by Pink Floyd, and a step in the writing process.  Just the knowledge that others go through this phase (often enough that there’s a name for it) makes it more tolerable.  It isn’t just this story you’re working on, and it isn’t just you.

The Wall is a test.There’s ten thousand things that will get in the way of you writing a book. This is just one of those ten thousand things. A conflict for you to overcome the same way the hero in your story overcomes their conflict. One of the very first conflicts is getting started, and some people never get past that point. If you’re up to the point where you are having problems like hitting the wall and motivational block, be thankful because you have actually made it further than most people.

Remember, to breach the wall of motivation block you don’t need jump starts to your creativity, you don’t need to tickle the muse, what you need is motivation. There’s ten thousand places you can get it. Here’s just one.

Outside the Wall

My lighter didn’t work (lucky, eh?), and so my manuscript is safe. For now.

Realizing that others have this problem is a big help, and I hope I’ve helped other writers recognize this problem for what it is. If you have other suggestions on how to avoid, circumvent, pierce, penetrate, or otherwise ‘tear down the wall’, drop them in the comments section. Best of luck, and I’ll see you on the other side.

Yours,

-Zero

Blood Hollow came as a recommendation from an employee at Rebild and Romain Booksellers (Formerly JJ O’donoghue Books) in Anoka. The helpful person working there suggested that William Kent Krueger is one of the best crime fiction writers in Minnesota. That’s high praise from someone who works at a bookstore, so I gave Blood Hollow a shot.

Mr. Krueger’s pedigree looks really good. (If he were a dog, he’d be worth a lot.) He’s a local guy with plenty of novels under his belt, and enough awards to make me puke jealous. He’s also a member of Minnesota Crime Wave.

Full Disclosure

I won’t lie to you. Crime Fiction ain’t really my genre. This would be me taking a distinct break from Horror/Fantasy. So I went into this book quite cold to partly, with a high chance of low expectations. From the cover copy, I was taken more by the location (of both the story and the author) than the genre. I was also interested in reading a book which won an Anthony Award, was nominated for Minnesota Book Award and got tons of great reviews in the press.

Cover Copy

When the corpse of a teenage girl is discovered on a hillside three months after her disappearance on New Year’s Eve, all evidence points to her boyfriend, Solemn Winter Moon. Despite Solemn’s self-incriminating decision to go into hiding, Cork O’Connor, Aurora’s part-Irish, part-Ojibwe former sheriff, isn’t about to hang the crime on the kid, whom O’Connor is convinced is innocent. In an uphill battle to clear Solemn’s name, Cork encounters no shortage of adversity. Some he knows all too well—small-town bigotry and bureaucracy foremost among them. What Cork isn’t prepared for is the emergence of a long-held resentment hailing from his own childhood. And when Solemn reappears, claiming to have seen a vision of Jesus Christ in Blood Hollow, the mystery becomes thornier than Cork could ever have anticipated. And that’s when the miracles start happening…

The Good

The writing was very good. Enough description to get you into the story, but not so much that it slows the story down. Good pacing. Great phrases like a sky “…the color of an old nickel.” Read the first two chapters and you will be able to feel the cold of a Minnesota snowstorm.

The location was perfect. For those who enjoyed the movie Fargo, this story has the same ’small town’ feel to it. Everybody knows everybody. The characters, scenery descriptions and little details (McCullough Chain Saw, Sorel Boots, Minnetonka Moccasins, etc…) made me realize that William Kent Krueger isn’t just a visitor here. He knows this place, and he does a good job of transporting the reader there.

He also does a great job with his portrayal of the Ojibwe culture. Blood Hollow includes plenty of the Ojibwe language and customs. I can vouch for his accuracy, as I have family who are Ojibwe and live on the rez in Minnesota . Very well done. I wanted more!

Mr. Krueger has a knack for names. There were plenty of characters, but I never got them mixed up (Hey, JRR Tolkien, are you listening? Sauron/Saruman ring a bell? Oh wait, he’s dead. Sorry.) The protagonist’s name is “Cork” and there’s a “Solemn Winter Moon” and “Dot”… the list goes on.  The last names of the townsfolk were particularly Minn-ee-soh-ten. “Soderberg”? I went to school with some Soderbergs…

The dynamics of the character relations were well done. The underlying tone of mistrust and prejudice between the townsfolk and the Ojibwe was a nice flavor. The miracles that occur and the problems they cause for the town add plenty of spice to the story.

The Bad

The plot was C.S.I. Aurora, MN. By that I mean linear, with the most meager of subplots. The entire storyline is a series of introducing new evidence pointing at a character as a potential suspect, then further investigation eliminates them as a suspect, and repeat until you swear that everyone in the whole town was involved and has some secret to hide.

This isn’t a mystery you will be figuring out on your own, the clues simply aren’t there. I read it passively, and tried not to guess where the story would go. I was just along for the ride, which I think you’ll find more enjoyable than the frustration of trying to solve the mystery before Cork does. Those looking for a Northwoods Sherlock Holmes story will be disappointed.

Cork O’Connor isn’t particular memorable for a main character. He has NO distinctive traits, and his family life is pretty emotionally sterile. He’s a bit like Sam Spade, only “over medium” instead of “hard boiled” and without the internal monologue. Cork is stoic, hard to read, and he goes light on the action. He’s an all-around-good-guy, and I mean that in a bad way. He needs a bad habit, or a patch over one eye, or a mysterious past that haunts him, or something to give him some depth.

The Upshot

Blood Hollow is a well-written, fast-paced crime story that takes place in a small mining range town in the northwoods of Minnesota. The story is flavored with small-town prejudice, miracles, and Ojibwe Culture. Light on the action and heavy on the investigation. Cross “Fargo” with “CSI” and you’re on the trail of a good read from a well-read author.

-Zero

As mentioned in a previous post, I’ve joined forces with MNSpec – the Speculative Fiction writers group. For July’s writing review, I entered the short story “Yellow King” – a prequel which introduces the characters and mythos of my upcoming novel, “The Demonslayer’s Handbook”.

The writer’s group met last Sunday and I was one of five authors on the critique hot-seat. If I learned one thing, it’s that getting honest criticism of your work is awkward. And sifting out good criticism from bad is difficult.

Wait, that’s two things I learned.

Actually, I learned a lot.

A Kick in the Balls… or not?

Opinions differed about many aspects of my story, but none as interesting as the division of opinions about our hero Nix kicking some jerk in the balls. There seemed to be no middle ground on this one. Half the group felt it was cliche and trite. The other half thought it was completely understandable and in-character.

My reasoning behind writing the kick-in-the-balls scene:

• I needed to disable the jerk character, and make sure he didn’t leave the scene, or put up resistance.
• It helps define the hero’s attitude.
• The hero needed a vehicle to make a hasty getaway. After kicking said jerk in the balls, the hero takes his keys.

Kicking him in the balls accomplishes these goals swimmingly, and has the following added bonus features:

• Most people know the effects of kicking someone in the balls (even those who haven’t experienced it firsthand) making it a very efficient narrative. One sentence conveys it all.
• It adds a touch of comic relief.
• It insinuates some sexual domination of the hero over the jerk.

The major drawback is that enough people (almost 50%) felt it was cliche enough to mention so in the critique. The majority of those who thought kicking a guy in the balls was cliche were women. Then again, the majority of the members of the MNSpec critique group were women.  I’ll let you make your own inferences.

I’ve decided that I’ll see if I can write up an action that disables the jerk, defines the hero,  and doesn’t take up much real estate in the story… without the cliche kick to the scrotum.

Inject the Venom… or not?

Another discussion that ensued was about our Hero ending an argument with her friend by injecting him with a drug that makes him pass out.  Some found this action impossible to justify, and some had no problem with it.

The argument was very similar to the argument about the hero kicking someone in the balls. Those against the action said that it was unnecessary – the hero could simply leave of her own accord. She’s an adult and doesn’t need to knock out this other character and run away. It was labeled ‘aggressively passive-aggressive’ behavior. Although like I said, some people thought it worked just fine.

In this case, I’d have to agree with voting it off the island. It was quick and easy to write. Simpler and faster to dodge the issue than talk about it at length.  I’ll change it, but I’m not exactly thrilled. Why? Because I’m writing an action/adventure story, not a fucking Throap like…

…Buffy The Vampire Slayer

It’s bound to happen.  Write a story about a kick-ass heroine, and the comparisons spew out like beer at a Nascar rally:

• Underworld
• Tomb Raider
• Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter
• V.I. Warshawski
• Buffy The Vampire Slayer
• Know more? Add them to the comments.

Alright, no one really compared my story to V.I. Warshawski. But I learned that I dislike my work being compared to hack TV shows that I’ve never seen. I guess if the genre is popular enough to be lumped into, then there must be a hell of a market.

I suspect that no matter what genre you write in (or what art you create for that matter) there will always be those who have to lump it in with all similar works. Guess I just need to get used to it.

Other Wisdoms

There were some things that everyone agreed on. They liked the pacing. They liked the fight scenes, even people who admitted they didn’t ordinarily like fight scenes, which I took as high praise. They all liked the description of the abandoned medical facility. Everyone liked the main character, Nix.

There were unanimous #EpicFails. Not searching characters for weapons once they are captured is a faux pas. Having weapons easily accessible; ditto. Handily-placed-syringes-labeled-in-the-Queen’s-English is frowned upon.

I don’t agree with all the critiques. Someone said that in a short story I should only have one thing blowing up in a fiery ball of fire and probably not at the start of the story. Obviously, this person has never seen a Michael Bay film.

Someone mockingly pointed out my instances of “Purple Prose” meaning phrases that are, “sensually evocative beyond the requirements of its context”. Point taken, and I appreciate the observation, if not the tone, which was a bit purple itself. I’m trying to take all criticism with a pound of salt, but my editor Sue might be right – she tells me that writers are cursed with terribly thin skin.

One suggestion was for me to ditch the fight scene at the beginning and start several pages into the existing story, with our main character in motion. I might do just that because it makes good sense for the work by itself. I have to remember that it’s detached from the full work. Once the short story becomes integrated into the full work (possibly in a later edition) I’ll likely add the fight scene back in. It means I have to rework the motivation for our hero to leave home.

The biggest praise came from the group organizer Hillary, who said I should try to sell the story before releasing it on the internet for free. I was surprised that anyone thought it worthy of publication. Another person said it had a “pulp sensibility” which I’ll take as a complement.

All in all, there’s plenty of resource in the massive stack of sequoia-killing redlined manuscripts I brought home from the group critique. I’ll rewrite “Yellow King” and pass it along to an editor, then release it for FREE either later this year or early in 2010. Those who are interested in reading it should sign up for the newsletter, or keep checking back here on the blog – you’ll be the first to know.

Yours Darkly,
Conrad Zero

In part one of this series on Audience Entitlement, we discovered that the author does not work for the audience.

In part two, I pointed out that the audience doesn’t have to take any crap from the author. (That’s what I’m here for. My amazing perception of the obvious.)

Now, let’s put these two parts together and find out, Will It Blend?

The Golden Rule

I listed “Honesty” and “Respect” as two things the audience can reasonably expect from an author. These are fluffy terms, and difficult to measure. In some cases, only the author knows if they are being honest or not. And there’s always some sum-bich who has to push the envelope. Who’s to say that intentionally leaving the third book out of a series couldn’t be Honestly and Respectfully done, if that’s the artist’s intention?

Plenty of gray area for us to all fight over, but the concept boils down to this:

Regarding the Audience/Author relationship, the best rule of thumb is The Golden Rule, which works in both directions. The author should respect the audience, and the audience should respect the author.

The Solution to Incomplete Series Malaise

Taking this discussion back to the original post by Neil Gaiman, the issue of audience entitlement was brought up regarding the phenomenon I titled “Incomplete Series Malaise”.

The problem summarized, is that the audience wants the next book in the series but the author isn’t working on it, or isn’t working on it as quickly as members of the audience would like.

For the author to simply say “I’m not your bitch” and leave it at that is disrespectful. The audience will say, “I’m not your bitch either,” and then see how many curses about you they can fit into a 140-character twitter post. Sadly this is where Mr. Gaiman left the matter hang, when I believe he is only half right.  I say that because the  solution to Incomplete Series Malaise comes in two parts:

If the audience respects the author, they won’t make demands.

When a member of the audience begins reading a series, they should not have any expectation of due dates or even of completion, except for what the author communicates. The audience can be as excited and enthusiastic as they want, and while they have every right to ask when the next book will be done, they have NO RIGHT to demand the next book in a series, or to get pissed off if it isn’t getting done when they’d like.

Audiences, if you can’t handle this, then don’t read a series until it’s complete. The author is not your bitch.

If the author respects his/her audience, he/she will tell them when the next book in the series is expected to be finished.

This is the part that I think Mr. Gaiman missed. True, the author does not work for the audience, but an author who does not at least have some respect for thieir audience doesn’t deserve one.

The wise author would have information about book release dates at a webpage/FAQ/blog post where excited fans can be directed. This is the official “I know, I got it, I already answered that, and you can find the official answer here…”

Authors, if you can’t handle this, then don’t write a series. Its disrespectful to the audience, and they are not your bitch.

And So On…

We can extend this simple solution out to ten-thousand other areas of the author/audience relationship. For example, social media responsiveness, web presence, the author’s right to privacy…

When I boil the whole thing down like this, it seems like the “Can’t we all just get along?” solution. And it is. You’d think we wouldn’t need this bit of common sense pointed out to us, but all it takes is one dickhead with a twitter account or an introverted author [Editor's Note: Aren't they all?] to ruin it for the rest of us.

So, when the inevitable happens, and you see authors/audiences getting into a pissing match, feel free to link them here for a dose of common sense.* And if you have any other applications for this bit of wisdom, feel free to leave a comment…

-Zero

*Except for me, naturally. Point me back to this post and I will totally fuck you up.

The Devil’s Advocate

It’s clear from my previous post in this series on Audience Entitlement that I’m in agreement with Neil Gaiman – the author does not work for the audience.  Or as Mr. Gaiman puts it, “the author is not the audience’s bitch”.

However, a career in writing wouldn’t be possible without an audience.  So we can also say that an author who doesn’t work for an audience… probably won’t have one. So let’s play Devil’s Advocate, turn this discussion on its head, and say the following is also true:

The audience is not the author’s bitch

Think about it – the audience doesn’t have to put up with an author who doesn’t give them what they want.

So am I playing both sides by saying the author doesn’t work for the audience, but still owes them something? Not necessarily. I’m saying the author doesn’t work for the audience, but if they want to have an audience, they can’t really tell them to go screw themselves. We could call this ‘good business sense’ or ‘common courtesy’, but for sake of this article, lets call it a ‘voluntary obligation’. It’s also a conditional obligation: IF the author wants to grow/keep an audience, THEN they have some obligations to the audience, but what are they?

What obligations should an author have to their audience? What can an audience reasonably expect from an author?

We could list a million things, and six billion people would still disagree. You can’t please everyone. Everything the author does is going to piss some people off. (This includes doing nothing at all!) But I think the essence of what the author owes to the audience can be nicely summed up in two words: Honesty and Respect.

Honesty

The first element the author owes to their audience, their publishers, and themselves, is Honesty. Being true to the story. This could be harder than it sounds, and overlaps the terrain known as “artistic integrity”, a topic I’ll post on later.

Honesty is easier to point out when it’s missing, so I’ve compiled a list of  dishonest practices I see from authors and their publishers.

Contractual Obligation: You know of what I speak – books that smack of  ‘time and money are running out, so I better get this done’.  Authors  who sign a multi-book contract and lose heart in the middle of the series.  (You know who you are, and so do we). The result? Lame plots and wooden characters in situations that the readers think they could have written better themselves. They’re probably right. Preposterous Leaps of Faith that don’t require you to simply suspend your disbelief, you actually have to tie it up in the woodshed.

Of course, it could just be shitty writing. Sometimes it’s hard to tell, but you won’t have to read much to find obvious cases of Contractual Obligation Writing. Especially when the author squawks online about their jaded experience. (Feel free to name-drop in the comments section.)

Bestseller Knock-Offs: Anyone else sick of all the Twilight book cover knock-offs? It’s sad and obvious when authors try to cash in on the latest bestseller. “If you liked Harry Potter, then you’ll Love this!!!” I doubt it because I’m not likely to read your cut-n-paste adventure.

Misleading Covers and Cover Copy: Similar to the Bestseller knockoffs, there’s books with covers and copy text that has NOTHING to do with the story inside, which makes you think the printer got the book covers mixed up.

Genre Stretching: How about people stretching the limits of the story’s genre just so they can get into the Genre Of The Month Club? Imagine picking up a Paranormal Romance, and discovering that the “Romance” is the kiss the hero gave his wife on page 3 before going off to battle demons for the next 397 blood-soaked pages?

Given, some of these problems are choices made by the publisher, but they reflect back on the author, coloring him/her dishonest.

There’s more examples of dishonesty I could throw out there (and feel free to add your favorites in the comments below) but I think I’ve made my point. Even if authors don’t care about their audience, their writing will be better overall, and their writing careers will be more substantial if they remain honest and true to the story, themselves, and their audience. Please don’t fake it, the audience isn’t stupid and they aren’t your bitch.

Respect

If Honesty is a fluffy term, then defining Respect is as difficult as nailing down cigarette smoke. Respect has less to do with the writing itself and more to do with the way the author conducts him/her self in public and in communications with others. I’d say Honesty relates more to what is said, and Respect relates more to how it’s said.

Once again, the effects are easier to see if they are lacking, so let’s take a look at some authors methods of being disrespectful to their audience.

Lateness: I don’t get to badger anyone about this one, since I was born two hours late and never caught up to the rest of the world. Turning in a manuscript late to the publisher, showing up late for meetings, interviews, webchats, etc. is disrespectful. Nuff’ said.

Rudeness:  Examples of author rudeness abound, but most are seen on the social networks, where replies aren’t as likely to be thought out before they are sent. Twitter, bulletin boards, comments, and e-mail replies are all fertile ground for snarky rebuttals and flaming.

Another example of rudeness is No Reply At All. I can’t tell you how many e-mails I’ve sent to midlist authors (that’s right, writers whose very paychecks are dependent on word of mouth) and I never received a reply. If you’ve got so much e-mail that you can’t keep up with it, then you have a problem that a LOT of authors wish they had.

Combatting Disrespect with Disrespect: This is a variant of Rudeness and I bring it up only because I’ve seen it happen firsthand.  This could be an area where Honesty and Respect are mutually exclusive. If you Honestly feel justified in disrespecting someone then to be Respectful would be Dishonest… That’s a no-win situation, and I guess you just have to pick one and live with it. (Like cell phone providers.)

If Trent Reznor wants to tell his fans to fuck off that’s his prerogative, but it isn’t terribly respectful. Trent chose to be honest to himself and disrepectful to certain members of his audience. This isn’t the best choice for everyone, but it’s the choice I made (in case you think I’m disrespectful for having swear words in my blog post.)

The Story So Far (for those too busy to read this ungodly-long blog post)

1 -The audience is not the authors bitch.

2- The author is not the audience’s bitch.

3 – Authors don’t HAVE to be Honest or Respectful to their audience. If they want to Lie, Cheat, Deceive and Swindle their audience they certainly can. But if they were any good at these things, running for political office pays better, and is a lot less work.

4- Authors who want to grow and keep an audience would do well to practice some Honesty and Respect.

The third (and last) post in this series on Audience Entitlement will reconcile these points into a Harmonic Convergence of Utopian Author/Audience Relationship Nirvana. I will become the Author/Audience Relationship Guru and go on Oprah. So, stay tuned…

-Zero

For those who don’t know, the 48-Hour Film Project (Sometimes called the 48-Hour Film Festival) is a contest where teams compete to create a 4-7 minute movie in only 48 hours. That includes concept and writing of the script, casting, traveling, directing, shooting, editing, scoring, post-production, and burning a DVD copy to deliver to the dropoff point.  It’s not easy, even with a large team of people. There isn’t much time for luxuries like eating, sleeping or ADR. You can learn more at the website: www.48hourfilm.com, and you can also search for #48HFP on twitter.

The movie genre is drawn randomly for each team. We drew ‘Horror’. There is a prop, character and line of dialog required in all the movie entries. This year, the prop was a sandwich, the character was Karen or Kevin Schnabel, an Expert and the required line of dialog was “I hope they decide soon.”

Christina and I have participated in the 48-Hour Film Project for several years. The group we worked with in previous years decided to take a break this year, so Christina and I decided to try by ourselves. Christina Produced and Directed the video. Together we wrote the script and edited the video.  I also got about an hour to add music score and sound FX. (Like I said, not much time for luxuries!) I also make a cameo in the film as the enigmatic Kevin Schnabel.

It was a lot of work for two people! But we did have some help. Jessica Mallon volunteered to be our starlet, appearing in the film as Karen Carlson. Reid Rejsa did some post-production audio mixing and mastering. Both of them did a fantastic job. Thanks much to Jess and Reid for all their help!

I attended the screening of the films selected by judges as the “Best Of” and after the screening, they listed the award winners for ‘Best Picture’ and such. There were a lot of really great movies this year, and all the awards were well-deserved. It was also nice to see the creator of the event, Mark Ruppert, come out to flyover land and oversee the showing and awards, and congratulate the winners personally.

Our entry was titled “Locked”. It didn’t win any awards, but that was never our goal. We had a great time, learned a lot, and completed the project on time. We made a video in 48 hours that stood its ground against the other entries. In that respect, our movie was highly successful.

You can view “Locked” here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVtHBqK-45Q Feel free to rate and comment on the movie!

-Zero

The Dark Tower Fiasco (aka: Incomplete Series Malaise)

Neil Gaiman posted on his blog recently on the topic of Audience Entitlement

A fan named Gareth, irate at the author of a series in progress, wishes that the author would hurry up and get the next book in the series out the door. Gareth asks “…what responsibility does he have to finish the story?”.

Have you been there? I know I have. I remember just settling into Stephen King’s ‘Dark Tower’ series when King took a break from writing it to pursue other projects. I thought to myself, “What happens now if he gets hit by a car?”

He did.  Thankfully it didn’t stop him from finishing the series, but it certainly stopped me from ever starting on a series that wasn’t completed – a situation I called “The Dark Tower Fiasco”, but we can also call it a more generic term: “Incomplete Series Malaise.”

Mr. Gaiman lists “life” as one of the things that can get in the way of deadlines, but “death” can too. There’s plenty of other reasons books in a series might *never* get published. An author’s imprisonment, career change, drug rehab, spiritual awakening or legal issues can leave an unfinished series unfinished forever.

Audience Expectations vs the Fickle Muse

So what’s the answer to Garth’s question? What responsibility does an author have to their audience, (even to the *world*) to finish the series?

Mr Gaiman answers in no uncertain terms: The author does not work for you.. Actually, that’s only partly true. He said:

The author is not your bitch.

And I agree.

Despite my own frustration at the large pause in the Dark Tower series,  it never occurred to me to get upset at the author. Any author/artist/musician can tell you the creative spirit which possesses them is fickle. Force it and it seems…forced.

I’d rather that Stephen King take a break if he’s burned out. I’d rather he shifted gears if that’s what he needs to do. Because if you really want to write a crappy story, simply write one you don’t want to write. And if the author’s heart NEVER comes back to finish the series or the genre or even if the author never writes again… that’s the way it is, and I’d imagine the author is far more disappointed about it than any fan would ever be.

How the Multi Book Publishing Deal is not helping…

Aggravating the issue is the fact that both authors and publishers LOVE to work the series. They layer multi-book-deal upon multi-book-deal with no end in site, treating their works like a television show. Laurell K Hamilton, Jim Butcher and many others have made multi-multi book deals, and who could blame them? Multi-book deals are a security blanket for authors who normally live from book to book.

Given, some writers will write books in their series as separated tales in the same universe. This is how I approach it myself with the Demonslayer’s Handbook, but some writers are pumping out  a 1,200 page epic saga and parsing it out over three or four books, and publishers (and fans) are eating it up. This is only going to make Incomplete Series Malaise more common.

What to do when an author gives you ‘Incomplete Series Malaise’

It’s difficult when the author takes a break from a series you really love, and begins working on other things, but just keep in mind that there’s plenty of other people in the author’s life/career who want other things from her/him. (The publisher being one of them; an obligation I’ll discuss in a future post)

Because of these practices and my own experience with the Dark Tower Fiasco, I vowed not to start reading a series until the author is one or more of the following:

• Finished with the series
• Dead

I’ll catch the finished version when it’s actually finished. Like Mr. Gaiman said, there are plenty of other books to occupy you in the meantime.

But what else can be done? What if you get sucked into a series and you simply cannot wait one more day for the next book? (I think this is why Scott Sigler calls his fans “junkies”…) I think the best thing you can to to help motivate the author is to tell her/him how much you love the series. Threatening might work.  (Read “Misery” by Stephen King.) Bribery might work, but I wouldn’t count on it.

Sorry if that’s cold council, but this is the danger of getting hooked into an unfinished series. You have to keep in mind that the author does not work for you. The author can’t please everyone, and you are part of that everyone.

In the next post on this topic, I’ll turn the discussion around and we’ll see how what the author *does* owe to the audience...