I’ve started this blog post several times, and my brain just hasn’t been up to it (or any post, obviously). And time hasn’t been on my side, either … I wrote “It’s been an interesting week”, and that line sat there for a few days, all alone. Then I changed it to “It’s been an interesting month.”
And it has been. It’s been an interesting month. On a global front there was a royal wedding (I know, that was in April, shush), Bin Laden was killed, and there was a prospective apocalypse last weekend. In the US, plenty has gone on (the moron governor of California, for example, and the perv from the IMF), culminating in a heartbreakingly brutal series of tornadoes in Missouri and states surrounding.
Closer to home, it’s also been interesting. This post started out handwritten in one of my notebooks on the ninth floor of the New Haven Superior Court building as I whiled away the day on jury duty. That’s another story… Suffice to say I told my sister what I had to do today and where, and the first word she said was, “Komisarjevsky.” I said “No! They picked the jury! Oh, crap, they need alternates…” And so they do. Badly, if this bastard’s partner’s trial is anything to go by; they blew through almost all the alternates on that one. My sister, as it turns out, was dead on: I spent part of this morning in the same room as evil. What a bizarre day. Again, that’s a whole ‘nother post.
Prior to today, the most interesting part of this month on a personal level was … well.
When I love something, I have a tendency to champion it, and once I realized it might mean something I started spreading my review around anywhere I could think of. A while back I bought a book called “The Essential Guide to Getting Your Book Published”, and one of the actually good pieces of advice was to create an online presence, so I started branching out into the groups on Goodreads.
I need to say here and now that there are a lot of people who have written something – story, book, blog, published or self-published – who are heeding this advice. My idea was to post here and there, now and there, to this one and that one (I just can’t stop quoting Harvey), and make some acquaintances, and then down the line when I have something of my own to talk about I can be diffident and say “Hey, you might be interested”. I was lucky; one of the reasons I haven’t been here as much as normal has been that I clicked with one community, with a loud click: Fantasy Afficionados. (Love ya, guys. I haven’t been part of something like this in years; it’s almost everything I’ve missed, the brilliant silliness and the kindred spirits, and while I’m doing my best to avoid all the pitfalls the Other Place had, I am enjoying myself. It feels good to be part of the group.) I will never be one of those people who joins a group, makes one post saying “Hi, I’m — and I have a book out please buy it.” I started out on Goodreads with no intentions of getting involved anywhere, but instead planned to just proceed with as little obnoxiousness as possible (as opposed to quite a few writers who don’t seem to realize they’re shooting themselves in the feet). I’ve found another online family.
Back on topic.
I don’t have anything to promote yet, obviously, but I thought I saw an opportunity to do a little bit for Adam Schell and Tomato Rhapsody
He wrote me back saying he had an idea, and could he call me.
My eyes went all wide, and I said sure.
Here I should say that at some point in conversation it had come up that I’m a Tolkien geek, and he told me that as a yoga teacher he has Orlando Bloom as a student. Once he threatened to call me next time they were together. (And immediately, I’m sure, forgot he said it, which is fine.) I’m not a Legolas girl, but I would still pass out cold … Anyway.
He called (Orliless), and said he had an experiment to propose. The short version is that he proposed that I take a little more time and do more of what I’ve already been doing, and try to spread the word of the book a bit more online, and see what kind of reaction I can spark in, say, a season. (He recognizes that it needs doing, but because of circumstances he’s working three jobs – AND his wife is expecting a baby in July.) Then, with results good or bad or indifferent, in the fall we will compile an article about the experiment, and pitch it to literary magazines – which is, seriously, a fantastic idea.
In return – wait for it – he will read give my book an “editorial pass-through” and, if he can do it with confidence (if he doesn’t hate it and think it’s birdcage liner), hand-walk it to his agent (who had nothing to do with the fiasco the book went through) and work to help me get it published.
All this because I wrote an honest positive review of his book two years ago.
Wow.
Now I just need to a) figure out what to do for him and b) finish my book.
Related articles
- What is a Goodreads Author? (debsanswers.wordpress.com)
- Are you a Goodreader? (lindacassidylewis.com)
Stewartry 