Comments for Shakespeare I Ain't

Comment on When you divorce online with a less successful writing career by cyndy

cyndy — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 10:04:47 +0000

The entanglements are the funniest part, JP. While I initially unfriended the ex immediately, I left his family on networks like Facebook, figuring they played no part in our break-up. But I quickly found they reported back any little thing I did, as well as who I was with, and I was forced to unfriend them, to their great consternation. Maybe 20 years from now, navigating these waters will be as commonplace as dividing up community record collections, but it’s still so new, I think there’s going to be a steep learning curve.

Comment on When you divorce online with a less successful writing career by James

James — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 09:34:00 +0000

What sometimes gets lost in all our (completely appropriate) concern about privacy and the lack thereof in online networks is the behavior of people who abuse those networks. While it doesn’t take much to recognize many clearly inappropriate uses of social networks, these networks haven’t been around very long. A picture of what an internet creep is still has some fuzzy edges. But I think we can know it when we see it by the effect it has on the victims of such creepery. And many inappropriate behaviors also have an offline analog that makes it easier to comprehend.

But it’s not just behavior that’s a problem. The entanglements of divorce shine a light on the effect social network participation can have on a person’s life. This combinaion of factors should not be a sentence of solitary electronic confinement for a divorced person in an age where many of our meaningful and rewarding interactions happen in the digial/social realm.

We, as a society, are going to have to figure this one out.

Comment on When you divorce online with a less successful writing career by cyndy

cyndy — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 01:52:46 +0000

Thank you, Jane! It was a pleasure getting to know you, Sunita, and the other panelists as well. Doing the panel was actually freeing; four years of hiding suddenly gone in an instant for me. It does make me feel like I have to constantly defend my writing, however, until I sell something, and if I never do… I’ll always be defending.

Comment on When you divorce online with a less successful writing career by Jane Davitt

Jane Davitt — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 00:28:52 +0000

I’m still horrified that he could use your writing against you. I admire your courage in speaking out during the panel discussion and it was a pleasure to meet you.

Comment on On coming clean and on That Book by Kassiah

Kassiah — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 03:55:38 +0000

I’m proud of you for this, and thank you for putting into words what I can’t articulate. I think she knows she couldn’t do it on her own. I know you can. xo

Comment on Middle Grade is from Mars; Young Adult is from Venus by Stacy

Stacy — Tue, 13 Mar 2012 19:19:25 +0000

You know, I hadn’t thought about this, but you’re right. I haven’t been looking for YA books for my oldest yet, but that’s just around the corner. Off the top of my head, I think that perhaps Scott Westerfeld is a good bet for YA books for boys, though ymmv.

Comment on Oh, AP, why must you make me hate you so? by Antof9

Antof9 — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 18:11:29 +0000

Amen, sister!

Comment on What’s the real story with self-publishing? by Tiffany N. York

Tiffany N. York — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 23:02:34 +0000

The more I learn about self-publishing the more I agree with you when you say that a lot of the success of self-pubbed authors depends on how much backlist they have to offer.

If they’ve been traditionally published before, then they already have that built-in fan base.

If they’re like Hocking, she had I think 5-6 completed novels to be able to offer folks when they became interested in her.

Self-pubbing is def not for everyone, and I think you must do a fair amount of self-promotion, despite what some say.

As for Marshall, he only said aloud what all of us think anyway. Someone will probably end up making a movie about him!

Comment on What’s the real story with self-publishing? by cyndy

cyndy — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 22:56:21 +0000

Agreed. And as I was discussing with Dan Friedman and Andrew Schaffer on Twitter, for those who are still in genres (and writing books) that would go HC to paperback, then traditional undoubtedly still makes sense. Note that I have zero desire to self-publish myself.

But if I were writing romance? I honestly don’t think I’d put myself through the angst of trying to go traditional. I think that the business itself is soul-crushing, and if I were in a genre where it made sense to just write, have it edited, and send it out into the world where readers would find it, I think that would bring a lot of the joy back into the process instead of writing knowing that in a lot of instances, you may never find representation, and in a lot of cases, you aren’t even being rejected by an agent, but by an intern.

The layers of complexity that have been put in place were designed to weed out all but the best, but because publishing has not kept up with the ease and simplicity of everything, what it does is weed out all but the most tenacious. I’m willing to bet that there are many very talented writers who are no longer willing to deal with the system, or who discover, like Mr. Marshall, that it takes a tremendous amount of patience beyond that which you expect to have to use in “normal” business dealings, and don’t bother, and that’s a loss for everyone.

We have reached another tipping point, at which electronic publishing has become the second Gutenberg, and traditional publishing needs to shift to adapt, and quickly.

Comment on What’s the real story with self-publishing? by Lisa

Lisa — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 22:41:03 +0000

I should mention, too, that there are sensible advances in traditional publishing that are not the mega-bucks — there’s a middle ground where you are far more likely to earn out and earn royalties and given the percentages of really successful self-pubbers, you are probably still going to do better with a traditional publishing deal. I will have to do the math and see how many books I would have had to have sold self-published to make what I’ve made in my traditional deal. I have a feeling I am way better off where I am.

But as you point out, there are certain genres where, particularly if you already have a traditionally published reputation and available backlist, the self-pubbing option makes a lot of sense.