I spent the weekend in Florida, speaking with publishing professionals, editors of the books section of the local newspaper, and other writers. We, of course, all discussed the rise of the e-book and the change it will bring in the industry. But it was a discussion with a man not in the book industry that made me think.
I visited one afternoon with a writer friend whose husband sells high end merchandise. In particular, grand pianos. These beautiful musical instruments are costly, easily selling in the high five figures and above, and are geared to a wealthy clientele. We talked about how one ships the instruments, tunes them, and runs the stores that display them. He commented that not all the franchisees were profiting, especially in this current economic climate. When I asked him what advice he would have for a struggling franchisee he said:
"They should think about what the ideal piano store would look like, how it would function, who would be drawn to the store, and how one would provide stellar service. Then he should look at the stores in his control and strive to make them this way. Not in two years, not in six months, but in two weeks or shorter if humanly possible."
It wasn't until much later, on the flight home, that I got to thinking about what he said. What he seemed to be saying was: "visualize your ideal situation, then make it happen."
Except he was really saying something a bit more concrete. If one took his advice, one would have to not only analyze the store under their control, but then take the steps to make it happen.
It's the last part that writers often stumble upon. Dreaming of the ideal situation is easy and fun. Creating the manuscript that will make it happen requires dedication and time. In short, keep writing. The writer, whether faced with a hardcover, paperback, ipad, nook or kindle, needs to remember that she must make the story happen. Without that story, the career doesn't exist. Without it, all the marketing in the world will not provide long term sales.
And isn't that the best part anyway? The creation? It's a magical thing that all writers love to do.
I'm in the middle of THE FINDER, by Colin Harrison. It's probably the third or fourth of his I've read, and every time I pick one up, I remember how much I love his stuff. He's a terrific stylist who draws psychologically sophisticated characters, people I not only believe in, but understand, dirt and all. He also tends to drop shattering observations almost as side notes, many of which on their own would be worth the price of admission.
And yet I don't feel like enough people know about him.
Harrison is a bestseller, so I'm not singing a sad song about a genius laboring in obscurity. But despite that, he's one of those writers whose names don't seem to come up as often as they should given the caliber of the work.
Don Winslow is another. This guy is a writer's writer. His prose is lean, powerful, stylish, and exciting. THE POWER OF THE DOG is flat-out terrific, like James Ellroy if Ellroy liked people. (I love Ellroy's work, by the way; I just think he's a misanthrope, and I doubt he'd disagree.)
Again, Winslow sells very well, and there have been awards lately and films in the works. I'm not suggesting he isn't doing beautifully. It's just that there seem to be a handful of names that take up most of the oxygen in this genre.
Which led me to wondering--who else am I missing that I really should read? What authors would you guys throw out that fit this category?
I frequently teach a workshop course entitled "Secrets to Getting Published"; I'm actually slated to teach it this July at the Midwest Writers Workshop, along with fellow Outfiteer Sean Chercover. If you're an aspiring writer, we'd certainly love to see you.
Anyway, though the title is obviously calculated for appeal, I have found that a lot of the things I present actually do seem like secrets to people. Sometimes that's because there's a dearth of information on the subject; sometimes it's because the existing information is out-dated or misleading.
So in that spirit, here are a couple of tips to bear in mind if you're trying to get published.
First, finish the book. I mean really finish it, which means getting feedback from a bunch of people, tearing it apart, putting it back together, repeating that as necessary, then revising, and then editing, and then polishing. It's not done until it shines.
But once it does, the next step is to look for an agent. You're not looking for an editor--they don't read unsolicited work these days--and I don't recommend self-publishing. While there are of course a handful of exceptions to every rule, for the most part self-publishing is disdained by the industry, and is also a really tough way to make a buck.
To find an agent, you first need to figure out who to approach. Go to your local library or bookstore and start checking the acknowledgments in books similar to your own. The best way to find an agent who will do well with your work is to find agents who are already doing well with work like yours.
Next, write a query letter. I have an extremely detailed article on how to do that on my website. In essence, it comes down to this: seduce the agent. Don't get bogged down in details, don't include that which has no place, and above all, make sure you're grabbing hold of their jugular. A good query should make an agent desperate to read the book before someone else scoops it up.
Send out a batch of these, then start working on your next book. As the rejections come in, have a beer, send out another batch. Then get back to your book.
In truth, this is the heart of the "secret" of getting published: present yourself professionally, demonstrate that you have knowledge of the industry, and then get back to your next book.
For all the talk of self-promotion, of marketing, of the rise of e-books and the importance of networking and the changing face of publishing, one element remains central. There is one element over which you have absolute control. And one thing that has to be your focus above all else.
Your novel.
For a far, far more detailed version of the query process, as well as a lot of other tips I've discovered, check out my website. Or come to Muncie this July and join Sean and I at the Midwest Writers Workshop--we'd love to see you.
That seems to be the question. The answers to who should e-publish, who should retain rights, and how much ebooks should cost has dominated the conversation in the publishing industry for over a year now. Moreover, the spin-off issues that have evolved threaten to shake up the way authors and publishers do business. Not surprisingly, in some quarters the conversation has turned shrill. Even misleading, as friend-of-the-Outfit and uber-Kindler Joe Konrath discovered.
What isn’t misleading, though, is the effect ebooks are having. In 10 years it’s estimated that over 30% of all books sold will be in digital formats. That’s a lot of books. For authors, it presents an unprecedented opportunity to take our work directly to readers without spending a lot of money or time. No middle men, no publishers, no limitations. If you have the rights to your backlist, going-e is a terrific way to give those titles new life. And if you (or your agent) can manage to keep those rights as you continue to publish, you'll find that royalties accrue instantly, with nothing held in reserve.
Not bad... But...
Unfortunately, I’m a proponent of the “other shoe theory of life.” So following is kind of a reality check, at least on ebooks. Don’t get me wrong. All of my novels and other work are on Kindle and some are on Smashwords (more about that in another post), and I will continue to make them available.
But it’s important to note that your mileage may vary. In several ways.
First, the money. You’ve no doubt heard the six-figure income Joe’s on tap to reap from publishing his books on Kindle. But Joe is an anomaly. My books sell, but nowhere near his level. Joe has “broken through” the e-universe, and deservedly so. There is no one who has worked harder to promote himself and his “platform” although he disagrees. (I hate the word "platform," btw.) Remember the 500 bookstore tour? The library promotion? His My Space page? He has thousands of followers. He has reach. He’s versatile, and he tells a great story. But what about the rest of us? I’m not so sure.
Second, and this is more a theory than fact, it seems to me that a significant chunk of Kindlers and ebookers are younger, hipper, i-Phone-ish readers whose attention spans are –um— just a tad imperfect. Is what I write going to be of interest to them? Will they stick with it? I don’t know. Notwithstanding Harry Potter and Twilight, the number of fiction readers keeps declining, so the challenge becomes one of appeal. The ebook authors who can stay relevant to hipper, more wired readers will have more success. Unfortunately, that won't be all of us.
But here’s my biggest concern. If you’ve been paying attention, you already know that B&N, and now Apple ,among others, have created divisions for self-publishing ebooks. The floodgates are about to open, and the ebook market is going to be a vast sea of self-published work.
Theoretically, we midlist authors who have been previously published should have an advantage. We have been vetted. We have been edited. Publishers stand behind us. But how are we going to get that message out? What kind of filters will be in place to differentiate our work from work that hasn’t been vetted? Will anyone pay any attention? I don’t know.
Those are my worries. But there's good news too.
Despite the fact that publishing is contracting and going digital, there are several emerging trends that are positive for midlist authors. One of them is described in this article about the collaboration between a midlist author and a small publisher. Whether you’re publishing in print or ebook or both, I thought this was a clever way for both author and publisher to survive in today’s market. There are other MOs out there, as described here that new authors are using to get their work out.
I hope we’ll see more of these innovations. It's clear the industry is changing, and that's good. It will force authors to become better businesspeople, give us more control over their careers, and hopefully make publishers more accountable.
One of the best days of a novelist's year is the one we print out the finished book. It's great fun the first time you finish, but it's all the sweeter after you've revised it, sent it to your editor and agent, listened to their notes, wrestled with the changes they suggest--which always improve the quality of the work, but that's not the same as saying they're fun--revised it again, and, finally, printed it again.
For me, yesterday was that day. Book the Fifth, tentatively titled FADE OUT, is sitting on my kitchen table, markered up with polishes and minor changes and notes. I've got a couple more days of work on it, and then I'll send it off.
In celebration, I thought I'd post the first few pages. I've not shared it publicly before--hope you enjoy.
---
He was naked and cold, stiff with it, his veins ice and frost.Muscles carved hard, skin rippled with goosebumps, tendons drawn tight, body scraped and shivering.Something rolled over his legs, velvet soft and shocking.He gasped and pulled seawater into his lungs, the salt scouring his throat.Gagging, he pushed forward, scrabbling at dark stones.The ocean tugged, but he fought the last ragged feet crawling like a child.
As the wave receded it drew pebbles rattling across each other like bones, like dice, like static.A seagull shrieked its loneliness.
His lungs burned, and he leaned on his elbows and retched, face down, liquid pouring in ropes from open mouth, salt water and stomach acid.A lot, and then less, and finally he could spit the last drops, suck in quick shallow lungfuls of air that smelled of rotting fish.
In.Cough it out.In.Out.There.There.
His hands weren’t his.Paler than milk and trembling with a panicky violence.He couldn’t make them stop.He couldn’t remember ever being so cold.
What was he doing here?
Like waking from sleepwalking, he couldn’t remember.It didn’t matter.The cold was filling him, killing him, and if he wanted to live he had to move.
He rolled onto his side.An apocalyptic beach, water frothing beneath a shivering sky, wind a steady howl over the shoals, whipping the sawgrass to strain its roots.Not another person as far as he could see.
Had to move.His muscles screamed.He staggered upright and tried a tentative step.His thoughts were signals banged down frozen wires; after an eon, his legs responded.His feet were bloody.
One step.Another.The wind a lash against his dripping skin.The beach sloped hard upward.Each step brought muscles a little more under his control.The motion warming them, oh god, warming them to razors and nails, his blood gone acid.He concentrated on breathing, each inhale a marker.Make it to the next one.Five more.Don’t quit until twenty.Goddamn you, breathe.
The boulders the ocean had broken to pebbles gave way to those it hadn’t yet, broad stones with moss marking the leeward side spaced with pools of dark water where spiny things waited.He stumbled from one rock to the next until he reached the top.
As lonely and blasted a stretch of earth as any he’d seen.Black rocks and foaming sea and sky marked only by the passage of birds.Only.Wait.
He blinked, tried to focus.Two thin dirt tracks led to a splotch of color, a boxy shape, a car.A car!
Legs cramping.Breath shallow.He couldn’t force his lungs to take.To draw enough.Air.The shivering easing.Bad sign.His feet tangled and he fell.Inches from his eyes, pale grass spotted and marked by the appetite of insects.The ground wasn’t so bad.Almost soft.Easy now.Easy to go.
No.
Crawl.Elbows scraping.Knees.Forearms going blue.Blue berries, blue water, blue eyes.
He reached the trunk, pulled himself up, the metal burning cold.Slouched his way to the door and bent stiff fingers around the handle.
Please.
The door opened.He maneuvered around it and fell into the smell of leather.His legs wouldn’t move.It took both arms to pull them in, one at a time.Gripping the burnished handle, he yanked the door shut.The wind’s laughter died.
There were keys in the ignition.He fumbled for them.They danced away, jingling.Come on, come on, come—
The engine roared to life.
The man turned the heat all the way up and collapsed against the seat.
#
A soft time.Warm air making his body ache and tingle and finally ease.For awhile the man stared at the ceiling, head lolled back.Content to watch the drifting spots in his eyes.Tiny floating things that he could only see when he didn’t try to look at them.He didn’t think about where he was, or why, or who the car belonged to and when they might return, or whether they would be happy to find a naked man dripping on the leather seats.
Just cowered like an animal in his den, the doors locked and the heat blasting.
After a long time—how long he had no idea—he felt himself coming back.Surfacing like he was waking from a nap.Words and questions swirling like leaves blown from an October tree, tossed and swirling and never touching the ground.
Gasoline.That was one.Gasoline.What did…
Oh.He straightened, rubbed at his eyes.His muscles weak and languid.The fuel gauge read almost empty.He switched off the ignition.
So.Where was he?
The car was nice.A BMW, according to the logo in the steering wheel, and well-outfitted, supple leather and wood-grain inlays.A pair of Nikes rested on the floorboards on his side.The passenger seat was buried in maps and takeout bags and a soda cup and empty blister packs of ephedrine and gas station receipts and a worn U.S. road atlas and a fifth of Jack Daniels with an inch left in it.
Hello.
He opened the whiskey, swallowed half the remainder in a gulp.It burned all the way down in the best possible way.
Now that it wasn’t killing him, the world outside the glass had a kind of desolate beauty.Lonely, though.Other than the narrow two-track the car was parked on, there was no sign of people in either direction.And while he hadn’t been fully conscious the whole time, he hadn’t seen anyone since he’d climbed in the car.
So then…
How had he gotten here?
Where the fuck was here and what was he doing in it?
Easy.Don’t panic.The worst is over.You’re safe.Just think about what happened.How you ended up here.You…you…
Nothing.
He closed his eyes, jammed them shut.Opened them again.Nothing had changed.Had he been drinking?Drugged?Maybe.So retrace your steps.
You were…
You were…
It was like that terrible moment he sometimes had waking up in a strange environment, in the dark of a friend’s living room, or in a hotel somewhere, that period where his brain hadn’t come online yet and everything was automatic, just panic and readiness and fear, the tension of waiting for certainty to click, for normalcy to fall like a warm blanket.That moment always passed.It passed, and he remembered where he we was and what he was doing there.
Right?
He set the whiskey down, gripped the steering wheel with both hands.Focus.Focus!
Outside, the wind whistled.The trees looked like they’d been on fire, dark black trunks spreading to broad limbs marked by a handful of stubborn orange and yellow leaves, the last embers.
Okay.Easy.Something must have happened.An after-effect of hypothermia, maybe, some kind of shock.Don’t try to force it.Tease it, coax it out.Like the floaters in your eyes, you can’t drag this front and center.Come at it sideways.
Your brain seems to work.Use it.Where are you?
A rocky beach.Cold.He could taste the salt on his lips, knew this was an ocean.Which one?
The question was crazy, but he ignored that, just focused on answering it.Let one thing lead to the next.The dashboard clock read 7:42.The sun was only a brighter shade of gray above the waves, but it was higher than before.Which made it morning, which made that east, which made this the Atlantic.Assuming he was still in the United States.Yes.The road atlas.
Okay.The Atlantic.And cold and rocky and sparsely inhabited.Maine, maybe?
Why not.Roll with that.“This is Maine.”His voice cracked.He coughed, then continued.“I’m in a BMW.It’s morning.”
Nothing.
His eyes fell on a bank envelope curled in the cup-holder.Inside was a stack of twenties, a couple hundred dollars.Under the envelope there was something silver that turned out to be a stainless steel Rolex Daytona.Nice watch.Very nice watch.
What else.He leaned over to open the glove box.There was an owner’s manual, three pens, a pack of Altoids, a sealed box of No-Doz, and a large black gun.
He stared.An owner’s manual, three pens, a pack of Altoids, a sealed box of No-Doz, and a large black gun.A semiautomatic, he noticed, then wondered how he could know that and not remember where he had been before he woke up on the beach. Or worse, even his own—
Stop.Don’t go there.If you don’t face it, maybe it’s not true.
The trunk.
He stepped out.The wind whipped his naked body, and his skin tightened into goosebumps.His balls tried to retract into his belly.He stepped gingerly to the back of the car on bloody toes.
Would there be a body in there?Handcuffed and shot in the head, maybe, or rolled in a carpet, hair and boots spilling out.
No: it held only a set of jumper cables and a plastic shopping bag with a red bulls-eye on it.He opened the bag.A pair of designer jeans, a white undershirt with pits stained yellow, crumpled boxer-briefs, wadded-up socks.Someone’s laundry.
He looked around again.In for a penny.
He shook out the underwear, stepped into it.The jeans were soft and worn, expensive-looking.Too fancy for Target, and dirty to boot.Maybe the Target purchases had been a change of clothes.He wriggled into the shirt then slammed the trunk.Climbed back in the car, the air inside wonderful, stiflingly warm.The sour smell of feet rose as he wriggled into the sneakers.
Then he sat and stared out the window.
How had he known that red bulls-eye was the Target logo?How had he known the watch was a Rolex?Or that Jack Daniels was whiskey, and that he liked whiskey?
How was it that he had been able to count the money, knew Maine was in the northeast, could identify the symptoms of hypothermia, he could do all of that and more, but he couldn’t remember his own goddamn—
He reached for the owner’s manual in the glovebox, careful not to touch the gun.The manual was bound in black leather.Inside the front cover was a registration card and proof of insurance.Both in the name of David Hayden, resident of 6723 Wandermere Road, Malibu, California.
Huh.
He climbed out of the car, walked to the back.California plates.
Who wandered away from a sixty-thousand dollar car, unlocked, keys in the ignition?Where would they go in the middle of nowhere?
And the clothes.The shoes fit.The jeans felt familiar.
Calling yourself David Hayden is a start.Try it on, just like the jeans.
David got back in the car, put on his watch, then cranked the ignition and pulled away.
Here's another book you should read. A book not just about writing, but also about getting published, promoting your work, issues faced by the publishing industry, the rise of e-books, and so on.
Joe Konrath has been blogging about his publishing journey since he was a newbie, and is one of the most generous writers in the business. He's gone out of his way to help publishing newbies who've come after him, and to help aspiring writers graduate to newbie status, themselves.
And now Joe has now collected the best of his blog essays into a book.
An e-book, actually. At over 1100 pages, it is not something you'll finish in an afternoon, but it is well worth your time. And at only $2.99 for Kindle, it is a steal. If you don't do Kindle, it is also available as a PDF download on Joe's website, for free. See what I mean about Joe being generous?
It also includes an excellent series of essays by bestselling thriller writer (and all-around great guy) Barry Eisler.
Now, I don't agree with all of Joe's opinions. Joe is somewhat of an iconoclast - I don't think even he agrees with all of his opinions - but he asks the hard questions, challenges the status quo, and we all come away richer for it.
A story: When I was writing TRIGGER CITY, I got stuck on a plot issue. Over many beers at The Red Lion, I explained to Joe how I'd written myself into a corner and would never find my way out. Then Joe started talking. And a rapid-fire burst of solutions poured out, one on top of another, competing for attention.
In five minutes, Joe came up with 2,193 different ways to fix my book. Some better than others, but all workable. What amazed me even more was that Joe's suggestions were not mere plot contrivances, but all stemmed from character issues faced by my protagonist.
So Amazon is having a sale on my second novel, AT THE CITY'S EDGE--they're selling it for $1.72 per hardcover copy. Considering that's about $22 off, it's a pretty good deal.
When I discovered that this morning, I promptly went on Facebook and Twitter and announced it to the world. Which prompted, among other things, a question from a fellow novelist:
"Why are you promoting this? Aren't you a little, well, embarrassed?"
The reason my friend asks, of course, is that the fact that they can sell it at that rate tells you that the hardcover has been remaindered, and that Amazon was left with a larger quantity than they might have hoped.
Remaindering, in case you don't know, is what happens to the hardcovers that don't get sold. You see, publishers have no clear way of knowing how many copies they'll be able to move in advance. They have to estimate, and because of the nature of costs in printing, as well as a lot of other factors I don't want to get into, they not infrequently print more than they end up selling. (Incidentally, those estimates become a part of the promotional process--announcing you are printing a large quantity is a message to booksellers that you expect a book to do well.)
The end result is that after a book has come out in paperback, and a respectful time has passed, the remaining books are sold to clearinghouses which resell them. You know those bargain books in the entryway of your local Borders or Barnes & Noble? The hardcovers going for $5? Those were remaindered.
Many authors are made bitter by remaindering. We don't make money on those sales, and of course the books are sold so cheap that it feels like a personal sting somehow.
Me, I disagree.
See, as a novelist, there are so many things you don't have control over. It's not up to you how many copies are printed, or what the cover looks like, or whether Dan Brown has a new book out that month. You can't control the decision to go hardcover or trade or mass market, or how big an order a store makes, or whether the economy is in the toilet.
The only thing you can control is the book itself.
Luckily, that's great. Because the best advertisement for an author's next book is the one you're already reading.
So I say, go for it! Buy a copy. Buy a handful. Get your holiday shopping done early! If you buy 15, shipping is free. You can stuff stockings. You can leave them on the bus. You can trade them with your friends. Hell, I don't care.
Because a book out in the world--instead of in a warehouse--is a book that might be read. And in the end, that's the game. We're not marketers or sales reps or promotional speakers. We're novelists.
As a novelist, the job is simply to write your damn heart out. Let somebody else worry about the cover price. My only concern is making a reader happy.
Hopefully, so happy that they pay full price for the next one.
"But it's too early to blog about Christmas," I hear you say. "We haven't even reached Thanksgiving!"
True, but we are living in desperate times, and they call for desperate measures. Surely you've seen the news, and you know just how desperate. You've heard the cries from Washington and Wall Street and Detroit. It's a Global Economic Meltdown(TM), and just in time for the Holiday Shopping Season(TM).
Run and hide!
Okay, I know that we're all in for some serious belt-tightening, but here's the thing: You will probably buy a few Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa gifts for your loved ones this year. You may not be as lavish as in years past, but you'll probably buy something, right?
Right. So please, make that something a book.
Doesn't have to be my book (although I have no objection to that), just any book will do. Fiction, preferably. But as I said, any book will do. Fiction, non-fiction, hardcover, paperback, frontlist, backlist. Just so long as you give books.
Maybe give a book that had a big impact on the way you see the world, or simply a book that made you smile. A book is a beautiful, thoughtful, personal gift. And a book can be burned for heat when the entire economy collapses and we are all left freezing in the dark.
Really, there's no better gift this year.
Those of you who read the publishing trades know that I'm not kidding around. Share prices of the largest book retailer in America just hit an all-time low. Some other bookstore chains and many independents may not survive the winter. Even the most optimistic economists project no economic growth until next spring. And that will be too late for many bookstores.
It's that serious, kids.
Of course, if you're so broke that you're considering roasting the family pet for Christmas dinner, you get a free pass. But for the rest of us . . . for those who are going to buy something to give our loved ones this Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa. . .
“I knew the character of Marlowe had changed and I thought it had to, because the hardboiled stuff was too much of a pose after all this time. But I did not realize [he] had become Christlike, and sentimental, and that he ought to be deriding his own emotions.”
Chandler wrote this to his agent, Bernice Baumgarten, after getting her negative comments on the first draft of The Long Good-Bye. He was often bitter, feeling that his work was under-valued. “I might be the best writer in the country,” he wrote to his editor after sending him the second draft, “and with two exceptions I very likely am, but I’m still [considered just] a mystery writer.” He added, “You’d better do a damned sight better with The Long Good-Bye than you did with Little Sister.”
Chandler was near the end of his writing life when he finished The Long Good-Bye. He was ill, from the alcoholism which plagued him much of his adult life, he was in turmoil from the illness of his wife, Cissy, and he fretted, as he constantly did, that his work wasn’t properly appreciated.
Raymond Chandler was born in Chicago on July 23, 1888 and he lived in America until he was seven, when his father abandoned the family for good and his mother returned to her native England. As a young man, Chandler hoped to write urbane aesthetic essays in the manner of Oscar Wilde. He angered the uncle who had supported him by abandoning a promising Civil Service career for literature. After several fruitless years, in which he had a few reviews and essays published, he left England to return to North America. In later life, he looked back on his young self with a kind of bitter mockery: “Like all young nincompoops, I found it easy to be clever and snotty...”
He served with the Canadian Expeditionary Forces during the First World War. After the war, he spent two decades moving from job to job. He became a senior officer at various companies, but between his drinking, his restlessness, and his womanizing, he found it hard to stay anywhere long. And he still longed to make his name in fiction.
In the thirties, at the height of the Depression, laid off from the oil industry, he turned to the pulps. He labored hard over his early stories, determined not to fail a second time at a literary career. An admirer of Hemingway, Chandler outlined Hemingway’s stories and then tried to rewrite them. He finally, in 1935, began selling his own stories to Black Mask. And in 1938, he published the first of his seven Marlowe novels.
The Long Good-Bye is usually considered his most important, fully realized novel. Because it has the fewest elements of a true mystery, critics claim that it “transcends the genre,” that it is a real novel, and that it merit’s Chandler’s assertion that he was one of the great writers of the Twentieth Century.
At its heart, The Long Good-Bye expresses Chandler’s bitterness and his weariness. Although Marlowe is beaten, is sent to prison, and has his life threatened, these action scenes are small punctuations in a novel about men trying to make sense of a world where they don’t feel at home. The first part of the book is an almost dreamlike series of conversations between Marlowe and Terry Lennox, a man scarred by war and by money. The middle, where Marlowe is involved with Roger Wade and his wife, has long passages filled with Chandler’s own torment about the state of his writing.
In a letter to his Hollywood agent, written while he was struggling with the second draft The Long Good-Bye, Chandler said, “I am suffering from...atrophy of the inventive powers. I can write like a streak but I bore myself.” And he added to his British publisher, “If I can do it wrong once, I can do it wrong again.”
Chandler’s doubts, his suicide efforts, his drinking, all bubble beneath the surface of The Long Good-Bye. Perhaps because of them, the novel remains a haunting look at what war and peace do to men, at how hard it is to be creative, and how hard it is to be alone.
Sara Paretsky
Note: The quotations are taken from Allison & Busby's Raymond Chandler Speaking. Biographical data come from Baker & Nietzel's Private Eyes.
When I do speaking events, a lot of times someone asks a question which, though politely phrased, adds up to, "But aren't books going away some time soon?"
It's a fair question. The publishing system is archaic as hell, built on an expectation of waste. Without getting into the gritty details, bookstores essentially buy everything on consignment; if it doesn't sell, they can return it. Because books take up a lot of space, that means that most of the unsold copies end up pulped. And since selling 50% of the printed copies is considered a moderate success, and print runs are frequently in the hundreds of thousands, we're talking about enormous inefficiency.
The question, though, is how to do better?
One answer is the digital reader, a gizmo that can store a library of books and yet fit in your bag. A couple versions of these exist, but for my money, they are a long, long way from being a solution. Even putting aside the tactile joy of books, a digital reader needs to contend with some serious design challenges: it must be rugged enough to survive the beach, easy on the eyes and yet bright enough to read in broad daylight, with batteries that don't quit--imagine your reader dying in the last ten pages of a thriller--plus being small and light and flexible enough to just tuck in your bag, and, oh yeah, it has to do all that at a really low cost.
Suffice it to say we ain't there yet.
More realistic, I think, might be an integration of print-on-demand technology with physical bookstores. Instead of storing and shipping thousands and thousands of books, publishers could send digital files to bookstores across the globe. These stores could either exist online, or else be more like storefronts, with catalogs, samples, and staff to guide you. You pick what you want, it gets printed on the spot, you're on your way. Obviously, this model is also pretty far off, but it's consistent with what other industries are doing: movies are increasing distributed digitally, and need I say more than iTunes?
It's hard to say what will come next. However, one thing that is often forgotten is that books are just a medium. It's not really books that I love--it's story. It's experiencing someone else's world-view, being scared or cheered or filled with joy, having a moment of grace or a laugh that makes me snort my coffee. And while books are my preferred medium, they aren't the only one.
Plus, new ones are on the way. Take YouTube, which, while still specializing in fart-lighting videos, is also a forum for tremendous satire, as well as fascinating experiments in narrative structure.
Or consider video games; long an arena where the story concerns rarely went further than "those are the bad guys, go shoot them," game designers are beginning to aspire to something higher. If you want an example of what I mean, look no further than BioShock, a morality tale set amidst a crumbling dystopic extension of Ayn Rand's ideas that still allows for the highly enjoyable kicking of great quantities of ass. (For more info on BioShock and its impact, check out my brother Matt's review of it here--even if you don't game, Matt's article is worth reading.)
What do you think? Would you read a book on a digital reader? If not, what would need to change so you would? Or does it not matter, since story will always find a way?
