I've stopped buying newspapers completely - and it wasn't hard either. OK, so I only used to buy the Guardian, the Times and The Independent on Saturday and Sundays and then the Guardian again on a Monday, but that's still a lot of papers if you count all the supplements that come with them. Instead, I've moved my habits online, streamlined the whole process and find that I can get through all of those, the New York and LA Times and a few others such as Salon in half the time.
Sure - I miss out on a lot of the columns I used to enjoy and some great articles but instead I'm reading differently too... but none of that has anything to do with what I was actually intending to write...
On the Guardian site today, there's an excellent blog called Dream comes true for aspiring novelist which is exactly what it appears to be about. If you're in the same 'hunting a publisher' boat as me, it's definitely worth a read. Actually, it's worth a read even if it's just to educate yourself that being a writer is apparently just as tough as being a musician or an actor when it comes to sitting your ass at the top of the pear tree.
Pick up any novel - especially those that are from first time authors. You'll find that a large percentage of them are/were journalists or have some link to the literary world. It never says 'Simon is a first time author who until now, has worked in Marks & Spencer pants department.' There's a good reason for this and that is, you spend eight hours a day working in the pants department and not writing. Sure, you really, really may have that killer Philosophers Stone in your back pocket but now you have to find somebody to take you seriously enough to read it and your big problem at this point is that around 4,000 other people have made the same proposal... this week.
What the hell are you supposed to do about that? Setting aside the obvious contenders, the chances of being pulled out of the slush pile are, let's be frank about this, as close to fucking zero as you can possibly get. Knowing this, you should probably try a different tact, however I do think that publishers should share this responsibility and post a communal notice on their websites that says 'all unsolicited manuscripts will be put directly in the recycling bin, so don't do it' - and then they should all buy server space or point people to blogger/wordpress or whatever and tell them to post their first 10 paragraphs online. It may sound unfair but at least it's honest. Who knows, maybe somebody could even check it over for an hour a day. It sounds tame, but guys... the slush pile ain't working.
So that basically leaves finding an agent and self publishing. I have had no word from my first approach and that's fine. It really is. Maybe he's on holiday, but this year four people in my family have died. That means d.e.a.d. Not coming back, no second bite of the apple. Time to make another approach. On the flip side, self publishing is easy, but then I would say that having self published a fair few magazines in my time - the hard part is what comes after that, and that's what you're paying for when you sign up with a publisher. You could probably work out the costs of putting your novel out but the time involved and selling the damn thing is never ending.
More on this tomorrow maybe. I need to write now. That and I've completely lost my train of thought.
On planet Smith, it's the first day of half term. One is out at a friends, the other is out at a friends and sleeping over. All is quiet on the western front but there are no stories from today! What kind of a day is that where there are no stories... maybe I'm just too tired to see them.
Clip of the day: How Come It Never Rains | Dogs D'Amour
