Writing Wrongs

March 15, 2007

Booking Through Thursday

  1. Speaking of writing in books, what about writing the entire thing? Do you write? Aspire to write? Dream about writing?
  2. If you do write, do you do it for yourself, or because you hope to be published? (Or because you ARE published?)

Do I write? Uh, yes. Aspire to? All the time. Dream about it? Constantly. I�ve written six complete novels and I don�t know how much other stuff.

Want to start a fight? Ask a group of writers the �write for yourself vs. publication� question. Good times. It always amazes me how writers on the must-be-pubbed-at-all-costs side of things assume that those who aren�t quite so � ruthless about it don�t care about quality or craft or improving.

It�s never made sense to me and I�ve stopped arguing with people like that because life is too short for pointless discussions. Besides, there�s a lot about writing that has nothing to do with publishing. Publishing is a business. Writing is an art and craft.

I think what writers need is a permeable membrane inside their brain that allows certain things from each side to pass through, while leaving certain stuff out. If you�re going to publish, you need to learn about the industry--if only to know where and how to send out your work.

And sometimes you can even write for fun and get published. I know. I probably broke some sort of rule doing that.

Today the Flash for Big Cash Anthology goes on sale. This contains my story Rules for Visiting Hades that combines Cold War espionage, cosmopolitans, Cary Grant, Pushkin, Greek mythology, and phrases like peace through superior firepower all in one 650-word package.

Last night, I had a dream there was a typo in the story. Somehow M16 (which isn�t in the story) was misspelled as Mer. Okay, one, how can you misspell M16? Two, someone (in the dream) kept insisting that the Army didn�t have M16s, and he knew this from personal experience.

Nice. I have no idea where that came from. Despite peace through superior firepower, I don�t mention M16 at all.

But the anthology is a �limited edition,� on sale until June. Buy early, buy often.

Or something like that.

Charity Tahmaseb wrote at 9:48 a.m.

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