April | 2010 | Absolute Write

Monthly Archives: April 2010

Just A Reminder

If you’ve been thinking about attending the Backspace Writers Conference, they’ve got a very few spaces left—you’ll want to secure your spot ASAP. The Agent/Author Seminar is May 27, 2010, and the Writers Conference runs May 28-29, 2010, at NYC’s Radisson Martinique on 32nd and Broadway.

If you’re thinking about it but still dithering, you might consider browsing their FAQ to see whether or not this is a good fit for your current writing level, goals, and needs. Or take a look at some of the scheduled events, and the list of agents attending the May Backspace Writers Conference.

The Backspace Writers Conference is one of the handful of events I’d recommend without hesitation to anyone who has reached that writing level where they’re ready to take that next important networking step.

Filed under: Miscellany

Talking Shop

One of the best things about the Internet is the expanded opportunity to find a community of people who share your interests, to whom you can relate.

After you find such a community, there are a couple of challenges to keep yourself in balance. First, you have to figure out how not to spend all your waking moments online. Second, you have to keep stretching, reading beyond your comfort zone, and interacting in situations where you might not always be entirely comfortable. There are a number of reasons to push yourself that way, not the least of which is that you keep learning, and broadening your own perspective and understanding, and polishing your communication skills and your ear for language. That can help make you a better writer.

To that end, here are some of the terrific places I’ve been browsing this week, offered to you as options to visit, read, comment, interact, and learn:

Emilywinslow.com – Emily Winslow’s book The Whole World, coming May 25th. I’m very much looking forward to reading this one.
Goblin Fruit (Spring, 2010) – Fantastical Poetry
Podcastle.org – The Fantasy Fiction Podcast
Xoom – Meg Worley’s blog about geekery, education, and other interesting stuff
Neverending Page Turner – Agent Kathleen Ortiz’ blog
How Publishing Really Works – From the perspective of a long-time publishing-industry insider, Jane Smith’s publishing blog is frank, charming, funny, and insightful
Running your own ezine? There’s a good discussion of dos and don’ts (with regard to soliciting contributors) happening in the comments on artist and writer Mary Robinette Kowal’s LJ, and an excellent post from poet and writer Elizabeth Barrette, here.

And finally, YA writer Emilia Plater posts a charming send-up of a bunch of agents and YA buddies, on Punk Writer Kid:

Filed under: Miscellany

E-books, Used Books, and Piracy

Jolly Roger Pirate Flag

A terrific essay on authorial control by Cherie Priest, posted on her blog and reprinted with permission at SFWA. I was especially delighted by what she has to say about libraries and used books, since recently I’ve seen an awful lot of doom, gloom, and anger from some writers about not getting a second royalty on used books, resold:

If your friend has a copy of a book and loans it to you, that’s awesome. If you enjoy the book, maybe you’ll even go buy some other books by the author. However, I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that you likely won’t pass that book around to a few thousand of your closest friends. Due to the restrictions of the space-time continuum, a physical object is unlikely to find itself enjoyed by more than a handful of people. The same principle applies to used bookstores. Really, at the end of the day, a used bookstore is just a borrowing service that comes with a fee.

Ms. Priest offers quite a good list of things authors can reasonably expect to control with regard to the books we write, and things writers simply cannot control no matter how badly we might wish we could. She also links to a thoughtful post by Nicole Peeler about e-piracy—a subject nearly guaranteed to send many writers into foaming-at-the-mouth, incoherent fury.

Then I found a site for fans of paranormal romance and urban fantasy. It’s a pretty, pink site with links to authors websites and contests, along with reviews and lots of excited discussion of new series, or new books coming out, or old books recently discovered. In other words, it’s a pretty typical fan site for readers of my genre. Only with one difference: this website also offers our novels, free for download. The authors of this site even ask those who download a book to leave a comment, to let them know that “their work was appreciated.”

My first thought was, “Oh my God, how could you! You say you’re fans of our work and then you’d steal from us?” My second thought was, “Where is my downloadable form from Hachette’s legal department, so I can get their lawyers on this shit.” My third thought, after I’d filled out and sent the required forms, and cleaned my bedroom to cool off, was, “Okay, let’s say they are really fans of our genre, as they claim. That means they are not doing this piracy to hurt us. They don’t know what their actions mean.”

Both posts are well worth reading.