Catch-22: not in print, never in print :(

Dear people, Back in 1993 I researched, thought upon and wrote an 179,000 word trilogy, provisionally entitled "The infinite principles and systems of logic, culture and aesthetics".
At the time of writting my original draft in five months, I took the official entrance test for MENSA UK and was rated with an IQ of 156, but my intelligence means nothing today.

I had started out with a draft for one very large book, but I rethought and reformatted this into a trilogy to be more user friendly for publishers. The market I was aiming at was architecture in general and architects and architecture students in particular. My third book was on aesthetics, my second book on culture as the context for aesthetics and my first book was on logic as the context for culture. The idea being that I get my third book published first and then if there was sufficient interest publish book two and then book one in order to completely underpin "the why" of my conceptual thoughts in book three.

Since then (over ten year ago) I have yet to see anything either in print or on the net which even starts to explore the area of thoughts which I put down in my trilogy. My problem (apart from being in the classic Catch-22 situation of (a) being unpublished and therefore unknown in architecture and vice versa (b) being unknown in architecture therefore I am unable to become published), is that my concepts inadvertantly undercut large areas of todays' avante garde design ideologies, so I am anathema to todays' trendy publishers.

For several years I tried to find a publisher and later an agent and in the process tried several different presentations. Yes, I did my research upon both publishers and agents using the standard publishers' yearbook, so that I targetted specific publishing fields, but only had two nibbles out of about ninety, one UK publisher asked for some chapters for review and then lost interest without telling me what the reviewer had written. the other publisher was in India, but as I was living in the UK at the time, I was not sure that I should deal with a publisher so far away in another country with a different legal system, etc.

My conclusion is that today there is no such thing as "a first-time author" as these so-called "good" publishers and agents are only interested in money, not original thinking, because if these so-called "good" publishers are not prepared to work with and actively help first-time authors then they are bucket-shops making mega-bucks from mindless popular sales.

Todays' publishing is an industry with chloresterol-clogged arteries so there is a complete and systematic systems failure which actively rejects originality, because originality is the dirt or filth in the machine which must be cleansed, an "anomaly" which the system is incapable of recognising let alone understanding or making any use of whatsoever.

Frank John ))

aka eraser said:

Hi Frank (nice name!) and welcome to the AW Cooler.

You're right that commercial publishers have a comfort zone. They are leery of anything that breaks known moulds. But that leeriness has justifiable roots. Publishing and distributing a book costs lots of money. The publisher's marketing gurus, whose words carry a lot of weight as to whether manuscripts are accepted or not, need to determine how to "slot" the title - where in a bookstore it will fit. It helps the cause immensely to be able to say that this book is "like" this one and that one in that it ____ (fill in the blanks) but it differs in that ____.

You need to be able to find common ground with a book(s) that were published and did reasonably well sales-wise, while offering something fresh that the previous books lacked. In other words, you need to show that there's a core audience out there for your book.

I'd suggest trying to publish a standalone excerpt or two (or ten) from your books as articles in architectural, cultural or logic-based periodicals. This would help establish your bona fides as an expert in those areas as well as begin to develop a core audience which (hopefully) would like to read more.

Also, I don't know if your research extended to academic presses but they may be a better fit for something that sounds to me as being quite scholarly.

Good luck.

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Dear Eraser, Thank you for your thoughts. I can understand the need to both key my work within an existing market as well as tempt with something fresh.
However, it boils down simply to the placing of my book on the same self as texts in the same field. Then the "fresh" is what I have written. The actual inside leaf and backcover marketing blurb I would leave to the professionals.

I have tried several times to have either essays or letters published in various professional journals, but without feedback I am left out in the cold. In the recent past I had a quite a number of series of carefully thought out topical letters published in a weekly newspaper over a period of several years which was good practice for making reasoned points with an economy of words...

...but as I am without any money these days (and I live in Turkey), I am unable to subscribe to professional journals and magazines, so as to watch for trends which I can intervene in and then put forward my own viewpoint.

Otherwise, currently, I am logged into "ARCHNET FORUM" on the net which is a forum for people interested in Islamic Architecture, but very short entries or sound bits are all I can do and some people do appreciate my words. ))

I doubt if any academic press would touch my work with a bargepole, mainly because of the "NOH" syndrome (NOH = Not Originated Here). I am not in any academic institution and not likely to be unless I have a proven profile.

Hoshchakal (friendly Turkish parting), Frank John ))

Nomad said:

Hi Frank John,
If you contacted more than 90 publishers and only 2 of them responded with any kind of positive reaction, it says more about what you are sending them than about their inability to appreciate originality. Thousands of very original, very good books are published every year; the fact that yours hasn't been picked up doesn't mean that all publishers systematically reject originality. It more likely means that those publishers don't think they can sell your work to readers.

Have you had other writers take a look at the manuscript? Have you honed your query? Have you even determined if there's a viable market for your book? If there is absolutely no other book out there like yours that's a bad thing, not a good one. No competition means that the market either isn't ready for this kind of book, or the market itself just isn't there. Publishers absolutely have to base their decisions on finances, just as any business does, and if the market is too small for a publisher to recoup its investment, it doesn't make good business sense to pursue a project.

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As you say originality is bad news.

Jamesaritchie said:

Funny the weird conclusions otehrwise intelligent people jump to without any logic Behind them.

It should take about five minutes of research to prove to yourself that more unpublished, first time writers are breaking in print today than at any time in human history. That's simply a fact.

The ONLY reason you're anathema to publishers is because they don't like what you wrote, the way you wrote it, and don't believe there's a market for it that's large enough to justify the publishing costs. They're probably right. They usually are.

It's always been this way. Forever and ever.

I mean, really, would you buy such a book if someone else wrote it? I sure wouldn't.

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Interesting, originality is only okay if it agrees with the Status Quo.

As you say, I should have qualified my comments about first time authors with the rider that "only those whose thoughts do not agree with the Status Quo are anathema". It reminds me of Christopher Columbus when he challenged a dinner party of influential men to "stand an egg on one end". They failed, so Columbus pressed an egg onto the table lightly crushing one end so it sat.

underthecity said:

Hmmm, can't say I agree with you there, Frank. From the description of your three books, it sounds to me like what you've written would appeal to an extremely narrow audience, not necessarily a New York Times Bestseller. While you might find the particular topic absolutely thrilling and endlessly interesting, do you happen to know how many readers would also be interested in it? You mentioned that one potential audience is architects. That's good that you've identified such an audience. Have you shown your manuscripts to architects and other such designers for their opinion?

It might also be helpful to show the manuscripts to "beta readers," people who will read the book to offer their thoughts or suggestions. Also, since you say that your IQ is above average, it could mean that your writing could very well go above the heads of average readers. If this is what you want, that is, you're speaking directly to your audience who also talks that way, that's fine. But if you're seeking a general readership, which it kind of sounds like you are, then you might need a rewrite. I have no idea; I haven't seen your manuscript.

If you've been targeting some 90-odd publishers, are they like Random House, Harper Collins, etc? Do you know if your targeted publishers publish the kind of thing you've written? If not, even the best-written query letter and book won't get the interest of a publisher who doesn't deal with that subject.

It almost sounds like your book could be used as a textbook in architecture schools. Have you considered the textbook market? Good textbooks can cost upwards of $100 and are required reading. How about the university presses? They often publish more special-interest topics than mainstream publishers.

And then there's self-publishing. Sometimes a very narrow-market niche audience book can do well self-published. I would personally save that as a last resort.

The key is to find the right publisher for your book. Seeking the wrong publisher only amounts to years of delay and frustration.

Good luck with whatever avenue you pursue.

allen

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Allen, Thank you for your thoughts. Hmm, finding the wrong publisher takes years, Yo! And finding the right publisher takes even longer. ahhhhhh!!!

To give you some background, I spent five years in architectural study after previous careers in marine engineering, service engineering and industrial production control. After I came ashore, I moved jobs every two or three years, because I would go in on a job, learn the inhouse system, improve on the inhouse system and then move on to find another challenge. But when I came to architecture, I found there was no inhouse system other than the subjective and usually negative views of the tutors.

In the second year of my degree, in a year meeting lead by the university's Psychology Unit. I tried to make the point that architectural design should be taught and was immediately squashed as a potential threat to the Status Quo viewpoint that "either you had talent or you did not, as decided subjectively by the tutors" ...so there was no point trying to architectural teach design.

The view that I want to put forward in my trilogy, is that everyone has the ability to design even if that ability had never been encouraged to grow. The second main point of my trilogy, is that there are "conceptual principles of design" in the same way as conceptual principles are used in other fields.

Both my points; teaching design and teaching the principles of design are anathema to today's avante garde / politically correct ideologues because it short-circuits their power-base mantra of "design = confusion and mystery".

So long as the field of architectural design is mixed, muddled, confused and mysterious, then subjectivity, negativity and mediocrity rule because like the old joke "When you are up to your butt in alligators, you forget your original intention was to drain the swamp." Simply, I am trying to drain the swamp and these naughty avante garde alligators are trying to chew my butt. ))

Mike Coombes said:

I have to say, Frank, that no matter how much you researched your subject, you appear to have given bugger all thought to your market.

Architects are a conservative bunch, I know, I work with them almost every day. Most still think that Le Corbusier and Schiele are dangerous trendies. Writing FOR architects, when you aren't a part of the club, is a bit like writing medical journals with no medical training.

What you have, it would appear, are 179k words of lay theory. And no publisher will touch that with a barge pole.

Do yourself a favour. Break that down into digestible chunks, 2k-5k in length, and start hawking these around as articles to some of the architectural journals. MAYBE they'll pick them up; get a dozen or two published, then think again about publishing the full work. If you can't get the articles published, then maybe it's you that's wrong and not the whole of the rest of the world.

BTW your IQ means absolutely nothing; as they say, knowledge is not wisdom...

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I think you have a confusion. My IQ simply means I have a better than average ability to think, because thinking is a process not a product. And another confusion is "knowledge is not wisdom" it should be "knowing and using knowledge is not wisdom" because wisdom is the use of knowledge.
Another saying about knowledge springs to mind: "Knowledge is power". In fact the intention is corrupt because it implies that "the withholding of knowledge is power". Knowledge itself is not powerful unless used.

My "179,000 words" formulated into a trilogy are the cumulative essence of multiple concepts and conclusions created throughout 27 years of adult life. Such, is in addition to everything I have read, observed and done.

The equating of architecture to medicine does not hold water. In medicine principles are known, used and taught. Whereas, in architecture principles are unknown, unused and untaught probably because of the extremely silly idea that art and science are run by completely different parts of the brain.

May the Force be with you, Frank John

Mike Coombes said:

I suffer no such confusion. My IQ is apparently something over 140 - it doesn't in itself actually make me any more intelligent than anyone else, or give me 'a better than average ability to think.' A high IQ simply means that you have an above average ability at solving the kind of problems found in IQ tests.

Regardless of your no doubt immense intellect, you have managed to produce a book (or 3) that will, in all likelihood, never be published.

The medical analogy is correct; both medicine and architecture are closed shops. This is something you have fundamentally failed to grasp. Architectural movements change from within, not because some guy with no relevant qualification writes a book. Furthermore, " in architecture principles are unknown, unused and untaught..." You're joking, right? Do you actually know anything about architecture? Or structural engineering? You think these guys make it all up as they go along?

If this book (or 3) is seriously the culmination of 20+ years of whatever, you should by now have worked out that unless you have the right letters after your name, the architectural establishment will take you no more seriously than uh... they do now.

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No, I am not joking. I wish I were joking. You assume that architecture and medicine are comparable disciplines. Such an illogical assumption is like Descartes stating the French existentialist philosophical illogicism "I think therefore, I am". What Descartes should have said is "I think (in French language), therefore I am (French in culture)".

My "immense intellect" as you put it, is nothing more than a tool which I use when thinking. I am human like everyone else and my higher than average IQ does not mean I am superior in any way, simply, in my service to humanity, I have a higher responsibility or duty of care towards other people.

I only found out what my IQ was when I was 43 and only took the entrance test to MENSA out of a mild curiosity as to just how intelligent I was and yes I have noticed that some people feel very threatened by my intelligence as though intelligence is somehow a weapon to use against other people.

In fact, I dislike those who manipulate the thoughts other people and particularly those who use psychological techniques as a weapon against other people. In all of my writings I give people the free choice of either accepting or not accepting what I write. I reason in clear plain english,
so people can understand even if they do not agree with me. ))

loquax said:

I normally disagree with Mr Ritchie (often just for fun), but what he said was probably more important that any other reply you've had so far.

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"Quis Custodiet Ipsos Custodes" = "Who Guards The Guardians". You should remember that your Latin language quote comes from the first fascist empire of continental europe. Fascism, Fascist Law and the native language of Fascism (Latin) should be taken with a pinch of salt ...."cum grano salis".

Mike Coombes said:

Frank, you continue to miss the point. I am in no way saying that medicine and architecture are the same - I was merely drawing analogous comparisons. They are, however, comparable insofar as they are both disciplines that require many years of training.

I'm also concerned that, in essence, you don't really have much of a grasp of what you're talking about - "Whereas, in architecture principles are unknown, unused and untaught probably because of the extremely silly idea that art and science are run by completely different parts of the brain."

Several times you make reference to the fact that architecture and design are 'untaught'. This may be the case in Turkey, but i suggest maybe you try speaking to a few real architects. To suggest that architecture is a profession with no structure or training is delusional. I have worked in construction related industries for around 20 years now, and have had to deal with many architects. And my father was a building surveyor; I have been on or around construction sites sites since before I can walk. Two things I can tell you about architects:

1 they can be a complete pain in the backside when it comes to specifying design. They can often find it difficult to grasp that because something can be done on paper, it doesn't mean it's easy or efficient to realise in 3 dimensions (although this 'pushing the envelope' is where progress and innovation come from)

2 they are highly qualified, and generally know what they are talking about.

I think maybe you are beset by the malaise that sometimes hits people after rejection. It can't POSSIBLY be that your work is sub-standard, inaccurate or irrelevant; it therefore has to be the whole of the publishing world that is aligned against you.

You seem to be out of touch, and this can only get worse if, as you say, you don't subscribe to the relevant periodicals. To use another (pertinent) medical analogy, that's akin to a doctor who doesn't read the Lancet.

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You are misled by the natural assumption that architecture should have design principles and design should be taught. The operative word is should.
I studied architecture for five years. My first year was a disappointment because we were not taught about design other than in a very haphazard, subjective and negative way. The other years followed the same pattern.

I am quite sure that medicine / civil engineering / structural engineering / etc is not taught in a haphazard, subjective and negative way. If people in those disciplines were "taught" in this fashion, there would be constant streams of dead bodies from hospitals and accident cases from engineering workshops.

In my second year the Psychological Unit at the university set up a year meeting ostensibly to discuss everyones' views, but in reality it was used to scuff dissenting views under the carpet. I put forward the proposition that architecture design should be taught at the school. The majority response was that architecture design does not need to be taught because either a person has talent or does not have talent, so teaching design is pointless.

The two points you made about architects are contradictory as on the one hand "architects have difficulty relating their design drawings to reality" and on the other hand "architects generally know what they are talking about".

What you mean is that working architects by and large are professional and this leads to the assumption that they recieved their training at university. Whereas, in the majority of cases they recieved most, if not all, of their professional training after university by working in architects' offices'.

You should try to understand that I am not attacking anything in architecture because there is nothing there and it is this absence of both teaching and principles that I want to redress the balance by filling the void with both a positive system of teaching design and the teaching of design principles.

I should say that "the principles" I have deduced are 'a universal law' that works for all human activities not just architecture design. I used architecture design to show how my principles work when applied to a specific activity...

...because I have read too many books which are all abstract theory without either examples or execises and therefore cannot be proven in practice. And it is this "cannot be proven" aspect which leaves the authors of such books claiming to hold the intellectual high ground of: "If other people are unable to use their books, then those people do not have the necessary ability to understand the author's theories". Whereas, in fact, the failure lies with the inability of the author to translate his/her own theories into practice.

In passing, I should explain that before my career in architecture, I had a career in engineering and a career in industrial production control. My own nature, my early acultural upbringing, my training and my experience have all allowed me to exercise and develop an analytical system of thought which is complemented by the abilty to understand and synthesis complex systems.

In the early 1990s when I was creating my original draft, I noticed in the newspapers that Chaos Theory appeared to have parallels with the thoughts I had. So I intentionally did not read any Chaos text until after İ had written my draft work to avoid any absorption or crossover. Then after I had written my draft I read a Chaos text and as I thought, I found a number of parallels.
Therefore I can state that I came to several parallel conclusions with Chaos Theory simply by using my own lifetime of thoughts as research material.

expatbrat said:

Hi Frank,



I have been reading your reaction to the comments above with interest. Your comments are fascinating.



I would have assumed you posted in the hope of finding help to get your works published. But no, it seems you have posted with the hope of finding others to agree with your view that nothing any good gets published these days. Evidence offered being the 90 (foolish?) publishers who have rejected your work. Writers have offered you suggestions and opinions, all of which you have shot down. Do you want help or do you want to be right?



You seem very preoccupied by this IQ thingy-ma-jingy. Have you written in a way that is completely over “normal peoples” heads? I write about fitness and health (among other things) and have more than 100 articles published. Mine are all very chatty and easy to read and full of easy-to-use-now suggestions. My University lectures (2 brilliant men) can’t get anything in print. Why? Because what they write is like eating breakfast bran in water. It may be good for you but it is so boring you just can’t get through it.



The other interesting thing (in my opinion) about your reactions is the overwhelming negative voice drowning every sentence. Everyone is wrong – but ooh so very clever high-IG you.



Whatever. Everyone is really dumb and you are smart. Big claps, give yourself a pat on your back. Go stick your brilliant manuscript on Lulu.com and watch no-one buy it there too. Or listen to some people who have taken the time to offer you advice and find a way to make your work marketable.



Or not. Reading your defences and screams of “you people are just too dumb to understand” is fun.



Expat Brat

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If you read carefully, you will see I have neither rejected positive thoughts nor am I hung up on IQ, nor am I being defensive in explaining my work. As I said I was mildly curious about my IQ and yes, pleased when I was rated with a higher than average intelligence, but I have never used and never will use it as a weapon to put down or bully other people. I do not like those who bully. Nor have I said anyone is too dumb to understand my work.

Sadly, judging by your repeatedly sarcastic comments, I can that see having a higher than average IQ is like waving a red rag at a bull for some people who see other peoples' higher IQs as life-threatening, so if I could turn back the clock to 1993 and never mention the fact outside my home I would.

Birol said:

Frank John, it should be noted that Nomad represents a small publishing house and most of the individuals who have responded to this thread are published authors who, at one point in time, were first time, previously unpublished authors. Are you suggesting that their works were unoriginal?

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No, but there are variations of originality. I have no doubt everyone is a first-time author, but these variations of originality are the primary factor which regulates the "Catch-22" phenomena. All written works have originality apart from those who plagiarise or regurgitate the work of others.

What I mean by "variations of originality" is from the fundamentals of logic:-

(a) A known problem in a known context.
(b) A known problem in an unknown context.
(c) An unknown problem in a known context.
(d) An unknown problem in an unknown context.

My problem is that I am in category (d) because my work is upon an unknown problem (because it is not recognised as a problem), therefore my work is in an unknown context (because it has no recognisable context). Furthermore, I assumed people would be pleased I had shone a light into the darkness, but instead the response is hostile a though I had broken some taboo. Weird. ))