On a blind date last night:
Date: So I hear you're a writer. What do you write?
Me: Mostly historical fiction, but I dabble in other genres too. Right now I'm working on a fantasy novel.
Date: What's fantasy?
Me: Well there's a lot of different kinds of fantasy, but think Lord of the Rings.
Date: Oh, so like teenager books?
Me: ...um, no, not really...
Date: So how do you get published? It must be really easy, because most books are crap.
Me: Um, no, not really. When I'm ready, I'll start sending it around to agents, and they sell my book to the publishing houses.
Date: And the only way to get an agent is to be published already, right?
Me: No, they judge you based on the book you wrote. If it's good, they don't care if you've never been published before.
Date: What? You have to send in the whole book and wait for them to read it? That must take forever.
Me: No, you just send a letter and the first couple chapters. Then they decide if they want to read the whole thing or not.
Date: I know! Why don't you just print the whole thing on bright orange paper! That way, it'll stand out from the pile and they'll read it faster!
Me: *headdesk* That's not really considered professional.
Date: Well, I don't think they're very professional, if they're publishing all that crap every year instead of anything good.
Me: *wants to fall through the floor and die*
Later on he insisted that "all good books are written at 2am with cigarettes and whisky, like the Russians", The Catcher in the Rye isn't really a novel, and (my personal favorite), James Joyce never needed to edit, so I shouldn't have to either. Uh, I have no idea if Joyce edited or not, but I definitely need to!
Mine is to create.
