Writing Fiction

Looking back at Kerouac

He was a big deal when I was 16 and 17 and On the Road was the novel of the 1950s. Now fifty years have spun past as fast as a car driven by Dean Moriarty, and a lot of people are looking back. One of of them is Louis Menand in The New Yorker: Drive, He Wrote. It's a long, thoughtful and perceptive analysis.

I haven't read Kerouac in many, many years, but I recall his writing (and especially the cadence of it) and the way he glamorized his generation and gave my generation something to match.

S.E. Hinton Sets Me Straight

Back in July, I posted an item about Publishing Early and included this example:

In the US, S.E. Hinton published The Outsiders when she was 18, and it made a fortune, but what has Hinton published since then?

Well, Ms Hinton recently ran across my comment and briefed me on her career:

Since you didn't seem to know, I have published 4 young adult novels since The Outsiders: That Was Then, This is Now, Rumble Fish, Tex, and Taming the Star-Runner. All are still in print and sell well every year. Also, one picture book for children, Big David, Little David, and a chapter book for elementary age kids, The Puppy Sister.

For adults, my published novels are Hawkes Harbor, and Some of Tim's Stories.

I've worked on the screenplays for Rumble Fish and The Outsiders, the pilot of The Outsiders TV series, and the play version of The Outsiders. I've worked on other screenplays, plays, and am still writing novels.

It is not the kiss of death to publish young. Yes, you can be embarrassed by your first works. That goes for adults, too. Keep On Reading!

I'm honoured to stand corrected. And Ms Hinton, keep on writing!

Farewell, Robert Jordan

Via CBC.ca: Wheel of Time fantasy author Robert Jordan dies. Excerpt:

Fantasy author Robert Jordan, whose Wheel of Time series captivated millions, has died of a rare blood disorder at the age of 58.

Jordan, whose real name was James Oliver Rigney Jr., died Sunday at a hospital in South Carolina from primary amyloidosis with cardiomyopathy, said his personal assistant, Maria Simons, on Monday.

The disease attacks the body's major organs and in the author's case, it triggered a thickening of his heart's walls.

Jordan released a statement in March 2006 about his disease and the four-year prognosis for his survival. He assured his fans he intended to beat the odds and would go on writing for another 30 years.

I could never get into the Wheel of Time, but Jordan's work has been immensely popular, and inspired many of his readers to try their hand at writing. That in itself is a real legacy, and a tribute.

Publishing a short-story collection

A reader writes:
I have a small collection of short stories and I need help getting them published. How do i go about doing that? I have looked everywhere, agents, small publishers, etc. What do I do?

I'm a little hesitant to offer advice to short-story writers because it takes me 5,000 words just to clear my throat. I haven't written a short story since I was in George Nobbe's wonderful class in creative writing at Columbia...and that was close to fifty years ago.

The short story is a demanding genre, but no longer a popular one. Every pulp magazine used to publish a batch of them in each issue, not to mention the general-interest magazines like Saturday Evening Post.

Now, the chief market for short stories is the academic little magazine, usually subsidized by a college or university. They pay mostly in copies, or fifty bucks a page. A tiny number of genre mags like Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine and Analog are still around, but they must be swamped with submissions.

Yes, some big names still publish short-story collections. But if you're not John Updike or Alice Munro, your best chance of getting a collection into print is to have published a successful novel...with another good novel in progress. The collection will keep your readers happy until novel #2 is out.

If short stories matter to you, then write them and don't worry about publishing them. Send them out to the little magazines, and if they're accepted, great. If not, write more stories.

As you gain skill and confidence, you should move to longer forms like the novella and the novel. You may find that a series of short stories about the same characters or locale can blend themselves into a novel-length work. (An unjustly forgotten writer, William March, wrote a wonderful novel called Company K in which every man in a World War I Marine company tells his own short part of the company's story.)

Should you self-publish? Sure, if you want to create a lifetime supply of Christmas presents for friends and family. You'd reach more readers by posting the stories on a website, free.

But if you want to publish a collection that actually breaks even, or makes a little money, you should first publish several successful novels.