This Writing Life--Mark Terry

NEW BLOG SITE

markterry@charter.net — Wed, 16 Aug 06 15:46:00 UT

August 16, 2006

This blog has moved to:

www.markterrybooks.com/blog.htmlwww.markterrybooks.com/blog.html and www.mark-terry.com/blog.html

Best,
Mark Terry

A little terrorism context

markterry@charter.net — Tue, 15 Aug 06 08:58:00 UT

August 15, 2006
An excerpt from "The One Percent Doctrine" by Ron Suskind that takes place just prior to President Bush's visit to the UN to drum up support for the war in Iraq.

"On Friday afternoon, January 10, Jami Miscik, the head of the DI walked down the hall on the seventh floor shaking with rage.

John Moseman, Tenet's chief of staff, saw her as she passed his office.

'You okay?'

'No. I'm not okay. I'm definitely not okay!'

A moment later, she'd made it to Tenet's suite.

She barely could get out the words. Stephen Hadley, Condi's second, had called from the office of 'Scooter' Libby, Cheney's chief of staff.

They wanted her down at Libby's office in the White House by 5 p.m. At issue was the last in an endless series of draft reports aobut the connection between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda. How many drafts? Miscik couldn't remember. The pressure from the White House--and from the various intelligence divisions under the Vice President and the Secretary of Defense--had started a week after 9/11.

Cheney's office claimed to have sources. And Rumsfeld's, too. They kept throwing them at Miscik and CIA. The same information, five different ways. They'd omit that a key piece had been discounted, that the source had recanted. Sorry, our mistake. Then it would reappear, again, in a memo the next week. The CIA held firm: the meeting in Prague between Atta and the Iraqi agent didn't occur.

Miscik was no fool. She understood what was going on. It wasn't about what was true, or verifiable. It was about a defensible position, or at least one that would hold up until the troops were marching through Baghdad, welcomed as liberators.

A few days before, when she had sent the final draft over to Libby and Hadley, she told them, emphatically, This is it. There would be no more drafts, no more meetings where her analysts sat across from Hadley or Feith, or the guys in Feith's office, while the opposing team tried to slip something by them. The report was not what they wanted. She knew that. No evidence meant no evidence.

'I'm not going back there, again, George,' Miscik said. 'If I have to go back to hear their crap and rewrite this goddamn report... I'm resigning, right now.'

She fought back tears of rage.

Tenet picked up the phone to call Hadley.

'She is not coming over,' he shouted into the phone. 'We are not rewriting this fucking report one more time. It is fucking over. Do you hear me! And don't you ever fucking treat my people this way again. Ever!'

They did not rewrite the report.

And that's why, three weeks later, in making the case for war in his State of the Union address, George W. Bush was not able to say what he'd long hoped to say at such a moment: that there was a pre-9/11 connection between al Qaeda and Saddam."

* * *

Of course, he was able to keep in that Saddam had bought quantities of yellow cake uranium in Africa, which not only wasn't true, but the CIA had been over this point again and again: 1. They didn't think it happened at all. 2. Saddam already had several hundred pounds of yellow cake, so why would he want more? 3. It's just not that easy to turn that crap into something that can be used in a bomb. He also said that the high-strength aluminum tubes were suitable for nuclear weapons production, which has been rejected by the CIA as well as the UN weapons inspection teams.

Educational, ey?

Best,
Mark Terry

General Motors, Timothy McVey and...

markterry@charter.net — Mon, 14 Aug 06 17:34:00 UT

August 14, 2006
Latest report:

WASHINGTON - Scientists have discovered the presence of a strain of bird flu in wild mute swans in Michigan â but testing ruled out it being the worrisome, highly pathogenic form of the virus which has spread throughout much of the rest of the world and killed at least 138 people worldwide, officials at the Agriculture Department said Monday.

Don't you feel safe?

Book Review: Kill All The Lawyers by Paul Levine

markterry@charter.net — Sun, 13 Aug 06 13:13:00 UT

August 13, 2006
When my book review editor called to tell me this reviewing gig was basically ending, one of the reasons she called was also to tell me to, uh, not plan on reviewing whatever I was currently reading. I was reading KILL ALL THE LAWYERS by Paul Levine and I finished it yesterday.

Some bittersweet irony here. The first novel I ever reviewed was for The Armchair Detective and it was FOOL ME TWICE by Paul Levine. That seemed like a license to steal. Great book and I promptly went out and bought all of his books. He took a few years off to write for TV (JAG, among others) and now he's back with a new comic mystery series dubbed the Solomon vs Lord novels, the principle characters being attorneys Steve Solomon and Victoria Lord. KILL ALL THE LAWYERS is the third in this series, after SOLOMON VS. LORD and THE DEEP BLUE ALIBI.

KILL ALL THE LAWYERS
by Paul Levine
Bantam Books
Paperback original. $6.99. 352 Pages
ISBN: 0-440-24275-4
Publication: August5 29, 2006

In Paul Levine's "Kill All The Lawyers," Steve Solomon finds himself facing down an old client, radio psychologist Dr. Bill Kreeger. Years before, Steve defended Kreeger in a murder case, getting the charges dropped to manslaughter, with Kreeger serving 6 years. The spin is that Steve could have gotten Kreeger off had he not found potential evidence of a previous, similar murder and surreptitiously turned it over to the prosecution.

Now Kreeger's out of prison, has his own radio talk show and is determined to destroy Steve's career... and probably his life. It is a comic version--if that's possible--of "Cape Fear," with Kreeger stalking Steve and manipulating events so Steve appears to be running down a cattle chute to his own destruction.

Meanwhile, on the comic front, Steve and Victoria are shopping for condos to move into together, Steve's brilliant and quirky 12-year-old nephew, Bobbie, now age 12, has discovered girls, and Victoria's mother, Queen Irene, has an important announcement to make. Oh, and Steve's dad has decided to become an orthodox Jew... sort of.

KILL ALL THE LAWYERS isn't exactly a mystery. It's more of a suspense novel. Kreeger does such a great job of pushing all of Steve's buttons and leading him into trouble of his own making that it's not entirely clear to the reader--until the end--if Kreeger is just a misunderstood good guy who took the fall for someone else, or a brilliant psychopath really intent on paying Steve back for his six years in prison. The novel is ultimately rather sweet with a satisfactory and exciting climax, with plenty of laughs along the way. Levine's books remain, as ever, fully entertaining.

Book Sections in Newspapers

markterry@charter.net — Sat, 12 Aug 06 16:09:00 UT

August 12, 2006
I'll try to keep from whining. As I commented yesterday, the newspaper I was reviewing mysteries and thrillers for has decided to limit their reviews to local authors or authors who are touring in Oakland County, or... you get the idea, it's no longer going to be a book section, but in the same way that the feature page focuses on medicine and health on Thursdays and food on Mondays, people and or books or writers will probably be the focus on Sundays, maybe...

Anyway, a common whine among writers, especially mystery writers (and romance writers, who rarely get reviewed in newspapers, or SF writers who NEVER get reviewed in newspapers and...) is the way the book reviews space is shrinking, especially in newspapers.

Wanna know why?

It's not lack of interest on the part of newspaper readers, although I've heard that said, but I don't actually believe it.

I commented to my wife yesterday, "Guess they won't be cutting out their car reviews, will they?"

Of course not. I live in the Detroit area. The newspapers in this area live and die by the auto industry. If you go through and look at their advertising, how much of it is by the auto industry do you think?

Get rid of movie reviews? Yeah, right. How many movie ads from both studios and theaters do you see in your newspaper?

Theater? Concerts?

That's right. Now, assuming that your newspaper isn't the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times or USA Today, how many publishing houses and bookstores advertise in your city's newspaper?

Yeah, I thought so.

Best,
Mark Terry

As I was saying...

markterry@charter.net — Fri, 11 Aug 06 16:52:00 UT

August 11, 2006
Got back from vacation today. It was fabulous. Weather was great and I spent a lot of time on the beach and kayaking and playing horse shoes and taking walks. The weather was iffy on Thursday so we went over to Traverse City and ate at Mabels and visited the Cherry Republic store and visited the sand dunes and the weather there was sunny and 80, but cloudy and 72 back at Higgins Lake. I spent entirely too much time communicating with a variety of editors and/or publishing folk who just couldn't live without me for 4 or 5 days and especially the pain-in-the-butt details of transferring my website domain, etc. Youngest son barfed in the car on the way home (Skittles), but otherwise...

Well, reality bites, you know? And I get home and check my cell phone and there's a message from my book review editor to call right away. Yep. I thought maybe this shoe was going to drop. The Oakland Press has a new executive editor and he told them that he only wanted book reviews if they have a local tie-in--by an Oakland County author or they're touring in the county. This essentially puts me out of a job.

Although I'm not exactly happy about this, neither am I particularly surprised. I've always felt that this particular gig hung on a thread, that the book page only existed because of my editor and her boss's desire to have that book page, and that if they retired or, uh, a new editor came in, it stood a good chance of getting pitched. Because, sadly enough, review space in newspapers and elsewhere are shrinking (and you've heard it here first, haven't you? Of course not.). My editor was practically in tears. I was more glum and...

Look, book reviews made up maybe 12% of my income last year and this year probably about 7%. But sometimes it can be a chore. There are books you want to read and you just can't get to them because they don't meet the editorial calendar, or whatever. I'm not happy about the money, although I'll continue to write features for the OP, which pay nearly double and take up less time anyway, so it's likely the money won't change overall.

This is a freelancer's life. They were one of my two least-paying clients and I ditched the other one officially at the end of this year. You roll with the punches. There are pluses to this kind of change in many ways. Now I can pretty much read what I want and going to a bookstore might be fun again. I'll miss the free books, sure, but I'm buried in them at the moment and there are a dozen or so on my shelf I want to read for fun anyway...

Just, this wasn't exactly what I wanted to hear before I even unpacked my bag.

On the bright side, I got 10 more news article assignments from one of my regular clients and some much-needed data came in for the biz report I'm working on, and we should have the new website going live very, very soon...

Now, how come nobody sent me any checks while I was out of town?

Sigh. The writer's life for sure.

Best,
Mark Terry

Nobody Knows Anything

markterry@charter.net — Wed, 9 Aug 06 18:51:00 UT

August 9, 2006
I suggest you click over to the Murderati blog and read today's entry. Interesting thoughts on the questionability of all this publishing advice floating around on the Internet, some thoughts made by Laura Lippman on the subject and others.

It reminded me of a book on screenwriting and the movie industry by William Goldman, where part of the underlying theme is: Nobody Knows Anything.

I essentially agree with the Murderati blog today in that, although there's a lot of publishing and writing advice out here on blogs and websites, and an awful lot of it is useful, not all of it is useful, not all of it is correct and not all of it is advisable.

For example: I think Joe Konrath's blog and website is a veritable fount (or is that font?) of terrific advice about writing and publishing.

Joe also gives an example of the query letter he used to snag his agent and it was very much a high-concept advertising kind of concept that read like a sales pitch.

Nothing wrong with that. But I pretty much get chills--and I suspect a lot of agents do too--at the thought of a thousand aspiring writers looking for agents now mimicking Joe's used-car-salesman-on-speed sales approach in their query letters. One in a thousand can attract their attention. A thousand people doing it and agents will be discarding the letters even faster than the DEAR AGENT, I NOW IVE GOT A BESTSE$$$LLAR CAUSE MY MOM SAYS MY BUCK REMINDS HER OF JON GRISHUMS.

In terms of how-to publishing advice, I've always been a big fan of Michael Crichton's, which essentially was, "I don't give out advice. What worked for me wasn't typical and might not work for you."

The majority of sales come about this way. Write a good novel. Write a good businesslike query letter to an agent who decides to take you on as a client after reading the manuscript, sending it to an editor who thinks they can publish it and turn a buck.

That's the simple truth there. How to write a good novel? What's a good businesslike query letter? What are agents looking for? How do you find an agent who's taking on new clients?

Hey, these are complicated. It's a numbers game and a quality game. And NOBODY KNOWS ANYTHING. Or more accurately, NOBODY KNOWS EVERYTHING.

Do I?

Hell no. Oh hell no. Does my agent? I'd like to think so, but she tells me she doesn't know what editors want all the time and admits she probably shouldn't admit that to a client. Hell, editors seem to pick up manuscripts on chicken bones and tea leaves, some unpredictable combination of gut instincts, experience, current publishing list, what's hot, what they like, what they don't like, what their boss has suggested they look for, what the New York Times and Publishers Weekly suggests might be a trend (written by some freelance writer who's desperate to make a mortgate payment probably), what has taken off in the industry and what has tanked recently and some X factor like liking the author's name, the title of the book, or the input of their spouse, siblings, dog, cat or guinea pig.

I'm convinced of a couple things. Quality and persistence are the two most important factors in getting published. Learn to write well and keep on marketing.

Neither will guarantee success in the marketplace. Doesn't that suck?

Best,
Mark Terry

Kayaking 101--oops

markterry@charter.net — Mon, 7 Aug 06 22:11:00 UT

August 7, 2006
We bought a 2-man kayak about a month ago and we've been using it a lot. Being both enthusiastic and foolish, I've taken it out by myself twice here on Higgins Lake. The first time was okay.

The other bit of advice they warn you about is that wind is not the friend of the kayaker.

It was windy today, but the water looked reasonably calm. I--again, note how the word "foolish" appears regularly in this case--went out alone and began kayaking with the wind at my back. Gee, I was flying. The wind was stronger than I thought and the water had a nice rolling, regular wave pattern to it, moving me right along.

So after a good twenty minutes I was close to the eastern shore, checking out the big houses and decided it was high time I returned. Yeah. Well, strong wind, one or two-foot waves... had a hell of a time turning the kayak around. Couldn't do it to my, er, starboard at all because of the wind and wave pattern, so I tried it to my, er, port and finally after a struggle got myself pointed back into the wind, facing the waves.

Quite exhilarating, pounding into these waves, my big butt in th back of a too-big kayak that was now back heavy, so the nose pounds on every wave, ka-bam! ka-bam!. Hell of a lot of fun until you discover that if you take any kind of a break, the wave and winds turns you automatically to your, uh, starboard and you're blowing back the way you came...

But still, I was muscling it along, then I got shifted to my, hmmm, starboard, and I'm getting blown toward shore and I'm probably a half mile or so from my destination and by god I'm going in the wrong freakin' direction and pretty damned fast and I can't get the kayak turned around...

Well, I do eventually, and the closer I get to shore the more control I seem to have (sort of), and my 20 minute ride with the wind and waves at my back took my 41 minutes to return for a total 61 minutes kayak ride.

Since I live in Michigan I decided two things. One, I won't take this kayak out on the Great Lakes. If I go off the shore of Lake Michigan around Ludington or Leland I could end up in Green Bay, Wisconsin by accident. And two, if I'm ever really stupid, I would try the ocean and could find out what it's like to drink my own urine and eat my shirt... (Okay everybody, sing along with me: "...a three-hour cruise...")

Probably a PS for this is to stick my cell phone in a baggie and carry it with me, so if I get tired enough and end up on shore somewhere I can just call my wife to come pick me up.

But I DID have fun.

Best,
Mark Terry

Aaaahhhhh, vacation...

markterry@charter.net — Sun, 6 Aug 06 20:36:00 UT

August 6, 2006
Second day on vacation. Brought the travel laptop, but left the work laptop at home. I'll keep up on e-mail, sort of, blogging, kinda, and work... well, not really.

Do need to write a book review of the book I just finished reading (on the beach in between kayaking, swimming, playing horse shoes with my kids). We're at Higgins Lake in northern Michigan. Even the water is reasonable temperature, which for Higgins Lake is quite unusual. Higgins is very deep and quite large--3 miles across, 8 miles long and I've heard it's 800 feet deep and spring fed, which explains why it's usually very cold, but due to last week's 90+ temps, it's, well... managable for us old guys.

Best,
Mark Terry

The Compass of Captain Jack Sparrow

markterry@charter.net — Fri, 4 Aug 06 08:25:00 UT

August 4, 2006
Haven't seen either of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies? Don't want me to tell you any thing about them? Go away. Otherwise...

Just a reminder. In the first Pirates movie, "The Curse of the Black Pearl," Captain Jack Sparrow, played by Johnnie Depp, has a compass he keeps checking. It is commented upon that the compass is broken. At one point Will, played by Orlando Bloom, comments that the compass doesn't point north and Mr. Gibbs replies that, "We not interested in heading north, now, are we?"

So where does it point? I assumed in the first movie it pointed to The Black Pearl, Sparrow's beloved ship, or perhaps to Isla de Muerta, the Isle of the Dead (the island which can only be found by people who have already been there, I believe is how it's described).

In the 2nd movie, "Dead Man's Chest," we discover that the compass actually points to whatever the holder's greatest heart's desire is. Which causes some problems for Sparrow, because it doesn't seem to be pointing anywhere. He gives it to Elizabeth at one point knowing it should point to Will, who she is trying to find, and it does, but when the compass starts spinning on her... well, go see the movie, okay?

Wouldn't that compass be terrific? Or would it? I suspect our ability to understand our own heart's desires are, well, suspect. Sometimes we THINK we know what we want, but maybe we really don't.

We as writers think we know what we want, right? Or do we?

I wanted to make a living as a writer and now I do, and in some ways that's enough, although, of course, enough is never really enough, is it? I want more money, or to make all my income from writing fiction, and...

A constantly receding horizon, isn't it? Human nature, I think.

I also think about the price of pursuing your heart's desire. I'm glad I'm making a living as a writer. Too bad I didn't get a journalism degree 20 years ago and do it. Or the technical writing degree I considered, but for some reason was so stupid didn't think there were jobs in it. Was the nearly 20 years I spent writing before going fulltime wasted? No. Of course not. But the route I took was sure circuitous and I can see how pursuit of one goal--fiction--prevented me from achieving another goal--making a living as a writer--even though I doubt anybody could have told me that. Maybe if I'd made the acquaintance of a professional freelance writer a dozen years earlier...

What's the price? I'm watching Joe Konrath hit 500 bookstores in a zigzagging book tour this summer. If I were given the Faustian option--if you do 500 bookstores in 4 weeks, you can make a living as a novelist--would I take it?

My bargain was simpler: give up TV, a social life, spare time. Like Ahab, pursue your white whale to your own possible destruction. Arrange your life around your writing, jump whenever the phone rang at work hoping it was an agent or editor calling, have your mind constantly on the writing and not necessarily on what you were doing...

I didn't let it destroy my marriage or harm my kids, but I was probably balanced on a cliff the whole time, whether I knew it or not. And people definitely do destroy their lives, their marriages, etc., in pursuit of writing dreams... or any obsessions, whether it's work or some art, or...

I've said it before in this blog: there's more to life than writing.

Yet...

I'm a writer. It's who I am and what I am, in many ways. Each page I write is an adventure, and my compass, at least from a career perspective, found its true north, although it's ultimate true north is with Leanne and my children.

Still... as Cap'n Jack says, "Bring me that horizon."

Best,
Mark Terry

just showing up

markterry@charter.net — Thu, 3 Aug 06 08:33:00 UT

August 3, 2006
I was walking Frodo this morning and I saw a woman running, pushing one of those running strollers. I continued my walk and she eventually lapped us. She stopped and petted Frodo and let her son pet him and then she was off.

I walk Frodo 2 or 3 times a day, so I know my subdivision really well. I'm pretty regular, too, so I know who most of the runners are. There's Terry, who's amazingly consistent. She's a friend of ours. There's Fred, who runs sometimes with his two dogs. There's Annemarie down the street, who for some time could be seen running with her daughter in the running stroller pushed by one hand and her 3 dogs on a leash in her other hand, an absolutely stunning example of competent multi-tasking. There's some guy who started out slow and heavy and now is thin and fast. There's another woman who lives one street over who's just started running. She runs with her CD Walkman and she's slow, but I admire her determination.

My wife's a runner. I was trying to get back into that again, but my Achilles doesn't like it, so I've happily taken up biking. And for the last year I've been religiously going to the gym. I also study Sanchin Ryu karate, although just how much of a work out you get from that is up to you, the classes are mostly about technique. So in a way, I'm a born-again jock. I've lost about 25 pounds in the last year and I'm determined to continue exercising forever. It's a part of my life now.

At the gym I often see people who are enormously overweight or out of shape and they're there, plugging along. I feel like cheering for them.

From time to time my workouts are bad. They feel horrible or I can't complete my routine. My wife will come back from some run complaining how crappy it felt. Invariably one of us will comment,"That's not the point. The point is just doing it."

I think this is true for most things in life. Woody Allen was probably right, 9/10 of success is just showing up.

I know that when it comes to writing, over the years there would be days when I didn't feel like writing or I was really busy, and I showed up at the computer and did some writing anyway. I used to tell myself, "Do one page. One page a day is 365 pages, which is a novel. You can do at least one page." And it worked. And typically once I got that page down, I was in the groove and could do more. Sometimes it was a struggle and I only made a paragraph or two, but there it was.

It was also kind of unpredictable. I wouldn't feel like writing, I'd go ahead and write anyway, and most of the time it felt great. Sometimes it didn't. But I never knew until I sat down and did it. Same goes with exercising, I think, which is not really the point of this blog today.

The point, in case you missed it and need me to hold your hand, is just like the Nike ads: Just do it!

Best,
Mark Terry

Beating Up Honor Students

markterry@charter.net — Wed, 2 Aug 06 08:35:00 UT

August 2, 2006
I went for a walk this morning, like I do typically 7 days a week, and I noticed a bumper sticker on a car. It said:

My chihuahua is smarter than your honor roll student.

It brought to mind that gem: My kid can beat up your honor roll student.

My oldest son, Ian, is an honor roll student. In fact, my wife's truck sports a bumper sticker saying: My Son is an OMS Honor Roll Student.

And for those out there who think your kid can beat up my honor roll student, I'll just point out that Ian is a 3rd degree brown belt in Sanchin Ryu karate. Yes, it's possible your kid can beat up my honor roll student, but trust me, there are no guarantees.

Anyway, over on Rick Riordan's blog, he has reprinted a lengthy article from a British newspaper about gender-sensitive education and the apparent need to educate boys differently than girls, partly because boys aren't doing as well. Rick, now a fulltime author (I really, REALLY recommend his books, both the adult PI novels featuring Tres Navarre and the YA books featuring Percy Jackson; in fact, if you're an adult, I recommend the Percy Jackson novels even more) taught middle school for close to twenty years, and his comment is, "About time." Rick, like myself, has two sons, and in fact I think they're pretty close in age.

Do I think boys and girls are different? Well, duh. Yes. Is it societal? Or genetics?

Both. Society gives boys a lot of slack in the intellectual area and encourages sports and competitiveness to an unhealthy level. Probably girls are given too much slack in other areas, as well. Particularly when girls get into the middle school and high school years where they start purposefully acting stupid. It's unforgivable that society actually encourages that.

There was a column in TIME Magazine this week by a female author who sort of went "undercover" in the business world to see how women were treated differently than men. One of the incredibly disturbing, but probably true, things she pointed out was how the business world has gotten away from "intellectuals" and "brains" and encouraged the kind of "social buddyism" that resembled a fraternity house. I'm not sure I agreed 100% with what she said, but there were some definite truths to what she had to say.

So?

Hey, no real conclusions here. I'm a guy and I have two sons. I like raising sons. They're in karate, but they also play guitar. My oldest also plays bassoon and wants to be a writer. They're remarkable people, these two boys (Ian's closing in rapidly on "young man"), and I'm quite proud of them and hope they successfully pick their way through the minefield that is adolescence and young adulthood in a way that will make them strong, happy, successful men--successful defined by them, not society or necessarily their parents.

Best,
Mark Terry

Amazon's getting clever...

markterry@charter.net — Tue, 1 Aug 06 16:49:00 UT

August 1, 2006
Got an e-mail from Amazon today:

We've noticed that customers who have purchased The One Percent Doctrine by Ron Suskind also purchased books by Tracy DiSabato-Aust. For this reason, you might like to know that Tracy DiSabato-Aust's The Well-Tended Perennial Garden: Planting and Pruning Techniques will be released soon. You can pre-order your copy at a savings of 37% by following the link below.

***
Well, that's nice. The 1% Doctrine is an in-depth book about the Bush Administration and the War on Terror since 9/11, with all sorts of in-depth interviews & background with the CIA, etc. Otherwise:

Book Description
With more than 130,000 copies sold since its original publication, The Well-Tended Perennial Garden has proven itself to be one of the most useful tools a gardener can have. Now, in this expanded edition, there's even more to learn from and enjoy. This is the first, and still the most thorough, book to detail essential practices of perennial care such as deadheading, pinching, cutting back, thinning, disbudding, and deadleafing, all of which are thoroughly explained and illustrated. More than 200 new color photographs have been added to this revised edition, showing perennials in various...

Ah well, maybe "The Constant Gardner?"

Best,
Mark Terry

Money & The Writer

markterry@charter.net — Tue, 1 Aug 06 08:54:00 UT

August 1, 2006
Yesterday I threw out that bit about how many books are supposedly sold. Today I'm contemplating money. Part of this might be Joe Konrath's blog yesterday where he mentioned his goals and one of those was doubling his current income.

I wouldn't mind doubling my current income. Last year I made just about the amount of money I made as my goal, and for 2006 I wanted to make about $10,000 more. The irony is that as of the beginning of July 2006, I had already equaled last year's income, so not only will I meet my goal of 2006 (pretty soon), but shatter it unless all hell breaks loose in the next few months. It's possible I might actually double last year's income, but that might be gluttony.

And it's not entirely planned. I picked up two clients that paid very well this year. One's got me doing this mammoth business report. The other has me doing short news articles for their website at $100 a pop, and they typically assign me 9 or 10 of these at a time to be done in a week or two, and those really add up. The funny thing about that, besides that I like doing them, is it was supposed to originally be a temp gig, probably ending in March, but it's continued on so far. I hope it'll continue on forever, naturally, but if it doesn't, it doesn't.

Which is maybe where I'm going today.

I don't think freelancer writers should get accustomed to an always increasing income. One year you make a little more, then the next year a little more, and then more and... sort of like a regular job where, just by virtue of showing up and doing a decent job, you'll get cost of living increases and regular merit raises. But for all I know, next year I'll make less money than I did last year. I hope not, of course, but I have to be aware that like any business, income can fluctuate.

I certainly hope my income keeps going up. For that matter, I hope my income keeps going up because my novels gain an audience and the royalties and foreign rights sales etc, keep pouring in.

I can't predict where the business will come from. One thing I've figured out--and quickly--is that things change. Clients you've been working with regularly stop working with you, even if they like your work. Editors change jobs. Publications fold. Publications change their editorial focus. Publication budgets drop and they stop working with freelancers. Sometimes editors can make more money by freelancing themselves for their own publications, so they stop hiring you and start writing the articles themselves. Sometimes they're forced to do in-house writing as part of their contracts.

It's such a part of the freelancer's life that you really have to change your mindset. I freely admit that although I'm not thrilled when a market dries up, I really do just shrug and say, "Well, I'd better go find another client." With the belief that I will. And so far that's true.

The funny thing about money is that when I make more, I seem to find a way to spend it without any obvious increase in luxuries. There's a minimum amount of money I want to see in our savings account. I want to be able to shove money quarterly into my retirement account.

Aside from that, well, pay the bills and take vacations and, gee, we could use a new couch, and we need to replace our kitchen floor...

There are two ways of thinking about freelancing or running your own business. And this applies to novelists, too, because I know many of you who read this are aiming at making a living from writing fiction.

One is, there's no security in this, so I'd better have a backup in case things go to hell.

Two, your security is your skill and ability, and that, at least, can't be taken from you.

I'll let you figure out which one I think you should have to be a happy freelance writer.

Oh, and one more thought about writing and money. Many writers--just like the rest of the population apparently--don't put much value on professional writing. I suspect many people I used to work with are surprised to find that I'm making a go of it. They don't believe there's any money in writing. I'm sure they'd be shocked to find that I made the same amount of money last year that I did working at the hospital and this year I'm far exceeding what I'd ever have made working in cytogenetics. My sister was surprised, even shocked, when I told her how much one of my regular clients paid me. It never occurred to her that someone might pay $1 a word.

My point is, do you think what you do has value? Then put a value on it. Do you think that you bring skill and talent and craft to what you do? Skill and talent and craft for writing the way a chef has for cooking or an engineer has for designing or a lawyer has for the law? Are you doing something better that somebody else down the road can't do? Then put a value on it!

Best,
Mark Terry

Book Sales--Getting Real

markterry@charter.net — Mon, 31 Jul 06 09:49:00 UT

July 31, 2006
Received this e-mail on one of my listservs today. Food for thought, or, as I prefer to think of it: REALITY CHECK, DUDES!

"Here are some numbers that may make you feel better about your sales.
Elaine

From SHOTS magazine: Ever wonder how well a book sells?

In 2004, Nielsen Bookscan tracked sales of 1.2 million books in
the US.

* Of those 1.2 million, 950,000 sold fewer than 99 (yes,
ninety-nine) copies each.
* Another 200,000 sold fewer than 1,000 copies.
* Only 25,000 books sold more than 5,000 copies.
* Fewer than 500 sold more than 100,000 copies.
* Only 10 books sold more than a million copies each.
* THE AVERAGE BOOK IN THE US SELLS ABOUT 500 COPIES

Elaine Viets
www.elaineviets.com"

Best,
Mark Terry