Kerry Allen

So I’m doing a little remodeling. I’ll have to come up with something spiffier for the header, but otherwise I’m liking this better.

Note in the comment section, it actually accepts a double space between paragraphs! (Honestly, that was the main thing driving me crazy.)

On the left, the beginnings of a guest blog post. Some people indicate a change of thought with a paragraph or perhaps a dividing line. I spin the page around and literally go in a new direction. There are also some random, completely unrelated jots because if I don’t write everything down the second I hear it, it’s gone forever. Not an auditory learner here—must see words to retain.

On the right, the printed version of a first draft (actually, a draft-and-a-half, since I write longhand first and do a little tweaking in the transfer to computer) with pre-second-draft notes in green. This is the cleanest page from the current WIP, as there is still white space visible and also no arrows indicating more on the back. My first drafts are about 90 percent dialogue. (And also single-spaced. I don’t know how anybody reads double-spaced type. It destroys the flow for me.)

There’s a new commercial scolding me people for the wasted paper that would extend in a 12-foot high wall from New York to Los Angeles. The largest part of my environmental footprint is probably paper (I’m pretty conscientious in all other respects). This causes me much shame, but try as I might, I am completely unable to compose on the computer. There’s a visceral element in putting pen to paper that I just can’t write without. (And spinning the ‘puter around to change direction? Not so effective.) I do make a point of using every square inch of paper, front and back, and recycling when I’ve run out of room to scribble.

But if you’re driving across the country and crash into an inconveniently constructed wall of paper… sorry about that.

WL: I has a sad. And it occurred to me that there’s a curve. The first time is painful. Then it gets easier, until you’re almost laughing about it. But then… you poke the same bruise one time too many, and suddenly it’s not funny anymore. I have One Last Ditch Effort up my sleeve, but at the moment, that just seems like drawing a bullseye on said bruise and inviting another poke. I’ll probably do it anyway because I couldn’t live with the “if only I’d tried it” factor, but I don’t have the heart for it at the moment. (It’s a pulpy mess on the floor. Awaiting transplant.)

NB: First two of seven “chapters” fleshed out. I really believed I would have it finished by today, but Day Job was very hostile toward the writing schedule this week. Still plenty of wiggle room with the word count. Hopefully done by next weekend. Done done, as in subbed. There’s the benefit of writing short: not a huge, heartbreaking investment of time and energy.

Blog: Wrote June 20 column for RTB (yes, June 20—I’m still a neurotic wreck about “guest appearances,” and the sooner I get them turned in, the less my sanity deteriorates). The gals’ POV from the Hero Matchmaker thing, and definitive proof that writers are evil. Now it’s official—you couldn’t pay me enough to be a romance novel heroine. If I’m on the schedule after that (heh), I’ll buckle down and do something slightly less fruity.

Saturday, May 10, is the annual Letter Carriers Food Drive. Please consider leaving a nonperishable or two out by your mailbox to be collected and delivered to shelters and food banks in your area. The holiday windfall is long gone by now. It’s especially important that these community resources be well supplied heading into summer, since the school breakfast and lunch programs that many low-income families rely upon will soon be unavailable.

Please, won’t you think of the starving American children?

It has been scientifically proven that happy employees work harder.

It is about to be scientifically proven that a bunch of male bosses who subject a bunch of female employees to eight hours of mandatory overtime on Mother’s Day weekend are not long for this world.

.

.

Very truly yours,

A devoted underling who fears for her employers’ lives

(In no small part because she has been assigned the task of disposing of the bodies)

(Yes, I persist with the futile argument of reason.) 

Author A and Author B have completed manuscripts of equal brilliance and originality. They send them off to Fabulous Editor. The manuscripts sit side by side in Fabulous Editor’s inbox. Fabulous Editor grabs Author A’s manuscript first and falls ass over teakettle in love with it.

Does Fabulous Editor subsequently dump everything else in the inbox into the trash because she has found The Next Big Thing and never needs to look at another manuscript again?

No. Fabulous Editor continues mining for gold in the slush because Fabulous Editor intends to have a career beyond next year.

I have it on good authority Fabulous Editor would be running round the office screaming “This is the best fucking day of my life!” if the next manuscript she read also made her fall ass over teakettle in love with it.

Therefore, Author A’s manuscript is in no way impeding the publication of Author B’s manuscript.

Author A’s book and Author B’s book hit the shelves at the same time and, by happy coincidence, are placed side by side.

Discerning Reader finds both covers equally compelling and takes a look at both books. The back-cover copy is equally interesting. A quick skim of the contents suggests the books are equally brilliant and original, and Discerning Reader wants both. Equally.

So Discerning Reader buys both.

Yeah, but what if Discerning Reader has only enough money in her pocket for one book? Huh? What then, smarty pants?

Discerning Reader eeny-meeny-miney-moes her choice and comes back on payday to get the other one because she can’t get it out of her mind.

Therefore, Author A’s book is in no way impeding the sale of Author B’s book.

I don’t dispute the existence of competition, but it is not between writers. The competition is between reader interest and reader disinterest as it pertains to an individual story, whether that reader is an editor, an agent, a contest judge, or a book buyer. All of the above are looking for an engaging read—or two or twenty or eighty-six. No reader has ever bemoaned the agony of having too many exciting stories to choose from.

Once a writer sends a story out into the world, it stands or falls on its own. Nobody props it up. Nobody trips it. If it’s not universally embraced as a work of genius, that is not the fault of any writer other than the one who produced it, and spending even one minute of one day spewing about how someone else has ruined your chances of success is a waste of time you could have spent writing something new, something better, something that will juxtapose asses and teakettles everywhere.

(End rant. Please deposit nonsensical outbursts in the appropriate receptacle.)

NB: Thursday, I think, got a wild notion to write something short (me, Ms. But-It’s-Only-40,000-Words-Over-Maximum-Length) for a specific market. It’s falling together pretty nicely. Don’t exactly have the ending. Didn’t have character names until I hit the wall with the ending and went back to fill in all those blanks. Finally came up with appropriate benign-sounding acronym for the evil group, prior to which it was my standard TAO (The Acronym Organization). None of which sounds like “falling together pretty nicely,” but trust me, it’s much smoother than most of my starts.

Stands at 7300 words (in 3 days—whee!) with my lack of ending and first-draft placeholders (such as “insert face sucking here”—seriously, this is my process), so hitting minimum length won’t be a problem, and I’ll have plenty of room to flesh it out before I hit maximum.

No suitable title yet. About 50 campy titles, at which I seem to excel. Unfortunately, not real fitting for my torture stories.

Don’t know how well suited it is for said market (primarily, don’t think my hero is enough of an asshole), but I suppose they’ll let me know. If they let me NO, I reckon we found our serial, since I’m of a mind the yield on a story this size is too low to expend a huge amount of effort finding it a home.

(Completely-unrelated-to-anything vampire story, by the way. Practicing stepping outside the universe upon which Kerry’s Fantasy Career was based.)