Smart Bitches, Trashy Books

Thank you, Laura.  As usual, the way you express yourself is simultaneously elegant, nuanced, and yet possessed of ringing clarity (to me, at least). 

Your comments about the magic of a book/story/idea/conception being then released into the world as a commodity, as well as addictive visits to various sites on the internet feeling like “having a bottle of liquor in the drawer” struck a chord, especially.

There isn’t much more I can say, except “Thank you”.  I truly enjoyed reading your post on this issue.

—MRM

I thought this was a brilliant response. Crafted, expressive, touching.

But in the end, I am afraid it will probably change very little. Which is kind of sad.

Art, by it’s very subjective nature, is to be assessed by it’s audience. It’s to be awed, studied, discussed, rejected, and often times, forgotten.

Reviews can be painful—a fact that I as a new author fear deeply—but like children, we cannot always protect our books. We’ve done our part and like with our kids, there’s always room for improvement on how we raised them. We can hurt that they were not universally loved, but we can’t pretend they won’t have flaws. Or wash our hands of our accountability to correct them.

Is the author the novel? No, not really. My books are usually a lot wittier—not to mention active—than I usually am. But I find that I cannot often change people’s perception of me once it’s created. That’s in person as well as in print. I can only be who I am, on the paper or next to you at a party. What you do with it is up to you.

I truly do believe readers have a right to be unhappy with a product they have paid for. We would complain if toilet cleaner didn’t work. We would be unhappy if we wasted money on dish soap or shampoo. I complain profusely when a product doesn’t work to my satisfaction, if only to myself or my husband, who in his graphic design business sells art to people who make the decision to purchase it while “art” is furthest from their minds.

That is simply the price of selling art as a commodity.

Dee

Now there’s this internet, another magic thing with a life of its own, a million voices roaring whispering screaming over your shoulder into the quiet place where the stories come from.

I’ve never heard it described more painfully accurately than that.  (And eww, I just used an adverb to modify an adverb.)

But there’s no rule that says authors have to let those voices in.  To me it seems unhealthy both for the work and for the sanity to open oneself up to such scrutiny/ridicule/adulation. 

How about not reading reviews, participating in group blogs, or lurking and posting on reader newsgroups?  There’s a radical idea, huh?

Based on Bitchery feedback from yesterday’s post, readers don’t want to get buddy-buddy with authors.  My desire to read someone’s book decreases with exposure to them in these kinds of forums.  Maybe readers would prefer authors “leave the room” so they can talk about their books honestly (as Ann pointed out in her comment on the other post).

So if exposing ourselves doesn’t endear us to readers, why jump into the fray at all?  Why not spend those hours and precious carpal tunnels writing better books?

Great Answer from laura Kinsale and she one of my all time favorite authors, but I think it is only half the story.

Yes, when You are carried into the middle of your story, you are creating art (Or something etheral. Pretty shit. Whatever) But when that is done, then you take a deep breath and start the edits. You think about spelling, grammar, syntax, whether this or that is offensive but your prepared to stand by it, or not. You try to gage what your agent/editor will think. This stage has everything to do with thinking about your audience, what you are trying to do with your writing and how you can best sell it as well. Perhaps it’s not that mercenery, but for me Oscar Wilde said it will with the line “an artist’s heart is in his(her) head.”

To sell a book you have to sell a bit of yourself? So be it. This is an age in instant and intimate contact. Or perhaps it’s a case of quantity over quality. People like a book, they want to know the person who created it. Yes often it’s tacky and icky, but it is reality. It has to be when books are competing with T.v., movies and other psuedo-intimate mediums.

And critism of a book is a shit and, yes, it is always personal. I’m sure if i told someone their kid was fugugly then I’d get a slap across the chops.

As Dee said, it is all the price of selling art as a commodity. And it is a price that has always had to be paid in some form or other.

Well that what I think any way

I used to love his books so much that I longed to write to him, like you’d write to a lover, as if I knew him and he must know me, and we could have long conversations and understand one another.

Laura Kinsale, even your e-mail is beyond eloquent.  I know exactly what you mean by this.  When someone’s writing speaks to me so profoundly or with such perfect clarity, I *do* feel as though the author must be my kindred spirit and that we would surely get on like a house afire if we got together.  This is probably at the root of the reader over-identifying with author problem (if you think it is a problem.)  In such cases, criticism of the favorite author can be perceived as criticism of one’s self.

I am glad that you think of your writing as *art* (and you are very right to do so, IMHO.)  But art is *always* subject to criticism, be it Monet, Mozart or the latest literary sensation.  It must be almost impossible to avoid reading criticism of your work, even if you are actively trying to steer clear of it.  The temptation to peek in on an internet review site and see how your work is being received must be nearly irresistible.  Actually, I would rather authors think of their detractors as “a bunch of clueless babbling idiots” and go on to follow their own muse than to start modifying their work to try to please every reader (and thus sap the life out of it.)  Just because someone criticizes your work doesn’t mean that they are right.  (The early Impressionist painters were savaged by the critics of the French Royal Academie of Fine Arts, but now they are laughing all the way to the bank.  Or they would be if they were still alive.)  Of course, *calling* specific posters “clueless babbling idiots” is not a good move from a PR standpoint.

>Of course, *calling* specific posters “clueless babbling idiots” is not a good move from a PR standpoint.

if people are aloud to cririse art, then surely artists are aloud to critise poeople. Though maybe they should say it quietly, under their breath, in a darkened room!!!! :-D

This was simply beautiful. Thank you for posting this.

Of course publishing is a business, but when we writers are writing we create art. When an author begins to approach her hands-in-the-dirt creation as pure business, I think you can tell. It begins to show.

As to criticism. . . >>How about not reading reviews, participating in group blogs, or lurking and posting on reader newsgroups?<

<

God, that sounds so simple. But writing is

such a solitary act. And you spend so much time and thought (Oh, God, the THOUGHT) on one little product. And, as someone who just recently found a critique partner, it is such a relief to talk to somebody else about these people and these lives that you’ve kept in isolation. So, though I won’t see any reviews of my work for a good year, I can understand that need to see what people are saying, and eavesdrop on discussions of characters you’ve raised and loved. *sigh* Even if it is a bad idea.

That said. . . responding to the reviews and critiques strikes me as a mistake. On so many levels. And it never seems to end well.

All the storm and fury of the internet and readers and critics and sales figures is nothing. It’s not out there. It’s in here. If I have to protect it from readers, I will protect it, viciously. That may be by thinking you are all a bunch of clueless babbling idiots, no personal offense. No more than you want to hear my personal woes do I want to know what your ten million conflicting opinions are.

This is such a relief to know; as a reader, I want to be able to forge a connection with a book that’s not mediated by the author and his/her expectations or responses to my opinions.  I realized, upon reading this, how much I really view discussion of a book—unless specifically directed at an author, either by his/her request—as something that happens among readers.  If I offer an author my kudos directly—as I have done in a handful of cases—I don’t do so with any expectation that such author will even read what I say.  If they tell me it was valuable to them in any way, I’m actually taken aback with a little surprise. 

I used to believe that Romance authors and readers had more in common than I now do.  Now, when Romance authors say that they are “readers first,” I don’t know if that’s really true, at least in the same way it’s true for me. 

As for the book, it’s really a separate entity from the author in my experience of it.  I realize that an author wrote it, of course, but I don’t relate to the author through reading the book.  It’s not simply a commercial product, IMO, although I do make a choice to buy or not to buy and expect that the *production values* of a professionally published book meet a certain standard.  I don’t believe that either the person or the work of an author owes me anything or should be prepared to recognize me in any way at all.  And while I may be blown away by what I see as a book’s artistic achievement, I hold that respect for the book, and only for the author as a disembodied voice that speaks through the book.  I might respect the author or even like her/him as a real person, but that’s separate from whether I like his/her books, really.  I also just don’t have the same kind of reverence for the personas of authors *per se* that I do for books (okay, maybe Derrida, but he’s dead now, and I can indulge my nostalgia for the lively and incandescent little frog).  And I don’t really want to feel that sense of responsibility, especially since authors are as unknown to me on a personal level as I am to them .  While I sometimes really enjoy the public persona of an author, I guess I view it as a kind of performance, in and of itself.  I try to keep it separate from the books, which is harder if the impression I have of the authorial persona is less than spectacular. 

As for the relationship between an author and her/his novel?  It’s wonderful, and as far as I’m concerned, it’s private—for you to experience and value as you will (“you” as in general author).  Furthermore, while I respect the production of art, I don’t really have this sense that writers of fiction are so much more special than the rest of us.  I guess I feel that we all have our wonderful gifts, as well as those moments of joyful engagement with our work in which we feel so perfectly aware of everyting important in the universe.  I view my own work as important and special in its own way, and I savor the accomplishments in my life that are meaningful to me.  I don’t think there’s anything better for the creative process than to honor it and love what it represents for you (general you, not Laura Kinsale you), but I don’t think I’ve ever connected with a book based on how long it took the author to write it or how much s/he had to sacrifice for it.  I love that Toni Morrison made her famous list of critical things she had to do before she died, and that somehow out of that list came her imperative to write, but I don’t think that’s intrinsically related to how much I love or don’t love each of her books. 

So the idea that authors may not want to stop by and see what some of us readers have to say?  A relief, really.  And the idea that some authors really do want to stop by and see what some of us readers have to say?  That’s fine with me, as long as they realize I’m not discussing their work because I want to get to know them, or want a mentor in the business, or want them to care what I have to say, or want to feel responsible for their feelings if in some way if their book disappointed me. Because in the end, it’s the book I’ve got the relationship with, not the author.  And once the author enters into that discussion, *I* have to protect the relationship I have with the book in order to keep it from changing into something different and/or less desirable.  I don’t mean that as an insult or as a slap to the author, but simply as a reflection of my respect for the *book* as a thing in and of itself.

I have a slight problem with this description of writing as art. I don’t disagree that writing IS an art—I’m totally on board about that—but the description makes it sound like FINE art, which is the kind of art that doesn’t think about the reader/consumer at all. And I think that’s wrong ... because authors DO have to think about their readers more than it would seem.

Here’s what I mean:

There are two kinds of art. Fine art and commercial art. Sometimes the line gets blurred between the two—the fine art becoming commercially successful or the commercial art transcending so much that people consider it fine art.

I’m a commercial artist by day. I manufacture my art almost exactly as it’s requested of me by my employers, and sometimes I might put a little of myself in it if I’m particularly inspired. By night, I’m a fine artist and paint whatever I feel like painting, and sometimes it sells.

Okay. Translate that to writing. I guess those who write articles or columns for newspapers or magazines might be like commercial artists. They write on assignment for a deadline to fill up copy space or to inform. Authors, I guess ... well, it would depend. There are those who pitch a story first, land a contract, then write the book. Then there are those who write their book, then hope to sell it to a publisher. To that extent, I suppose the second type of author is like a fine artist.

But, if you consider the publisher…

A publisher’s goal is to sell books. As a result, they tend to buy what they think would be commercially successful. If it’s a beautiful baby of inspired writing, but they don’t see a market for it, they won’t buy it. So you have the publisher standing between the writing artist and the consumer. So an author is probably more a commercial artist than a fine artist ... because they have to consider what a publisher needs if they actually want to sell their baby, and what a publisher needs is what readers will buy. Then, once it’s sold, the writing artist has to edit that baby according to what the publisher wants to see changed, again also based on what they think readers will want to see. No?

Fine artists, on the other hand, the painting kind, generally sell their work directly to the consumer after they’ve painted to their heart’s content—that is, if they’re not lucky enough to land a gallery showing or a contract with a major poster printing company or something. The artist paints their whim, and if the consumer likes it, great—someone might actually buy it, or even prints of it. They don’t follow editorial guidelines. They don’t change the nature of their work. They follow their muse, and if the consumer doesn’t like it, tough. They’ll cut off their ears instead.

So ... while I’m all for calling writers artists, I really don’t think that authors must please only themselves—at least, not if they want to nab a publishing contract to sell books to readers. Publishers generally won’t contract anything they don’t think will sell, so you HAVE to think about the readers. Seriously.

Or you might as well self-publish and try to sell your work on the boardwalk. Like fine artists do.

Anyway, that’s my take—a lot less mileage, maybe. Not really a disagreement, just kind of a tweak on single point.

And I also want to add:

That was very beautifully written, Laura. A true artwork on its own. :)

Art V’s Craft?

Is that what you are getting at April??

I’m not sure if a Think of writing as art, but that is more a personal thing because I see ‘art’ attainment. Only truely great painters are artists in to my way of thinking, the rest are plying their craft. The same with writer. Only truely brilliant writers are artists.

But then I also have a problem with the concept of a muse. I’ve heard writers speack very elegently about their muse (Laura Kinsale for one) but it always leaves me with a slight feeling of disbelief. It’s one of those things I want to believe in but I never quiet get myself over that hurdle.

Maybe the true distinction between the fine arts and writing is that writing is more of a co-operative arrangemt. Though many of the plastic arts involve a level of outside help come to think of it….

Does anyone have an answer for this???

There are two kinds of art. Fine art and commercial art. Sometimes the line gets blurred between the two—the fine art becoming commercially successful or the commercial art transcending so much that people consider it fine art.

Perhaps the line gets blurred because the distinction is revealed as artifical at some point.  I think we can all come up with examples that distinguish “fine” art from “commercial” art (i.e. the David v. a television commercial), but when it comes to books and movies and visual arts, I think the distinction *can* and *does* blur more easily, in part because the opinion of the viewer is incorporated into the process of determining a work’s value.  Haven’t you ever done something for work—even though you’ve executed it within specific guidelines that are not your own—that feels close to the work you do after hours?  I’m also thinking about those famous Mapplelthorpe photos—the ones that were considered “obscene” and therefore caused such flak within the NEA?  I’m not arguing that anything should or shouldn’t be considered “fine art,” just that with some things it’s more difficult to define the difference without simultaneously invoking the exceptions.

Art V’s Craft?
Is that what you are getting at April??

Nope. I believe art involves craft—there is no versus. But then, I always consider the etymology of the word art when I try to define it:

art - [13] Like arm, arthritis, and article, art goes back to an Indo-European root *ar-, which meant ‘put things together, join.’ Putting things together implies some skill: hence Latin ars ‘skill.’ Its stem art- produced Old French art, the source of the English word. It brought with it the notion of ‘skill,’ which it still retains; the modern association with painting, sculpture, etc did not begin until the mid 17th century. Latin derivatives of ars include the verb artire ‘instruct in various skills,’ from which ultimately English gets artisan [16]; and artificium, a compound formed with a variant of facere ‘do, make,’ from which we get artificial [14].
>arm, arthritis, article, artificial, artisan, inert

I’m not one of those who believe that if it’s from the heart and soul and pure emotional depths, it’s automatically art. If there isn’t also a whole lot of craft and skill involved in the making of something, then I don’t really consider it art.

That said, I have a very healthy respect for commercial artists ... because it takes additional craft and skill to please an audience. And if an artist can please both him or herself AND their audience, all the better.

Laura, thanks for this essay. You got word.

Now there’s this internet, another magic thing with a life of its own, a million voices roaring whispering screaming over your shoulder into the quiet place where the stories come from. You can either shut it out entirely or try to open one tiny window and hope you aren’t washed away in the flood. It’s foolish to open the window, frankly. You do that when you’re stuck with no magic at hand, and you’re bored and discouraged and fretful but you have to stay at the computer just-in-case. It’s like having a bottle of liquor in the drawer.
This paragraph couldn’t present it’s self to me at a better time. I’m trying to break my internet addiction because it’s killing my writing. Too much information, too many opnions, too much of everything. Thanks Laura.

Laura Kinsale said:

A book is a magic thing. It has a life of its own. Do you doubt it, in the small hours of the night when you sit up in bed reading and reading, living in a world you never made, unable to bear to leave it until the last page closes and it vanishes into thin air?

Oh my God, yes! And that’s why, when a book is not as enjoyable as we would like, we feel so disappointed.

There’s almost nothing I enjoy more than being lost in a good book.

Laura Kinsale again:

I serve a different master. I serve this art, whether you buy it or not. I began to write because I loved to write. That is still the only way.

So, being able to publish your work, receive good reviews, and reach an audience count for nothing in your decision to write? Or is it all just gravy? I’m deliberately being a little dense here, ‘cause I can’t imagine it would be as satisfying for a successful author to just scribble away in a notebook… God knows I love creating my hand-crafted jewellery, but I also enjoy having people enjoy my pieces. But then, maybe writing and making jewellery shouldn’t be compared. Truly, I couldn’t write a novel if my life depended on it. *shrugs*

I loved reading this essay. Thank you.

Victoria Dahl wrote: So, though I won’t see any reviews of my work for a good year, I can understand that need to see what people are saying, and eavesdrop on discussions of characters you’ve raised and loved. *sigh* Even if it is a bad idea.

It’s so easy to get addicted to external validation.  Writing is a solitary (lonely) act, and like you said, after so much time alone with a book, we crave feedback.

But trust me, if you’ve written a good book (which I’m sure you have), the feedback will come to you—on your blog, your fan mail, at your appearances, etc.  If you seek it out by entering situations that are reader-oriented, you have to be prepared to be disappointed.    Know your limits.

*sigh*

When I grow up, I want to be able to write this well.

Thank you, Laura.

You sure do write nice but I can’t agree with all the points you raise.  Books are not like children because children are real people. Tisty said:

Books are things.  Items.  Paraphenalia.  They may be the product of hard labor.  You might be leaving a personal piece of yourself in each manuscript but it’s still just a thing.  Not a person and therefore doesn’t deserve the same treatment as a person.

Just because you publish doesn’t mean your work demands automatic respect.  I often think that writers believe that they are superior beings for being able to write.  Every person has a skill at which they excel and for one group to believe that they deserve automatic respect for the product of that skill is ridiculous. 

They deserve personal respect that they are skilled but the books themselves do not deserve automatic respect.  Authors must prove that their books deserve respect and they must prove it each time a new book is published.  This truth is constant for anyone who places themselves or their work out there for public consumption.

I also have a difficult time viewing books as art.  I feel that they are entertainment in the same vein as music, television, and movies.  I don’t feel like they are in the category of Ansel Adams.  Like a previous poster, they can rise to that level but most are not.

When I first started photography, one of my mentors told me, “This is not your child on the wall.  I am not calling your child ugly.  I am saying that this is an unattractive photograph.  If you can’t let go of the emotions you’ve attached to the picture, you’ll never survive.”

In a way, that’s the same way I view writing.  To compare the two, a book is a collection of photographs.  Just because there is one bad picture, doesn’t make it a bad collection, nor does a grouping of beautiful photographs mean that it is a cohesive collection.  And some people would rather see pictures of fluffy kittens than anything else, and if it isn’t a fluffy kitten, then it’s crap. 

Yes, you (and I for that matter) put our heart and souls into the art we create, but you must must must be able to let go of the emotions brought about in the creative process if you are going to release it to the public for consumption.  Because it will be consumed.  Sometimes it will be loved, sometimes it will be spat back out on the plate in disgust.  But it is not your child that they are accepting or regecting, or merely acknowledging.  It is a product that you put out there for them to evicerate should they choose.  Because once you put it out there, it is just that.  A product.

And if you are not willing to be judged, then don’t put your art in the public eye.  That is a hard lesson for most to learn, but it must be learned to survive.

I respect Laura Kinsale, I really do. She writes fascinating books, and what she had to say was thought provoking. But really, let’s look at this from the readers perspective too. When I pay for a book—and believe me I pay for my books and never go to a USB for them, mostly because there isn’t one in my neck of the woods—I want value for my money. I don’t want to read grammatically incorrect books no matter how much art was applied in the writing stages.

So what? Do we now have to make excuses for those authors who seem not to give a huge hoo ha about punctuation, grammar, or anything else? Just get that book written and get it out there, hey, no one’s going to complain about sloppy writing, they’er just in it for the sex scenes anyway?

And a huge caution here, folks, buy the books and let the sloppiness slide and eventually none of us will be able to get a bit of entertainment out of much of the stuff we read.

Thank you, Laura. I enjoyed this essay. I don’t agree with every point, but I appreciate your passion and respect your talent.

If my own blog ever stops giving me fits and lets me post again, I’ll address the one point upon which we differ most radically: I DO consider the reader as I’m writing. For me, writing is a conversation. If I thought no one would ever read my stories, they would cease to be as valuable for me.

I know some people see that as heresy. (“You must write for the sake of WRITING.”) But for me, storytelling is the key. And “telling” implies someone on the other end, “listening.” Without that, it’s just so many echoes in an empty room. For me, at least. I understand that this is a totally individual experience.

I don’t know why (probably finals-induced psychosis), but when I was reading through these fascinating comments I had this image of Laura Kinsale (some image from the back of one of her books, at least) shaking her head, hair flying across her face, wondering aloud why none of us got what she was trying to say.

So what? Do we now have to make excuses for those authors who seem not to give a huge hoo ha about punctuation, grammar, or anything else? Just get that book written and get it out there, hey, no one’s going to complain about sloppy writing, they’er just in it for the sex scenes anyway?

Am I the only one who blames the publisher and editor for these things? When I read a crap book, I automatically think “This crap got PUBLISHED?! What walking brainstem decided this was publishable???” Or I think “what, did the editor just decide it was ready by sniffing the pages instead of actually READING them??”

When I think of the value of a book and the money I paid for it, I realize that I chose to put my money down on a chance - I chose to pay for the potential of being enthralled. I don’t pay to be enthralled, I pay for the possibility that it just might happen. I don’t get huffy about the money I “threw away” on a bad book - I get huffy that so many bad books keep getting published or I get huffy that an author blew a great chance to enslave me to his/her words. But I don’t mourn the loss of my dollars and cents all that much, because just as I don’t assign a monetary worth to a really great book (how could I? If I paid what some books were truly worth to me, I’d have to shell out several million just for like 2 Kinsales, for petesakes, and I don’t even wanna know how much I owe to Wodehouse), I likewise don’t have a measure for What I Expect For My Money. Because what I expect is to open the pages and see what happens. And that’s always what I get.

Personally, I don’t think there’s anything incongruous about saying that writing is art and ALSO that you should think of your reader.

This whole debate about whether it’s art and whether we’re being arrogant and “special” to call it art. . . Calling something art doesn’t mean that it’s GOOD. And it doesn’t mean you’d like it or that you would consider it art.

From my dictionary: “The conscious use of skill and creative imagination esp. in the production of aesthetic objects.” Check.

As to “fine art” vs. “commercial art”. Well, hell, I don’t know much about it. But if romance novels need to be defined. . . To me, commercial art means something produced for a specific client. (Is this wrong? Very likely.) “So, Jane Doe, how well do you like your heroes hung? Do you like ‘forced seduction’? What about pirates? What overall theme are you interested in? Okay, let me put something together for you and see what you think.”

And fine art. . . I assume there’s some long-standing debate about what this means, so I won’t step into it, but I remember from all the trashy books I’ve read that most of the masters were supported by royalty and noblemen and still had an audience to please. They weren’t working in an artistic bubble.

But it seems to me that we’re talking about mass-market art here. Something in between. It’s not created in agreement with a client, but that doesn’t mean we don’t think of the audience. Or the publisher. And you can choose to disregard quality and grammar, etc., but the reader will determine whether that is acceptable.

To me, the actual writing is art, then the business comes after. The editing, the revisions, the blurbs and quotes and blogging.

Blah, blah, blah. I’ll shut up now.

Oh, wait. April said this really well a while ago. Ha!

As to books being babies. . . I like this analogy. Because there are plenty of people out there who think their children are little golden haired angels. Perfect and undeniably brilliant. And it doesn’t matter how many other people think those kids suck. . . Sounds like some author-book relationships to me.

I took my ten page response to my blog because I wasn’t sure what the etiquette is of lengthy comments.  Suffice to say maybe I don’t have any idea of what Ms. Kinsale is saying as Robin suggested (not to me personally, of course), but I think every author would like to think that their book is art but thinking it doesn’t make it so.

I can’t imagine any phase of this process in which I wouldn’t consider the reader. The way I see it, the experience of storytelling requires the active participation of both writer and reader. My stories, without the readers, are only half finished. I bring the entertainment to the table, yeah. It’s more work for me to create the story than it is (God willing) for the reader to read my stories - sure. But without them, I’m not done.

Do I read my reviews? Absolutely. Do I care what they say? Absolutely. Does it wound my very soul when someone hates the shit out of my book? Not so much. It just means that that person is not my reader. She is not the person who needs my story. Vice versa, there’s some stuff out there that’s not for me. Doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with it, it just means I don’t get it. I heard great things about David Foster Wallace. I got one of his books, and about twenty pages in I discovered it wasn’t for me. I think pretty much everyone on the planet would argue that he’s a wonderful literary writer. He’s just not for me. So, when someone doesn’t care for a book I put out, I write it off.

What matters to me most is when someone does like my book but thinks, perhaps, a certain storyline wasn’t done well enough, that an ending was too pat, that a character’s action didn’t ring true. These criticisms are exciting to me, because then - if I agree with them, and often I do - I can move into the next book with an eye toward improving that element of my craft. So, I need readers. I need input. My goal is to get better with every book, and without an objective eye taking a good look at what I do, that becomes a lot harder.

What I don’t do is argue with readers. I don’t tell them they’re wrong, I don’t get upset if they don’t like me personally, and I’m not up nights devising ways to make them my friends. I blog with six other authors, and we all blog for the readers. Not other writers. Not our friends. The readers. Do we become online-friendly with them? Sure, if they’re cool and fun. Why not? But the author-reader relationship is, for me, one of service. And I like it that way. That’s the approach that works for me. I’m a blue-collar writer. My words don’t melt on anyone’s tongue, but my stories resonate. I think. I hope. I pray. When the readers who get me close my book, I want them to think, “Wow, that was worth the six bucks,” or whatever they paid for it.

I’m not being deliberately humble or ingratiating, and I’m not trying to say that Laura is in any way wrong. We come to it from different places. I haven’t read Laura, but I’ve never heard from anyone who has closed one of her books and not felt it was money well-spent. So how she comes to her page and how I come to mine doesn’t matter, as long as the result is the same. If, from the reader’s perspective, it’s money well spent, then that’s the goal, right? For me, caring about the reader response helps me to do that. For Laura, not caring might be what helps her to do that. So, it’s all good.

And for the record, I have no issue with people buying my books from UBSs or getting them at libraries. As a matter of fact, if you haven’t read me before, I encourage it. If I’m doing my job right, you’ll like it enough to maybe buy the next one. All I need to do is sell enough books with each release that I can get a new contract. I don’t care about making a load of money - I have the luxury of a working husband. I need to make some money, yes, and I’m doing that. The roof over my head might be leaky, but I have it. My kids might be eating spaghettios, but they’re eating. All the rest is gravy. I don’t mind being midlist, and I don’t mind buying my clothes at Wal-mart. It’s a privilege to be able to write, and I want to hold on to it as long as I can. If you’re not sure about me, about whether I’m worth the six bucks, then absolutely - hit the UBS or the library, and don’t for a moment feel guilty. That’s crap. It’s my job to earn your six bucks, and as a broke mother of two, I know how much six bucks is.

But that’s another topic entirely, isn’t it?

Anyway, I don’t mean to come off all sappy and bow-at-your-feet. This is just how I feel about the relationship, and it’s the only way I can come to the page with balance. So I hang onto it. Am I right? Only for me.

And this is my apology for the length of that last post. Yeesh! I can go on…

>>but I think every author would like to think that their book is art but thinking it doesn’t make it so.<<

Jane, I’ll go read your blog, but my initial response is the same as below. Something being bad art—or not art at all for you—doesn’t negate it.

As to the hoity-toity-ness of it all: when my friend says that she’s a graphic artist, I don’t scoff and say, “Oh, really? Since when is designing cereal boxes an art form? You have no right to walk around thinking you’re so much better than the rest of us.”

My husband is a commercial artist. What that means is that he has a client that requests a specific project…for the consumption of a greater audience.

His twin is a fine artist. What THAT means is that he makes what he wants and awaits praise from any audience.

Both are often rejected and/or neglected.

The classic artists we are so enamoured with worked for commissions and patrons. It’s how they kept food on the table. They were the commercial artists of their own time.

So were the Brontes. And Dickens. And Austen. And Shakespeare.

Art is art. We catagorize it differently in our own time frame because no one likes to admit that the moment we put our creative works on a platter for the world to see, we’re selling it. As if that makes us whores or something, so we have to dress it up, or dress it down.

Being a creative doesn’t make a writer more “special” than a person who does construction for a living. Such a sweeping generalization does rather twitch my ears, by the way. The only thing that makes ME special is that I’m completely unable to calculate basic math, and believe me, that’s not the kind of special you want to be. Just like the construction worker, I’m trying to make a living doing what I have learned and what I’m (hopefully) good at.

Brass Tax: We sell our work to a client (the publisher) for the consumption of our audience (the reader). We target, we contract, we earn. That does not devalue the art, how much we put into it or our emotions concerning it. But it does require us to accept that once we have sold our work, we no longer reserve the right to shield it from review.

We shouldn’t get prickly about the fact that readers are not always satisfied. No one can please everyone. Would we like it if every review was lovely and kind? Of course. But they aren’t. Some reviews are biting, revealed with a stinging sarcasm and occasionally vicious glee. That is THEIR art, which they provide to any audience and await praise for. As long as we put our best efforts and continue to strive toward improvement, we should be able to sleep well at night no matter what they say.

Shakespeare. Talk about mass-market! Fart jokes much, anyone?

Art is art. We catagorize it differently in our own time frame because no one likes to admit that the moment we put our creative works on a platter for the world to see, we’re selling it. As if that makes us whores or something, so we have to dress it up, or dress it down.

Great point—I just wanted to highlight it so it doesn’t get lost.

Suffice to say maybe I don’t have any idea of what Ms. Kinsale is saying as Robin suggested (not to me personally, of course) . . .

Just so there are no hurt feelings from my comments (!), I want to make sure everyone understands I wasn’t saying we *don’t* get Kinsale’s point (I include myself because I posted on her letter, as well).  It’s just that there seem to be some fundamental differences in the ways authors and readers approach the genre, and maybe on some points we’re not going to have a common ground, or even a shared understanding.  It’s kind of cool, though, to see how many millions of different ideas *authors* have about their work, too. 

And this is my apology for the length of that last post. Yeesh! I can go on…

Although I’d been contemplating it for a while, that last post of yours catalyzed a quick trip over to Amazon to buy one of your books (well, that and my oh so convenient Amazon Prime account!).  I really hope I like it, but if I don’t, at least I know I won’t be hurting your feelings.  Maybe I need a list of all the authors who feel this way and a corresponding list of their books.

I wasn’t hurt by your comments at all Robin, I was just referencing the fact that I don’t know that I did understand LK’s letter/essay.

Art is art 

I don’t know if I buy this either but my definition of art is likely different than many others.  It reminds me of the argument about athletes and who and what sports defines athletes.  Does the mere skill (exceptional hand/eye coordination needed to hit a fastball) make one an “athlete” or is “athlete” more limited in its definition, requiring physical prowess accompanied by technical proficiency.

I have a hard time understanding and accepting the books as art concept.

What matters to me most is when someone does like my book but thinks, perhaps, a certain storyline wasn’t done well enough, that an ending was too pat, that a character’s action didn’t ring true.

I so agree.  Consistent, constructive criticism should clue an author in to what needs to be fixed/developed in the next work.  Forgive the obscure “Kids in the Hall” reference, but if 30 Helens agree that a certain element of my book is weak, I’d listen.  Furthermore, I’d be damn grateful. 

The key is sorting out the helpful reviews from all the “Squeee, it’s the best book evurrrrr!” and “This book sux donkey dong.”

I’ve actually never heard that argument about athletes. But I would say that a person can be athletic and not an athlete. Or that a person is an athlete, but not a professional athlete.

Basically, you’re trying to put a very big label on a very tiny thing, there, Jane.

Look at it this way. Autism Spectrum Disorder. There are millions of shades of autism, all of which fall under the same umbrella diagnosis. Each person with this disorder is different and unique, challenged often in similar ways, but overcomes it differently.

Art is a huge subjective umbrella of creative expression. A person may be artistic at times and create art, but not be an artist. That doesn’t make the piece any less of an art. It doesn’t define the person who created it.

Art is art. The people behind it (the makers) and the people in front of it (the audience) are not defined by it. They are touched by it.

Dee - you just aren’t listening to enough sports talk radio! LOL.  The argument comes up quite often in reference to golf and, to a lesser degree, baseball.  Any sport where a guy like John Daly or David Wells can excel can’t be an athletic endeavor, right?  It’s all in how you define athletic in determining whether sports is a superset of athletes, a subset or a different set altogether with some overlapping areas?

I view that argument akin to this one.  Some books rise to the level art and some are mere works of craft so that books are an overlapping set but not subset of art and that no one piece of fiction, whether it is art or craft, deserve automatic respect by its very definition of being a piece of fiction.

Re: Books as art

There’s art and then there’s entertainment.  There may be (should be) moments of artistry in works of entertainment, but to me the difference is this:

Art is done to adhere to aesthetic principles, which may or may not be shared by a large audience.  Something can be art and still be unpopular and unnoticed except by a few (or even one, the artist him/herself). 

Entertainment, on the other hand, is nothing without an audience.  As someone said earlier, a “storytelling” assumes a listener.

I write to entertain.  I blog to entertain.  I embarrass myself in front of family and friends to entertain.  If they passed a law saying no one but me could ever read my books again, I’d quit writing and join the karaoke circuit.  At least then I’d still be making people laugh.

Quote of the year—of the freakin’ century, in fact, uttererd by Tracy MacNish over the AAR ATBF board:  http://www.hwforums.com/2005/messages/14303.html

Criticism is not that different than praise, really, but is just a matter of whether or not one agrees with what’s being said.

I’ve never read her books and I don’t agree with all of her points, necessarily, but that quote—it ROCKS!

Well a good and wise friend of mine has sworn me to silence regarding my blog entry, but someone asked me a direct question so hey, I can answer that, right? ;)

Melanie asked:

“So, being able to publish your work, receive good reviews, and reach an audience count for nothing in your decision to write? Or is it all just gravy? I’m deliberately being a little dense here, ‘cause I can’t imagine it would be as satisfying for a successful author to just scribble away in a notebook…”

This is an excellent and insightful question.  They count, somewhat, but let me tell you a little story.  When I began to write, I did it on yellow pads of paper while I was at work.  I wrote in the wee hours of the night under the blue-white lights of a drilling rig, scribbling away among the towering stacks of Playboy and Penthouse in the tool pusher’s trailer (now there’s inspiration for you).  Eventually I quit that job and kept writing.  At that point my only reader was my husband, who was and always has been supportive and encouraging.  He helped me think of plots, and I’m sure his participation and enjoyment of what I was doing was a critical factor that kept me going when I would have fizzled out for lack of a clue how to plot.  I loved what I was doing but I had no idea what to do with it until I read some articles about publishing.  So I started sending my stuff in.  And it all got rejected.

It is possible again at that point that the whole thing would have eventually fizzled out, but I was just doing it because I enjoyed it and had some vague idea that in the future I might get published.  Who was I writing for?  Myself.  My husband, secondarily, but mostly for myself.  I was writing the books I wanted to read and couldn’t find on the shelves, but I was also learning what it was like to have a character come alive and start to move with their own will, to tell ME what and who they were.  This in itself is a vivid joy, and it is still my primary joy in the process, followed closely by how the words work to create this character and story.

I got lucky and got a contract.  And my whole life became writing.  The characters became very very real to me, like real people.  When I was done with that book, after a year, and realized that those characters weren’t actually people in my life, but just fantasies in my head, it was a true shock.  It was like that old boyfriend you idealized for years after you broke up, and then when you met him again he was just a kinda chubby average dull guy with a receding hairline, not the witty handsome person you’d been dreaming about all these years, and suddenly you understood that person you thought you were in love with wasn’t him and in fact never existed at all.  It’s a shock.

So I grieved and started on an another book.  This time it was on a contract from the beginning, so I had a deadline.  But I still loved it and the characters became real to me again, and it was what I wanted to do.  Somewhere in the middle of writing that, I got some good feedback on the first book, which was published, so that was encouraging too.  But it was still all for me, it was the process that I loved.

I got a contract for the third book, and by that time, it began to dawn on me that four thousand dollars for a year’s full-time work was perhaps not going to amount to a lucrative career.  And I thought—I so clearly remember thinking this—“Well, I don’t care if I had to pay them to write, I love it so much I’d do it anyway.”

Yeah.  Continued in next comment….

Fast forward a few years.  Reviews, good and bad, awards, won or not, deadlines met, books written, I still loved it but it was getting harder sometimes to go in there and sit down at the computer.  Particularly the deadlines got difficult, because I took great pride in meeting them, but I also took great pride in producing my best and most original work, two things which don’t necessarily compliment one another.  So I was allowing longer and longer to go by between finishing a book and starting one, and it was getting more and more physically and mentally exhausting to squeeze the work into the time left.  But I was a pro, see?  I could do it.  And people out there were loving my books, as far as I could tell, and that is certainly a high, so I pushed ahead.  I won an award or two.  Real money was involved now.  Real good money.  Like anyone else would, I think, at that time I just envisioned an ever-rising arc of success on top of success.

Silly me!  There is a golden goose, you know.  And you can kill it.  And I did.

I won’t go into that, I wrote a bit about it on my website; suffice to say I ended up with years of writers block.  The block, I know now, came from confusing the external motivations from the internal motivations.  Slowly, without me even realizing it, writing ceased to be a labor of love and became merely a labor.  I had publishers chasing me, but I could not write.

Kind of a change from, I’d do this if I had to pay -them-, huh?  We can argue about what’s art and what’s owed to readers and all that, but whatever was inside me that had loved doing this and produced work that readers loved too was gone.  I didn’t know if it was hiding or destroyed, and I spent a long time figuring that out.  At first I called it burn-out, and certainly it was some of that, but eventually, when I did begin to write again, I learned the real truth. 

No, I don’t write for readers.  I don’t even write for myself, really.  I write to release these people and these stories from wherever they are hidden, and no, I don’t know where the come from or why.  I write for the joy of typing a sequence of words that tells me this man, this assassin, is terrified of going to Hell, and that drives him to many things.  That particular joy is mine.  If a reader feels it too, which I certainly hope they would, that’s cool and I’m glad for them.  But I can’t create it just for the reader.  I can only create it for me. 

Perhaps this isn’t art, I don’t know.  Perhaps there’s no such thing as a muse, or menstrual cramps, or headaches, because we can’t see them or touch them or haven’t experienced them ourselves.  I define art as Passion + Craft.  The craft must be there, oh yes, but the reason the craft is there is to draw out and define the passion.  The craft alone is not enough, and the passion alone is just an undefined impetus to somewhere.  Both together create a magic reality.  That’s why I write.  If people want to pay me for it, I’ll sure take the check, but if I write -for- the check, only the check, well…bye-bye golden goose.

Of course I’m only describing my own experience here.  Writers can be quite different, and for many the production of large amounts of work on demand is not a problem at all.  I would never ever in a million years say that work isn’t just as valuable or just as much fun for them and readers too.  And publishers sure like them better. ;) 

I have wanted to present my perspective here, not to claim that it’s a universal truth, but to point out that it is a real one.  There is a lot of talk about “authors should be this” and “authors should be that,”  But the rabbits don’t always line up in a row, and the market is not always perfectly efficient.  I’m not selling insurance.  I can’t just push for greater success by working longer hours and cutting back on costs and providing better quality for a lower price.  I’m not a service industry.  I tried, and I found out I couldn’t be.

Entertainment, on the other hand, is nothing without an audience.  As someone said earlier, a “storytelling” assumes a listener.

But are the lines between art and entertainment always clear?  I think, for example, that The Sopranos or Deadwood is art, even though it’s also entertainment.  And I’ve read some books that are considered “high art” that were also extremely entertaining to me. 

I agree that sometimes we’re lumping together art and artifice, but at some level, I think the high brow - low brow divide has more to do with individual perception of a particular book, film, painting, etc. than easily identifiable differences.  We could probably come up with lots and lots of examples on which we agree that such and such is or isn’t “art,” but there are probably lots of places where we couldn’t agree, as well.

I am also in sympathy with Jane’s point that just because a book is published souldn’t automatically afford it respect as “art,” if only because that seems, again, to draw this big ‘special’ demarcation around fiction writing as an intrinsically more valuable activity than, say, kick-ass cheffing (America’s Top Chef, anyone?).

...just because a book is published souldn’t automatically afford it respect as “art,” if only because that seems, again, to draw this big ‘special’ demarcation around fiction writing as an intrinsically more valuable activity than, say, kick-ass cheffing (America’s Top Chef, anyone?).

Ah, see, you should have a blog.  You more clearly articulated what I was thinking.  I don’t so much have a problem with labeling books/fiction as art as I do the idea that “art” deserves special treatment. 

And I love Top Chef, Iron Chef, and Project Runway. Yeah for cable.

Jeri said, “I write to entertain.  I blog to entertain.  I embarrass myself in front of family and friends to entertain.  If they passed a law saying no one but me could ever read my books again, I’d quit writing and join the karaoke circuit.  At least then I’d still be making people laugh.”

Jeri,

You, my friend, are a liar and a fraud.

You may think you write to entertain, but the effort and care you put into your shit is the magic that Kinsale speaks of in her essay.

What you do is not so much a soft-shoe in a silly hat, but more a production of (insert fabulous ballet here).

Your characters respond logically to the stimulus of the worlds you’ve created.  Your approach to mundane, overcooked topics/premises is innovative and your writing is damn near seamless.

So just shut the fuck up with the bullshit.

Shaunee

But are the lines between art and entertainment always clear?

Not at all.  Often the best entertainment has high artistic values, and in most cases art and entertainment overlap (which is why the A&E Channel exists, I guess).  My point was that they have different justifications for existing.

And after thinking further about it and reading Laura Kinsale’s comments (which were even more eloquent than the original letter, IMO), I’d like to backpedal a bit about what I said about becoming a karaoke queen.  If the novel I just finished, totally on spec with no publisher waiting for it, never got published, I’d still be glad I wrote it.  Those characters needed to live.  I hope that doesn’t sound pretentious.

And I didn’t say writing deserves “special treatment,” I said it deserves respect in and of itself as form of an endeavor that has deep implications for our humanity, whether or not those implications are realized in any given work.  Not only from the “consumers” but from the “producers” of it. 

I mean by that, it is more than just a hamburger with onions.  :)

You, my friend, are a liar and a fraud.

Sorry, Shaunee, our comments passed like two drunken sailors in the night.

Time to go all Joe Pesci on your ass:

Don’t I amuse you?  Huh?  Aren’t I your clown?  Aren’t I here to fuckin’ amuse you?

And time for Candy to go all LLB on our asses and cut this thread before we starts us a fistfight!

Laura, your comments bring to mind a lot of what many (painting) artists go through. The ultimate dream of many artists is not to have to do the commercial art ever again but to paint to their heart’s content and hope someone buys it. One of my favorite artists, Michael Whelan, started out doing book covers and now does “fine art” which sells online and in galleries. He now paints the visions in his head and not in some art director’s description, and he makes a lot of money now because he has already built up a reputation and a huge fan base through his commercial art.

He was good with the commercial art, but I’ll bet that like you, it just didn’t move him as much as his other work and he was looking very much forward to retiring by doing what I like to call fine art.

I know a great writer who, after writing and directing radio and tv commercials got burned out doing them and went on to writing movie and tv scripts. Then, he got burned out doing THAT because of all the kow-towing to producers and studio executives that now he’s working on a novel or two. He likes it better because he writes for him, and when he describes a scene, he’s not worried about how much it would cost a studio to have 15 helicopters flying around. It’s what his heart and mind dictates. Screw everyone else.

He is still writing for someone, though, so he pays attention to his craft, how the words flow together, how the images unfold.

It takes a lot to craft something people will like, true. But if the thought of what people will think will hinder the process, it’s best to remove that thought and see how it goes from there. There are a lot of fine artists who do well commercially because they are just that good and that appealing to their audience. And then there are those who don’t sell much, but their art gives them relief so they keep doing it.

Laura, I haven’t read any of your books (yet), but from what you’ve written, I’m betting that whether you write for yourself or for others, you do it well enough that you’ll ALWAYS have an audience and do well commercially. So, in your case, you probably won’t need to worry so much about the reader as you write. If thinking about the publishers, editors, reviewers, and readers hinders you in your writing, then don’t think about them.

You’re not a commercial artist; you’re a fine artist who does well commercially.

That’s all there is to it. So write on! :)

I mean by that, it is more than just a hamburger with onions.  smile

And yet, I think I’m moved more profoundly when someone makes me a truly great, truly rare but not raw, truly juicy and just salted enough to be savory, perfectly trimmed and dressed hamburger than I am by a great filet or prime rib.  Maybe it’s the ordinariness of the hamburger, or its ubiquitous association with the words “drive-thru,” but I can go into raptures over a truly great burger.

Anyone seen “Babette’s Feast,” by the way? An articulate case for the powerful connections between food, culture, love, beauty, sensuousness and sensuality, and, of course, art.

As for your point about respecting literature—in the broad sense of the word—yes, absolutely I agree.  I was recently lamenting the fact that there seem to be no more public intellectuals (insert comment here about the rise of American anti-intellectualism over the past 6 years), especially those who could get out big ideas in a way that didn’t seem snooty or intimidating.  I think it’s all of a piece, actually.

Jeri,

Wait until I see you at RWA!  I’ve been doing those stupid Tae Bo tapes and could probably kick your ass!

Okay you do amuse, but I can’t help but admire the way you do it.  You want us to think you’re pie-in-the-face girl when the truth is you’re much more layered and finely wrought.  Sure I love a good pie in the face (who doesn’t?), but I also really love the challenge that I’ve come to expect from most art.  Including yours.

LOL Robin.  Perhaps I should have said, it’s more than just a Big Mac. (Then again, I can get pretty misty over Big Macs myself, particularly when I’m on a diet. ;))

Who was I writing for?  Myself.  My husband, secondarily, but mostly for myself.  I was writing the books I wanted to read and couldn’t find on the shelves

This is almost reassuring to me becuase, while it doesn’t contradict anything you said before or after, Ms. Kinsale, it still confirms that “a” reader was part of the process - yourself. That I can accept and appreciate on all levels. Partly because I’ve felt the same way at times when I looked for something I wanted to read but mostly because it simply makes sense, even to this reader only.

The original essay was beautiful but I have to admit that your additional comments touched my heart. Thank you.

I lurk more than I post, but I’m compelled to toss my 2 cents into the wishing well today. Writing & Life both have communities, and we either choose to live in them…or not. Where we as readers OR writers choose to live depends upon the scope of our personal desires and needs. Sometimes I need that feeling of being incognito, the one that begs just let me write and leave me alone status—therefore a pseudonym. Other times I’m out of the closet and saying go for it - take your best shot.

Jeri’s words hit home - her comment about the external validation that some authors need…and some don’t.  If I choose not to care what someone says about my writing, it doesn’t mean that I don’t care about THEM per se. Just means their opinions won’t affect how I feel about myself and my craft.

LOL - the one thing I do disagree with - and I’m not even sure who said it - is that the artistic part belongs to the authors and the business to the publishers.  I just handed in final edits on a book to my publisher, and trust me…what she can do with what I hand her IS art. *grin*

...have a good day, everyone…

Great comments.

Oh, I’m many, many years out of college now but I still drool over the thought of a Murph’s burger.  But you know, if I went back to Champaign and had one I’m fairly sure it would disappoint.  The real thing cannot possibly measure up to what I’ve made it in my memory.

Books can be the same way.  I read something that rocks.  I then go for the backlist or wait anxiously for the new release and the next read often will just not measure up…possibly because of my now overinflated expectations.

As for authors and reviews and such.  Meg Cabot attributes one of her relatives with this quote, “You’re not a $50 bill.  Not everyone is going to like you.” (Or your books)

LOL Robin.  Perhaps I should have said, it’s more than just a Big Mac. (Then again, I can get pretty misty over Big Macs myself, particularly when I’m on a diet. ;))

It’s the French paradox.

Apparently the French don’t even have a word for “guilt”.  So the lesson is that it’s the guilt that kills us, not the Big Macs.  How insane it is that we’ve created all this wonderful food only to tell ourselves it’s basically poison.  Forget the 20 Snack Wells and go for the small portion of creme brulee.

I’ve always said that I have to keep writing whether I get published or not. Otherwise it’s just me, sitting around, thinking about imaginary people gettin’ it on. Writing it down makes it a slightly more valid endeavor. Art even. You can’t beat that with a stick.

The frustrating thing for me as a reader and message board participant is that (as has been pointed by other readers) it sometimes seems like some of the same people who view their work as art and want us to do so as well, are quick to tell us that it’s “just” romance. 

I’m not speaking of Ms. Kinsale here, of whose work I’m just as much of a squeeing fangirl as Candy.  I’ve never seen her hold that view.

But it’s not as uncommon as I wish it were, in discussions at AAR, to hear an author or even their fan step forward and say these words: It’s just romance.

And even when it’s not spoken, it’s often the subtext of many an argument.

Want to examine the prevalence of forced seductions and rapes in the genre?  I don’t understand why, it is just romance.

Think a particular sentence is cliched, or the prose purple?  Why are you complaining, it is only the romance genre after all.

Finding typos, grammatical errors or malapropisms in a book you want to like? We’re talking about genre fiction here.  What do you expect?  It’s just romance.

This is the subtext:  What right do you have to expect artistry?  You’re so mean.  Don’t you know it’s unfair to the author and offensive to us fans?  Look, now you’ve gone and hurt the author’s feelings!  And who do you think you are, with your college professor airs?  Who asked you to bring symbolism, foreshadowing, or quotation marks into this? Where do you get off holding this book to the standards of art?

The frustrating thing for me as a reader and message board participant is that (as has been pointed by other readers) it sometimes seems like some of the same people who view their work as art and want us to do so as well, are quick to tell us that it’s “just” romance.

Sure, because in both cases, the author is measuring the worth of her work through the lens of the reader, and that’s like trying to read through kaleidoscope.  That’s why I like the idea of the author writing simply for herself, because it relieves me of the burden of feeling like I’m responsible for the author’s feelings no matter what I think of a book.

As for inter-poster dynamics, IMO it’s often less about disagreement over the book (or even outrage that a favorite author is being criticized), and more about personality clashes and opportunities for these little grudges to come out in what some posters see as a legitimate way.  I understand about   getting annoyed with other posters, but at least keep it tightly reined enough to express it through an actual rebuttal of their position, not an attack on their person.

On the flip side, LFL, here’s the other argument: “How dare you point out my misspellings and comma splices? They’re part of my art, and therefore sacrosanct. Why can’t you understand my art?”

To which I’m tempted to reply: “Because I can’t understand your sentences.”

That was so beautiful, Candy, it makes me want to cry. I think I’ll have a hamburger for lunch and revel in all the artistic beauty of this morning’s dose or SBTB.

LOL ok I can’t stand it.  My friend will kill me.  But anyway…

Candy and others, a serious and significant part of what I meant by “respect” in my original post, and maybe this didn’t come across fully, was that the author also has (probably the most) responsibility to respect the art of writing.  That means spell things right and use correct grammar (well maybe—there’s James Joyce too and some of his stuff is incomprehensible and some of it is simply beautiful, but it’s a part of this art too).

Carelessness is a lack of respect.  There’s no excuse for it beyond just being a human screw-up and you fight that tooth and nail BECAUSE of respect.  No one should excuse carelessness as respect for art because it is in fact the opposite of respect.

Sometimes a sentence may not be grammatically correct for a reason, by choice, not out of carelessness.  In that case, it’s open to critique by all and sundry.  But I would ask that the critique also maintain the same respect for the ultimate goal of creating this magical living breathing vision, and not be just self-interested carping or showing off. Because in the same way that authors can be defensive about their work, reviewers and readers and commenters too are subject to enjoying the sound of their own opinions.  We all have to fight that, our common human foibles, and to me the reason we fight it is out of respect for the art itself.

Because in the same way that authors can be defensive about their work, reviewers and readers and commenters too are subject to enjoying the sound of their own opinions.

HAHAHA It’s funny because it’s true. 

And what you said about authors needing to respect the art. . . priceless. Thank you.

Gah well on re-read I sound like some stuffy old lady going on about “respect”.  But, so what, I still mean it.  Imagine I’m wearing a silly hat and clown shoes while I type. ;)

From me, from
readers, from publishers. We should all give it the best that we have.

What is the “respect” that readers should be giving the art?  I guess that is what I don’t understand.  How does the respect manifest itself from a reader? That statement, made against the backdrop of this past week, seems to infer that respect is by passive acceptance of the book, no matter what its problems are. 

What is the disrespectful actions taken by readers toward a book?

‘I would ask that the critique also maintain the same respect for the ultimate goal of creating this magical living breathing vision, and not be just self-interested carping or showing off.’

Some literary analysis (which I think can be done on popular fiction as much as on ‘high art’) is also art. Maybe a parasitic sort of art, but art by many of the criteria mentioned here, such as feeling impelled to write, of doing it because it needs to be written, not for the audience, and of how it can be improved by learning the craft of writing. From that point of view, I find comments dismissing other people’s critiques for being like that of a ‘college professor’s’ an inverted compliment. Not that all professors write deathless prose, but the comment could be taken as implying that the author has some training in writing, that they are attentive to detail, that they’re widely read in their subject area and that they write because of their love for their subject.

But I would ask that the critique also maintain the same respect for the ultimate goal of creating this magical living breathing vision, and not be just self-interested carping or showing off.

That’s the respect I mean, Jane.  You don’t have to give it, nobody’s making you, it’s just what I believe that writing as an art deserves and what I hope for it.

And please note that I’m not saying there should be no criticism, which seems to be a thread that gets inserted easily into this kind of discussion.

I am nowhere near as eloquent as most of you but I still want to throw this out there:

So, the author should respect his/her art (and presumably, through that, s/he’ll also respect the readers), enough not to be careless with the language.

And then, both readers and reviewers should respect themselves and the book they are critiquing enough to keep the book as the object of their review/discussion—as opposed to taking potshots at the author, his/her personal life, physical appeareance, religion, or political affiliation.

So far so good, right?

Then… Why is it that ‘I don’t want to hurt the author’s feelings, so I agonize over my review’ is a comment one reads over and over again? The object under discussion is a book (art or trash), why are the author’s feelings even impinging on the reviewer’s/reader’s conciousness?

Laura V, great point.  And take the kind of reviews that are done here at the SB’s.  They are an art in themselves, for sure.  The humor and even the language are vivid with life of a certain kind; they are a sort of literary self-characterization that could well have been created by a very talented fiction author and become beloved throughout the universe. ;)

But I do believe Sarah and Candy are looking in the same direction I am looking, though from different perspectives.  And that’s why, as I told Sarah when I sent the OP, I felt safe to have it published here.

But that’s the whole problem.  Who gets to be the judge of what is valid respectful critcism and what is showing off?  Was Robin showing off by marking up her mistake filled copy and citing examples from on it a reader message board. Are reviewers who are crass, snarky and mean but still convey the why the book didn’t work involved in self-interested carping?

How about the SB cover snark that I so love?  Are Candy and Sarah showing off, involved in self-interested carping?  If so, how are they respecting the genre?

Is it the authors that get to decide if the readers/reviewers are respecting the genre?  Or isn’t it all just a matter of perspective.  By asking for more “respect”, aren’t you impliedly saying the there is a certain type of review of that you find more valid than another?

I can’t answer those questions Jane.  Only the person writing the review or making the comment can answer for themselves. 

I’m not “asking” for anything.  I didn’t read that whole thread you mention so I don’t know what was in it particularly.

Also, I never said the “genre” (the romance genre) should be respected, per se.  I said the art of writing fiction as a whole deserves it.  Does that mean you never get to snark again, or aren’t supposed to enjoy it?  Of course not, it would be silly to think so. 

But underlying that, somewhere, is what I believe and maybe you don’t, which is that the art as a whole IS an art, and has a value beyond snark.  That it is a lovely thing that brings joy and wonder beyond what even the best hamburger could ever bring, because any given hamburger, no matter how great, can’t change the world. 

A book can change the world, and some have. 

It’s just a point that I thought was getting lost amid the discussion of commercialization and such, so I wrote the OP.

But that’s the whole problem.  Who gets to be the judge of what is valid respectful critcism and what is showing off?

No one. Everyone. I’ve read a (very) few reviews that have ticked me off. Not here, not at Dear Author. Actually, I don’t remember where, but one was vitriolic, with a fuck you very much opening and a general author attack.

Other people thought it was valid.

There was a kafuffle a while back in sff circles about mocking Touched by Venom by Janine Cross. Some people thought others crossed the line. Other people thought nothing of the sort. (I didn’t actually follow it closely enough to form a strong opinion.)

Yeah, so I dunno. That said, I absolutely believe readers should be able to state their honest opinions about books. It’s important. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt at times, but it’s important.

>The object under discussion is a book (art or trash), why > are the author’s feelings even impinging on the >reviewer’s/reader’s conciousness?

I know, I know. Book. Author. Two separate objects, right? But, well, not exactly, imo. This same converastion goes on in workshops and critiquing circles. People dread giving a critique and realizing that they have apparently devastated the author when they were only trying to be helpful.

I’m sure there are some hardy souls who really feel no pain whatsoever at any and all criticism of their writing. But honestly? I think most writers cannot entirely divorce themselves from the book. Myself, I will just have to deal, and know that if I’m lucky enough to get any readers—still feels like a pipedream—I will at least be thrilled someone read it.

Final statement, sorry to get so long, and it doesn’t particularly follow but it’s important: I don’t think the author should come between the reader and the book. I certainly prefer a one on one when I’m reading.

I have nothing meaningful to add to this awesome conversation. So I decided to contribute in another way.

Not less than an hour ago, in honor of the fantabulousness of this thread, I ate a Big Mac with hot mustard and medium french fries. And because I respect you all so much, I refuse to think about the loss of willpower and discipline that it took to scarf down all that fatty goodness.

LOL, kudos to you, anu439!  I haven’t had a Big Mac in years.  Sounds like a plan.  Micky D’s, here I come…  :-)

—MRM

I have wanted to present my perspective here, not to claim that it’s a universal truth, but to point out that it is a real one.

Not less than an hour ago, in honor of the fantabulousness of this thread, I ate a Big Mac with hot mustard and medium french fries. And because I respect you all so much, I refuse to think about the loss of willpower and discipline that it took to scarf down all that fatty goodness.

And I, alas, ended up with a salad; NOT because I didn’t want the “fatty goodness” of a burger (witness the fact that I had two scoops of Baskin-Robbins ice cream for dessert—pistachio almond and turtle cheesecake in a waffle cone), but because the restaurant I went to has the most AWESOME salads with house smoked chicken, raspberry vinaigrette, and lots of avocado, veggies, candied walnuts, goat cheese, and mixed greens.  Yum.  Plus I had a burger for dinner last night.

LOL, kudos to you, anu439!  I haven’t had a Big Mac in years.  Sounds like a plan.  Micky D’s, here I come… grin

Make sure you have fries, too.  Julia Child always swore that McDonald’s had the best french fries, and after years of sampling, I agree with her.  Just enough crisp, just enough salt, and just enough grease.  Yummy!

Okies, I’m back from a short trip around the blogosphere and I need to make one last clarification, then I’m gonna sit on my hands.  But I’ll post it here because I just don’t want this kind of misreading to get going and turn into an urban legend or something.

My OP is NOT about reviews, it’s not about whether readers have a right to voice their opinions, or should or shouldn’t comment or how polite or nice they should be about it.  C’mon. 

Of course readers can say anything they like about any given book.  Jeez, talk about overreacting and defensive, lol, everything an author writes about the process is not secretly geared to shutting down readers’ comments.  Say the meanest, cattiest, most vicious durn things you want to say, who am I to stop you?  I’ve lived with that for *mumble mumble* decades, from the first anonymous poison pen letter I got in the mail telling me that UNCERTAIN MAGIC was the most horrible book ever published and should be burned.  No reason, no name, no return address. You think the internet is bad, this person had my address.

My post is centrally about this idea of books as a consumer commodity, a service industry, and why I don’t think that’s what they are—or at least, that’s not all of what they are, not in my experience. 

I realized that I did use the word “ask” in my later comments, in terms of how I’d hope a reader or reviewer would publicly critique any given book, but that’s just MHO.  It is by no means a clarion call to throw all readers off the internet and take away your keyboards so you can never snark again.

LOL, can I have a Big Mac?

Apologies Candy, not your posts here.  Just a couple of blog posts elsewhere.  And you know how these things go, someone reads this in one place, and then goes and comments on it somewhere else, and the next thing you know it’s gospel truth on the net. 

So I just wanted to make all that clear!  Thanks!  No upset, tho I probably sounded a bit exasperated; I guess I was when I posted. 

I suppose it is part of the same thing in a way, isn’t it?  People could say, well they have a right to interpret my OP any way they like, but then again I just have to say that wasn’t what I meant, or what I said.

Jorrie - I did not believe that LK was attacking me or the blog.  I was just trying to stick up for the reader in this debate.

My post is centrally about this idea of books as a consumer commodity, a service industry, and why I don’t think that’s what they are—or at least, that’s not all of what they are, not in my experience.

I’m not sure I agree with this. Your book may not have been originally written with the consumer in mind, as per your retelling of your process, but a publisher paid you money for that book, to shine and polish it.

At that point it became a consumer commodity, because the publisher didn’t buy it so it could look great on the shelf, they bought it to attract the consumer to buy, to read, to spread the word of their love of the book to more consumers. To make the publisher money. They didn’t pay you for something they intended simply to have, as many patrons of the arts do, they paid you for something they want to profit on. And to profit, they need consumers. To continue to profit, they need the consumers to be happy. So your original intent may not have been to have the book be a consumer commodity, but once you signed the publisher’s contract, I believe that’s what it became.

So perhaps your book started out as your art, but once you sold it, it became less for you and more for the consumer. At that point of sale, assuming publisher profit is the goal, the publisher wants the best product possible for the consumer, so they remain happy and come back for more and tell their friends to go, buy, love the book. That is reminiscent of service industry to me.

Hmm…re-reading my response, I don’t think I communicated well that the book can still be considered art, during the creative process, during the editing process, and once published but my point is that it is also a consumer commodity and yes, part of the service industry. I don’t think these things are mutually exclusive from one another, and fear that to think so is a fallacy which can result in the “author/reader disconnect” being bandied about the internet.

So, basically: a reader shouldn’t come between an author and her book, and the author shouldn’t come between the book and its reader? Is this what everyone’s agreeing on?

To take the discussion back a step: I like the child analogy because it discribes something that is produced by you, but something that you have only a limited control over how it makes it’s way through the world! I don’t, however, think that books grow up and sit in the garage smoking pot (at least I hope not. their paper for God sake. They’ll burn!)

Actually on the whole, I’m fairly pragmatic about the whole process of writing where it concerns me. I’m not an artist so much as masocist pushing shit up hill with my nose. Yes, if someone reads my work and doesn’t like it, i get a little upset and start worry. I want to know what they didn’t like and how I could make it better. Maybe it was because I wasn’t breast fed as a child, or perhaps because I’m just a needy whiny bitch, but either way, I like my work to be liked. i can cope if you don’t of course, but…. Also I don’t beleive I have a muse (Or if i do it’s a fat little cherub that spends to much time eating out of the fridge) and I don’t literally think of my books as my children. If they were I’d be in jail for criminal neglect!

And I think that the term art is loaded. It implys a value judgement. This is good, this art. This is crap, this is only commercial art. Books are books. We read them, enjoy them (sometimes) and waste our money on them. Do we need to see this habit justified by calling it art? is the art v’s Commercial art argument really about snobbery?

And If we are agreeing that writers and readers should inhabit seperate universes as Maili suggests, can I jump ship and become a reader again. Please. If I ask real nicely?

But hay I’ve had a bad day and am feeling a little more cynical than normal. I’m sure my wally optimnist will be back and transmitting some time tomorrow!

There’s no doubt I’d like to write what people want to read all the time. The problem is, it doesn’t work.

I can say to myself “People want Chick Lit” and I can even sit down to write it. But _I_ don’t like it.

I can tell myself “people don’t like poverty, disease or unfairness in their historical romances . . . think costume drama” and I get so bored trying to write what people want that I can’t drag myself to the computer.

Each book has its own spark of life. Screwing with the story to make it more palatable or marketable seems to make it still born.

So I figure people who read books ‘takes their chances’. I always have.  I’ve read thousands of books, some that have scarred me for life.  There are writers I won’t read again—but I don’t blame them for the money I wasted on their book. God knows, they probably wrote the best book they could.

(Lolita . . . yeah, its a classic. Yeah, its got that cool unreliable narrator.  It took me a year to get over that book. Ick.)

I also wanted to mention . . . I really don’t like it when I can tell a writer has fit his book to the market.  Its lame when I read a subplot that has nothing to do with the main plot and is clearly an add-on.  Its bizarre when a book should be over 40 pages before the author stopped writing.  Its irritating when a character is vanilla-fied.

I just want to know the story the author wanted to tell me. I want them to tell it the best they can.  If they do that, I got my money’s worth.

You know, there’s so much about this argument that doesn’t make sense to me. And, yes, I’m generally obtuse, so that could be the problem. But I honestly don’t know a) what we’re arguing about or b) why we’re arguing about it.

It takes two to tango. You can write and write for yourself all you want, the process simply isn’t complete until someone reads it. Be it your best friend or hundreds of thousands of faceless strangers, you still need at least one reader.

A writer cannot interfere in the reader’s experience unless the reader seeks her out. In which case the reader has no one to blame but herself. It’s not like you’re gonna just flip through the channels and see us jumping up and down acting like a lunatic on Oprah. Yes, some of us may get all pissy on internet boards where you lurk, but the act of reading is not passive. If someone starts to act stupid, you can easily go somewhere else. She’s only human, and everybody’s stupid sometimes. At this moment, this post might be a prime example of that. ;)

(That said, dear GOD authors PLEASE don’t defend your books on the internet. Bitch to your friends and have a glass of wine, but people are entitled to their damn opinions and you jumping in all pissy just dampens conversation. Unless they say something that is factually incorrect - like that you plagiarised, or that you lead small children into gingerbread houses so you can cook and eat them - then LET. IT. GO. Yargh.)

This works both ways. An author can easily avoid reader white noise. We have to seek it out, too. And we do. We check Amazon, we read reviews, we chat with readers at book signings and events, etc. However, for the most part, we are completely capable of shutting it out entirely, or at the very least, controlling the volume. We are not victims of reader opinion. We either seek it out or we don’t. If we get smacked in the face while seeking it out well… they certainly didn’t come looking for us, did they?

(Speaking of which: Robin - darling, sweetheart, you do not have to feel bad if you don’t like my book. You are not responsible for how I feel about your experience. Yes, I want you to enjoy it, I thank you for buying it, and I hope it’s a good experience for you. But if it isn’t, that’s not your responsibility. You take on too much responsibility in this writer/reader relationship. Let it go. It’s not your job to protect our fragile feelings. If our feelings are fragile, we’re in the wrong line of business, and that is certainly not your fault.)

So, since we all each individually are in complete control of the author-reader relationship… what is all this discussion about?

Oh. Respecting the art. Another argument about which I am also horribly obtuse is the respect thing. I don’t demand respect from anybody for anything I do. If I do it well, I’ll get respect from the people who read me. If I don’t, I won’t. The people who don’t read me (aka, the mainstream literary world, Curtis Sittenfeld) don’t matter because whatever they have to say about me is just so much blathering because they haven’t read me. My readers are the people who matter, because they know of what they speak. Some literary wanker who judges me because my books are pink or have a happy ending or involve s-e-x is not my concern, because he knows nothing about me. The people who read me? They are my concern.

As far as a book not being a burger - yes, you’re all right. It’s not a burger. And in order for me to serve my reader, I need to be the story’s bitch, bottom line. So, if a reader says one thing and my story says another, I go with story all the time. But, the thing is, the really good readers, the smart critics, they know story. They may not study it consciously, but they know what works and what doesn’t, and if something doesn’t work, then I didn’t serve story so well, did I? So I rarely find that story conflicts with the good feedback. But if it does, crack that whip - bottom line, I’m story’s bitch.

Which is the trailer park way of saying what Laura did about following her muse. It just doesn’t interfere with my process to hear what people have to say, so I do it. For her, it seems to, so she doesn’t. Either way, it doesn’t matter if someone thinks we’re artists or waitresses. We provide story, and God willing and the creek don’t rise people will keep coming to us for it. If everyone does her part, no one gets hurt. So all this nattering about what is art and what deserves respect and etcetera makes no sense to me whatsoever. I just don’t see how it matters if Candy (for example) thinks I’m an artist or not. What matters is, did I write a story that fulfilled its promise to her as a reader?

And that’s the way I see it. Not that any of you asked… :)

I don’t think I’ve made myself clear.

Respectfully—“It takes two to tango” is IMHO _completely_ inaccurate when it comes to writing.

Writing takes _one_ to tango.  The writer.  The writer sees pictures, hears voices, has feelings, writes the best story they can.  They take care mastering their craft and developing their voice because those things make writing more fun.  The first “reader” of a book is the writer who wrote it.

When it comes to selling books, it takes thousands to tango.

On a really good day, the externalized dream/nightmare of a writer makes that writer a few bucks because folks like what they wrote.

But . . .

Interview with a Vampire wasn’t written to make money. It was written cause that woman’s child died and she wished she was dead too.  She put into that book a host of metaphors:

*  The lover who says you have to get over becoming the living dead.

*  The “half life” of eating rats and worse which seems honorable when compared to killing again?  Why love anyone ever again?  Why have another child.  Why go on? Dying is very hard, but living with yourself for having a kid and letting them die of a trully horrible disease is almost as hard.

*  The dream child trapped forever in a half life. Fearful, angry, wanting to grow up and dead before their time.

*  The mother who _does_ get to die with that child.

Ad infinitem.

Its not about the reader for many, many writers.  When you read their books, you are coming to their world.  You are free to hate that world. You are free to love it.  But that world was not created for you or with you in mind. To the writer, the people in those books are as real as they people they knew in highschool. They are more real than 99.9% of readers will ever be.

Some writers do “write for the money”.  I write technical training material for the money.  Books and scripts I write for the same reason I breathe. I have to.

Its 4:16 so I’m punchy. Sorry if I sound cross.  I’m not.  I’m just emphatic. Its actually more interesting to read books (IMHO) when they are the best work a writer can do undiluted with any fear of what a reader might think.

Andreya wrote:

Its 4:16 so I’m punchy. Sorry if I sound cross.  I’m not.  I’m just emphatic. Its actually more interesting to read books (IMHO) when they are the best work a writer can do undiluted with any fear of what a reader might think.

No problem, punkin. You have to work really hard to offend me. And disagreement is fun for me. It makes me either back up my argument or shut up. It helps me hone what I really think about things. It’s all good.

That said, I do believe that writers need readers to complete the process. One or many, it doesn’t matter. But the reader needs to finish it. That’s just how I see it. If you see it differently, that’s cool.

And sure, Anne Rice came to the page to talk about things that have nothing to do with her readers. So do I. I don’t come to the page thinking, “What do my readers want me to write?” I come to it thinking, “How can I have the most possible fun with this story?” Then as I write, I try to write to the best of my abilities. If there were weaknesses in earlier books, I try to work on whatever skill I was lacking. But there is a point in the process where, yeah, I consider whether what I’m giving the readers is worthy of them. My goal is to give them the best story I can, because that’s what makes it fun for me, and that’s what they want. It’s a win/win.

And, oh, man, are you ever right about not writing to the market. That’s not what I’m talking about. What I’m talking about is the fact that readers matter, that they are an active part of the whole process, whether we as writers choose to think of them or not. Yes, you have to write what matters to you, write the story you’re called to tell. If you’re writing to story, if you’re doing it right, you can do that and please the readers. They’re not mutually exclusive. S’all I’m saying.

“Readers.”

So who is your reader?

That’s one question.  That could be, yourself, your best friend, etc.  That’s fine; it’s not really a problem.  Sure you write to communicate; the words mean something. The craft itself is in how those words communicate.  In that sense, the reader is taken into account, as to the words you choose to convey the setting, characters and story. Otherwise you’d paint or play an instrument to convey this “thing,” this feeling.  But as a writer, you choose words.

Who are your readers?

In the plural.  Now we are into a wholly different mechanic.  Who are these “readers?”  There are way too many of them to possibly please them all, or even communicate with; that’s just common sense.  So which ones do you target your story to?  Romance readers?  What if your story is about an erotic romantic threesome, and romance readers “don’t like” threesomes?  (As I’m told over on AAR.) Or rather, many do, and many don’t.  Then how do you move your story?  Do you sit there writing and worrying about the ones who won’t like it?  Do you piss about the awards you’ll never win because “some” readers won’t like your stuff?  That you’ll never be “a success” because you know you aren’t writing to market?  But what if the next big market IS for threesomes, but nobody knows it yet?  The only way that market ever happens is because some writer somewhere said THE HELL WITH READERS AND WHAT THEY LIKE, -this- is the book I am going to write.

And they write an erotic romance about a threesome, and they write it so well and so brilliantly that it just blows “the market” away. 

That’s why it’s not about readers. That’s why it’s not a service industry.  That’s why it is an art. 

Some of you guys are getting all tangled up in the words “art” and “respect.”  Don’t drag in all that baggage about authority and pleasing and who’s in power and who gets to say something is valuable.

Those are just the words I used for the dynamic that I’m talking about.  For art, I mean the dynamic that a writer experiences when he or she is gifted with whatever it is that comes in the wee hours and tells you what to write.

Any writer knows that it isn’t some white shaft of light that you just sit there waiting for.  It comes through the sweat work and out of the sweat work.  If you aren’t sitting there working, in the truest sense, choosing words and thinking and editing and creeping along, then it will never happen.  But it does happen.

It’s happened to me, and to many other writers. My best work comes out of that, and I don’t even take credit for it, because I can’t produce it on demand, it’s just there or it’s not.  Call that art, call it a muse, call it cream gravy.  It doesn’t matter.

I realize this is a humbling thing both for readers and writers.  To realize that, like in a marriage, what you want, what you think you deserve, may not be what you get.  And that no matter how much therapy you pay for, how many reader surveys you run, how much you think of your “reader” and “the market” and what that man wants (what DO men want??) that you don’t get to it through those means.

It comes as a gift.  The gift comes first to the writer, not to the readers.  And the writer takes it and runs with it or sits there shaking in her boots and is too scared of the market and the readers to take it.  It happens. 

Every single book that ever really rocked the market was something new and strange and wonderful and individual.  Maybe it was simple, even clunky in execution, but there was something in it and about that that sang so loud everybody could hear it for miles.  Knock-offs don’t sing that kind of solo.  Knock-offs sing the background chorus. There’s nothing wrong with that, but when it’s all background chorus, then “the market” starts complaining about how blah and pedestrian and boring it all is.  And they wait…

What they wait for is the art, and unless one of them happens to sit down and start writing it themselves, which has happened many and many a time, then they just have to wait.

That’s why it’s not a service industry. ;)  Readers don’t control it.  Writers don’t control it.  It’s not in service to anybody.  We are in service to it. 

It comes or it doesn’t.

Again, beautifully written and wonderful advice for writers to keep in mind. Thank you, Ms. Kinsale.

One quick bit about fine art vs. commercial art, and art vs. entertainment: I don’t know about anyone else, but I don’t think I’m placing much of a value judgment on these categories. Commercial art can be excellent, whereas a lot of fine art is just plain shitty, and both can serve as entertainment, and the lines can get pretty fucking blurry all the way around, anyway. There seems to be a tendency for people to think fine art = good, commercial art = bad, but I don’t think it’s so. Commercial art is different from fine art, but it’s not necessarily inferior.

“The only way that market ever happens is because some writer somewhere said THE HELL WITH READERS AND WHAT THEY LIKE, -this- is the book I am going to write.”

Ms. Kinsale, I don’t recommend you write a book with a hero who has a stroke and is locked in a madhouse. That doesn’t sound like a romance at all. Who will want to read about that? No one, that’s who.

While I’m at it, I really don’t recommend that you write books set in a sort of alternate-medieval period. I mean, it isn’t a historical, and it isn’t a fantasy, per se. Readers will just be downright confused and we can’t market it. Oh, and for God’s sake, under no circumstances should you write any of it in old English or (shudder) iambic pentameter.

Also, you shouldn’t have a “sequel” (Shadowheart) come out so long after the first book. Readers just won’t remember any of the first book. This will turn them right off.

As a huge fan, I for one am so, so, so happy you never listen. Thank you for never listening to anyone.

Abby

There seems to be a tendency for people to think fine art = good, commercial art = bad, but I don’t think it’s so. Commercial art is different from fine art, but it’s not necessarily inferior.

And, as a number of posters have pointed out, what was once considered commercial art (Dickens, for example) can later land in the fine art category.

I think the tension over the *type* of art we’re talking about is related to the author/reader issue and that both, really, are false dichotomies.  If an author views his/her own work as fine art, then maybe that’s enough to make it so for THEM, even if a reader finds it to be ‘merely’ commercial art.  Same with a reader finding something to be fine art against the opinion of an author or other readers.  The difficulty comes exactly from the fact that categorization is also a mode of discrimination (not in an equal protection or Title VII kind of way, but in the general ‘establishing a difference’ kind of way). And how those categories are composed and populated is driven by external judgments.  As those judgments change, so do the categories and the nominees.

Now, as for the reader/author tension (do I write for a reader or don’t I), again, I think the tension comes from a sense of anxiety over how a work will be judged and who will do the judging.  Anyone who writes, ANYONE, is both writer and reader during the process of composition, and in that sense, the universe of inside and outside is created by the act of writing.  However, this doesn’t, IMO, mean that the writer writes for a specific someone or a set of specific someones or according to expectations that she, as the writer, feels bound to artificially import into her process or her writing.  But at the same time, it doesn’t mean that writing occurs without some sense of reading.  I just think it has to do with how one experiences that process—consciously and unconsciously—and how the writer perceives that insider/outsider tension.  There is, IMO, a difference between awareness of the fact that someone will be reading what you write and a conscious attempt to write to their expectations (whatever they may be). However, I’m not sure the *effect* is different (a distinction without difference?).  Because, really, whenever one writes, even for a supposed audience, isn’t that writer still just projecting her OWN version of the audience’s expectations onto her work and thus ultimately holding a conversation with herself in both the guise of author and reader? 

I know probably none of that made sense, so I’ll try to boil it down.  A writer who sees herself as writing for no one but herself functions as both writer and reader, insider and outsider.  A writer who thinks she’s writing for someone else must, necessarily, translate her own idea of what said reader’s expectations are onto the text, making her, again, both writer and reader (even if she thinks she’s writing for an audience, she’s inventing the audience in the process of writing, and therefore still writing to herself).  This second phenomenon is best revealed, IMO, when an author is baffled when some readers don’t read her book the way she thought they would—well, of course!  She was *assuming* their expectations or at the very least *translating* them herself.

So, in the end, it’s a false opposition, because the writer can never truly know the reader’s expectations and therefore meet them.  She is writing to a reader, though—herself.  How she pictures that, whether it’s in the guise of lots of bowing fans or one shy reader in the corner of the library or as the person in front of the comuter doesn’t matter because in the end it’s still the same process, IMO.

Commercial art is different from fine art, but it’s not necessarily inferior.

Hear, hear. That’s why I have such a high regard for really good commercial art. Not only does it cater to clients, but it’s done so well it knocks people off their feet.

Ms. Kinsale said:  “Every single book that ever really rocked the market was something new and strange and wonderful and individual.  Maybe it was simple, even clunky in execution, but there was something in it and about that that sang so loud everybody could hear it for miles.  Knock-offs don’t sing that kind of solo.  Knock-offs sing the background chorus. There’s nothing wrong with that, but when it’s all background chorus, then “the market” starts complaining about how blah and pedestrian and boring it all is.  And they wait…

To that I say, Amen, amen, amen.

“What they wait for is the art, and unless one of them happens to sit down and start writing it themselves, which has happened many and many a time, then they just have to wait.

That’s why it’s not a service industry. ;) Readers don’t control it.  Writers don’t control it.  It’s not in service to anybody.  We are in service to it.”

Perhaps it would help to clarify if the “it” Ms. Kinsale is talking about was referred to as imagination.  It would, I think, help to put aside the fine art versus commercial art thing.

Readers can not and perhaps should not, control the unpredictable wanderings of a writer’s imagination.

The imagination is not a service industry. 

And I would guess that no one really wants the kind of “drive-thru” product that such a thing implies.  “Yes, I’ll take a historical romance, extra virgin heroine, blond hero, evil step-mother, with a side of happily ever after.  Yes, I’d like that super sized.”

Ms. Kinsale is absolute correct:  those extra-special, super-duper, mega-deluxe favorite “keepers” on our bookshelves are there because we admire the nooks, crannies, twists, and wild turns of the imagination behind it.