But I've also had tough dealings with my agent. She reamed me out (some of it undeservedly s0) because I asked for help to get a reading NYC. The bookstore said no, and I felt disappointed that she didn't push hard enough. But she was angry at me because I asked her to help and though she has health problems she went all the across NYC to request a reading, even though she knew they would refuse my request for a reading. My thinking was that if you knew they would say no, why go through all the trouble of going over there and then blaming it on me. To teach me a lesson? So from now on, I'm trying to get readings without the help of my agent.
She also got on my case about my web presence. As I said in an previous post, my presence on the web (at least in the traditional sense which is an interesting thing to say, the web in the traditional sense because I grew up in the time before everyone had a computer so to call something like the web traditional is really odd) is extremely limited. I have a website that just links you to hear. And I have this blog that has only only follower and that no one has ever commented on. But I'm still out there on the social networks and making connections with people through that and through e-mail messages. Blogging has always bugged me. What I have to say isn't so important that I think I have to share it with the universe. And it's writing for no audience and worse, for a professional writer like me, no pay. And spending time blogging every day cuts into the other important things I need to do, like write for money, write my next novel and take care of my family. And now (or as early as two years ago), some experts are saying that blogging is dead, at least for people like me who don't have a shitload of fans who read my books.
http://www.wired.com/entertainment/theweb/magazine/16-11/st_essay
http://www.wired.com/beyond_the_beyond/2008/08/blogs-as-dead-m
I mean look at this blog. I have one follower, one person who sometimes reads this. And it's taken several weeks to get that. On FB, I have 755 friends (that's pretty low compared to some), and I got 100 new ones in the past week. I can get more info out to those people much faster than this blog.
So I'll blog her to talk about writer and bigtimewriter but you can also find me on FB and be my friend. Or just go to an online bookseller and pre-order my novel as an e-book or a hardcover.
http://www.amazon.com/Fall-from-Grace-ebook/dp/B00457X80I/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&m=AZC9TZ4UC9CFC&s=digital-text&qid=1287629631&sr=8-2
http://www.amazon.com/Fall-Grace-Wayne-Arthurson/dp/0765324172/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1287629701&sr=8-3
http://www.amazon.ca/Fall-Grace-Wayne-Arthurson/dp/0765324172/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1287629570&sr=1-2
3 comments:
Actually, according to my google reader, you have THREE subscribers to your blog.
It's probably me, you and your one follower on your page.
And now I've left you your first comment.
You're welcome :) hehe.
In order to be a "follower", I have to sign up for yet another kind of account. So I'll just bookmark you and come visit some of the time, 'K?
I agree that the big blog frenzy is probably a fad but your FB friend who talked about the keywords may have made the only really good argument I've heard for blogging.
I too believe my writing is more interesting than I am. I suppose we could create an interesting life on our blog lived by a person far more special than we are, but like you I'd like to save my energy, what I have of it, for actually writing.
That said, people love to look through windows into other people's lives--especially people who do interesting things (like write books and so on), so there's a point there too. When your book comes out there need to be some focal points of contact to make up for the book tours of yesteryear, with their radio (and sometimes even TV) interviews, public readings, signings and all those other chances to get up close and personal with a Real Writer...
There is, after all, a whole generation of people who do most of their living and info-gathering online. It's a world very different to the one that faced me as a newly published writer even as short a time ago as the 1980s. Adapt or perish, I guess. (Speaking as someone who hasn't even got her $%!# together to finish my website yet. And since we have the same agent, if she sells the book I just finished and sent her yesterday, she'll be wanting me to blog too...!)
I know some successful writers who have managed their online images very well (c.f. Peter Watts, Rob Sawyer, Nicola Griffiths, Dana Stabenow) and perhaps we need to look at what they are doing and how they integrate blogs with websites with real life, and see if we can pick up some pointers...
yours, being dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century
Candas
Wayne, I'm still catching up with your posts, so you may have already started doing this or addressed it, but have you tried 'VLOGGING'. Do a short 1-2 minute video of your updates is faster and less consuming than writing blog posts, OR automating your blog so that it outsources to social media outlets. I can help you get that set up. I'm going to contact you on your fb page as Kandie DFW. Good luck
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