Author Cooperation

***AUTHOR COOPERATION***

The key to having a successful community of any kind is cooperation among its members. Competition is what tears us apart, but teamwork and friendship is what brings us together. That’s part of the reason why I chose to be an independently published author: the sense of community. We critique each other, we honestly review each other’s books, we promote each other, and we’re there for each other when it desperately counts. When you’re a part of this community, there is no stepping over each other because there’s room for everybody at the top of the mountain. It takes a village to write a novel, sometimes even a capitol city. Nobody becomes a legend on their own.

My own journey to where I am today was marred with resistance to criticism. In 2001, I went to an anime/sci-fi/fantasy convention called INCON and had a piece of writing critiqued by five different professional authors, all of which had decades of experience and wisdom. Because of their somewhat harsh demeanors, I walked away after the first two authors got their words in. Maybe I was intimidated by the fact that I had so much work ahead of me to make my writing immaculate. Maybe I believed “potential” was an empty word when the first two authors told me I had it. Maybe it was my massive teenage ego that shoved everybody out of my circle who didn’t worship at the Temple of Garrison.

Whatever the case was, this over-inflated ego carried over throughout high school and college. I wrote a violent and sexually explicit poem about a classmate who said my writing sucked and he was hardly the only target of these rants and raves. Online folk, geology teachers, real life strangers, they all felt my fiery poetic wrath in one way or another. The more I reflect on this, the more I think that the reason I don’t have many Deviant Art followers is because of my past behavior and tendency to lash out.

It wasn’t until 2012 that I realized I needed help. I gathered up some money and went over to Writer’s Digest’s website to use their Second Draft critique services. For a moderate sum of money, you can have a famous author critique your work, but it’s only for a one time deal and there’s no guarantee you’ll get published. Given my verbally violent past, I was terrified to go through with this.

But sure enough, the piece of writing I wanted critiqued was a memoir about my experiences with getting bullied in my freshman year of high school. My intention was to circulate this essay to various literary magazines with the hopes of getting picked up. My editor was an author named Carolyn Walker, a nonfiction author, champion for the mentally disabled, and cordial human being. Her biggest critique for my essay was that it sounded too angry and that I hadn’t been descriptive enough to earn my ending. I ended up scrapping my own essay because that’s a part of my life I want to leave buried forever and I regretted writing about it.

As scary as taking that next step was, I would happily use Second Draft again, this time with a short fantasy story called Beauty and the Barbarian. In this story, Sonya Jade’s boyfriend is turned into a hideous monster by a witch and she wants to sneak into her castle to get the antidote. My hired beta reader, named Kathy Giorgio (if I remember correctly), said that the story felt incomplete and that it should be an entire novel or longer short story. I took her advice and expanded it to ten pages of single spaced text. It made it onto a short story collection I published in 2013 called Dragon Machinegun. Unfortunately, due to my dissatisfaction with how those stories were written, I took Dragon Machinegun off the market and it’s no longer available.

The third and final time I went to Second Draft was when I wrote a story called Dick Tater, which is about a homecoming prince with a bloodthirsty monster for a penis. This time, my beta reader was a military fiction author named Stephen Mertz, who said my story was marketable, weird, and kinky. He also said that it needed dialogue to show instead of tell (my story had absolutely none). As a token of my appreciation for his services, I bought a novel he wrote under the penname Jim Case called Cody’s Army and gave it a glowing review after reading it.

I didn’t completely come out of my shell until I joined the Good Reads group Weekly Short Story Contests and Company. With all of the friendly people who helped me through the rough drafts, whether it’s Edward Davies, Ryan Stone, Leslie Onus, Melissa Andres, and many others, my writing improved greatly and my fear of being critiqued was non-existent. When I got in touch with Marie Krepps in 2015, she became my permanent beta reader and I trust her with everything. She’s honest, she’s smart, and she’s funny as hell. She’s also a damn good writer who has earned every ounce of praise I’ve given her in my reviews for her books.

It was a good thing that I had calmed down over the years and learned not to take everything personally, because in June 2014, I may have just submitted the most offensive short story to the WSS during that time. It was a PG-13 bondage erotica called Tainted Love where Marilyn Elkins is kidnapped by a handsome stranger and duct taped to a hotel bed. She enjoys the kisses and sexual attention she’s getting to the point where she helps her kidnapper fight off her abusive husband. I wrote this story strictly for entertainment, but it ended up offending many people at the WSS and gave them the false idea that I was a sexist. As a token of apology, I took down the story from all of my social media sites and dropped out of the contest for that week. I spent the next week hurting like hell, but I took pride in the fact that I handled it like a champ instead of a raging lunatic.

That just happens to be my story. Everybody’s path to success is different, but nobody does it alone. Wisdom comes from experience and experience comes from the best the writing world has to offer. Don’t push these people away. They’re just as much a part of your inner circle as your friends and family. They want you to be successful. They want you to be happy. They want you to be the best damn writer you can possibly be. The more you listen to their critiques, the less it hurts. You may have to read their comments more than once to ease the sting, but if you take what you’ve learned to heart, you’ll do just fine in this world. In the words of Red Green, “I’m pulling for you; we’re all in this together.”

***WEEKLY SHORT STORY CONTESTS AND COMPANY***

As long as we’re on the topic of sensitive gender issues, this week I’m going to tackle a topic that’s hotly debated in pro-wrestling and MMA alike. I hope I can handle this topic with class, unlike Tainted Love from 2014. The prompt is “Dazed” and my story is called “Gender Blind”. It goes like this:

CHARACTERS:

1.      Sting Masters, Mixed-Martial Artist (Lightweight)

2.      Rachel Gustafson, Mixed-Martial Artist (Lightweight)

3.      Bill Dash, Referee (Heavyweight)

4.      Raymond Katz, CEO of Battle Born Promotions

PROMPT CONFORMITY: Being dazed is a normal part of an MMA contest since one of the ways to win is by KO.

SYNOPSIS: Battle Born Promotions is making history by sanctioning its first ever inter-gender mixed-martial arts fight in the lightweight division (155 lbs.). This upcoming main event match between Sting and Rachel has sparked a lot of debate and controversy among media outlets and MMA fans. Some people think it pairs men and women as equals while others are sickened by seeing a man beating up a woman. When the pay-per-view actually takes place, there are excited audience members in the building and protesters outside. Raymond Katz has a lot of explaining to do and a lot of security detail to hire.

***DARK FANTASY WARRIORS***

Okay, so he’s technically part of a modern day drama and not a dark fantasy story, but I’m going to draw Sting Masters anyways. I’ve drawn MMA badasses in the past whether it’s Edward Glass from Molly-Dolly or Christina McKenzie from Gates of Hell. Sting Masters is a lightweight fighter from England and I want my drawing of him to reflect those things (not stereotypically, of course). Wish me luck!

***YOU TUBE QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“Hi, I’m an attractive woman on the internet. You are somebody who comments on my videos or articles, though what you say isn’t always pleasant. But honestly, that’s not what we’re here to talk about. Though yes, you are awful. Even more alarming is those of you who think you’re being complimentary. While I’m flattered that you’re trying to express a fondness for what I do, you’re doing it wrong. If you like one of my videos, screaming, “TITS!” is wrong. Providing the phonetic representation of the sound of a man masturbating is incredibly wrong. Unless you’ve just typed in credit card information, telling a woman you’ve never met that you just masturbated to her comedy video, it’ll never be the right thing to do, honestly. I don’t know, maybe you’re confused because there are videos on the internet where the women explicitly tell you to masturbate. Yeah, I’m not making those. If you like what I do, say that. And if you like masturbating to things, go do that, just don’t tell me about it. Thank you for your time. I’ve been a woman of the internet. I didn’t ask to see your genitals, so don’t ask to see mine. And please stop telling me how you masturbate!”

-The women of Cracked.com-

Getting Better

I recently watched a shoot interview with WWE Hall of Fame commentator Jim Ross in which he said that in order to be successful in the wrestling industry, one of the things you have to do is be willing to improve every day. The same thing applies with every field out there, including writing. Whether you’re just starting out in your mid-teens like I did or you’re well in your elder years, you always have room for improvement. In order to improve, you have to listen to three different sources: your elders, your peers, and the authors you’re currently reading and enjoying. I will say that you don’t necessarily have to agree with everything they say. In fact, every author should have a filter for the things they listen to. For example, if an author is being bombarded with insults and hatred, it’s probably a good idea not to draw inspiration from those people. If on the other hand an author is being sensitively critiqued by someone who genuinely wants him to succeed, then listening to those people is probably a better idea. The key word there is sensitively. You don’t want to be critiqued by someone who takes delight in hurting your feelings. But you also don’t want to misconstrue every piece of critique as hateful and tormenting. A good critique giver will tell you three different things about your work: what you did right, what you did wrong, and how you can correct the things you did wrong. Critique isn’t just a laundry list of complaints. Telling an author what they did right can be as informative as what they did wrong. It lets them know what to continue doing as well as what to stop doing. And when the editor gives the author advice on how to fix the problems in his work, it lets him know that he’s not alone in the struggle to have a presentable manuscript and that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, pardon the cliché. When you surround yourself with people who can balance kindness and honesty, your game will improve dramatically. When you surround yourself with hate mongers, your career will be over before it begins. The journey to authorship should be one of happiness and excitement, not despair and sadness. If it wasn’t for people like Stephen Mertz, Carolyn Walker, Kathie Giorgio, and my army of friends on Good Reads, I would have never known what kind critique was. It’s because of those people that my game has improved dramatically from hyperbolic mediocrity to fast-paced simplicity. I want to give thanks to all the people I’ve mentioned both specifically and generally. I hope they’re reading.

　

***COMEDIC QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“Zesty and tangy are not real words that normal human beings use in everyday conversation. They’re advertising words. Has anyone ever turned to you and said, ‘This is real zesty! And tangy too!’?”

-George Carlin-

"Cody's Army" by Jim Case

The reason I purchased this book to begin with was because the author (real name Stephen Mertz) critiqued one of my short stories and I wanted to thank him for his sensitive and honest service. And I thought, “Well, buying a white-knuckle military thriller, that should let him know I care!” It was worth every penny. Cody’s Army follows the story of John Cody and his three brothers-in-arms as they storm their way through the Arab desert in search of hostages taken from an airline flight to Tel Aviv. John Cody is a Vietnam war veteran who can beat the living piss out of anybody if given an Uzi machinegun, a garrote wire, a knife, grenades, or just his bare knuckles. Richard Caine is an explosives expert who can blow pretty much anything or anybody so high up in the air that they can personally say hello to their deity (feel free to take that any way you want). Rufe Murphy is a helicopter pilot who also happens to be a gigantic monster of a black guy who can snap the necks of smaller men with his thumb and forefinger. Hawkeye Hawkins, well, he’s just a badass Texan with a hair-trigger temper and a switchblade for a tongue. Okay, I may have stolen that last line from a Five Finger Death Punch song, but you get the idea. Individually, these four Vietnam vets are rough, tough motherfuckers who can kill at a moment’s notice. Together? Oh, you’d better bring every last soldier you’ve got and even then it may never be enough. They’re not just toe-to-toe brawlers, they’re intelligent tacticians who can work their way around any opposition. If you’re looking for a fast-paced action thriller, pick up a copy of Cody’s Army. By now you’re probably asking yourself why a peace-loving liberal like me is promoting a military-style novel. I already told you the first reason, because I want to support the guy who critiqued my work and made me a better writer. The other reason is because I know the difference between fantasy and reality. In Cody’s Army, the action is high-octane, brutal, and as dazzling to read as the Rambo movies are to watch. In real life, it would still be brutal, but there would be a lot of PTSD and vomiting in reaction to such horrible violence. Relax and enjoy the thrill ride from a safe distance. Buy Cody’s Army!

　

***JOKES OF THE DAY***

Q: What’s it called when a female soldier is getting emotional?
A: War-mones.

Q: What does a soldier get after he has sex?
A: War-gasms.

Synopses

Before I get started with the body of this blog, I just want to take a moment and read to you the synopsis for “Cody’s Army”, which I am currently 72 pages into. It goes like this…

“The sequence was familiar: Another jet hijacked to Lebannon. Once again America held hostage by fanatic rebels. And just to prove they meant business the terrorists dragged two innocent passengers out on the tarmac and shot them in cold blood. That’s when John Cody and his mone got on the scene. Their mission was to free the hostages. But Cody wasn’t going to stop there. This time he had to make sure it didn’t happen again. And there was only one way to do that. The hard way. The bloody way.”

If that doesn’t get you excited about reading a high-octane military thriller, I don’t know what does. Just from that synopsis alone, you can expect John Cody to be a literary version of Rambo. The reason I reposted that text verbatim is to make a point: it may be wrong to judge a book by its cover, but it’s nowhere near immoral to judge one by its synopsis. If you’re a potential author and you want people to be at least vaguely interested in your book, you have to hit them with something hard long before they delve into the first page. It’s called hooking them in and it’s not a new thing. Movies that don’t hook in their audience by the first five minutes are going to lose a lot of patrons. And when you write your synopsis, don’t worry about overselling your product. It’s much more practical to oversell something than to undersell it. If you’re advertising a dog turd to someone dying of hunger, you’re going to want to oversell it as tasting like a Butterfinger candy bar. Otherwise, there won’t be a sale. If you want an example that’s closer to my heart, let’s use a WWE example, particularly one starring Dolph Ziggler. When he gets thrown around the ring, he doesn’t just flop over like most guys do. He spins around and flies like a birdie just to make that hip toss look painful. Dolph Ziggler can wrestle a broomstick and make the broomstick look good. If you’re an author looking to get people excited about your book, be a literary Dolph Ziggler and oversell your product. Talk about the bloody and painful moments early on. People love blood and pain. Now if only I could take my own advice when it came to selling “Red Blood, White Knuckles, Blue Heart”. If you’re wondering why I keep mentioning my self-published book in my posts, it’s because I haven’t sold a single copy as of today. It’s pathetic, I know. One day, I’ll shut up about it forever. I promise.

　

***WRESTLING QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“CM Punk could burn an orphanage to the ground and he would still be popular with the fans.”

-Me-