Small Business Saturday

Hey there! As I have several times in the past, I thought I’d take a moment at the holidays to mention some of the books I’ve read and enjoyed this year by much more talented authors. If you’re still wondering about what to get that certain someone, you could go hit your local bookstore, browse around a bit, and maybe find a few things from this list they might enjoy.

Or maybe you’ll just find something on your own. That’s the fun of browsing in real-world bookstores.

So, in no real order...

Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir – we’ll start with an easy one. If you haven’t somehow heard, Andy’s latest is (surprise) just fantastic. The tale of an (accidentally) lone astronaut’s desperate attempt to save the Earth. It’s fun, it’s fast, it’s incredibly smart while being ridiculously accessible. Absolutely anyone will enjoy it. Yeah, even that grouchy uncle who doesn' tlike sci-fi stuff.

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab—I’m a sucker for stories about memory and identity, and this book approaches it from the opposite side. What if it wasn't your memory but everyone else's. What if no one could ever remember you? What if they forgot you the moment they couldn’t see you? What kind of life would this be? And what if that life never, ever ended... ?

Bottle Demon by Stephen Blackmoore---every year Stephen writes a new book about necromancer Eric Carter and every year it ends up on this list. This most recent one is, hands down, his most amazing, and probably the most emotional, too, as Carter deals with an army of golems, an irate djinn, and the completely mysterious and unexpected resurrection of... well, himself.

King Bullet by Richard Kadrey—if you’re one of those people who waits for the end of a series to start reading, well, I guess this is a good day. Kadrey brings the Sandman Slim books to a close with one last Stark adventure and a truly magnificent ending that feels perfectly fitting while also being somehow completely unexpected.

Dread Nation by Justina Ireland—I’ve read a lot of zombie books out of a very broad genre, but this book manages to be fresh and very fun, picturing an alternate world where the American Civil War is disrupted by a mass zombie outbreak, and young women of color are trained to be bodyguards against the undead for “proper” women. I liked it so much I recommended this one for our Last Bookstore dystopian book club.

The History of What Comes Next by Sylvain Neuvel—a wonderful tale about aliens and their very long-game plan to shape the Earth’s assorted space programs to prepare us for... something. It’s one of those books that’ll teach you a lot of history even as it entertains you.

Madi by Duncan Jones, Alex deCampi, and too many fantastic artists to list here—this graphic novel is set in the same world as Jones’s films Moon and Mute, and asks what happens when a government super-cyborg decides to retire, especially when their body’s loaded up with proprietary software and hardware that requires ongoing maintenance and updates. It’s kind of like the weirdly fun baby that came out of a threeway between The Transporter, Crank, and The Bionic Woman.

Hard Reboot by Django Wexler—it’s a love story about a pair of women trying to rebuild a giant robot so it can compete on the giant robot pit-fighting circuit. Seriously, what more do you need to know?

Reclaimed by Madeleine Roux—remember what I said about memory and identity? Seriously, it’s like Madeleine wrote this book just for me. A group of people agree to be test subjects for a procedure that can erase traumatic experiences from your memory. But how much of who you are is defined by those experiences? What kind of person are you changed into once they’re gone? And how would you go about fixing that change...?

The Book of Accidents by Chuck Wendig—this is a beautiful, brutal book, and it’s almost tough to recommend because it hit a lot of nerves for me, personally, that are probably going to be raw forever. That said, it’s a wonderful book about choices and consequences and how they make us who we are.

All Systems Red by Martha Wells– people have been telling me about the Murderbot books for ages, so I’m really late to this party. You may already know this but if you somehow didn’t... wow, what a fun read. The story of a security android that figures out how to hack its own code, inadvertently becoming an independent being and now stuck guarding a group of scientists on a survey mission.

Ballad of Black Tom by Victor LaValle –another one I’m really late on but goddamn. This was one of the first books I read in 2021 and it’s still hands down the best. There just aren’t enough adjectives to describe how fantastic this book is and on how many levels. Lovecraftian horror grounded in real-world horror and it’s just brutally beautiful.

And those are my personal favorites for the year. I may add to this list over the next week or two, depending on how my current reads go. Please feel free to add any of your own must-reads down in the comments. I’d also shamelessly remind you that you can find a lot of my own books at your favorite local bookstore, like The Fold, Paradox Bound, or the Ex-Heroes books.

I’ll also take this moment to remind you of my Black Friday offer, just in case you missed it earlier. Please feel free to get in touch if you think it might help you out. And please—it’s not about if someone needs it more than you. It’s just about if you need some help.

Oh, and if you happen to be at SDCC Special Edition this weekend, I’m going to be hosting the Writer’s Coffeehouse on Sunday at 11:30, room 32AB. Ninety minutes of random tips and facts from me as I try to answer all your questions about publishing, writing, and anywhere those two might overlap.

Happy holidays. Probably back to all our usual stuff next week.

Nothing Left to Learn

I was thinking of new topics a week or so back, and about the fact there’s not much I haven’t covered here. I mean, it’s been well over thirteen years now. There’s only so many times I can say “Try to make your characters relatable somehow.”

And that train of thought led me to, well... why are you still here? Why are you still reading this? Not just this post but I mean... the whole blog?

Yeah, over the past year or so, I’ve tried to be better about doing stuff here. Writing advice is still the majority of it, but lately I’m also trying to put up some related thoughts on publishing, marketing, movies, and well... the state of the hellworld we’ve all found ourselves living in.

But, yeah, in all fairness, a lot of the writing advice is stuff I’ve gone over once or thrice before. Which makes me ask, again... Why are you still reading this?

I mean, I love that you’re here. Seriously. It’s truly appreciated. But I’m asking about you in the larger, general sense. What are you still hoping to find here?

For a lot of our time as writers, professional or not, there’ll be people taking that journey with us. They can be teachers in school or professors at university. Maybe they’re other writers we know. Some might be at the same stage of their writing career as us. Others may be a bit behind. A bunch of them may be way ahead of us. Or they could’ve written a bunch of books (or blog posts) about writing and storytelling you really enjoyed.

And these folks have given you tips and suggestions. Maybe some rules to follow. A few guidelines. Maybe a bunch of examples. They’ve pointed out paths to follow and given you a gentle (or not so gentle) nudge in what they think might be the right direction for you.

Eventually, though—like with any active effort to learn—there’s going to come a point when the time and money I’m investing in all that reading and listening and learning is going to outweigh what I’m actually getting out of them. We call it diminishing returns. It’s the point when I’ve gotten ahead of the learning curve. When I’m getting less and less out of each book or class or blog post because, well... I already know I should try to make my characters relatable.

And this is when I need to move out of that safe, comfortable learning bubble and start doing real work. 

This is a big, scary step, because it’s essentially taking away my safety net of excuses. A lot of them anyway. Why didn’t I write today? Well, I’m not quite there yet. I signed up for a class. I’m waiting for feedback from my writer’s group.  I was reading a new book about how to structure novels. And there’s this other book coming out in a few weeks, and I don’t want to get started and then go back and redo things. Plus, let’s be honest... writing’s just the first step toward getting rejected, right?

If you’ve followed this blog for any amount of time, you know the advice and tips here are mostly aimed at people who’ve got a solid grip on the bare basics and are ready to start taking a few more steps forward. But right there, that’s telling you this shouldn’t be your go-to place for years and years. If you’re doing things right, there’s going to be a point where the returns have diminished and these posts just aren’t worth your time.

And I’m cool with that. It happens. It should happen. Your writing should hit a point where you don’t need to be paying for classes or buying books or searching the web for the best way to include subtext. You should progress, improve, and just not need these things anymore. Over the years I’ve belonged to a ton of writing groups.  I took several classes in college. I’ve attended a few writing conferences. And I have bought soooooooooo many books on writing. I don’t regret doing these things, but it’s also been a while since I’ve done any of them.

(True fact—the last writing book I bought was Damn Fine Story by Chuck Wendig when we were both attending Phoenix Comics Fest. He laughed at the idea I was buying a copy, and he signed it “You don’t need this book, so I hope you enjoy it”)

(it is, for the record, a really fantastic book on storytelling, and even though it turned out I did know a lot of what he was saying, I really did enjoy how he said it and the examples he gave)

Look, I’m not saying any of us are ever going to be the end-all be-all authority on writing. Personally, I’d tell you to steer clear of anyone who claims to be. But that’s just because with any art—with anything at all—there’s always going to be more to learn. So if I’m waiting until I know it all before I start... it means I’m never going to start.

So stop worrying that you don’t know enough yet. Recognize that maybe it’s time to stop putting effort into learning how to write and shifting some of that effort into... y’know, writing. Give yourself permission to learn on the fly, to figure things out as you go, and to not look up every possible way to do something before you do it.

Next time—if you’re still here—I think it’s time we talked about the cheating problem.

Until then, go write.

No, seriously. Go write. What have I been talking about for the past ten minutes?

Other Fantastic Books for You

Okay, I did the Cyber-Monday marketing thing the other day. Now let me tell you about a bunch of other amazing books you could—nay, should pick up as gifts for your loved ones.

These are all some things I read this year (or I read earlier, but they came out this year). Nobody pushed for these, they’re in no particular order or anything, they’re just books I really enjoyed. And I’m betting you’ll enjoy some of  them too.

Girl Like A Bomb by Autumn Christian

Well, I’m starting this list with a lie, which isn’t great. I read this book before it came out, and it was so freakin’ good I put it on last year’s list anyway, even though it didn’t come out until this year. Imagine if your strange mutant ability was bringing out the absolute best, self-actualized version of people, and you activated this gift with... sex. It’s thought-provoking, a bit naughty, and does some wonderful things with the ideas of what it means to be your best and the responsibility of having such a gift.

The Warehouse by Rob Hart

This story about two new workers at the local distribution center of a *cough* large internet merchant has tons to say about relationships, technology, business practices, and just morality in general. I guess it’s technically sci-fi because it’s in the not-too-distant-future, and some of the tech is slightly advanced, but you’ll be hard pressed to find a far-out, stretching-things-too-much element. It’s a fast, easy, and wonderfully disturbing read. 

Lady from the Black Lagoon by Mallory O’Meara
How have you not heard about his book already? It’s fantastic. It’s the true story of the woman who designed the legendary Creature from the Black Lagoon and then got pretty much erased from history by her jealous boss. It’s a brutally honest look inside Hollywood then and now that still manages to be upbeat and positive.

The Fat Lady Sings by Sean Patrick Traver
Okay, this one’s more of a novella but it’s part of Traver’s absolutely wonderful Temple, Tree, and Tower universe (world?) that’s appeared on lists here in the past. A centuries old wizard, currently inhabiting the body of a black cat, takes on a new apprentice to help him protect Los Angeles. It’s ridiculous fun with just the right amount of creepy.

Salvaged by Madeline Roux

This book has one of the creepiest beginnings I’ve read in a while (serious Event Horizon vibes) and then it brings in... okay, I don’t want to ruin it. But this is a wonderful story of guilt and love and it’s kind of a gothic romance in space but with more infectious spores.

Fire Season by Stephen Blackmoore

I’ve pushed the Eric Carter books on some of you before, about a necromancer in modern, Aztec-magic-influenced Los Angeles. With this latest one, book four in the series, Stephen moves his noir urban fantasy into a whole new level of amazing. These books have always been really good but this one was just fantastic. I think I shrieked with glee three or four times while reading it. Seriously.

Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse
Okay, look. To be shamefully honest, I picked this up because I saw it on a couple lists and I thought the cover was pretty cool. And y’know what? Sometimes you can judge a book by its cover because this book is freakin’ magnificent. It’s about Maggie, a professional monster hunter on a post-apocalyptic Navajo reservation. And if that doesn’t get you excited, I really don’t know why we’re even friends. Seriously. Stop texting me.

Our War by Craig diLouie
Full disclosure, I’ve known Craig years longer than any other author on this list, but he honestly still astounds me with the level of emotional gut-punching he manages to bring to everything he writes. This is the story of an all-too plausible second American civil war and the brother and sister child soldiers who find themselves on opposite sides.

Magic For Liars by Sarah Gailey
Odds are this one’s crossed your radar screen sometime this year. A fantastic story about what it’s like to be the sister who isn’t chosen to go to Hogwarts (so to speak). There’s a lot of emotions in this book, and that’s without the murder mystery aspect of it.

Wanderers by Chuck Wendig

Goddamm I loved this book. It has so many things I love. Fantastic characters. A good mystery. Some great twists. Cutting edge science. And considering how long he spent writing it (it’s a monster of a book) it’s ended up being eerily prescient in a lot of political/societal ways.

Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

Holy sweet craptacular jeebus. A bunch of people told me I would love this book but I really didn’t expect to LOVE this book as much as I did. In a super-simplified nutshell, the foundling squire of a royal household of necromancers has to pose as their most decorated knight and serve as bodyguard to the adopted “sister” who’s made her life hell for years. Plus there’s some murders, tons of skeletons, and some wonderfully filthy humor. It’s just so much fun.

The Killing Light by Myke Cole

It’s been a looooong time since I’ve enjoyed a straight fantasy series this much. Although I guess this is technically a steampunk fantasy? The Sacred Throne series is the story of (again, quick version) Heloise a peasant girl who hides in a suit of steampunk armor, ends up fighting a demon, and is now lauded as a saint by all her fellow villagers and expected to lead them against the tyrannical church that rules over them. The characters are fantastic. The battle scenes are amazing. 

And as a last note, I’m only about thirty pages into Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James but holy crap. If the whole book's this good it might just be my favorite of the year.

There you have it. Some of my favorite reads of the year. If you check back in a week, there maybe more added to this list. And I think you can find almost all of them at your favorite local bookstore so... get going. You’re going to have to mail stuff next week if you want it to get there in time for the holidays.

Also, please please please let me know if you’re someone who might benefit from my Black Friday offer. I’ve been there and I know what it’s like. It's not much, but if you need a hand, just say so.

Anyway... tomorrow let’s talk about writing.

Yeah, tomorrow. Let’s get back to it.

Until then, go write.

Cyber Monday VII: The Purchasing

            Well, it’s that time of year where some ugly truths must be addressed.  Artists only get to make art because they get paid.  Artists get paid when people buy their art.

            I’m going to talk to you about buying stuff.

            However...

            While I do one of these lists every year, I find myself in a weird place right now.  Y’see, I technically haven’t had anything new come out this year.  Which hasn’t happened in... well, about ten years.  I think the last time I didn’t have something new come out—a novel or a story in an anthology or something—was back in 2007.

            Granted, I do have things out in new formats.  Paradox Bound came out in a wonderful paperback this year.  My second novel ever—The Eerie Adventures of the Lycanthrope Robinson Crusoe—finally came out as an audiobook.  But new stuff...

            Look, next year’s going to be crazy.

            Anyway, I figured as far as my s own stuff goes... just look at last year’s list.  Or the links above.  That covers just about everything.  Plus, I’m doing my usual holiday deal/promotion with Dark Delicacies—get in touch with them in the next two weeks or so and you can order a personalized, autographed book.  If they’ve got it, you can buy it, I’ll sign it, and they’ll ship it to you.

            What I thought I’d talk about instead—sort of combining two annual posts into one—is a bunch of the other books I’ve read this year.  There’ve been one or two I didn’t like, a bunch that were really fun, and a couple that were just friggin’ amazing.

            So let me tell you about those.  Then you can go pick them up for somebody special or just add them to your own holiday wish list.

The God Gene by F. Paul Wilson is the latest book in his ICE Sequence series.  It’s a wonderfully creepy story about a missing scientist and evolution.  If you or someone you love likes sci-fi thrillers, this is a great one.  And I think the new one comes out in five or six weeks, so if you like it, there’s barely any wait ‘til the next one.

Kill All Angels is Robert Brockway’s freakin’ masterpiece conclusion to his Vicious Circuit books.  The story of an aging punk rocker and a Hollywood stuntwoman trying to save the world from Lovecraftian cosmic entities who can unwrite your entire existence.

One of Us by Craig diLouie is a modern masterpiece.  Seriously.  It’s X-Men meets To Kill A Mockingbird, about mutant children growing up in the deep south.  It’s dark and beautiful and—unless something happens in the next four weeks—unquestionably the best book I read this year

Lipstick Voodoo by Kristi Charish is a bit of a cheat on this list.  I got to read it early for blurbs, and it’s not going to be out until early next year.  But if you like the undead, urban fantasy, a bit of naughtiness, and a bit of mystery... you might want to save a gift card for this one.

I kinda stumbled across Copperhead.  It’s a comic book/graphic novel series by Jay Faerber, Scott Godlewski, Drew Moss and it’s just magnificent.  I've seen “western/frontier in space” done many times and many ways, but never as well as this.  It’s fantastic visual storytelling and seriously, Netflix... what the hell?  Why aren’t we all binging this right now?

Damn Fine Story by Chuck Wendig is the only non-fiction book on this list.  it’s a wonderful (and very entertaining) piece about the art of storytelling.  Not writing, but the act of telling stories and narratives and so on.  Chuck says a lot of stuff about character and dialogue and structure that I’ve said here on my ranty blog, but he says it in a much more entertaining way.  It really is a must-have book if you’re interested about any form of storytelling.

The Tiger’s Daughter by K. Arsenault Rivera is about two girls with grand destinies ahead of each of them who decide to forge one together.  It’s a beautiful, truly epic story of love, demons, and women with swords.  In my top five of the year, no question.

Atomic Robo by Brian Clevenger & Scott Wegener is one of those comic series I’ve heard about for years but never read until I got a volume as a housewarming gift.  It’s about a sentient robot built by Nikolai Tesla who now carries on his creator’s work of trying to improve the world while also fighting assorted super-villains and monsters out to destroy it.  It’s ridiculously fun and something for the sci-fi/pulp lover in your life.

The Grey Bastards by Jonathan French is a fantasy novel I first heard about a year or two back (Jonathan and I have the same editor).  I’m not usually much of a fantasy guy, but the idea of this was so clever I had to check it out.  Orc gangs that ride actual hogs and patrol their territories, with all sorts of gang rivalries and politics.  It’s fun, exciting, kinda sexy, and just fantastic.

I Only Killed Him Once by Adam Christopher is yet another series ender.  The final story of Ray Electromatic, the robot detective turned hitman in 1950’s Hollywood. This time Ray’s on a case that might lead him to the secrets of his past... but first he has to get his current “client” to stay dead.

Girl Like A Bomb by Autumn Christian is another cheat.  This is a fascinating book about what it really means to be your best, mixed with a healthy dose of sex-positivism (new word?  You know what I mean...), and what it’s like to be the person with the unusual superpower that controls all of this.  Unfortunately for you, this is another “save a gift card”  one—it’s up for preorder now and on sale in the spring.

Constance Verity Saves the World by A. Lee Martinez is more fun with the woman blessed (or cursed) to have a life full of excitement and adventure who really just wants to enjoy settling in to her new condo with her accountant boyfriend.  These books are so much friggin’ fun and if there’s any justice in the world we would see them on the big screen.

            And real quick, you also can’t go wrong with Heroine’s Journey by Sarah Kuhn, Kill the Farmboy by Delilah Dawson & Kevin Hearne, Zeroes by Chuck Wendig, or any of the Sandman Slim books by Richard Kadrey.  And I may add to that previous sentence in the next week or two.

            And there you have it.  A bunch of my favorite things I read this year (even if they’re not available quite yet).  Please feel free to add any favorites of your own in the comments below.

            And also, despite all the reference links up above, please think about going to your local bookstore or comic shop to pick up one of these or get it ordered for you.  It may cost you a dollar or two more—and I realize dollars can add up fast this time of year—but you’re supporting local businesses and not the monolithic corporate giants.  That’s something you can humblebrag about until New Year’s Eve, easy.  "Oh yeah--I look for stuff on Amazon, but then I only buy from my neighborhood store."

            And also-also—if this is all too much for you, financially, please don’t forget my regular Black Friday offer.

            Happy Holidays.

            Back to writing-related stuff on Thursday.

Other Awesomer Books

            Monday I posted the usual ego-stroking Cyber-Monday list of my own books and some anthologies I’m in.  Today--as I have in the past--I thought I’d toss out some other books I’ve enjoyed this year that were written by much more talented people than me.  They’re not really in any order, and a few of them aren’t exactly new, but if you’re looking for something for that special somebody (or for yourself), it’s going to be tough to go wrong with any of these... 

            As always, you can prove you’re a morally better person by visiting your local bookstore.  There’s still plenty of time for them to order something for you if they don’t have it in stock.  Plus, some of them have connections and can get you autographed copies and stuff like that...

Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire—the short, simple explanation is that this book is about all those kids who find mystic gateways or enchanted wardrobes or interdimensional touchstones, have fantastic adventures... and then eventually end up back in their normal, mundane homes again and having to cope with real life. The best thing I can think to say is that I’m so ridiculously jealous of this book. It’s just magnificent.

Blackbirds by Chuck Wendig – I am super-late to the table with this one, because Wendig’s been writing this series for five years now.  Miriam Black is a foulmouthed alcoholic who’s gifted (or cursed) to immediately know how and when everyone she touches is going to die. After years of dealing with said ability, she’s seen someone’s future death that involves... her.  It’s funny and dark and fantastic and I think there are five of these books now.

Heroine Complex/ Heroine Worship by Sarah Kuhn –superpowers are real. So are superheroes.  The two aren’t always connected.  Oh, demons are real, too, and they can possess all sorts of things.  Evie and Aveda are such crazy-fun -lovable-exciting characters that you’ll devour each book in a day.  I did.

Killing Is My Business by Adam Christopher—I mentioned the first book in this noir-robot-detective series a while back. Adam’s written more of said series.  They’re still amazing, and now there are mysteries-within-the mysteries.  You should read them.

An Excess Male by Maggie Shen King – I got to read an early copy of this and it’s just brilliant.  A dystopian tale set in future-China, where the one child policy has gone... well, just like everyone predicted.  Our four protagonists are trying to form a family while also each hiding an array of personal secrets and deciding who to trust with them.  It’s a fantastic, slow-burn book that reads like the wonderfully twisted love child of The Handmaid’s Tale and Big Love.

Sleeping Giants/ Waking Gods by Sylvain Neuvel—another one I was late picking up (but got caught up quickly).  A fantastic epistolary tale about the discovery of a giant alien robot and the team that comes together to figure out how they use said robot to defend the Earth.  It’s Contact crossed with Pacific Rim, and if that idea doesn’t excite you we have nothing else to say to each other.

            Good day to you.
            I said good day.

We Are Wormwood by Autumn Christian – a beautifully surreal tale about a young woman growing up with insanity and then... well, descending into it herself with a few nudges from her demon girlfriend.  Christian also has a fantastic collection of creepy/scary/sexy short stories called Ecstatic Inferno that I wolfed down in about a day.  I befriended her on Twitter just so I can constantly prod her to write new stuff for me to read. I'm selfish that way.

Ninth City Burning by J. Patrick Black—okay, this glorious space opera’s kind of tough to explain, because in the future Earth has shifted over to an entirely new form of technology.  In short, its about a group of people developing new weapons, learning to use them, and learning to be them.  It may take a little bit to get into this one, but it’s sooo worth it.

Revolution –by John Barber and Cullen Bunn—I was a die-hard comic fan for years, but got driven out by the constant (and often substandard) crossover events.  I started reading some of IDW’s “Hasbroverse” books last year and was frustrated when they announced Revolution, their own upcoming crossover event.
            Holy crap.  This was my favorite comic book event in at least twenty years. It begins with a conflict between the GI Joe team and the Autobots which gets disrupted when Rom the Spaceknight shows up and uses his Neutralizer to incinerate General Joe Coulton before flying off again. If you were already a fan of IDW’s GI Joe or Transformers books, you can guess how a silver robot showing up and killing the Joes’ CO goes over.  If you’re a fan of Rom... you know what this killing implies.  Revolution is honestly suspenseful and dramatic, and has amazingly solid ties to all the books involved.  It’s clearly a crossover that was planned far in advance, and it made me a regular at my comic shop again.

            And anyway, those are some of my favorite things I read this year.  Any one of them would make for a fantastic gift.  And if you’ve got some suggestions of your own, please mention them in the comments down below.

            Tomorrow... regular old writing advice.  Thanks for your patience.

In This Club We Have One Rule...

            I wanted to talk about writing advice a bit.  The good stuff and the bad stuff.  I just did a few months ago, yeah, but this is a little different. 

            This time, I want to talk with you about taking those words to heart... or not.

            Here’s an ugly truth about writing advice. 

            I’d guess a good 40% of it is just people telling you what worked for them.  Here’s how I do characters, here’s how I do dialogue, here’s how I plot, here’s how I write fifty pages a week.  There’s nothing inherently wrong with this advice—it clearly worked for that particular professional.  It’s just a presentation problem.  It assumes every writer and project is like every other writer and project.

            Still, that’s better than the 50% of people who are bellowing advice that hasn’t worked for them.  The only thing sketchier than someone  with a lot of credits insisting “this is how it’s done” is somebody with no credits insisting “this is how it’s done.”  Or somebody who had a credit twenty-five years ago.

            What? A twenty-five year old credit should still count?  I mean, on one level I agree with you—it’s a credit.  But it’s a credit from another era.  Seriously.  Johannes Guttenberg may be the father of printing, but he’s not going to be much help if my Brother 5-in-1 gets a paper jam.

            Let me put it in these terms.  Let’s say we were talking about computers. Let’s say I knew someone who’d been a kinda-known name in computers twenty-five years ago. And hadn’t really done anything since.  How seriously would you take their advice about computer engineering?  Or programming?  Or breaking into the industry?

            Actually, I take it back. There’s one thing worse than somebody with no credits insisting “this is how it’s done.”   It’s when somebody with no credits wants money to tell you “this is how it’s done.”

            Anyway, that leaves us with, what... 10%, roughly?  Math isn’t my thing.  What’s that last ten percent of advice?

            You’ve probably seen it. It’s the folks saying “try this.”  Or maybe they’re a couple of provisos before or after their statements.  I’ve mentioned the idea of this here a few times.  It’s called the Golden Rule.

            No, not that Golden Rule. I made this one up.  The Golden Rule is one of the core things I try to put out with all the writing advice I offer here.  It goes something like this.

What works for me probably won't work for you.

And it definitely won't work for that guy.

            You see, writing is a very personal thing.  In the same way I can’t say “urban fantasy is the best genre,” I also can’t say “writing 500 words before lunch every day and another 500 words after is the key to success.”  Because it’s not. 

            Oh, it might be for some people, sure, but it isn’t for everybody.  There are people who write in the afternoon.  There are people who only write in the morning.  Some like massive outlines, some like very minimal ones.  If you ask a dozen different writers how to do something—anything—you’re going to get a dozen different answers.  Because we’ve all found what works for us.  That's the golden rule.

            There’s a joke I’ve used  a couple times to explain this.  If the only time you can write is Sunday afternoons, and the only way you can write is standing on your head, wearing that “enhancing” corset you bought at the Ren Faire last summer, using voice-recognition software, but doing this lets you write 15,000 words...

            Well, that’s fantastic.  Seriously.  I know professional, full-time writers who don’t always get 15,000 words down a week.  I can maybe hit those numbers once a month.  If that’s what it takes for you to do it, and you can do it consistently—power to you!

            See, at the end of the day, how I write my book doesn’t matter.  Perhaps I write first thing in the morning or maybe late into the night.  I could work exclusively on a laptop, on my phone, on a typewriter, or on yellow legal pads with a #2 pencil.  Maybe I reward myself after every thousand words with half an hour of reading, a video game, twenty minutes of exercise, booze, sex, whatever.  Do I do one long, constantly reworked draft or two dozen drafts each with a few minute, specific changes?

            However I do it, that part of writing doesn’t matter.  As long as I’m working, I’m doing fine.  People can insist whatever they want, but at the end of the day it always comes down to the golden rule.

What works for me probably won't work for you.

And it definitely won't work for that guy.

             I don’t write books the way Victoria Schwab does.  She doesn’t write books the way Andy Weir does.  Andy doesn’t write like Sarah Kuhn.  Sarah doesn’t write like Chuck Wendig.  He doesn’t write the same way as Kristi Charish.  And she doesn’t write like me.

            And none of us write like you. We don’t have your habits, your preferences, your thoughts, your goals.  We’re not telling your story your way.

            Which is why you shouldn’t worry about writing like us. Sift through all the hints and tips.   Learn which ones do and don’t work for you.  Don't worry if four of the six people above do X, find out if X works for you.  Find your way to write.

            And if your way happens to involve a corset... hey, who am I to judge?

            Next time... I want to talk about babies.  I hate those guys.

            Until then... go write.

Amazon Review Revisited

            For those who came in late...

            About seven months ago I came up with this idea of running a little experiment with Amazon’s review policy. A new wave of complaints had cropped up about reviews being deleted or blocked, and—as they tended to-there wasn’t a lot to them past “Amazon took down my review of XxX!”  Supposedly, the new rumor at the time was that everyone’s favorite online megastore was surfing social media sites, looking for potential connections between reviewers and reviewees—and using them as a reason to delete reviews.

            It struck me that I’d been hearing about review policies for years, but never seen any hard data on them.  It always came back to he said this, she said that, lots of people had it happen to them. There were never any hard facts.

            So... I decided to find some.

            I reviewed thirty books I’d really loved. One every day for the month of August.  I listed out all the social media connections between me and each author. I even did a handful of control reviews—ones that should get pulled regardless of social media connections.  And I listed all of it out for everyone to see.  And tweeted about it. And talked with folks on Twitter about it.

            A month after my little experiment ended, nothing had happened. No warnings, no deletions, no reprisals... absolutely nothing. Even on the control reviews, which really should’ve been removed under every possible version of the review guidelines. I left it at that and decided to check in six months later.

            Which is... right about now.

            How many control reviews finally got spotted by Amazon’s algorithms?  How many warnings were issued?  Did my account get frozen?

            Pretty much across the board... nothing’s changed.

            All thirty reviews are still up, including all the blatant control reviews.  Heck, two of the control reviews even have “people found this review helpful” checks.  I never heard a peep from Amazon. Even with the tweets.

            Seven months since the first review, Scott Sigler’s Alight (great series, check it out).  Scott and I have known each other for almost four years, if memory serves. We follow each other on Twitter, we’re both with Random House subsidiaries, we’ve done panels together, he even interviewed me last year at WonderCon in front of an audience of about three or four hundred people.  There is absolutely, no question a connection between us.

            That review is still up.

            I feel pretty comfortable saying the social-media scanning algorithm is either a myth or reaaaaaaally poorly written.  If it can’ t find a connection between me and Scott, it’s pretty inept. Same holds for me and the next two authors on the list—Chuck Wendig and Eloise Knapp.  There’s social media connections and shared blurbs galore.  Heck, with both of them I think there are pictures floating around.  Incriminating pictures, for these purposes.

            And yet... the reviews are still there.

            So, yeah, the social media bot probably isn’t real.  I wouldn’t bet anybody’s life on it, but the evidence sure seems to point that way.

            I think there’s another possible conclusion we can draw here, too. I might be stretching here, so bear with me. Feel free to point out flawed logic.

            The control reviews have nothing to do with the social media bot. As I mentioned above, just as they are they violate the basic rules for reviews.  And all six of them are still there.  Yeah, six examples isn’t a great number for a data pool, but considering the 100% survival rate...

            I think getting reviews pulled doesn’t have anything to do with the reviews themselves. I think it has to do with me. Or at least, my account.  Last time, one of the spitball-hypotheses I tossed out was that Amazon only applied its all-seeing eye to accounts based on suspicious activity or complaints about said account.  I’m more inclined to lean that way after six months of no activity.

            So if my review of Yakko’s Yappy Dog Omnibus gets quickly pulled, I think it’s more likely because of something else I did in the past than anything about this particular review.

            But, again, other ideas are always welcome.

            If I happen to notice anything happen with these reviews, I may revisit this again.  Barring that, though, I’m probably done with it.  Feel free to share the data with anyone next time you hear about reviews being pulled. 

            Or, in the spirit of science, repeat the experiment and share your results.

2016 Is Over. Finally.

            I don’t know about you, but this year has been kind of brutal on me.  We don’t even need to bring up politics or innumerable dead entertainment icons.  It’s sucked.  I lost my grandma.  Two friends.  One of my cats.  Hell, even the car I’ve had since I was twenty-seven and working on Silk Stalkings.  

           All dead.

           Screw this year.  Screw 2016.  And I’m only saying “screw” so this page doesn’t get banned from your work server.  I’ve been a lot more emphatic in real life.

            But, anyway... let’s talk about writing.

            At the beginning of every year I toss out some encouragement and ideas about writing. And throughout the year, I jab you pretty much every post with a gentle reminder to go write.  Because that’s the only way this happens. We sit down and we write.

            So... what did you write this year?

            I’ll go first.

            Well, let’s be honest.  The vast majority of this year was spent on Paradox Bound (which most of you will get to read in about... seven months?). I turned in a really wild, scattered draft to my editor (I can admit it), and he politely handed it back and said “try harder.”  Which made me take a long, hard look at a lot of it, rip out a large part of the ending and restructure it, which also meant going back and reworking a fair amount of the beginning.

            But in the end... I’m really proud of how this has turned out. I think you’re going to like it a lot.

            Between drafts, I also finally finished (and submitted) a little story called “Projekt: Maria” for an anthology titled Mech.  That should be out early next year, I believe.  If you read Kaiju Rising a while back, this story is another World War II adventure with Kraft and Carter trying to counter the latest weird and unusual Nazi plot.

            Plus, I’ve done a bunch of work on my next big project (no real title yet—well, not one I’m up for sharing).  And a lot of notes and bits on the next Ex-Heroes book (currently called Ex-Tension).  And I scribbled some notes and pitches for some things... well, that I can’t really talk about quite yet.

            And, hey, this is the 46th ranty blog post this year.  Granted, a handful of those were photo tips, but still... that’s a fairly regular output there. I mean, I’m no Chuck Wendig or Scalzi, but I think that’s a respectable number.  I even managed a couple over on my geeky blog, too... although nowhere near as many as I'd wanted to.

            What else did I do with my time?

            Well, if I’m counting right, I read about thirty-eight new books this year. By which I mean, books I’d never read before.  About half a dozen of them non-fiction. 

            There were also another twenty or so books I re-read, either for reference or enjoyment.  Plus a big pile of comic books and graphic novels—the IDW Revolution event (featuring GI Joe, Rom, Transformers, and Micronauts) was magnificent, as was the conclusion to The Sixth Gun. If you added all of those, I’m probably somewhere in the low sixties.

            Not an ugly score.  Essentially a book a week. I’m huge believer that reading is essential if I want to be a decent writer.  I have to take in material if I want to create material.  I can’t be a filmmaker without watching lots of films. I can’t be a bodybuilder without taking in food.  I can’t be a teacher without learning.  And I sure as hell can’t be a writer if I never read.

            So that’s what I accomplished.  How about you?

            Granted, I’m in the fortunate position where I get to do this full time.  On average, I’m probably going to write more, revise more, and read more than most of you reading this.  It’s not a slam, that’s just basic scheduling.  There’s only so many hours in the day, and I get to spend most of them in this area.  We all have different amounts of time we can put toward these things.  People have kids, jobs, other priorities.

            This also isn’t a contest.  I’m not going to berate you because you only read twenty books this year. I wouldn’t feel extra-special if I read a hundred.  We all read and absorb and work at our own rates. 

           The key thing is that I can see honest, real forward motion.  I started here and I ended with all of this done.  I can’t be telling myself “well, this counts as getting stuff done” or “I meant to do that.”  I should be able to point at things I wrote.

            I mean, that’s what we’re all trying to do, yes?

            I’d like to thank you all for reading this collection of random thoughts and lessons as we head into (holy crap) the ranty blog’s tenth year.  I’ll try my very best to stay entertaining, educational, and semi-relevant.

            Next time, as I usually do, I’d like to start the year by setting down a couple ground rules—for myself and the ranty blog and the rest of you.

            Until then... go write.

            Have a fantastic New Year’s.  May 2017 be better for all of us.

Better Books by Better Authors

            Hey, folks.  Sorry about last week—I had, alas, a family emergency I had to fly back east for, and there just wasn’t time to get a ranty blog post put together.  So, now that I’m back, I thought I’d give you this for now and return to our usual semi-useful writing stuff on Thursday...

            As I have in the past, it’s time for me to toss out a few more titles and names for you.  Essentially, these are a bunch of books I really wish I could say I wrote.  They’re not in any order, and I don’t even think they all came out this year, but if you’re looking for something new and different for somebody (or for yourself), it’s going to be tough to go wrong with any of these. In fact, you may have heard me mention some of them before...

            As before,  I’ve put links to a few of them, but you can also just go to your local bookstore.  You may spend an extra buck or two, but you’ll feel better about yourself in the long run...

The Unnoticeables/The Empty Ones by Robert Brockway– This is a fantastic, twisted little series about punk rock and stuntwomen and angels.  It manages to swing back and forth between damned funny and seriously unnerving, sometimes on the same page.  The first book works as a stand-alone, which is why I was stunned when he pulled off the second one.

Experimental Film by Gemma Files—If someone you know is a horror fan, they’re going to love this book.  If they also happen to be a film fan (as in, the process of filmmaking), this is going to be their new favorite book.  It’s about a film student who starts researching one of the early pioneers of filmmaking in Canada, a woman who had some very eerie subject matter.  This is one of the very few books I’ve read in recent years that  freaked me out and actually made me feel nervous about shutting lights off at night. Seriously.

Rise of Io by Wesley Chu—If you know his Tao books, this is the first of a new series set in the same universe.  Although now things are flipped—Ella is a smart, savvy street-urchin in a future-shantytown who finds herself sharing headspace with one of the most incompetent Quaslings on Earth.  It’s got action, humor, a touch of romance, some political intrigue—it’s just fantastic and a beautifully smooth read.

Anamnesis by Eloise Knapp—This overlooked gem is half identity crisis, half biomedical thriller.  Ethan’s a low-level drug dealer whose life began a few years ago when he woke up on a beach with full amnesia.  He stumbles across the new thing hitting the streets—a drug that erases recent memories—and feels compelled to help people affected by it.  Now imagine every creepy thing you could do with that drug... Wonderful character stuff with a creepy-as-hell plot

Invasive by Chuck Wendig—I’m sure you’ve heard about Wendig’s Star Wars books, and if that’s your thing you should definitely check those out (they’re fantastic).  Invasive is for everyone, though.  Unless you have a thing about bugs.  And if you don’t now, you will by the end of this.  Hannah’s a brilliant character, and the premise is skin-crawling.

The Voodoo Killings by Kristi Charish—This is another one I got an early peek at, and then I was kind of annoyed because I couldn’t talk to anybody about it for another four or five months (and now I’m waiting for her to finish book two so I can whine and plead to see that one early).  This book takes zombies back to their voodoo roots, and imagines a world where the supernatural is real, publicly known, and so heavily regulated that our main-character, sorceress Kincaid Strange, has to pay the bills by summoning up dead rock stars for frat parties.  And then an illegal zombie shows up in her neighborhood...

Panacea by F. Paul Wilson—If all goes well, this book is the start of a fantastic ‘80s homage series.  This one starts with a simple premise—what if there was a substance that could cure anything?  And then think of all the different reasons people might be searching for it. It also has, hands down, one of the most horrific death scenes I’ve read in years.  So there’s that...

The Crooked God Machine by Autumn Christian– Do you like Ray Bradbury?  The Addams Family?  Small town America?  Dystopia?  If you can answer yes to any of these, you’ll love this story of the life of Charles, his family, friends, and the girls he falls in love with. It’s dark and beautiful and one of my absolute favorite things I read this year.

Made To Kill by Adam Christopher—This is a noir detective novel about a robot assassin, Ray Electromatic, in 1960s Hollywood.  And if I need to say any more than that to make you pick up this book, you are dead to me.  Seriously.

Breaking Cat News

by Georgia Dunn—If you or someone you know is a cat lover, you’ll love this little comic strip about a cat news team as they report on the odd happenings around their home and the bizarre behavior of “the people.”  Plus, Georgia just got the strip syndicated—she’ll be in your local paper soon, so buy the book now so you can look all in-the-know and cool before everyone else jumps on the bandwagon...

The Last Adventure of Constance Verity by A. Lee Martinez—I just finished this one a few days ago on a plane (it had been on my Kindle for a while) and I absolutely love it.  A young child, Constance was blessed (or cursed) to have a life of action and adventure.  Now, after over two decades of fighting monsters, cults, ninjas, clones, and killer robots—having stopped wars and saved the world countless times—she just really, desperately wants to have a normal, boring life.  This book is to the action/adventure genre what Shaun of the Dead was to zombies.

            And there you have it.  Eleven books I’ve really loved.  Please check ‘em out, or feel free to mention anything I’ve overlooked down below.

            Next time, long overdue... I’ll be shouting at you.

            Until then, go write.

            And maybe do some Christmas shopping and pick up a few books.

Imposter!

            Look!  We’re a day early because tomorrow I’m going to be cooking and watching a lot of my favorite black-and-white movies.  Joy!

            Well, not all joy...

            I need to get something off my chest.

            I’m a fraud.

            Seriously.

            I would guess, on an average week, this idea runs through my head five or six times (by odd coincidence, I tend to work five or six days a week).  The notion that I’m a complete fake who’s kind of stumbled into this life off sheer luck more than ability.  I re-read my new projects and wonder if they’re good or if I’m just deluding myself.  Maybe I don’t know a tenth of what I think I know—a textbook case of the Dunning-Kruger effect. 

            I sometimes wonder if the next book is going to be the one where my small fanbase gives a big shrug and says “ehhhhh... I guess he’s burned out.  Time to move on.” 

            I fret a lot about whether or not my publisher’s going to dump me as a writer, too. Well, not dump me, but just decide this latest contact will be... well, the last one.  Same with my agent.  He has some much, much bigger clients than me, and it’s not irrational to think he might decide his time and efforts are better spent focused on them.

            You may have heard of people feeling this way before.  It’s called imposter syndrome, and it’s really common.  I get it all the time.  Chuck Wendig gets it.  Victoria Schwab gets it.  Pretty much every writer I’ve ever talked to at length has copped to it. They’re plagued with self-doubt. They question most everything they write.

            (You didn’t think Hemingway drank that much because it was fashionable at the time, did you...?)

            I’m not saying this to freak you out or feed your insecurities.  I’m hoping it reassures you a bit.  We all feel this way sometimes.  Yeah, even those of us so-called-pros who are doing this full time.

            There are two reasons people get hit with imposter syndrome, in my so-called expert opinion.  For what it’s worth.  And they’re kinda related.  It’s almost the same thing, really.

            First is that, once I hit a certain stage in my writing, I start to see certain things.  I can admit to flaws in my work.  Of course, once I admit problems might be there, that also opens me up to imagining and creating problems. 

            As it happens, imagining and creating is what most writers do.  We’re good at it. Sometimes we do it even when we don’t want to...

            Second is fear.  I think imposter syndrome is a lot like writers block.  The act of creation—of pulling something out of my head and setting it down on paper—can be terrifying.  If you think about, it’s really common for people to talk themselves out of doing scary things.  Think of a couple times in your life when you had to do something that scared you.  How often did you end up thinking something along the lines of “ I can’t do this! What was I thinking?  I shouldn’t be here!”

            I can think of three or four times that sort of mantra ran through my head, all long before I became a full time writer.

            There’s a flipside to this, too.  The folks who are utterly, 110% confident their work is perfect, and that they absolutely should be professionals.  The ones who have no doubts at all.

            And yet, for some reason... they’re not.  They don’t make sales. They don’t get deals.  Usually because of gatekeepers or antiquated systems or something.  Definitely not because of them.

            I’ve run into a few folks like this. You probably have, too.

            Y’see, Timmy, I shouldn’t look at imposter syndrome as a problem.  Oh, it sucks, yeah, and it can lead to one or three stressful days or nights. But really it’s a sign of my maturity as a writer. It shows that I’m open to the possibility my work isn’t perfect, which means I’m open to improving it.

            And improving it is the big goal for all of us.

            Next time I might shout at you real quick.

            Until then, go write.