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May 31, 2007
Ficlets
This could be fun. Ficlets is a site where you post a short-short and then others can create sequels or prequels to your work. It's a nice little exercise in brevity.
I posted a short a few moments ago.
Posted by sferrell at 1:29 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Brains like clay
I'm coming up for air just long enough to share this interesting NYTimes article about how the brain may be more maleable than previously tought. It discusses a field of research known as neuroplasticity (which is a new favorite word) and it's really pretty remarkable.
Posted by sferrell at 9:20 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 24, 2007
Wil Wheaton's Comedy Club
While I'm on the subject of trackbacks, I thought I'd share one: Wil Wheaton's kid has some chops. It's a cute story, and the joke is divine.
Posted by sferrell at 10:35 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Trackback poetry
This website is built with a "trackback" feature. To be honest, it's been explained to me no fewer than three times by my webmaster and I still don't get what a trackback is. Some sort of "instant link exchange." Whatever. I've yet to get a trackback that isn't some form of spam, except for once, and that was when I trackbacked myself. I've got the trackback option set so that I must approve all trackbacks, so it doesn't really cause any problems. Usually I just junk them in large batches. As I was about to do so this morning I scanned the trackback messages and sender names, just to be sure that no genuine trackbacks were getting lost in the process. I found a odd sort of beauty. A trackback poetry, if you will.
So, I thought I'd share with you what I found.
"Crazy Frog Ringtone"Hydrocodone. Hydrocodone bitartrate. Worried sick about unborn baby due to hydrocodone.
These are banners of mortal manufacture.
During the whole party, and if possible to conceive of any fortunate event that might have puzzled even an Indian virtue; and, as usual, but I've brought the canoe in the field.
The air, and the hut, or bound in any way except in friendship and sarvices.
I wanted to marry me in a high mountain road one evening, he remarked to Schryhart, however--Lake Geneva--and we would be an explosion in his accounts, hundreds of miles from north to south in a cell, he sighed.
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drunken nights drunk consequences abdul
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Posted by sferrell at 10:21 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
May 21, 2007
The Philosophers' Problems
The day the thinking factory imploded everyone for miles knew there was a problem. The sound of the walls crumbling in upon themselves was heard for miles, or perhaps it wasn't. Who's to say except those who heard, and they may not be talking. Nevertheless, the destruction of the factory brought ruin to the town which had previously only conceived of ruin as the opposite of un-ruin. Now they knew different.
The philosophers, now without a place to work, wandered the streets. Their beards held bits of debris: pencils, unfinished logic puzzles, errant thoughts. A sapling tree lay on the ground near the site where the factory had stood, unable now to ever fall in an empty woods. Bits of Socratic dialogue echoed off the neighboring warehouses. Inside, behind their large windows, lay the last boxes of forms and principles that the factory had produced.
Where once the assembly line had kept each school of thought in its place, now all wandered across each other's paths. Philosophers with nothing in common met, reached out for help from each other, but found nothing which they could recognize. Aristotelians angered the Platonics. Heideggarians refused to acknowledge the Neitzcheans. The tautologists struggled to agree with anyone but themselves. From out of nowhere a Freudian wandered by, calling for his mother.
Conversations broke down in games of oneupsmanship, useless attepts to out philosophize the other.
"What are we going to do?" Asked one.
"What are we going to?" Responded the other.
"What are we?"
"What are?"
"What?"
"Go to hell."
One of the materialists waved to the others and said, "I have an idea." An idealist punched him, hard, in the teeth.
"This is no time for sarcasm," he thought.
Each of them gathered a brick and held it close to his chest, pushing it, as if trying to bring it close to his heart. As if replacing his heart. They moved among each other, looking down at their bricks, each unwilling to acknowledge the others, each speaking quietly to their bricks, certain that if they spoke low enough, quietly enough, the pieces of the building might hear and understand, and spread the word to the other pieces, and rebuild into something better than before.
* Inspired by Trevor Record's revelation that he is studying philosphy, as I once did. God help him.
Posted by sferrell at 7:27 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
May 17, 2007
Crapshoot
Ben Dooley at The Millions has a response to the recent New York Times article which lays out the crapshoot that is modern publishing (i.e. the publishers put their money down, then hope for the best). Ben's approach to the whole "revelation" seems to mirror my own and that of most writer/bloggers who have commented on it: "Oh, yeah... that." But, Ben also crosses this article with a review of the Macmillan New Writing imprint, which has had some controversy. It doesn't pay advances, takes all subsidiary rights, and gets first look at second books, but it is (arguably) bringing new writers, who would otherwise be ignored, into print.
This could be a new model of publishing mid-list authors. The problem with the midlisters (from the big house's point of view) is that the cost of printing their works is outweighed by the small profit made on the small number of books sold. If there is a chance of not paying advances and having the only cost be printing itself, which in a day of POD should be very, very low, then might more publishers take a chance on that odd little title they would otherwise pass on?
As Ben says:
If advances are the big gambles everyone says they are, then they only serve to make publishers risk averse. ... By not giving writers advances, New Writing has found a way around this problem, allowing them to take a chance on a book, while reducing the considerable overhead attached. This system should be a boon for mid-list writers who, it's often said, are not nurtured by publishing houses in the way they once were. Sure, you'll hear writers grousing about being unable to make a living from their work, but, with the exception of the biggest literary stars, isn't that's how it's always been? For my part, I'd much rather have my books in print, giving my readership a chance to grow with me. After all, readers will seek out a good writer's backlist, and every book that sees print should increase royalties from previous efforts.
I think he may be right.
Posted by sferrell at 9:05 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
May 15, 2007
Jeff Somers
I saw a woman on the train yesterday reading an ARC and loved the cover. What kind of freaked me out as I looked at it was that I knew it was an ARC. "How," I thought, "do I know that is an ARC?" I checked out the title and the author's name. Something about "Jeff Somers" rang a bell, so I did a bit of digging. Turns out he and I have the same agent. I haven't met him, read him, or thrown any eggs at him, but now I want to do two out of those three.
People should check out Jeff Somers. His book is coming out in the fall: "The Electric Church." It sounds like Philip K Dick crossed with HP Lovecraft telling a Raymond Chandler story. Cool stuff. And, his blog is funny, his take on the publishing industry is as fearful and superstitious as mine, and he's got a pretty cool site dedicated to the book too.
Posted by sferrell at 9:20 AM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
May 14, 2007
Hit or Miss: a profile of publishing
The NYTimes has this excellent article about the publishing industry and it's lack of research on its consumers. Basically, they buy books with their fingers crossed and hope it will sell.
Posted by sferrell at 1:03 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
(Meme of) Eight (is enough)
Lee Carlon has tagged me. It is another opportunity to share information about myself, and force others to share it with me. It's also another opportunity to pass along links to some of my favorite sites and get people to pay attention to what I pay attention to. That being said (I'm tired, please forgive me) the "Meme of 8" goes as follows:
1. Each player starts with 8 random facts/habits about themselves.
2. People who are tagged write their own blog post about their 8 things and post these rules.
3. At the end choose 8 people to get tagged and list their names.
4. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged and to read your blog.
So, here is where we start with my 8 random facts/habits:
1. At one time I was studying to become a comic book artist.
2. Kirk's eulogy for Mr. Spock at the end of STAR TREK II: The Wrath of Khan always (always, dammit) makes me weepy.
3. I have a dog who is known as Yogi, Big Fatty, Fatty, The Poopie Says, and The Original Fat-boy.
4. I have developed a sense of divinity that I felt was impossible as a child/teenager. I used to sit in church when I was a kid and think, "I believe in something, but I don't think it's this..." without being able to say what it was I did believe in. Because church does such a good job of making a "my way or the highway" message clear I thought I had to choose either one way or the other: belief, no belief. Now, as an adult, I realize that I believe very, very strongly in something more powerful than me. I still don't know what it is, but I'm okay with that.
5. I believe that most people should, as general way of being, simply sit down and shut up. It would solve so many problems.
6. Advertising is evil. Always. Unless it's funny.
7. I feel bad for children, because I know they'll have to grow up.
8. Daffy Duck is underrated.
So now I get to tag these people: Matthew, Jaye, Jason, Scott, Anne, Trevor, Christopher, and Kurt (because I've been thinking about him so much as I've worked on my current book).
I don't believe they'll all respond to this, some for very obvious reasons.
Posted by sferrell at 9:31 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
May 11, 2007
Incan Bridges
Not much time to post today, but I thought I'd share a NYTimes article I was captivated by. I'm fascinated by the Incan bridgebuilding technique. I almost wish we built things like this now. I can imagine New York City's highrises strung together by delicate lines of bridges, like spider webs covering the city. People able to walk in a straight line from the 30th floor of the Empire State Building to the 20th of the Chrysler would stop grumbling about crowds and street traffic and would instead would swoon at the vision of the city from above, as they swayed peacefully, clinging for dear life to a series of small fibers that barely hold themselves together.
It would be marvelous.
Posted by sferrell at 8:10 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
May 10, 2007
Colbert Report: Literati is in retreat
Strangely, Salman Rushdie mentions Paris Hilton's book. Do you think he saw my review?
Update: These things always travel in three's, don't they. Paris Hilton sculpture in Brooklyn.
Posted by sferrell at 9:23 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
May 9, 2007
In honor of Paris Hilton's sentencing...
... I've decided to reprint, for your pleasure, my 2004 review of Paris's "Confessions of an Heiress":
"All Ways We'll Have Paris" by Sean Ferrell
A response to "Confessions of an Heiress" by Paris HiltonCecil Roethke and Mr. Smith waited in the empty warehouse. The dust kicked up by their shoes glowed in the sun shouting against the grimy eastward windows. It wasn't yet midmorning, Cecil thought, and I'm already exhausted.
"I don't get it," Mr. Smith said, his camouflaged blazer and vest making him both hard to see and dapper. "Why so close to L.A.? Shouldn't we be somewhere out of the way?"
"She's in the middle of a book tour and she's got high profile fashion shows and sporting events to hit. She could barely make time for this meeting as it was." Cecil looked at his watch. Not yet midmorning and she was almost two hours late. Right on time for her, probably.
"How come a top level assassin is writing books and starring on television and all those movies I hear about."
"Part of her cover, Smithie. Illusionist's technique. Make everyone look one direction, go in the other."
Mr. Smith nodded as if understanding but Cecil knew he didn't get it. Unless there were shivs and garrotes involved, Mr. Smith didn't understand anything. Cecil dabbed at some sweat budding on his forehead. Not yet midmorning and it was hot as an easy bake in the CIA's only remaining warehouse in L.A. The other warehouses had been rented out to the Immigration Department for "storage."
Mr. Smith coughed. "She's late, right? When was she supposed to get here?" He was sweating too. Cecil could tell by the way he was walking.
As Cecil lit another cigarette a voice from the rafters answered, "We were supposed to meet ten minutes before you guys arrived. I've been waiting to make sure you weren't followed." The figure of a woman in a skin-tight, black leather catsuit, Dolce & Gabbana if Cecil knew his catsuits, descended on a nearly invisible silver line from the ceiling. Mr. Smith already had a gun pointed and warily circled to her far side, made her the mid-point on the line between Cecil and himself.
Cecil took a drag from his cigarette. "You keep a close eye on your appointments, Ms. Hilton."
As she ripped the leather mask from her face Paris Hilton said, "Always, when my life is on the line." She threw a hip toward the west wall creating a healthy curve on her good side. Her smile was vacant, inappropriately perfect for any occassion, Cecil thought. Her left eye squinted a little more than her right.
"Tall drink of water," Mr. Smith observed. Cecil waved him quiet and tossed his cigarette in the direction her hip pointed. Clattering sounds came from the roof. It was Fatty and Dunkirk, two more from Cecil's team, handpicked by him and "Those In The Know" in D.C. His team answered to an acronym inside an acronym. He'd long ago forgotten what the acronym's acronym was. Fatty and Dunkirk stood guard up top and amused themselves with throwing stones at pigeons.
After several odd moments of staring at Paris' impossibly thin nose Cecil croaked out, "You have the book?" Why were his cheeks so flushed, he wondered.
"Right here." She heaved a leather satchel up from her side. It was from the Gucci espionage line. It wouldn't blow up if tampered with by the wrong hands as much as revert to an out-of-fashion model when in a highly embarrassing public setting. Then it would blow up.
"How do you move so quietly?" Mr. Smith asked as he watched the book trade hands. Another rattling of stones from the roof.
"Nike Airs, 2006 model*. From after Jordan's next comeback."
Mr. Smith nodded approval.
Cecil flipped calmly through page after page of "Confessions of an Heiress." One-hundred and seventy-eight pages, nearly all photos. The brilliant pink cover screamed both "Run away" and "Look at me" at the same time. The Daisy Duke pose on the back was ironically ignorant, or ignorantly ironic. Cecil's brain stopped functioning for a moment. When it unfroze he said, "Your list of 'Instructions on How to be an Heiress,' that's a little dangerous don't you think? "Number 13: Act ditzy. Always lose things." You're revealing that it's an act aren't you?"
A click and squawk from above. Fatty's high pitched giggle squealed out.
"Not a chance," Paris sighed. "It's written in such a way that people will think I'm trying, but failing, to be funny. Those who like me will love it. Those who don't will see it as unintentionally funny. They'll make fun of me for trying to make fun of myself and still being blissfully unaware."
"They won't buy it. How could they? No one is this--"
"Trite?" She laughed. "You black ops guys are so silly." She swung her body to the other side. Now it was her good side. How is it possible to have two good sides, Cecil wondered. Or are they just equally not bad?
Paris strutted toward him. "It's all based on my show and the sex tapes. I've positioned myself to live down to the worst qualities expected: ignorant, entitled, slutty--and I've made them my strengths. There's no going up in the public's eye, but no going down either. I'm just there, constantly. And since I'm always there I'm constantly re-suggesting myself. I'm that jingle you can't get out of your head. I'm the chain of stores that is around every corner. I'm a pop-up window. I'm spam."
Cecil was just starting to understand when two loud thuds from the roof made him jump. Mr. Smith pulled out his .357 again and Paris pulled out a gold plated Louis Vuitton semi-automatic. Pearl handle.
"That was no pigeon," Mr. Smith whispered.
From the corner came a snapping sound, a camera flash, and an evil chortle. A small man in a Nicole Ritchie mask ran across the dirty floor and dove at an open window. Leaping to the ledge he spun around, gave them the finger and shouted something meant to curl their toes, and dropped out the window. Cecil couldn't understand through the Nicole mask. He made a confused grunt.
"Huh?" Mr. Smith echoed.
Paris, shifted her weight back to her other good side and snarled, "It's the North Koreans. They've been trying to blow my cover ever since the first sex tape."
Before Cecil could even realize that a picture of them would blow all their covers Paris sprinted across the warehouse floor. She hurled herself, not through the open window the spy had used, but headed for a large, dirt smeared plate glass window at the east end. Just as the silhouette of the spy fell on the glass Paris leapt high into the air, curled upon herself and cannonballed straight through the glass.
Mr. Smith lowered his gun and said, "Is it just me, or is it getting turned on in here?"
Karate chop sounds could be heard coming through the broken window as small glass shards fell from the frame and tinkled on the ground below. Before the final piece dropped Paris re-entered through the door. She dragged the limp body of the spy with her, the Nicole mask dangling from one ear.
Paris' skin tight leather was shredded. She pulled disdainfully at it with a loud shout, removing the tatters. "Italian crap! D&G my ass." She was left in nothing but a bright pink bikini, silver dollar sized bra cups with a tortilla chip sized panty triangle at the crotch. Her hip bones pointed at the two men standing before her, each at an enticing angle matching that of her pistola.
"You boys want to put your tongues away and take care of this guy for me?"
Mr. Smith's gun dropped to the dirt. "Boss, I think I'm in love."
"We all are, Smithie. And we hate it."
*Note: this story was first published in 2004. 2006 was the future back then. How naive, right?
Posted by sferrell at 8:47 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
May 8, 2007
Reading PKD
It's exciting when writers you admire get a write-up in the NYTimes. In this case, it's almost a belated obit. Charles McGrath does a nice job of paying homage to Philip K. Dick. Like the Times' obituary for Vonnegut, this hits me in an especially sensitive spot because Philip K. Dick is a very influential writer for me. I discovered him through the movie BladeRunner and have read I don't know how many of his books. I try to space them out lest I finish all of them and have no new books to pick up. I reread him several times a year and have two short stories which, while not sci-fi related at all, include scenes which are heavily, heavily influenced (no, not plagiarized, I didn't go that far) by Mr. Dick's writing in "The World Jones Made."
Mr. McGrath rightly touches on Mr. Dick's obsession with reality, divinity and authenticity. He ignores the author's politics for the most part, which is unfortunate, because Mr. Dick's writing was especially timely in an era of governmental distrust of the populace, popular disconnection from government, and general abuse of power for short-term, banal gain. His writing included political elements, responded to the era he lived in (Viet Nam, Nixon, political assassinations de jour), and offered very little in the way of remedy. That's a good thing. He was descriptive, not prescriptive in his political writing (possibly due to his paranoia causing him to see no solutions other than death/divinity), and that's what I'm trying to do right now in my current work in progress.
Overall, a wonderful, touching tribute to one of my favorites. Its conclusion:
The books aren’t just trippy, though. The best of them are visionary or surreal in a way that American literature, so rooted in reality and observation, seldom is. Critics have often compared Mr. Dick to Borges, Kafka, Calvino. To come up with an American analogue you have to think of someone like Emerson, but nobody would ever dream of looking to him for movie ideas. Emerson was all brain, no pulp.*
*Note: not to take away from Mr. Dick's talents as an author, but Mr. McGrath's argument that it's hard to come up with an American analogue to Mr. Dick is to ignore the talents of authors like Steven Erickson whose surrealism moves in a direction clearly inspired by Mr. Dick but which explores its own unique territory. I'd also mention Mr. Pynchon in any discussion of exploration of reality/divinity/politics.
Posted by sferrell at 9:16 AM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
Happy Birthday, Mr. Pynchon
My haiku in honor of Mr. Pynchon's birthday was deemed "disqualified for lateness, but fabulous" by Miss Snark:
Real gravity hides
Beneath the Groucho glasses
And the clown car plots
Posted by sferrell at 9:06 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 7, 2007
Interlude
Not much time today (I have to hurry off to watch my son while my wife gets an all too seldom day-off from Mommying) so I thought I'd just share a doofus moment.
At work, I regularly get e-mail notifications about projects which are ready for my review. When I get them I forward the email to a coworker with the brief request, "please print". I typically get the emails in batches, so I'll type "please print," copy it and then go from email to email pasting it. Today I got a batch, did as I usually do, then started reading a few websites for relaxation during breakfast.
One of the sites I visited was Miss Snark. One of the writers on her site wrote a really funny line which I wanted to share with someone else and I copied and pasted it into my email to them. I then returned to my work email. There, I found several more emails for proposal, and began to forward them with my customary "please print," only I didn't paste "please print", instead I pasted this:
am I pounding sand in my desires
I caught myself as my cursor hovered over the send button. I don't think my coworker would have been offended, but he might have been curious as to why I was asking him this.
Posted by sferrell at 9:56 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
May 4, 2007
Books I can't wait to not read, Part 1
Seems that there's a problem on the internet. That problem? The internet. Andrew Keen's "Cult of the Amateur" is a book I can't wait to not read. Why? It's a reactionary "Day After Tomorrow" screed against the democratizing nature of the internet, and it sounds like trash. Mr. Keen would have enjoyed the similar debates that surrounded the invention of the printing press, the car, airplanes, the computer...
Key section of the story:
What's more, Keen doesn't seem to understand that mainstream media and user-generated content are enjoying a symbiotic existence. Bloggers and amateur videographers spend so much energy reacting to traditional staples of pop culture that they wouldn't have much to do if they didn't exist. Even if mainstream media is dying, Webheads will feed off its bloated carcass for the foreseeable future.The Viacoms and Time Warners of the world likely will cede some ground to amateur creators. But there is another way professionals and amateurs will co-exist: The best of those amateurs will simply be co-opted by the professionals. It isn't quite the either-or equation Keen imagines it to be.
"Cult" applies a blind faith to the media powers that be without ever considering that this creative Internet subculture he rejects is getting traction precisely because the studios, networks, etc., aren't quite perfect, either.
This is akin to the "online writers are hurting traditional writers" argument which spawned the Pixel Stained Techno-Peasant giveaway. The idea at work is that gatekeepers are a necessary part of consumable culture. Without gatekeepers the masses will wallow in their own filth. Eventually someone will smear feces on themselves and call it art and everyone will go gaga over it. The only problem with that argument is that all that fecal-smearing has already been done. People are drawn to what they are drawn to, and web-based writers, filmmakers, musicians, artists, etc. fill in the gaps between what the mainstream cultural gatekeepers (i.e. huge publishing conglomerates interested in reaching the widest possible audience to sell the most product) finds marketable. Note that I didn't say what they find "acceptable" or "artistically meritorious." Marketable.
This got me thinking about the "culture" that Mr. Keen seems hell-bent on saving. That would be the culture of "According to Jim," "Yes, Dear," "Paris Hilton*," "Girls Next Door," Rob Schneider, Ashlee Simpson, David Hasselhoff, and Clive Cussler. That would be the culture that Mr. Keen sees as threatened? This is marketable culture, according to the gatekeepers.
* "Paris Hilton" is in quotes because she is actually a robot.
Posted by sferrell at 10:15 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
May 3, 2007
John Scalzi on writing
I found this video thanks to Struggling Writer.
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May 1, 2007
Cliches that are as old as the hills... um... I mean...
I found myself in a stragely familiar place this morning. I was in a conversation with a forboding older man who seemed to have all the answers. He must be behind the mystery I was pursuing, and he and I were playing a game of cat and mouse as we danced around the issue of what I knew and what he knew.
Well, it wasn't me, really. It was my main character.
I had written myself into the well-worn scenario described above. Scenes like that are comfortable, familiar, and hard to avoid. There's something about them that makes writers find them. Perhaps it is the deep routes in our subconscious that have been dug out by similar scenes going back through movies and books and myths (the darkly foreboding witches in the woods who direct MacBeth to his future; the mirror on the wall which reminds the Queen that her beauty isn't all that she might like; the Catepillar on the Mushroom asking Alice "Who R U?") I suspect it's that combined with their ability to make writers feel incredibly productive: they write themselves, so before you know it you've churned out a thousand words and think, "I can't be bad if I just got 1000 words in 20 minutes. I'm a friggin' genius."
Cliches provide for lazy writing--they hide lack of quality inside quantity. They must be undone. So, I got to some undoing. In the end I was pleased with what I scribbled into my journal, and thought that a few of my detours through the cliche I was unknotting might be helpful to others. First, I had a character state that he was locked in a cliche. The other character agreed and they moved forward outside the cliche. No more "games" were being played. They talked openly about what was going on.
Second, the scene became about something other than the conversation. I never really wanted their conversation to be the focus of the scene in the first place, but by falling into the cliche it had done just that. By undoing the cliche and allowing the conversation to be more above board the scene returned to its true focus: body-language and symbols which the main character found in the setting took on higher importance. With the conversation being so, in a word, plain, I was forced to heighten the tension by creating layers to the antagonists actions--subconscious ticks came to the fore. Finally, by undoing what would have been game-playing dialogue (lies, half-truths, feigned surprise) I opened the door for more of the main character's personality to come through (sarcasm, intelligence, puzzle-solving) in the dialogue. It went from being hack dialogue to original dialogue where protagonist and antagonist traded verbal jabs in a knowing, almost enjoyable way.
Cliche happens. It's how we deal with it that's the trick. Sometimes a cliche can get us into a scene, keep things moving, and allow us to prime the pump. Once the words start to flow, that's when you have to redirect that energy.
Posted by sferrell at 10:05 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Aural sex
Neat way to do book promotion.
Posted by sferrell at 1:14 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack