The Road To Publication – And How Not To Get Mugged Along The Way

By Simon Wood

The road to publication is long and without road signs. There’s no one to hand you a map or rules to the road. So when every would-be author hits the road with his or her finished manuscript, they are vulnerable to predators. The scent given off by a new author is very powerful. The wolves and bandits will smell you coming a mile off. I think first time authors must smell like cut bait.

For most authors, finding a publisher is a Tolkienian adventure. My personal quest to find a publisher took two years and cost me hundreds of dollars. But in hindsight, a number of my run-ins with the wolves and bandits were of my own creation. To my credit, I dodged the perils that line the road to publication without serious injury, but they could have been avoided all together, if I’d been a little smarter.

Gone are the days when fiction authors could sub their novel directly to the New York publishing houses and be given a chance. Every author needs an agent to be their guide to publication. But, how does the naive author know what a reputable agent looks like? This is where I wasted a lot of time and money. I scoured the various Writers’ Digests of Literary Agents because that’s the right thing to do. Unfortunately, these digests are like yellow pages. They list the good, the bad and the ugly. I sent blanket queries and synopses to over a hundred agents without a clue of who I was introducing myself too. Not surprisingly, I introduced myself to some of the carpetbaggers along the way.

I had agents who said they loved my work and praised the great book I’d written when I’d only sent them a one-page query letter. One agent threatened to trash my name in the industry when I quizzed her on her standard operating practices, then she sent my manuscript back in pieces. Luckily, I never broke the golden rule of dealing with agents—DON’T PAY AN AGENT ANY MONEY UPFRONT. Regardless of their reasons, reputable agents don’t ask for money before they market your book. I know it’s tempting to accept an agent’s offer, but the newbie author has to know when to say no. So when an agent asks for $700 for printing and postages expenses or $200 to read a manuscript before they’ve done a thing, don’t haggle or negotiate, say no thanks and move on.

Although it seems to be a growing trend for reputable agents to charge expenses for postage, I’ve known authors to have paid less than a hundred dollars. But the agents bill after the fact, not before. If any agent says they are charging expenses, ask what they are for and get an estimate before you a sign contract.

So, if I was setting out on the road to publication again and was hunting for an agent, what would I do differently? First off, I wouldn’t bother with the market guides. An unsuspecting author doesn’t know what they are letting themselves in for. If you want to find an agent, start with their trade association. The Association of Authors’ Representatives, Inc. (AAR) lists their members, a code of conduct that all their members must abide by and a great list of questions to any and all agents who offer representation. There are some great agents out there who aren’t AAR members, but finding them is hard, so the AAR is a good place to start. Another good resource is writers’ associations. If you are a mystery writer, consider joining the Mystery Writers of America. If you are a horror writer, consider joining the Horror Writers Association. They have a member’s directory where the authors list their agents. The first time author should write to these agents. The agents listed represent someone with a reputation in the same genre and someone who has made a legitimate book deal.

After doing things like this—the right things—the first time author still may not find an agent. I didn’t. This means you probably aren’t going to get a book contract with Harper Collins, Penguin or Time Warner, but it doesn’t mean all publishers are off limits. There are a number of small and medium sized publishers who will deal with unknown writers. You need to do their homework. Scour bookstores and jot down the names of publishers. Seek out their websites and check out their guidelines. If a publisher says they will take unagented submissions, then submit. You have nothing to lose…

…or do you?

There are bad publishers out there, just like there are bad agents. The same law about agents applies to publishers—DON’T PAY A PUBLISHER ANY MONEY UPFRONT. Publishers pay authors, not the other way around. Again, if you are asked for money, walk away. If you see an author mention their publisher and you’ve never heard of them, check them out. See if the publisher’s claims live up. If a publisher says their books are available on Amazon, use the search facility on Amazon. Punch in the publisher’s name and see how many of their titles pop up. If you don’t find any or it says to allow six weeks for delivery, there may be problems with distribution. And if so, your book might make it to print, but not much further. Authors shouldn’t be afraid to ask for changes to a publisher’s contract. If certain rights are asked for and you aren’t happy, negotiate them out. Again, the likes of the HWA and MWA do have typical sample contracts that authors without agents can use for reference.

The road to publication is fraught with danger. But it doesn’t mean the first time author has to be mugged and left for dead. First timers need to stop sticking pins in the pages of digests and hoping for the best. To put things into a plumbilogical terms, when hiring a plumber to fix a broken pipe most people don’t go for the first name they see. Usually, they ask for a referral and check that the plumber is licensed. The search for an agent and/or publisher should be the same. You need to know the industry and ask around, choosing from trusted sources.

Following my tips won’t guarantee you publishing success, but they should help prevent you from walking into some of the horrors that lurk on the road to publication.

Simon Wood is originally from England but now resides in California. He’s an ex-racecar driver, a licensed pilot and an occasional private investigator. He’s had over 150 stories and articles published. His short fiction has appeared in a variety of magazines anthologies, such as Seattle Noir, Thriller 2 and Woman’s World. He’s a frequent contributor to Writer’s Digest. He’s the Anthony Award winning author of Working Stiffs, Accidents Waiting to Happen, Paying the Piper and We All Fall Down. As Simon Janus, he’s the author of The Scrubs and Road Rash. His next thriller, Terminated, will be out next June. Curious people can learn more at www.simonwood.net.

Agent Miriam Goderich rebutted it here very nicely. So, I’m sure, have others, but I’m about to add my voice to the chorus simply because that’s the way I roll, baby.

Do you need an agent?

Yes. Yes, you fucking do.

Period.

Okay, sure. If you’re planning on having a career in epublishing, you probably do not need an agent. If you’re planning to self-publish, you do not need an agent. There’s nothing wrong with either of those things. I started out in epublishing, without an agent, and thoroughly enjoyed the experience. I’m glad I did it and am grateful to Ellora’s Cave for treating me so well and enabling me to make some decent cash. Working with them was a pleasure for me.

But–no offense–I wanted more than that. I wanted books on shelves. I wanted advances. I wanted a bigger career. I wanted to move out of genre romance/erotic romance; not because I didn’t enjoy it or don’t enjoy it (writing and reading), but because the more of it I wrote the more a little voice inside me told me it was simply not quite the right fit for my voice or the kinds of stories I wanted to tell.

To accomplish those things (aside from moving away from writing romance, which of course is a huge genre in all forms of publishing: ebook, mass market paperback, trade paperback, hardcover, audio, whatever) I needed an agent.

Here’s what fascinates me (and infuriates me) about the original Galleycat article (aside from the fact that its author apparently also runs a website devoted to helping writers self-publish; again, legal, but certainly interesting). It’s this paragraph here:

One published author who asks to be unnamed disagrees, “What do you need an agent for anymore, really? Why? To negotiate a meager advance? You can’t get them on the phone anyway. You’re stuck promoting the book yourself because publishers don’t put any marketing dollars into your book unless you’re John Grisham. I don’t see the whole point when I can hire an attorney to negotiate my publishing contract for a flat fee or just upload the book to Kindle myself.”

Let’s take a look at these points, shall we?

1. “To negotiate a meager advance.” Hmm. Speak for yourself, buddy. My advances aren’t huge, but I certainly wouldn’t call them “meager.” And having been involved in the negotiation process–through regular discussions with my agent, every step of the way–I’m well aware of how much bigger they became once he started negotiating them. In fact, several surveys have been done proving that the average agented advance is something like twice the size of an unagented one; Tobias Buckell’s, for one.

2. “You can’t get them on the phone, anyway.” Dude, if you can’t get your agent on the phone, you need a new agent. (Or perhaps you need to stop calling several times a day; ever considered that maybe the problem is you?) I can assure you, each and every one of you, that if I picked up the phone right now and called my agent, he would take the call. He always has, and he always will. And you know what? He calls me, too. When I send him a proposal, he calls me to discuss it. When he sells subsidiary rights (yes, we’ll get to those), he calls me. As I said above, he called me every step of the way, sometimes several times a day, when we were negotiating the sales of the Downside books and the second & third Demons books.

He calls me when something happens, like when my release dates changed. He calls me when we get cover art so we can discuss it. He calls me to talk about ideas.

Do we talk every day? No. Do we talk every week? No. Do we talk every month? No. But we do talk. And we do email, and he always answers those too. My agent is THERE FOR ME. And I am not unusual in that, I promise you. Every single writer pal I have is in the exact same situation. We talk to our agents. All the time. About all kinds of things.

An agent who does not have time for you is not a good agent. Find a good agent and stop bitching.

3. ” You’re stuck promoting the book yourself because publishers don’t put any marketing dollars into your book unless you’re John Grisham.” First, this is about agents how? Second, patently unfuckingtrue. Those books you see on front tables, end caps, mid-aisle tables, and those little rotating shelf things in bookstores? Are they all by John Grisham? No. Are they all, even, by known, NYT-Bestselling authors? No again. I see debut authors on those things all the fucking time, and guess what? Marketing dollars buy those spaces. Marketing dollars that publishers, real ones, put into the books they sell every fucking day.

And again, this has nothing to do with agents, as promoting your book to the public isn’t their job.

Here’s what my agent does for me. You look at this list and tell me if you think it’s worth it:

1. Reads my work, discusses it with me, offers suggestions
2. Sells my work to editors for major houses (not just “sends” or “submits.” SELLS. Pitches. Anyone who’s ever worked a sales job knows that isn’t easy.)
3. Negotiates not just my advances, but my CONTRACTS. All those confusing things about royalties and schedules and payouts and subsidiary rights and non-competition clauses and options and exclusive- and non-exclusive? He knows what all of it means, and how to get the best possible deal for me.
4. Sells those subsidiary rights. I would not have a UK deal without my agent. I would not have an audiobook deal without my agent. Which means readers in the UK and those who enjoy audiobooks would not have access to those books without my agent.
5. Keeps track of what monies have been received and which haven’t. Follows up on checks.
6. Keeps track of royalty statements. Follows up on those, too.
7. Knows what’s selling and what editors are looking for.
8. Talks about me; lets editors know I’m available (if I am) should they be interested in working with me.
9. Discusses my career with me. Offers guidance. Helps me plan my schedule.
10. Is a third opinion in discussions with my editors, should either of us wish him to be. Should a problem arise, my agent will step in to help. My agent is always on MY SIDE.

These are all equally important, at least to me. These are things that MATTER. My agent is the lifeline between myself and the world of publishing. He is invaluable.

Sure, I could probably do those things myself. I could fly to New York regularly and try to build relationships with editors. I could submit over the transom and wait a year for responses. I could spend ages learning about contracts. I could fly out to Frankfurt and London for the book fairs there and try to sell foreign rights (after first thoroughly researching all the publishers in lots of other countries, to determine if they’d be good for my book, and hope they’ll be interested), and then I could spend a bunch of time figuring out exchange rates. I could mark my calendar to make phone calls to follow up on payments and statements and all that stuff. I could be my own, my only, advocate, and jeopardize my relationships with my editors should disagreements arise.

What I probably couldn’t do, if I were doing all of that, is still have time to write.

If you want a real career, you need a real agent. You need an agent. YOU NEED AN AGENT.

Anyone who tells you that you don’t is either wrong or is trying to sell you something. Or both. Don’t believe them.

1. “The Mammoth Book of Vampire Romance 2″ has been released, containing stories by myself, Jeanne Stein, Jaye Wells, Caitlin Kittredge, Tiffany Trent, and Ann Aguirre. My story, titled “Trust Me,” is–I think–kind of a fun little yarn about Jack the Ripper, and is officially the Last Erotic Romance story I wrote (for now). So while I did tone it down a bit for the antho, expect lots of sexxoring.

Shorts are difficult for me, in general; I have a hard time keeping myself from expanding and expanding and introducing subplots. But this was a story that really didn’t leave a lot of room for a novel, and the idea had appealed to me for some time (as with all mystery buffs and goulish people, I am fascinated by the Ripper), so when I had the opportunity to submit it for the antho I jumped at it. So rush on out and get it; my story is probably the weakest of the bunch, given the other names involved, but I think it’s kind of a sweet little tale nonetheless.

2. Kari Stewart, my agent-mate and author of A DEVIL IN THE DETAILS, coming next summer from Roc, has written a great little series on writing series novels on her blog. You have to scroll down a few entires, but it’s well worth it.

3. Charlaine Harris did an interview at Voice America’s “Mystery Matters” show on Friday, and guess who she mentioned as one of her favorite secondary characters ever, right around the fifty-four minute mark? Terrible, my big bad greaser from UNHOLY GHOSTS. Check it out!

Now. To the point of the post. (Yes, I seem to be on a bit of a self-publishing kick. I promise I have not forgotten the Critique series. I’m just busy as heck these days and going through some other things I won’t bore you with.)

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Here’s the thing. I am not against self-publishing. Absolutely, honestly, 100% not. I think it can be very useful. I think that if you’re a writer who focuses on a specific niche area of nonfiction, for example, self-publishing can be fantastic for you. So this is not a rant against self-publishing per se.

What it *is* a rant against–or rather, a cautionary post about–is the idea so many self-published or vanity-published authors seem to put forth that this is the Wave of the Future, and that said future will be so much brighter without those nasty old philistines at major houses churning out crap week after week.

Um. First of all, yes, as a writer with series at two NY houses and one UK house, I’d rather not be told my work is obviously crap because it’s being published by people who actually have the insensitivity to art to think they can make money from it (and in return have paid me for it.)

But this isn’t about me (except where it really is, which I’ll get to in a minute). This is about lots and lots of other writers, who’ve worked very hard and deserve to earn money for their work. I might add, this is also about book piracy, which a lot of those who engage in seem to feel is their way of Bringing Down the Man and Smashing the State and Standing Up For The Little Guy.

Because, sure. It will be a much, much better word when publishing is only an option to those who can afford it. Don’t you agree? Aren’t you glad these Caretakers of Art are decreeing that things will be better when nobody gets paid for their work, that they will in fact have to pay someone else to publish it, that they will have to handle cover design, marketing, and promotion all by themselves?

Yes, sure, every author is expected to do some promo, even at the big houses. But we’re not alone in it. We’re not making meetings with book buyers at stores trying to convince them to buy our books; our publisher’s sales staffs take care of that. Even when PERSONAL DEMONS was originally released by Juno/Wildside, a small press, they took out ads in Romantic Times and made sure the book got reviews. Yes, I have some promo plans on my own for my books. Yes, I carry out what I can. But I do the suff that’s fun. I blog. I Twitter. I play on Facebook when time allows. I don’t carry copies of my book hoping to sell them to random strangers. I don’t slip cards with my title and cover into my utility bills when I pay them in hopes someone will see it and give the book a chance. I don’t have to invest a dime of my own money if I don’t want to. I have, yes, but the only reason I can afford to do so is because I was paid an advance for my work.

Frankly, if I’d had to pay to be published, I wouldn’t be published. I couldn’t afford it. Nor could most professional writers I know, very few of whom could manage to scrape together $5k to pay a publisher.

So what would we have, in a world where those Evil NY Houses have fallen?

We’d have books written exclusively by those who could afford it. Much like in the 18th century, when so many books were diaries of some peeress’s trip through Europe with titles like, “My Gleanings.” FUN. I know I can’t wait to read books written exclusively by the wealthy, with no viewpoints other than their own. I’m sick of hearing what baby boomers think already; I can assure you I don’t want to read more of their “Gee, the sixties were sooo great!” back-patting. I know I can’t wait for a world where books written by those from other cultures have no chance to be translated into English and released here, when we become even more ignorant of the lives of those in the world outside because there’s no way to get their books in front of English-speaking audiences. Oh, and of course, given that self-published books tend to be much more expensive, thanks to POD technology, I can’t wait for a world when reading and books are even less available to the poor. When they don’t have the same opportunities thanks to their inability to get hold of books.

Oh, what’s that you say? Oh, right. The internet will provide all of that. Of course. Because I know when I want something to read I’d much rather spend hours and hours slogging around online looking for something decent than just go to a bookstore. I know people who can’t afford books totally have the money for laptops and ereaders and the internet. So in seeking to democratize literature, what you are actually doing is STEALING IT from those less fortunate than you.

We’d also have a lot more unreadable books. I’m sorry, but it’s true. For every excellent work of self-published fiction–and they are out there, make no mistake–and for every one that’s not bad, just not terribly polished or professional or interesting, there are dozens of horrible ones. Not horrible the way so many of you like to put down NY books which aren’t to your taste, but awful. Really.

Let’s not forget that the way most people learn proper grammar, punctuation, and spelling isn’t through school. I mean, we do learn those things at school, but we develop those skills by reading. So you tell me, how literate will we be as a society when there are no professionally written books? When there are no people to judge if a work is even readable or not before it gets published? When anything goes? Would you like to go back to the middle ages, when words were just spelled however they sounded? Because I wouldn’t.

But this is it. With no publishing houses, there are no gatekeepers. Without publishing houses, bookstores–not just the big conglomerate ones, but the independents–will fail. There will be no way to check a book out before you buy it. No libraries, which are already in trouble. Writers with talent will be forced to suck up to reach people in hopes of their financing the writer’s latest books. I know I look forward to the day where I have to go out hunting for a sugar daddy so I can keep publishing, and hope he lets me write what I want and not simply odes to himself.

Maybe I’ll be lucky, though. Maybe that sugar daddy will simply love my work, and will publish it. Maybe he’ll grease the right wheels so my book can be sold through some outlet. Maybe he’ll pay someone to help me polish it; not change it, but polish it, catch the things I didn’t catch. Maybe I’ll be really lucky, and he’ll even pay me a share of the book’s earnings.

In short, maybe he’ll set up a publishing company.

Bringing Down The Man or claiming the world will be so much better when the NY houses are no longer around is a fallacy. You’re hurting yourself, you’re hurting all writers, you’re hurting people whose only education comes from the books they find and read themselves, you’re hurting people who depend on those industries to put food on the table, you’re hurting artists in other countries, you’re hurting everyone with a story to tell. You’re making literacy a hobby for the rich.

Wow. That’s something to be proud of.

Lemme ‘splain.

More and more lately I’ve been hearing this argument, or discussion, or comment. Self-publishing is just like punk rock! Because anyone can do it. Because self-published authors are taking the bull by the horns and doing it themselves! Fuck the Publishing Man! Rock on!

And it’s something I’ve wanted to write about for some time, but it was this Genreville blog post in PW that finally inspired me to do so.

Yes, there are a few similarities, or rather, there is one way in which they are alike. But for the most part they are vastly different, and this is what irritates me and makes me want to pull out my hair sometimes. Because the differences are vast and wide.

Before I start, let me give you a quick run-down of my credentials to even discuss this topic. I was heavily involved in the punk scene for, oh, ten years or so. With an ex-boyfriend of mine, who was in a band, I ran a tiny punk record label; we sold records for a dollar each. I helped book shows; I had bands stay at my house; I slept on floors; I did a little touring; I watched recording sessions; I sang one line in a song that ended up on a Lookout! records compilation; I went to drunken all-night parties; I never paid to get into shows because I always knew somebody in the band; I traveled across country with the ex (he wasn’t my ex at the time) and his band to attend a three-day punk festival in northern California; I can play a few Ramones and Sex Pistols songs on the guitar; I started my own band with a couple of other girls, and we were getting ready to try booking a show when our drummer quit; and a whole bunch of other stuff I’ve forgotten. This was one of my favorite things about writing the Downside books, was being able to draw on those experiences and namecheck my favorite bands.

I say this just because I want to make it clear that I do in fact know what I’m talking about; it’s not to brag or say “Look how cool I am” or anything of that nature (I readily admit I am not cool. Perhaps I was at one point in my life, but now I sit around all day writing and pouring juice for my daughters).

The only self-publishing I can honestly and truly say is punk rock are zines. Zines are–at least they used to be–fully punk self-publishing. Handwritten pages (although now that we have computers it’s very possible they’re typeset or laid out using Pagemaker or whatever), usually full of personal essays, record reviews, jokes, show reviews, that sort of thing, photocopied and stapled together at Kinko’s or in your basement or whatever. Are you getting a sense here of what punk rock zines are about? Could it be, hmm, that they are about punk rock? (I haven’t seen a zine in a while, save some of my old copies of big ones like COMETBUS or SCAM. So forgive me if some of my zine info is a little out of date.)

The rest? Not so much.

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Yes, self-publishing is punk in that anyone can do it, and that’s where the Genreville blogger is incorrect. With punk anyone can do it. To an extent. Just because anyone can do it, doesn’t mean that anyone can do it well. And therein lies the rub.

Here’s what happens when you self-publish, as far as I know: You write a book. It gets rejected by many agents or editors, or perhaps you don’t want to bother with that and want to do it yourself. Maybe you believe the myths like “an editor will make you totally rewrite the book so it’s not even yours,” or “Publishers do no promotion” or “You have to pay to be published,” or “You have to give back your advance if it doesn’t earn out” or any other crap. Or maybe you do not want a single one of Your Golden Words changed. Or you simply want to be totally in control of every step of the process; I don’t mean to imply here that everyone who self-publishes does so because they’re rejected, untalented, or stupid, so please don’t think that’s what I’m saying. I don’t at all believe that’s the case.

Anyway. You write a book. For whatever reason you decide to self-publish. Most of those who self-publish seem to go through a company like Lulu–which is a great service (I’m still loosely planning to use them to print copies of the Strumpet series for those who would like print copies). They take their ms, they load it in, they design a cover, and there you go. You have self-published a book.

Now let’s take a look at a punk band who decides to produce their own record. They save their cash. They rehearse (or maybe they don’t, but they probably do.) They hire a studio. An engineer–or maybe they have a friend from another band do that part. They get–again, this is from my experience years back so the actual equipment may have changed–a DAT, Digital Audio Tape, and send that on to the record plant, which converts it to vinyl (or CD, or whatever.) I have no idea if DATs are still the norm or if it’s more digital now.

So right away we have some difference, though. The self-published author does it all himself. The band recording its own record has, in addition to the (at least) three band members, someone to handle the recording and engineering. More ears to hear what’s happening. More hands to play and write songs. And every recording session I ever attended had still more people, too; the friends, the girlfriends. Doing hand-claps or backup vocals or whatever. Granted none of us gave our opinions unless asked, but we were usually asked. For their first record a friend of ours did the producing along with them, essentially. For the next one (I believe it was the next one) Joe Queer did it. They worked with even bigger names later; always on indie labels, but not purely doing it on their own. Because that’s not how it works.

Now let’s look at the bigger stuff. How does a band go about making a record? I don’t think I ever knew a band that made one without some guarantee that some of them would sell. I saw a lot of bands come and go. I saw a lot of bands playing their first or second or third shows. None of them had records. Why? Because it’s not the first thing you do. You play some shows. You gain some sort of following. And when people start asking if you have a record, that’s when you make a record. You have an audience ready to buy, so you give them something to buy. (I’m going to get to merchandise shortly.)

But if you’re good, chances are you actually aren’t making your own records. My ex’s band made their first record on their own–it was a tape, actually, if memory serves, just a little demo kind of thing. Then they recorded the song for the Lookout! comp along with four or five other sings for a different label in California. This is a huge difference, and it’s where the self-publishing = punk crew always seem to get it wrong. In fact, in the comments for that Genreville post, the man who made the original comment the post is about even manages to muddle his own argument without even thinking of it. It’s six comments down:

By “punk rock” I mean the spirit of much independent-minded music in the seventies through the nineties. If you listen to stuff on SST records, it’s not three notes and screaming.

Yes. If you listen to SST records. SST is a label, y’all. Just like Lookout!, or Alternative Tentacles, or Crypt, or V.M.L., or Fat Wreck Chords, or Sub*Pop, or Melted, or Porterhouse, or Boner, or BYO, or Recess, or Far Out, or Kill Rock Stars, or any one of hundreds of other indie punk labels around the world.

Recording for an indie label is not self-publishing your music. It’s indie publishing. There IS quality control. There IS a vetting process. In punk anyone can start a band, but not everyone can get recorded by a label, at least not one with a reputation for putting out good music. Anyone can start a band, but not everyone can get people to come see that band play live. Anyone can record their own record, but not everyone can get people to buy that record, or anything else.

Which brings me to another big difference, possibly the biggest difference. There is no merchandise. Punk bands have t-shirts; often they make the screens and print the shirts themselves. I saw a couple of bands collect t-shirts and addresses from people, then take the shirts home, screen them, and send them to the owners. I’ve seen over the years quite a few people with home-made Sharpie t-shirts, when they couldn’t get an “official” shirt. Punk bands have stickers and buttons and keyrings (I carried my Blanks 77 bottle-opener keyring for years and still have it somewhere). In punk, fans feel as if they’re part of the bands gang, to some extent. They wear the shirts and buttons and in doing so declare an allegiance, a “We’re all in this together” kind of thing, which is awesome and fun.

When is the last time you saw someone with a book title magic-markered onto their t-shirt?

See, punk is a culture. It isn’t just about music, it’s about a lot of things. It’s about beliefs; it’s a way of life. And punk bands are at the forefront of this, and that culture sprang up around them to support them. There are magazines devoted to it, to review records and give you some idea what’s happening in other parts of the country and other parts of the world. I remember on my first trip to London, being on the Tube in my Misfits t-shirt and spotting a cute Asian guy in a Teengenerate shirt. We smiled at each other; he asked if I knew where the punks hung out and I had to tell him I didn’t. But we KNEW each other. We could have gone and had a drink and talked. We were part of something, both of us, him from Japan and me from the US. We even knew we’d have similar tastes (I freaking love Teengenerate).

Pinks listen to punk music. We look for it. We watch for it. We see a record with an interesting cover and grab it to give it a try. We hear a new band is playing and we go to see them, and if they’re any good we buy their record. If the band is on tour and we can afford it we buy a shirt, too, if we liked the music, because they need that money to get them to the next show. We get recommendations from our friends and recommend things to them.

Self-publishing, in the main, does not have that culture. Self-publishing isn’t about labels. It’s not about social gatherings. Nobody lines up to hear the latest self-published author read out loud or buy shirts or buttons with his or her name on them. Self-publishing doesn’t support a culture and a culture isn’t built around it.

When you buy a punk record you generally have some idea what you’re getting, especially since most of them are on labels and you usually know what kind of stuff that label puts out. When you see a Lookout! record you know chances are you’ll be getting some East Bay pop-punk; not always, but usually. (Again, there are those LABELS. Because the majority of records you buy are on labels, unless you bought it at a show where the band was playing, or saw a great review in Maximum RocknRoll and decided to take a chance–in other words, you knew something about it.) But even if you don’t know the label, you have some idea of what type of music it will be. You know the production will probably be decent and the music itself will probably not be awful; again, because you’ve heard the band live or seen a great review in a magazine you read anyway because it’s devoted to your particular subculture. Maybe you saw it in an indie record store and asked the people working there–who you probably know–to play it for you. It probably has cool cover art, a picture of the band or a little cartoon of some kind. You didn’t stumble across it online and buy it without hearing a sample or hearing something about it.

With self-publishing, you don’t. It could be a funny coming-of-age story. It could be a spy novel. It could be non-fiction about ornithology. It could be fantastic and well-written; more likely it won’t be (not it definitely won’t be, but it’s more likely it won’t be). You’ve never heard of the author. You know nothing about the book. A punk record, at least a 7″, will probably set you back $5 or so; a CD may be as much as $10 or $15, but if you’re buying those, again, you probably know something about the band. A self-published book, which may have amateurish cover art, could cost as much as $25 after shipping.

Yes, punk has a spirit of independence. Sure, self-publishing does too, in some cases. But punk bands aren’t playing punk and releasing records on indie labels because they couldn’t get Warner to sign them. They’re not doing it because Capitol rejected them. They’re doing it because it’s their culture and what they believe in. They’re playing the music they love and want to hear and they’re not doing it hoping a major label will pick them up. Whereas it seems to me a large proportion of self-published authors self-publish because they couldn’t get an agent or a NY deal (again, not ALL, just most).

Yes, there are some self-published authors who simply want to do it all themselves. And you know, more power to them. I appreciate and respect that. But again, the majority of them that I’ve seen, even those who most loudly proclaim that they are INDIE publishing, are hoping that by going this route they’ll get a NY deal. Not so with punk bands.

The simple fact is, the two are not the same because the products are not the same and the culture is not the same. The emotions behind it are not generally the same. The goals are not the same. The process is not the same.

If you want to self-publish, more power to you. I think, as I have said a number of times before, that there are some genres and areas where self-publishing can work very well. But punk is its own platform; if you want to self-publish you need to build your own.

If you’re already punk, and you’re writing something and self-publishing it, you already know how to do that. You already know who your audience is. But if you’re not, don’t claim you are just because you’re putting out a book yourself. Punk isn’t just about DIY. It’s about a lot of other things, too. And if you know enough about it to know that, you should also know that most punk record labels aren’t equivalent to self-publishing. Aside from zines, really, the analogy simply doesn’t work. If you write and self-publish a tale of urban alienation, wasted youth, and your personal quest through it, you could probably call that punk publishing (assuming you are in fact punk yourself). Publishing your fantasy novel yourself and calling it punk publishing, not so much. It doesn’t offend me as much as that infamous Subaru “This car is like punk rock!” ad from the early 90′s, but it doesn’t endear me either.

I’ve ranted for long enough, now, I guess. Any and all comments welcome, of course.

Of cervical cancer.

At the age of 27.

Cervical cancer is one of the slowest forms of cancer there is. If caught early, cervical cancer is nearly 100% treatable.

But Jade Goody’s cervical cancer was not caught early. You know why? Because Jade Goody was unfortunate enough to live in England, where regular (not annual, I hasten to point out, but regular, by which the NHS means every three years) pap smears are not given to young women until they reach the age of 25. Twenty-fucking-five.

Many forms of cervical cancer stem from strains of HPV, HumanPappillomaVirus. HPV is a sexually transmitted disease.

That’s why in the US, pap smears are recommended for all women once they become sexually active. Because sexual activity automatically increases your risk of HPV exponentially. And because even without HPV, you are still at risk (I get irritated when I see people behaving as though HPV is the *only* cause of/risk factor for cervical cancer. It’s NOT) once you become sexually active.

A loose scan of my memory gives me the names of three or four of my female friends, including myself (I’ll get to that in a second) who were treated at one time or another for cervical dysplasia–precancerous cells on the cervix. To a woman treatment was short and simple, and fairly non-invasive. Easy.

Pap smears save lives. Period. End of fucking story.

At least, it’s the end of the story for Jade Goody, dead at twenty-seven, leaving her two small sons behind. Who wants to be the one to explain to those boys that their mother is dead now because England couldn’t be bothered to spend the money for a simple test that would have saved her life? And, far worse, that rather than simply admitting they can’t afford it but urging women to get them anyway, by not even recommending the test until age twenty-five they imply strongly that the pap is a waste of time, that there’s no point in getting one before you hit twenty-five, even in a country with one of the highest teen birth rates in the world (Goody surely could have afforded private insurance or to get the test on her own, but she’d been told it was unecessary)? Which would certainly imply a very high rate of teen sexual activity, wouldn’t it? A country which decides to save money by crushing the lives of young women and treating them as though their health is unimportant, that the pap smear is unecessary and silly? Do you want to explain that to them? I sure don’t.

It’s not just paps, either. Right after we moved here my husband asked his doctor about getting an annual physical. At thirty-three, with histories of cancer and heart disease on both sides of his family, he’d been getting annual check-ups for three years as recommended. The doctor laughed at him. “Oh, yes, well, that’s just insurance companies in America wanting to make more money,” he said. “You don’t need an annual check-up until you hit fifty.”

(No, this is a different doctor from the one who told him, when he went in with bronchitis and could hardly breathe, “You look healthy enough. Give it a few more days, and if you start coughing up blood come back.” But the point is the same, isn’t it?)

So Jade Goody is dead at twenty-seven, because she grew up in a country that told her pap smears were a waste of time. Whereas I consider her death to be a waste of time; time she could have spent raising her children and living a life.

I got my first pap smear at eighteen, because I knew I was supposed to get them once I became sexually active; it was something which had been drilled into my head by teen magazines and Health teachers and the world at large. Because I didn’t have health insurance I went to Planned Parenthood and paid $35, if memory serves (they bill you on a sliding scale there. Years later I also went to PP for an HIV test, don’t remember what I paid for it; I didn’t think I was at risk for HIV and I wasn’t, but I am a bit of a hypochondriac so wanted to be certain.) It wasn’t too bad; it didn’t really hurt or anything. They sent me my results; all clear.

I got another at nineteen. Another at twenty, and twenty-one. Twenty-two I skipped, but went again shortly after turning twenty-three.

That’s when they dinged me.

I had moderate-to-severe dysplasia, confirmed by a biopsy done with a colposcopy (which is like a really bright light and a dye or something that shows the doctor where the “bad” cells are during the examination so he can take samples from those spots). My gynecologist–a fantastic man who went on to deliver both my children–booked me in for a LEEP biopsy, whereby a loop of wire with an electric current running through it was used to remove the cells. The only really unpleasant thing about it was the lydocaine shot; not painful, but I had an uncomfortable reaction to the lydocaine. It took about an hour.

I did not have HPV, by the way.

I went back every six months for the first year or two to get another biopsy & colposcopy. After three years I was considered “clean” and could go back to regular annual paps. Those have been clean too, ever since, although of course I’ve only had one since I’ve been (not pleasant; no chair with stirrups, you have to lie down, tilt your hips up and spread your legs, with no little paper blanket or anything, which is both uncomfortable and undignified) here because history of cervical cancer or not, the NHS considers women’s health to be unimportant (another friend of mine came up against a stone wall when trying to get a mammogram at thirty-five, after every other woman in her family had been disganosed at various times with early-onset breast cancer.)

My other friends who’d also had cervical cancer, who’d had crosurgery (freezing) or LEEPs like I had or cone biopsies? All had the same outcome. One incidence; closer checkups after, eventually sliding into regular annual checks again. We were all very lucky to live somewhere that paps are taken seriously. We were all very lucky indeed.

We were also all, to a woman, under twenty-five.

The youngest was eighteen. The oldest was me, at twenty-three.

Think about that for a minute. If I had grown up here instead of there, I might very well not be alive now. I might be alive but without my two children; had the cancer spread I probably would have ended up with a hysterectomy.

Dead or infertile by the age of twenty-five. All of us. All because in order to save money the NHS pretends there’s no point in doing a test, an important test which has been proven to save countless lives. Think for a minute about the women you know; have any of them had it? How old were they?

There’s been a movement here since the Goody diagnosis to lower the age for pap smears to twenty, in accordance with what the other UK countries do. Which is better, but not enough.

Pap smears should be done annually once you become sexually active. End of story. On a message board a little while back some women were having a discussion about this, and one was saying (at twenty-one, I think) that she was terrified to go get the pap, that she cried at the thought of anyone who wasn’t her fiance seeing her ladyparts, that she was panicky and sick and blah blah blah. And you know, I felt bad for her; I can’t imagine what that kind of fear would be like. It’s not one I’ve ever had. A doctor is a doctor. To me it’s no different than having my hands examined.

But I told her something. She didn’t like it and probably still thinks I’m a big old bitch for it, but I didn’t apologize then and I won’t apologize now, because it’s true. If you’re not mature enough to suck it up and get a pap smear, you are not mature enough to be sexually active.

Seriously. Responsibility is part of it (the same holds for birth control). Pap smears are part of being a grown woman and not a child. I have two daughters, and you bet your ass they’re going to get their paps every year when the time comes, if I have to drag them in and hold them down on the table myself. Because they are so, so, so hugely important.

It’s just too bad the NHS doesn’t think so. And that now another young woman is dead because of it. I never watched Jade Goody on TV or really knew very much about her; reality TV isn’t my thing, in general. But I am absolutely furious that she is dead, when she didn’t have to die. I am furious that her government killed her by pretending she wasn’t at risk for a disease which strikes thousands of young women every year. I am furious that they behave as though my experience and the experience of so many others is unimportant or an aberration; I cry to think of all I might have missed had I been born and raised here instead of America.

A young woman is dead today, of an entirely preventable and treatable illness. And I feel sick about it. And I hope the NHS does too, because they should be fucking ashamed of themselves.

PLEASE, if you are reading this and you are female, or if you’re reading this and you know some females , PLEASE encourage them to get their pap smears. Please. It is so important.

NOTE: Last night I noticed Mrs. Giggles–whom you all know I adore–linked to this entry and wrote an excellent and very informative post about Pap smears and the types of cells/cell abnormalities found in them. It’s well worth a read. But more importantly, Mrs. G. makes a point that I neglected to make: whether or not you are sexually active, you should be getting your pap smears annually. I don’t care if you’re a nun, once you reach a certain age–Mrs. G suggests 18–you need to do them. And she is 100% correct. I’m ashamed that I didn’t mention this myself. Please…get the test, whether you’re having sex or not.

(I’ll be in a better mood tomorrow, I promise, and I’ll post the OMFGAWESOME cover and back copy for UNHOLY GHOSTS, and you do not want to miss those!!!)

Patrice Michelle brought up an excellent point at Fangs Fur & Fey, though, and it was one I failed to stress adequately in my little disclaimery thing. Guys, this is NOT the only way to write books, and it is NOT something you should get hung up about. Seriously. It isn’t. Even I, who loves doing this with my books, do not look at it as gospel.

From Patrice’s comment:

For new writers, the goal is to just write the story and then once it’s written, go back and look at advice like this to see if it can help you tighten and streamline your story to give it the most impact to readers.

And this is exactly true. Just as there is no magic bullet to finish your book, there is no one exact right way to write. If stuff like this bogs you down, don’t do it. If it feels too tight, don’t do it. You can, as she said, ignore this while writing and go back later once it’s done and see how it works for you. But please don’t ever think that because you handle things differently, you’re not “doing it right.” Whatever works for you? That’s what’s right. Period.

For me this is just a way of keeping track and making sure I’m pacing correctly. When I hit 30k words, have I put in all my basic clues? Have I laid the groundwork? Have I given myself plenty to work with and expand later? Are all the characters introduced who need to be, is the basic set-up of the world and story clear?

And there’s a little more to that as well; simply being 1/3 done is a little achievement. Writing a novel is hard work. When you first start out it can seem daunting. But once you get through the first 30k, you know you can do it. You only have to do another 30k and you’ll be in the end zone. And that’s a good feeling.

So. Last week I mentioned pacing. Anyone who’s spent any time reading about writing is familiar with the phrase “sagging middle.” The sagging middle hits all of us at one point or another; it is, basically, the long stretch of book from, well, 30-60k words or so, where…not much happens. The story falters. The characters start spending too much time thinking or talking and not enough time doing.

This is also, to put it bluntly, where characters start acting stupid. This is where, in our eagerness to have *something* happen, we send our characters alone into dark alleys, or have them pick fights with each other, or any number of things. Bad things.

It is my firm belief that the main cause of the sagging middle is pacing, and that the main cause of pacing problems is failure to allow for structure. There are other reasons, of course; too much telling is a big one, too. But I’m assuming you all know the basic rules of writing (such as they are) and so are not writing a book that’s nothing but a big long infodump.

We have pacing problems because we have inserted too much information into our first Act, and we have pacing problems because we have not given ourselves enough clues to work with.

It sounds like an oxymoron, I know. But let’s go back to last week’s example, Jennifer the detective with the elderly grandma and the just-ended relationship.

Our story started when a body was found. Let’s say there was no obvious cause of death. Now, using the three-act structure, we can make a decision; do we want to find out the cause of death before the act ends, thus giving ourselves the second act to explore it? Or do we want to wait, maybe pile up at least one more body?

It’s up to you and the story you’re telling. But if you’re not thinking in terms of using Act One for clues and Act Two for expansion, if you’re not using that first act to thoroughly ground your characters and their world and introduce some issues for them to deal with, you may find yourself with no choice but to give us a cause of death, simply because something has to happen next. If you’ve gotten too deeply into your subplots in the first act you may not have room to add complications to them in the second act, either.

Here’s the thing. If in the first 30k you have introduced plenty of characters and situations, the second act will essentially write itself, and I’ll tell you why.

Because of logic.

Your entire second act is simply adding more complications and doing what would logically come next.

For example. At the end of Act One Jennifer finds another body. In the beginning of Act Two she learns cause of death. So what would Jennifer logically do next? She would start studying/researching that cause of death. Let’s say it was an overdose; a particularly pure, new form of heroin. Okay. We learned a little about our first victim in the first act (because we were planting clues). So we know the victim was not an IV drug user; that’s a dead end.

To gran a few examples from mid-air, Jennifer might now logically start talking to drug dealers or users. That could be a nice suspenseful scene, her interview with a tough local drug dealer. That could have enormous complications that might effect the main plot; it could draw some new people into the case, perhaps, or cause jennifer problems with the police.

And we have her grandma. The poor lady might have a stroke at the end of Act One and thus be in the hospital. The plot if to some degree resolved; Jennifer knows that her grandma can no longer safely stay with her. But that introduces new complications; Jennifer has to research homes and residences. Perhaps she decides to kill two birds with one stone, and go to the residence where the first murder victim’s mother works? That might provide us with a nice way to tie those subplots together later, right?

So already we have some action for the second act; we’re meeting drug dealers and having wary conversations with them–perhaps a flirtation, depending on what kind of book this is?–and we’re getting involved more closely with a victim’s family and trying to find a place for grandma and expanding conflict with the cops. When we add that to researching the second victim and trying to find connections between them–perhaps they went to the same college, and Jennifer can go there and discover they had a class together? we’ve got a good 15-20k or so worth of action.

Any time you get stuck in writing that second act, every time you feel the story flagging, you have only to stop and think back or look back at your first act. What seeds did you plant there that now need to grow a little? Maybe in the midst of all the turmoil with meeting scary drug dealers and putting her beloved grandma in a home, Jennifer’s ex shows up and wants to get back together, there’s a complication. Maybe the college connection falls through but it’s there that Jennifer gets another idea for a possible motive, one she needs to explore. Your Bad Guy should show up again, for whatever reason; let Jennifer interact with him/her, however briefly. Let her feel close to or uncomfortable with the BG.

Your second act is all about expansion and information. Otherwise known as “the plot thickens.” The second act is where a new clue or two turns up; the second act is where you might illustrate a connection between one of your subplots and the main plot.

And remember, nothing should be easy; we need conflict on every page! You don’t want Jennifer to just meet someone who tells her who the Bad Guy is in exchange for money; you want them to tease her with the info, make her perform tasks, put her in danger. Information should be a reward or compensation, never (or very rarely) a given.

There are two other things I like to do/check with Second Acts. One, just as the first ended with a bang, so should the second. An even bigger bang (sometimes literally, heh heh; see below). I used Silence of the Lambs last week, so I’ll mention it again here; Dr. Lecter’s escape comes right around the end of the second act.

The other is, by the end of the second act, I like to leave the reader with no idea how things are going to work out, or who the bad guy is. I like to know, at the end of the second act, that all of my main threads are still loose but are closing in on each other; I like to be in a position where there’s only one more big clue, or one more fact to be uncovered, before everything falls into place and we’re ready for the climax. I like to think of someone reading to that point and thinking there are so many open holes there, there’s no way they can all be resolved by the end.

Now, I write UFs with thriller-y, mystery plots; you may write romance, in which case the end of the second act is right about where you’ll put your big sex scene and have it make everything even worse. (The end of the second act is a place I tend to put sex scenes as well and always have, and I’m not alone. I think most romances or UFs with romantic elements do the same; it’s usually a bit past the halfway point, so anywhere from 50-60k words, but again, that’s not set in stone and of course if you’re writing a more heavily erotic story you may well have had sex all throughout.)

But the end-of-act-2 bang should put everything in jeopardy. It should leave the reader doubting they’ll get a happy or even a decent ending. It should raise the stakes exponentially.

So, to sum up (and I realize this segment was a bit longer and wordier, sorry, but I think I covered everything I needed to):

*The second act should be about expansion and information.
*The second act is the logical next step of the first; I always think “What would they do next?”
*The second act is where you watch your first-act seeds grow. Don’t forget them!
*The second act is where everything gets deeper and more complex. You can solve a msytery or two and that’s fine, but you should bring some new ones in to replace it, or have the resolution of one question only bring up more questions.
*The second act is a good place for sex scenes
*Nothing should be easy; good information or realizations are worth paying for. Keep the conflict high, don’t let that middle sag!
*The second act must end with a very big complication; just as the 1st-act-end raised the stakes or made the problem more personal or trapped the hero/ine into solving the mystery, so the second should make it clear there is no out, this is very dangerous, and they have no choice but to follow through. Thus setting us up for Act Three and the climax.

So, any questions? Anything that doesn’t make sense, or needs expansion?