Comments on: Thanks, Evil Editor!

By: Marissa

Marissa — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 21:28:34 +0000

Oh, okay, Wiki says it was only a couple of years back, so that seems reasonable.

Still though… Dang, that sure throws off my morning. =/

By: Marissa

Marissa — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 21:26:04 +0000

…You’re kidding. My dad didn’t tell me he was dead. xD

My dad and Robbie go out for drinks all the time (Robbie being his son, the one who does all the stunts now), and I just thought Evel was settling down at home or something.

Wow, now I feel so observant. -facepalm-

By: B. Mac

B. Mac — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 21:13:02 +0000

I thought he was dead! Man, if Wikipedia was wrong about his death, then maybe this throws my Wikipedia sales strategy into question.

By: Marissa

Marissa — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 20:45:47 +0000

Aww, really? ‘Cause I know Evel Knievel (which is close enough, in my professional opinion ) and I’m sure he’d be willing to give it a look.

Kidding, of course. Not about knowing him, but about him looking it over with any degree of success. xD

By: B. Mac

B. Mac — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 14:07:50 +0000

At some point, I’ll hit the big time, and then I’ll be able to rely on reviewers who don’t have Evil in their name.

By: joel wyatt

joel wyatt — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 12:59:33 +0000

Hey, B. Mac,

The fact that you’ve got eyes on your work, and someone who’s willing to give you (fairly) constructive criticism to boot, is good news – congradulations!

By: Ben

Ben — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 03:57:50 +0000

I think you might be limiting the audience of your work, B Mac. I’m a high school English teacher and find your advice very good. You have collected views on a very wide range of topics – all relating to writing for superheroes which hasn’t been done as far as I know.

I’ve pointed students in the direction of your blog as well as adults. And funnily enough, I’d say the adults are more open to reading about writing. Students can sometimes tend to barrel in to a writing task without thinking (that is a generalisation, I know, and the students on this blog are obviously not the ones I’m thinking of). Adults, on the other hand, don’t have to write for an assignment or whatever, so I think they are more open to reading advice and looking at writing from a multitude of perspectives.

So I would not limit the audience of your book.

A friend of mine got a novel published for the first time a couple of years ago. It was a superhero book. And he was in his late thirties.

Keep up the good articles, and good luck with the publishing merry-go-round.

By: B. Mac

B. Mac — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 00:25:22 +0000

It’s also much easier to give criticism to strangers than to people close to you.

By: B. Mac

B. Mac — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 22:55:45 +0000

Hey, hey! The full quote was “Actually, it’s evidence that the same twelve people visit your site 20 times every day. And I should know.” It was tongue-in-cheek– he even made a jab at his own site.

I agree wholeheartedly that the author’s credentials don’t matter all that much to younger readers. Now, I just need to find a publisher that does as well.

By: Marissa

Marissa — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 19:56:43 +0000

Well, I don’t check who the heck the author is before I pick up a how-to book, I just read it and see if any of the advice makes sense.

And what I meant by ‘putting you down’ is… Like, ‘a tiny blog with a maximum of five followers isn’t nearly enough to show you have any idea how to write’.

By: Ham

Ham — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 17:35:23 +0000

One problem I could see with your book, is that people are going to think: “who the hell is this guy?”. And that’s a bad thing. You’re writing a sort of how-to book. But why should people listen to you? Why should you know any better than the average Joe about superhero comics and novels? Of course we know that you definitely know something about this kind of stuff. But people who’ll see your book and your name for the first time don’t. Now, if you would have a successful series of comics or novels, it would be different.

By: B. Mac

B. Mac — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 17:10:50 +0000

Keep rewriting my query until it’s ready to go, and then start submitting to agents. Then it’s up to the agent to find me a publisher.

By: B. Mac

B. Mac — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 14:05:54 +0000

Marissa said “I bet they’d quit putting you down if they checked out your site.” Well, first, I don’t feel like they’ve been putting me down. No one crossed the line from “this isn’t working” to “you’re a terrible writer.” In fact, even some of the more negative reviews compliment my writing ability. I’d say that the tenor of the criticism has mostly been “you could have written this much better than you did.”

For example, my writing works for a lot of teens. (See my audience statistics, etc). A prospective publisher would want to know why. It’s my job to lay out why my writing works in an exciting, clear way that makes the publisher think “wow, this book is really going to work.”

I think that part of the problem is that I don’t really understand the teen-appeal of my writing. I write like a political scientist, not a Twitterer. And my credentials in this field are quite thin.

The conclusion I drew– that my writing works better for teens because teens care less about credentials– seems to have come off like I was “talking down” to teens. I think the subtext they picked up was “they read my writing because they’re too stupid to know any better.” I don’t think so. Teens use Wikipedia and TV Tropes, which are edited by amateurs. That’s not irrational or stupid. Both sites are convenient sources of fairly high-quality advice. Maybe not as high-quality as what professionals would put together, but high enough. An economist would say these consumers were satisficing (looking for advice that is good enough). Now the question is whether I can convince people to pay for advice in the Wikipedia model.

By: The ReTARDISed Whovian

The ReTARDISed Whovian — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 13:39:49 +0000

My earlier attempts are writing were so awful that I just want to set fire to the world when I read them. Granted, I was ten at the time, so I wasn’t exactly a literary genius, but I still sucked.

There was one day when I woke up and realised how terrible my writing was, so I decided to get better. Now I’m a lot better, even though I’ll probably never publish anything amazing. I’ll be satisfied if I can get anything published at all, so I can tick “become an author” off my list of life goals.

I wrote this when I was twelve:

“The dim lights lit the streets and cast eerie shadows on the walls. This started to unnerve me, as the threat of robbers and murderers was fairly high, and I did not want to be stripped of my money. Or my life.”

I thought it was awesome at the time, but now I think it’s okay. At least it didn’t look like my first short story. (shudders) Must. Burn. World. Haha.

By: Marissa

Marissa — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 11:05:11 +0000

Also? I just read that review of the book trailers, and how all those crazy fans freaked out... I don't even think you got that much crap over your review of Twilight. That's insane.