A Sort of Homecoming

And A Hearty Hello To U2 As Well!

In order to combat monotony, music was often a frequent topic of discussion at my last job.  One of the more memorable exchanges I had was with a co-worker named Bob who told me that he'd actually seen The Beatles live in Toronto in 1964.  I was in awe when I heard this.  Imagine being able to claim such a thing!  Imagine having been a witness to this sort of music history!     

Well, as of July 30'th I'm hoping to make a similar claim.  I'm hoping to see our generation's answer to The Beatles perform live and in person.

I'm hoping to see U2. 

Now, there are some people out there who will cry "Blasphemy!" and declare that U2 isn't fit to carry Ringo Starr's drum kit.  Well, I'm not going to stand here and pretend that such an argument is completely devoid of validity, but I would challenge critics to name another 80's-era band that continues to pack in massive crowds and wow them consistently with stellar live shows.

My history with U2 is a bit checkered.  By the mid-to-late Eighties my heavy metal heroes were releasing increasingly mediocre albums.  I was looking for something new.  This conveniently came along in the form of what I now dub "Conscience Rock", so named after it's eternal association in my mind with my High School's Social Action committee.

Here's a quote from the first part of my music-oriented blog entry from May 21'st 2010:

"I fell in with a group of friends who'd joined an Amnesty International group in High School purely to ramp up their sad odds of meeting girls who might mistake them as 'sensitive'.  I was chided for listening to The Scorpions so I began a 'Conscience Rock' phase which involved exposure to...U2.   
 U2 was initially a tough sell to me, but I borrowed 'Under a Blood Red Sky' from a friend and it soon grew on me.  Thank God I didn't see the accompanying concert footage until years later since the band's appearance would surely have been a deal-breaker: especially Bono's prototypical mullet, Peter Pan boots and tendency to stage prance."

I'm not kidding here, folks.  If I'd caught sight of U2 back then I'd likely have never been a fan of theirs.  Years later I learned that these young, naive, devoutly religious boys looked the way they did because that was the way they thought they were supposed to look like.  They didn't have a stylist on retainer or an entourage of public image consultants.  All they had was a best guess as to what a modern rock band in the 80's should look like.  Too bad this made them resemble roadies for Kajagoogoo.

Mercifully, the only image of the band that I had at the time was the iconic cover of Under a Blood Red Sky and the video for the following song.  Here's a snippet from this now-famous live performance:



After the live renditions of these songs infiltrated my brain, I purchased the band's first three studio albums Boy, October and War.   The stripped down Red Rocks performance had been so powerful to me that I distinctly recall being disappointed with the studio versions of "I Will Follow" and "Sunday Bloody Sunday", mainly due to their superfluous use of chimes and violins.  Nevertheless, I thrilled at hearing "new" material by the band, particularly "Out of Control", "Stories for Boys", "A Day Without Me", "Another Time, Another Place", "Two Hearts Beat As One", "Seconds", "Like A Song...", "With A Shout", "Tomorrow", "Is That All?", and "Rejoice".

Um, did I mention that they were kinda religious? 

Then I discovered The Unforgettable Fire, still their best and most even album, IMHO.  Although I wasn't a big fan of "Pride" with it's conventional verse/chorus/verse structure and borderline pretentious lyrics, everything else is money.  From the buoyant instrumental heights of "4th of July" providing a flawless segue into the hauntingly beautiful "Bad", this album is pure genius.  I love the kaleidoscopic melodies on display in "Promenade", the propulsive drum beat and choppy riffs in "A Sort of Homecoming" and the driving attack of "Indian Summer Sky", which actually sounds like it could be an out-take from the soundtrack of The Road Warrior.     

"MLK" is a showcase for the sort of vocal passion and delivery growing increasingly extinct in today's musical landscape.  The album's title track alone is an incredible mosaic of  instrumental textures which climbs to dizzying and ever-more powerful heights.  "Wire" comes at the listener with an unrelenting guitar and bass assault and then spins off into an incredibly infectious shout-chant.  "Elvis Presley and America" winds things down nicely but Bono still can't help but raise some vocal rabble towards the end of the song.

The first time I actually remember seeing U2 on stage was probably during the "Live Aid" broadcast.  Speaking of transcendental performances, it was this moment which catapulted the band from groundswell underdogs to bearers of the rock super-group standard.  Too bad this performance nearly broke up the band.

More on that in a bit.  First, here's that historical performance in it's entirety.  Stick with it,  kiddies, 'cuz it's a doozy...



Y'see, the band didn't expect to do a twelve-minute, extended dance-mix version of "Bad" while Bono pulled his little stunt of dragging girls out of the audience to dance with.  In fact, it completely derailed the band's plan to play "Pride" as their third scheduled song.  So, for about a week after their showing at "Live Aid", Bono's name was mud with the rest of the band.  However, as soon as the amazing moment went viral (or as viral as it could go in that pre-internet world), the rest of the lads had to admit that it was stroke of inspired genius.

Then came that cultural juggernaut: The Joshua Tree.  To me this isn't so much an album as it is the soundtrack for tremendous change in my life.  At the time I was about to graduate from High School with all the fears and trepidations that go along with it.  This landmark record gave me tremendous fortitude to face what was ahead and also somehow feel as if better days were to come.

The first half of the album is an emotional roller-coaster.  Standouts include the perpetually building "Where The Streets Have No Name", the haunting and melancholy "With Or Without You", the oddly optimistic "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For", the apocalyptic "Bullet The Blue Sky", and the truly heart-rending "Running To Stand Still". 

My favorite song on the entire album, however, is track six: "Red Hill Mining Town".  I don't like my odds for hearing it live on Saturday, but I remain optimistic since it would make for a stirring and rousing sing-along.  This is the band at it's most cohesive, powerful and sincere (even if the accompanying video isn't):



Well, after embracing Americana for two albums, the band went to hell with the joke on Rattle And Hum.  Although somewhat deservedly criticized for being pretentious and self-aggrandizing, there's still a ton of "A"-list material here.  Witness Edge's stark and mournful performance on "Van Diemen's Land", the chill-inducing beauty of "Heartland", the clarion call-out of "Desire" and "All I Want Is You", arguably the band's most delicate and passionate slow tune.  Oh, and you also have to recognize the penultimate delivery given to "Bullet The Blue Sky":



Regrettably, Rattle And Hum gave us too much U2 too quickly (try saying that five times real fast).  Although Bono is the band's resident extrovert by default, the rest of the band is pretty reticent.  As a result, the film's interview segments and "musical discovery" plotline seem terrible contrived.  It almost seems as if America didn't exist until it was discovered by U2.

So, what's the perfect antidote for looking too self-absorbed and serious?  Why, make a daring, avant-garde, German-influenced album that self-parodies fame and dresses the entire band up in drag!   Enter Achtung Baby, one of my top five favorite albums by the group.

If it had been released in the Eighties, fans would have been left to ponder just what the band had been smoking in order to produce such a record.  But in the early Nineties, a time of musical derring-do and alternative acceptance, Achtung Baby was birthed at a perfectly opportune time.  Plus it certainly helps that there is absolutely no dead weight on this album whatsover.

In a moment of synergistic genius, the Zoo T.V. tour that followed in support of the album was an incredible, multimedia-driven assault on the senses.  As it evolved and grew, so did Bono's stage personae.  He developed no less then three self-depreciating alter-egos: "The Fly" a black leather-clad, sunglasses-sporting egomaniac, "Mirror Ball Man" a slippery used car salesman/good 'ole boy and "MacPhisto" a melancholy demonic lounge singer who may very well have been the precursor to Lorne on the T.V. show Angel.  .   

As if that wasn't enough, each live show was an orgy of message-strobing televisions, pop cultural references, channel surfing, prank calls and video confessionals.  It was the perfect way for the band to completely erase their reputation as pompous, goody-two-shoes crusaders and still attack the media-soaked masses for their passive resignation.

Although every song on Achtung Baby is a winner (no lie!), my favorite tune has to be the deliriously melodic "Ultraviolet (Light My Way)".  This rare clip features one of "Mirror Ball Man's" many failed attempts to get then-President Bush on the horn.  It also illustrates the in-born live potential of the new material:



U2's adventures on the Zoo T.V. tour gave them plenty of fodder for their follow-up album, the unfairly maligned Zooropa.  Although it isn't nearly as even as it's predecessor, I find Zooropa certainly more complex and subsequently, more interesting, then some of the band's more recent efforts.  I keep coming back to it over and over again and discovering something new, as evidenced by the haunting title track which explores themes of moral confusion in a future rife with commercial and entertainment-related over-saturation: 



 The band has played "Zooropa" live as recently as eight days ago so, fingers crossed, I may get to hear it this Saturday.  

Am I pushing my luck to also hear Lemon?  Yes?  Um, okay then...  

In typical U2 fashion of going to overboard, their next album Pop really tested the loyalties of fans who were patiently waiting for them to record Joshua Tree II: The Revenge.  I'm a bit guilty of this myself, having chuckled at and then soundly dismissed the video for the album's lead-off single "Discotheque":



Although I die laughing every time I get to the 4:20 mark of the video, the musical landscape at the time was so dire and depressing I really didn't need one of my favorite bands to remind me of just how bad it really was, even in parody.  I needed them to step and provide an antidote to it.  Sadly, since I didn't buy this album until years after its release, it took me that long to realize that Pop actually was a solid kick back against the mediocre musical landscape of the time.

In fact, to this day, I'm confident that if the band had used a different lead-off single (like "Staring At The Sun", "Gone" or "Wake Up Dead Man") and employed a more sober video, the album would have been a massive hit.   

As if U2 could sense the collective will of it's fan base it went back to it's simpler roots with All That You Can't Leave Behind.  In doing so the band composed and released the most anthemic and optimal single possible in their bid to once again be regarded as the best band in the world.  That single was the rousing "Beautiful Day":



 The album yielded a slew of hits, some awesome ("Walk On", "In a Little While", "Wild Honey", "Stuck In A Moment You Can't Get Out Of") some unfortunate (like the inexplicably meat-headed "Elevation").  Overall, though, fans came back in droves and U2 rode a renewed wave of popularity.

They managed to distill this momentum directly into their eleventh studio album, How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb.  Sticking to the successful formula of it's predecessor, HTDAAB cranked out more radio-friendly unit shifters like "Vertigo", "Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own" and "City of Blinding Light".  Although I enjoyed both of these albums quite a bit, I still couldn't shake the feeling that the band was taking a risk-free step back and pandering somewhat to audience expectations.

Which is why I prefer their most recent album No Line On The Horizon.  Although it's wildly uneven and even a bit off-putting at times, I believe it's their deepest and most daring offering in this recent crop of releases.  Maybe I dig it because of the semi-experimental Achtung Baby/Zooropa-esque flirtations which crop up album from time to time.  Although I'm not a big fan of "Get On Your Boots" (although I do acknowledge it's potential as a stadium-pleaser) I really like the title track:



And so U2 find themselves at a cross-roads.  Like other venerable and legendary rock outfits like The Rolling Stones, their new studio releases might not be quite as urgent or relevant as they used to be.  But their appeal as a live act is as undiminished as ever, in fact this year the U2 360° Tour became the highest-grossing concert tour, with ticket sales totaling over US $700 million.

I'm hoping to contribute to this myself on Saturday and finally earn the right to claim that I've seen the biggest band in the world live.  It's been a long time coming...

EPIC   Five must-have U2 albums:


FAIL: Sign of a great band: their earliest albums don't sound dated like this pablum...

The Elephant In The Room

"I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs."   Thomas Jefferson

Welcome, Free Thinkers!

So, America is teetering on the edge of total financial collapse and the mainstream media is doing a fantastic job keeping the general populace blissfully ignorant of this looming catastrophe. Instead of warning people about the ramifications of the U.S. dollar evaporating, we're hearing about J-Lo's separation, "McSteamy's" pain killer addiction and rampant speculation as to what chemical finally killed Amy Winehouse.

But, hey, maybe it's our own fault.  Maybe all we really want to do is keep fiddling blissfully while Rome turns into the equivalent of Backdraft.  Sometimes it's difficult facing reality, especially when it's the equivalent of a greasy pork sandwich served up in a dirty ashtray.

I will endeavor, in my own modest way, to try and compensate for this.  If and when everything goes bizzonkers, at least the five or six people on this planet who regularly read my blog will know what the hell is going on.

I don't want to split hairs here, people. When the U.S. economy tanks out (please note the deliberate use of the word 'if') we're all in some serious shit.  It will likely result in a planet-wide economic depression, the proposal of a centralized global economy, the subsequent erosion of sovereign nation identity and a major hit to our quality of life.  It will also result in the utter annihilation of bank savings and personal investments and make the debt-ridden middle and lower classes further beholden to their economic slave masters.

First and foremost, here's a documentary about the U.S. Federal Reserve: the shadowy and secretive organization at the heart of this financial crisis:

Some take-away's to consider:

1. The U.S. Constitution clearly states that the nation's currency must be Gold and Silver coin not government-issued paper I.O.U's.  Paper money no standard anymore, no backing.  In fact, it's printed like Monopoly money by the Federal Reserve whenever the government asks for it. 
2. The Federal Reserve is about as Federal as Federal Express.  It is not a government body but a cartel of large, elite, private Federal Banks who have allied together to curtail competition and maximize their own profits.
3. Ever wonder why the U.S. government never increases taxes?  It's because that, under the Federal Reserve system, Congress can go to the Fed and request that money be printed out of thin air without having to piss off voters by raising taxes.  
4. Income tax was introduced in the same year that the Federal Reserve system was instituted partially to off-set the in-born interest that every bill comes with as soon as it's printed.  
5. Banks routinely loan out more then they have in reserve in order to make lungfuls of money.  The market sets prices and wages based on what it assumes is the total amount of money in circulation.  When the Central Banks bleed reams of cash into the system, it devalues the dollar, increases the cost of goods and services and drives inflation through the roof.  That's why a bag of chips that cost twenty-five cents in 1978 now costs $2.25.   
6. If you want a sneak preview of what may happen to us if we don't smarten up, just have a look at Germany between World War I and World War II.  Forced to pay for war reparations, Germany started printing their currency like the Federal Reserve does now.  Eventually it destroyed the Middle class, who were forced to take wheelbarrows full of money down to the market just to buy a loaf of bread.
7. This all seems pretty important, so why aren't we hearing about  this constantly on T.V. or in the newspapers?  Well, ever since deregulation set in we went from having over 100 independent media voices to about six, which are all now owned by wealthy corporations.  Corporations that don't want the general populace to be informed about how the money system really works for fear that we'd all get super-pissed off and start rightfully demanding change.  
8. Inflation has nothing to do with the rising cost of living and everything to do with our currency losing it's value
9. Things actually should be getting cheaper not more expensive anyway because our modern production capability easily outstrips demand. 
10. Inflation caused by the Federal Reserve is so severe that it now takes a two-income family to make ends meet.

Now I'm not an economist, but that actually helps my argument here.  The powers that be are not just doing a poor job running the world economy; I believe they're doing a terrible job running the world economy, so terrible in fact that I believe that it's deliberate.

Leading up to the economic crash of 2008, efforts had been made to deregulate the banking industry in the United States.  The venerable Glass-Steagall Act, which recognized the conflict of interest inherent in allowing financial institutions to pursue both investment and financial banking, was systematically dismantled during a tsunami of industry lobbying.  Once the floodgates opened and banks began to engage in the most drunkenly reckless use of unlimited credit and Derivatives-based Ponzi schemes, the end was inevitable.

This is perhaps best-illustrated in the tremendous documentary Inside Job, which endeavors to explain just how this often-convoluted and Machiavellian economic false flag event was orchestrated:

Untitled from harisgr on Vimeo.

So, after things start falling apart as expected, George W. Bush's Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson goes before Congress to begin a campaign of what can only be called economic extortion.  He warns the American people that if the big financial institutions don't get bailed out, the entire edifice will crumble.  Under threats of a global financial meltdown and warnings of impending Martial Law (!) Senators and Congressmen feel compelled to approve it:

Long after those notorious bailouts got rammed through, it's since come to light that a frighteningly large chunk of this money (which was supposed to write off bad debt in an effort to remedy the sub-prime mortgage crisis) was misappropriated.  In fact, huge tracts of the stuff was given away, blank-check style, to hung-over financial institutions to snatch up more assets that they didn't already own.  Co-incidentally, this also included a life preserver for Goldman Sachs, one of the biggest sinners during the investment frenzy and Henry Paulson's old Alma-mater!

As if that wasn't bad enough, there's at least $700 billion dollars still unaccounted for.  When asked about this, all the Chairman of the Federal Reserve Ben Bernanke will say is that it was given away to foreign banking interests and and that no-one has the right to ask who those institutions are.

Can you believe the unmitigated arrogance of this asshole?  It just blows me away that the Federal Reserve has never been the recipient of an external audit.  If one of us regular, old, clock-punching, carbon-based units acted like this in the workplace we'd be fired and then locked up indefinitely...

It also pisses me off that people keep cutting Obama slack in his utter failure to jump-start the economy.  The old argument that he "inherited a mess" from Bush just doesn't hold water anymore.  The sad fact is, Obama's promise to keep his administration free from lobbyists and economic opportunists was cast out the window just as soon as he picked his cabinet.  Check out this Rogues Gallery of creeps:

• Larry Summers helped neuter the Glass-Steagall Act, served as Chief Economist for the ultra-shady World Bank and was forced to resign as the President of Harvard University over conflicting economic relationships and some pretty sexist remarks.  For most people, this would result in a black-listed resume but Obama apparently thought he'd be make the ideal director of the White House National Economic Council.
• Timothy Geithner, Obama's Secretary of Treasury was once the President of the private Federal Reserve Bank of New York.   He oversaw the dispersion of $350 billion dollars of bailout money which criminal outfits like AIG translate then used to give massive bonuses for it's own executives.  Frankly, making someone like Geithner Treasury Secretary is like putting a fox in charge of a hen-house.
• Speaking of a massive conflict of interest, William Lynn was made Deputy Secretary for Defense despite being a former lobbyist for Raytheon, one of the world's largest defense contractors.
• Geithner's Chief of Staff is Mark Petterson, a former Goldman Sachs lobbyist.  
• George Mitchell, former lobbyist for the Saudi Royal family, now enjoys the position of Lead Envoy to the Middle East.  
• Tom Daschle was a lobbyist for several health care firms and was tapped by Obama to run the Department of Health and Human services.  

Frankly, I was willing to give Obama the benefit of the doubt for awhile but his time in office really does drive home that there's no difference whatsoever between the Republicans and the Democrats.  They both serve the same corporate masters.  In fact, every one of Obama's broken campaign promises leads me to believe that he is 100% in the back pocket of the big, global corporate interests. 

Face it, if Obama was really committed to driving down the debt and cutting spending he would have immediately followed through on his most popular campaign pledge to shut down American military garrisons around the world and bring the troops home.  Senator Ron Paul, one of the few sane voices in Washington today, reminds us of that right here:

So what happens when the rest of the world wakes up one morning and decides that the U.S. dollar isn't worth the paper it's printed on and then demands that all past payments are now due?  Well, the following video may be a tad alarmist and mercenary, but it'd also a fairly good 'what if?' speculation:


So what can be done to try and offset this?

1. All the corporate criminals, special interest groups and lobbyists have to be flushed out of Washington pronto.  Corrupt "walking dead" businesses must be allowed to fail to make room for fresh growth.
2. The United States must cease to be global policemen.  Rampant military spending must halt immediately.
3. The Federal Reserve system must be moth-balled and the gold standard has to be re-married to the dollar.
4. Free-thinking, non-partisan and truly independent political visionaries like Ron Paul need a kick at the political can.  Be wary of the same old, two-party choice of bad and worse being foisted up by the mainstream media!  Embrace those candidates that make sense but are being ignored! 
5. People need to get out of debt as soon as possible and must stop spending beyond their means.
6. Cash and bonds are a volatile form of savings right now.  Gold, silver and other commodities are the smartest investments when fiat currencies are revealed as the financial house of cards they really are.  
7. If the worst-case-scenario happens and hyper-inflation takes root in a panic, you can expect the value of investments and cash savings to evaporate.  The price of goods and services will skyrocket.  Having a stockpile of food and supplies as well as growing your own produce would be a very smart thing to do in this scenario.
8. If a crash does happen and suddenly our politicians are telling us that we must abandon our Canadian currency in lieu of an amalgamated North American/Global currency, this is our cue to rise up.  After all, this emergency could easily be used to usher in a global version of the Federal Reserve system which is designed for one purpose only: to make poor people poorer and the rich even richer.   

I truly hope that I'm wrong about all this.  In fact, I hope someone reads this, does their own research and  comes up with a truly compelling rebuttal that completely deflates my concerns.  But when you take a long, hard look at the current debt figure, it's hard to feel optimistic:

You know that when the corporate-controlled mainstream media is suddenly talking about the possibility of a U.S. economic default, then we need to unplug ourselves from the opiate of mainstream infotainment and be very vigilant.

Don't say that I didn't warn you.  Now go forth and get informed...

EPIC  Another documentary about the sketchy origins and ruinous nature of the Federal Reserve:

FAIL This doc if far from even-keeled but it does do a fair job cataloging Obama's failure to deliver any of his campaign promises. 

MINOR FAIL: Hate the song and video but I LOVE the mantra towards the end...

Hey, 'Geezeraid'! Suck on THIS!

Hello, Youngsters, Oldsters and 'Tweeners!

So, I pop up to the Irving Circle K the other day to gas up the ol' Ninjamobile and abuse my bank account  (simultaneously, as it turns out).  Just as I'm pulling up to the front of the store I see this:

Now, I know that exclusion, prejudice and discrimination still exists in our wonderful society, but I'd kinda hoped that by now we'd all come to a general consensus that using insulting terms to describe a person's identity is just not cool.  After all, the elderly have about as much choice about being elderly as a Korean man has being labeled as a visible minority or a wheel-chair bound person being categorized as "physically challenged".     

Honestly, can you imagine if Circle K had decided to do a campaign called "Asianaid"?  Or "Cripleaid"?  Jesus, what were they thinking?  What the f#@% is the point of this stupid ad campaign, anyway, except to insult people?  Does it mean that if you dare drink this goop you'll age yourself prematurely?  'Cuz if you consider just how nasty this manufactured, hyper-sugary, nuclear day-glo slop is, that's probably the case. 

So I see this poster and think to myself: "Jesus, that's pretty f#@$%^& insulting.  If I was a senior, I'd be hella-pissed!"

So I go in and pay for my crap and the pimply-voiced teen with the patchwork facial hair behind the counter squeaks:

"Thanks!  Have a nice day, SIR!"

Instantly my brain was seized by a red rage.  I began shaking like Hulk Hogan in the denouement of a Pier Six brawl with Rowdy Roddy Piper.  I instantly tore off the yellow wifebeater I just so happened to be wearing, inadvertently crushing the "Twix" bar in my left hand during my fit of berserk fury.

"Sir!?  SIR!?!   I'm no 'Sir'!"  I raged.  "My Dad's a 'sir', you gangly, mangy-looking, pencil-necked, mutant Adam-appled genetic casualty!"

I immediately whipped him into the ice cream cooler, followed up with a boot to the mush and then polished him off with my patented leg-drop.  After Earl Hebner conveniently materialized from out of nowhere to provide a timely  three-count, I posed down for the benefit of my adoring fellow patrons, snatched up my Championship Belt  and then stalked back to my dressing room...er, car... all the while indiscriminately pointing at people.  

Actually none of that really happened.  In reality I think I just said something edgy like "Thanks, sonny" and then flipped him a dime and told him to spend it on penny whistles and moon-pies.

It's a sad time when you realize that you're not as young as you used to be.  I'm going to be suffering through another birthday soon and frankly, I couldn't give two shits about it.  From age one to age eighteen birthdays still hold some novelty but at my age it's just another reminder of how far away you still are from where you want to be in life.  Not to mention the fact that you seem to wake up every morning like the Tin Man in dire need of an oil can.

Which is why I think I'm so hyper-sensitive to this whole "Geezerade" thing.  In twenty or thirty years from now it could just as easily be my kisser up on that sign.   

It's a tough thing to come to grips with aging, especially when you didn't think you'd live long enough to see thirty let alone forty!   As a kid, I thought forty was ancient.  Cripes, you might as well be Kharis, the Immortal Mummy at that age!

And why not?  As I've gotten older I've started to become acutely aware of how shabbily older folks are treated by the media and pop culture.  In fact I think it's the last bastion of acceptable discrimination.

Here are just a few examples:

•  I'm listening to the CBC broadcast of the Boston Bruins/Vancouver Canucks Stanley Cup finals and the moron doing color commentary is stunned by a burst of speed by 43-year-old Mark Recci because "he's, like...like a hundred years old."   Instantly I turned to my infinitely better half and said: "Um, did I just hear what I thought I heard?"   Man, can you be more insulting?
• In 2004, Eighties-era punk band The Alarm released a comeback album.  Aware that their more recent efforts were never getting any airplay on “younger and mainstream” radio stations they recruited a young local band named The Poppyfields to be their stand-ins for the video for "45 RPM".  The single was their first to chart in years and, interestingly enough, got tons of heavy airplay on radio and T.V. 
• According to American Idol you can't possess a whit of talent beyond age thirty.  It's like the entertainment equivalent of Logan's Run... 
• In the 80's people like John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, David Bowie, Yes, Dire Straits, Tina Turner, Robert Plant, and Robert Palmer all had chart-topping hits.  Hell, even in the Nineties, Roy Orbison, Tom Jones and Johnny Cash all experienced major career revivals.  In an era where the next pop icon is likely to be a singing/dancing fetus, I maintain that such acknowledgment of our collective musical legacies would never happen now.      
• The BBC, in all of it's infinite wisdom, decided to put Miriam O'Reilly out to pasture, a twenty-five year employee and presenter for the television program Countryfile.  A tribunal soon ruled that the BBC's claim that they were restructuring the show was just a weak excuse to bring in hosts twenty years her junior.  
• In the motion picture industry, women in particular suffer the worst sort of indignities.  Actress Hope Davis was once asked to portray Johnny Depp's mom in a film, despite the fact that she's actually a year younger then he is!  Glen Close's Gertrude would have been about ten years old when she gave birth to Mel Gibson's Hamlet.  Then, after serving as Tom Hank's love interest in the film Punchline, Sally Field found herself playing Mama Gump only six short years later!      
• Honestly I love the character of Grampa Simpson and often laugh in spite of myself, but when you get down to brass tacks, he's a pretty mean-spirited stereotype:
 

*pfffttttt*  Hee, hee...er...sorry...I mean...disgraceful!

Now, let me also mention a coupla corollaries to this rant of mine.  First off, I don't believe people automatically deserve respect just because they have crow's feet.  I still believe that people need to earn respect, regardless of seniority.

I'm also still pissy about the Baby Boomers clinging to their jobs and avoiding retirement like it's a greased slide into a crematorium.  How vapid and one-dimensional are you as a person if you think your identity and self-worth is completely tied up in working some generic, crappy McJob that has no creative input but just serves to make some rich asshole who doesn't give a f#@$% about you that much richer?

Get a grip, people!  If it makes financial sense, retire, dammit!  Make room for the younger generation who desperately need to pay off crushing student loans.  Go enjoy life!  Volunteer your time!  Read a book!  Buy an X-box!     

In a related point, also think that there's plenty of examples of ageism that go the other way and discriminates against younger people.  Have you looked at those automobile insurance rates lately?   

I just think it's brutal how we almost seem to go out of out way to denigrate the elderly in North America.  In certain Native and African cultures, age is synonymous with wisdom and experience.  In Japan the term for an elderly person is "Oji-San".  In the Western world we'd likely interpret this to mean "Old Person", but it's most literal translation is actually "Venerable One".

I'd invite you, Kind Reader, to remain vigilant about this.  Post a comment below if you come across any specific examples of blatant ageism whether it be a line in a movie, a television commercial, or a CD review.

I'm just asking you to be aware of it.  After all, I'm gonna be old myself one of these days.

But, more importantly, you will be too.   

EPIC:   http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/story/2011/05/24/nb-geezeraid-campaign.html

EPIC BY ASSOCIATION:    http://www.facebook.com/pages/End-geezerade-Campaign-Now/223839950975658

FAIL As bad as it is for men, women seem to get it ten times worse:  http://www.realbodystory.com/view.php?cat=11       

ANIMATED FAIL I sincerely hope Hogan got a truckload of filthy lucre to attach his name to this pile of poo:

Okay, So Now What?

All Hail, Diligent Readers (and Writers!)

Well, after the first draft of my book was completed I endeavored to get it published through the traditional route.  In order to do that, I first had to find out if there was anyone out there even willing to look at it.   

I felt that local publishing houses were immediately right out.  After all, my book was a tragic revisionist modern historic fantasy, not some slice-o'-life Atlantic Canadian yarn.  These people wanted Nights Below Station Street and I wanted to give them Tigana crossed with MacBeth.  

So, I set my sights on the big American fantasy publishers.  I diligently picked up a copy of the Writer's Market, a publication that lists thousands of prospective publishers and agents.  Each entry gives you the name of the periodical/publishing house/agency, the contact names, what they're looking for, the submission guidelines as well as their terms and conditions.  Unfortunately most of them also maintain that they:

• Don't accept unsolicited manucripts
• 85 to 95% of what they publish is agented fiction
• Or, my own personal favorite: agented submissions only

Nevertheless, I did find one or two places that were willing to look at unsolicited manuscripts.  So, I cobbled together a query and fired it off.

What's a query, you ask?  It's the method by which writers prostrate themselves before potential publishers in the vain hope that the GOD OF DISTRIBUTION will actually read your proposal and grant you some semblance of a future.  Typically there are three components to a query: the letter, the synopsis and a few sample chapters.

The query letter is your book's Player-esque sales pitch.  You'll include information about the book, what makes you uniquely qualified to tell the story, and how it fits into the literary market.  As such, here's an example of a good query letter:

Dear Ms. Conclusion,

Thank you for your continued encouragement of my short stories, including my most recent submission, "The Sad Goat".  At your suggestion, I've enclosed a new story, "Philandering," for your review.

Since last submitting to the River Tam Review, I have had stories accepted by The Hudson Hawk Review and the Skull & Bones Review (both forthcoming), stories published in the Berkeley Breathed Fiction Review and ByMine Magazine, and I recently secured representation for my first novel.  My fiction has also appeared in The Salamander, The Flannel Review, Black Panther Review and a Room With A (Re)-View.    


I am originally from the Sheboygan area, and returned here last fall after completing the Creative Writing Program at the Correspondence College of Barstow.  I now teach writing at the Sheboygan School of Applied Wankery.


Thank you for considering "Philandering".  


Sincerely,


Lisa Awesomeface

Okay, here's an example of a bad query letter (my comments are in brackets):


Dear River Tam Review,


         Enclosed in this envelope are some of my writings.  Thirty-one years old. Poor. Pist (I think he means "Pissed"). Ready to unleash some malcontented words upon paper and society.  Not having a degree in english (Obviously) leaves me at a disadvantage.  Writing was once just a hobby.  Now I feel that it could be more.  My dream is to someday have something, anything published (Dream on, pal).  Whether it be a short story, prose or novel (Um, redundant much?). This is what I will work for. Working long taxing hours.  Late hours as a waiter adds to the white noise that I call my meager existence (Wha..?).  Okay, maybe it's not that bad.  Actually every night is like a Saturday night (Um, where are we going here?). Women, alcohol and fun (!).  Words come with ease but I feel that they are unnoticed (Gee, I wonder why?). Prose is the great escape.  Shorts (Does he mean short stories?) are, well like a silent fart of a mongoloid (!!!). All writing is enjoyable to me. My true passion is the working of a novel.  Last week I embarked upon Blowjobs, Whiskey, and Steak (TMI!!!  TMI!!!). This is my arena.  Believe me when I say that I will send you the work (Is this a threat or a promise?). You will not be able to ignore the way the words will speak to you (Creepy!). Safe to say that you have not heard the last of me (Creepier!).  Yes I am in love with the word; it has never let me down (Except, say, in this awful query letter).  With this in mind I am ready for failure (Well, that's a good thing).  I believe that a man or a woman can only be measured by their reaction to failure.  So any words of encouragement, or even if you feel the need to rip me apart (More likely). It would be greatly appreciated.  I would even settle for a list of other publishers in your area that might offer some advice.  My expectations are low, by my writing is different (That's one way of putting it).  Thank you for your time.  Hope to hear from you in the near future (Not bloody likely).  

Michael Mutant                      

Although I goofed around with the references, both of these letters are completely real.  Here's what the editor said in response to the last letter:

Our magazine is a 20-year old award-winning literary magazine and his style would never fit in or be accepted.  The writer did not read our guidelines.  This is, by far, the most offensive and profane letter I have ever received.  If the goal was to capture my attention and make me want to read the manuscript, the writer failed miserably.  The query disgusted me.  Period.  

Okay, so what have we learned here, kiddies?  Make sure your query letter is brief, to the point, inventories your accomplishments, gives pertinent details about your current submission, avoids gratuitous use of the word "mongoloid" and also opts not to mention the last time you got a hummer.

Well, after I'd removed all of these references from my own query letter I also noticed the conspicuous absence of one other key element: publishing experience.  Frankly, in this day and age, with so many books to choose from (not to mention all the other entertainment-related distractions) publishers are quite keen on  known quantities and a certain amount of bankability.  I can't say that I can slight them for this, but then again, who's gonna roll the die on an emerging writer in an effort to uncover that new, original literary X-Factor?

Typically included with the query letter is a plot synopsis, which either indicates that you actually finished the damned thing or at least you know how to finish it.  Plus it also shows if you have a head for crafting a full-bodied story with a beginning, middle and end.  Please note: unless you're Steven King your finale probably shouldn't include prepubescent group sex or a Pier 6 donnybrook with a giant space spider.  I'm just sayin' is all...

So, after I'd crafted a pretty decent, fellatio-free query letter, typed up a synopsis and Über-proofed my first three inclusive chapters, I sent this plucky little document blindly off.  During this entire process I felt like I was trying to double into a game of darts with my helmet's blast shield down.

Sending a query letter to a prospective publisher is sure to generate feelings of despondency and helplessness  for the budding writer.  Your book could be the modern day equivalent of The Great Gatsby but unless there's a cappuccino-fueled agent pushing the publisher to the floor and trying to stick your manuscript up his nose, it's much more likely your book will end up in that most dreadful of purgatories: THE SLUSH PILE.

And what is that you may ask?  Well, the traditional description (a pile of dirty, half-melted snow) isn't too far off the mark.  It's the name publishers give to the massive mound of unsolicited manuscripts lying around the office, a stack so high that every year a bakers-dozen interns around the world are killed trying to scale their respective peaks.

Liberating your manuscript from slush pile oblivion is one of the hardest things for a new writer to do.  Which is traditionally why you need an agent to constantly be screaming  "HERE!  Read it!  Read it!   Don't make me go all Clockwork Orange on your ass!"  Truth is, there's a real double-edged sword at work here.  You can't get an agent without first being published and you can't get published without having an agent!  See how annoying this is?

I decided to cover both bases for awhile by sending my queries out in pairs: one to publishers willing to accept unsolicited manuscripts and another one to potential agents.  I could only do this one set at a time since publishers tend to get upset when confronted with evidence that they're not the only game in town.

And then, you wait.  Often for months at a time as your poor, sad proposal slowly works it way to the top of that Olympian-sized slush pile.  The responses that you get back are often non-committal, blandly inoffensive and uselessly abstract.  Here an example of one of mine:


Dear Author (Why didn't she just address it 'Dear Carbon-Based Lifeform'?):


Thank you for your recent inquiry.  I'm sorry not to respond personally, but the volume of submissions that we receive unfortunately makes it impossible.  I always enjoy reviewing the wealth of material that crosses my desk, but we do receive hundreds of submissions every week. 


Your proposal has been considered, but I regret I am unable to offer you representation.  Thank you, however, for thinking of (insert name of short-sighted literary agency here), and best of luck in the submission of your work elsewhere.  


Yours truly,


Marianne Foad 
Dictated but not read

So, as you can well imagine, once you've been on the receiving end of a half dozen of these little missives you begin to equate the submission process to palming a red-hot stove burner.  Frustrated by THE MAN and THE MAN'S SYSTEM of doing things, I once again put my manuscript away in a hermetically sealed vault until new avenues presented themselves.

This happened a few years later when a friend of mine turned me on to Cory Doctorow.  He's a Canadian writer who's done some brave and groundbreaking stuff with digital media, copyright laws and open access to his work.  In 2003 Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom (and much of his subsequent work) was released electronically under the Creative Commons banner, which allows people to read and circulate his work for free as long as they don't alter it in any way or try and make a profit from it.  It garnered the writer a tremendous amount of attention, including a standard paperback publishing deal.

So, I thinks myself: "Hey, self, why don't you make a portion of the book available for people to read for free?  It might garner some hype and help you attract a publisher!"

Conveniently, another buddy of mine soon told me about a website called Storiesville.  Storiesville allowed writers to post their flash fiction, short stories and serialized works on a blog-like website for readers of all persuasions to peruse and review.  In 2008 I began to post one chapter of my book every three or four days until the first third of the book was available.  Soon I'd earned myself a pretty ardent little following.

The dozen or so people that read it and left a comment were very supportive and complementary.  After this confidence booster, Storiesville inspired me to set up a "pay to read" website.  I'd make the first third of the book available for free and then charge fans a small stipend to unlock a new chapter or the rest of the novel in one fell swoop.

This was a boffo idea except for one thing: I had no clue how to go about doing it.  I made a half-assed effort to cobble a website together about a year ago but the web host (HostPapa) and their affiliate site builder (SohoLaunch) proved to be w-a-a-a-a-a-y too creatively inhibiting.  The templates they provided were frustratingly restrictive and generic.  If I was going to create a internet billboard to promote my book I didn't want it to look like the website of a small town dental office.

Then disaster struck in September of 2009 when Storiesville vanished off the face of the interwebs.  The site's administrator soon revealed that some douchestore with way too much time on his hands had released a virulent attack upon its web host resulting in a complete loss of all data.  Faced with the monumental effort of having to get the site back up and running, he decided to pack it in for good.

And with it, all the great comments people had left for my book were also lost forever.  The only information I had about my supporters were a bunch of vague usernames like Pastor Reg, Rage Age, Chicago Jake, Moxjosie, and R.E. Potter.  I had no way to contact them.  I wish that I'd had the foresight to save their feedback in a Word document but I never thought in a million years that the site would ever be so utterly annihilated by hackers.

I was at a whole new low.  It seemed as if I was destined to keep my book all to myself like some malformed mutant brother locked up in the spare room and kept alive by a diet of fish-heads.

Then in late 2010 I did Stephen Patrick Clare's C.K.D.U.'s radio show "The Book Club" while promoting Open Heart Forgery.  One of the other guest was an interesting local actor named John Alexander Baker, who'd just self-published a book called God Yes, Hell No.    

Now, although the book's subject matter wasn't exactly my cuppa joe (and there's no chance that I'd ever be able to plaster my own mug all over the cover of my book), I could see the potential in self-publication.  At least I'd be able to steer people to it if they really wanted to read it.  And although John's formatting, editing and organization was a bit cockeyed, I was still impressed by the book's overall production values and reasoned that my anal-retentive nature would ensure that I could produce a pretty decent-looking product.

Plus, John's an older guy and (I suspect ) not the most technologically savvy dude on the planet.  So, my theory was, if he could pull it off then so could I.

So, I set to work researching Kindle and CreateSpace publication routes.  My goal: to make my book available to anyone who wanted to read it by hook or by crook.

But, as you might expect, things are never quite as easy as you'd hope...         

EPIC  Here's an inspirational news report on a tremendous independent publishing success story.  Damn, I wish I'd written a book about 'tween paranormal romance instead of deathwish-obsessed berserker pirates.  Which begs the question: are only teenage girls reading en mass anymore?    



FAIL  More query letter FAIL-ures.

http://querytracker.net/forum/index.php?board=5.0

I Hit It With My Axe - Part III - My Axe, Your Sword, His Bow and Her Staff

Greetings, Bold Adventurers!

Well, after the events detailed in Part II, I just had to let some friends in on this amazing, new Dungeons & Dragons game that I'd discovered.  I needed to find someone who was appropriately nerdy and open-minded; someone who I felt comfortable broaching the subject with.  After all, D&D was starting to carry some pretty heavy societal baggage around then.  It was even getting lumped in with Satanism and Heavy Metal music, which I was also heavily into.  Er, Metal, that is, not Satanism.  Honest!  Stop looking at me that way! 

The first person I selected to baptize into my unholy order, er...my gaming circle, was my buddy Glen.  Glen was the dude who'd reintroduced me to the joys of Marvel Comics.  It's because of his patient and wise tutelage that the recent movie release of Thor carried with it a modicum of adult appeal.   

One day while we were perusing the latest issue of The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe (looking for new images to trace for our own "original" stable of superheroes), I finally worked up the courage to ask Glen if he wanted to try playing D&D with me.  I did this so sheepishly I might as well have handed him a gold- filigree invitation to a circle jerk.

"So it's like, what?  A board game?" he asked, lingering on a fetching sketch of the obscure Irish Marvel heroine Shamrock (natch!).

"No, no,"  I said.  "It's better then that.  You create a fantasy character like a fighter, a sorcerer or a thief and the Dungeon Master (that's me) guides you though a series of adventures where you fight monsters, explore dungeons, avoid traps and solve riddles."

"Uh huh," he replied, sounding supremely skeptical as he flipped the page to She-Hulk.

"Yeah, and there's no board because all the action takes place in the player's mind," I said, sounding ethereal, fanning my fingers and looking up into the buzzing florescent heavens of our Elementary School classroom.

Instantly I realized, that by quoting directly from the game box, I'd made a major tactical error.  To Glen, I probably sounded like 70's-era hippie stoner magician Doug Henning.  I'm sure the Jazz Hands certainly didn't help. 

I spent the next few days doing D&D damage control, launching into a P.R.blitz that would make the advertising juggernaut for the Transformers sequel look like ads for your local dinner theater's production of "Glee Club Dropouts".  I loaned Glen the issue of Starlog magazine containing the article that first inspired me to check out the game.  I also brought the Basic Set Player's Manual in to school and showed him some of the completed character sheets.

Eventually something clicked with him and he became unabashedly intrigued.  I probably have Larry Elmore's spectacular art to thank, since it had certainly cast a spell on me a few weeks prior.

"Yeah, okay," he reneged.  "I'll try it but I wanna play a fighter."

"Yeah, great!"  I enthused, knowing that the naturally tough and easy-to-play warrior class was a natural  choice for a beginner.

I invited him over to my place the following Saturday and spent the rest of the week designing my first dungeon.  By the time I was finished, my home-brew catacombs were rife with traps, riddles and vile undead (the living-challenged being my favorite monsters at the time).  I set up a table in my basement (Long live the stereotype!), laid out some snackage, and then went to hide my copious notes and graph-paper dungeon schematics behind a rudimentary screen so Glen couldn't see them.

But, crap...I hadn't bothered to buy an actually official cardboard screen!  What to use?
 
I ended up just using the biggest hardcover book I could find in the house: National Geographic's Romance of the Sea, a coffee table book that could actually double as a coffee table.  I split that sucker open, balanced it precariously agape, and hid my top-secret documentation just behind it.  Excepting that errant pages of the massive tome would slowly infiltrate my personal space and it threatened to collapse every four minutes, the thing worked so well that I ended up using it for years after.

The first few hours that day were spent hammering Glen's character (christened "Valain") into shape.  I was pretty generous with the character's initial statistics, reasoning that adventurers are made of sterner stuff then just the average Medieval turnip-farmer.  
                
To stress just how dangerous this crypt was, I made it very difficult for Glen's character to persuade any NPC's (that Non-player characters, BTW) to accompany him on this inaugural delve.  The only person willing (and apparently crazy enough) to venture down there with him was another fighter: a twitchy, shifty character named Saren.  Together the unlikely pair managed to drive into the heart of the dungeon, but just as soon as the duo stumbled upon a mother lode of phat lootz and magical items, Saren promptly went missing on his first watch.

And so did the lion's share of the treasure...

Glen was understandably enraged by this turn of events and I was delighted to have incited such a genuine emotional reaction from him.  Through the framework of this amazing game, my ability to weave a compelling  story and Glen's action-altering decisions, I'd managed to create a completely interactive, emotionally provocative visceral experience.  It was a resounding success!

In fact, Glen's character was so pissed off that he immediately began an obsessively thorough recruitment campaign in his home town and all the nearby hamlets.  His goal: to forge a proper adventuring fellowship to seek out and kill Saren post haste.  He eventually found another fighter who seemed curiously predisposed to a revenge mission: a pint-sized, badger-like, hot-headed soldier-for-hire named Gailen who carried a two-handed sword that was bigger then him.  Initially, Glen was decidedly leery about trusting another stranger, but when his new ally soon proved his mettle in combat, a strong bond began to grow between the two.

Soon Aleara, a geeky (but ultimately smokin' hot) sorceress, was added to the mix.  She also provided a key, previously-absent component to the group...brains.  She was adept at interpreting secret writings, solving riddles and negotiating civilly with people without it ending in inevitable eviscerations.

Then, on a trip to the BIG CITY, Valain caught a wily thief named Demetrius as he was attempting to pick his pocket.  Aware of the thief's legendary reputation, Glen offered the foot-pad a spot in his adventuring group.  With execution or imprisonment being his only choice, Demetrius the Rogue reluctantly agreed.  Cursed by a strong streak of honor, Demetrius turned his ample skills towards the noble cause and saw tremendous success.

Just as the group's final charter membership began to coalesce, Valain's old partner Saren turned up like a bad penny.  He accused Valain of abandoning him in the crypt and claimed to have absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the missing bling.  During a particularly heated parley, a fracas erupted and Aleara ended up using her 'splody burn magic on Saren's face.

Needless to say that it would be awhile before my old foil would be seen in public again. 

Next time on "I Hit It With My Axe": a new player player character ushers in my own personal Golden Age of D&D!            

EPIC SNAP  Glen, all smiles before I had to tell him that his character had been robbed completely blind...

EPIC Another decent D&D doc:



FAIL  Gawd, this movie was an insult to all things D&D.  If I recall correctly, Jeremy Irons's "performance" won the "Jack Palance Memorial Scenery Chewing Award" for 2000.  Eeeeesssshhh!

Kill Your Darlings

Aloha, Audacious Alphabetorical Art-o-philes!    

When William Faulkner wrote “You must kill your darlings” he wasn't referring to what your neighbors are thinking when your pack of Pomeranians start the act of collective barkening at 2 am in the morning.  He was referring to the nigh-heartless attitude towards editing that all good writers must learn to embrace whilst writing in flagrente as well as post prose coitus.

After my patron saint for the arts moved on to another division in the company I soon lost my dedicated weekly writing day.  In spite of this jarring leg sweep I'd seen enough progress on the book during this time to ensure that this was only the briefest of setbacks.  My momentum now was juggernaut-esque and I dedicated every free moment to completing the first draft.

When this was accomplished I wasn't quite sure what to do with my Frankenstinian creation.  I read back through it once and made some superficial corrections and improvement.  I showed it to a couple of  people.  And then...nothing.

It went to fallow for a long time until I discovered the aforementioned Stephen King memoir On Writing.  After voraciously devouring that book, I discovered to my giddy thrill that I was already practicing quite a bit of what King suggested neophyte writers do.  I also uncovered some truly fantastic tips that made the process of Darling-euthanasia fairly painless.     

Here's a list of his biggest Do's and Don't and my own personal take on whether not I was already a practitioner, if I adopted his advice or chose to avoid the suggestion like the plague.  Ready?  Okay, here we go!

1. Write What You Know and Tell The Truth  This is some solid advice right here.  I followed it in the sense that I was already quite familiar with Greek and Shakespearean tragedy as well as Medieval history.  Granted,  I didn't know a lot about the aristocracy of Italian city-states in the Middle Ages, but I researched what I needed and since my book is historic fantasy, I fudged the rest.  I was also pretty comfortable (as most of us would be) writing about familial dynamics.  King goes on to make an encouraging point: just because you've spent your entire life as a chartered accountant doesn't mean that you shouldn't write a sci-fi novel.  Just consider the possibility of writing about chartered accountancy...IN SPACE!!!  After all, most readers are looking for "echoes of their own lives and experiences" while reading a book.  I thinks this goes to great lengths to explain why I tend to fly though contemporary novels and often drag ass when reading the average fantasy book.  It's usually because so many works of fantasy don't really bother to include anything relevant to the life a modern-day person. 
2. Adjectives and adverbs suck.  Amen, brotha!  Writing something like:  "Adele had petulant eyebrows" not only sounds gut-bustingly awful it's also shamelessly lazy.  If Adele is supposed to be petulant, show her being petulant in behavior not on her forehead.  
3. Beware of Crappy Metaphors and Similes  I was initially quite guilty of this and I think a lot of budding writers suffer through an unfortunate bout of this as well.  In order to prove that they're "lee-jit-uh-mit" writers, a lot of folks will do the literary equivalent of jumping up and down, waving semaphore flags and screaming: "Hey!  Lookit me!  I'm a writer!  I've got style!  Look at how clever I am!"  Well, I hate to break it to you, Beulah May, but when you write stuff like "Bob fought like a jackal" (or worse: "Bob fought like a deranged jackal") you actually look like a schmuck.  Go sit down...James Joyce hates you now.          
4. Speed Doesn't Kill, Bad Dialogue Does  This could be the hardest thing for inexperienced writers to do properly and it's often virtually impossible to improve.  It's also, as it should be, a literary deal-breaker. Your either gonna be able to write good dialogue right now or you can't.  The main reason for crappy dialogue is often the writer's own social inexperience and ineptitude.  If you haven't been around a lot of different people in your lifetime and were weaned on network television, your characters are likely gonna sound like a bunch of maladjusted shut-ins.  Or, even worse, they'll all sound the same.  King makes the observation that even a descriptive genius like H.P.Lovecraft was wretched with dialogue.  As soon as he stopped cataloging the thirty-third tentacle on the unspeakable horror approaching the narrator and that character had to actually verbalize something, fuggedaboutit.  Speech by rural characters or characters of race were particularly wince-inducing.  Frankly, Lovecraft makes George Lucas look like Aaron Sorkin.  Now, although I grew up a somewhat shy and sheltered kid, my self-induced tenure in university residence and then immersion in two massive call centers soon allowed me to develop a good ear for realistic, naturally-flowing dialogue.  Even when I decided to make my characters sound contemporary to appeal to modern-day readers, I still had to ensure that they  actually sounded like real human beings communicating naturally with one another.  In fact, if I'd stuck with a "Middle English" mode of speech it would have been easier to pull of since most people wouldn't have had a clue what they were saying to one another.  But that kinda defeats the purpose, doesn't it?  One bit of good news: if you follow King's advice to "write a lot and read a lot", eventually your dialogue-writing capabilities should improve. 
5. Be Conscious of Showy Literary Gimmicks  This sort of dovetails with Point # 3, but in a way it's worse because it usually eats up a ton of unnecessary space.  Once again, you usually see this coming from a rookie novelist who's trying too hard to impress people by trotting out the literary lug nuts in his or her stylistic toolbox.  Even the Mighty King has been guilty of this one as anyone who's ever read Carrie can testify.  King's first published novel is chock-a-block with showy newspaper clippings and diary entries.  Frankly, the time spent on such gimmicky things would have been w-a-a-a-a-a-y better spent on developing the main character in the book's "here and now".  Mercifully I'd manged to steer completely clear of anything like this in my own book.  The closest I came was in Chapter Forty when I had the Rogues speak only in dialogue to one another to see if readers could discern who was saying what to whom.  It was a simple, Hemmingway-like experiment to see if I'd done my job as a writer to make each character's voice sound unique and identifiable.  Best part about it: it actually decreased the book's page count, not increased it.
6. Symbolism ISN'T One of Those Gimmicks  In fact, it's an awesome tool to help re-enforce your theme, increase repeat reader appeal and give your audience some unconscious tasty bits for their brains to gnaw on.  In my book I took my dedication to symbolism quite...um...literally.  The number three features prominently in the book and it ties into the Triple Sword sigil and the 'Strength, Wisdom, Courage' mantra that no less then three major powers are all vying for.  I could go on but I've already said too much...
7. Two Drafts and a Polish Should Do...Not!  I actually went a wee bit further.  Actually, I went a lot further.  I read through it, made any glaringly obvious corrections, followed the procedure laid out in Step # 12, made corrections and revisions based on their feedback, and then did something totally nuts.  I re-read every passage of the book, out loud, four times in quick succession.  The neighbors probably thought I'd gone loopy, but by the time I was done, any wonky descriptions, tinny bits of dialogue and gratuitous adverbage had been exorcised.  Basically, I wanted to eliminate any passages that might cause me to trip up if I ever had the privilege of reading the book in public.  Remember: Your Darlings.   Kill 'em with impunity.  
8. Finish First Draft Before Waving It Around  In retrospect, the dude at the Nova Scotia Writer's Federation actually gave me some solid advice here.  Make sure the first draft of your book is completed to your personal satisfaction before letting anyone else paw all over it.  This will ensure that, at the very least, it's free from undue influence and the oft-corrupting powers of committee decision.  No matter what you say about it initially at least it's still the product of one clarion voice. 
9. Give It A Six-Week Burial  After that first draft is done, put it away for at least six weeks.  Go work on something else.  Clear your head.  Forget about THE BEAST in the desk drawer.  King maintains that time and distance will allow you to tackle the book with fresh eyes and make the Darling-related executions far less painful.  Lord know I followed this advice but I think I did six years instead of six weeks. Yeah, don't do that, BTW.
10. Editorial Book-Keeping  When you sit down to do your first edit, make sure you're equipped with a pen and separate pad of paper.  Record page number, line reference and the desired or suggested correction.  Personally, I didn't do this for my own first edit, I just made changes right in the manuscript. Having said that, one of my trusted volunteer readers/guinea pigs adopted this fastidious strategy all by herself and, bless her heart, it turned out to be ludicrously helpful.
11. "Plot Hole!  'Roit Ahead!"  Be on the lookout for plot holes so gapingly big you can drive a Mack Truck through 'em.  Someone once said that "if there's a gun that's described over the mantelpiece in Chapter One is has to be fired by the end of the book".  'Nuff said.
12. "*PSSST!*  Wanna See My Captain's Log?  Show your beloved tome to two or three trusted friends. These people should represent your ideal reader but also stand in as fair and constructive critics.  Hell, I even subjected my three test subjects to a friggin' survey!  King suggests that this process be fairly democratic and I mostly concur with him.  Now, I don't believe that your readers should dictate major elements of your story, but if you hear the same concerns over and over again you seriously need to look at changes.  For example: if one reader loved the way a character was miraculously redeemed at the end of the book and another hated it, consider it a draw.  However, if everyone surveyed thought that it was completely improbable, you may want to do a few revisions.  One major caveat: if in doubt, make sure that your novel doesn't become the equivalent of a "choose-your-own-adventure" book.  Too many good movies are homogenized and subsequently ruined this way.  If you decide to alter your original ending just make it's not because someone said: "Well I just wanted it to be happier" or "I wanted the hero to end up with the girl".  Frankly, most people are unhealthily enamored with convention.  If they want something that white-bread, encourage them to watch reruns of  7'th Heaven.
13. "Get Along, Little Plotty, Get along!"  Have your test readers really pay attention to the book's pacing.  Again, this is very important if your book is loosely plotted since the danger of meandering is considerably higher.  As I've previously detailed, before sitting down to write I'd always jot down a one-sentence description of what I wanted to see happen in the next chapter in order to drive the story onward.  I think this tactic kept me pretty well on course based on the feedback I've received thus far.
14. Second Draft Is The First Draft Minus 10%  Again, this is more appropriate for authors who write without plotting.  This is not to say that I didn't mercilessly cut, hack, chop, jettison, raze and demolish Kaiju-style anything that failed to serve the plot.  Remember, don't be afraid to push your Darlings down the steps and then kick them in the sternum a few times to make sure you've properly killed them.
15. Flashbacks are Boring  King follows this up with the following truism: what will happen is always more important then what has happened.  If you don't believe me, just have a look at those crappy Star Wars prequels.  As King puts it ever so delicately: everyone has a history, unfortunately, most of it isn't very interesting.  In my book, there were a few times in which I had to resort to a super-brief flashback for the sake of story economy but it didn't happen very often.  I'm a big proponent of the old writing adage:  show, don't tell.        

I'm tellin' ya, fellow fledgling writers...this is some Grade-A solid advice right here.  Seek out On Writing.  Read it.  Embrace it.  Become one with it.         

You'll thanks me later.

EPIC  The invaluable tome in question:

       
HILARIOUSLY EPIC:  Comedian Patton Oswalt illustrates what will happen is always more important then what has happened in the only way he can.  WARNING: not suitable to work.  Like, at all.      



FAIL  Bad dialogue is everywhere.  Do your best not to contribute to it's proliferation!

http://www.ew.com/ew/gallery/0,,20174698_20399906,00.html

Saviour

And a Fine Mahok To You, Hallowed Reader!

Before I start prattling on about the editing of my book, I wanted to discuss something that, technically, should have been covered in my previous entry about the challenges that writers face.  It's a biggie, so I thought it deserved it's own separate mention.  It's a big, hairy bugbear that stands directly in your path like a bully and pushes you down on your well-intentioned ass.

That challenge is TIME.

For most creative types who work a full time job, time is most assuredly not on your side.  There's the time you allocate getting ready for work, there the time you burn getting to work, there's the time you spend actually at work, and then there's the time you waste getting back home.  Add in various other errands, chores, and responsibilities and it's little wonder why aspiring writers don't just say f#@% it, fire up the ole' X-Box and then spaz out in a virtual world where they actually feel like they're accomplishing something.

And perish forbid if you've got kids to take care of.  Maybe one day when I'm independently wealthy as a self-employed writer I'll consider replication but until then I'm gonna avoid parenthood like the movie Zookeeper.   

I say that not to be miserable, but because it's the way it should be.  It's been my experience that people who hesitate to have kids (and actually ponder the ramifications of parenthood) are the one who actually  should be having kids.  As I've stated clearly right here, as far as I'm concerned, as soon as you start spurting out mini-me's you're livin' for someone else from there on in.  IMHO, your feeble, bulls#!^ self-concern should be as dead as acid wash jeans.

Now, mercifully, around the time I began the book in earnest I also became convinced that T.V. was a vast, time-sucking wasteland.  Like Steven King says, if you've got the time to watch crap like Sarah Palin's Alaska then you've got time to write. 

Indeed both of us are in complete agreement when he records in his memoir On Writing that in order to be a good scribe you have to do two things: read a lot and write a lot.

Although my idiot box was collecting a lot of dust at the time, I wasn't really reading as much as I should have. This is a character flaw in me that I struggle with to this day.  I either blow through a book in a few days (usually anything contemporary and written by Irvine Welsh, Chuck Palahniuk or Douglas Coupland) or it takes forever (witness my recent experience with Pillars of the Earth) or I just abandon the damned thing because I'm bored with it.

Okay, let's all swear this right now, Determined Readers: "I hereby do solemnly pledge that I shall emancipate myself from the Plasma/LCD teat and read at least four books a year.  We'll DYB, DYB, DYB, DYB and we'll DOB DOB, DOB.  Hey, nonny, nonny, etc, etc."

After all, according to Unca Steve: "A day without a book is like a day without sunshine", and let me tell ya, folks, us poor Vitamin-D/Spring-deprived slobs on the East Coast here really know what it's like to be livin' without sunshine lately.  I swear to God I'm developing Rickets.        

Although I was slack with the reading, I tried to write whenever I could.  Between calls at work.  When I was left alone at a coffee shop.  After being abandoned by my wife in a mall and turning up at the Lost n' Found looking dazed and frightened.  If I was left home alone for a time.  Any moment of peace I had I'd endeavor to compose a spot o' prose.

Trouble was, these moments were fleeting.  The opportunities weren't consistent enough and huge stretches of semi-abandonment threatened to occur.  As a result, the process began to drag.  Things got worse after the whole Sears debacle.  In September 2000 I started a new full-time job with a major American office supply vendor.  I don't want to give away their name but it rhymes with an ancient southern Italian city close to Mount Vesuvius.  Called Naples.

The fixed nature of the nine-to-five, Monday-to-Friday, forty-three hour a week job dove-tailed very nicely with my wife's schedule, but now I didn't have any randomly scheduled middle-of-the-week days off when I could work on my book.  As my life became more regimented by this new job my opportunities to spend time at home working on the book began to fall by the wayside.  Despair and desperation began to set in and I secretly feared that it would never be finished.    

Before I started this new gig I spoke to people working there to see if they could give me the inside scoop on what managers were good to work for and which ones were Coo-Coo for Cocoa Puffs.  I'd used this same tactic in university to find out which Intro Philosophy profs would force you to mathematically chart arguments and which ones would play audio tapes of Monty Python skits.  

My future co-workers/moles put in a good word for me and said in no uncertain terms that the team I wanted to be on was Linda Shaughnessy's.  As soon as met her I instantly knew why.  Linda was possessed of a warm disposition, a creative soul and a genuine desire to keep her people as happy as possible in such a challenging environment.

As such, a year or so later when we were in the middle of my performance review we somehow got on the topic of art.  I may have mentioned my Dad's paintings at the time and I was impressed to learn that she also liked to paint.  Then, of course, came the inevitable question:

"So, do you have any artistic talent yourself?" she quizzed.

After I got over the initial shock of her not asking: 'So, what do you paint?' I spilled the beans about my book.  Right off the bat, Linda was inordinately sympathetic to my plight.  A few days later, after I brought my MONSTER IN A BOX in to show a few people, she took me into her office and told me:

'Look, if I get you some extra time every week, do you think you can finish it?' she asked.

'Yes!', I shouted, throwing her for a loop.  'You're darned tootin' I can!'

I could scarcely conceive that this gracious lady was going to bat for me over what a lesser manager would likely make fun of.  I was even more shell-shocked next week when she took me aside and said:

'Look, David, I managed to get your shift adjusted.  From here on in you'll only work Monday to Thursday.  You'll have Fridays off to work on your book.'

I was so happy I think I cartwheeled out of her office.  Knowing what she'd likely gone through to procure this privilege for me, I vowed then and there not to squander my rare opportunity.

That Friday I used my newly borrowed time to attack the nigh-dormant manuscript.  The consistent effort of that day and many that followed really helped the book's narrative flow take off.

I can say in all confidence that my book would never have been completed without this woman's charitable intervention and for that I will be eternally grateful.  Needless to say, when it came time to design the paperback's Dedication Page, I made sure Linda's name was included:

For Linda Shaughnessy for understanding the importance of creative needs over business needs.

EPIC  To get a jump on our minimum "Four Books A Year" pledge, here are four contemporary books that I positively flew through:



FAIL  What the eff is Rosario Awesome doing in this cinematic turd?!?