Posted on 12/31/2008 3:47:03 PM PST by Vendek
I collaborated with the late James A. Michener on his South African novel, The Covenant and later went on to write my own epic on Brazil.
My plan for A Novel of America is to follow the same plan Jim Michener and I used in crafting our books, with a key difference of letting these multilayered tasks unfold on the Web.
Much of my work is presented blog-style: current entries reflect a search for ideas big and small that will inspire and shape my story of America.
As I go along, I share "Working Notes," "Research Links," "Images" and "Maps" with readers. When I begin the writing, I will post regular drafts. I invite readers to share their thoughts and suggestions, much as Jim Michener did with his drafts.
I see this project as part of the long transition between traditional books and literary concepts of the future, aspects of which I discuss in The Bridge, a companion blog to A Novel of America.
I find myself thinking of one of my great heroes: DeWitt Wallace, founder of Reader’s Digest. – I was an international editor with the Digest for more than a decade. -- Back in the days when Wallace worked in a basement office under a Greenwich Village speakeasy, traditionalists scoffed at his little magazine. Today, I can imagine DeWitt Wallace grabbing the tools of the Web to find a new path of “lasting interest!”
A Novel of America is in the same spirit, experimental, exciting and challenging, and surely takes me out of the attic and into the public eye of my adopted homeland!
I’ll be reading all updates.
Added it to my favorites list and will stay current with your work, but be warned conservatives are AWOL on the arts.
Thanks for posting this. I will check this out every so often. There is a lot of info on that site.
Not this conservative. I'm an agented novelist myself, not yet published but am confident I will be once I finish the current thriller. I gotta tell you I eagerly look forward to following the progress on this project.
MM (in TX)
Thanks for posting this. I have bookmarked your links and will be paying close attention.
Happy New Year.
Bump
“agented novelist”
What does that mean?
I smile quietly in response, Mississippi Man :-))
In my days as a Digest editor, I often marveled at the cutting-edge subjects covered in our “conservative” magazine.
Jim Michener, too, was often dismissed by critics who mocked his style. Yet a great swath of Middle America and the world beyond waited eagerly for every epic!
[Now back to the kitchen and the cutting board for New Year’s Eve dinner! A toast to one and all!!)
BUMP!
I saved the web site for keeping myself updated.
Thanks for posting this.
What does that mean?
I'm a novelist who has secured an agent to represent me, but I'm not yet published. (Just getting representation often takes many years.)
MM (in TX)
Jim Michener, too, was often dismissed by critics who mocked his style. Yet a great swath of Middle America and the world beyond waited eagerly for every epic!
When a well-known critic likes a book, there's a good chance I won't. I have no experience within the world of book publishing, but it's easy to see that it's dominated by liberal elitists.
How did you break into the realm of the published?
MM (in TX)
Yeah, good literature is ‘elitist’, fer shore. Good luck to you.
“I’m a novelist who has secured an agent to represent me, but I’m not yet published. “
I think I see what you mean. The agent likes your work and believes he can sell it, even though you haven’t been published yet.
Exactly. While there are exceptions, as a general rule it's nearly impossible for a writer to get the attention of a major publisher without an agent. Publishing houses get truckloads of unsolicited manuscripts, referred to as the slush pile, and the vast vast majority of them are utter garbage. As a result, even if your manuscript does get picked out of the slush pile by one of the publisher's readers, reality is that they're expecting it to be garbage before they read the first word. Having your work submitted to a specific editor by a fellow publishing professional adds credibility and makes it much more likely that the manuscript will get a fair reading.
Agents are hard to get because the vast vast majority of manuscripts submitted to them are utter garbage, too. :-)
And lest I forget, all the difficulty outlined above is exacerbated if the work contains any kind of conservative element, because as a whole the publishing industry is uber-liberal.
I fought the fight hard for years and decided to break from it for a couple years. The tech thriller I'm working on right now will be my best ever and I'm hopeful that it's the one that gets picked up.
MM (in TX)
I have written for a relatively small publication in the past and have also toyed around with writing a novel but haven’t gotten serious yet. A novel is way more work than most people realize. I admire your determination.
I think I understand what you mean about the lack of quality submissions. I have been to writer’s groups and it’s pretty sad to see some of the stuff people bring. They think they have written a best-seller and it reads like someone who didn’t finish high school.
I was not aware of the anti-conservative bias in the industry but it is not surprising. The libs have taken over most every form of artistic expression in our society.
Good luck to you in your writing career.
I've published perhaps fifty pieces in various national magazines, journals, reference works, etc., all dealing with technology. Fiction is my passion, though, as a writer. To me there's nothing more satisfying than creating a whole new world that I'm then able to share with someone else.
They think they have written a best-seller and it reads like someone who didn’t finish high school. Amen. I'm always amazed at how totally separated from reality people can become when chasing a dream. I've seen what you mention, a thousand times. You can see the same phenomenon in action each year on American Idol, people who sincerely believe they are star material when in reality they should never sing outside the shower unless they're making a joyful noise unto the Lord.
Perhaps the saddest aspect of all this is the fact that these people spend years chasing [insert appropriate dream here] and not one soul around them ever says, "Man, I love you, but you can't sing/write/dance/whatever. Figure out the gifts that God DID give you and make the most of them instead of wasting your life chasing something you have no chance of achieving." I think this is yet one more byproduct of a society more concerned with "self esteem" than reality. From childhood, people are told "you can be whatever you want to be," and that's just not true. Oh well, now I'm getting long-winded, LOL.
Thanks!
MM
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