THIS is a great interview with the always fantastic, Ken Sparling.
Wonder Lust Zine, courtesy of Riley Michael Parker and two other "fellas" are accepting submissions for both online and print material. Submit to wonderlustzine@yahoo.com Parker has done some cool little chapbooks, so expect whatever he's got up his sleeve to be pretty cool.
To be honest, I've been kinda down. This could be partly due to the massive clumping of rejection letters lately, but also in part to the bad news I've been hearing and reading about the world of writing. I'm generally pretty optimistic about the writing universe. I think great things are happening all over. But sometimes there are bleak periods before the light shines through and I feel like that's where we are. It's hard to have something you want so bad to be in such a crappy state, it gives being at a cruddy real job an even duller sheen. It also doesn't help when you're student loans extort $150 just to get a four month hiatus from them harassing you. It also doesn't help when those people don't seem to understand that you can't just pull $150 from your ass.
Holy rant.
I thought it would be fun to come up with a list of things I would like to have my next job not require of me:
-I don't want to clean up after others. I clean up after myself, isn't that enough?
-I don't want to deal with other people's kids, especially when they're having tantrums. I have my own kids, with tantrums of their own.
-I want to be able to go to the bathroom when I need to. Waiting for customers to leave to go pee is ridiculous, but then again I don't trust anybody to not steal something If I slip into the back room for a minute.
-Ideally, I'd like a boss who's logical. 'Nuff said.
That was kind of fun, huh? (I'll probably think of a thousand more by the end of lunch)
I like your rant.
ReplyDeleteRe: rejections. I just got a rejection for a non-fiction piece I am trying to sell, i.e., make money at writing (!!!!), something I haven't done or tried to do for a while because it's too HORRIBLE. Worst is, I slaved over on the pitch and submitted it first to the place I thought had the best chance of taking it. One hour later I get an email saying they'll read it if I write it on spec. Do I want to slave over this piece on spec so that someone (one mag) might read it and most likely let's face it, reject it, so then I've got a feature piece sitting around looking at its own pretty self? No. No. No. Life is TOO short. And it's not like writing fiction where I can justify it because it's fun. Mostly. Sigh. Apart from rejections. Ah, rejections....
I just added a rant to your rant. I don't think that's what comments sections are supposed to be for. Ah well.
Keep on ranting.
my comments section has no rules :)
ReplyDeletere: non-fiction... that's a tricky game. before my hard drive died i had manuscript for a memoir about my time doing construction in the arctic, and i had been sending queries all over the place. i got the most varied rejections i've ever received. one said the topic was great but the writing was horrible, another said the writing was great but that the topic didn't fit their needs. non-fiction is definitely a different game, i think. there seem to be more preconceived ideas about what the "voice" should be like. maybe i'm wrong, but that's what i gathered from my experiences.
I'm glad (re: no rules)!
ReplyDeleteSounds like an interesting memoir you have/ had? there. I haven't tried to sell a nonfiction book, although it's something I might try in the future. I used to write the odd article, but it's so much work as a lowly freelancer, trying to pitch things and coming up against people who basically only want to work with people they've worked with before, never mind what the writing is like.
That was my experience anyway. But I don't think I'm built to be a writer of articles either, at least not for most mainstream publications. I don't enjoy having to present a logical argument and pretend that I think I'm right. But I'm coming around to the idea of memoir / autobio... There's some interesting ones around, one of them Molly had on her blog a while back, David Shields, Enough About You I think it's called.
I like your writing about bookstore customers. I used to work at a psychology and therapy bookstore. Hell on earth.
psychology and therapy? that's a heavy bookstore!
ReplyDeletesome of my favorite fiction writers have written memoirs like Pete Fromm and Craig Lesley. i've written the odd memoir-ish essay, but have never done anything with them. the arctic thing just seemed like it would be an interesting book because i was working there during some tumult for the pipeline.
All kinds of crazies in that place!
ReplyDeleteI don't know those writers. I'll look them up... Any plans to go back to the Arctic memoir?
Oh, there they are on your blogroll....
ReplyDeletei don't know. i've only been able to recover about a tenth of it, and i also lost a lot of the photos i took up there. maybe i'll just use all the craziness for fiction pieces... we'll see :)
ReplyDelete