Ann Anderson's Blog

How lucky I was to grow up pre-Internet, to be shoved into literacy by the absence of shiny electronic objects. I was a reader from the get-go. Props to my late mother who took me to the library every Saturday. We read because that's what there was to do.

I recall a 3-day bout of flu when I was 13, spent not altogether unpleasantly in the company of The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters, an exciting but wordy tome I doubt many 13-year-olds would find appealing now.

Today I have to carve out time for reading. Back then, there was all the time in the world. I read because my parents read. Our house was as quiet as a library after dinner, and there was no such thing as "age appropriate" reading. If I could read it, it was allowed, and as far as I can tell, casting a juvenile eye on Lolita did not turn me into a weirdo.

Lord knows I'm addicted to the Internet, but there's no substitute for losing myself in a really great novel, or even a merely entertaining one. The Internet will amuse you, but a book will feed you.

My tastes are eclectic. I like some of the classics but not all. I tried Dostoyevsky. He's not for me. Edith Wharton I can read all day.

Life's too short to read a book you don't enjoy. Just read. Read like it's 1964.

Thou Shalt Not Offend the Advertisers

What, you thought magazines are on the racks to to deliver interesting, informative content to readers?

Sadly, no.

Magazines are on the racks to deliver eyeballs to advertisers.

This fact of publishing has been true ever since the end of the 19th century when magazines were invented.

F.G. Kinsman, a bottler of patent medicine (read “snake oil”), realized that any blank sheet of paper could be used for advertising. To that end, he invented a religious magazine for the purpose of including ads for his products.

In one genius stroke, Kinsman married advertising to respectability. Publishers, aware of Kinsman’s phenomenal success, created Harper’s Magazine, Atlantic Monthly, Ladies’ Home Journal, Collier’s, Saturday Evening Post and others specifically to embed ads within the pages.*

Magazines live or die on advertising, and advertisers are notoriously thin-skinned. Any hint of controversy, however mild, remote or indirect, makes advertisers as jumpy as cats. And when advertisers are unhappy, editors give the next job to some other freelancer.

(I refer mostly to the middle-of-the-road commercial fare you see at supermarkets, but every publication has its taboos, even the “edgy” ones.)

Writing for magazines is but one path a writer can take. I’ve been down that road, and I can tell you this:

If you’re pitching an article, your query’s personal style may win you the job, but be prepared to see every bit of your personality erased later on.

“Oh, we love your sense of humor,” was the comment I usually received after handing in the first draft. After editing, I realized they meant, “We had a good laugh here in the office. We have no intention of publishing your humorous but potentially troublesome quips.”

When you write for magazines, check your personality at the door. You’ve been hired to be the voice of that corporate entity. And if corporations are people, too, they’re the boring, easily offended kind.

Your keywords are these: bland, inoffensive.

Study the magazine if you wish to include your prose within its pages. Study the tone. Mimic it. Cash the paycheck.** Then do your creative writing happily and well-fed.


*I quote myself, from Snake Oil, Hustlers and Hambones: The American Medicine Show, McFarland & Co. Publishers, 2000.


** That’s assuming you receive the paycheck, the topic for my #Mondayblog on annandersonwriter.com.

This is a shout-out to writers with a completed manuscript who are wondering whether to seek an agent. Should you? Hard to say, but decisions are best made with lots of information, so I offer my experience and insights, such as they are.

I wrote a YA manuscript, did the query thing and signed with a well-respected New York literary agency.

Not gonna lie, I was so thrilled to be validated by a book industry pro that I worked “my agent” into every other conversation.

This is what happened:

She sent my mss. out to the majors. We got a nibble from Penguin but ultimately no offer.

I started and abandoned several other projects—attempts to regain my agent’s attention, which drifted off at about the six month mark. Most agents will tell you they’re in it for the long haul, that they want to develop your career. In fairness, I think they mean it when they say it, but that’s not the reality of the book business.

Agents need to make deals, and if it’s not with you then off they go to find a revenue-producing client. I don’t blame them one bit. This is a business, after all.

But here’s the thing: There are more publishers than the Big Six, and many of them will entertain a query from an unagented author. And here’s the main thing: Querying publishers is the exact same process as querying agents.

So, if you’re okay with a lower-tier publisher, why not approach someone who can actually offer a book contract? It worked for me, and I’m thrilled to be in the Solstice Publishing family.

Keep writing, keep on marketing, and best of luck!

Hi All,

Miss me? Of course not. That's the thing about social media - you can show up or not, but don't expect anyone to register your absence.

Which brings me to marketing: You gotta do it - if you want eyeballs on your book, that is. Are there any authors who enjoy marketing? If that's you, please let me know. I'm doing my best to enjoy it this time, and so far, so good.

My strategy is making personal connections, so howdy handsome stranger! If I put my concentration on making friends instead of sales, I think I can do this.

("This" by the way, is the marketing of my soon-to-be-released YA title FOUR CHAMBERS, from the good folks at Solstice Publishing.)

Regards,
Ann

We all know (or should) that celebrities aren’t as good-looking in person as they appear in print and in pixels. Photoshop is everywhere, even in our very own publicity shots, right Goodreadsians?

Quick story about the early days of Photoshop: My husband was directing a publicity shoot for a movie; female star would not emerge from the trailer. Sez husband, “No problem, I’ll build the photo digitally.” She didn’t know what that meant, but it made her nervous so she came out and did the shoot.

Warning: Photoshop is a tool. It’s value depends on its use. It can be heinous in the wrong hands. Exhibit A:

http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/52-worst...

Exhibit B:

http://tinyurl.com/mjqvs8q

My as-yet-untitled two-line, one-act play based on a true conversation:

Scene: Dance studio
Student: (leafs through a supermarket tabloid) People say I look like Drew Barrymore. (sighs) I wish.
Me (If I may suggest casting me in the role of Me): Drew Barrymore wishes she looked like Drew Barrymore.
. . . aaaand scene.

There are a ton of before and after sites for your schadenfreude pleasure. Google Bad Photoshop and snark away.

Another prom season has come and gone. All that remains of overdone hairdos and dicey wardrobe choices are photos and YouTube clips.

The high school prom has been a fixture of teenage life since the 1930s, hanging in through seismic changes in American culture. Currently, the event is roaring along as never before.

The Millennial generation embraces the custom without a trace of irony and has added a couple of new wrinkles. They often go to the prom in party buses that hold 40 or more. Attending as a herd lowers expectations and makes the evening less fraught for all concerned.

For those who want to pair up, the so-called promposal is de rigeur. Serious male prom-goers create a moment of high, high school drama.

A promposal is the transformation of a simple question (Will you go to the prom with me?) into a major production. It developed in parallel with the modern marriage proposal (hence the conflation of terms), which is often elaborate, rehearsed and posted on social media.

A promposal doesn’t have to be expensively produced, but it must be original—and preferably public. The asker not only showcases his creative chops, he forces the askee into a corner—only a churlish promzilla would refuse a well-staged invitation. A successful promposal is an offer she can’t refuse.

Videos, lunch room performances, classroom serenades, assembly presentations; a proper promposal is crafted with YouTube in mind. I understand the impulse: If you go to that much trouble, you want some love—and not just from your prom date.

To learn more about the prom, see High School Prom: Marketing, Morals and the American Teen.
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15...

Promposal examples:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RlUaFc...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUrGul...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dgk2BB...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGRzV0...

I’ve been using my fancy Homo Sapien prefrontal cortex to ponder how Twitter has turned me into a pellet-seeking lab rat.

I had no reason to join Twitter until it was time to gain a toehold in the world of Big Time Publishing, an effort that’s ongoing. I’m refining my play as I go, mostly by imitating people who’ve been playing the game for a while. Hence Twitter, essential component of the total marketing package.

Twitter: The name rankles—annoying use of onomatopoeia and too precious by half. Joining was like walking into the main terminal of a big foreign airport. So many people, where to go? Whom to approach? Why is everyone talking at once?

A few so-called followers turned into a few more, and that felt like a victory, which made me feel stupid for caring how many followers I have. Sometimes follower, sometimes the followed, I’m staring at myself in a fun house mirror, and it’s hard to look away because the site is so hypnotic.

Five minutes on Twitter melts into twenty, and although my full attention is fixed on the screen, not a single tweet sticks in my head. Read this, now this, now this.

Twitter provides more places to click, click, click. Favorites, retweets, DMs! A new inbox! Click click click. Read this, now this, now this. I fall into a Twitter trance. Rat brain want pellet. Smart rat push lever. Pellet! click click click

New tweet every second. Tweet-Mississippi, tweet-Mississippi, click click click. New followers! :-) Pellet, pellet! click click click, reply! click click click! No pellets? :-(

Click Goodreads. Blog views! click click click, Facebook likes! click click . . . pellet! pellet! . . . click-click, click-click . . .

@Andersonista
Thanks for your time.

Aging is like reducing a sauce: You become a more concentrated version of yourself as you go along. The sweet become sweeter, complainers turn into sour-faced cranks. It's always possible to make an attitude adjustment, but it's harder as time goes by. 

Complaining makes wrinkles. Your mother was right—if you keep making that face, it will freeze that way. There are a few stony curmudgeons who frequent my neighborhood rec center. When they point their angry mugs in my direction, I feel I'm being reproached, but it's nothing personal. They're not aware of their negativity any more than a goldfish thinks about the water in its bowl. 

I spend a lot of time with older people, perhaps because I am one—but only technically. In my head I'm still 16, which is why the woman in the mirror shocks me every time I see her. Who is that crone, and what has she done to my eyelids?

I have more energy and enthusiasm now than when I was a high school junior. That was my mopey, disaffected stage. (It lasted far too long, but that's another blog.) I'm finally having the adolescence I should have had; carefree, healthy and active. 

I take advantage of the 55+ swim at the county pool because it's the least crowded time, and I qualify. A few of us swim laps. Some put on floaty devices and congregate in clumps. They bob and bitch, mostly about medical procedures—usually their own, but someone else's hip replacement will do in a lull. Sometimes I think the purpose of modern medicine is to keep people alive so they can talk about their surgeries. 

I work with a group of library volunteers who sometimes indulge in medical gossip, but not as a recurring theme. They read. Their minds are occupied with interesting things, and bless their pointy grey heads for that. It's a big, wide, wonderful world out there—lots to think about besides body issues.

We all have a right to be fascinated by our own physical processes, but do let's use our inside voices, the one in our heads that other people can't hear. 

Thanks for the eyeball time. Find me on Twitter, and I'll follow you back. @Andersonista ;-)

A hundred years ago, snake oil salesmen roamed the countryside, staging shows and selling phony cures. Medicine shows were the precursor to TV commercials; the tradition of packaging entertainment with sales pitches goes back to the Middle Ages. Med show hucksters often made their potions in hotel bathtubs, and they used alcohol, laudanum, cocaine and other mood-altering drugs that were legal at the time. Their stuff didn't cure anybody, but consumers definitely felt better for a little while.

Today's medicine pitches are on TV, and although the medium is different, the message is the same. (Ask your doctor what SydeFX can do for you.)

Christine Daniels, a self-styled doctor and minister, recently went to jail for selling a potion to cancer patients. Her proprietary blend of tanning oil and beef broth cured nothing but her lack of cash, and at least one of her customers died. It's not surprising that some people took her seriously. She was a doctor and a woman of God, who identified herself as such . . . on Teevee!

Electronic media hasn't made consumers smarter. TV delivers eyeballs to hustlers, and it does so very efficiently. Everyone occasionally buys stuff they don't need or really want because they were temporarily persuaded that the thing would make their lives better. I fault no one for making that calculation.

Everyone's weak spot is the same. It's called wanting; a strong desire will overcome rational defenses every time. You may have a wall of sales resistance a foot thick, but there's a chink in it somewhere, and that's what all those marketers who gather your online info are working to find. They know what you want: to be thinner, sexier, richer . . . happier.

I wrote a book on medicine shows, and I still get suckered. In the wee hours, when TV and insomnia are my best pals, I sometimes watch infomercials. It's a bad combo, sleeplessness and TV; I'm at my most vulnerable. Good thing I'm too tired to actually reach for the credit card because the dietary supplement that's guaranteed to whittle my waist and change my life looks like a must-have at 2 a.m.

So that's your caveat, Dear Emptors. Keep your guard up. The pitches are more sophisticated than they used to be, but we aren't. Especially at 2 in the morning.

For more on medicine shows, see Snake Oil, Hustlers and Hambones: The American Medicine Show.
http://tinyurl.com/ls5jqhc

Have you seen the story about the dangers of swimming pools? It started on the Interwebs and migrated to TV news. Now everyone has picked it up, which I guess means we're supposed to pay attention. The big scare? There’s fecal matter in the water!

I just came from the pool where I swim laps thrice weekly, and nothing is going to keep me from it. The water is sparkling. (And a big thumbs up to the good people at Wash. County Oregon Parks and Rec.)

What the story didn’t say is that there’s fecal matter everywhere, even your dinner plate. This is Planet Earth, and everybody poops. We shed microscopic bits of ourselves everywhere, all day long. We swim in a sea of nasty particles, and we (meaning humanity) have been doing it for a while now. Remember that old saying, you have to eat a peck of dirt before you die? You don’t have to, but you probably will.

You’re going to die of something someday, but a regular swim will likely not be your proximate cause of death. (Unless you drown.)

As for the so called news item: Fecal matter.