The future is here. Do novels still matter?

This is an advice letter sent to those — like me — who participate in this year’s National Novel Writing month. No, I haven’t gotten anywhere near my goal yet. It’s the holidays! I’m traveling! I have no excuses! But a letter like this one, from Lemony Snicket himself, puts a smile on my face. Lobster and Johannesburg, here I come!

Dear Cohort,

Struggling with your novel? Paralyzed by the fear that it’s nowhere near good enough? Feeling caught in a trap of your own devising? You should probably give up.

For one thing, writing is a dying form. One reads of this every day. Every magazine and newspaper, every hardcover and paperback, every website and most walls near the freeway trumpet the news that nobody reads anymore, and everyone has read these statements and felt their powerful effects. The authors of all those articles and editorials, all those manifestos and essays, all those exclamations and eulogies – what would they say if they knew you were writing something? They would urge you, in bold-faced print, to stop.

Clearly, the future is moving us proudly and zippily away from the written word, so writing a novel is actually interfering with the natural progress of modern society. It is old-fashioned and fuddy-duddy, a relic of a time when people took artistic expression seriously and found solace in a good story told well. We are in the process of disentangling ourselves from that kind of peace of mind, so it is rude for you to hinder the world by insisting on adhering to the beloved paradigms of the past. It is like sitting in a gondola, listening to the water carry you across the water, while everyone else is zooming over you in jetpacks, belching smoke into the sky. Stop it, is what the jet-packers would say to you. Stop it this instant, you in that beautiful craft of intricately-carved wood that is giving you such a pleasant journey.

Besides, there are already plenty of novels. There is no need for a new one. One could devote one’s entire life to reading the work of Henry James, for instance, and never touch another novel by any other author, and never be hungry for anything else, the way one could live on nothing but multivitamin tablets and pureed root vegetables and never find oneself craving wild mushroom soup or linguini with clam sauce or a plain roasted chicken with lemon-zested dandelion greens or strong black coffee or a perfectly ripe peach or chips and salsa or caramel ice cream on top of poppyseed cake or smoked salmon with capers or aged goat cheese or a gin gimlet or some other startling item sprung from the imagination of some unknown cook. In fact, think of the world of literature as an enormous meal, and your novel as some small piddling ingredient – the drawn butter, for example, served next to a large, boiled lobster. Who wants that? If it were brought to the table, surely most people would ask that it be removed post-haste.

Even if you insisted on finishing your novel, what for? Novels sit unpublished, or published but unsold, or sold but unread, or read but unreread, lonely on shelves and in drawers and under the legs of wobbly tables. They are like seashells on the beach. Not enough people marvel over them. They pick them up and put them down. Even your friends and associates will never appreciate your novel the way you want them to. In fact, there are likely just a handful of readers out in the world who are perfect for your book, who will take it to heart and feel its mighty ripples throughout their lives, and you will likely never meet them, at least under the proper circumstances. So who cares? Think of that secret favorite book of yours – not the one you tell people you like best, but that book so good that you refuse to share it with people because they’d never understand it. Perhaps it’s not even a whole book, just a tiny portion that you’ll never forget as long as you live. Nobody knows you feel this way about that tiny portion of literature, so what does it matter? The author of that small bright thing, that treasured whisper deep in your heart, never should have bothered.

Of course, it may well be that you are writing not for some perfect reader someplace, but for yourself, and that is the biggest folly of them all, because it will not work. You will not be happy all of the time. Unlike most things that most people make, your novel will not be perfect. It may well be considerably less than one-fourth perfect, and this will frustrate you and sadden you. This is why you should stop. Most people are not writing novels which is why there is so little frustration and sadness in the world, particularly as we zoom on past the novel in our smoky jet packs soon to be equipped with pureed food. The next time you find yourself in a group of people, stop and think to yourself, probably no one here is writing a novel. This is why everyone is so content, here at this bus stop or in line at the supermarket or standing around this baggage carousel or sitting around in this doctor’s waiting room or in seventh grade or in Johannesburg. Give up your novel, and join the crowd. Think of all the things you could do with your time instead of participating in a noble and storied art form. There are things in your cupboards that likely need to be moved around.

In short, quit. Writing a novel is a tiny candle in a dark, swirling world. It brings light and warmth and hope to the lucky few who, against insufferable odds and despite a juggernaut of irritations, find themselves in the right place to hold it. Blow it out, so our eyes will not be drawn to its power. Extinguish it so we can get some sleep. I plan to quit writing novels myself, sometime in the next hundred years.

–Lemony Snicket

Lemony Snicket is the author of A Series of Unfortunate Events. You can learn more about his work here.

In deference to the new year …

And all those ridiculous resolutions we make… I know they don’t go much of anywhere. But here’s one for the writers. How many words per day do you resolve to do this year? What did you manage last year? Do you a daily count, a weekly count, a monthly count? Or no count at all? How do you stay productive?

I haven’t been very “accountable” this year, so in 2010 I resolve to do a weekly count of 5,000 words. There, I said it. Some days are very good, some days are very bad but if I can get 5,000 for the week progress will be had.

What about you?

Twenty Rules about Mystery Conventions

Since I returned from Bouchercon, the International Mystery Convention named for writer/critic Anthony Boucher, I’ve been ruminating on that strange beast, the writer/reader/fan convention. I went to my first one in 1993 and burned out on them about 2004. Well, ten years of conventions will do that for you. But, as I have a new book and a new press to promote, I went this year to Indianapolis to mingle, chat, and bemoan the state of publishing with some 1700 like-minded souls. Lots of fun, did some business, and came home to wonder if there should be some rules about these things. So here goes.

1. Have a very doable goal in mind for the weekend. NOT ‘sell a million books.’ Mine was meet with my agent and talk about what I laughingly refer to as ‘my career.’

2. Do not pack by simply putting every black piece of clothing you own into a suitcase.

3. Keep your head on your shoulders. Almost every writer in attendance — a) thinks they are more important than you, b) is more important than you, or c) has never heard of you. Get over it.

4. Crash any publisher’s party you can, as long as you have cohorts. The bigger the cohorts, the better. This is where the good food is and sometimes you meet amazing people.

5. Be open for any invitation, not just publisher’s parties. Plan some events of your own.

6. Stick to wine and beer, and, ah, it’s not really five o’clock any old time. Make club soda your friend.

7. After you arrive don’t moan about your hair/clothes/weight/shoes/agent/editor/lack of whatever. Be positive!

8. Do not wear your new cowboy boots then walk all over Indianapolis.

9. Do not forget to pack blister pads.

10. You don’t need to go to all the functions, panels, receptions, awards, and dinners. Know your limits.

10. Do not interrupt VIA (Very Important Author) to ask him/her how they handled third person point-of-view in a book they published ten years go. I don’t care how urgent it is or how much you’ve had to drink.

11. Do not interrupt VIAs at all. Hang around beside them smiling until a break comes along. Then barge in.

12. Try to have a roommate in the hotel. Not just for economy’s sake but to have a con-pal. Con-pals are crucial.

13. Try to find a roommate who doesn’t snore.

14. If the neighbors start pounding on the adjoining wall, it’s 2 a.m. and you’ve been laughing too late with your roommate.

15. Try to get a room in the hotel where the convention is being held so you don’t get lost late at night walking back to your room. Those skywalks aren’t open after ten.

16. If the convention is rather dull, go to your room and write! You lugged that computer all the way, didn’t you?

17. Talk to all the booksellers in the dealer’s room, just to introduce yourself. A postcard or bookmark is good for this also.

18. Be kind to all the people who put together the convention and say good things to the people planning other ones. Be kind to everybody actually. You can cackle about them when you get home.

19. Hang around in the bar and mingle. Don’t plant yourself. Yes, you’re a writer but you have to be outgoing sometimes.

20. When you get home, forget all about all the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune at the convention, sit yourself back down and write. Because that’s what you do.

The jigsaw of life

Ms. Katy,

This morning I am reading, belatedly, a review by Michael Cunningham of Margaret Drabble’s new memoir in the NYT Book Review. The book is called The Pattern in the Carpet; it is a sort of history of the jigsaw puzzle and a memoir, combined.  Cunningham is an amazing writer, his The Hours (and of course Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway) is one of my favorite books. And, yes, I once read a novel by Margaret Drabble but it has been years now. The reason I bring up all this ancient history is that I want to quote a few things from her book via the review. That’s all. So here goes.

Drabble states: “The jigsaw is the very opposite of the novel. The novel is formless and frameless. It has no blueprint, no pattern, no edges.” Which seems to me sort of an amazing observation. I have been reading James Wood’s little book, How Fiction Works, and according to Wood there are so many conventions in novel-writing that if you want to be published you can barely be original these days. Maybe to Drabble there is no form or frame, but to many writers, including me I am now observing, there are thousands of bits of collective understandings about how a novel should work, how narrative works, and what the reader expects from a novel — and also from the sort of writing they will accept and embrace. This sounds a bit pretentious. Okay. The novel was invented about 300 years ago. It has grown, changed, improved, and become part of the fabric of modern life. It hasn’t changed much for about 100 years. If that’s not a form I don’t what is.

Cunningham says: “She writes that our human desire to create order, to solve something, is entirely natural, given all there is to fear in the world, and that spending time imposing order, even if it produces nothing of practical value, is no cause for shame.” Drabble is talking about the jigsaw puzzle here… or is she? Cunningham continues, “It’s courageous, considering her life’s work, to contemplate the possibility that putting together a jigsaw puzzle might afford a sense of engagement and companionship not unlike, and not inferior to, what a good novel provides.” Drabble is quoted: “Books, too, have beginnings and endings, and they attempt to impose a pattern, to make a shape. We aim, by writing them, to make order from chaos. We fail. The admission of failure is the best that we can do.”

Okay, now I’m going to go shoot myself! At least Cunningham disagrees with that statement by adding: “Well, maybe. Or maybe not.” If a novel doesn’t provide pleasure and engagement by making order out of chaos, I don’t know what it does. Why bother? That, to me, is the essence of the novel, the satisfaction of writing and/or reading one, the joy of companionship with characters and the thrill of the denouement. If you don’t want order out of chaos, read a biography. Real life is rarely orderly.

Margaret Drabble says she’ll never write another novel. Maybe she’s just depressed about that. But I AM writing another novel. And it feels damn good, Margaret. Even the chaos.

xxx,

Lise

The Mouths of Babes

Kids say the cutest things. (Especially if they’re our own kids, right, Katy?) And some of them are so just plain cute all over you want to bottle up that innocence and charm. Even the stories they write are delectable in that awkward, simple, freckled way of children everywhere.

This week I did a school visit with seven grade-schoolers in the little village of Alta, Wyoming, on the west side of the Tetons. They were doing summer camp, and writing mysteries. The teacher asked me if I had anything visual, presentations, hand-outs, etc., and of course I didn’t. Since I don’t write for young people I wasn’t sure if I could even talk about some of the plots I’m familiar with, murder, violence, crime of all sorts. As she told me, these kids are pretty sheltered.

We talked instead about problems and puzzles. But one little boy declared: “there is no dying in my story!” Which I thought was pretty mature, since he was writing about a four-eyed poison robot frog. About eight, he was a smart cookie. When we were discussing what made a good writer, I mentioned being a good listener. Like when your grandparents tell you stories, listen. One girl recounted her grandparents’ story of getting a sample of Ex-lax in the mail, thinking it was candy and eating it as they walked back down the long lane to the house. It was a good story but the second-grader was baffled. He’d never heard of Ex-lax. The eight-year-old gave him the scoop: it makes you go number 2 — a lot.

Two seven-year-olds were writing a story together and, I have to say, theirs was the most developed tale. A baby dinosaur egg gets lost and they (the boy and girl writing the story were also the main characters) must find its mama before it hatches. They had all the pictures drawn and were the first to start writing. The other writing duo, a boy and girl in 4th or 5th grade, were having collaborator problems. The plot about missing doughnuts had, well, some holes.

The oldest student, a sixth grader, was writing a Nancy Drewish tale about a girl who is forced to move cross country with her parents, and live in a creepy old mansion. It may or may not be haunted. Her story was the most complex and, due to her no doubt reading Nancy Drew, Encyclopedia Brown, et al, will turn out just fine. Her eyes flashed as we exchanged ‘what-if’s.’

I had to do some quick thinking to find kid-level words for terms we use all the time when we talk about writing. I was explaining conflict when I asked if they knew what that meant. Blank looks. Clash? Still not there. It was explain by example time. When we discussed sci fi and fantasy, the little second-grader piped up: what’s fantasy? He knew Harry Potter so we went from there. But in the second grade can you tell the difference between reality and fantasy? Did he think Harry really flew around on a broom? No, he knew it wasn’t real. Not like baby dinosaur eggs.

I left with a box of yummy pastries and a smile on my face. I left them with a couple mysteries for the school library (to be vetted by Mrs. Cowan.) Thanks, guys. Can’t wait to read your stories.

Guest Blogger: Deborah Turrell Atkinson

I’m excited today because we have a guest! My friend and fellow mystery writer, Deborah Turrell Atkinson. Debby hails from Honolulu and writes atmospheric mysteries set in Hawaii. But not from the tourist point-of-view so you really get a feel for what it must be like to live and work in the Islands. Her new book is Pleasing the Dead, from Poisoned Pen Press.

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I had the amazing good luck to get to know Lise at the Jackson Hole Writers Conference.  This was my third or fourth time at JHWC, where Lise and I get to hang together, discuss the ups and downs of the writer’s life, and find the best sales—oops, I digress. We both do manuscript reviews for attendees of the conference, which always takes me back to the first writers’ conference I ever attended.  Back in 1995, (ack!) I scraped together the conference fees and plane fare, left my husband with our then-small children, and found the way to Palm Springs

The experience I most anticipated when I signed up for the conference was the manuscript review.  As you know, conference attendees pay extra for this, but that wasn’t even the deal-maker for me.  I was going to have the opportunity to speak with a Published Author  This person would tell me how to make my half-completed novel better, divulge the secrets of a glamorous writer’s life, and set me on the gold-paved road to publication (stop laughing, I was young and naive).

Sweaty-palmed and nearly hyperventilating, I parked myself across from The Author.  He was middle aged (wise and experienced, I presumed), and sat in a cloud of stale cigarette smoke.  My still-pristine ten pages sat in front of him.  He looked down at the title page.  “You’re from Honolulu?”

Debby

“Yes.” My address was written on the front.
“Does the university out there have creative writing classes?  You should take one.”
“I’ve taken two or three.”
“You think they need any visiting instructors?  I’ve written four books on *.”

“I don’t know.”
“You know someone you could ask?  One of your old instructors?”
“I guess.”
“Thanks, eh?  Maybe I’ll see you there.”

The rest of the conference was a good experience, especially all the aspiring novelist friends I made after I told them about this guy, and I returned home inspired, with a list of better techniques to apply to my work.  But the one thing I learned to the core was how NOT to do a manuscript review.  I hope like crazy new writers walk away from my sessions with at least one (I try for more) idea they can apply to their work.  Their pieces range from being newly-hatched outlines to virtual swans, and it’s my job to encourage them to take flight.

* I can’t remember.  Really.