IWSG - Flops & Friends

Happy IWSG Day!

The Insecure Writer's Support Group exists to support the writing community in the airing insecurities. Created by Alex J. Cavanaugh, anyone can join. Simply click on his name and put your blog on the linky list.

The co-hosts this month are Jemima Pett, Nancy Gideon, and Natalie Aguirre. Be sure to drop by their blogs and thank them for their help!

The optional question this month is: Do you remember writing your first book? What were your thoughts about a career path on writing? Where are you now and how is it working out for you? If you're at the start of the journey, what are your goals?

Technically, my first published book was my nonfiction title The Business of Short Stories. The first ones I wrote are in limbo somewhere. My career path has been a bit different from that of most authors, as it's focused on short stories up to now. 

All that is changing, as I feel like I've grown stagnant in my writing career. I don't want to keep doing the same thing over and over again (this from a person whose longest work position before getting bored and moving along has been maybe 2 1/2 years). That doesn't mean I want to abandon horror or short stories, but it's time for me to grow and stretch and try new things. What that means right now is writing the next two books in my urban fantasy series so I can self-publish those, completing edits on a horror comedy novel I'll be shopping to agents this year, writing a memoir of my dad's journey with ALS, and writing the first in what will be a proposed amateur sleuth mystery series so I can start shopping that, as well. In addition, I'd like to revisit a YA Post-Apocalyptic novel I wrote way back when to see if I can bring it up to my current standards and either start shopping it again or finish what was a planned trilogy to self-publish.

So I have some fairly diverse plans for the next year, yeah?

I do have the rights back on enough short stories that I'll be releasing another collection in the next year. I just haven't decided how I want to time that yet. Plus I have to figure out which unpublished short stories to put in it, because I always like to put several brand new ones in for those who loyally purchase every publication I'm in. 

While I'm doing all this, I'm telling myself I will be pulling back on both submitting short stories and attending writing events as a speaker/featured author. Given, there are a few favorite events I'll likely keep appearing at, but I will not be seeking out new appearance opportunities. Which also means slowing down on the podcast appearances I was doing for a while. I think? (I have a work ethic I struggle to overcome, lol, which means I say I won't take on anything more, and then I do it anyway, but I REALLY need to give myself a break.)

Since I'm pulling back on submitting short stories, I'm going to probably cease keeping track on my IWSG posts to kind of discourage any deep focus on that. We'll see if that works or if I remember next month that I'm not doing that, LOL!

Both Sandra Cox and I are guests on L. Diane Wolfe's blog today, so stop by and say hi!

I want to thank anyone who helped with my book release in March! Diane is the last person on this hastily thrown together blog tour. Something significant and traumatic happened when I should have been prepping my book release, and it tied my hands for a couple weeks right after I got the book cover. I wrote out a whole post last month about it and ultimately decided it wasn't something I could share at this time. When I posted in desperation for help on Facebook the week of the release, a lot of people stepped up and helped by sharing the book release post. I feel bad, because, depending upon how that's shared (visibility setting) I can't see everyone who shared unless I happen to scroll past the post on their page. So some people don't end up getting thanked.

My current insecurity? I consider this launch a bit of a flop. The sales just weren't there. Since I released this title to force myself back into the game and it was meant to be fun for me, I've decided to move on and quit dwelling on the numbers. I didn't expect it to be BIG, but I did expect more than what ultimately happened. Interestingly, with the posts people did, several included other titles, and I saw a bump in sales on my older titles, so that was awesome and took away some of the sting of the low sales on Happy Ghoulidays II. But the support I got from the blogging community, the local writing community, and my friends and family when I asked for help is the most important and valuable thing that came from this book release. I appreciate all of you.

Onward and upward! The book is out. I learned some things. There were many factors I had zero control over due to personal life issues. But the factors I CAN control, I learned about. Each experience is an opportunity to learn, right? That's what I'm doing.

I'm actively editing the horror comedy novel now and will be asking for beta readers in the near future, and that's exciting! I have a plan for research material I'll need for my dad's memoir. And I've crappily outlined (I hate outlining and simply don't do it) the mystery novel. 

Cheers to next steps!

This ended up much longer than I intended. It was kind of a mental dump. I'll either add the open submissions onto this post later tonight or do a whole new post with those, but I wanted to get this posted.

What are your insecurities? Where are you on your journey? How has your journey changed since you started? Have you ever had a book release you considered a flop?

May you find your Muse.

A Flower in My Hair - Reflections on Genre Bias

It's one of those weeks again, where there's been an attack on horror authors via social media, implying we're all psychopaths and terrible people. Happily, I've never had someone tell me to my face that they believe this about me, but on the wider spectrum it can be hurtful to hear this repeatedly.

Angry Eyes, by OCAL, clker.com

The good thing is, I can fall back on my communities, those of the blogging world and of the authors here in Colorado who I've gotten to know, and I can remind myself that there are plenty of people who know that being involved in the horror world doesn't make someone a bad person, just a creative person whose creativity has a dark bent sometimes. I also write humor, mystery, memoir, fantasy, and science fiction, and no one has judged me based on those things.

It makes me think of the abuse those in the romance genre also get. The insinuations and side-eyes they receive, because they MUST be smutty people, right? No, of course not. Or how about when a literary writer looks down at genre writers as writing junk or when the opposite happens and a genre writer dismisses a literary writer as being snooty?

We writers know that writing something doesn't mean we've done it, that we want to do it, or anything along those lines. I'm not even sure, though, if this current attack that blew up on Twitter came from a writer or a reader, but I've seen plenty of writers generalize those in other genres, and even in their own genres. After all, we do this all the time about ourselves. Stereotypes exist for a reason. Sometimes we amuse ourselves by playing around with stereotypes. For example, that guy at the bar who laughingly downs his fifth beer and says it's okay, because he's Irish. Or what about all the stereotypes surrounding something as basic and unchangeable (except with dye) as hair color? I bet if I asked you to list a bunch of hair color stereotypes you could bang them out, no problem. You may have even joked about your own hair color before. 

The Beer Snob, by OCAL, clker.com

As writers, I think we often employ stereotypes or generalities in our writing, especially in the beginning before we learn to outgrow those bottled characters, settings, or situations. In some ways, it's a necessity, as it's a comfort level for a reader to find familiarity, and one way to achieve that is through generalizing and using commonalities or things we've observed regularly. When there's a story about a group of people, chances are at least some of those characters will fall under some sort of stereotype, like the fiery, short woman or the "Karen" asking to see the manager. Part of writing is pulling the reader in as soon as possible, so if we sat back and looked at the ways we do that, we might find we're generalizing or stereotyping more than we even realized it.

However, I mourn for the days where I didn't hesitate before answering every time someone asked me what I wrote. Now I lob it like a softball and wait for a reaction before I say anything else about it. The two responses I'm most likely to get are either "Oh, I love horror! What have you published?" or "Oh, I don't read that stuff." Sometimes I get a really puzzled or semi-disgusted look and a, "But you're so pretty," as if somehow not looking like a hideous beast means I can't possibly be a horror author. That one cracks me up, and I can usually spin it into something positive.

Hey, to each their own. I don't hold it against anyone if they don't read horror. I admit that sometimes I get tired of hearing it, especially when it's thrown out like a shield or as if they feel they have to state it lest they be judged as a horrible person. I don't respond to someone who writes a genre I don't read with, "Oh, I don't read that," even if I don't or it's rare that I do. I don't hate any genre that I can think of. And I certainly don't think ill of anyone writing any particular genre. I prefer to continue asking them questions about their stories and their love of their preferred genre, so I'm supporting them instead of making them feel defensive or shutting them down. After all, we're all spinning tales and creating worlds and situations, which means there's always something worthwhile to talk about. Even someone writing memoir or other nonfiction is actively creating, whittling down the many details that surround real life, then weaving the remaining threads into a story people want to read.

Things were more fun when I didn't fear people's reactions to me doing something I love. When I didn't have to wait out whether that person might end the conversation with me or get that look of disgust before they realized it and brought it under control. When they didn't eyeball me as if looking for a knife hidden behind my back or horns peeping out from beneath my hair. I'm well aware that I shouldn't care what others think of me. I'm a middle-aged woman, after all, and no matter what I've done as a serial people pleaser, I'm certain I've left behind plenty of people who simply didn't like me.

But those who do like horror, and those who simply respect that it's something I enjoy, and that it doesn't make me a bad person, make it worth it. Because ultimately writers DO support writers. There are bad eggs, but they're greatly outnumbered, and I truly believe that most writers don't judge each other based on the genre they write, and are just intrigued as to the worlds their counterparts create. I know it's that way for me. I want to know about your stories. I want to know what inspires you. 

Photo with my "thank you" mug from Sisters in Crime after a recent workshop I did for them. Note the flower in my hair and the suit jacket.

So I put a flower in my hair to signal that I'm harmless, dress professionally at writing events so they know I'm a normal person, and throw out that softball to wait it out and see where the conversation will go afterward.

If you've ever had a knee jerk reaction about a genre someone writes, I'd love to challenge you to read a story in that genre and to go one step further: write a piece of flash fiction or a short story in that genre and see how you feel about it then.

Do you have a genre you have a knee jerk reaction to? Is it one you've experienced or is it one you've always avoided? Have you ever challenged yourself to try out a genre you weren't fully comfortable with? What happened with that?

May you find your Muse.