Advice for Writers

Writing, Not Blogging

PETERMBALL Smart Advice from Smart People ,

I keep reading articles that say blogging is mandatory for writers nowadays. That agents and editors won’t take you on if you don’t already have a platform. This is hooey.

Let me repeat that. Hooey.

Cat Rambo has a sensible blog post about not blogging up on her website this week, which I’m linking to because: a) it’s good, common-sense advice that syncs into the things I routinely tell people who ask about writing and social media and stuff; and b) it neatly explains why I’ve been absent around these parts, and left everyone hanging half-way through the Die Hard series.

The TL:DR version: I’m being mugged by life at the moment, and most of my brain-meats have been expended getting the GenreCon Program up and running. The head-space I’ve got left over goes on projects in order of deadline, ’cause when you’re working with limited time and mental resources, ya gotta prioritize the things that need to be done and the things that help you recharge.

I am about halfway through my draft of Die Hard, Part Three, though. With luck, I’ll get it finished over the weekend (which is looking gloriously, outrageously free of day-jobbery) and posted next week.

You Have Great Taste: Ira Glass on Creative Journeys

PETERMBALL Smart Advice from Smart People , , , , ,

This week has been a lesson in the ways of the internet. I put a handful of links to a brilliant Ira Glass video on creativity and taste in the middle of my post about On Writing and only 3% of you fuckers went and watched it, despite the fact that I talk the damn thing up ’cause it really is that useful and awesome.

I put one link in a post about Robot Jox where I mention that the writer is shitting on his own project, and all of you motherfuckers go traipsing off to snicker to look at Joe Haldeman being all “yeah, this film is a dog, man. What were we thinking.”

You people, you people worry me. And I know the excuses that people will throw my way. I hear you sitting up the back, being all, “”No, Pete, it’s not like that, we swear.”

To that I say: “bullshit, motherfucker. I’ve got goddamn metrics. Three fucking percent.”

“But it’s hard,” you say, “we don’t want to follow a link just to see people being brilliant. We want to laugh at peoples misery and failure.”

And really, I should leave you to your foolishness.

But I won’t. ‘Cause the Ira Glass video really is that damn good and it really is a useful thing to have heard, at least once, if you’re engaging in any kind of creative endeavor. And ’cause I care.

So here you go. No linking required. JUST PRESS GODDAMNED PLAY ALREADY. Think of it like eating your vegetables before you move onto a delicious schadenfreude pudding.

Ira Glass is a goddamn legend. And now you know it.

And I really hope that video works, otherwise this post is going to look really goddamn stupid.