Writing Ramble, Continued

[the_gneech]

Yesterday's rambly post about my writing was more or less a preamble to thinking today about where my writing might go, assuming I find a way to work on it. partiallyclips has recommended I try to publish some short fiction, and I have thought about that from time to time over the past couple of years. My first inclination was to try to get "Stray Cat Strut" into something like Weird Tales, and while it might be suitable, without more Michael Macbeth stuff to back it up it strikes me as a sort of flash-in-the-pan kind of exercise. Maybe it's just because I'm used to thinking in terms of a comic strip, where you always need to know what comes next, but I can't seem to come up with a stand-alone tale without wanting to come up with a series framework to go with it.

I do have a pretty decent premise and largish chunk of an outline for a Michael Macbeth novel, that I came up with last year in a sudden fit of inspiration. It could be that I just need to start focusing on that. Lately, tho, I've been having a lot of fun (and getting a nice response) with Brigid and Greg, so I might try to do something more along those lines. I've recently been perusing more of the mainstream pop lit for things of the "light comedy" or "romantic comedy" line, trying to find something that's comparable. My inspiration is largely Wodehouse, of course, but he's not exactly contemporary any more, and I haven't found a lot of stuff in a similar line.

Most of the stuff I find currently has way too much postmoderney to it, for lack of a better way to complain about it, full of unlikeable characters and stories that go nowhere. (I won't even get started on the fact that they all seem written with the intention of having "A sexy romp!" as one of the cover blurbs.) What's New Pussycat? was fun and different in the '60s ... but it's not the '60s any more. Haven't current readers gotten past adolescence?

To put in a caveat here, I imagine that if, say, Four Weddings and a Funeral were a contemporary book, it would be described as "A sexy romp!" too, but it's actually something I would consider a positive example. So maybe there's something else bugging me that I haven't quite put my finger on yet. I think maybe it's that 4W+F is actually about something else besides just being a sexy romp in its own right, whereas a lot of other things aren't. I dunno.

Anyway, I'm sort of dubious that Brigid and Greg in and of themselves could sustain a whole book; certainly they were never designed for anything other than vignettes. Do they ever leave their apartment, except to go on unexplained car rides? B & G are all about "voice," rather than plot.

I'm not sure. What do you think? And for that matter, can you recommend any good contemporary light and/or romantic comedies in print?

-The Gneech

Comments

[walkertxkitty.livejournal.com]

I don't think Brigid and Greg as they stand could sustain an entire book, but there's potential for fleshing them out. Your other option would be to consider submitting the work as a screenplay; I could definitely see it working as such. Either way, you won't know until you try. Somewhere around here I have a drawer full of dozens of rejection letters from various publishers. Some got as far as a first edit, others never made it off the slush pile.

A bit of advice: when you get ready to market, get an agent. The good ones won't charge you a commission until the contract is signed and will take no more than 15-25% off the initial agreement. Most publications don't take unsolicited manuscripts (those are submissions without an agent) and those that do put them into the slush pile (meaning they'll look at them when they feel like it, which is almost never). It can't hurt to get a current copy of the annual Writer's Market listings of publishers so that you know which ones are most likely to accept what you're soliciting. There's a neat index in the back of the book which divides publishers up by type of literature.

[the-gneech.livejournal.com]

Well, I don't want to do screenplays 'cause for the most part Hollywood treats writers like cr*p. I probably will get a Writer's Market in the not-too-distant future, tho. Last one I got was '98, I think.

-TG

[walkertxkitty.livejournal.com]

Oh, no... I wouldn't submit it to Hollywood. There are, believe it or not, people out there who READ plays. I'd look for a couple of publishers who specialize in that sort of thing. There were about ten of them out there last I looked but my copy of Writer's Report is even older than yours.

[copperwolf.livejournal.com]

I enjoy the Brigid & Greg interludes. They reminded me of your "Whistling in the Dark" strip, and after I added you to my friends list and encountered Brigid & Greg, I had to go Google the strip to check if the characters were the same. They might be nice as side characters if you have a novel in mind.

The day before you posted the link to "Gossamer Commons," my boyfriend had a mini-crisis about not feeling able to write his Great American Novel, for a variety of reasons. The strip was especially meaningful to me -- to the point that I decided showing it to him right now might just depress him further.

[the-gneech.livejournal.com]

Heh ... I hadn't thought of that re: Brigid and Greg being like WitD, but now that you mention it, I can see it. :)

-The Gneech

[oceansedge.livejournal.com]

Ya know - there is precedent, for writing a 'novel' as short stories, or perhaps even as vignettes, Spider Robinson's Callahans books worked better as short stories collected together than as novels.... you might want to pursue that sort of a format for Brigid and Greg.

No one ever said as a writer you have to follow any given predetermined path or format.

Let the characters write themselves, and it'll work