I may not have posted anything else since my last round up, but that didn’t stop me grazing the literary ruminations the internet has to offer. Which I guess makes me a ruminant.
This week it’s all about TV, rejection, cruelty, and cult SF. Which describes many of my weeks come to think about it.
A post at Storyfix.com suggested that certain TV shows might help the writer. Seems reasonable. But I wouldn’t personally say that House
goes deeper than anything you’ve seen on television before.
House does boast some great writing, but it suffers from a repetitive structure. Still, with the exception of the formulaic and vapid Burn Notice I’d agree that most shows Larry Brooks mentions merit study. My top ten? In no particular order: The Sopranos, Deadwood, The Wire, Battlestar Galactica, Nurse Jackie, Rome, Spaced, Kings, Californication, Brotherhood. I bet I edit that.
I discovered a blog called Query Shark this week. This site critiques query letters. And it doesn’t pull its punches
This is lunacy. The tone and subject matter combination is so disjointed it makes me think of “Springtime for Hitler” or broccoli ice cream: two things that just do not go together.
Very refreshing. In many forums the negative is frowned upon. While that spares bad feeling, it can also force us to mine useful criticism from varying shades of praise. “I so loved your story. It moved me. And such a bold experiment, eschewing punctuation. The all-caps presentation was also a bold touch.”
The last post is about a month old, but there’s plenty of content here, and it’s both entertaining and useful. Next time I have something worthy of a large brown envelope, I’ll spend serious amounts of time reading this. I don’t think I’ll risk posting my query letter, though. Janet Reid is scary.
And while we’re contemplating rejection and ridicule, it’s worth remembering that there can be comfort to be found in some rejection letters. At least according to Roz Morris of Dirty White Candy, who has guest posted a useful analysis of rejection letters at Fiction Notes.
What is it with the downer? It must be the onset of winter. Agent Nathan Bransford suggested this week that writers’ should channel their over-sensitivity to criticism into something useful. Like writing.
The Guardian offered positive reviews of both Terry Pratchett’s Unseen Academicals and Eoin Colfer’s continuation of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, And Another Thing. I’ve read both books. Pratchett can’t write a bad sentence, and so he didn’t. He could have written this book in his sleep, though. Colfer’s imitation of Adams’ was commendable, but a tad labored. But then some might argue that the later h2g2 novels were themselves imitations of the first few.
Anyway, I promised to keep it short. I should do some real writing. Or maybe drink beer and watch the Battlestar Galactica movie. Strictly for research purposes of course.
