Branding Your Writer's Self

I resist the idea of making "a brand" of myself and my work, but they say I must. We all must. So how do you accomplish that when it feels like shoeboxing an entire wardrobe?

I've written before about finding one's niche as a writer. About finding your tribe. Speaking specifically to your audience.

My tribe would be humans moved by humanity, what makes us and drives us. And what may lie beyond our human perception or comprehension.

As a writer, the first part of that statement would have me writing literary fiction. The second part puts me firmly in the speculative fiction camp.

I'm a split personality. And to that duality, I have to add a third: being a gay man with a desire to be a voice in that tribe. So I'm a writer of gay literary speculative fiction? Try to find that section of your local bookstore.

See, here's the thing. I love good horror, but I hate the often cheesy places it goes. I love the idea of alien interaction, ancient or current, in, upon, or among humans, but I don't always love reading science fiction. And while I would love to be one more author making gay characters an integrated part of everyday life, I don't want to limit myself to gay fiction. And I don't want to write gay "issue" stories. There are plenty of those.

So, shouldn't we speak to those with whom we'd love to speak, who would like to speak with us? People who are moved by or interested in what moves us to write? And wouldn't that, shouldn't that be found in what we like to read?

Well, no shit.

What moves me in reading, besides beautifully crafted images, language that sings, is what's amazing and beautiful and heartbreaking and brave and heroic about the human experience.

That can be found in fantasy worlds, of course, but I prefer to write about the world I know, with elements of speculation, because I love "what if…?" And if the suppositions are about horrific possibilities, well, I'm there, too. Bring it on.

So, back to branding. I think I prefer variations on a theme. But that's just me. And where's the niche?  Can I be an author of Speculative Gay Literary Fiction?  Author of Gay Literary Speculative Fiction? Or gay author of Literary Speculative Fiction? Yeah, show me that shelf.

Hello? Gay and gay-friendly wonderers, are you there? Can we talk about our fears, hopes, disappointments, tragedies, and joys? About what brings us together and tears us apart? About what makes all of us human? And, in some cases, decidedly not human? What I can bring to the party is a slew of good questions, some deep, some silly, some sad, some scary, and some without answers—at least from our limited view. We are, after all, only humans.

Or are we brands?

What say you?

Baiting the Hook

New Post today on the Speculative Fiction group blog on crafting suspense. Read it here.

Expect Less, Gain More

Sounds counterintuitive, doesn't it? It's not.

First, remember that everything is relative. What's rich to me may be near poverty to someone extremely wealthy, just as I may appear wealthy to a huge percentage of the world's population. I'm not. Far from it. But there are a lot of folks I'd never say that to.

And yet, I do think I'm pretty damn rich.

A couple years ago I was in close contact with a bright Danish woman who was beta-reading for me and I was helping, on occasion, to put her English, which is embarrassingly excellent, into a more English-sounding vernacular. During that time, Denmark was named by some credible source as the "happiest" nation on Earth. I asked her why.

At that time, and still today, it was obvious that, for all the awesomeness of the USA, land that I love, we are nowhere near that happy, as a nation. Why would little Denmark, with its winters of endless nights and summers of endless daylight, its cold, wet climate, be so damn happy?

Her answer? That they were a country of lower expectations. Maybe not lower. Maybe fewer.

Sounds wrong, doesn't it? We're taught to dream big. To hitch our wagons to the stars. We deserve the American Dream, right?

But think about it. Today I read a terrific blog post by MarcyKate Connolly on From the Write Angle. The title reflected what I'd been ruminating on for a few days:  The Journey Is the Destination. Check it out.

Whether it's the journey of the writer, from blank page to draft to revision, querying, publishing, and back to blank page, or just how we live our lives, if we're always looking beyond where we are to where we think we should be or want to be instead, we're missing the moment.

Our power is in that moment. It's in the now.

Sometimes that now feels great. We're in the flow. What a high! But sometimes that now seems stagnant, frustrating, hair pulling, and we'd rather be anywhere else.

Big mistake.

How does this relate to expectations being too great, set too high?

Let me refer back to another blog post from the inimitable Nathan Bransford, wherein he warns against letting dreams become expectations.

But aren't we supposed to dream?

Sure. Dream. Have expectations. But don't let them become what you live for. Because you'll never get there. There's always the next level, the next step, the next bigger, better thing that you'll need when what you have or where you are just isn't enough.

That's how we set ourselves up for disappointment. For failure. Even if we succeed at a level for which we should be kicking up our heels in a happy dance, we don't, because now we expect we should do better, get more.

Back to Denmark. They enjoy a very high standard of living. They pay high taxes. They enjoy many benefits in return. (This is not a political statement, by the way.) There are probably more bicycles than cars. Okay, I just made that up, but it seems so. They just don't expect the kind of overblown life of riches that's become the carrot dangling in front of us. They're content with what they have and they enjoy it. Ergo, they're happy.

I could list things I'd like to have and don't. Actual things (newer car, refinished floors) or writer's goals (an agent, a book deal, a best seller, a work-in-progress humming along), but, fact is, I'm cool with what I have and where I am. And I think a lot of that is because I don't expect that I should be elsewhere or have more than I do. I have enough. I like the journey. If I get those things, well, great. If I don't, I haven't failed.

So, again. Everything is relative. Especially when you measure what you have and where you are against what you've set yourself up to expect. Don't give up the dream. Just don't let it rule.

Hitch your wagon to whatever star you want, but don't forget to enjoy the clouds and the heavens as you pass through.

(This is a re-post from Friday, Aug. 3)

Don't Show, Don't Tell

Sometimes, what we don't show...
on the Speculative Fiction blog today

Stanley and Phil Are Out

So, I finished the story, and Stanley and Phyllis are Stanley and Phil. It's now a gay couple, but the story is no different than it would have been had they remained a hetero couple. The point is, they aren't different. It's time for LGBT characters to go mainstream.

The Southern Baptists may feel differently, and the Holy See may disagree. Too bad. They can't hold back the tide.

When Ellen came out, the news rated magazine covers. She stepped into a spotlight where she had to state that she did not want to become a spokesperson. But she was, anyway. Nowadays, the news of another celebrity being gay is usually a throw-away line, no big deal. As it should be.

So the story becomes not about being gay or about gay rights, but about being human, facing human conditions, and incidentally, being gay along the way.

Stanley and Phil face the same fate in the same way as Stanley and Phyllis would have. But now that nice old couple next door, the ones that have been together for, well, longer than most, just happens to be two men. Could just as easily be two women. Any two humans.

Neil Patrick Harris may have limited his options by telling the world he's gay, but mostly those who loved him as a performer love him more. Did he lose a few admirers? No doubt. Has it hurt him? Well, I can't speak for him, since we don't often sit down over drinks together, but I'd wager a tidy sum it has not.

So for a writer, is playing it safe, working within broadly "acceptable" boundaries to gain the widest possible audience by not offending anyone a smart idea? A look at best-seller lists would say no. Sex sells. All fifty shades of it. Serial killers, sociopaths. Children killing children.

But homosexuality being shown as a natural part of the fabric of life?

Guess what. It is. And no longer is it relegated to LGBT lit, TV or movies. What had to be front-and-center with Will and Grace has become the gay family member and her/his partner, the gay couple next door. Modern Family? American Horror Story? Gay couple neatly worked in, simply part of the whole.

No one ever made a mark by playing it safe. You can't please everyone, anyway. And "they" say, if you haven't pissed anyone off, you haven't done your job. Plenty of books, stories, and movies play to kids or "wholesome" families, and carefully do NOT anger anyone. But Harry Potter was condemned for promoting the occult, Hunger Games for the hideous idea of kids being pitted against each other to the death for society's amusement (although often it seems we're not far from that now.)

So I'm taking a stand for risk. And if I piss off some, so be it. I probably wouldn't want to have drinks with them anyway, or they with me.

So who'll join me for a martini, a beer, a sweet tea (ugh)?

Stanley and Phyllis or Stanley and Phil?

A while ago I posted about a story in the local paper that I was mulling for a short story. An old couple found dead together, frozen in their back yard in mid-winter. Cause unknown. A history of illness, possibly Alzheimer's. Perhaps the wife had fallen, the husband had gone to help and…

I've half written the story.

I've also (see my last post on platform specificity) been working on defining myself.

So now I will digress, and put aside that story yet again. But not really.

The novel I've written includes (count the audiences) a gay protagonist, an evangelist (antagonist) who hosts an interdimensional alien invader, the protag's sister (strong but vulnerable woman) and her hot live-in boyfriend whom she won't marry (women's fic), a pre-teen black boy and his mother (multi-racial/intercultural), both brave and in danger, the protag's partner, a jealous friend, another teen seeking revenge and teetering on the edge of dark and light, and other minions and allies, family and foe.

That's sure as hell not narrowing it down.

Is it a gay novel? Not really. It's a thriller with a gay protagonist who has a partner. But the sister's/boyfriend's story arc is central.

The high school jock and the brave boy are key, but it's definitely not Young Adult. While I've read some YA I enjoy, I'm not a YA writer. I just can't give up enough sex or judiciously used swear words. (English would be a far less expressive language lacking "fuck.") So I know that's not my audience.

Is it a spiritual/religious novel? It does posit questions about certain kinds of religious practice (help me here, John Lennon) and concepts of "light" and "energy." Those concepts and questions intrigue me. What are the truths that give birth to the legends, beliefs, myths, and religions? But I'm more about the questions than the answers.

But this isn't about me. Or about my story, or my novel. It's about homing in on whom I'm writing for. 

No doubt I'd lose people if I go for gay. Do I care, if I gather more LGBT folks who relate to me? Actually, no. Plenty of straight folk would come along if, in writing "gay," I'm writing "humanity."

And don't some of that group enjoy speculating on the nature of reality, spirituality, the paranormal? Sure they do. And a good supernatural scare, too.

So I'm out in the garden watering the other day, thinking about these things as I water baby zinnias, and suddenly I'm thinking maybe that story about Stanley and Phyllis should be about Stanley and Phil. Same story, different angle.

A generation ago, a few very famous playwrights did just the opposite. Maybe it's time for Martha to take off her drag. Maybe now it's time for George and Mark, not Martha, to duke it out.

Easy to say get specific, but hard to do. The "experts" say not to go for thousands, but for a specific few.

Anyone out there into supernatural/metaphysical/speculative/gay fiction? 

Platform Is Audience. Think Small. Be Specific.

We writers have so many options today. The world of publishing is changing so rapidly that many of its professionals seem to be riding the waves on inner tubes. We're all in it together, but we're all in it alone. And so, one thing is being consistently stated:  having a meaningful platform is ever more important in this noisy world.

Hey! It's me. I'm over here.

Now I'm sure I'm not the only writer who quails at the prospect. And not knowing how or where to start, a strong impulse is to read more, do more research, which can be helpful (if put to use.) Or a great distraction. Or an evasive maneuver.

So Don't just stand there getting ready.

As a kid, I wanted to do two things that scared the crap out of me: go off the high dive and ride the roller coaster.

Every day at the pool, I'd climb the ladder, stand at the end of the board—only ten feet, but it looked like a hundred—until I'd back off to let the others behind me go ahead. I'd climb down, wait until the board was free, and go back up. Finally, in a WTF moment, I jumped. Scary? Yes. Exhilarating? Oh, yes! I went back again and again, graduating to cannonballs and eventually dives.

But oh, the time standing there, getting ready. 

At the roller coaster, an old wooden one that raced out over the beach toward the ocean, I stood on the entrance platform. Same deal. I watched that coaster leave the station a dozen times at least before I got the courage to get on and ride. Then ride I did, middle car, front car, back car (the fastest), knees braced, no hands.

Sure, we need to prepare, maybe get up the courage. But then we have to do it.

Go ahead—scare the sh*t outta yourself!

It's often the only way to move forward, and the thrill can be amazing.

Those things scared me. I don't think there's a power on earth, not even vast sums of cash, that could get me to jump from an airplane or off a bridge with an elastic cord attached to me. I'm sure they have their thrills. Big ones. I'll take mine a bit more on the safe side of scary.

But being scared of doing something masks itself in all kinds of ways. Excuses. Other things that need to be done first. Too hard. Beyond my reach.

Well, how the hell do I know it's beyond my reach if I don't reach for it? How do you? And there's only one way to do that. Do it.

From the many, one.

Or a couple. Hell, even a few. 

Platform building is about audience. Connecting. Building relationships. We need to brand ourselves (that one is vertigo-inducing), and in order to do that, we need to get specific about who and what we are, and to whom. 

Writers on this topic often talk about the thousands they hope to reach. Now that's more than scary, when your followers could fit in a very small room. But a couple very astute (because I loved what they said, so they must be, right?) writers boiled it down to something more easily swallowed.

Don't go for the thousands. Go for a couple. Who specifically are you wanting to write for? To communicate with? To relate to and to have relate to you?

I mean specifically. What do they like to read? To wear? To listen to? What are their beliefs? What do they love and what makes them crazy? Pick a guy and a girl. How are they like you? How different? Invent people you'd easily spend an all-nighter with, tossing out ideas, comparing philosophies and fantasies. Make those people up, in detail, and talk to them.

A couple of folks you'd really like to talk with and write for, to entertain, to tease with unanswerable questions, to challenge, are a lot less intimidating than a sea of thousands.

So to you, dear readers—both of you—some things I'd like to know: 

Do you think we're alone in this universe? Is God the Force? What are those things that go bump in the night? Do souls return? Do aliens live among us? How do you feel about (name the issue, say, gay marriage)? Is time really a continuum, or is that merely a human way to sort the incomprehensibility of simultaneity?  And what the hell is he talking about?

If those kinds of questions engage you, can we talk? Just us. In this little room. On this very small planet.

But I'm still not jumping out of any airplanes.