House Call #8

And A New/Old Trend Rears Its Shaved Head

Thank You to Sunshine, Who Sent This From Paris This Week

Did You Have a Great Week?

“People only ask about your weekend so they can tell you about theirs.”

I Had a Great Week, Largely Due to Levi Polzin

Levi and I have been crafting away on his story Tattoo Tales, which I suspect is one of many such stories he’s got. Possibly enough for a linked collection or a novel? Judge for yourself.

Attachment to your work is a double-edged sword, even triple-edged. One: Your attachment to the story — as your baby, as thinly veiled memoir — keeps you writing it (that’s good). The second edge is that attachment makes you resist any changes that might improve the story and better serve the reader. The third edge of the sword is that you don’t actually want to finish writing the book — ever — because it’s so personal you never want the market to see/judge it.¹

Levi is the rare writer who seems to enjoy his materiel, but isn’t so attached that he won’t instantly try a new approach to achieve a better effect. Tattoo Tales runs on verbs and near-constant action. Give it a look, and offer Levi your feedback.

As always, if you want to offer a writing sample for a House Call, please post a link Here.²

A Note About Money: Money is boring. It’s what your characters do with the money or intend to do, that creates sympathy and keeps the reader surprised and engaged. That’s why This News Story stuck in my craw this week. A man in Eugene, Oregon started a business that promised buyers 600,000 rare, limited-edition tennis shoes. He didn’t deliver, but accepted some $80 million dollars which he spent largely on — Something interesting? Something useful? Something original? — no. He bought boatloads of designer purses for his wife (they live in Eugene, the home of the University of Oregon, a town so crunchy granola that locals call it “Blue-Jean”), that, and he bought diamond jewelry, lux watches and sports cars. He’s going to prison, but Writer’s Court would add an extra twenty years to his sentence for Lack of Imagination.

In good fiction, creating a Great Problem is 90 percent of the task. But creating a Great Reason For Getting the Money is another 90 percent of the task. If your protagonist robs a bank, it should be for this Good Reason. If memory serves the Federal government or Lloyds of London eventually assumed ownership of the Good Reason and had to distribute the film in order to recoup the lost bank robbery money. The lesson? Don’t buy $14,000 Louis Vuitton purses crafted in the shape of ducks. Instead, be This Guy.

You wanna know where to spend da money? Read Levi’s story!

Everything Old

Is once again new. Take for example “Laddy Culture” or “Lad Culture.” In the 90s Chick Lit had a contender in “Lad Lit,” and Lad Mags such as Maxim, Bikini Review and FHM. Irvine Welsh struck gold with Marabou Stork Nightmares as did Bill Buford with Among the Thugs. Bit by bit that trend ran its course. So often book trends die because too many people flood the market with products that read as rushed and samey. The first big wave of Chick Lit lapsed once every such book cover featured a high-heeled shoe, a stemmed martini glass or an oversized pair of Audrey Hepburn sunglasses set against a background of bright pink.

In the eyes of too many critics Fight Club was the peak of Lad Lit, but they overlook the fact that I’d previously written Invisible Monsters and couldn’t sell the book. As the World Trade Center collapsed, so did Lad Lit. Transgressive fiction became synonymous with terrorism, and small clutches of young men horsing around were frowned upon by Homeland Security. To some extent Lad Lit donned a mask and became Horror.

Now with podcasters and political pundits and this, it looks as though Lad World is on the rebound. Public media is on the ropes funding-wise and there’s no shortage of young men on YouTube to take up the slack. If you’ve a half-written Lad Lit manuscript under your bed, this might be the time to dust off those pages and finish it.

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In Closing, A New Picture of My Old Dog

My Boston Terrier Isn’t Dead, She’s just Fourteen

1. Personally, I know a dozen writers who’ve been working five+ years on books they’ll probably never finish because the material is too dear to them. That was my mistake until I set everything aside and had a long laugh while writing ‘Invisible Monsters.’

2. I choose future House Calls based largely on how much writers visit and comment on earlier House Calls. Levi, for example, has been a prince about offering feedback to others.