Bandwagonpunk! Is it right for you? (Probably not)

I think I mentioned that at the last PNWA conference I heard several agents ask for steampunk stories and many in the crowd had no idea what that meant.  Because I seemed to know what steampunk was, I was asked by several aspiring authors to explain it to them so they could alter their already-written books to fit this unknown setting.

Allow me to repeat that: alter their already-written books to fit this unknown setting.

I've been pretty immersed in the genre for awhile because I was (at the time) contemplating a steampunk novel.  I answered their questions and asked my own.  Mostly I asked why they would want to do such a thing?

Because it's what they want. ("They" being accompanied by a nod toward the nearest editor or agent.)  I tried to explain that it really isn't, but I'm not sure I got much traction.  In a competitive marketplace, it is tempting to write to the current trend.  But any reputable agent or editor will tell you not to chase the trends.

And then they ask for anyone who has one to step forward.  I know, it's frustrating, but after years and years in bookstores, this much I know is true: There's no appreciable market for Bandwagonpunk.

It just seems like there is because we see so much of it, but not if you want a lasting career.  Because while I have little or no data to back it up, how many of those authors do you think earned-out their advance?  How many of them do you think put up sufficient Booksense numbers to earn a second contract?  Relatively few.

Sure, careers have been launched by following what someone else did.  It's hard to name a fantasy author who didn't get started aping Tolkien.  God knows Harry Potter made the world safe for everyone from Artemis Fowl to Percy Jackson, but those are two among a horde of also-rans.  And note that neither of the two I mentioned is a clone of the author that laid the path that got it into the bookstores.  There's a difference between "Psht!  I can write that, here's boy wizard Number 293" and "That's an intriguing idea, what can I do that's new, but fits?" 

There are probably some good authors who have tried to hook a vampire premise to their novels just to catch the coattails of Twilight and some of them even pulled it off.   But I would wager that those authors would have done just as well (if not as quickly) if they're resisted the urge to graft foreign elements into their tales.

If you are adding things that the story does not demand to fit the trappings of the current setting du jour, then I (and many of your readers) will get bored quickly.  What's more, we'll trip over the things you grafted onto the story because even the most myopic readers will realize that they're not supposed to be there.  But if the story hinges on the death of Queen Victoria and troubles with the accession of King Edward VI, or if you're making some important parallel point using the story world to mirror our own, then I'll have my bowler hat and brass goggles and be flying alongside in my airship the whole way.  (Or space helmet, diving helmet or other headgear as appropriate.)  

Seriously, I sometimes think that "Me Too" should be a genre of its own. 

I think it usually goes something like this...

"I want to write a sort of proto-King Lear with a female as the Lear character."
"That's been done to death; how are you going to make it new?"
"I'm going to set it ON A SPACE STATION!"
"No one writes space opera anymore, Steampunk's really big right now..."

Make sure to oil the axles, that bandwagon squeaks something awful and they'll hear you coming.

Okay, I'll admit that I'm being a bit snarky.  On the face of it, there's nothing really wrong with this.  Putting it in space (or steampunk London, or Narnia, or turning them all into vampires for that matter) might make an old story feel new.  Maybe.  God knows Shakespeare's been cadged in every setting under the sun.  And a good writer could make that work.  But even though making King Lear into a western sort of worked with King of Texas (kind of), it only worked because the setting suited the story and there were enough changes made to the play to carry the western motif.

But it seems to me that someone who does this is actually creating obstacles for themselves that don't need to be there unless there's some compelling reason beyond "because it's cool right now".   Unless you have an angle that demands this setting, you have a longer road to walk than your peer who is telling a story that needs to be told in that setting.  If you're gifted (or lucky) you can make this work anyway.  Unless your reason for taking your story into space or back in time is the story, it's going to feel like a gimmick and you will have to work a lot harder to make it not feel like a gimmick.  Writing is hard enough; ask yourself why you're giving yourself extra work to do.

My guiding light remains true: Elements are in service to the story, never the other way around.  When you're shifting the story to fit the elements, you have a problem.

The Fourth "W"

The first three, of course, are who, what and when.

I am often told that setting is the soul of a novel. But what of the setting of writing of the novel? How important is location for the author? There are writers whose writing studio, garage office, garret apartment or table at the cafe are as important to their work as the gardens of Giverny were to Monet.

This morning I had a business meeting in the cafe where I usually write. This is a smallish cafe near the school where I work. It's communal, convivial, funky and all the things a coffee shop should be. It's also a bustling local hangout, an intersection of writers, musicians, book groups, poets, priests and politicians all of us bonding over a cup of caffeine.

One of my colleagues looked around and said: "You write in here?"

I looked at her for a moment and then shouted "Sorry, what?"

I'd never noticed before how noisy the place was. But to be honest, I like it. The first question I ever asked my readers was "Where do you write?" As I said then, I like to have people around when I write. Rather than a distraction, the boisterous atmosphere of the cafe reminds me not to be a hermit, that the writers who have a breakout hit and then retreat to an isolated cabin to compose the Great American Novel are usually never heard from again. The people around me inform the narrative, pour their energy into the words.

Because it's been awhile and I have hopefully attracted some new readers since I first asked this back in February I thought I'd ask again and expand upon it a bit...  

If you're a writer: "Where do you write?" Does the boisterous energy of the masses distract you? Or does it help you? What makes the ideal place for you to partake in the written word? Does the setting have to fit the piece? Or is it a mixed bag: does the crowd around you help with scenes that bustle, but take you out of your groove if you're trying to write something lonesome?  

If you're not a writer: "Where do you read?" Does the setting help or hinder the narrative? One of the first things I did when I got to Seattle was read everything I could find that was set here. If I'm traveling somewhere and I know there's a book on my shelf that's iconic for my destination, I'll grab it and take it with me. When I was driving across the US, I read 'Lost Continent' by Bill Bryson in the hotel room every night before bed. I discovered Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch novels when I was in Los Angeles. Leave your thoughts in the comments section! I really want to know.  

Today's Quote of the Day:

"Walk into any bookstore or library, calculate how many lifetimes the average person would need to read all the fiction contained therein. To think that one has anything to contribute, to any genre or tradition, takes genuine hubris."

-Laura Lippman Read in the Washington Post Online

Find Me Here

It takes an imaginary village. . .

Most children have imaginary playmates. I would be intrigued to find that some researchers have interviewed writers and non-writers to chart the incidence of imaginary friends as it correlates to storytelling in later life.

For my part, I had an entire village, called "Westmoore". It was woven of snippets of Sherlock Holmes and Wordsworth's moor wandering, and not a little of Tolkien's bucolic Britain. Like one of those mythical islands sitting on the back of a giant sea turtle, Westmoore wandered from fantasy locations to real ones as suited my playtime needs. It was a secret base for GI Joe, a setting-off point for Hobbits and elves, and a waystation for all manner of imagined heroes and villains.

Cobbled lanes pass underfoot as the wanderer enters the village. A lumbering haycart trundles past, the mists wrapping tendrils through the spokes as the farmer gives you a tip of his cap and an appraising look on his way by. Lights filter through the soot-stained glass of the Cat & Fiddle where the echoes of frivolity keep back the gathering night. Half-timbered houses wander away into the gloom and up on the hill overlooking the town, the ruined castle (there has to be a castle) watches over the bucolic scene.

By the end of my childhood, Westmoore had become anchored in an imaginary corner of the Lake Country of northern England. The Hobbits and elves had wandered off to points unknown and more modern adventures were taking place in the mists of Westmoore. My first full-length novel took place almost entirely in Westmoore and amid the rooms and secret passages of that castle. It's a book that may never see print because books by lads of fifteen so rarely do (with good reason) but it did serve to finally cement the place in the modern era.

In the book I'm currently trying to sell, Westmoore makes a cameo appearance. A teensy tiny bit of the action takes place under the skeptical eye of the matron of the Cat & Fiddle. It gave me a bit of a thrill to take my readers to a place I loved so much as a child, to allow part of my mysteries to unfold among the misty byways where I wandered as a child.

Future editors may excise it as unnecessary, or object to a journey through a very real swath of England that ends in an imaginary village. But for the moment, it lives and breathes once more -- an imaginary village where Wordsworth walked arm-in-arm with Tolkien for a little while in the mind of an asthmatic kid crafting adventures in his head.

Welcome to Westmoore.