John Scalzi (author of the Hugo Award-nominated Old Man’s War
) gives some Unasked for Advice to Writers About Money.
1. You’re a writer. Prepare to be broke.
Writers make crap. Why do they make crap? For many reasons, beginning with forces outside their control (publishers pay as little as humanly possible; lots of would-be writers willing to work for pennies, keeping the pay rates low) and working up to forces entirely within their control (writers playing with their XBox 360s instead of writing; willingness to be to paid stupid low rates for their work). Most salaried writers in the US are lucky if they get above $50,000 a year; most freelance writers in the United States (which includes novelists, screenwriters, etc) could make more money being assistant manager at the local Wal-Mart. It’s not a joke.
It’s tough love, folks.
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June 8th, 2009
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In keeping with the last post, here’s a short story about a John Carter of Mars movie. Well, movies. Read it.
(From Tor)
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June 5th, 2009
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Nerd alert. I am heading into massive geek out territory here, but you know, I’ve been writing this blog for about a year now (ignoring my hiatus earlier this year) and it’s about time I exposed my geek underpants.
Andrew Stanton (WALL-E) is working on a screen adaptation of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ John Carter of Mars stories! It’s going to be live action, with plenty of CG, and PG-13, which means… nearly naked princesses!
Fourteen-year-old me is freaking out right now.
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June 3rd, 2009
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A little flash game to find out how good you are at deciphering 17th century handwriting (hint: the words are largely from official documents–wills, parish registers, etc).
The 17th century abbreviations are my favorite part.
H-bly yrs,
Chris
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June 1st, 2009
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Here’s a series of articles on writing, by the two-time Hugo Award-winning author, Robert J. Sawyer.
The columns focus on practical advice, solutions and problems faced by beginning science fiction writers–and most of it is applicable for writing in any genre. Good stuff.
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May 22nd, 2009
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Carte Blanche is the literary review of the Quebec Writers’ Foundation.
carte blanche, accepts poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. Send us your odes, sonnets, free verse, short stories of all types and genres, memoirs, personal essays, book reviews, literary journalism, musings on the writing process—as long as it’s well written (and within our 3500 word limit) we’ll consider it.
They also have an annual prize for an outstanding submission by a Quebec writer.
I really should have posted this sooner.
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May 21st, 2009
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A local Lloydminster paper, The Meridian Booster, interviewed me for my winning story in Geist! I’m very flattered and want to thank Graham Mason for taking the time to talk to me.
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January 21st, 2009
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Happy 2009, folks. This has to be my favorite way to ring in the new year: my short short story The Other James Buchanan won a first prize in Geist Magazine’s first annual short long-distance fiction contest. It will also be in print in the next issue of Geist. It’s my first publication, so I’m psyched.
Enjoy!
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January 10th, 2009
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Some fiction for a Monday. An excerpt from The Flying Troutmans, winner of the Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. A sample:
Shotgun, said Thebes.
Already dibsed it, said Logan.
I hate you, said Thebes.
We were back on the road.
It’s over here at Geist.
An editorial note–litfarm is going on hiatus for a week or so while I move servers and do some last minute shopping. See you in a bit.
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December 8th, 2008
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Something a little more serious than usual: libel and defamation. A computer, an internet connection, and one or more functional digits is pretty much all you need to be an irresponsible journalist these days.
“What journalist? I’m a blogger,” you’re saying. The truth is, if you’re making an unprivileged publication of another person’s statements to a third party–ie writing it on a publicly accessible blog–you’re one-quarter of the way to defamation.
Clearly it’s worth educating yourself about defamation and its cousins libel and slander. Luckily, OurMedia has a concise online guide for bloggers. And if you’ve been synergizing all morning, they even have links to an executive summary to get you up to speed and proactive.
Read it before you update your site about the Moon Landing Hoax with nine-point proof of Chandrayaan-1’s real mission, and save yourself the embarrassment of being punched in the face by a living legend. Or being sued for libel. Mostly the latter.
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December 5th, 2008
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