Ryne Douglas Pearson's Blog, page 5

My son's middle school band performing today. I think they sound pretty good.

A smiling dog is just about the best thing there is :)

 

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Enjoy!

What is the natural length of a novel? Let's look at two classics by two masters to find a consensus.
 

Ray Bradbury, by any stretch of the imagination one of the giants of science fiction, wrote this little book you may have heard of called Fahrenheit 451. Has sold a bazillion copies. Is beloved. Treasured. Has been adapted for film. Became a cultural touchstone in arguments over banning books.

 
This jewel of modern literature comes in at about 46,000 words.

 
Okay. We have a starting point. Now lets look to another master. Stephen King. Carrie may have put him on the map, and The Shining certainly cemented his place as the king of modern horror, but the book that took him to a singular level of talent is The Stand. Deep and dark, layered with its own mythology rooted in our beliefs and fears, it is sprawling and insightful.

 
According to stats from Amazon, this lauded tome of apocalyptic terror comes in at about 462,000.

 
Wait...
 

The Stand is ten times longer than Fahrenheit 451? How can this be? Is there no rule as to how long a novel should be?
 

No, there is not.
 
If you write, you will hear 'guidelines' or 'requirements' from a variety of 'authorities'. Some state that a novel begins at about 40,000 words. Others say 70,000. Some claim 100,000 depending on genre.

My shortest novel, Simple Simon , contains about 66,000 words. My longest, October's Ghost , about 149,000. My most recent novel, Confessions , comes in at 68,000 words. The one before that, All For One , 129,000.
 
So what does all this mean to a writer who is trying to figure out how long their novel should be?
 
It means this: tell the story and worry about classifying it later. Short, Novella, Novel, Behemoth...it doesn't matter. Conventions as to length should not dictate how you tell the story. Every story has its natural length. Find that, execute it, and stop worrying whether your peg is going to fit in a hole defined by someone else.

But we can remember the greatest gift he left us, which is not any device or service which makes our existence a bit easier or more enjoyable. His legacy, to me at least, is this:

Never ask permission to do something you believe in.

To my knowledge he never said that. But it's clear from what he accomplished and how he went about it that approval was not something he sought when he was passionate about something. He just did it. And if it didn't work he found a way to make it work.

Never ask permission to do something you believe in.

Remember that. Whatever it is you do as the hours of each day spin by.

Never ask permission to do something you believe in.

I'm making this prediction. I've said it before, but the announcement today by Jeff Bezos of the Kindle Fire and new eInk Kindles makes this clearer than ever in my opinion. Why?

Amazon is a distributor. Always has been. Whether that distribution entails the physical (a book, a DVD, a flat screen TV), or the digital (eBook, streaming movie), they have always made their mark by matching a customer's desires with fulfillment of those desires, and by bringing the two together via delivery. And what they understand better than any other company is that entertainment content will be almost exclusively digital in the very near future. All of it. Everything.

Paper books, DVDs, CDs, are going to disappear except for niche providers. Gone. Poof.

Amazon gets this, and they want to be the conduit to bring you and your entertainment together. Sure, they'd love to sell you the TV you'll be watching a streamed movie on, but they would rather you consume your streamed movies through them. That is a continual flow of income, and it predisposes you to use them for other purchases...particularly if you are Prime subscriber. And it highlights a fact of the digital age.

Content comes to you.

You will not go to the store to get a CD, or a DVD, or a book. I'm sorry, but the economics of that simply will not support retailers continuing to carry physical products that are available digitally. About the only digital content that will remain as one you leave your house to seek out will be new release films in theaters. And there's even some long term doubt as to the viability of that experience.

Amazon hasn't been blind to this paradigm shift as some have. They've embraced it. These new offerings and the downward pressure in price makes the road to free all that easier to see.

How long until the Kindle in some form is free? I'm betting five years or less. And it could be A LOT less.

 

My first literary agent was Clyde Taylor at Curtis Brown, who sold my first four novels. He passed away some years ago, and we parted company professionally a few years before that, but there was something he said to me once very early in our tenure together that has stuck with me always.

This was nearly twenty years ago. He had gone out with my first novel to publishers, and we were receiving offers. One editor called me and talked about the book, how much he loved it, and why he really wanted to be the one to bring it to market. It was a very nice conversation, and for someone just starting out in the business it was an absolute thrill for me. I mean, I was talking to someone in New York about my book!

But, this editor would not be the one to bring my book to market. The offer from the publisher he worked for came in below a better one from William Morrow and Avon, and that was that.

Or was it?

A few days after I signed and returned the contracts I received a call from Clyde. He said, in essence, that I should drop the editor who wanted the book a note. I asked why, and he said, 'You will be in this business a long time, and so will he, so the likelihood that you may work together is there, but in this instance, good manners is reason enough.'

Good manners is reason enough.

Now, I consider myself a pretty nice guy. I'm not saying that in any sort of bragging way, but I try to function, especially in a professional sense, by following two rules: 1) Don't be a jerk. 2) Remember rule #1. So what Clyde was telling me wasn't any divergence from how I tried to behave without prompting.

But what I've experienced over the years since then is that there is an impetus advanced by external forces to 'move on', and to leave any connection that didn't pan out behind. To move on. Keep pushing forward. Maybe there is the expectation to extend thanks, but it is rarely given voice. Not that it never happens, but it seems almost forgotten. If it occurs, wonderful. If not, well, we all lead busy lives.

But here was my first agent, who'd worked in the business a lifetime by the time he took me on, reminding me that 'good manners is reason enough'.

I consider those words to be the best advice given me in my career, because they have little to do with writing, but everything to do with being a better person.

Yes, fear those steely, uncompromising eyes. That bluster backed by cold steel and a single bullet.

 

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A post by my friend Ellie Soderstrom reminded me of my unabashed adoration for the best second fiddle to ever grace a television screen. A small shrine to the Fifester hangs on my office wall, with a wooden duck (as seen in the reflection) watching warily as Barney locks and loads.

Fly, duck. Fly away while you can. You're facing the most terrifying lawman television has ever seen.

I am at a bit of a crossroads here. One where a decision must be made. And I'm stuck.

Just for fun the other night I decided to actually, finally, and with extreme prejudice, lock in my five favorite movies of all time. In no particular order they are...

To Kill A Mockingbird

The Exorcist

It's A Wonderful Life

The Dish

???

This is where I hit the wall. I can't decide. I have several viable candidates, but to choose one and heave the others aside would be too horrible to imagine.

So here is my collective number five favorite movie...

Rudy

Ordinary People

Grumpy Old Men

Alien

Looking at that list, I'm okay with my indecisive decisiveness.

Metaphorical Blood: discussing the give and take of my new book 'Bled'

Right up front on the cover of my latest novella, Bled, you'll see two giant references to the red stuff. Obviously, the title, and second to that is the giant smear of red plasma right there on the white book jacket.

 

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But there's more to this story of an addled waitress at the Highliner Cafe. Much more. Metaphors are silly things. They can be simple-minded and trite. Or they can be deep and metaphysical. I don't know where the metaphors in Bled fall in that spectrum, but I do know that the bleeding that takes place in this book is more than just the kind that comes from a young woman's veins in the bathroom -- though there might be some of that too.

Teeny McLeod is coming up against a particularly vile creature: the taker. Someone who bleeds things dry and then moves on from them after he has what he wants. Not what he needs, but what he wants.

I can't tell you if Teeny comes out the other side of her confrontation okay. But I can tell you that I'm fascinated with this kind of character -- not only his, that of a taker, but with hers too. Teeny is a giver, you see. She's a waitress so there's the obvious connection with how she may serve others. But further than that, she will give you her shift at work if it's better for you. She will give you her dinner if you are hungry. In fact, Teeny McLeod has been giving her whole life -- and to everyone in the small island town of Dovetail Cove.

But will Teeny finally discover she's had enough giving while everyone else just takes?

I hope you'll find out in Bled, available now.

Bled: About the Novella

She only wanted to leave. But he took that option from her. Now she wants it back.

Set on the same island as the reader favorite Shed, the latest literary suspense novella from bestselling author Jason McIntyre picks up the Dovetail Cove saga with this story of one lonely woman...trapped.

Tina McLeod is on the cusp of a new life. Extraordinary change is rare in her world but this newsflash means she can finally leave her small island town for good. No more pouring coffee for townsfolk in Main Street's greasy spoon, no more living under the weight of her born-again mother. That is, until Frank Moort comes in for his usual lunch and dessert on an ordinary Friday in May.

Bled sees things turn backwards and upside down for each of them. Their encounter is prolonged and grotesque, the sort of thing splashing the covers of big city newspapers. Both are changed. And neither will come out clean on the other side.

A story about taking what's not yours, Bled explores pushing back when you've been pushed too far. It paints in red the horrors from our most commonplace of surroundings: right out in the open where nothing can hide behind closed doors and shut mouths.

About the Author

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Jason McIntyre has lived and worked in varied places across the globe. His writing also meanders from the pastoral to the garish, from the fantastical to the morbid. Vibrant characters and vivid surroundings stay with him and coalesce into novels and stories. Before his time as an editor, writer and communications professional, he spent several years as a graphic designer and commercial artist.

McIntyre's writing has been called darkly noir and sophisticated, styled after the likes of Chuck Palahniuk but with the pacing and mass appeal of Stephen King. The books tackle the family life subject matter of Jonathan Franzen but also eerie discoveries one might find in a Ray Bradbury story or those of Rod Serling.

Jason McIntyre's books include the #1 Kindle Suspense, The Night Walk Men, Bestsellers On The Gathering Storm and Shed, plus the multi-layered coming-of-age literary suspense Thalo Blue.

 

Bled : Teaser Trailer