So, the RT Bookfair just occurred in New Orleans. It’s one of the deals where booksellers and authors and readers show up to mingle and meet and buy and giveaway and all that sort of thing. The indie authors and smaller presses with nonreturnable books (ie., books sold on consignment) were put in one room and the traditional pressers were put in another. A lot of indies have been grumbling about this, particularly in light of an RT staffer who referred to them as “aspiring authors.”
Well, you know what? Who cares. It’s not the end of the world. At least you haven’t been kidnapped by Boko Haram thugs in order to be sold into slavery via a forced Muslim marriage. Heck, it could always be worse. The Spanish Inquisition could start up again, right on your lucky little doorstep.
Speaking of the end of the world, I’m starting to grow a bit weary of all the dystopian novels. I realize trends are things that people jump on (like: flying carpets, trolleys, and spiders that stroll across your kitchen floor), but the trendification of publishing is starting to become a Sight to Behold. A trend begins and then a vast wave of similar widgets surge their way across the landscape, singing in chorus and all painted the same color (see: have I seen those abs before?).
It would be fascinating if someone did a study of publishing and analyzed trends. Did trends occurs in the Ye Ancient Dayes of Yesteryear like they do now? Twilight…instant vampire trend! Hunger Games…instant dystopian trend! Some book with abs on it…instant New Adult trend! When Tolstoy published War and Peace, was there an instant Massive Russian Novel trend?
I’m thinking…no.
Okay, back to the Seal Whistle. 109 pages so far. I’ve noticed something interesting while writing this story (and, by the way, if you haven’t read my Tormay trilogy, the Seal Whistle takes place in that same land…go read The Hawk and His Boy if you don’t know what I’m talking about; it’s free). I started out with a specific plot in mind, specific characters who are from the Tormay trilogy or related in certain ways to those books. The characters have strongly asserted themselves in the process and are basically demanding page time to do what they want. Even if it really has nothing to do with the plot. I realize that authorial wisdom says one should edit and prune out such passages. However, these characters will probably beat the stuffing out of me if I do that.
Did trends occur in Ye Ancient Days of Yesteryear? Uh, yeah, you bet they did. Horace Walpole writes “The Castle of Otranto” and bingo, instant Gothic Novel trend (see Austen’s “Northanger Abbey” which skewers the idea, but by the time it was published the trend was over and they had to explain it to readers in a foreword). Goethe writes “The Sorrows of Young Werther”, bingo, Sturm und Drang. In fact, every literary era is just such a trend.
I’m with you on the dystopias, though. The good news is that this, too, shall pass.
Ah, interesting to know. I suppose, though, that the advent of the internet and the collapse of the agent-publisher system have conspired to accelerate and concentrate the trend effect (I’m determined to think better of the past…).