It looks like Blake has abandoned his attempt at a barbarian sex novel with unicorns. Hey writing is tough enough without writing in a genre that you don't really care about. When you measure yourself against the masters of the form you have to realize that it takes a lot of talent to write something that doesn't make you look foolish.
Take Westerns for example. I love to read a good western but so many literary elitist types scoff and laugh at the genre. When a big time writer like Larry McMurty does it in Lonesome Dove he gets praised to the sky. But other excellent writers like Elmer Kelton and Elmore Leonard are masters of the form who get no respect.
I would love to write some alternative history, or noir style detective stories or westerns but I just fear that it will be too derivative to be much good. It would be easy to ape someones style and oh so hard to find your own voice.
But one of these days I am going to try.
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I have what I think is a pretty good idea for a sci-fi novel and I have bounced off some of my buddies who agree and think I would run with it. Only problem is I don't think I 'write' worth a damn. The funny part is I have a lot of what a lot of people think are good ideas for stories but I'll be damned if I can put them on paper.
I love to write but the problem is you want to be original. I mean I don't want to be so derivative of the writers I admire that I seem like a pale copy of them. So until you can find your own voice it is really tough to establish something.
Trooper,
Just write a western or detective novel in the voice you use here.
Just have the scenario and all of the side characters play it straight and the protagonist have your way of seeing things.
It might not be what you are aiming for, but would be a hell of a read.
I know but I think it would be very reminiscent of Robert Parker and his Spenser character. I have an idea about a cop who grew up with the mobsters in Carroll Gardens and is shunted into the computer section of the NYPD as happened to a friend of mine. Using the story of Greg Scarpa as a model with a little Joey Gallo thrown in for flavor. I think it would be an interesting book and an even better movie.
But I already have two jobs; I don't think I can take on a third.
The wife really wants me to do it so who knows. Maybe I can preview a few chapters here to see the response.
That is how the great Eric Flint does it you know. He writes what he calls "snipets" that he posts on his blog and takes comments. It helps drum up interest in his stuff which is great by the way.
The hard thing for me is that, unlike my other artistic endeavors, I don't like what I write.
If I write music, e.g., no problem. Sounds great. I'm a primitive drawer at best, but when I draw something within my range, it looks fine to me.
But my writing just grates. And my singing voice. I'm not sure if it's just what I expect to hear or what, but it's hard to do in that circumstance.
Troop you have a wonderful writing style. Hell the 'narratives' you post on here and on Althouse are publish worthy.
I was always convinced back in th day you were one of the striking Hollywood writers.
Actually I have been told I can write decent dialogue because I tend to write like people really talk, ungrammatically. Lot's of conjunctions and the like.
I read once that to write good dialouge, tape record a conversation, play it back and transcribe it. That's dialouge. Bad English but real dialouge.
I have a collection of cloth bound 1930's- 50's pulp westerns (including a 1911 first edition Zane Grey) left to me by my grandmother.
One long, cold winter I read them all; must be about 50 of 'em.
They can be summed up as 'Guy meets friend (with beautiful sister/daughter/neice)in trouble; kills bad guy and marries girl'.
Since I wrote that I am trying to figure out a plot line that this scenerio DOESN'T describe- but, I digress.
Point being, some were intertaining reads, and some were useless dreck. It had nothing to do with the genre, but everything to do with the writer. you could almost sense who was using the western backdrop and genre to make a quick buck and who was writing westerns whether they made a dime or not.
The old saw about 'write what you know' should actually be 'write what you LOVE'.
Redneck,
Exactly the advice Martin Gardner gives in "The Art of Fiction".
You should think about enrolling in some writing glasses - it'd be a GREAT investment for you - REALLY!
Hey JJ why all the hate man. Don't you have something better to do?
But heckle away guy. I never said it would be good. It just interests me. Its a free country.
At least for a little while yet.
Elmore Leonard has written westerns? Cool, I can't wait to try one out.
I am reading "Hit Man" by Lawrence Block right now. It's pretty entertaining. My next one on the queue is the second "Ripley" book by Patricia Highsmith.
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