Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Conflicted

I don't like trumpeting this, but I'm doing it anyway:
One week left! Get 10% off the price of my book PLUS get a free copy of The Other Face: Experiencing the Mask. Just order the print version of The Principle of Ultimate Indivisibility from Lulu.com and enter the coupon code SUMMERREAD305 at checkout, then forward the receipt from Lulu to me at order[at]blissplotpress[dot]com.

I'm uncomfortable with being a salesman. Hawking art like merchandise feels sleazy. At the same time, I want people to read my book and I want it to bring me dollars so I can recoup the (small) expense of publishing it. Sales = good. Selling = bad. I have Inner Conflict.

This is a good thing.

To be "of two minds" (or more) is much better for a fiction writer than to be comfortably reductionist. In storytelling, conflict is key. And self-observation may be the best tool (neck-and-neck with observation of others) an author can employ in creating convincing characters. Each of us is a world in microcosm, a jumble of contradictory selves like cats in a bag. We label the bag "I" just to get along in society.

Truth is, we live in a complicated universe. Complexity theory tells us that everything is a system of interrelating parts, and attempts to reduce the complexity run the risk of falsification: simplistic rather than simple. To embrace the big tangle is to think holistically. Aristotle in the Metaphysics: "The whole is more than the sum of its parts."

I am an entire ecology. So are you. That's the truth of being human. It feels good to accept what is.

So I occasionally play a salesman role, and will continue as long as it feels right to do so. When it doesn't, I'll stop.

Saturday, June 12, 2010

I Am Not a Brand

The writing/publishing journey includes a stretch of highway running through a desolate landscape of blood and horror, the Valley of the Shadow of Death. It's usually just called Self-Promotion.

I've been happy to visit that territory less and less frequently in the months since my book came out, as I've learned more about walking a path with heart.

Part of the torture is the non-stop screaming of harpies with Advice: marketing, branding, networking, facebooktweettweetblahblahblah! So I was glad to come across a blog by author Maureen Johnson that expresses very well my thoughts about selling one's work on the Internet (it's funny too). Read her Manifesto here:
http://www.maureenjohnsonbooks.com/2010/06/08/manifesto/

Thanks, Maureen!