Well, today could be better
Jan. 12th, 2006 11:40 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annathepiperI'm seeing a lot of links coming over my Friends list about the erupting controversies surrounding James Frey and JT LeRoy. It's a little odd for me, because I've never read a word attributed to either of these names; in fact, I'd never heard of either of them until I saw these links coming around. (This might say something, I suppose, about my lack of connection to non-geek culture.) Since I have no particular investment in either of these writers, I can't say I feel any particular anger about the brouhaha surrounding them.
Yet I am vaguely miffed, and I think it's because I've become acquainted with so many other writer hopefuls via LJ and via Writer's Weekend. I see all you folks who, like me, are laboring over products of your imaginations. You're lavishing many hours of care into your writing. And all for the love of writing stories. Though I am proud to know some exceptions to the rule (hi![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mizkit! Hi jesshartley!), most of you, like me, are still working on getting something solid enough to get a publisher interested. It's a hard process. I know it. You all know it. It can and will probably take us years to get our works into print.
And what I'm seeing in these stories about Frey and LeRoy are people who have seen fit to short-circuit that process by being dishonest. I wrote with amusement before about Jim Butcher speaking at Writer's Weekend about when it came to publishing, you didn't have to worry about outrunning the bear, you only had to worry about outrunning the person next to you. This, though... this feels like turning around and shooting the person next to you in order to outrun that bear. It feels underhanded, and it feels wrong.
In other news, Google got back to me, and the word is no. Bah.
Wednesday evening miles: 1.85
Thursday morning miles: 1.6
Miles out of Hobbiton: 614.15
Miles out of Rivendell: 156.15
Miles to Lothlórien: 307.85
Yet I am vaguely miffed, and I think it's because I've become acquainted with so many other writer hopefuls via LJ and via Writer's Weekend. I see all you folks who, like me, are laboring over products of your imaginations. You're lavishing many hours of care into your writing. And all for the love of writing stories. Though I am proud to know some exceptions to the rule (hi
mizkit! Hi jesshartley!), most of you, like me, are still working on getting something solid enough to get a publisher interested. It's a hard process. I know it. You all know it. It can and will probably take us years to get our works into print.And what I'm seeing in these stories about Frey and LeRoy are people who have seen fit to short-circuit that process by being dishonest. I wrote with amusement before about Jim Butcher speaking at Writer's Weekend about when it came to publishing, you didn't have to worry about outrunning the bear, you only had to worry about outrunning the person next to you. This, though... this feels like turning around and shooting the person next to you in order to outrun that bear. It feels underhanded, and it feels wrong.
In other news, Google got back to me, and the word is no. Bah.
Wednesday evening miles: 1.85
Thursday morning miles: 1.6
Miles out of Hobbiton: 614.15
Miles out of Rivendell: 156.15
Miles to Lothlórien: 307.85