For the six of you who still read this blog….
…I think I should explain about the relative radio silence of the last few weeks. When I started ABlog the Author in March 2009, the aim was to promote my then new novel “Everything Hurts” and in the process try to contribute two-three posts a week that ideally contained some insights about writing and general musings on my experience past and present. The goal was not to be gratuitous, recklessly opinionated, joke-based, self-indulgent or self-reverential, but also to not be like the recently divorced guy on the date that yaks too much. For instance, I don’t think it’s useful or valid information that I switched to black coffee three months ago or that the previous owners of our apartment installed plumbing that contains a known carcinogen that has been outlawed since the Seventies. Or that I had my first chocolate Pop Tart the other day and they know what they’re doing over there. Or that I lasted exactly ten hours with Windows 7 and they DO NOT know what they’re doing over there.
I think for the most part, I’ve been responsible and diligent with these posts. And, please Christ, entertaining. Okay, maybe a little too much Truants. And I’ve maintained the pace of around three posts a week for the last two and a half years. But lately, the last few months, it’s been a struggle.
When I stopped drinking 16 years ago, it was quickly revealed to me that I had to learn what was my business, what was nobody else’s business and what was none of my business.
So, do with this what you will.
Just before Memorial Day, I finished my latest novel, SHRINK THYSELF. I’ve posted about five excerpts here, so in a perfect world, you’ve been following along. What I was unaware of was that in the two-plus years I had been writing the book, the publishing industry as I knew it was going the way of the Dodo. I knew it, but didn’t think it would affect me. I am a low-risk author. My advances are small enough to be considered shipping and handling charges and my books, while not huge sellers, make the money back for the house. And I get some nice play along the way, thanks to Dave, Bob and Tom and the Times.
This is my nuanced way of saying that it’s almost six months later and no bites.
Fine. Nothing so far, and we are far from done casting the line in the water. But that said, can you understand how the notion of ABlog the Author seems a tad fraudulent now? (By the way, Tad Fraudulent would be a great name for a Republican Party operative, wouldn’t it?) As a purveyor of fiction, I’m in limbo now, waiting to hear and not all that geeked to embark on something new. This is the first time in 12 years I am not at work on something long-form. I don’t write novels to make money, haven’t so far, but I do write books to be read. There, I said it.
One other factor. Six weeks after I finished SHRINK THYSELF, I joined Twitter. I did it originally just to register my name and promote upcoming Truants gigs. But I quickly realized it was an incredibly valuable distraction while waiting…and waiting…to hear. An old stand-up colleague of mine, Fred Stoller, described Twitter as “Facebook without the bragging.” So, for the last five months, I’ve been weighing in a few times a week with the kind of inside sports jokes I used to write at SI or topical takes that are two towns over from Dave Letterman’s voice. In other words, content I would never have considered for the blog, where I like to stretch out, as I do now.
Enough. I felt I owed whoever still checks in here an explanation and to thank you again for all your support over the last two and a half years. The response has always been nourishing and humbling. I want you to know that however halting, I’ll still check in. This is where I am. As a guy I love, Kevin Talty, likes to say, “Give time time there.”
