Weekend Update #17

(Fsck me, a Weekend Update. For the week ending 6 May. Worth the wait. 850 more items and I'll be caught up.)

Note to agents: whenever you feel like complaining about idiotic slushdwellers, email me. I'm a good listener, and cheaper than a shrink.

The Rejecter denies the existence of the slushpile blacklist, and describes the type of authors that really annoy the crap out of agents. She also points out that agents usually pass on literary fiction, mostly because no-one buys it unless the author is already successful.

Denis McGrath continues his rant on fan fiction from the previous week, and hits on the crux of the issue: "A good writer writing fanfic is a tragic waste [of talent]." Fanfic writers should have this engraved into their monitors, tattooed onto their wrists, or chiselled into their gravestones.

McGrath goes on to discuss the dark side of fanfic, the accusations of plagiarism, where a writer who has ripped off someone else's idea then accuses them (or a staff writer) of ripping off their idea. He later explains that ideas are in the air, for anyone to breathe in then sneeze out onto paper.

For those of you with a scholarly bent, Rosewater Chronicles ponders the central question of modern philosophy: Why are bad writers attracted to complex theory?

BookEnds literary agency announces that they hate paper, especially if you've ruined it by writing something on it. They also remind you that "book publishing is a completely subjective business," so you better be writing about a subject. Bookends, while we have your attention, Do people follow submission guidelines? The fsck they do.

Nathan Bransford enumerates the two sides of the he said / she asserted debate. He's writing from Camp Said, a base near the border with the terrorist state of Fanfic, where agents wage a war of atrishun against the members of the BadGrammarian cult. He also wishes he could patent himself. 

Mike Toot suggests a solution to the moral problem of sending astronauts on a one-way mission to Mars: send bad writers instead.

Agent Kristin reveals (part of) the secret language of agents. (Hint: "No" translates as: "No".) (Part 2.)

Victoria Strauss of Writer Beware tries (successfully) to draw the attention of 50% of bad writers with her talk of The Insidious Double D's.

I'm not sure, but I think screenwriter turned novelist Robert Gregory Browne is admitting that he ripped off a plot from Tess Gerritsen.

Simon Haynes, who has published three humourous SF novels @ roughly 80,000 words each, has amassed 700,000 words of edited material "for future use". Must have one of those limited edition keyboards without a Delete key.

Advice from Micah Robinson at CHUD: "Here’s a super secret tip for getting your work sold: Stop writing screenplays and start freelancing for fancy mags." [Emphasis added]

Henry Alford of the NYT discovered that the publishing industry actually does edit, especially when it comes to quoting reviews. Publishing industry response: "We'll quote the entire review when the reviewer reads the entire fsckin' book." (Via Nathan Bransford.) 

Inspirational Quotatery:

From Lee Wood at Smart People Write (via Kenneth Davis), the truest sentence you will read this year. Really, if you read just one sentence this year, make it this one:

Bad writing makes smart people look dumb.

Writer Tom deFalco, quoted on Comics Should Be Good:

Most beginning writers believe you need one great idea to tell a story. One good idea will barely get you through the first page. To write a story, you need hundreds of ideas, and if you don’t realize that, you shouldn’t be writing.

Quotes Taken Out of Context:

• French screenwriter/director Francis Veber: "I have very bad writing."
• J.A. Konrath: "You're [...] a poor judge of your own work."
• Hugh Hewitt of Townhall.com: "If I was Garrison Keillor, I'd stop writing."
• B. Elwin Sherman of American Chronicle: "Dave Barry would quit writing again."
• Novelist and comic book author Jamie S. Rich reviewing Spiderman 3: "All I ever see is bad writing." (Actually, that one's in context.)

Stop Writing if You Need This Advice award nominees:

• Nathan Bransford says don't cold-call an agent. Filed under the general heading Don't Be an Asshole.
• The Rejecter reminds you that US postage rates have increased. Just my 2c.
• Agent Kristin says if you get bored with your story and want to take it in a new direction, start a new story.
• Lit Agent X points out that there is a limit to the effectiveness of time spent polishing a turd. (Miss Snark adds that everyone has a few turds in the bowl.)

Weekend Update #16

(For week ending April 29th.)

Amazon have finally decided to retire the worst neologism in the history of the Internet . It was bad enough when someone tortured the perfectly innocent and functional "weblog", saddling a nascent communication tool with a name remarkably similar to a slang word for excrement, costing the communication tool half a decade of credibility. Then last year Amazon decided to patent another idea no-one wanted to steal, and name it with an onomatopoeic word for excretion. Thank fsck common sense eventually prevailed. (Via Victoria Strauss, who debates the merits of plogging [sic].)

While pointing out the folly of trends, the Rejecter explains how it's great to work for a book packager, if you can write to deadline and have no soul.

Miss Snark details the exact circumstances under which she sets fire to submissions.

Fiction Scribe has more Pet Peeves than I have Reasons -- some of which will become Reasons, when the statute of limitations runs out.

S.M. Hutchens tries to couch his criticism with the term "writers of bad writing". But then, without "wish[ing] to embarrass", "much of what we reject is that of simpler people". Occam's Razor does not apply.

The Rejecter explains the Second Book Clause, for those of you who will never get to read a book contract.

Alison Jannsen of Bleak House Books talks shop in an interview on YouTube (Warning: actual footage of a real live editor in her natural environment). There's a brief shot of her crawling through the slushpile on her hands and knees, if you're into that sort of thing. (Via Miss Snark, who really wants you to think about the slushpile.)

Jonah Goldberg of National Review (who may or may not be related to the brothers Goldberg of frequent linkage) writes passionately and clearly about the need to say what you fsckin' mean.

Lynn Veihl observes that becoming an author means automatic membership in a semi-exclusive club for professional nutbags, and the amateur nutbags who stalk them, and the club events that bring them together. She's discussing romance writing in particular, but the only difference to other genres is the costumes they wear.

Nathan Bransford says there are three C's to remember when it comes to writing query letters. One of them is Crazy.

Denis McGrath calls bullshit on fan fiction. The substance of his complaint: that fan fiction is "puerile, overwrought, florid, hamfisted, tin-eared, illiterate, badly spelled, laughably punctuated, intellectually bankrupt pig vomit." He writes for Canadian television, so he speaks with authority.

Quotes Taken Out of Context:

• Jay Lake: "I made a decision to stop writing."
• Mirtika paraphrasing Cory Doctorow: "He suggested you should [...] stop writing."
• Andy Brouwer quoting Geoff Ryman: "I sit and stare at the wall in despair and consider giving up writing."
• Whiny opinion editor for college newspaper, Matt Piper: "If you're lucky enough have the chance to stop writing columns [...] it's fantastic."
• Janet Berliner interviewing Ray Bradbury: "I'd have to quit writing."

Special Lee Goldberg Section:

• Why you have no chance of getting your own TV series.
• When you lie on your resume, you have to keep updating the lie, even if the truth is pretty bloody good, and especially if you're Clive Cussler.
• Successful film producers have more money than you. If they ask you for money, it's been a few years between hits.
• Lee Goldberg has the best fans.

Stop Writing if You Need This Advice award nominees:

• Agent Kristin lists seven novels she's sick to death of reading, but you keep writing.
• Lit Agent X lists five more reasons why your submission is lining a toilet bowl.
• Teresa Neilsen Hayden says that paying to attend a "pitch session" is effectively paying someone to say "maybe, uh, but really no".

SWiYNTA Miss Snark Edition:

• Don't listen to writers whining about writing. If writers knew what they were doing, there'd only be a few hundred of them.
• Don't get cute with your submissions. If it doesn't fit in a photocopier, it'll fit in the dumpster.
• Some people just want to be parted from their money.
• Don't criticize the agent's website, unless their name is at the bottom of the page alongside the "Made with MS FrontPage" badge.
• If a friend or relative offers to publish your book, check if they know what they're fsckin' doing.
• Get used to disappointment. If you're seriously thinking of a career in writing, it's because you realised no-one was going to make you an astronaut or an entrepreneur or a detective without you having to, you know, do some work yourself. Guess what, bucko.
• Four more reasons your submission is now stoking the fire.

Weekend Update #15

Look, don't expect me to comment on the recent Virginia Tech massacre, or the perpetrator's now infamous writing. Tod Goldberg has already said more than I'd ever want to. Heck, every second blog has said more than I'd want to. Tod says it well enough.

[Moment of silence.]

News from the You Will Never Be This Good Dept: Cormac McCarthy won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize (Fiction) for The Road. (Via The Elegant Variation.)

That weird noise you heard last weekend was the rumblings of of the science fiction community sharpening their lightsabers after outgoing SFWA vice-president Howard Hendrix referred to writers who publish online as "webscabs", who are "undercutting those of us who aren't giving it away for free". GalleyCat has a nice roundup of the collective umbrage. I think it was Groucho Marx who said "I would never join a club that would have him as an officer."

And just in time for International Pixel-Stained Technopeasant Day, an over-reaction to the above which I know is going to be marked by the posting of a thousand terrible stories (including yours?), Miss Snark says "don't post your work on the web". Oh, the quandaries you find yourself in.

Even in 2007, you still can't put "Fuck" on the cover of a book if you want it in mainstream bookstores. Of course, you can get The Book Formerly Known as Fuck Noir (with the, um,  original cover) at your local Fucktopia, Uncle Cranky's Fuckapalooza, Post-Fuck Fiction, Fuck Fucky & Fuckit, Would You Like Some Fuck With That and wherever lapdances are sold.

The Arizona Republic delves into the issue of ghostwriting, which soon may be the only way to break into publishing (I'd point out that Kerry Lengel wrote the story, but how can I be sure?). If James Patterson™ and Tom Clancy™ continue to expand at their current rate, there will eventually be only one Official Author™ per genre, the Booker Prize will be given for the best Salman Rushdie™ novel, and Harlan Ellison™ will once again rule over science fiction. (Via Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind.)

Simon Haynes explains why outlining sucks, and why not outlining sucks.

Teresa Nielsen Hayden says that changes to Google's search/results algorithms are making it slightly harder to find examples of bad writing. God only knows why she'd go looking for bad writing, when people mail it to her every day.

Nathan Bransford on where the other 90% of a book's cover price goes. Oh, and your blog counts for exactly squat.

Frank Darabont, screenwriter/director of the extraordinary The Shawshank Redemption, whom you would think was finally above such things, talks (briefly) about the crushing disappointment of having his script for Indiana Jones 4 rejected by George Lucas. Please take a moment to voice your own version of "How can anyone think George Lucas is qualified to judge writing after Star Wars Episodes I-III?" (Via Defamer.)

I don't think I need to say anything about an American Idol-style show called Publish My Book!. If the exclamation point isn't enough, just imagine watching it.

According to the Rejecter, there are two kinds of bad books: there are the ones that sell a million copies anyway, and there are the ones that you write.

Miss Snark gets an awful lot of "joke" queries from people who think that saying the opposite of what you mean is the apotheosis of funny. And sometimes, just sometimes, agents are assholes. Sorry, "idiots".

English literary critic and Professor of Unemployable Graduates Terry Eagleton:

I have tried to stop writing. In fact, I am looking for a “contrascriptive” — a tablet you can take that stops you from writing. There’s this organization called Writers Anonymous. They try to get you down from a full-length volume to a poem.

There. Now you don't have to read the interview. (Yes, I'm annoyed that I didn't think of "contrascriptive" first.)

Stop Writing if You Need This Advice award nominees:

• Miss Snark details the people you don't want to be at a writer's conference.
• It doesn't matter what your genitals look like, as long as your writing does not emanate from the neighbouring orifice.
• Sending your query on colored paper just makes it stand out in the trash.
• Your novel is not "hot", "cool", or "sexy". It's a room temperature pile of paper, you sick freak.
• Miss Snark's own ten reasons you're stuck in the slushpile, which is a slushload less funny than mine, but probably more accurate.
• FictionScribe suggests you pay attention to the little details, and spell your own name correctly.
• Jessica Faust at Bookends points out that you need a thick skin. See Reason #56: You Can't Handle The Abuse.
• The Rejecter says if you're turning to writing after your midlife crisis, just give the fsck up now, because she's already read and rejected the novel you're writing.

Weekend Update #14

This week's Stop Writing The Hard Way award nominee: Kurt Vonnegut. The entire literary blogosphere has linked to the NYT obit, so I'll link to Yankee Pot Roast.

Bill Cronin of the wonderfully named Comics Should Be Good discusses a pervasive problem in comics and in genre fiction in general, which he unfortunately names "Women in Refrigerators", referencing an anecdote even he will eventually forget. H.W. Fowler, had he discussed the practice of slaughtering female characters merely to provide provocation for a male character, might have coined "The Fairer Sacrifice" instead.

Nathan Bransford wraps his advice in an analogy that is guaranteed to send every single writer into paralytic despair.

Nathan also expresses reservations about the tortured language in many fantasy novels ("What will thou doest with all thy junk, all thy junk inside thy trunk"). He is, of course, too shy to suggest that the authors might actually talk like that, or to observe that this is all Shakespeare's fault.

And in a big week, Nathan asks whether you think it's valuable to spend months or years studying under the tutelage of a writer who usually isn't all that more successful than you, to develop skills that no-one in the room possesses, to pursue a career that almost certainly won't earn back the cost of the course.

Fiction Scribe hates your poetry.

A fascinating new chapter in the battle over Clive Cussler's Sahara (covered earlier), and a great read if, like me, you enjoy the phrase "bad writing" being spoken (repeatedly) under oath in civil court. "It is flawed in every way writing can be flawed." Marvellous.

Bella Stander points to and comments on a GalleyCat story about an author who hired a publicist to to create buzz for his bridge-burning, iUniverse-shipping BigPub-hating memoir antics, proving the adage that no-one can screw you while you're busy screwing yourself.

Stander also discusses one of the many ways life as a freelance writer sucks.

Keith DeCandido explains why your fanfic is no match for his profic (via Lee Goldberg).

Somebody want to tell me what the fsck "urban fantasy" is? No, don't, I've lived this long without knowing.

Victoria Strauss points out that copyright only matters if someone thinks your work is worth copying.

John Scalzi explains why tax time sucks even harder when you're a fulltime writer.

Slush Pile Diva says she is "constantly amazed how many letters I get from authors who have crafted novel length projects, but can't manage to define the genre their project fits into." You'd think the amazement would wear off after a while.

The Rejecter discusses how to get into publishing -- by working.

Lee Goldberg discovers that fanfiction writers really are worried about plagiarism and copyright abuse.

Stop Writing if You Need This Advice award nominees, Miss Snark Only edition:

• Miss Snark says if you copy elements of a published novel, don't fsckin' submit. If by some miracle you're talented enough to hide the plagiarised elements in enough original writing to get it published, you'll have the rare pleasure of watching your publisher disown the book and sue for the advance while Gawker blogs a side-by-side comparison of the work you plagiarised.
• Things not to say to an agent at a conference, #10: Validate me! #11: If I have sex with you ...
• Don't ask "Did you get my email?". If you're worried, hand deliver your submission. Agents love that.
• Oh, and get the fsck over yourself, if you think that fiction that "breaks all the rules" doesn't ever get published. It's time to set that albatross free. If it comes back, you're still going to be a shit writer, but at least you'll have a pet albatross. Vonnegut never had an albatross, and look at him now.

Weekend Update #13

(Delivered on time!)

DJ Bran-Unit gives you the 411 on how he rolls (he answers email queries quickly, leaving you to calculate the maximum number of seconds it took to reject).

Nathan also asks the question that no-one in publishing wants to hear the answer to.

Andrew Kiraly of Yankee Pot Roast reveals Mitch Albom's secret to bestsellerdom: keyboard shortcuts. (Via Zooba.)

Victoria Strauss has more on the AuthorIdentity bookstore scam from last week. I'm sure there are a few bad writers already racing to turn this story into a dull, unpublishable thriller.

Agent Kristin gives one example of how publishers (and agents) have to think about more important issues than what picture to put on the cover.

JA Konrath explains, in a roundabout way, why your career is in the toilet.

Author Jan Burke has a few things to say about self publishing. (Via Lee Goldberg.) Hint: Are you dying?

If you've ever received a rejection, this news will make you want to suck the vitreous humor out of your eyes. (NY Times, requires registration. Via Zooba.)

Next time you're whining about how no-one recognizes your genius, remember this story, then think about how many times you've passed the Classics section in a bookstore and gone straight for the genre-porn. (Via Miss Snark.)

Stop Writing if You Need This Advice award nominees:

• Nathan Bransford suggests you try coming up with a good, original idea. 90% don't, as predicted.
• Agent Kristin says don't go to an agent's office to pitch in person. If you think rejection hurts, try a security guard's foot in your ass. (Don't bring your entire manuscript, for the same reason.)
• Miss Snark counsels an anxious writer on the most important aspect of meeting agents at a writers' conference.
• Fiction Scribe says shut the fsck up already.
• Miss Snark points out that business cards are for people who have a business.
• And don't start a website where you will pithily pronounce upon your collection of rejections. Oops, I mean rejection collection.

Weekend Update 12.1: The SWiYNTAs

Stop Writing if You Need This Advice award nominees:

• D.Challener at Write Stuff observes that coincidences in real life are magical, but coincidences in fiction suck random dirty objects.
• If your far enough along the publishing path to need to avoid scams that purport to increase your book's Amazon Rank, I'm probably too late, but that doesn't stop the Wall Street Journal from trying. (Via Zooba.)
• Victoria Strauss again begs you: don't fall for stealth vanity publishers. The latest wrinkle is seeking "outside investors".
• Nathan Bransford says don't waste your prospective agent's time. If you do, they'll have to say "No" just to make the subway.
• He also suggests that your novel's theme belongs in the subtext, not in your query.
• The Rejecter says if you open your query with "saw you at a conference", make sure the agent went to the conference.

SWiYNTA-MS (Miss Snark Category):

• Don't re-query the same agent, even if you changed one of the character's names. And you wonder how they get 30,000 submissions a year.
• Don't submit selected excerpts. No matter how gifted you think you are, if chapters 1-3 are not representative of the overall style of your novel, you're still on an early draft.
• What to do if you find that someone had your idea first. Miss S neglects to mention Get another idea.
• Some people just want to be screwed.
• If the sign says "No Queries" ...
• Before you mass-email agents with address you trawled from the web, take a moment to comprehend that all your emails are probably being automatically deleted.
• And if you're wondering who won Nitwit of the Fscking Year ...

Bonus: Stories from the Sunday Edition:

• A Modest Proposal For Preventing Unemployed Novel Writers From Being A Burden, and For Making Them Beneficial to The Publishing
• Richard Powers’ Secret Ghost Writing Career
• Pynchon Completist Located After Long Search
• Judith Regan Starts New Press
• Dan Brown Sues Himself
• More Potter 7 Details Revealed- Harry is Gay?

Kudos to the absurdly prolific Edward Champion. I didn't write anything for April Fool's because, well, I'm not sure you would have noticed the difference.

Weekend Update #11

(For week ending 25/3. Almost back on track.)

The Rejecter suggests that if you think writing is a sucky job, try working in the New York publishing scene.

Miss Snark explains why there's a discrepancy between what an agent's listing in Writers' Market says and what they actually want. Hint: They don't make money from it.

Dean Koontz is apparently too cheap to ride the "book trailer" bandwagon, instead opting to audition hoboes to ride for him (Via Zooba). If you're not au fait with the recent book trailer craze, it's just the opportunity to demonstrate that you're crap at making short films too.

Do you ever get the feeling that in years to come you're going to be trying to explain to your grandkids what a book was? The New York Times is saying that "author films" may replace book tours. I'm lining up right now at my local bookstore to get a ticket for the next Ian McEwan movie.

Aspiring writers: read through this list of pun-enriched writing tips. If there's a single one where you can't identify the pun, stop writing. There will be a test.

Miss Snark posts her query-to-contract ratio. You ain't in it.

Nathan Bransford totally rips me off to post 101 Things in Queries That Catch My Eye. He only makes it to 21, but that's better than I'm doing.

Russ Kaufmann quits writing. One down ...

Lee Goldberg finds out what happens when you cross the fanfic Mafia. Oh my God! They're bringing in the angry letters! AAAAAAAAAAH!

The problem with being an agent is, the more successful you are, the more fscking query letters you get.

The Rejecter makes a point about grammar, but in the first paragraph, she (unintentionally?) makes a more profound point about the state of the book-buying market.

Stop Writing if You Need This Advice award nominees:

• Miss Snark suggests if you're submitting electronically, save your work in a file format that Macs and PCs can read. Remember when typewriters only had the one font?
• Agent Kristin says don't ask an agent what they think of another agent. Or a publisher, for that matter. Would you ask the manager at McDonalds what he thinks of the service at Burger King? (I'm not saying agents would lie, but there's no angle in telling you the truth, is there?) AK gives you the skinny on how to evaluate an agent, for those that haven't stopped writing yet, but I'm not going to link to it. Why should I help you? Where's my angle?
• Elise points out the dangers of listening too closely to other unpublished writers.
• Miss Snark recommends that if someone asks for a manuscript, send them a MANUSCRIPT, not a LuLu-bound copy with an acknowledgements page thanking your mother for the fish. Editors and agents have spent years getting the crick in their neck just right so they can read and edit a loose-leaf manuscript on the subway, in a cab, at lunch, and while making whoopee. Don't send them to the chiropractor.
• And don't mention rejection, of any flavour or orientation, in your query letter. Some people just want to fail.
• Author Kit Whitfield uses a longwinded speed dating analogy to suggest you don't be an asshole. If you're looking for an excuse to unleash the asshole within, the fossil fuel lobby is always looking for new talent. They get paid for their fiction.
• Dr Hack explains why you shouldn't bother entering writing contests.
• The ever lovely Slush Pile Diva says you must find your voice. But she doesn't tell you what it looks like, or where you put it.
• Victoria Strauss of Writer Beware says don't use Literary Agents Online, a querying service that thinks you'll pay one hundred dollars to read an expression of interest from an agent prepared to read submissions from an automated query service, and to let you be charged by a third party to hear from them. If you're silly enough do this, they deserve your money, and I'll be happy because you're $100 closer to quitting.

Weekend Update #10.1: The SWiYNTAs

(For the week ending 18/3.)

Stop Writing if You Need This Advice award nominees:

• Agent Kristin suggests you decide whether your book is fiction or non-fiction, preferably before you write it. When was the last time you read and enjoyed a "message" novel? (Bonus points if it was a message you didn't already believe in. If you say Da Vinci Code, stop writing.)
• The Rejecter implores you: don't send a CD with your query letter. Of anything. This says one of two things to your prospective agent: my query letter sucks, so I hope you'll just read the manuscript, which is in virus_riddled_incompatible_file_format.doc, or I'm really a musician, but every record company turned me down, so I hope you'll listen to the poetry of my rockin' lyrics.
• If your queries aren't even making it past the agent's intern, here's why. Now stop writing. Spencer Ellsworth, who sounds like a character in a Jane Austen novel but is actually the new intern/slushpile marauder for agents Lori Perkins and Jenny Rappaport, kindly details some of his bad writing filters, to save you the trouble of submitting.
• Fiction Scribe explains why paragraph breaks must be used wisely.
• The Rejecter says don't use any words to describe your novel that you can't find labelling a bookstore shelf -- especially "quirky". Never, ever "quirky". "Quirky" says "even I don't know what I've written".
• Jenny Rappaport begs you to send the correct return postage, in stamps. I suggest you don't bother with return postage at all. Anything that makes it easier for the agent/publisher to say "this guy's an idiot, he can't do us the basic courtesy of not costing us money to say no to something we didn't even request" is one step closer to the constant frustration that will make you stop writing for good.
• Slush Pile Diva points out that happy people are dull, and prologues are for writers who can't write beginnings. It's the same post, but it's so nice, I linked it twice.

SWiYNTA-MS:

• If you're lucky enough to secure the services of an agent who doesn't charge you reading fees, Miss Snark recommends that you let the agent do their job.
• If you're lucky enough to get a publisher interested in sending you something on paper, read the contract carefully, particularly to check if the word 'born' has been crossed out of the 'first right of refusal' clause (methinks the lawyer who wrote the contract in question used to work in the music industry).
• Don't be an asshole. Assholes make great entrepreneurs and terrible novelists. A publisher might not care too much about an author's assholarity if the book sells, but the agent will, because no-one likes to talk to an asshole. For every person in the publishing business who is prepared to overlook your assholiness on the off chance of making a buck, there are a dozen who won't give an asshole an even break.
• Finish the damn book, even if it's a memoir, and you're not dead yet. I think you should always wait until after you're dead to finish your memoirs. If you life is interesting, someone else will write about you.
• When you're sending material to an agent/publisher via digital file, remove your comments/notes from the file. And don't send a paper copy with all your revision scribbles. This isn't high school; you don't have to show your working.
• And the one you should tape to your monitor, etch into your bathroom mirror, tattoo on your wrist just above your watch, and burn into your inner eyelids -- don't talk about your work-in-progress, especially in social situations where real writers or publishing folks may be within earshot. Nothing says Wannabe quite like a discussion about a bunch of fragmented ideas that you'll never finish, let alone see through to publication. At best, people who don't know what you're talking about will think you know what you're talking about. At best. Everyone else will wish they smoked so they could stub out a cigar on your tongue.

Weekend Update #8.1: SWiYNTA Nominees

(Pronounced swin-ta.)

Stop Writing if You Need This Advice award nominees this week:

• Agent Kristin says Don't write your autobiography. Well, she says don't admit it. I say don't write it. If your life was interesting you'd already be rich.
• She also says don't ask about selling the film rights. Someone has to buy the fscking book first.
• Lynn Veihl observes that blatant self-promotion makes you look like an asshole.
• The Rejecter hates bad writers who think that Grammar is the Amish word for your mom's mom.
• Nathan Bransford (in a long, plotless post) explains that if your novel has no plot, it's not "literary", it's just shit.
• Fiction Scribe has a bee in the bonnet about repeating plot points.
• Elise thinks you should act professionally. That this even needs to be said ...
• Lori Perkins reminds you not to bitch, whine, pester or otherwise attempt to correspond after a rejection.
• Victoria Strauss advises that paying to attend a writer's conference run by a vanity publisher is more expensive than a herbal enema, for the same result.

Miss Snark deserves a category of her own (SWiYNTA-MS, pronounced swin-tams). She warns against:

• The "lunacy" (her word) of submitting to only one agent.
• Ending a book on a cliffhanger.
• The egoism of thinking that agents owe you anything for reading your submission. You owe them that minute of their life back.
• Cold-calling to pitch your idea for a novel. This was covered by Agent Kristin a few weeks back, but it's worth repeating for the anecdotes.
• Sending your queries by Fed Ex. Insert tasteless Britney Spears joke here.
• Thinking there's a shortcut around the slushpile.
• CC'ing an email to more than one agent. If you're too lazy to write separate emails, how did you string 80,00 words together?
• Trying to pitch a ghostwriting idea to a celebrity. Who thinks of these things?