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Blogs by E D Detetcheverrie
What Does It Take? 5/1/2011 6:13:34 PM
...to get published? Just finished reading another one of those books. Y'know, the one published by a major publishing house that's not as good as the stuff you write. I run across them quite a bit. Normally, I don't finish reading them; they're so poorly written or the stories are lame or both. But this one intrigued me...because it read so very much like the stuff I was writing twenty years ago when I thought I was good enough to be published by a major publishing house.
Oh the author is so gung-ho to spit the story out, and she's quick to insert humor wherever she can, and she even does that annoying thing I used to do where I'd write what the hero or heroine was thinking before I put what they actually said. The narrative is first-person and reads more like the point of view of someone who's mind we can read rather than a narrative told after the fact or even a good, solid play-by-play of events as they happen. Ah yes, deflect the lack of writing skill with all the humor you can muster....
And she did that thing I used to do where I know the story plays out like a movie in her head, but she's writing so fast to keep up with what she's visualizing that she leaves out all sorts of pertinent details, forgetting we're not picturing the same scenarios just as she is. She even has characters speaking without identifying them in any way so you're forced to backtrack and re-read the surrounding passages a few times just to figure out who it was that said those lines.
Her book held more emotion than story, and if it hadn't she wouldn't have had enough story to fill the pages necessary to call the thing a novel.
It's another book like the glut of them flooding the market today featuring a blend into the background young(ish) woman who suddenly finds herself in a supernatural setting where she discovers latent butt-kicking abilities, acquires an astonishingly gorgeous boyfriend (often supernatural also), and utterly changes her lifestyle to accomodate her new heroic role along with her wardrobe (going from plain Jane to club tramp but with a small arsenal of assorted weapons).
In this one there's a lot of crushing embraces and tons of "hot" kisses, but actual sex is barely described.
It's also unfortunate that it appears to be the second of the five books this particular author has successfully published, the unfortunate bit being she launches the book with action to lure in those of us uninterested in emotional dilemmas, but never really introduces the characters, assuming we are completely familiar with them from her first book. I usually discover new authors by picking up whatever book I happen to chance across first. Thus, it's always nice to have a little background if the book is part of a series I'm unfamiliar with. I have never heard of this author or her series outside of the Dollar Tree where I happened to pick it up looking for something to kill time with while waiting for Endeavour to lift off last Friday. It's absolutely unlikely I would have ever discovered her otherwise and said to myself, "Oooh! I should read this stranger's stuff and go to some effort to begin with the first book she published!"
Like me when I was first starting out, she plunges ahead through a rambling, rather disconnected storyline, filling in gaps with what's running through the main character's head, again and again failing to describe scenes enough to allow her readers to really follow along, often surprising us by abruptly having a character talk when we never knew they were present, and wasting time with red herrings obviously planted because her writing's not mature enough to produce a well-thought out and well-woven storyline. Too much filler, not enough story. It's obvious some of the side-stuff is just there to add numbers to her final page-count.
I noticed on the spine that the subgenre these books are filed under is "Paranormal Romance". Had I seen that when I first picked the book up, I never would have bought it. But I know romance is an incredibly easy genre to break into...and many authors have "prostituted" themselves through it (often under pen names) in an effort to get their feet in the door of the big-name publishing world. So briefly I wondered if my sci-fi series could be jammed into this dubious genre and realized, no...it would never work. Too graphic.
In the author's favor, I'll mention that she did do a good job writing more story than romance...weak as the story is, which is the only way I could finish it. I won't even be passing it on to my friend who introduced me to what I'll term, "Paranormal Porn", because neither the storyline nor physical interactions would keep her interest.
Yet there are five novels published in this series...five honest to goodness God-awful crapfests just like it, through a side arm of a better-known publishing house. It's a genuine paperback, not a POD mass-market and is treated like a "real" book by a "real" author...despite the fact I was just as good twenty years in the past...before my writing improved.
How do these people succeed in the business? How do authors who write as good as I do or worse end up signed by major houses? I know...romance. Second to kids' books in popularity. But I've read mysteries, techno-thrillers, and horror that totally sucked and been equally stymied...do they just know someone? Someone who knows someone? See, I couldn't do that. I'd feel I was stealing an opportunity from a better writer out there. I want the world to be filled with great books, not the mediocre or worse crap somebody's cousin or wife or kid or dentist's kid or whoever wrote and got published just because someone knew or was related to someone who could make things happen.
But that's how the business works. It's not about talent or technical skill...and I know this because I've said it here before so many times myself.
What a shame.
Even this chick's website is lame. The really bad part is her bio where she describes her extensive writing background...and she still puts out crap that bad? Wow.
At least the stinkin' thing only cost me a dollar.
