J. D. Seeber Art Cards has created a set of Twilight Zone sketches to be used as trading cards. Check out the full Twilight Zone line at this link. I’m a huge Twilight Zone fan, so I love anything that brings more attention to this fine show!
Amazon.com…Brick and Mortar?!
Say it ain’t so, but Amazon.com has just announced that it plans to open an actual–walk in–brick-and-mortar bookstore. Yeah, just when you thought…
This single store is to be opened in its home town and will be a test market for its creation. It will carry high-end products. My first thought was why open it in its hometown as a test? Too incestuous. They should open it elsewhere to really test it.
I got this (of all places!) from a Business Baramoter report on the Weather Channel this morning, but was unable to find any other info in a quick search….
Added Feb 7th: click this link for more information.
Added Feb 12th: click this link for more information.
Bitchin and Moanin? Take Responsibility!
It’s interesting to see the ongoing back-and-forth between “one side or the other,” on this Amazon-vs-the World thing. Each side thinks they’re right, that they’re the only ones with the purchase of truth (pun intended). Fact is things aren’t perfect on either side, which gives existence to the mirrored position. There’s very little “black and white” anymore.
Oooh, Amazon’s taking over the world! It’s soooo scary!
Yeah, well, before Amazon, who had control of it, huh? Six guesses.
All I know is that there are writers out there–good ones, we’re not talking about those who still have a lot of work yet before getting into this conversation–looking for representation. And why are they getting turned away?
Projected that they can’t sell beyond a certain benchmark?
Because they don’t have ready made audiences.
They’re not immediate successes out of the fricking gate.
Anyone can be made into a success, it’s all about promotion. Spending a little quality time with those you feel are worth the effort and building a following through word of mouth (include all modes of technology, here, but it’s all the same thing, people!) I am still stunned and amazed at what I see being published and bought. I’ve recently come to the to point in my life where if it loses my interest, I stop reading. I used to be loyal to the book I bought and slogged through it, but I found myself forced-rep reading so many titles that simply were not well done, I decide–no more. Just as recently as two weeks ago, picked up a pseudo-brand namer, stuck with it some 70 pages, and it killed me. Extremely choppy writing that was completely jarring, and words that (sorry) went nowhere for me.
And I’m not a hard reader!
I’ll give most anyone a chance–I would’ve even continued reading had the story half interested me!
Thing is, all this polarization seems to be because of things like brick-and-mortar income versus Internet income. How if authors go to Amazon, they’re gonna “lose out.”
HOW???
These writers who go to Amazon (I’m bettin’) have gone elsewhere. I’m sure they went to Random House, Bantam, S&S, not to mention agents. I’m sure they fought every inch of the way across fields of broken (and poisoned!) glass–just like the rest of us.
And, whatdyaknow?
A publisher took them on!
Yes, a publisher!
Take out any modifier to “publisher,” and look at it from the writer’s point of view. Someone out there in Bookland decided to take a chance on them. Someone with clout. Wherewithal. Is hip to the Coming Things.
How do they lose?
Have you not heard of the Internet?
How instantly global it is?
Low overhead?
Lights always on?
All the success stories?
Oh, right…they don’t get an actual store to walk into. Don’t get pushed by traditional publishers and all their clout.
Bad press.
Have we all forgotten just how much “help” traditional publishers give authors?
The real problem here is not who authors are going to…it’s what’s happened to publishing. How it’s infected all that orbits it. Yes, there are people’s jobs at stake–but so are there at the author end of the spectrum. These big business people are simply doing what’s “best for them,” and yes, at the expense of everyone else. All those in the Big Box Stores do have their jobs at stake and they could find themselves out of a job, and that sucks…and I do feel for them…so I see their angst about the whole mess…but the unfortunate aspect of that is that they (right or wrong) weighed anchor at a port that maybe isn’t long for commerce.
I love books, love books stores, but if they end up drying up because those who run things won’t change, while other avenues for buying books continue to exist…well, it will be a sad world. And (apparently) I can’t save the world. Only my little space in it. All I can do is do the best I feel I can do–just like all the rest of us out there. Some are just more greedy, more rigid, more scared than the rest, and yes, some of those actually run things. And shit rolls downhill. So, if you’re attached to something whose days are numbered, maybe you should start looking elsewhere.
I don’t believe in End of World scenarios. I think we can all co-exist peacefully and in harmony. Call me full of shit, but I don’t really care. Those who complain without offering constructive suggestion–action!–have only themselves to blame.
Take responsibility for your actions!
If we all treat each other with respect and dignity, we can all prosper and go far. I am so fed up (if you couldn’t tell) with all this fricking finger pointing. Get over yourselves and do something right for a change.
Work with each other!
See the worth and value in each other’s business models. Grow and welcome positive change. Take chances. Make things better.
Just quit bitchin and moanin without action.
One of my reincarnational lives, as a WWII tail gunner…
Dog Gone
There were three dogs in my life that meant a lot to me, and two had the same name (“Mac”; the other was “Crackers“). Two were from my childhood, the third, adulthood.
I lost the first “Mac” to a little sports car out in the country (where we lived) driven by a guy with his girl. He’d come around the bend and didn’t see Mac as he crossed the road. Mac–I swear to you–looked both ways just before he was slammed into. Out comes the little sports car. Next thing I know, Mac’s lying in a small puddle of his own blood in the middle of the road. Mac was a Black Lab and he’d accompanied my young teenage self on my bike to the Post Office, a short jaunt down the way. We were returning home. We’d buried him “up back,” and I put his favorite and well-chewed tree branch across his grave, in homage.
I don’t know exactly when it’d happened, but sometime later, at the top of the stairs in our house, I don’t know what I’d been doing, but I turned around and looked to the head of the stairs…and saw the butt and wagging tail of a Black Lab heading downstairs.
We hadn’t had another dog at that point.
I rushed to the head of the stairs…only to be met by empty steps.
In 2003, our 11-year-old Black Lab, Mac, died of bone cancer. He was my “Little Buddy,” and we did everything together. When I wrote, he sat at my feet. When I paced working on or reading my manuscripts out loud–he was there, eyeing me always with his big brown, caring, eyes. When I worked in the backyard, he followed me everywhere. Walked behind me when I mowed or sat and made sure I never missed a spot. Went with us on all our hikes.
When he died…I felt his spirit depart. Just as real as if I’d been hit. Or someone leaning on me had left. It was stark, jarring.
I didn’t think I’d cry–I was prepared, understood death as best as I could from my point of view–but I burst out in tears. Uncontrollably. Never saw it coming.
High Summer of 2006, I was out in the backyard, sweeping grass clippings off a sidewalk alongside a window. It was a bright, sunny day. As I worked past the window…in the window…was the reflection of a Black Lab following me.
I whipped around.
No dog.
I rushed back to the window to verify what I’d seen–the reflection of a dog behind me, or maybe just me and my broom at some weird angle–and held the broom back to where I’d had it, moving it back and forth where I’d had it…but no reflection behind me did it yield.
I was extremely surprised to see a dog behind me, because we no longer had a dog, and there were no dogs that size (at the time) around us.
I looked back to the window.
“Thanks, Mac.”
I smiled and continued on.
I found this curious, given the “Vulgarities” post (http://fpdorchak.wordpress.com/2012/01/06/on-the-vulgarities-of-writing/) I’d recently posted!