This morning I came across this article written by Korean-American author Leonard Chang:

I will start by being so bold as to quote a rejection by an esteemed former editor, publisher, and literary agent who shall remain nameless, but who read The Lockpicker in manuscript form. He wrote a brief letter of praise, but ultimately rejected the novel. The line from his letter that shouted back at me was thus:

What fails for me is that it [that] virtually nothing is made of the fact that these guys are Koreans. I suppose in the alleged melting pot of America that might be a good thing, but for the book it doesn’t lend anything even lightly exotic to the narrative or the characters.

Before you get shocked or wince sympathetically, I must confess that this was not the first time I’d receive this kind of rejection. I won’t get into the identity and racial politics of why this critique is so pernicious, but it’s enough to say that exoticism for exoticism’s sake, especially from a Korean-American writer who sees himself as American and not exotic, is just, well, antiquated.

Another rejection for another novel, another, longer quote from a legendary editor:

The characters, especially the main character, just do not seem Asian enough. They act like everyone else. They don’t eat Korean food, they don’t speak Korean, and you have to think about ways to make these characters more ’ethnic,’ more different. We get too much of the minutiae of [the characters’] lives and none of the details that separate Koreans and Korean-Americans from the rest of us. For example, in the scene when she looks into the mirror, you don’t show how she sees her slanted eyes, or how she thinks of her Asianness.

Half the problem is that the agents and editors, who probably knew or guessed Chang was Korean-American, expected him to write only about issues related to that ethnicity (and then, probably dreary accounts about how difficult life is in racist America). I’ve mentioned this problem before in the context of Turkish author Elif ?afak:

When my first novel written in English came out in America, I heard an interesting remark from a literary critic. “I liked your book,” he said, “but I wish you had written it differently.” (Laughter) I asked him what he meant by that. He said, “Well, look at it. There’s so many Spanish, American, Hispanic characters in it, but there’s only one Turkish character and it’s a man.” Now the novel took place on a university campus in Boston, so to me, it was normal that there be more international characters in it than Turkish characters, but I understood what my critic was looking for. And I also understood that I would keep disappointing him. He wanted to see the manifestation of my identity. He was looking for a Turkish woman in the book because I happened to be one.

…

Writers are not seen as creative individuals on their own, but as the representatives of their respective cultures: a few authors from China, a few from Turkey, a few from Nigeria.

It must be pretty depressing to be an author from an ethnic minority and find editors and agents are only interested in your stories if they include characters of that minority and they are described and behave in the way Western progressives suppose they should. As a pale-faced Brit I am unlikely to encounter such prejudices – editors and agents will reject my work for very different reasons – but the answer is there anyway: self-publish.

Firstly, I want to thank everyone for pitching in on the book blurb. 70 of you voted, 48 said you preferred the second one, 18 the first, and 4 miserable sods said both were shite, which perhaps they are. Thank you for voting, and especially for all those who wrote a comment, especially Bloke in Germany who – if readers’ reactions to his re-write are anything to go by – will be demanding royalties if this thing ends up on Oprah.

This was a fascinating exercise because it turned up results that were wholly unexpected and I need to explain why. I will start by saying this book defies categorisation, and a book agent has confirmed that. It is not really a romance, and it is most definitely not a typical, formulaic romance. It’s not even a romance with a twist, it is barely a romance at all. It is far more of a character study of two people, both of whom are flawed, struggling in a relationship with one another. It is also social commentary, and as readers of my blog should know, when it comes to that I generally don’t water things down. There are some pretty robust opinions in there, and much of what I say will generate plenty of controversy. This is why I made the decision not to engage a female editor, because I think the type of woman who goes into editing will have serious problems with a lot of the commentary taking place. A lot of people will not like this book, and quite a few might even hate it. On the plus side, this is what sells: my ultimate aim is to see a hundred thousand deranged feminists wearing pussyhats taking part in a mass burning of my book in the middle of Brooklyn.

The reason I chose this story was because it presented itself and I reckoned it would be easy to tell, but also because I thought I would be saying things that haven’t been said before in a way which is new, and I still believe that’s the case. Now it may be it’s a bag of shite and nobody is interested, but the important thing is I tell *this* story in *my* way and see if it sells. If it doesn’t, then meh. What I didn’t want to do is try to write a story which has been told before in a way which is “proven”, hoping I can do a better job than a million other writers. Perhaps I can attempt that on my third or fourth book, but not the first. Like I try to do with this blog, I reckon I have a better chance of capturing a small but dedicated niche audience rather than gaining mass appeal by saying what everyone else is and copying their style. In many ways the book is an extension of the blog, and my regular readers will recognise the narrator’s voice in places.

So, back to the blurb. The first one was my overwhelming preference because it accurately reflects the book. The one other person in the world who has read it thought this was the case too, and chose the first. I wrote the second as a generic blurb for a romance in a few minutes, but it doesn’t really reflect the book. As Adam Thiele says in the comments, the second one sounds like Mills & Boon bullshit. BiG did a grand job of improving it, but alas it doesn’t reflect the story at all – it suggests a romance with a hint of mystery to entice people in which would be great if it was a classic romance novel – but it’s not.

I learned from flogging overpriced meals in a four-star hotel that customers don’t complain about rubbish per se, they complain that their expectations haven’t been met. I may be able to shift more copies initially with my second blurb (or BiG’s edit!) but the customer will feel disappointed and leave a bad review. If I go with the first, many people might not like it and hence not buy it, but at least those that do will get roughly what they are expecting, i.e. something different. Put another way, I’d rather reach a niche market of 10,000 customers likely to be satisfied than wade into a market of 100,000 most of whom will be disappointed.Therefore I need to be honest in the blurb and give a hint of the controversy inside, and not miss-sell it. Saying that, I am quite sure regardless of the blurb a lot of people who read this book will put it down and say “Well, that wasn’t what I expected!” Like I said, it’s hard to categorise.

What I found most interesting about the vote is this. I don’t know how my readers evaluated the two options, but did they:

1) Think I was writing a romance and judge the second blurb to be more typical and fitting with a romance novel, hence likely to generate more sales?

2) Know nothing about the book and on the basis of the blurb alone decide they’d rather read Book 2 than Book 1?

Because if it’s the second one, I have discovered that my readers – who appear to be mostly male, middle-aged, and centre-right – would rather read a soppy romance novel of a classic form than a story of a fellow battling angry feminists as he tries to handle a near-nutcase and navigate the Brooklyn arts scene. I’ve got to say, that surprised me a lot.

Once again, thanks very much for your input and all the support I’m getting. I have some thinking to do, but given the editing won’t be finished until January, I have time.

Okay folks, I need your advice again. I need to write around 100-120 words of blurb to go on the back cover of my book and on the Amazon page. I’ve come up with two versions so far, and would like some feedback on which you think is better so I’m running a poll at the bottom of this post.

If anyone is feeling generous, please leave suggestions in the comments. Perhaps elements of each could be combined? Is anything missing? Does anything grab you? Does anything fall flat?

I should probably say that my target markets are:

1. Women aged between 30-50, more conservative than liberal, with an interest in dating, relationships, and a man’s perspective. Most will have children.
2. Men aged between 20-50, seeking dating advice and/or looking to share bad experiences.
3. Men aged between 30-50 with daughters in their teens and above, interested in social discussions.

Getting this right is the most important part of marketing any book, and I need some third-party input. This is a first draft, and I’m sure there will be several more.

So, the first:

How far should you go to maintain a relationship with a weird foreigner you met online?

It’s a question a British man struggles to answer as he falls in love with Katya, an artsy Russian living in London, only to discover she’s not who she seems.  Seeking a solution, he stumbles into a bizarre world of Brooklyn-based misfits obsessed with Burning Man, an annual gathering where anything goes. On the way he must face his own self-doubts, outbursts of angry feminism, and revelations about Katya’s past he’ll wish she kept to herself.

Entertaining, honest, and brutally realistic, this is a story of an ordinary man dating a very modern woman.

The second:

And it started off so well.

When a middle-aged British man meets Katya, a charming Russian woman, he thinks he’s finally found what he’s looking for. But one morning she blurts out a piece of her past which changes everything. Torn between staying and leaving, he tries to understand the life she’s led and the choices she’s made. But the more he discovers, the more questions arise. Why did she divorce the man she says she loved? What happened in the Orgy Dome at Burning Man? And why is she sticking with him?

Entertaining, honest, and brutally realistic, this is a story of a man in love with a woman he doesn’t know.

Vote please:

[poll id=”2″]

Having finished the third draft and taken my book as far as I could on my own, this week I took another major step: I hired an editor.

After doing some reading around I decided to run a search on the members of the Editorial Freelancers Association, an American outfit. I plugged in a couple of details and went through the list of names almost randomly. Originally I’d intended to use a female editor for this work, but when I saw most of them lived in Brooklyn, San Francisco, and other liberal strongholds and that a good half of them had dyed hair, tattoos, and facial piercings I began to think this might not be such a good idea. Any liberal matching that description is likely to struggle with the content of my story, particularly if she’s a feminist, and this would inevitably affect her editorial work.

So I picked two men (both Americans), based mainly on the content of their websites, and sent them an enquiry. Both asked me to send a 2,000 word passage or the whole manuscript, and they’d provide a sample edit and a quote. One came back with $1,200 and the other $1,600. However, the more expensive of the two returned a much better sample edit: more explanation behind the changes, and he seemed to “get” the voice of the narrator better and buy into the story more. The other editor made two changes which I thought dumbed down the narrator’s voice, making it sound more like a young American than a middle-aged Brit. The good news is that both sets of suggestions were minor: no “WTF is this, please rewrite completely” in any of them.

I gave my preferred editor a call and we had a long chat about the editorial process and what I was looking for, and it was very productive. I made the decision to switch the spelling and punctuation conventions to American English, purely because the US is a much bigger market than the UK. The downside is I know seeing z instead of s will grate forever. I am sure I will learn a lot from my editor, who has already shown me a few ways I can improve my writing (again, minor points) and I’m looking forward to the whole process. With luck, what comes out will be a decent product which will sell.

The one downside is that he is busy until early December, so nothing will get done in November. On the plus side, it means he has work and isn’t some 25 year old grad with a BA in Media Writing who’s touting himself about as a freelance writer waiting for his first paid gig. He reckons the editing will take 14 days, so shortly before Christmas I should begin the process of accepting or rejecting the changes and compiling the final version. Then it’ll need to be proof-read, which is a separate exercise I’ll also get done professionally.

In the meantime, I need to get a book cover done. Once again, I’m going to get this done professionally and it looks to be around $350 for both an e-book and paperback cover, based on 3 options with 2 revision cycles. By now I’m seeing that getting a book self-published is going to come in at around $2,500 which isn’t that cheap. However, the most common complaints about self-published books are that they’ve not been properly edited, they’re strewn with errors, the cover looks crap, and the formatting is bad. I might be able to save money by doing a lot of this myself, but I’d be far happier with a professional-looking product than an amateur effort – particularly if I’m going to flog the thing.

I’m hoping that by mid-January it’ll be published and available to purchase on Amazon. I have a marketing strategy, and once I have something to sell I’ll put that into action and see how it goes. Frankly, I haven’t the slightest idea whether this will sell or not, nor whether anyone will like my writing or the story. But as I said right at the beginning, there is only one way to find out – and I intend to do so.

Yesterday I finished the third draft of my book, which basically involved me going through the whole thing line by line trying to choose the correct word and making sure each sentence read well. I did this partly by reading each line out loud as if I were standing on a stage addressing an audience. The clunky words and bad metaphors tend to jump out at you when you do that.

So it is now 75,400 words across 16 chapters. It’s a little on the light side – I was aiming for 80,000 words – but as a (kind of) romance fiction by a new author this ought not to do me any harm. Better than asking tentative readers to wade through 120k words at any rate. The next step is to read it through from start to finish, looking for obvious improvements, grammatical and spelling errors, inconsistencies, and looking at the overall pace and flow. Then I’ll be writing to one or two editors asking them for quotes.

I have no idea what to expect from the editing process, but I guess I’ll find out. In the meantime, I need to write two synopses (a long and a short), come up with a title (I may even run a poll on here once I’ve narrowed the options), get someone to design a cover, and start the ball rolling on the marketing. I’ve already started playing with the compilation software to turn it into an e-book, but I feel I have more to learn on that yet.

Anyway, completing this third draft feels like a big achievement. Hopefully that’s the hardest part done, but we’ll see.