Where did that decade go?

[julesjones]

This weekend marks ten years since I was bitten by the writing bug. I went to a science fiction con, and saw my first fanfiction zines, ones for a political sf show from the BBC. Something clicked, and not long after that, I started writing my own fanfic stories. And submitting them to zines with editors who edited. The first story I ever wrote was submitted to someone who tore it apart, showed me why it didn't work -- and how to fix it. I learnt a lot from that, however painful it might have been at the time, and when I started writing original fiction three years later it showed. I sold the second original story I wrote, to the second editor I submitted it to. For forty two pounds, a number which amused me and will amuse a lot of other science fiction fans.

Ten years on, and I've got ten books out with a small press. It's still mostly political sf crossed with gay romance, and it's still a lot of fun to write. I hope everyone else has had as much fun reading it as I did writing it. Cheers.

Comments

[hafren.livejournal.com]

Congrats on your anniversary! I wish I were as prolific - ten books in ten years is pretty good going.

You've got me trying to recall when I started, now. I know I joined Fc in autumn 2000. I'd only written one thing before then, which was on Liberated at the time, and I think I'd sent that to whoever then ran the site in January 2006. So I've got a while to go until my 10 years in fandom...

[julesjones]

It's a bit of a cheat, in that one of the books is a short story published as a very *small* book, and some of the others are novellas. I think all of them together still add up to one of Mary Gentle's recent doorstops -- rasfc has the unofficial unit of the Ash for measuring how heavy a book is or isn't. :-)

I haven't written any fanfic in the last four years, although it's not obvious that it's that long because some of them didn't come out in zines until a couple of years later, and I was still editing zines for another two years after I stopped writing. But there are one or two unpublished ones that might see an appearance with the serial numbers filed off, and then there's that Avon/Turing HEX I've been mumbling about for years...

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

The tenth anniversary of my arrival on Lysator and Space City must have passed a few months ago, because this weekend is ten years since my first con - Who's 7 '96. I remember because the clocks went back. So I presume that's where julesjones got bitten, though I don't remember meeting her in person until we shared a room at Neutral Zone in early 1998. Happy Anniversary [to her]!

[julesjones]

Yup, it was Who's 7 96, which was my third ever con. My first was Neutral Zone 96 (which is where I first met Gareth, so I've actually known him longer than I've known most of the fans), and my second was the first Discworld con. But I didn't get a home internet account and join the B7 lists and afp until sometime around April or May 97. (Though I was intermittently reading the Lyst archives for some months before then whenever I had web access via Other Half's access at work, and corresponding with watervole via my work email account after I met her at Who's 7.)

watervole is one of the few people I can actually remember from that con, because I didn't know anyone at the time apart from Gareth. But it's hard to forget the person who spent some time persuading me to try a slashzine. At the time I didn't quite like to say out loud in public that the reason I wasn't entirely certain about the idea of A/B was that I simply didn't see Avon as gay, and that yes, I did actually like the idea of two guys in bed. Liked it quite a lot, in fact. :-)

I was so glad the clocks went back that weekend, because I'd been helping Gareth prop up the bar on Saturday night, and didn't go to bed until around 2:30. The extra hour in bed the next morning was much appreciated.

Remember the guy who phoned our room at NZ at 3 am with the demand to speak to Paul? "Are you *sure* Paul isn't there?" And I hung up, and we looked at each other, and said, "We wish..."

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

How could I forget? Particularly given that Paul was at the con, wasn't he?

Who's 7 '96 was where I first met watervole and steverogerson. And Pred (not sure if she's on LJ?) And there were a lot of other people who I found out later had been there, but I missed them.

[hafren.livejournal.com]

And Pred (not sure if she's on LJ?)

I think she still is, though she rarely posts.

[julesjones]

He'd been there the year before, but I don't think he was there that year. Of course, a week later we were all at Deliverance...

Pred's at predatrix, although it only gets updated about once a quarter, usually after I have nagged her for several days in a row.

I know that a lot of people I knew later on were at the con and I'm sure I talked to a lot of them, but I can only remember a few who stood out for various reasons. watervole, for the dealer's table and the Just A Minute game. David "Servalan" Walsh, for being David "Servalan" Walsh. :-) lexin and the_magician for various committeeish things, not least of which being the breakfast conversation in which it became apparent that they *had* noticed a steward doing her best to stop a crowd blocking the fire exits, and had marked it down for future reference when looking for arms to twist. (Though nobody has yet managed to twist my arm hard enough to get me onto a concom. I'm not stupid, I'm not expendable, and I'm not going on a concom.) Val Westall, who noticed me drooling over a zine cover, and got a photocopy of her own copy when she got home and posted it to me. Gareth, who seriously startled me by remembering me from a con six months earlier. That man's got a prodigous memory. Saturday night in the bar was the first time I saw him pull his trick of demonstrating acting by scaring someone half to death. I have a feeling I may have met temeres as well, but may be confusing it with a later con at the same hotel. If I dug out my prgramme book and checked the panels I'd probably turn up a few more people I remember as panelists even if I didn't know them at the time.

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, I think I did meet temeres. Or did I? It's a bit blurred. I remember someone else, who was around on the lists at that time, kindly drove some of us into town to look for a restaurant, but we couldn't agree on the restaurant so split our forces. But now I've forgotten her name, which is sad. Someone tried to teach me to juggle. And Chris B was there, of course, that was when we played our first cricket match.

[anghara.livejournal.com]

Ten years on, and I've got ten books out

That's damned impressive, and quite a testament to how much you like this life [grin]

congratulations on the milestone.

[julesjones]

Thnaks. :-) As I said to Hafren, it still only adds up to about one Ash, if that (and I do miss Mary and wish she'd come back to us...). But it's still pretty satisfying to get my monthly royalty statement, and see that yes, I was able to get that many pieces finished to a standard where the backlist still sells slowly but steadily.

[pinkdormouse.livejournal.com]

Congratulations.

[julesjones]

Thanks. :-) Oh, and I do like that GirlPower icon. :-)

How go your pro writing efforts? I've not been keeping up with a lot of people these last few months, because I was head down in writing and then more or less offline for a couple of months.

[pinkdormouse.livejournal.com]

I'm currently trying to cut 20,000 words out of the completed urban fantasy detective novel, then I think I'm going back to the Young Adult SF adventure while smtfhw nitpicks it for one last time prior to trying to shop it. The more-or-less our universe detective story is very much a backburner while my characters try to find a plot (I've got an idea, it just needs a lot of fine tuning).

Meanwhile Real Work keeps kicking me and stealing all my writing time.

[julesjones]

20k? Ouch. Though my problem's usually the opposite - I'm a natural novella writer, and there aren't many print markets for novella length.

So are you going to try shopping it in the US as well?

[pinkdormouse.livejournal.com]

Reading US Writer, Agent and Editor Blogs is the main inspiration for me to reduce the word count (170k to 150k) -- I was originally aiming to cut at least 10k but last time I checked I seemed to be on target to cut the full 20k.

I'm wondering about the US market -- my writing and themes tend to be very British and I'm not sure whether that's going to be a hindrance or a help selling it elsewhere before I get a UK sale. What would you think?

[julesjones]

I think it'll mean you need to hit the right agent at the right time even more than usual, but it certainly wouldn't rule you out. There's a US market for Britlit, and although a lot of it is reprints, I know there are people who sold to the US first. Charlie Stross sold to the US first, although that's slightly different as he already had a name in short stories. You might want to ask in the relevant forums at Absolute Write:
http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/index.php

As you will have already gathered, the US market is currently going for shorter books from first time authors, at least in science fiction and fantasy. 150k would be a hard sell, although not impossible. I don't know what the situation is in mystery. With it being somewhat cross-genre, it might be worth asking alg about both word count and the Britlit aspect if you haven't already -- I think the current "ask me a publishing question" post is here:
http://alg.livejournal.com/74060.html?mode=reply

My own experience has been that the British flavour of my books is very popular with the American readers, but that's not terribly relevent because it's a) small press b) a genre where part of the appeal for a significant number of readers is reading about exotic places. Remember that mine are marketed specifically as romance.

[pinkdormouse.livejournal.com]

Thanks for that. As soon as the chaos at Real Work calms down I'll poke around at Absolute Write, like I've been meaning to do for ages.

I've been meaning to ask alg too. I've been following her LJ for a while, and I was about to post a question on that thread when I got involved in a minor argument with commenters on another of her posts. Hopefully that's all blown over and forgotten by now.

On the one hand a novel about Oxford academics ought to appeal to Anglophile Americans, but on the other hand we're talking socialists-with-money, which is either going to come across as quaint or completely alien to those readers. And then there's the whole Richard/James dilemma (and implied Charles/any-suitable-student) thing, which kind of fits the late 80's better than it fits current sensibilities.

[twisting-path.livejournal.com]

That is very good. Made me think back and realize it's been ten years for me, too. I was 33 when I started to write and lol it was a Star Trek rpg that got me hooked. It finally clicked in my head that hey, I should try writing a book (though oh what a high writing that rpg was!).

But I haven't done as well as you--ten years sees 3 books published, one other that was supposed to be but the publisher nuked it (grrr but I have my rights back on that one and the first one in the series so may do something with it yet).

I'm still happy though with the accomplishments--went through some rough years there, lost my husband to illness--but sold the book that I wrote during that time so feel like I'm back on my feet again and having fun. That's the best part of all. :)

C, off to hunt your books down and give you another sale :)

[julesjones]

They're short books and four of them were co-written with predatrix over a period when I was writing full time because I was on an accompanying chattel visa and not allowed to work. But I'm still pretty pleased with the output.:-)

Mine are all with Loose Id, so I shall post my catalogue page because it has all the pretty cover art - and some of it is *very* pretty. Glad to see that you've been seeing good sales with A Red-Tainted Silence.

http://www.loose-id.net/searchresult.aspx?CategoryID=30

[twisting-path.livejournal.com]

LOL I was incredibly happy with my cover. It is so cool to have pretty covers. And yes, I am pretty chuffed so far--and getting fan email is pretty cool. I like it I like it!

Now to get back to this rewrite--I write way too long for my own good. :)

C

[jomacmouse.livejournal.com]

I've still got two years to go before making it to my tenth anniversary as a Lyst member, and my writing amounts to a few filks, some of which watervole liked enough to put on her website. So I am in awe of your efforts and salute you *bows*

[julesjones]

"A few filks" is still a lot more than many people manage.:-)

[communicator.livejournal.com]

well done, it's a great story of success