Sigh ... Yeah, I experienced all the degradations outlined above, and am still left wondering why I ever pushed myself to write a novel in the first place. And yet, I'm even now plotting to hold myself hostage and do it all over again ... My book, Grim Legion, is an admittedly semi-pulpy historical thriller -- so I didn't even have any literary pretensions to keep me going while writing it. Grim was originally written in six months, from 5 to 8 a.m., before heading out to my day job (rewrites, arrgghh, took another two years). Yep, up well before dawn, my eyes glued half-shut with crusty sleep, drinking cup after cup of scalding, mud-like coffee while staring at the often immobile cursor on my laptop screen and thinking, "move, damn you" ... The very essence of creativity ... Somehow, though, the work got done, and while I never had visions of big dollar signs dancing in my head, I had hoped I'd get lucky and earn a few bucks, maybe enough to buy myself a Fender Telecaster (my other hobby that pays nothing). Oh well; my book's been out there for a few months and I've yet to see a check. But it is on Websites in England, Japan, Germany and even New Zealand, and that's a kick (I have readers in Auckland!). And Joe Queenan, he of the rapier pen, gave it a fairly positive mention in a column in The New York Times Book Review. So I can at least frame that and hang it on the wall of my study ... Now if only some hotshot Hollywood agent would pick up a copy of Grim and get it made into a movie -- ka-ching!
Jack Alcott
Author, Grim Legion
Sigh ... Yeah, I experienced all the degradations outlined above, and am still left wondering why I ever pushed myself to write a novel in the first place. And yet, I'm even now plotting to hold myself hostage and do it all over again ... My book, Grim Legion, is an admittedly semi-pulpy historical thriller -- so I didn't even have any literary pretensions to keep me going while writing it. Grim was originally written in six months, from 5 to 8 a.m., before heading out to my day job (rewrites, arrgghh, took another two years). Yep, up well before dawn, my eyes glued half-shut with crusty sleep, drinking cup after cup of scalding, mud-like coffee while staring at the often immobile cursor on my laptop screen and thinking, "move, damn you" ... The very essence of creativity ... Somehow, though, the work got done, and while I never had visions of big dollar signs dancing in my head, I had hoped I'd get lucky and earn a few bucks, maybe enough to buy myself a Fender Telecaster (my other hobby that pays nothing). Oh well; my book's been out there for a few months and I've yet to see a check. But it is on Websites in England, Japan, Germany and even New Zealand, and that's a kick (I have readers in Auckland!). And Joe Queenan, he of the rapier pen, gave it a fairly positive mention in a column in The New York Times Book Review. So I can at least frame that and hang it on the wall of my study ... Now if only some hotshot Hollywood agent would pick up a copy of Grim and get it made into a movie -- ka-ching!