I should mention that you can read a few of the opening pages as a free sample, if you want to see for yourself how to cause distaste in the publishing industry.
I bought the file but I don't have the reader app. I'll get it figured out. That's probably the same issue as the other person is having. I've enjoyed many historical novels, from Scott to Michener. Some of them attempt to use the parlance of previous centuries and foreign dialects. It shouldn't be a problem. Almost everyone's first novel sucks. A great first novel is Fifth Business by Robertson Davies (a gem). Steinbeck's first novel Cup of Gold is a good book. John Irving is an example of one whose early novels did not evince his true capabilities. That's more normal.
It did not float a single boat in the publishing industry, which responded with such hostility that my agent refused to show me any of the responses. So be warned that I’m pitching a novel here that was uniformly despised by professional publishers, although much of the recent output of that industry makes me take it as a compliment.
--------------
I was gonna say, the fact that nobody wanted to touch it makes me more inclined to read it, not less........
" although much of the recent output of that industry makes me take it as a compliment"
I was once an English language tutor for a group of Russian immigrants about 20 years ago. It was fun, my not-very-good Russian improved, I learned a bunch of Russian swear words. The students were my parents' age, they had been children during Stalin, and were all well educated. It was an interesting job. I also discovered that Russians have a wicked sense of humor.
One of the ladies was especially eager to improve her English for the sake of her American-born grandchildren. She had been a literature professor in Russia and had read all the great English and American authors in translation, so was familiar with Shakespeare, Twain, and everyone in between. One day she told me she'd gone to a bookstore to find something to expand her English vocabulary and, showing me the Danielle Steele novel, declared, "Is crap."
Getting rejected by OldPub is nothing to be ashamed of. Unless you're queering history or presenting the marginalized perspective of women of color, they don't want to hear from you. Their abysmal sales suggest that no one wants to hear from them, either, but apparently they can stay solvent longer than their dwindling readership can stay sane.
I absolutely hear you on the anachronistic dialogue issue. Watched Black Sails a couple years ago, and there was much that I enjoyed about it, but 18th century pirates telling each other to go fuck themselves was not one of those things. Lazy Hollywood writers too lacking in imagination to look up the lexicons of their historical settings and retrojecting 21st century LA lingo into the past is infuriating.
Yay! I hope working on this novel provided some mental/emotional respite from, well, life. I will check it out. Mysteries are my thing, and I read *Beowulf* last week (in translation, because I am weak), so period diction will not throw me ;-) I'm all for realistic speech, myself. The "Don't judge me, Lizzie!" moment in the Keira Knightley version of *Pride and Prejudice* had me gritting my teeth.
I sympathize greatly with your antipathy toward all things Amazon. But the kindle is a superior device for reading that I can't give up. I'll try using the Nook app on my iPhone. Agree with the commander that publishing industry response makes me MORE enthusiastic! I'm excited to read your book!
I also have a Kindle, I am ashamed to say. Seriously, if the Kindle is superior to the Nook, then I have to wonder what the Nook is like! I've been complaining about the Kindle's outdatedness for years.
I didn't realize there's a Nook app (should have though) and I'll download it so I can buy the book.
I loved my nook but it became outdated and they wanted me to buy a 4 x more expensive newer one and I refused when I have the nook app on my phone. So when my book eventually wouldn’t charge anymore I resorted to the app. I also use the kindle app and apple iBooks but I much prefer to hold a physical book in my hands. That’s just me.
I used a self-publishing company to publish my sister's poetry. For a very reasonable price (about $2k 10 years ago) we got formatting, a cover design, and one-pass of an editor. I think it included about 15 hardcopies (a very small number). They obtained the ISBN. I had to write the intro, back cover fluff, and find some appropriate photos. We did not pay for marketing (WAY more expensive) so very few sold, but it was mostly a family and friends project. She was quite disabled at the time and it was her masterpiece.
Best of luck with yours - I hate modern dialogue and I love mysteries, so let us know when it comes out in hard copy.
Crowd source it: 99designs or similar. There are some incredibly talented people doing great work for very reasonable flat rates. Offer a premium award, proactively search the samples to find designs you like and invite those designers to join your project. You’ll get a much better response than just waiting or the least busy folks to find you. https://99designs.com/
My fourth great grandfather came to the Pennsylvania colony from Ireland as an indentured servant and then ran away from his masters in 1767 to the Virginia colony, where he later joined the Revolutionary army and ended up with a land grant in the county where I was born 198 years later.
I have a copy of the ad the masters ran in the Pennsylvania Gazette newspaper in 1767 offering six dollars reward for his return. My ancestor was 24 at the time; pondering his misery, youth, and courage often brings me to tears.
I bought a copy. I prefer period language to the tripe they call language now. Looking forward to reading it. Thanks for refusing to bow to stupidity!!
I wonder if treating the political opponents as vanquished confederates was not planned long term, possibly before 2020 and the questionable election during the scamdemic. It coincides with the extreme way that people have been imprisoned and treated from the January 6 "insurrection." It is all so smooth that the playbook must have been choreographed with precise detail, including the strange legal claims that are thrown at Trump and his associates.
Somewhere in a book on the Civil War, maybe Shelby Foote's, the author quotes a Confederate man saying that after that war the Northern Republicans weren't going to offer grace, forgiveness, and clemency. It was not in their nature.
And, Stephen Carter wrote a novel, The Impeachment of Abraham Lincoln, that I believe picks up on that theme. Has anything changed in 160 years?
Yes. The description Foote gives of Grant and Lee's meeting there leads into Lincoln's talk about reconciliation in the week or two before he died. Carter's novel, I'm pretty sure (didn't read it), envisions the Radical Republicans impeaching Lincoln largely over their anger at his promotion of reconciliation.
I live in Maine. And this post just made me laugh out loud. After 3 NYT's bestsellers, my mainstream publishers have cancelled me. Your book is now on my list. We have a lot of people who would love to meet you. Come and we'll have a book signing.
I should mention that you can read a few of the opening pages as a free sample, if you want to see for yourself how to cause distaste in the publishing industry.
Would you call it a historical novel?
I would.
I bought the file but I don't have the reader app. I'll get it figured out. That's probably the same issue as the other person is having. I've enjoyed many historical novels, from Scott to Michener. Some of them attempt to use the parlance of previous centuries and foreign dialects. It shouldn't be a problem. Almost everyone's first novel sucks. A great first novel is Fifth Business by Robertson Davies (a gem). Steinbeck's first novel Cup of Gold is a good book. John Irving is an example of one whose early novels did not evince his true capabilities. That's more normal.
The preview didn't work for me when I visited the B&N page for your book. Acted like a dead link.
Good to know. I'll dig into this.
It did not float a single boat in the publishing industry, which responded with such hostility that my agent refused to show me any of the responses. So be warned that I’m pitching a novel here that was uniformly despised by professional publishers, although much of the recent output of that industry makes me take it as a compliment.
--------------
I was gonna say, the fact that nobody wanted to touch it makes me more inclined to read it, not less........
And your refusal to "update" the language is selling point for me as well.
Same here.
Ditto.
With this kind of recommendation there's no way I can miss it!!
Thank you, Chris.
Right there with you.
" although much of the recent output of that industry makes me take it as a compliment"
I was once an English language tutor for a group of Russian immigrants about 20 years ago. It was fun, my not-very-good Russian improved, I learned a bunch of Russian swear words. The students were my parents' age, they had been children during Stalin, and were all well educated. It was an interesting job. I also discovered that Russians have a wicked sense of humor.
One of the ladies was especially eager to improve her English for the sake of her American-born grandchildren. She had been a literature professor in Russia and had read all the great English and American authors in translation, so was familiar with Shakespeare, Twain, and everyone in between. One day she told me she'd gone to a bookstore to find something to expand her English vocabulary and, showing me the Danielle Steele novel, declared, "Is crap."
So yes, it is a compliment.
That’s great.
Getting rejected by OldPub is nothing to be ashamed of. Unless you're queering history or presenting the marginalized perspective of women of color, they don't want to hear from you. Their abysmal sales suggest that no one wants to hear from them, either, but apparently they can stay solvent longer than their dwindling readership can stay sane.
I absolutely hear you on the anachronistic dialogue issue. Watched Black Sails a couple years ago, and there was much that I enjoyed about it, but 18th century pirates telling each other to go fuck themselves was not one of those things. Lazy Hollywood writers too lacking in imagination to look up the lexicons of their historical settings and retrojecting 21st century LA lingo into the past is infuriating.
Btw just gave you a follow: @martianwyrdlord
Give me period music as well.
Yes!!!
Yay! I hope working on this novel provided some mental/emotional respite from, well, life. I will check it out. Mysteries are my thing, and I read *Beowulf* last week (in translation, because I am weak), so period diction will not throw me ;-) I'm all for realistic speech, myself. The "Don't judge me, Lizzie!" moment in the Keira Knightley version of *Pride and Prejudice* had me gritting my teeth.
I sympathize greatly with your antipathy toward all things Amazon. But the kindle is a superior device for reading that I can't give up. I'll try using the Nook app on my iPhone. Agree with the commander that publishing industry response makes me MORE enthusiastic! I'm excited to read your book!
I also have a Kindle, I am ashamed to say. Seriously, if the Kindle is superior to the Nook, then I have to wonder what the Nook is like! I've been complaining about the Kindle's outdatedness for years.
I didn't realize there's a Nook app (should have though) and I'll download it so I can buy the book.
I loved my nook but it became outdated and they wanted me to buy a 4 x more expensive newer one and I refused when I have the nook app on my phone. So when my book eventually wouldn’t charge anymore I resorted to the app. I also use the kindle app and apple iBooks but I much prefer to hold a physical book in my hands. That’s just me.
I'll get a print edition up soon!
Me too. Trying now.
I used a self-publishing company to publish my sister's poetry. For a very reasonable price (about $2k 10 years ago) we got formatting, a cover design, and one-pass of an editor. I think it included about 15 hardcopies (a very small number). They obtained the ISBN. I had to write the intro, back cover fluff, and find some appropriate photos. We did not pay for marketing (WAY more expensive) so very few sold, but it was mostly a family and friends project. She was quite disabled at the time and it was her masterpiece.
Best of luck with yours - I hate modern dialogue and I love mysteries, so let us know when it comes out in hard copy.
I should hire a book designer. I know it, but I'm being stubborn.
In my experience, stubborn people live longest - and often - best.
Oh, how I hope you’re right about that ;-).
Makes a big difference. I have designer people if you need people lol.
Crowd source it: 99designs or similar. There are some incredibly talented people doing great work for very reasonable flat rates. Offer a premium award, proactively search the samples to find designs you like and invite those designers to join your project. You’ll get a much better response than just waiting or the least busy folks to find you. https://99designs.com/
Bravo! Cannot wait to read it. 👏🏼
My fourth great grandfather came to the Pennsylvania colony from Ireland as an indentured servant and then ran away from his masters in 1767 to the Virginia colony, where he later joined the Revolutionary army and ended up with a land grant in the county where I was born 198 years later.
Ain't history great? 😉
Amazing that you've tracked your family back that far.
I have a copy of the ad the masters ran in the Pennsylvania Gazette newspaper in 1767 offering six dollars reward for his return. My ancestor was 24 at the time; pondering his misery, youth, and courage often brings me to tears.
There's a history book called White Cargo, about the indentured servants brought to the colonies from Britain, that you might like.
A great and poignant book. Everyone should read it.
I took the liberty, and followed you on X, fellow Vet.
M
2/504 PIR
2/75 Rbat
I bought a copy. I prefer period language to the tripe they call language now. Looking forward to reading it. Thanks for refusing to bow to stupidity!!
also wanted to say I followed you on ex-twit, but i never say anything there so no point in following me 😉
I wonder if treating the political opponents as vanquished confederates was not planned long term, possibly before 2020 and the questionable election during the scamdemic. It coincides with the extreme way that people have been imprisoned and treated from the January 6 "insurrection." It is all so smooth that the playbook must have been choreographed with precise detail, including the strange legal claims that are thrown at Trump and his associates.
"I loathe period literature that uses 21st-century California shopping mall language"
I couldn't agree more, which is why I don't read historical fiction published in the last 20 years or so. I will happily make your book an exception.
Somewhere in a book on the Civil War, maybe Shelby Foote's, the author quotes a Confederate man saying that after that war the Northern Republicans weren't going to offer grace, forgiveness, and clemency. It was not in their nature.
And, Stephen Carter wrote a novel, The Impeachment of Abraham Lincoln, that I believe picks up on that theme. Has anything changed in 160 years?
But remember what Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain did at Appomattox, a gesture of grace that no longer seems possible.
https://www.nps.gov/places/chamberlain-gordon-salute.htm
Yes. The description Foote gives of Grant and Lee's meeting there leads into Lincoln's talk about reconciliation in the week or two before he died. Carter's novel, I'm pretty sure (didn't read it), envisions the Radical Republicans impeaching Lincoln largely over their anger at his promotion of reconciliation.
I read mostly Stephen King, so I'm a little bored with Maine. 😏
😉😊😋
This is waaaaay early Maine, a totally different world than dorkface writes about. Although I probably should have added some clowns in sewers.
I'd read it if there were clowns in sewers. <--- That's a joke!
BE RIGHT BACK, MAKING AN EDIT
😂🤣😂🤣 👍👌
Thanks for the laugh! 🤗
I'll read the hard copy when it's ready.
Danny Huckabee
I live in Maine. And this post just made me laugh out loud. After 3 NYT's bestsellers, my mainstream publishers have cancelled me. Your book is now on my list. We have a lot of people who would love to meet you. Come and we'll have a book signing.
What part of Maine?