FIRST POST!1!!1!
All the self-publishing marketing advice I’ve read says to go into the vast wastes of the Internet and set up a blog, a Twitter account, a Facebook, and every other form of social media known to man or naked mole rat. The purpose of this, I read, is to somehow convince your rabid readers into purchasing your works, whereupon you will receive glorious monies. Or perhaps glory and money under separate species. Either way.
As I hate Facebook and loathe Twitter, I will set up neither. I have no excuse not to set up my own blog, so here I am, loyal slash rabid reader. PLZ GIV GLORIOUS MONEIS.
Or, well, not just yet, as I have yet to even begin writing, after several false starts, my first draft of my newest novel, one that I intend to publish, by myself if need be. Given the chosen indignity of not having a true domain name, this free blog needs no money nor do I expect any glory as of yet.
In any case, I expect to be posting mainly reviews of whatever strikes my fancy, along with occasional updates on my writing process. Absurdities are to be expected at any time***. Being Catholic, the reviews will mainly be from a moral perspective. Being eclectic, they will usually have little or no relation to what is actually popular at the moment. As it is, my entertainment is usually limited to the free and to that which can be found at the library.C’est la vie.
That all said, expect my first “real” update tomorrow.
* Or perhaps a naked mole rat hive, as the animal is in fact eusocial.
** The horn of the rhinoceros of broken dreams has been removed to deter poachers.
*** Including, dare I say, now.
The Taste for Realism
I have seen, and admittedly indulged in that fan activity I will call the Fact Checking Game. It goes like this: First, you take some work of fiction, particularly a popular one, and you find some fascinating idea or claim it has. Then you deconstruct it with real world logic, checking all the facts and invariably coming up with an unrealistic or at least implausible conclusion. At this point, bemoaning that the creator did not think of this may commence. As a sequel, you can find some plausible counterpoint, and argue with the proponents of the former conclusion until the cows come home.
This is not, in itself, a bad thing.
Philosophical Diversity in Fiction
No, this is not a post about the culture war. Chill.
This post is about writing other cultures such that they are believable–not as middle-class Westerners wearing funny hats, but as fundamentally different worlds.
On Gratuitous Rape
This is not a happy-go-lucky post. If this subject matter disturbs you, I suggest reading something else, or perhaps waiting a few days–I plan to blog more frequently in the future.
The taste of the modern public has been, as of late, for dark and “gritty” fiction. Whether or not said fiction actually is is a subject for someone else’s post, but consider: The Hunger Games. Game of Thrones. The Malazan Book of the Fallen. The Witcher. Actually, I could rattle off a whole list of popular, dark, fiction, and invariably most of them are going to contain rape.
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