The age/publishing issue

E. Don Harpe wrote:

Yeah, but don't tell her (him). She thinks she'd providing a service. Protecting us from those evil POD's and all that.

Who said I'm "protecting" you? Do you think I care where you submit your manuscripts?

I get it. This is like the "cultural understanding" stuff I get at work, where we discuss how everything is equal.

LC, give an honest answer to these three points, and maybe it will become clear why we think you're wasting your time.

1. Why can't folks like you just be glad that someone like this guy has his book out there for others to see and maybe read.

2. Why is it so important to make the distinction that people like you seem compelled to have to make concerning publishers?

3. Why exactly does it matter who published it, or how?

You made your last post while I was making my last one, and I just now read it.

To be perfectly honest, LC, I don't think you "get" much of anything. Especially not what most of us here are talking about.

No, everything is not equal, LC. You're written and published what, one text book? Is that about it? Wow!

Get back to us when you have another three of four under your belt, preferrably fiction, and maybe there'll be some kind of equality that you can talk about.

E. Don Harpe wrote:

2. Why is it so important to make the distinction that people like you seem compelled to have to make concerning publishers?

3. Why exactly does it matter who published it, or how?

I was simply responding to Abe's post that asked if, tying to another thread, the guy submitted something the publisher wanted. Abe must have missesd the Lulu part (as I did) because otherwise, his post was a non-sequitor. Lulu wants everything. Lulu will publish anything. Lulu doesn't give advances, edit, market your book, or do anything a publisher that I presume was the subject of that article does. Get it?

E. Don Harpe wrote:

No, everything is not equal, LC. You're written and published what, one text book? Is that about it? Wow!

Get back to us when you have another three of four under your belt, preferrably fiction, and maybe there'll be some kind of equality that you can talk about.

I've published 6 editions of a non-fiction book that has been in print for 20 years. I have a textbook in print, and another due to be pubbed in exactly one year. All with advance-paying, marketing houses.

I realize this isn't as illustrious as your body of work, for which you opine and give counsel about here day in and day out. But I do my best.

Seldom do I mention my own work here, LC. It's available, everyone knows where they can find it, and so far, a lot of people have.

I'm not a best selling author, and I didn't get any huge advances from a publisher, but I sell copies, and that's kind of a good thing.

Also, most of my work is fiction, which is entirely different from what you have written. BTW, isn't 6 editions the same thing as saying the same old book has been revised six times? Hardly see how that qualifies as being something different. And now you've written another textbook. Again, wow. I suppose there's something to be said for staying on familar ground. Why take chances when you don't have to?

You are right, however, that as of now you don't have as many thinggs out there as some of us do. Maybe you should work on that. Get that first fiction book finished, see how hard it is to publish, and then get back to us.

I think the reason you don't want to answer the questions is because if you're honest you'd have to say that you envy those who manage to complete a work of fiction and then get it on the market. By making it seem really easy, you can downplay the accomplishment.

Once again, get back to us when your fiction book is out there. We'll talk again about how easy it was.

And LC, I think you have a few credentials that have helped you along the way.

I have credentials but not in the present area I am writing. I choose not to write in the area of my credentials and am in the process of selling the rights to something that was written 20 years ago. This is a good thing and my co-writer and I are getting paid by a nonprofit organization. They wanted the rights when they became our publisher a few years ago, but we stuck with a contract and got royalties.

So, probably because we wouldn't give the rights away, they decided they needed to pay us.

Carol

E. Don Harpe wrote:

BTW, isn't 6 editions the same thing as saying the same old book has been revised six times?

Yah, but you keep saying, "You wrote one textbook, wow!" I'm not sure if you missed my posts about the non-fic book and the second I'm writing, or if you need some fish oil pills for memory or something. My books are also with real pubs. Oh wait, Lulu provides ISBN numbers, so it's a real pub. My bad.

You're also missing that we were discussing what pubs want to buy, and I opined that we need to synch what we can do with what they want. I can't write fiction. I can't even write most types of non-fiction. I submitted a non-fic idea to one of my pubs and it was turned down due to lack of credentials. So I do what I can and find pubs who want it. I never said it was easy for anyone. Unfortunately, you have such a chip on your shoulder that anytime someone posts anything you perceive as "advice," you start screeching that they think they're "better than you." You once tried to pass this off as a Southern thing (in the dmondeo thread) but sorry, I lived in the South for years and never ascribed that characteristic to the folks I met and worked with there.

Marie Pacha wrote:

LC,

I don't believe the response you are getting has anything to do with the advice you dispense.

I don't dispense "advice" anymore than anyone else here. Re my tone, oh well, it is what it is, it has gotten me banned from other boards, and is partly why I don't post my books, too, lol. Feel free to filter me.

You'll have to work a lot harder here if you want to be banned. LOL!

And I don't need your advice on my tone, or your nutty self calling my pubs, but thanks for your requests.

Fair enough -you're about the dullest poster on any message board I've ever read.

<<<< The dullards' room is that way

LOL, I'm not the pathetic old woman calling other people's pubs in some creepy, desperate effort to "verify" them (as if they're applying to you for a job).

I understand, LC, little lady, that you're kind of ashamed of not having written anything that anybody would want to buy. That's fine, not everyone has the talent.

If you don't want to tell us anything about yourself, take Marie's advice and head for the troll thread. You'll be better tolerated there, and your opinion will fit in better with the rest of the non-credentialed posters.

(Damn, is that even a word?)

I don't know how old you are LC, but you're sure as hell creepy and pathetic.

Here a troll, there a troll, everywhere a troll, troll...

Don, will I find you in the non-credentialed authors thread, too? LOL

Then quit responding, dullard.

Yep, I'll be right there beside you.

Oh wait, no I won't. I've actually got some of my work published.

When you do, be sure to let us know. Not that we'll care, after all, anyone could write a text book.

E. Don Harpe wrote:

Oh wait, no I won't. I've actually got some of my work published.

No, actually you haven't, and at this point, you're as interesting as Marie.

:::plonk:::

Well, this has been fun. Now to answer Carol's earlier question, I don't believe it was P.D. James who started writing mysteries in her 80s. She's old now, but she's been writing them for 30 years or so. I'm not sure who you have in mind.

LC wrote:

No, actually you haven't, and at this point, you're as interesting as Marie.

And here I was thinking you weren't ever going to pay me a compliment. Thanks.

Carol,

Irish novelist, Molly Keane was ninety-one when she died. Between 1928 and 1956, she wrote 11 novels, and some of her earlier plays, under the pseudonym M.J. Farrell. When her husband died in 1961, she didn't write again for twenty years. In 1981 (then aged seventy-six) she wrote Good Behaviour under her own name; the novel was short-listed for the Man Booker Prize.

E. Don Harpe wrote:

non-credentialed...(Damn, is that even a word?)

If it's not, each of us can agree to use it with sufficient frequency to make it one. I like it.