Mark is the author of The Rasner Effect, and its sequels, Without Hesitation and Rasner's Revenge. His work is also featured in two anthologies, Cats in a Dreamspell and Killer Recipes. Today Mark is speaking about both sides of authorhood...
“Are there any negative aspects to being an author?” It’s one of the questions I get all the time, although I’m not sure why. There are so many positive aspects I could talk about, my favorite being fan mail. Whether good fan mail (I love your story, please write another) or bad fan mail (my birds won’t even poop on those pages), I love getting mail about my books.
To answer the often-asked question, if I had to come up with one negative aspect of being an author, it’s that everyone wants you to write their story. I’m amazed at how many people around me have a great story–usually about their lives, their place of work, their family or their friends—that they want to partner with me in creating. By partner they mean I write it, edit it, get it published, market it and create a fan base for sales while they supply the idea and split the royalties. I usually don’t answer these requests, but maybe it’s time I did offer one general answer. I apologize if it comes off rude:
No, your job would not make a great story that everyone wants to read. It’s just like everyone else’s job, we all have crazy co-workers. No, your family isn’t so unique or screwed up that it would attract a billion readers and eventually get picked up as a sitcom. Your relatives aren’t anymore kooky and dramatic than anyone else’s. We all have that uncle who was married four times, who cheated, and ended in crazy divorces. The same goes for your friend, we all have that buddy who did funny things in college while intoxicated.
For most of you, and I say this with the utmost respect, the only ones who will find your life’s anecdotes funny and interesting are the people around you, and they’ve all probably heard these stories before.
For the rest of you who do have a great story, and decide to write it yourself, a final piece of advice: creativity is the key. Be original and dynamic. And, remember your punctuation. It’s the difference between helping your Uncle Jack off a horse and helping your uncle jack off a horse.
Mark Rosendorf
Author of The Rasner Effect series
Mark...So glad you dropped by. Having read your work I find it hard to believe anyone would be sending anything but glowing reviews! PS - That punctuation? Great advice...;)
ReplyDeleteThanks for the opportunity, Louise, this was my first time. (blogging, that is)
ReplyDeleteLOLOL! Great post and SO true! So, so true! Did I mention it was true? Because it is. (grin)
ReplyDeleteMark,
ReplyDeleteThat does happen to me very often as well. People tell me how I should write their life story or they have a story to tell me that they believe I should immortalize. What I say is that we can all be authors and they should think of writing their own story in their own way.