Everything Old is...Well, Still Old

14 had a bad game last night. He fumbled a punt return, missed a tackle that would have prevented a fourth-down conversion, and got burned on the game-winning pass. He felt bad – at least, he looked as if he felt bad; he insisted he was fine – but it’s actually my fault. His team lost because I forgot to post my fearless prediction yesterday.

Sorry, 14.

In the meantime, I’m feeling depressed about my book. I looked it over for the first time in a couple of months and came to the conclusion that it’s not really all that unique. It has a few good scenes and I think the characters are reasonably compelling. It’s well-written (if I do say so myself). But Solomon complained 3000 years ago that there was nothing new under the sun. If that was true then, how much more is it true now?

How do you tell a unique story in today’s jaded world? How do you make a splash when the water has congealed into mud?

The secret lies in how the literary world has evolved over the years. I don’t know why, but we humans love to stick things into categories and keep them there. Thus the print world is subsected into genres. Not just fiction and non-fiction, but Sci-fi and Fantasy, Horror and Romance, Historical, Contemporary, Classical, and a thousand more. If you want to be noticed, find a way to break these molds; combine two or more genres into something new, or take a genre stereotype and play it the opposite way. Take a chance.

The best recent example (cue commercial music) is Tamara Siler Jones’ books. Ghosts in the Snow and, due out next month, Threads of Malice are getting rave reviews because they successfully blend the Fantasy and Forensic Mystery genres into something new. If you haven’t checked Ghosts out yet, go get it.

But the same set-up that makes such satisfying blends of genres also makes it difficult to market said books. Bookstores want neat categories for the books they sell; they don’t want to have to think about which section (Fantasy or Mystery?) to put Ghosts in the Snow. And God knows they couldn’t put it in both! Think of all the extra work!

So Ghosts loses half of its audience simply because the average Mystery reader doesn’t spend much time browsing the Fantasy section.

Hmm…It appears that I’ve moved onto a tangent of my original point. Oh well. Back to the grindstone. Maybe I’ll add some Horror to my Fantasy book. That’s never been done before. Oh, wait, yes it has. Hmm..how about…no, that’s been done too.

Shit. Back to the drawing board.

Fearless Prediction of the Week:

Carolina – 26

Green Bay – 12

This, incidentally, is an important game in my house; Carolina is my favorite team and Green Bay is 14’s favorite

I absolutely guarantee that Ohio State won’t lose this weekend. Remember, you saw it here first..