I Don't Need No Rules for Writing

How often do you listen to advice? Any kind of advice? And how often do you ignore it? I think as we get older we ignore more. We've already heard a ton of it by a certain point and as we go forward the old advice stored in our memories is really no different than any new advice we may be given; we also get to the point where we say, "Fuh-get it," and damn the torpedoes because advice is like opinions and we all know what opinions are like.

That's what I think, nowadays, when it comes to writing. I enjoy reading about a writer's routines and how he or she planned (or didn't plan) a particular book, but when it comes to their "rules on writing" which we see a lot, I have no use for their remarks. When I was young, I certainly did. Boy did I! I thought there was a secret in there somewhere and if I sifted through enough advice, I would find it. Instead I found a lot of tips that helped me when I was starting out. Those tips improved my reading as well so I could see what authors followed those rules and which ones didn't. After so many years, I have decided that "rules on writing" are only for the writers who write those rules and really don't apply to anybody else. Are you listening, Elmore Leonard?

On this wonderful website, Brain Pickings, you'll find a ton of information about writers on writing and their rules for it. We still need this stuff because there are always people starting out, either teens like me back in the day or grown-ups who have finally decided that now's the time to write "that darn book."

But I look at these articles now the way a seasoned veteran looks at a cadre of rookies. You smile as you think of all the neat stuff they're about to learn, and you feel satisfied that you yourself have learned enough that, while you should always refresh so as to never get rusty (and that's an important point), you also know enough now to make up your own rules.

Which, in my case, I only have one. Tell the story in the best way possible. If that means using an adverb, then I'm using every adverb I can think of and if Stephen King doesn't like it, fuh-get him.

Too Much Black Mask?

There was a time when I thought the hard-boiled writing style, as pioneered in Black Mask magazine, was the only way to write. I'm certainly not the only one, nor am I the only one to extol the virtues of the magazine and the writers who wrote for it and how they wrote, both individually and as a group. But I got to thinking today...has Black Mask been too much of an influence? Have today's crime writers neglected the development of their own voice in order to continue a writing tradition that doesn't necessary work all the time?

I think I almost fell into that trap. The stripped down style of Hammett. Chandler, Stark, et al, was wonderful to read and I worked hard to emulate it. Allegedly, I did it very well. The editors who bought my first handful of stories thought so, and even one who turned a story down said I had a "talent for this sort of thing" but as I moved from my 20s to my 30s I started reading different authors (like Leslie Charteris and PG Wodehouse and F. Scott Fitzgerald) and found a whole new way of storytelling that was just as wonderful as the hard-boiled style (you could make a case that Fitzgerald stripped his prose a little, but not to the same point Hammett did).

Based on reading Charteris alone, I started writing The Rogue Gentleman, and while there is still a mix of the hard-boiled in spots, the writing is much more filled out than what I had previously done. I wasn't comparing myself to Dashiell Hammett or Paul Cain or Frederick Nebel or any of the other hard-boiled masters. I was finding my own way and, I think, finally developing a voice that sounded like my own. Allegedly, I've done well with it.

With all of the adoration given to Black Mask and the hard-boiled style, is it choking off greater creative effort? Hard-boiled certainly teaches you the basics. Less is more. Get the action going. Be clear, pay attention to important details, have realistic motivations. But at some point, those training wheels have to be taken off and the writer must find his own voice. To continuously try to keep the tradition alive for the sake of the tradition itself doesn't do the crime and mystery genre any favors, and only continues the idea that hard-boiled fiction consists of dummies in trench coats and hats who talk out of the side of their mouths and carry a gat in each hand and end every sentence with "sister" or some other wise crack and lines like, "I got hit with a brick as heavy as Texas and after that the lights went out. I woke up with a slight headache that a couple of beers took care of, picked up my coat and hat, and went to find the fat man so I could give him back the brick."

Hard-boiled doesn't work all the time. Sometimes you need the extra details, the emotions, all the things that Joe Shaw said to cut. Sometimes you don't need them, too. Finding that balance is the key. I think I've found it, though I reserve the right to go back to the pure hard-boiled style when I feel like it. Because, while it's a good way to teach writing, it's also friggin' FUN.

Paul Cain: The Complete Slayers

They finally did it. About a year or so ago, Centipede Press released the definitive collection of Paul Cain fiction--basically everything he ever wrote for Black Mask, etc. Paul Cain: The Complete Slayers collects every piece of fiction he published. Sticker price: $75. For some reason I didn't jump on it at the time, and now, since only 500 copies were printed, prices are between $140 and $200. I scored a copy for $140 on eBay. I have never paid that much for a book and, judging by the result of this one, I will never bother doing so again. But let me tell you the good stuff first.

The content is wonderful. It has the most extensive biographical information on Paul Cain than any other reference book I have come across, the reproduced magazine and book covers are terrific, the interior illustrations are amazing, and it's an absolute thrill to finally have all of these stories. I am a real Paul Cain junky. You can keep Hammett and Chandler and all those other guys. If I'm stuck on that desert
island, I want my Paul Cain books.

Not only do you get all of his short stories, but the book includes the original version of Fast One in its serial form. That's neat to see. Each story is connected, of course, but the opening of each installment includes background detail of what came before, and a few other extra lines, that were cut from the novel. (Now if I can only get the original stories that made up Red Harvest!) Cain changed a few names here and there but it's still the same fast-paced story that you either love or hate. I still say the only thing wrong with it is the ending, so I always stop reading where Grandquist says, "I forgot."

But for a book that was priced so high to begin with, and commands a premium now, you'd think the people involved in assembling the book (I'm looking at you, Keith Alan Deutsch--see comments below why I have omitted the other editors) could have hired a decent layout and copy editor. There are typos and extra words (the bio says Cain had "several two sons") as well as layout problems, where paragraphs don't quite line up and some lines of dialogue are on the same line. I paid how much for this? For such a handsome volume, with such pros with their names on the cover, it's sloppy, and disappointing.

But it is the mother lode. This is all the Paul Cain there ever was or ever will be. I will read every story very slowly. And then I'll read them again and again. They never get old. I read Fast One once a year!

My Other Identity

Are you one of those writers who has a stack of material in a file? Things you think would make good books or short stories that you'll "get to someday"? I've got a trunk full. Stuff I'll never get to or even live long enough to write. The other day I figured out a way to actually use some of that stuff. Like other writers before me, I'm going to use another name to write those "other books".

I've selected "Dean Breckenridge" for my new pen name. I just pulled it out of my rear end. My own books will be the Steve Dane series and other full-scale thrillers in the traditional form; under the Breckenridge name, I'll do pulpy crime stories. Most of those ideas I'll never get to are things I thought were too generic; upon new examination, they're actually okay, but still not something I want to do under my own name, so I'll make use of them under this new identity.

I'm in the middle of the first Breckenridge book, Blood Cries, about a war vet coming home to find out who raped his sister. It's turning into a really good vigilante action story. It will probably be short, but that's okay. A short, punchy action story is sometimes just what the doctor ordered.

Adventures in Createspace

If you're thinking of using Amazon's Createspace to publish your ebook in paperback, I can heartily recommend the service.

I've been setting up my new novel, The Rogue Gentleman, for paperback publication over the past few weeks, and it's been a great experience. A friend helped me out with the interior layout, and I was tempted to hire somebody to
design a new cover. I had already purchased a cover for the ebook but wasn't sure how to make it fit with the paper version. A little futzing around after work one night solved the problem, and I was able to do all of the cover art myself by dropping it into Amazon's pre-made template.

I ordered a proof once the initial layout was done, and it looks amazing. The glossy wraparound front stock not only brings out the colors in the cover, but also the lettering of the back copy. Inside, the content is in nice black ink on white paper, and not cheap paper, either. It's in the trade paperback format rather than mass market, and it's a quality presentation indeed. The product is well worth $12.99 (which I think is market standard currently), should you decide to take the plunge, but I'll be pricing mine around $7.99 (lucky #7 and all that).

Of course, reading the proof, I found not only errors but other things in the text that I wanted to adjust. Now the corrected file is back at Amazon awaiting their review; once done, I'll order another proof for yet another check. I think I'll have it on sale by summer.

James Bond Is NOT the Worst Spy Ever

I am often amused when noted authors, critics, literary scholars, et al, state with the kind of authority reserved only for God himself that James Bond is the worst spy ever. A simple Google search will reveal a lot of writing on that subject, and a lot of it very vitriolic, especially from authors who were contemporaries of Ian Fleming but did not then and do not now share his kind of success.

These critics procede to note with great enthusiasm all of the parts of the Bond movies and books that "just aren't realistic" and "not what a real spy would do."

For some reason, these guys and gals do not like James Bond.

Is it the success of Ian Fleming and the Bond films, which have done more to influence spy stories than Brian Freemantle ever will, and who the hell is Brian Freemantle anyway? John le Carre is a known Fleming-basher, but I'll dare say more people know Fleming's name than le Carre's, and I will bet that many more have been entertained by Fleming's work than le Carre's....um....well, it certainly isn't drivel. But it's not terribly entertaining.

Perhaps it's the influecne of the Bond Lifestyle, because most guys want to be Bond. Maybe that's what makes the critics angry. Guys want to have the clothes, the cars, the women, the guns, and the adventures, that James Bond has. Other writers and filmmakers have been able to tap that area of the imagination, but Fleming/Bond are tops in the category; we note that the Bond critics have not been able to achieve the same result.

Maybe Graham Greene and Len Deighton wish they had created a hero that influential.

The value of the Bond character goes beyond the millions of dollars the books and films generate. Ian Fleming and James Bond inspire the imagination. If you remember nothing else about the adventures, you know were you somehow transported into a world where a spy could indeed behave the way Bond does, and not only get away with it, but still accomplish his missions, get the girl, and, basically, stick it to the slug heads who say that's not the way it's supposed to be.

Nobody wants to read about a paper-pushing desk-jockey. (Sorry, Len--I tried but I couldn't get through The Ipcress File.) I don't want to know that the CIA and MI6 are bloated bureaucracies where it's a miracle anything ever gets done and how the hell did we survive the Cold War with such asinine egos working in those buildings?

That's why Bond is popular. He gets the job done. Oh, and he's fun. That's something the slug heads seem to forget. They also seem to forget the fact that James Bond isn't real, and that's important.  Fleming never claimed to be writing non-fiction. Why y'all so upset? Why cut down more trees just to write books that are "more realistic."

Nobody reads fiction for realism.

We read fiction to be entertained. Ian Fleming has been enteraining me since I was 13 years old, and I'm almost 40 now. There is no other author who has remained at the top of my reading list for so many years.

Refocusing

You may have noticed there are a few things missing from this blog. Like the links to my books that are not The Rogue Gentleman. While giving allowing Bullet for One, my private eye story, which received very nice reviews from pros like Paul Bishop and Wayne Dundee (thanks, guys), to be downloaded free was a huge success, for better or worse, I have decided to pull the old books for a variety of reasons, most of which are to do with the fact that those books suck.

Well, maybe suck is the wrong word. But they done got their problems, Horace.

I was learning when I wrote them, and they could be better, and maybe in the future they will be available again, slightly revised with the help of my awesome editor Elaine Ash. For now, they're gone. Not many people bought them anyway, and those who did have not come back for more (that tells you something, doesn't it?) so it's best to move on.

For now, my efforts will be on launching Steve Dane, the aforementioned rogue, in paperback (coming soon and priced to move), and keeping that series going. The Rogue Gentleman: Mine to Avenge is well on its way to completion; at least two other Dane adventures have been fully outlined and are ready to go.

There are other non-series surprises coming too.

Thank you for all of your support; let's raise a glass to Steve Dane and carry on.