Is Book Writing the Most Time Intensive Creative Endeavor?

I was listening to some of my favorite songs from the 80′s on YouTube… and I realized something that hit me years ago, but I did nothing with.

Writing a book is the most time intensive creative thing you can do. Isn’t it?

Book writing, when compared to other things creative – is definitely high on the list. I guess creating a building would be time intensive, but that’s a team of people. If you did it yourself I guess it could be a couple month project. Is putting rectangles and other shapes together – taking their physical properties into account – creative? I guess it is…

I guess a symphony composition would be tough – but who is doing that anymore?

Writing a book in the old style – for print, takes a long, long time. Hundreds of hours. Maybe thousands. If you work 8 hours a day for 5 days a week that works out to 21-2,000 hours in a year I think I remember from somewhere (too tired to do my figurin’). That’s a full year of work. Since some people take years to finish their books, you can see where I’m going with this.

How long does it take to write a song? I think I could write a great song in anywhere from 1-3 days. The music – someone else would have to handle. I’m no musician. A song has the potential to affect the entire world – to rev them up and get them dancing in the street. A song can affect our emotions intensely. Much more than a book I think. For most people anyway.

How long does it take to create a sculpture? Lets say a full human figure of marble… a couple weeks? A couple of months? Not longer than a couple of months I’m sure. I have no skills in that area either – but, someone that did could whip up a marble statue in a couple of months – surely.

What else is there?

Origami? Maybe it would take you a week to come up with something different.

Website post? Couple hours, day or two at the most for a good article of 500-1000 words.

Drawing a scene? I’ve seen people draw an entire detailed scene in minutes. Painting a portrait… couple weeks? Max.

Photographer? I can’t call a photographer creative – as hard as I try. I was a photographer. Sure there is some skill to it, but basically you’re pushing a button at the right time when the settings are correct. It does take some imagination to take great photos. I’ve seen some advertising photos that took a lot of thought. How much? Couple days. Week at most.

Directing a movie? Writing the movie took the effort and time. Is putting the movie on film really that creative? Nah. I don’t think so. You already have a script – like a book someone wrote… nahhh.

I must be missing about 90 things – but I can’t come up with anything else really creative – like an artist would do.

Pottery? A couple of minutes. Glass blowing? A day, couple days.

Book writing or script writing for a movie takes more thought than maybe anything else you can do creatively.

Can anyone think of anything that takes more time?

New Writer Advice: Write Your Ass Numb

I could have said, “Write Your Fingers Numb”, “Write Your Butt Numb”, or something else less forceful, right? Would you be surprised to find out forceful works well most times?

Write what you know. Write how you know. Know what you know. Write like you know. And, like what you write.

If you are just now considering becoming a writer of books – whatever flavor, you have to write until your ass grows tired of sitting in a chair. Ideally you’ll be writing about things that might make a popular book topic – or one that tweaks your turtle.

If you just start writing books -that is the true ideal. Practice. You learn to write books by writing books. Get one or two under your belt and see whether you think you’ve got what it takes. Ask others if they think you’ve got what it takes.

I know people that think they can write a book that I think have deluded themselves. They’re not good book writers.

Am I going to tell them?

Nope. Is it possible they have a break-through and suddenly can write? Yes, it is possible, but of the 4 people I’m thinking about – a meteor hitting them in the thick of the skull is a much more likely occurrence.

There are book writers and there are… those that do everything else.

If you’re a book writer then start writing. It doesn’t matter whether you’re 15 years old or 55, just write. If you can’t force yourself to write exercises that will improve specific skills you’ll need to master, then forget it – just write. Write short stories about something you like. Challenge yourself to write the shortest story ever. Write a journal. Write comments at blogs you read and try to show you’re smart – or, try to piss everyone off.

A writer is a master of communicating something – some idea. The more you write, the more you’re going to understand how to use written words to spark neurons in a reader’s head, leading to reader enlightenment.

What ideas do you want to get across to the world?

Write! For god’s sakes write! Stop reading all these blog posts! lol…

Agents, Paper, Grammar – Blackholed

Like the newspaper industry, the book publishing industry is being turned sideways and twisted like a corkscrew – sucked into the whirly vortex of the digital publishing black hole.

Book publishers, agents, grammar rules, and books as we know them are going the way of newspapers which are going the way of magazines… all of it leaving a sparkling crystal white Pepsodent-clean taste in my mouth as I climb toward $100,00 earnings in the digital publishing market.

I was thinking the other day, as I was writing my 2nd fiction novel, Collecther, that I must write in a way that appeals to an agent and publisher.

I don’t know why, but I still had this idea I needed to cram my thoughts into a format that every other published writer was following and had followed for decades… scores of years.

And then it fell straight out of the sky hitting me squarely on my egg head…

I’m free to write as I wish.

Why it didn’t hit me before, and why for the last 8 months when I wrote, was I  writing for others – I’m not sure. Cognitively I know that the entire industry is going ass over noggin, but I hadn’t thought about everything that meant. I’d missed this crucial fact.

We’re free. Writers are free to write as they wish – whateverthefucktheywish. Whatever format you want to write in, you can write in.

Nobody has the final say on my work – but me. On your work? You.

Grammar rules, accepted for years – go right out the fucking door and freedom takes its place. How cool is that?

See, Mike Fook didn’t get a degree in English. In high school, university, grad school – the intricacies of English grammar did nothing for me. I could write master’s level papers, sure. My vocabulary? Uniquely bedecked.

Can I keep a proper tense throughout 120,000 words? Nope.

Can I tell you when to use commas – or hyphens – or these things -> (;:)?

Nope.

Can 98% of the US population explain even ten rules of grammar?

Nope.

Am I going to worry about it anymore? Nope.

I’m writing for an audience. You are too.

Who is your audience?

If you’re writing for PhD’s then you’ll want to continue to adhere to the same style of writing your audience is used to. You must if you want to communicate at the level that makes them all cheesy, warm and gushy.

My audience isn’t that same group. My audience is a group of intelligent dudes -ettes that could give a rat’s tiny hairy one whether I used the proper tense, as long as the point got across. My audience wants to read intelligent shit presented in a way that’s unstuffy, unpretentious, un-microedited, and that flows smoothly from my fingers not unlike dripping jasmine nectar off my pinky finger into their willing mouths.

Nobody     in     my     audience     gives      a    shite      if       I       space      wackily.

Nobody cares if I use shite instead of shit. Fark for fuck. My audience wants to see new words and phrases in new context. My audience wants to try to figure out what the hell I’m saying – sometimes at least. The written word has been dead for so long. That’s why people like Keroac, Hunter Thompson, found an audience… people were ready for something real.

Two thousand ten is a very important time for the written word. Here’s why…

Any jackass that can move his mouth can be on television.  Remember Morton Downey Jr’s guests? Some could barely be said to have been speaking English – but, it didn’t matter. They had a nationwide, and even worldwide, forum. They could communicate whatever they wanted and be recognized for it.

There is no grammar test for people that are speaking on television or radio. There is a DJ in Tampa, that, years ago spoke like a hillbilly from the sticks. Guess what? He killed radio there – to a sick degree. He was way ahead of every other DJ in listenership.

Why is that?

He had a message.

The message counts on TV – always has. Have you watched any popular YouTube videos lately? There are whole flocks of idiots telling their story, in whatever way they know how – that are making bank on top of bank.

Television, video, internet, radio, walkie-talkie and karaoke radios – nobody cares about grammar except the publishing industry.

That’s about to change because the paper publishing industry is being blackholed by digital publishing.

Digital publishing, though at first glance might seem like a panacea for only the tech-literate, is actually a game leveler for writers of all types. Writers that don’t have the slightest idea how to put together a book – will put together books because they aren’t constrained by the format anymore. There is no test to pass… no agent, no publisher to get through. You write a book. You get an editor if you want (I still want), and you publish your book digitally.

Right now I have 5 books on Amazon that are selling. They’re not selling gangbusters, but they’re selling. I’m making $5 per book sold. How much would I make if I went with a paper publisher? $1.30? Hmm.

Any day now my books will be sold at the Apple iBookstore and Sony ebook store. I have worldwide distribution, INSTANT distribution, without the paper publishing industry at all. Actually, nobody even had to edit my books – I can write one in a week, edit myself, upload, and bang – I’m live on Amazon.

Are you beginning to see now how much the good lord loves digital publishing over traditional publishing?

Sure you are.

While traditional writers are banging their heads against oak writing desks, crazy over whether one of the 300 agents they sent query letters to will respond, I’m banging my head against silk-covered feather pillows banking  extra sleep while my ebooks put cash in my electronic accounts.

Where do you want to be banging your head?