On Writing – Page 51 – Further Annotations

Jo Walton Book Quote:

Posted on April 25, 2015June 1, 2015 by blablablaandgabbler

‘To tell the truth I’ve been pretty angry with God since Mor died: He doesn’t seem to do anything, or to help at all. But I suppose it’s all like magic, you can’t tell if it does anything, or why, not to mention mysterious ways. If I were omnipotent and omnibenevolent I wouldn’t be so damn ineffable. Gramma used to say that you couldn’t tell how things would work out for the best. I used to believe that when she was alive, but then after she died, and Mor died, I don’t know. It’s not that I don’t believe in God, it’s just that I haven’t felt very inclined to get down and worship someone who wants me think “no dbout the universe is unfolding as it should.” Because I don’t. I think I ought to do something about the way the universe is unfolding, because there are things that need obvious and immediate attention…’ –Jo Walton, Among Others.

[“BLA and GB Gabbler” (really just a pen name – singular) are the Editor and Narrator behind THE AUTOMATION, vol. 1 of the Circo del Herrero series. They are on facebook, twitter, tumblr, goodreads, and Vulcan’s shit list.]

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#BLAThoughtOfTheDay: Why Alan Moore went into comic books

Posted on April 17, 2015June 1, 2015 by blablablaandgabbler

With the news that comic book creator Alan Moore has written a prose novel that probably has more than ONE MILLION words, I can see why comic books were his original means of a successful outlet.

Jesus. A picture is worth a thousand words, dude. No need to actually USE words if your story is going to be that complicated (har, har). -BLA

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Pen Names—Necessary Evil or Ticket to Crazyville?

Posted on April 13, 2015April 13, 2015 by blablablaandgabbler

[As someone who technically uses two pen names for one book, I bought my tickets to Crazyville a long-ass time ago. In fact, I’m probably the mayor of it. But I also had hopes that pinning the extra word “Anonymous” to the cover would let the readership automatically know what craziness they dealt with. For this series, the contrived anonymity of it all is half the fun. — The Author, from Crazyville].

Kristen Lamb's Blog

Image via Flickr Creative Commons courtesy of gaelx

Today we are going to talk about a somewhat touchy subject. The pen name. Before anyone gets in a fluff, understand two things. First, I’m on your side. Secondly, this is only a decision you can make. My goal here is to make sure you guys are making educated business decisions. Thus, I won’t stop anyone from having a pen name, but about 95% of the time? It’s unnecessary.

In my opinion? Pen names are more hassle than they are worth and they’re a fast way to land in Crazyville. Pen names used to offer benefits, but most of those benefits have evaporated because the world is digital and connected. In fact, pen names can actually hurt book sales and stall a platform and brand.

Let’s look at some of the advantages pen names used to offer that no longer exist.

I…

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Sam Sacks on “The Rise of the Nameless Narrator”:

Posted on April 9, 2015June 1, 2015 by blablablaandgabbler

“When modern writers wish to set their tales outside of time, they often employ this technique. The characters in Franz Kafka’s subversive fables “In the Penal Colony” and “A Hunger Artist” are named for their roles or vocations; Philippe Claudel’s more recent “The Investigation” (2012) centers, naturally, on the Investigator. Realist novels occasionally do this to evoke a sense of folklore, giving us the Whiskey Priest of Graham Greene’s “The Power and the Glory” and the Consul of Malcolm Lowry’s “Under the Volcano.” Sometimes, the unnamed figure is a pure narrator, so to speak: a character with no part in the book except as an intermediary between tale and reader. We don’t have anything to call the person who tells us Marlow’s story in “Heart of Darkness,” because we have no reason to refer to him. He is simply the Storyteller.

…Behind this effacement, there seems to lurk a deepening distrust in writing itself, a crisis of faith in the ability of words to either capture the essence of a life or else speak truthfully to its essenceless condition. Consider the Bible, one of the earliest textual cases to deal with the conundrum of naming. In much of it, God is identified by what theologians call the tetragrammaton, four letters that cannot be spoken—because the word lacks vowels, no one really knows how it should be pronounced—and must be substituted with generic placeholders. If God had a commonplace proper name, He would merely be distinguished from other deities. Being the one true God, His name is sacred and unutterable.”

Read the rest at The New Yorker.

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