The Author as a Commodity

This week I'm attending a writer's workshop in New Orleans with my wife, who is the real writer in the family. I rather hate being the living cliche of attorney who is a wannabe writer, but I'm finding that it is easier to aspire to be an author than it is to take the attorney out of my psyche.

For example, the instructor of our class is filling in our little workshop group on the travails of the publishing world. Specifically, She claimed that authors are "brown leather pumps" to the publishers. She said it to make the point that authors were mere commodities to the book industry and the fickle reading public will burn through a book and it doesn't matter much whose book it is. If you don't write it, someone else will. My poetical version: authors are the meat that is ground up to make book sausage.

I don't doubt the wisdom of the instructor's comments. From what I can see, commercial fiction (and non-fiction) on a visceral level work in this way. The formulaic novel, the ghost written celebrity book, the tough life memoir and the motivational/spiritual tome really could be written by anyone and consumed by the undiscerning hordes as the corporate book manufacturers scoop up the majority of the cash.

The best example of this is James Patterson, who doesn't even write all his own books. He hires would-be authors to write them for him. This is the final end game of creating books as entertainment (a game that has sadly been encouraged by "cut and paste" technology -- How much of the Harry Potter series was cut and pasted back story?) The brand supercedes the art. Sure there is quality control and a formulaic sameness that soothes the reader, that is why it works.

Looking at the entire process through the legal lens, I see a supply chain of author to agent to editor to proofreader to printer to book distribution company to book retailer with every participant sucking off the teat of the writer's words. In much the same way a lawsuit bleeds the litigants dry, the publication process bleeds the author's work dry.

And if this really is how it works, why would an author (attorney or not) want to be treated like a pair of brown leather pumps chewed on by the book industry puppy?

Sunday Morning Musings

It is so quiet -- birds chirping, sun rising as I see the contours of the ridge line cut across the scrub oak as the mountain's shadow sneaks towards me. Unbelievable as it may seem to those of you who know me, a little kitten is perched on my shoulder, purring softly, asleep. Maybe not quiet so unbelievable is that the kitten's name is Henry Miller.

This week I've been thinking a lot about writing. My wife, JulieAnn, is an exceptional writer -- and she writes. Boy, does she write. One of her greatest skills as a writer is her tenacity. I've watched her develop her talent and watched her in practice. I envy her ability to just dive in and work on her novel of the moment. Her first published novel is why I'm married to her in a very real way, since it was the catalyst to our meeting.

Books (and thus writing) seem to be headed in the same direction that music went ten years ago. Books are becoming more and more a commodity and the price for the book is dropping, creating an economic pressure on both authors and publishers. They can be easily copied and transferred, even with some DRM encoding. I find myself gravitating towards author's I know and still pick up on new authors and hot books from the Sunday New York Time's Book Review, so I'm strongly in the traditional publishing realm as a consumer.

Yet, I can feel it all changing underneath my feet. I'm worried about it from a dual perspective -- as a potential author and as the husband of an author. Who do you listen to if you want to get a good recommendation for a book? How do you develop an audience? How big of an audience is enough? How do you hone the writing craft when the ability (and the compulsion) is there to spew out your thoughts onto the Internet in a blizzard of uncensored typing?

I'm sure my day job makes me look at writing from an economic perspective. Writing takes time. Time equates to money. How much money do I need for myself and my family? How do I increase the time I have for writing?

Sunday morning and I have all the questions and none of the answers.

The Future of Reading

One of my favorite new blogs that I read daily is Kindle Review. Anyone who knows me at all, knows that I am in love with my Kindle and in love with books. Today there was a post on the future of reading -- or more accurately the future of books. (I don't think reading is going anywhere, books appear to be in a state of flux however.)

The post raised a couple of questions, especially when it was combined with my wife's post about literature yesterday. So here are a couple of questions and my random musings on them.

1. What is literature?

Harold Bloom, the literary critic, sees the literary tradition as agon -- a conflict or contest of artistic style and morals. (Agon is the same root as agony, which seems completely applicable to the writer's craft.) Being the male combative that likes rugby and the law, this theory of literature appeals to me greatly. Obviously literature is a game and as a writer it is fun to play the game. The problem is that there are no rules -- or at least you need to pick the literary game you want to play. Literary fiction is a different game than writing mystery novels.

Before you answer the question as to what is literature, you must look to see that you are comparing tradition to tradition.

2. Will books become more than words on a page?

No -- and yes. No, because books are words on a page. Yes --think David Foster Wallace. His books become words on different pages through an old technology, footnotes. eBook technology is going to open up artistic possibilities to authors that have been tried before, but the tools weren't really there until now -- split narrative streams, collage, asides, merging of various texts/authors, alternate endings and whatever an artistic mind can come up with to use the brush strokes of eBooks and digital technology. Depending on what literary tradition forms around these uses of technology, then yes, books will become more than words on a page, but it won't replace the century old progression of other literary traditions. This is an addition, not a subtraction.

3. Time to go to work

The problem with books is not the form, but the quality.

The $ Value of Words

Contingent and non-contingent interests in the estate of a decedent -- mysterious words like these are responsible for my livelihood. I joke around with my clients that if it weren't for words like this attorneys couldn't charge outrageously hourly sums. If you ask someone do you have any contingent or non-contingent interests in the estate of a decedent, the eyes glaze over and catatonia ensues. If you ask the question this way: Is anyone dead or dying that is going to leave you money or stuff? The eyes light up, the laugh comes and often, they gush, "No, I wish." To which I respond with a chuckle, "Glad I'm not your relative."

Computers and Google make words much less mysterious. I don't know that words are how I'm going to be able to keep making my income. The change is that people are not going to want to pay simply for my ability to interpret mysterious words. I get paid not for my understanding of legal jargon, but for my ability to pilot people through a legal system that I just happen to know from doing it 8000 times. Nothing mysterious.

Pricing Ourselves Out of Existence

One of the struggles I've had with being a lawyer from the very beginning is how much we charge. Usually, the cost of legal fees far exceeded the benefit we provide. This is probably why I ended up in the consumer bankruptcy realm where the cost/benefit analysis of fees and benefit to the client is so clear and so definitive -- I feel like I'm worth every penny of fees based on the benefit to my client.

I was speaking with another attorney yesterday and told him that a couple of my daughters are considering law school as an option. He shook his head and noted that by the time they got through law school, attorneys will have priced themselves out of existence. He then went on to quote several other attorney's hourly rates and noted how ridiculous those rates were. I bit my tongue because one of the rates is what I charge -- and earn.

The demise of my profession may not be eminent, but with technological advances, the free flow of information and the infiltration of money and power into the legal system, financial access to the attorneys for the poor and middle class is in fact threatened. Solutions need to be found, so that the Courts remain Courts of the People and not Courts of the Corporate.

My Love of the Kindle

The last week or so has had plenty of hullabaloo about the new iPad and everyone seems very concerned about what Apple is going to do to the Kindle. Hate to break it to you Apple folk, but you are a little late and on the wrong side of the eReader game.

I'll never use the iPad for reading. I use plenty of Apple products, but the Kindle -- at this juncture is the dream book.

Those issuing the death knell of the Kindle obviously don't read, so they don't have a clue. The virtues of the Kindle have been expounded by its acolytes, but I'd like to offer five great reasons that the Kindle is here to stay in a Gutenberg-ian sort of way --

1. Real bibliophiles are ecstatic about not needing to lug thirty books with them when they travel. My carry-on is so light these days.

2. I actually get the newspaper delivered to me without the annoying and unreliable paper boy -- and it is the New York Times.

3. As I'm reading my NY Time's Book Review on Sunday Morning in my slippers and bath robe, I see a book I want to read and I click the convenient shop button, type in the name of the book and two clicks I'm reading the book instead of the review. I spend more money on books (and I spent a lot before).

4. I can lay in bed and read without flipping back and forth like a rotisserie chicken -- just hit next page.

5. Oh, did I mention that I like being read to -- even in the mechanical voice?

Actually I think one problem with the Kindle and "Death of the Kindle" crowd is the people saying this aren't really readers. How the hell would they know what a good reading experience? This is the same crowd that was saying reading was dead just before Harry Potter sold a gazillion copies and every adolescent girl on the planet purchased Twilight.

Seth Godin in his marketing blog encourages marketers to "disaggregate" and he starts off his blog post with this gem, "The typical American buys precisely one book a year". He points out the obvious that based on the statistical analysis, between Seth and me at least 950 Americans didn't buy a single book last year (Seth bought about 400 and I bought about 450-(250 on the Kindle)). Ok, that may have been a little hyperbole.

The people who say the Kindle is dead or dying are the same people that haven't bought a book of any kind for a long, long time.

More Writing and My Job

Most of what I write is crap.

"I love my job."

Now that sentence is simple to the point and probably crap. It loses all nuance in a bold, white declaration of affection. I do get a thrill out of my work, but love is a word that is devoid of meaning in this context.

When people ask me what I do, I tell them "I Robin Hood for a living, taking from rich, evil creditors and give back to the poor and destitute, while skimming a little off the top for myself."

Now, that is a more accurate description than saying I love my job, but again -- crap. Not all creditors are rich or evil. Not all clients are poor and destitute. I don't really skim, but take court ordered and disclosed fees for my work. I am trying to create a persona, a facade -- to make my job and myself, way more glamorous than I really am. I know, because when I tell people I am a consumer bankruptcy attorney I get one of two reactions -- 1) Eyes glaze over and the subject is changed or 2) A smile, a nod and "Wow, you must be really busy these days. Glad someone has work." Much better to describe my profession by turning Robin Hood into a verb, but while greasing the social skids, the words are still crap.

Writing is an attempt to connect with other people on a non-physical plane of existence that removes time from the coordinates and takes the physical and transforms it into the mental. Maybe this is why I think everything I write is crap. Writing is a modified and socialized form of what the psychics call "remote viewing." I think psychics are crap.

Take the word, "crap." I am using this word in a metaphoric sense, as well as the colloquial meaning of "not good." As a metaphor, physical crap is the detritus of biological functions and metaphoric writing crap is the detritus of my mental functions. This is also why we refer to excess material possessions that have become useless as our consumerist version of crap -- the shit we have left over from our spending.

Another thing about crap is that no one is really interested in crap -- their own or others. Although you may check out your own crap or grouse about how much crap you have or how your writing is crap, you never check out anyone else's crap or care how much crap someone has (unless it is bigger and nicer crap than yours) or you rarely read someone else's crap, because after about two sentences, or if the writer is lucky, two paragraphs, you say, "This is crap" -- and stop reading.

So I'm stopping -- for today.