Authors: e-network or die? (part 3 of 3)

Part 3: Where do I go from here? (or, who says I can write anyway?)

'Nuff said (image: Charles M. Schulz)

So, the futurologists (otherwise known as sellers of online services) want me to own some serious cyber real estate, but agents (otherwise known as the gatekeepers to glory and riches) assure me that the writing is everything. What should an aspiring novelist (otherwise known as a manic depressive) do? I'm still not convinced much has changed from the traditional route for a new author; it really depends on that writer's personality.

Those garrulous, social types who, in the past, wrote lots of letters, spent all day on the telephone, and all night at the pub can do so using the new technologies. In fact, they can be BFF with thousands of people they'll never meet. Stephen Fry is a prime example: he would do what he does socially even if he wasn’t famous; he just wouldn’t have two million followers on Twitter.

If an unpublished, non-celebrity author can generate that kind of following, then great; I hope someone tells me when it happens. Claims of similar success in the music industry involving MySpace, such as The Arctic Monkeys, proved to be false.

If I'm honest, I really enjoy writing the occasional blog – it's a bit like coughing up phlegm on the brain. But even if I had the inclination, I just don't have the time to spend cultivating a Facebook or Twitter following worthy of mention. Actually, even if I had the time, I wouldn't know where to start – I'm simply not a naturally social animal. Does that really mean I’m doomed to be left off the bookshelf?

My time is limited because I have to work for a living – long hours, and I’m trying to come to the creative writing party in middle age. I'm not in the industry already, so I can only write in my spare time; and remember, the writing is everything, so that’s my main objective. The second authorial priority is reading. Why would you want to write if you don't read? And if I am going to enter cyberspace, it's likely to be for research.

I have nothing against people who like to build up a friends list the size of Wales, in the same way that I ignore fat, middle-aged men who buy sports cars. But I rail against those who wish to force me to do things their way for no good reason. I write because I find immense pleasure in doing so, but I don’t tell everyone that you have to write to find pleasure. I wouldn't expect someone who enjoys bungee jumping to tell me it’s the only way to have fun; I'd tell him to go and jump off a cliff (bad example).

My advice to new authors? Write. Write what you want, how you want, when you want, for whatever motivation you have. Write it to the best of your ability because that’s what an agent wants to see. If your instinct is to network, then do it. If you're an old curmudgeon like me, don't (people soon catch on and unfriend you).

If the futurologists are right, then we’ll only be able to buy books (and e-books) written by authors who are internet sensations. But I’ve yet to see anyone equate ‘socially popular on the internet’ with’ talented at writing a pageturner’. I really hope they’re dead wrong.

Let me know what you think.

I'd like to thank those agents who generously offered their time and thoughts to help me make sense of this issue. Rest assured, I'll be knocking on your doors in twelve months time with my manuscript. We'll see how bloody generous you are then.

Yes, no, maybe - could you repeat the question?

Forget gluttony or sloth; vacillation and procrastination are the two mortal sins in my possession that I abhor the most. Too often I find myself in a situation where either I bounce between two options like a rubber ball in an evacuated room in zero-gravity, or I am frozen in a tangle of indecision resulting in several hundred consecutive games of Mahjong on my laptop.

So, when I was asked to choose the specialism of my MA – fiction novel, screenwriting or non-fiction – I was torn. Quite quickly I decided I did not have a strong enough knowledge base in any single subject to sustain an entire non-fiction book, ergo strike that one. Now I just have to select one of the remaining pair.

At the start of my creative quest three years ago, it was simply to garner techniques and strategies to enable the writing of a novel – after all, everyone has a book in them, don’t they? However, my Open University coursework in 2009 explored screenwriting, and I found that my stories were already film-like in my head. I felt a natural affinity with part of the writing process for film and television.

There are strategies for people like me

I enjoy reading fiction and watching movies equally. I would be happy to be successful at either. I have more than a dozen ideas for both. Both sets of course notes were very attractive. Both UCF lecturers seemed equally enthusiastic about and able at their craft. How on Earth could I decide? In the meantime, my win-lose ratio at Mahjong was improving dramatically.

There are many commentators who will offer opinions about whether it’s easier to move from one field to the other later on in a career, or which profession is more worthy. Strangely, these opinions tend to fall in line with the profession in which the author of them inhabits. A co-founder of internet-based screenwriting magazine Twelvepoint, Julian Friedman, in an article, says that ‘writing prose is relatively straightforward and it does not require the same obsessional adherence to structural templates that scripts need’. On the other hand, the snobbery inherent within fiction literature, even against other novelists let alone other genres, is well documented.

Novelist/screenwriter Richard Price, whose screenplays are probably more well-known than his novels, when interviewed at the 2009 Istanbul Book Fair, pretty much mirrored the reasoning I used to make my decision. He says, ‘Writing novels is a very solitary occupation. When you’re done, it’s all yours. Screenwriting is anything but solitary, you’re working with directors, actors, studios, agents and you have no control over that.’

Richard Price almost won an Oscar: Touchstone Pictures

Of course, agents, publishers, and editors are still present to throw a spanner in the novelist’s fragile works, but because, like many others, I don’t (yet) work within the writing industry and I rely on a ‘real’ job to pay the bills, I have no choice but to work in solitary way. From what I can gather, much screenwriting relies on selling an outline to a producer long before there is a need for a script. Waiting for someone to give me a green light before I’m allowed to write is untenable at this stage in my embryonic career.

So, novel it is for the MA. But it doesn't stop me from wondering if I've done the right thing, so I plan to write a first draft screenplay at least for this idea for a movie that I just can’t get out of my head. Next up: which of my ideas shall I use for the novel? Oh well, I imagine I’ll be a Mahjong grandmaster by the time I nominate my project.