Luke Fischer Saved Me - Part Two

 

When we last left our hero (me), he was despondent and had just about enough of this crap. It felt like it had been at least a decade of close calls. Maybe if I would have got rejected all day long, both for my novels, and my short fiction, it might have been different. But instead, I had scored an agent, had a novel go on submission, and had several agents interesting in my new novel - one to the point of talking about pitching two books. 

I work really hard at my writing. I've taken courses at Gotham Writer's Workshop, and workshops from places like One Story, and read several shelves of craft books. I was asked to be a reader at Carve magazine. I was a finalist in a Glimmer Train competition, and one of my published stories (from Smokelong Quarterly) made a best of the web list from Wigleaf.

But, I really felt like I was pounding my head against a concrete wall trying to get a new agent and a book deal. And I couldn't take it any more. So I decided to quit. I have lots of pursuits, I'll go after something that's not quite so soul crushing.

It was a dark time, and it lasted a while. If you're a writer, you've probably had a time like this. People were not interested in what I wrote, and writing anymore is pointless. And it's no longer fun.

That's when it hit me. Cue the sfx (maybe a sproing, or a kaboom or something.) This was supposed to be fun. What do I really want to write? What would I enjoy writing? What do I love?

 

Some answers: neo-noir type detecitves in 70s movies who are laid back, and who love a good drink of bourbon and a bar fight. Yes, I was thinking Elliot Gould in Altman's Long Goodbye. Or Paul Newman as Harper. Or even George Clooney in Out of sight. Or yes, Jake, forget it, it's Chinatown.

In fiction, John D. MacDonald's Travis McGee, or Joe Lansdale's Hap and Leonard, James Lee Burke's Dave Robicheaux, and James Crumley C.W. Sughrue.

That's what I felt like writing. And agents and publishing be damned.

I'd recently taken a job at a University that meant full time 9-5 for the first time in my life. I lamented to my wife, saying I how am I going to write?

She said, "Get up in the morning. Write before work."

I was not a morning person, so my first response was a general "ugh." 

But I did, every morning at 6:00 AM. I got up, made a coffee and wrote for at least an hour. Rarely more, sometimes. less. 9 months later (including edits and revisions) I had a novel. A brand new novel, which was the quickest that I'd finished a novel, and more importantly, the most fun I'd ever had writing one.

Ahhh, this is what I forgot. Yes, writing is deadly hard work, but it should also be fun. This 70s style, laid back beach bum – so laid back that he never admits that he is a detective – rose out of those morning pages and brought me back from the brink. No, I would not quit. I would continue doing what I love.

A note on the naming of this guy. While writing I had bounced around a lot of names, which no one, including me liked. In a text or email convo with my son, I asked him out of the blue what he would name this guy.

"Luke Fischer."

I can't recall if I asked him why this name, though recently he told me the reason he picked the name - Luke was the manliest friend he knew. There was some other reasons for Fischer, but I'm not going to share that detail, only to say that when I heard it... I knew that was the guy.

I love hearing from readers about Surf City Acid Drop - the first Luke Fischer book. I feel like he's made a connection with those folk, he certainly has for me. Luke's second book - Manistique - will be coming out in early summer of this year. Stay tuned for more posts on that.

And yes, Luke three (no title yet) is also in progress. Why? Because it's fun.

Thanks for reading. 

Luke Fischer Saved Me - Part One

As the title of a post that seems a bit dramatic - but it's actually true.

In 2012, I was as close to quitting writing as I've ever been. These were dark times.
Here's the story:

Some writers keeping writing new novels in an attempt to score an agent, and then hopefully a book deal. I kept re-writing the same novel. For years.

 

Correction Line gathered a good amount of attention. In fact, one of the very first agents I queried in 2004 (I think? 2003?) asked for an exclusive on the manuscript. Could she have it for a week before I sent it to anyone else?

If you're reading this and you are a querying writer, you probably guessed what happened. That pass was the first of many - and along the way there were lots and lots of close ones.
A number of partial and full requests, comments on the quality of the writing and the structure, but nope, nope, and nopers.

Seven years later
An agent I'd found on querytracker, but knew little about, said he liked what he read but had some suggestions for a rewrite. I didn't know back then what an R and R was (Revise and Resubmit), but that was what he suggested. I think we had a phone call too, but it's been so long I forget. Anyway, I did revise and resubmit, not really thinking anything would come of it. A couple of months later I had a New York agent. I still remember the shock I felt when I told my wife that the agent said yes.

I've written on this blog about what happened to that book - a book I'm still very proud of. It went on submission and was read by editors from the Big 6 (now Big 5... 4... etc).
Included in this group was Neil Gaiman's editor from Harper Collins/William Morrow. The fact that my manuscript was in front of Gaiman's editor still blows me away today. You see, my agent, had connections to some of the best editors at the biggest houses - one of the reasons being he represented Joe Hill. The now very well-known (on his own merits) son of Stephen King.
Anyway, the book didn't sell, and it didn't sell to small house either.

Part of my education as a writer was learning that this happens all the time - having an agent and being on submission does not guarantee a book deal. I know this now. Nonetheless, I kept writing, a new novel, and a lots of short fiction. I'd been published a number of times as a short story writer, and I love the form.

A published short from Carve Magazine.


But I laser-focussed on a new novel, excited to not have to query it, as I had an agent.
When I finally finished a draft I was pleased with I sent it to my agent who told me this book would be even harder to sell than Correction Line. This was the first of many blows.

You see, the thing was, people, readers, and even agents, kept telling me the work was good - but they passed. A different, and notable, New York agent at a great agency became interested in this new novel that my agent passed on. So we began conversations about changing agents. I'm not going to share names in this post, but just to say this agent was hugely helpful in the feedback he gave me. Another R and R was asked for. But as before, I couldn't get it through the gate. Ultimately he passed.

What amazed me (give how busy agents are) was that when this agent passed, he recommended me to another agency, in Canada, as he said it's really more of a Canadian book. I was disappointed, but now I had something else to build on, a recommendation!
Again, if you're a writer, I'm sure you've experienced these small victories. For example, if you get personally rejected from a magazine editor (as opposed to form rejection), it's called "getting ink." Yes, that is as sad as it sounds.

The excitement machine was cranked up again (geez, Craig could you not see this coming?), when the Canadian agent became very interested and excited in my work. I say "work" because they learned that I had this other first novel in the can, one that had went on submission in the U.S. Phone conversations began as to which novel they would try to sell first, and how to navigate a two-book deal. I wrote bios and summaries and other statements to support the manuscripts. It would seem that after ten+ years, I was looking, finally at a writing career.

And then the emails became more sporadic, or not answered at all. And then the manuscripts got sent to another agent in the agency, as the main one couldn't commit the time. And then after all the phone conversations, and correspondence, with barely a couple of sentences they passed. Even the agent in New York had taken the time to write me a page of notes as to what was working and why he passed.
When I asked for some explanation, I was given the "the market is too competitive" answer.

I started writing seriously in the 90s. Over the years, I published stories and got a lot of encouragement, I even scored a great agent. But none of it was enough. I felt that I could not get invited to the party.
This was now 2012. And I was done. I couldn't put myself through this anymore, and I decided to quit writing. I was finished.

I decided to break this story into two posts - next time, the book, and character that saved me.
(Hint, his name is in the title of this post.)

No, He Really is Coming Back

Looking back in the wayback machine at the blog, I saw a post from 2017 about Luke Fischer coming back.
Indeed, I have written a sequel to Surf City Acid Drop - and it is coming out this summer, early summer even.

It's taken a while for this book to take flight, but I'm quite happy with it.
Here was an excerpt from that post in 2017 - a taste of Luke. Stay tuned, I'll be giving more updates soon.

###

Wayback machine - Sept. 2017:
Hey, I'm a big fan of Luke Fischer... and I know of some other readers out there who feel the same way. 
I've been working away at the follow up to Surf City Acid Drop, and I wanted to share an excerpt.

Thick clouds stuck to each other like wet cotton, hanging in the air, full or moisture, but not letting go of their rain. Not yet. Still, the road ahead, the shoulder, the tree line, everywhere I looked hung a mist. Up and down the rollercoaster road we drove. It was smooth enough, probably be hell in winter, slide your car right into the pines, and they’d never find you. Left to freeze to death or be eaten by a moose. I admit, I wasn’t sure if a moose would do that, but I thought the thought anyway.

We drove in silence, I didn’t even feel like asking Sam what the plan was, I wasn’t sure I cared anymore. In the last few days I’d lost my way. Right from the beginning, I had questioned my reasons. I wanted to help out Franko. But how was this helping? Me drifting with a local sheriff from depressed town to sadder town.

The sides of the highway were dotted with mom and pop motels with names like NorthWoods, TimberView, and Iron-everything. The weathered signs were the originals, letters flaked off, and even older than the restaurants they advertised. No one thought to update them. If you were driving along this road you knew where the good places were. Maybe the odd tourist family, the ones too poor to go somewhere where something was, they ended up on this road— them and the fishermen.

Why did I want to help Franko? Sure, I felt for him. You see someone gut shot and just about die in front of you, well, it’s gonna affect a guy. He probably should have died. But it was more than that. I was damn pissed off. I wanted answers and not one person was providing them.

Sam and I weren’t one fucking scrap of dogshit information closer to knowing a goddamn thing. We were doing what this always comes down: chasing money. What was it about money anyway? Why did everything end up there? What were you supposed to do with it anyway? How much crap can you buy? How much could you drink or snort up your nose? For some, a lot I guess. Those old movies, the westerns, they always had the guy that was going to pull one more big job, and then hang it up, get a ranch in Butthole Wyoming and raise llamas. And they never did. They always got shot, or screwed by someone else, or jailed, or all three.

“Pretty deep into it, Luke.”

Sam’s voice bounced off the car ceiling and smacked me in the head.

“Yeah.”

“You’re wondering what this is all about,” she said.

“You do card tricks too?”

“Come again?”

“Mind reading me.”

She gave a low laugh.

“Well maybe Luke… because I’m wondering myself. Kinda thought you would be too.”

“I figured you got some info from the girl at the desk and we were following that.”

“Not curious?” she asked.

I didn’t answer her. A surfer’s wave of tiredness crashed into me. I let my eyes travel along the landscape as it whipped past. A doe poked her head out of the treeline. Sam slowed, seeing it when I did. The deer took a few timid steps toward the highway and stopped as we passed, spraying mist up at her.

Another rollercoaster hill came up and the rain picked up. The gray clouds became a solid dull mass overhead.

“We looking for more money?” I asked. “Is that what’s going on?”

“Yep. But that’s not the whole of it.”

“It was for Phil. That’s all he saw.”

“Things are getting pretty bleak there Luke. Maybe we should pull in and have plate of eggs and a few PBR’s.” She blew a stream of air trying to get a strand of hair out of her eyes.

“Just tell me this is about more than money.”

###

You can't go home again, or if you do you need to shoot your way out.

From the Wayback machine - 10 years ago! When I discovered Stark.

(And a follow up after)

Under the "finally got around to" category, I finished my first Richard Stark, Parker novel. I first heard of the Parker character when I watched the amazingly gritty noir-esque Point Blank. It starred Lee Marvin in a great suit, and the principal from Animal House (what was his name... a Canadian I think) in a nasty role.

The end credits said based on the novel, so I went looking. I was surprised, in a really good way, when I found out that Stark was one of the pseudonyms of Donald Westlake. I read a ton of Westlake as a teen, loved the character Dortmunder, and the movie Hot Rock (Redford and Segal, if I recall). But I have found that going back and reading stuff I liked as a teen is often a sad affair. Reading the Stark novel (The Jugger), I found it really clipped along, and I liked the darkness of the main character - he kills a guy and puts him in a hole that the dead guy had just dug. (Wait, does that make sense?) Anyway, it was hard boiled and sparse, but at the end of it, forgettable.

I might read another one, or watch Point Blank again, just for Lee Marvin. Onward to other summer books now - like Snow Crash, one that has been on my "got to get around to" pile for, oh, three or four years.

Follow up - 
Surprising to me, for how much he influenced me, that I only started reading Stark 10 years ago. After a morning of reading Donald Westlake articles, I see how long ago the love of crime fiction was planted. When I went to the library as a young teen, I scouted for three kinds of books:
1. Three Investigators. Ok, pre-teen. But I loved these stories about a trio crime fighting teens, unexplainably introduced by Alfred Hitchcock. They even get a mention in my novel Fall in One Day.

2. Philip K. Dick. A sharp and progressive 8th Grade English teacher turned me onto a book called, Ubik, and an obsession was born.

3. Donald Westlake. The Hot Rock, though Jimmy the Kid might have been the first, and the character Dortmunder fascinated me. The humour wasn't laugh outloud, especially for a kid reading above his grade level, but the quirkiness of these characters drove me to keep finding books featuring them.

So now, 10 years later than the original post, I'm still thinking about Stark, and even more obsessing about Point Blank and Lee Marvin. I think about my character Luke Fischer, and how he is an amalgamation of these early loves. Not sure how P.K. Dick fits in there - but definitely that Westlakian sense of humour shows up in Surf City Acid Drop. And the character in that book that is the most like Parker is not Luke, but rather Mostly Harold, a stone cold killer if there ever was one.

Embarking on the writing of a third Fischer novel, I know that Westlake, Stark, and Parker will be in the shadows... oh, and of course Lee Marvin, always Lee.

 

Why I write 2.0 (The Profit Version)

Interesting, for me anyway, to revisit this post from the way-back machine. As it turns out, 4 years later I would have my first book deal and make a few bucks. But this is a question that still has value for me (pun not overly intended).

It does seems that around the time of this post, I turned the corner on worrying about writing and profit and trying to sell the work... even more in these last few years, and on the verge of finishing another novel, I've discovered that quite simply I need to write. I could say "for my soul", "my well-being", "my creative heart", or whatever... but best to just say, I need to write. (Or I'm a mess.) 

Enjoy this post from July 9, 2013: 

I was posting something at a writer's site where I hang out - and thought I would share it here at the blog. A writer, maybe young, I am not sure, asked about the profitability of being a writer. As usual, lots of writers chimed in that there is no profit in being a writer. I don't fault these writers at all - I share their sentiment about the monetary side of writing.

So I wrote this in response:

(edited to protect the names)

I always find it kinda sad when I see these posts (and don't get me wrong ____, I don't mind you asking at all), just that the responses are usually like others - there is no profit.

And I have been known to post the very same. It seems like writing for profit these days, even minimal, is such a long long long shot. We talk about back in the day when the big pubs paid decent cash, and there were just more of them. Truth is, there were fewer writers trying to do it.

So the paying markets have shrunk - and the amount of writers trying to publish has... well, I don't even have a number that can represent that (kajupled?) Add that to a time when self-publishing is easier than it has ever been, and what do you get? More writers. 

I've read a lot of self-published writing - trying to gauge the market - and I have to say, there is a lot out there that is not ready for press. That doesn't even mean quality of writing - simple typo's and grammatical errors abound, along with the Swiftian adverbs, and clichés you could cut with a knife.

This is seeming tangential, but maybe I will find my way back. I have tried all of the above, collected rejections from the bigs, pubbed in the smalls, actually scored a great agent, and had my novel read by the big 6 (unsold). I have self-published (just put out a collection last week), and made an embarrassingly small amount of money. But boy did I give away a lot of books.

I am using your question as a jumping off point, but here is the thing. This whole journey has led me to really question why I write... I mean really question it. Work hours and hours and days, weeks, etc. on something that will maybe make you enough to buy a case a beer (non-import)? Seems kinda nutty. But I realized after all the frustration, I write because I have to. There is nothing I would rather do - and nothing fills me creatively, intellectually, or spiritually as much as the craft of a well-told story.

I am back looking for agents again, collecting pennies for my self-published efforts, and subbing the odd story to the big, small,and tiny magazines. But above all, I am writing. And now with a different purpose. Which is much more profitable than any of my other efforts. It helps make me human.

Sorry for the pontification - your question and subsequent responses just grabbed me. There is, as I always tell my artistic kids (actor/comedian/theatre major... oy), the grand "you never know." And so I still write for that too.

Best of luck with all your writing.

End note - in posting this, I feel I am being more forthright about my self-publishing than in the past. True, I have been disappointed by my sales in that area. So why release another collection? (As I did just last week.) The explanation is somewhat hard to articulate, but I do know this release is different than my other ones. I am very proud of these stories, and I wanted to feel as if they were truly finished - even the ones previously published. I loved writing them, I liked re-writing and ordering them into a theme, and loved putting them into a book form. Basically, it was about the artistic buzz. Would I love lots of people to read them? Of course. But I've been down that road. For me writing has a new purpose - or maybe one that was always there, and only has just now re-emerged.