This is an older piece but I've brought it back. You can have somebody say "Awesome" about a piece which is very flattering, and then somebody else moans about the punctuation. Then you read their stuff and its banal. So don't believe any of it, just the balance sheet, that's if you make any money.
Michael Casey
http://butcherbakerundertaker.blogspot.co.uk
http://www.michaelgcasey.typepad.com
Internet Story ©
By
Michael Casey
So all I had to do was send an email, and then I’d be a
writer, my book in every shop, my face smirking from cardboard cut outs of me
holding my book aloft. My book had a great title, so it was bound to sell. A
Nation Of Shopkeepers was a great title, if only people could remember their
History, were people interested in History, and for that matter my book. It
wasn’t a history book, would people think it WAS a history book, and then not
buy it. It was a comedy drama, about a street of shops, interconnecting short
stories, for all the family, but would people notice the levels, the strands of
humour, or would they say it’s a Ma & Pa book, and miss the joke, just as
one publisher called did?
I decided to keep the title, though I had a reserve title,
The Butcher, The Baker and The Undertaker. Then I realised the US market would
rename it The Butcher, The Baker And The Funeral Arranger. You don’t think
about such things when you are writing the book, you’re just happy, on a roll,
in love with your own intellect, or just surprised you actually DO have any
intellect, then you discover that you are dyslexic, you really are dyslexic,
thankfully not a really bad case, just dyslexic. As you proof read you see you
have put BUT instead PUT, LEAD instead of READ, things like this and other
strange things. Sure there are spellcheckers but or is it put, you have to
check it anyway. As you read you are surprised at your own ability. You didn’t
waste 4years in journalism school, but your writing is GOOD, Did I write that?
Then your chest filled with pride you get somebody else to read it, and guess
what? They think its crap. So now you have to decide, should I give up or
should I carry on?
I gave up for as while, while is a unit of years in my case, my life took another path, so the
writing was forgotten, it lay dormant for years, then like a phoenix it arose,
or more truthfully, like a tortoise awaking from hibernation, sleep still in my
eyes I slowly poked my head out, then back in, went back to sleep again, then
finally with the pangs of hunger in my stomach I just had to do something. In
my case it was eat, as in really eat, then I turned to my old Atari and
realised it was not PC compatible, so I bought a new, or rather an old new
Atari which was PC compatible. Then I spent a day copying my files so that I
could read them on a PC. Then I wrote a few more pieces before I realised I’d
get nowhere in England. The chances of being published were 1 in 2000. So like
a bear, I went back in my cave and slumbered.
Meeting my wife Jing Jie was a turning point in my life, and
not just because it was like Thunder as Jing Jie calls it, it was a turning
point because I had a professional opinion on my writing, from a journalist at
the very top of the tree. Her uncle is an editor in chief, so his comments were
and are like gold, worth more than my first coffee and Cadbury’s chocolate, the
pleasure rush I treat myself to every day, his comments really were that
important to me, and I really DO like my Cadbury’s, so being better than
Cadbury’s is the highest praise I can give. So I knew the quality of my writing,
even if others said and say its crap.
Getting a modern PC and internet connection was another
turning point. Email in our house is like water and eclectic in any other homes.
Jing Jie can “talk” to her mum in Shanghai every day. To friends all over the
world as well. Birmingham IS the centre of the universe.So with hope and fear I
had to transfer my files from my old Atari to the new PC. The floppy discs
were old and battered, several were
unreadable, finally my work, my babies were safely on the new PC. Just to be on
the safe side I set up a web site, so now my work was on somebody’s server in
the US, thousands of miles away , safe from fire or theft. I could also put our
new baby’s photos on the web site so that my Chinese family in Shanghai and
Miami and friends all over the world could see Annie and Jing Jie and me, they
could even read my work too.
So now all I had to do was market my work in the US, simple
really, soon I’d be doing something useful with my life, making people laugh.
I’d be a writing whore, I’d get paid to make others laugh, the best job in the
world. So how would I set about it? I got a list of radio stations from the
internet and started sending emails galore. I’m talking in the hundreds now, to
radio stations the length and breath of the US.They could publicise my site
then eventually I’d get published, or my play would get produced. It was simple
wasn’t it. So merrily I went about my business, sending emails galore. Years
before I used to send off big heavy envelopes with my work in, with more
persistence than hope in my heart.”Thank you for your pieces of paper“was the
best put down. I once even met a writer and he agreed to to read my play
Shoplife, then he wrote back calling me a plagerist, because it was so good. So
I used his note as toilet paper, Shoplife was so good because I had 20years of
experience given to me by my sister, I just improved on it, but yet I was
called a Copyist, so naturally I was angry and used his note to wipe my bum.
I wondered why my strike rate was so low with my emails to
radio stations, then somebody casually mentioned, “You do know they will just
delete anything with an attachment”. In these days of viruses or worms which
I’ve discovered is the new trendy word, nobody can risk their PC, so I merrily
send and they merrily delete. I’d been wasting my time, but not my money
because I’d got a 24/7 package on my internet from AOL.However one radio
station did read Shoplife. The DJ or is it Host, he called it hilarious and he
could not stop reading it. It turned out he was an actor as well, though isn’t
everybody an actor in the US?
So I thanked him, and quoted him in my future advertising.Humour
is a funny thing. The things that make English people laugh are not the same as
the things that make Americans’ laugh. We are constantly told by people on tv
that English TV is the best in the world, the US material we see is the top 10%,
the rest is rubbish. But I know I’d never get my foot in the door in England so
I had to persist with my American campaign, so now I pasted in my material, no
attachments. Just get them hooked, then paste in a sample then direct them to http://butcherbakerundertaker.blogspot.co.uk/
& www.michaelgcasey.wordpress.com
Then bingo part2 of my life could begin,I’d be the man that
made America laugh, a naïve sentiment, but it was honest.Only AOL turns things
into zip files and some people cann’t unzip your files, its like wanting sex
but your zipper is broke and you cann’t get your trousers off. Such a strong
urge, but no forfillment .
I switched to MSMAIL and pasted in my stuff, things started
to happen, my files weren’t being deleted or too zipped up to be read. At least
I wasn’t frustrated any more. Now I had an agent interested, and a new magazine,
even a theatre replied.All praise to Bill Gates, and to a Christian called Pat
Verato who pointed me in the direction of a few good sites.However some of the
sites that I trawled through were just, so very American. Hey, you too can be a
writer, just send me 10 dollars and I’ll send you my book “How to make 10
dollars” , and he does. Then there’s
magazines you can subscribe to, yes you’ve guessed it, just send another 10
dollars “Writing for Beginners”. There’s all these agents too who are so
successful, persuading tap dancing bus drivers to write about Tap Dancing For
Bus Drivers, the complete self help book, costs 10 dollars. The agent gets 20percent, and the bus driver pays 5000dollars
to print 500 copies, then he can boast he’s a writer, not just a bus driver,
and guess what if you pay 10 dollars you can learn to tap dance too.
As for me, what do I think of all this? I’d say just keep on
writing, stop your selling, or attempts at selling, just write a bit. Add to
your catalogue of 3 poems and 2 short stories, then search for an agent.
Believe you’ll never be published and then you won’t be disappointed. There is
one final thing you can do though, just tell everybody to go to my site www.michaelgcasey.wordpress.com
http://butcherbakerundertaker.blogspot.co.uk/
And help find a publisher for my book, and then you’ve
guessed it, just send me 10 dollars!
End
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