May 24, 2004
Bloggers Writing Books; Demand For Copy Editors Rises
Yes, the blogosphere is built on mentioning other bloggers and giving them credit for slight, inconsequential things - blogfucking, we believe it's called. Still, we were surprised to see the New Yorker engaging in this kind of thing. In this week's issue, Daniel Radosh interviews ambitious ICM agent, Kate Lee, who he credits with "sifting through sloppy thinking, bad grammar, and blind self-indulgence for moments of actual good writing" when reading blogs [Disclosure: Gothamist met with Kate Lee last year, but, as we're prone to do, we got distracted by some other stuff]. The only redeeming quote in the story comes from TMFTML, our favorite player-hater in the blogosphere: "what the fuck would I write about?" Au contraire, anonymous friend, Gothamist would definitely part money from our cold, dead hands to read a book by you, as long as there was a Marion Ettlinger photograph on the back.
Gawker dissects the shell game that would be the business of publishing bloggers. But, getting to brass tacks, what's next, blogger reality tour buses ("That's where Felix Salmon lives!" "That's where Peter Rojas gets tea!") of the Lower East Side, "Blogger Eye for the Unwired Guy?," high concept movies about bloggers ("Imagine Die Hard without Euro terrorists or guns: Just kids with computers whose loss of Wi-Fi and DSL make them go John McClane on ISP providers...so, it'll be like The Net, without Dennis Miller sullying it up, and while it may only do $40 million domestic, ancillary should be good."), blogger tips to journalists on how to be snarky and unsubstaniated?
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Everyone, let's remember that this is a place for constructive criticism. And with that, I'm bracing for the onslaught.
Publishers will soon find out that the number of books any blogger can sell is about roughly half of what Michael Wolff sold on his last book.
~you had me at "blogfucking"~
Isn't a blogger just a writer who has a website? I don't get the cynicism. My book won't have the word "blog" anywhere in or on it. I've wanted to be a writer since I was five! The fact that I have a website is kind of a coincidence, except that it's making things...easier, I guess. Go ahead and hate now...I guess the cynicism doesn't surprise me. But we should acknowledge that some good stuff could come out of this.
hmmm... pay for longer version of currently free writing that tends to be at best bar chat based on current events and the New York media industry? Get me some that pronto! Ms. Lee should call McSwys and ask for the sales figures for Pollack and Superbad. Or maybe not. Don't want to ruin y'alls money play. Someone better move fast and do the young, idealistic farm kid who moves to the big city and gets caught up in the whirlwind lifestyle of blogging, falls hard into drink and drugs, has epiphany, meets life companion, cleans up, blah blah blah story. Someone more clever or bored could marry up all the plot points to existing bloggers, but there are like eight people writing basically the same post right now, racing to get to the publish button first so they can start crowing about their ideas being stolen. Besides, W probably already got the deal, since she is the supremo starfucker, and easily the worst writer. Then we can all blog about it.
I believe I met Kate Lee at the last NY Bloggers meet... if I'm thinking of the right person, "ambitious" is a very good term to describe her. (I'm 99% sure it's the same person because I know she was talking about her representation of Elizabeth Spiers' book. And I wasn't drunk either. Really.)
Some of the bloggers are talented authors... perhaps not commercially viable, but talented. I think Choire's bile-spewing rant about the subject pretty much summed it up. The money will be flying fast until a couple of people strike out.
That said, if you're a wanna-be author, you have to dedicate most of your time to paying the bills, and you can't invest much money or time into a book-writing career... well then it's nice to have a free try-out courtesy of Movable Type or Blogger. It's a nice idea that a few agents out there are peeking around looking for people who can write... new opportunities are always a good thing.
However, not everyone's in it for that reason...
I don't see what is so wrong with this. I'd love to read a Lindsayism book, or a Spiers book, or an Old Hag or TMFTML book. If these guys are talented enough to get hundreds of media types not of thier own family to read their daily "stand up routines" then why wouldn't they be attractive to a talent agent?
Good for them.
Bloggers will only be in a better position if they succeed.
Like btezra, you also had me at "blogfucking," but for more personal reasons.
This is like any scene, the talent rises to the top, then leaves. The rest are left standing around going either "why not me," or, "fucking sell-outs," which is just code for "why not me." I'd check out books by any of the aforementioned writers, with hopes that they would be as good as their blogs. If they weren't, then no big deal. If they are good, then those people probably would have been published eventually with or without blogs. I just can't believe lit. agents actually think there are people behind these blogs. I'm thinking that when they find out the horrible truth, they will be thrilled as bots don't get paid.
I would perphaps buy that argument, sac, if I truly believed the talent is "rising to the top." While it's true that many of these people are extremely talented and among my favorite bloggers, so many more/equally talented folks never make these articles (note that it's almost always the same people mentioned every time, and that the articles are almost always written by their friends). I think it's the star system and the insularity that a lot of people are responding to when they hate on blogs.
that article made me want to jump in the shower with some steel wool, and then take an axe to my server. has it really come to this?
Boo-hoo. If those undiscovered gems you mention were worth reading, or had something beyond navel-gazing, then they'd be linked in a heartbeat. Allow me to be sincere for a moment (don't worry, it will be over quickly), but that's the beauty of blogs. Good things spread like wildfire. Boring things do not. Or more accurately, things that have been said before do not catch on, no matter how well written they are. And for a good reason. Example: Are there better writers than Belle de Jour. Most certainly. Do I want to read them? Probably not. It's hard to beat an angle like "young, wet, hyper-literate call girl." Go ahead. Try.
sac: let me guess. You think everyone that went to Harvard got in because of their innate talent. I have one word for you my friend: Nelson.
Now you've gone too far. Are you trying to insinuate that the Nelson twins got into Harvard just because of their television lineage and fantastic hair!? Wow, you bring new meaning to the word "cynic."
Bloggers are being looked at for editors for one simple reason. People who write blogs are writing. And people are reading blogs. That said, most of the appeal of blogs is the time factor. If something is new, poeple flock to that blog. Does anyone read Gawker or Gothamist because of the rich quality of writing or the time based "it's hot and new!" gossip factor.
Editors at publishers will obviously attempt to look at bloggers. And newspapers quick for a trend story will jump on that. But face the facts. Take away the gossip immediacy of blogs and the snarky tone of the authors and what do you have? Not much.
I'd gladly read a book by any of the Gothamist folks. Jen should do a book...a guide to New York, Jake should do a photo book, Tien should do a sports book and Doug should do a wedding book. Where are the agents contacting these people?
Do people actually think that bloggers are all writing "My Blog: The Book!??" Think outside the 'blog!
Take Spiers: she's writing a *novel*, not "The Kicker Print". And I'm willing to bet the only thing the two will have in common is the sharp, witty voice. I don't think anyone has the delusion that a book based on blog entries would sell. My god.
how come no agents have contacted me? i mean, other than those rubes who offered me $10 grand to pose topless for Hour Detroit Magazine. all you NYC kids with book deals, just you wait! i'll be the Jack White to your Lou Reed! wait a second, that means success will come calling roughly 30 years from now ... no buzz! some say durst...
that's what i meant, a book by the personalities represented in the blog, not a stack of blogs on paper.
Lindsay: I know every blogger has the Best Novel Ever inside them, but isn't it a bit naive to think that the people who ride the crest of hip culture mongering give a shit about what that novel is? After The Devil Wears Prada I doubt that every publishing house in town was wondering if Harvey Weinstein's assistant could produce the next Of Human Bondage. The first blogger novel will be sold as a novel about blogging (in some SATC/Nanny Diaries way- why do you think we have all these Chick Blogger articles, but none on the guys? Really, whether you like it or not, y'all are just angling to be the next Amy Sohn). Sure, some of the elite have a leg up on getting meetings with editors and agents, but, if anything, aspirations of Litrachur will be a detriment, as no blogger is known for being a good writer (as in novelist). They already got plenty of them. Brad Pitt can play architect if he wants cause he's Brad Pitt. Unless someone starts to generate real revenue from their blog, they are going to do what their agent/publisher tells them, and they're going to like it. Cause if they don't, W is right outside the door, willing to step in your shoes.
oh sandra, you do jest. a book on sports? i have my eyes set on the great american novel...it's about this 20-something new yorker who starts a blog, then starts writing sports stuff on another blog. the protagonist also moves into an apartment in greenpoint and eats a lot of unhealthy food.
Grambo -- you shoulda said "Iggy Pop." And, on a side note, if it wasn't bad enough that Rash-Weed Wallace got slapped around by Jeff Foster on the court, he's gotten slapped around by Scot Pollard off of it, who put Rash-Weed's aching foot into his mouth. Yeesh.
As for the subject at hand: me, I'm waiting for "Romenesko: The Novelization."
Miss R -
I'm writing the same book I've been writing since before 'blog was a word. The only thing my blog has to do with anything is the avoidance of the slush pile. I'm sure there are much better and more deserving writers out there burning the midnight oil copying unsolicited manuscripts in the Kansas City Kinko's, but I didn't drop out of school and throw everything I owned in my hatchback and move to the big city not knowing a soul to be a fucking BLOGGER, that's for sure.
Also - my blog will obviously never "generate revenue" - that's what my JOB is for.
Also: why hate?
frankly, i just found the article condescending towards bloggers ("People tell me all the time, 'You should blog.' But I don’t have that need to share everything I’m thinking.") and silly, because it's hyping books that haven't been written by authors who have never been published and are part of a scene that doesn't really exist ("TMFTML, in particular, often invites her along when the New York blogging clique meets up for drinks or karaoke.")
That last part grosses me out the most- there is certainly not one single blogger clique- there are probably dozens, or hundreds of groups in New York City. Pretending one single group is the important one or the talented one is ridiculous- especially if that clique does not include, at the very least, Jonathan Van Geison.
Why not? That's not serious, but included to show the uselessness of tossed off comments posturing as debate. I don't really care about your personal toil. There is someone who has it ten times as hard and ten times as easy (and I might be either one of those people). So why bring it up? And why does that qualify you as being a good writer any more than being a blogger?
I had imagined you in the camp of bloggers who don't see it solely as a vehicle for becoming the next George Gurley. But you seem unable to distinguish between getting a book contract based on perceived market value versus publishing a book because it is good, and if that process actually sullies the writing (not because you get a check, but because of the external pressure of producing something to fill a market niche). Clearly, most of Ms. Lee's efforts are in service of the former. And based on the writing of many of those she name-checked, if they are lucky, that's the best they could produce (and, to their credit, I don't think all of them are implying they are the next Great American Novelist). If they write any better, I wonder why they don't hang it out every day for us to see.
the above (Why Not? etc.) was in response to L, not Jake. X-post.
Speaking of...
Never Threaten To Eat Your Co-Workers: Best of Blogs with contributions from Choire, Will Wheaton, and Heather Havrilesky among others.
My point is that Kate is not capitalizing on a fly-by-night trend as much as she's using the internet as a gigantic slush pile. So these books that may or may not come out will (hopefully at least) not have anything to do with blogging! Nothing. Not even a url mention in the author bio. Mine certainly wouldn't.
Somebody has to write the books that will come out in two years, right? Why not us? To assume that our books won't be good just because we've written things on the internet before is kinda ridiculous.
ps: I don't have any sort of book deal of any kind, btw. I'm really not even sure why I was mentioned.
Jake, me-thinks you're upset because the article itself highlights what many "blog haters" having been saying on this site and others. That being the NYC bloggers are very self-serving and very nepotistic. Are there many different blog circles? Probably. But clearly you have forgotten your own nepotism in choosing primarilly friends/cronies when doing your Photoblogger and NYC Blogger events. You clearly have hyped your own clique of who is "someone" in NYC blogging and now you're upset that other media outlets are playing off of the image you have promoted.
Jake, deal with it. There is a clqiueish nature to blogs. And there is a group of bloggers that place themselves on a higher plane than others. And you're right up there.
Congratulations! Your efforts to promote yourself have finally paid off!
And Sandra, my book will not be about blogging, nor will it necessarily have to do with weddings. It will instead be a story of drug and alcohol abuse and rehabilitation as it has never been told before. Recounted in visceral, kinetic prose, and crafted with a forthrightness that rejects piety, cynicism, and self-pity, it will bring us face-to-face with a provocative new understanding of the nature of addiction and the meaning of recovery.
Okay, I ripped that off from the Amazon review of "A Million Little Pieces," but I think you get the point.
miss representation totally deserves a book deal!! right everybody? who wouldn't read it? sign me up!
pitch: disenfranchised blogger blogs! nevermind the blog posts when stringing together miss rep's blog COMMENTS is even better.
working title: "The BackBlog of Pigs"
setting: junior high woodworking/metal shop classroom because with an axe to grind the size of miss rep's, surely it will require some serious machinery.
plot: alienation, frustration, medication, simplification, masturbation, zionist castration. (pardon the last one, kate lee always insists on some woody allen jew blue.)
summary: forget all these other posers, miss representation's obviously the real deal. hey, clever name too! this is a can't miss. represent! (whoooo!!)
L: I thought no one read the slush pile. Given her list names, seems she doesn't either. She could have cribbed her list of candidates from the NY Post peice, or the New Yorker article, etc. It looks like she called one person and asked if they had friends, which is something you could glean from reading the blogs mentioned. But if there is anyone who talked in detail with Lee, could they report back whether or not their were being telegraphed into a concept, or are houses really interested in whatever some of the longer practicing authors were writing before their blog?
Ketel Whatever: I deserved a book deal years ago.
This is boring now. Kate was doing this long before any of those articles were written and she did her own homework. You just really don't know what you're talking about.
Boring? How dare you say such a thing? Are you gonna put this in your fuckin' book? Is this all copy for you to expand your stupid ideas from? Phooey-balooey girlfriend! I want my royalty check! Waaaaaaaaa!
Now, I'll try to pick up where Ketel One left off but this might be hard.
I think it's great the medium is finally getting some recognition, but I'm reminded of that Marx quote about history repeating itself, first as tragedy, second as farce. It's the Web craze or the "zine" craze all over again. The hype really doesn't help anyone in the long run.
And, yes, the A-list (as defined by Dan R.) is a tad insular and clubby. Then again, so was the Algonquin Round Table.
A sure sign the end times are near: a Law & Order episode a few weeks back featured a "blog" in its plotline.
Miss Understood: I wouldn't say your assumptions are unreasonable, but in my experience, they're definitely not accurate.
The book for which Kate is representing me is a satire about Wall Street and has nothing whatsoever to do with blogging and/or Gawker. Like Lindsay (and a lot of other people, I'd imagine) I've been writing fiction for my own enjoyment much longer than I've been blogging. The book was something I was doing anyway and would have continued to do regardless of whether it had any shot of being published. It's not being produced, as you say, to "fill a market niche."
I've never tried to get any of my fiction published, and this may not work out. But it doesn't really matter because it has no bearing on whether I continue to write.
Kate was one of several agents who approached me when Gawker started picking up steam and I chose her in part because I wanted someone who could also help me manage the freelance work I was doing as a journalist. She has never, ever tried to railroad me into doing anything I didn't want to do, and that was a major factor as well. I can't tell you how many agents told me I *had* to do chick lit--despite the fact that I don't read or like the genre, am constitutionally incapable of writing unironically about romance, and know nothing about shopping. (Female + writer = chick lit, apparently.) Kate never did that. Also: of the book editors who have approached me directly, not a single one has expressed interest in a book about blogging. If they did, I wouldn't volunteer to write it. And I'd only *read* a book about blogging under extreme duress.
Bottom line, Kate's been an excellent agent. I'd recommend her to anyone.
And, oh yeah. Jake: The first rule of Blogger Clique is No One Talks About Blogger Clique.
Cliques in New York? Nepotism in New York?
You jest.
Why should social structures and codes of behavior change with the medium? Why do people always see the internet as some acid bath that can dissolve all the mores, habits and barriers to which we conform away from the computer screen?
sac, bring your EMP blunderbuss next month. This bot-town needs an enema.
To almost all of the people in the NYer article, have you really been so deluded by hype as to think you have the requisite talent to write a full-length book?
so i took a look at lindsay's site for the first time yesterday. what does she write about? how she ate lobster for the first time in her life. how thrilling.
honestly, if this is the future of fiction writers, i don't want to be around.
Damn. Now I have to abandon the roman a clef I was writing based on the Lobster Incident.
How could anyone not appreciate the lobster incident?
Ron, are you getting a cut of the advance, too?
I'll second that. Could Ron Mwangaguhunga be a bigger ass kisser?
Agents looking online for writers should be looking on sites like PindeldyBoz, storySouth, Eclectica, Eyeshot, etc., where writers are ACTUALLY WRITING.
the point wasn't that lindsay was going to write a novel about lobsters... it was that lindsay isn't funny and it doesn't seem like she has much to say either.
I don't think I'm really allowed to comment here because a.) I don't live in New York and b.) I already published a book. I think I was mentioned in that article by accident. Oh well. Keep up the fun discussion!
and claire, you're an "online diarist" not a blogger, right?? as an "online columnist" i often think, "when are WE gonna get our day in the fun?"!!
krucoff, where you been all my life, man? you and I are like this (making the 'you and I are like this' gesture.)
oh, for god's sakes- get a mention in a god damn talk of the town piece, and you blogger/authors get so full of yourselves.
Do you not get what seems fairly obvious to blog-readers, ie. what serves as entertaining writing while flipping through 5 windows on your computer screen- well, that doesn't mean you have what it takes to write a book that people will read, regardless of the subject matter?
Maybe you've got what it takes to write the great american novel, but the blogging isn't proof. You could still really suck.
No, the blogging doesn't prove you don't either- but,wow, have you guys gotten full of yourselves.
Lil Streak of Jealousy, you are so so so so SO wrong. I have the Great American Porno Movie in me. I can't wait until Hollywood starts offering us bloggers some serious screenplay deals!! Suck up now all you lil monsters and maybe we'll let you work the craft services table!!!
And don't hate us if we're full of ourselves. It's only because. People. Like. You. Can't. Stop. Commenting. About. Us.
Now really, who's the loser around here?
Um, see the 5 windows open comment. You make many assumptions- I have zero interest in writing an novel myself, but I'm pretty tired of seeing crap on the tables at the bookstore.
And who hasn't wondered how the Graydon Carters, et al. go from Spy mag to $100,000 whores? So it's illuminating, in that respect.
I'm guessing the loser is probably the person that goes around using words like loser- always sign of a sensitive literary mind, no?
And- wow- if you have to resort to cheap, grating gimmicks like one-word sentences- it's pretty safe to say your "novel" will find a cosy home on the remainder table
Lil, you just don't get it do you? It's amazing that you, or anyone, takes one iota of this seriously. Forget I said "loser", you're simply an idiot. I shan't explain a joke that's clearly wasted on you. Be off and don't stare at the crap on bookstore tables when there's plenty of actual dog shit you can gaze at on the streets. Either way I'm still gonna make my porn flick, bitch.
Monosyllabically,
Chief Blog'em
Agents are attracted to bloggers for the same reason they are attracted to celebrities: they have an audience (albeit on a much smaller scale). Two talented young wrtiers: one lives in Cleveland and works for a local paper, the other lives in New York and has a well-know blog. Who's going to attract more readers? Who's going to sell more books? Deep breathes everyone. It's not rocket science.
Genius script-writer/ blogger:
Yeah, of course, I'm the idiotic bitch here. Your jokes aren't that clever, so if I don't find them funny- well, don't blame for that while you also blame me for your inflated ego. Pick a whiny bitch schpiel and stick to it.
I actually do value decent literature, whether coked-up, gossip-obsessed, Graydon-Carter wannabes such as yourself do or do not.
You and your witless "jokes"- and they aren't jokes; they're cheesy cop-outs.
Hopefully, you're book will sell a shitload of copies, so you can justify your existence for 30 seconds of your life. But, if you took a mention in the Talk of the Town blurb, in post-Tina Brown New-Yorker at all seriously- I'm most defintely not the idiot here.
And I'm definitely not the bitch here- you can't take back words like loser. You're either the kind of pathetic, perma- high-schooler who thinks that way or you aren't.
And , yes, it makes for seriously crap writing. But you knew that- or you wouldn't have attacked someone stating the obvious in such a lame-brained, personal way.
Anyway, go sniff something, and see if you can delude yourself into thinking you're hot shit- until it wears off anyway. The come-down is a bitch, huh?
holy crapology. someone is taking themselves WAY too seriously. that's funny. Lil's craw is literally bursting at the seams. i do believe we are witnessing a breakdown. loser? bitch? hmm, let's throw in miserable-crazy-mother-fucker too. you hit the trifecta!
btw, for the third time i don't even read books much less have any aspirations of writing one. can you get that through your poor, tortured skull, sweetums? i want a three picture deal. porn. i would invite you to cum on my face but i think you already have! thanks!!
You keep thinking people want to know about your pschyo-sexual issues. Doubt it- but go get to work on your scripts.
Will you two just DO IT and get it over with?
I could live off a mention in the New Yorker for weeks, if only The New Yorker and, for that matter, New York City, existed. Thank God they don't becasue then this little bitch fest would be real and I would lose just a little more respect for humanity. But hypothetically, bloggers have just as much chance as anyone else to get a book published;, i.e., almost ZERO. So more power to them and anyone else who can scare up interest from an agent. Nothing wrong with a little, or in the case of some, a lot, of self-promotion and networking. My daddy told me when I was 18 that was the best way to score a job. Hey, he was right!