Play rehearsals for “My Fair Lady” are ramping up. As a result, my free time (aka writing time) has drastically been reduced as we prepare for the show’s opening next month. Granted, my first scene in the musical is my easiest (I’m a man from Hoxton who asks Professor Higgins where I’m from. No singing or dancing involved.) and my three lines shouldn’t give me too much trouble. Even the Yorkshire/Cockney blended accent isn’t too bad. No, the part that has me worried is my favorite part, the role of Professor Zoltan Karpathy, the Hungarian.
Karpathy is a blast to play. He is smart, obnoxious, slimy, charming, overbearing and friendly all rolled into one. He is the ultimate antagonist who you don’t even realize that he is one until the other character is engaged with him. It’s a terrifying prospect to be talking to someone and suddenly realize that not only is he your fellow antagonist, he had the potential to be your arch nemesis.
So who is your favorite antagonist in a book you’ve read recently?
I’m going to babble for a bit today in hopes that it might break some of the deadlock I am having with The Bronze Lion, the rewrite of the first Christian Cole book. So if you don’t want to listen to me ramble, may I suggest visiting The Donald Maass Literary Agency and seeing their submissions guidelines, since I’ve seen a lot of people following the link from this site to theirs recently. It’s a good guide, and you could probably use that as a reference when submitting to other agencies. Only a few (a rare few, thankfully) ask for different submission requirements and as the world is going green, so are too are most of the literary agencies. I, for one, welcome our impending Redwood overlords.
On to the babble.
Is this one of those things that you enjoy tormenting me with, Oh Great & Mighty Muse? Is this one of those promises that a teen boy receives from his girlfriend on Prom Night, only to be denied when Daddy taps on the back window with the butt of his shotgun? Is it something I said? Was it something I said? I haven’t mocked you in a great while, not since I compared your mad skillz to that of an Australian striker’s prowess in this World Cup. Okay, so that was last week, but still… that was a great long time ago in my mind.
Why don’t you want me working on The Bronze Lion? I understand your fixation with Wraithkin, but damn it, we need to work together on other projects. We did well when we were writing both Corruptor and Vindicator four years ago. Heck, even that mad rush when we wrote The Green Jewel and The Midnight Crew in six weeks showed that we are great together.
Are you that enamored with the original story of Christian? Do you not like his parents being alive now? I’m sorry, Ganeesh, but the whole orphan boy with special powers is sorta… old. Christian is not a Potter or Fowl, not a Percy Jackson. Christian is a hero because he sees that others will not do the deed. He chooses to do it, albeit reluctantly, but he still makes that choice. He isn’t destined to be anything special, nor is he blessed with magical talents or great strength. He is a normal boy choosing to do something extraordinary. Is that your problem, you peanut-addicted miscreant?
Sorry, sorry… I promised to quit making fun of your peanut fixation.
I understand if you don’t like me moving the setting from the west coast to the east coast, but it makes more sense. In Cali, the amount of mountains a kid can play in are limited and heavily regulated. Too many park rangers, hippy campers and whatnot. In Virginia there is so much more space to use, places that are older than this country and yet haven’t been truly exploited. There is far more possibility with an area that has so much more historical value to the overall plot than Cali has… really.
So then what is it? Can you not see things the way I want them to be? Is it because I didn’t offer the White Chip Macadmia Nut cookie this morning to you? Sorry buster, but that stuff puts the rolls on your hips. And I’m looking at your statue right now, and buddy, you don’t need any more cookies. You need Jenny Craig.
What? I’m not making fun of your peanuts. Heh. Heh heh. Ahem.
So tell me what to do and I’ll try to listen. But understand: you may hold the whip of this relationship, but it’s my brain your flogging. Screw with that too much and you will not like the road we will wander down.
Trust me.
If you go the extra mile, you’ll end up a mile past where you want to be. – Peggey the Editor.
Truer words, as a writer, have never been spoken. Of course, the picture below lies. Lies big. Lies like the dog in front of the door who doesn’t want to move and insists that you rub his belly before making your way out of your house. Yeah, it’s that big of a lie. Let’s expose it for what it truly is to everyone out there: one big, fat, stinking, baldfaced LIE.
So how do you know when enough is enough? How do you know when the time is right to lean back, look at your monitor (or piled sheets of paper next to your ancient typewriter… dear God man, buy a computer!) and say “I think… this is done.” Usually that last saying is followed by a “?”, a moment or five of disbelief, then jubilation. Wonderful, blissful jubilation because this cursed book is finally done. But then…
Then you look at it a little more. It could use some more infodumps, maybe an extra explanation… no. Stop right there. Really. 120,000 words for a first novel is really good. Plus, that makes it about 500 pages roughly. Put it aside. Let someone else read it. See what your wonderful first readers (people you know who give up their valuable time to dissect your book for free) think of your work.
Then, and only then, do you go back and see not only what you should add, but what you may have to take out. Because if anything, things can be removed, cut and shortened in a book easier and quicker than lengthening the thing.
The temptation is always there. Every rejection letter, every “This book doesn’t meet our criteria”. Every single time a publisher tells you that your baby, your tome, your painstakingly crafted work of art isn’t good enough, you want to throw it all in the trash and give up. Just retire from this charade and try to do things the normal, boring way? To put aside that creative spark and bury it beneath the everyday, mundane existence?
Don’t.
Look at what’s being published these days. Vampires. Vampires in love. Vampire hunters. Werewolf in love with an underage girl who in turn is in love with a hundred year old glittery vampire (I harbor no grudge, I swear). Oh, and zombies. But soon that will all change.
Everything in publishing moves in cycles. Back in the 50′s (That’s the 1950′s for the under-30 crowd), SF and Fantasy ruled the roost. Sure, contemporary literature was all about Hemingway and Salinger. But what was surprisingly selling were novels of the SF/F variety. They sold almost as well as contemporary literature while being awarded no Nobel Prizes, no acclamations, nothing. It wouldn’t be until thirty years later that the pure genius of the 50′s SF/F writers would become apparent.
Now we’re looking at an inundation of urban fantasy, specifically vampires. But what’s next? Nobody knows. And if you give up, three or four years down the line you may find yourself listening to an agent who is telling you that your six year old novel (who could be starting first grade) is ahead of the curve and wants to represent you, you’ll find your own foot planted firmly in your bum because you gave up.
So in the immortal words of Winston Churchill: Never give in.
I… got my hands on the e-ARC of Larry Correia’s Monster Hunter Vendetta and, unfortunately for me, I can’t review it yet because it would give away too much. It’s a great read, though. Go buy the damned thing so that Baen will give him more money to wrote more books.
See, life is cyclic.
Addendum: I can say that Larry, because of you, little children will no longer look at David the Gnome in the same light ever again. You officially killed my one happy childhood memory. That single, lonely spark of joy in my dark and harrowing youth. That innocent and carefree memory. That glorious moment when I was able to sing along to a song with love in my heart and tears of happiness in my eye. Where I could always find David… the Gnome.
Thanks a lot, ass. 
Author Sharon Lee talks about the difference between writing on spec (speculative, meaning you haven’t sold anything yet… the situation for most new authors) and writing with a contract in hand. It’s fairly enlightening, and a good rule of thumb for new writers out there.
How is Man to be well-governed? How is he to govern himself? Many approaches have been tried and many more proposed. Some of these have been, in the words of a philosopher of Old Earth whom we know of only as R.A.H. , “Weird in the extreme.” None have worked; none have lasted. All have ultimately failed and usually in the most disastrous ways imaginable.
So opens Colonel Tom Kratman’s latest book, The Lotus Eaters, from Baen Books. Delving into the philosophical for a moment, this is one man I can never call “Tom” to his face. He’ll always be Colonel to me, despite assurances from unidentified sources that it is quite okay to call him “Tom”. I refuse, maintaining the officer-enlisted mentality (which may, or may not, ensure my survival). There’s a lot to be said about a man who can stare down a zombie and force it to spontaneously combust with naught but a withering glare.
Beyond the norm, Colonel Kratman’s novels tend to remind one of the gritty, hard-hitting realities of life while throwing everything which can be labeled “politically correct” in your face. He’s agreed to an interview, and while many of you may or may not see eye to eye with his politics or views, one thing can be certain: he writes damn good books. And I, curse the talented man, have spent quite a bit of money on his books over the years.
Me: Thanks for agreeing to the interview, Colonel. First question I’m going to ask, as it relates to The Lotus Eaters and the two books preceding it, A Desert Called Peace and Carnifex: Where did you come up with a character like Carrera?
Colonel Kratman: Carrera’s existence actually arises from a question, or two of them; what kind of man would be required to do the things, and succeed in the things, he does and succeeds in, and what would spark him to do that. That was true even in the original version I wrote back in the 90s, mostly while in law school, which version wasn’t remotely science fiction.
As for his attributes and talents, those are composite. Some came from me, yes. Still others came from people I’ve known. Some more came from historical characters. And one particular one, the spark of madness, came from losing his family in the way he did.
There was also a fictional character, Clancy’s Jack Ryan, who is a negative part of Carrera’s make up. See, whenever I had a moral problem for him I asked myself, “What would that goody-two-shoes, failed to kill the man who shot his wife and little girl, failed to nuke the Iranian city under the full provocation of a biological attack, wimp Jack Ryan do?” And then had Carrera do the opposite.
Me: So you’ve got a series which starts off similar to the September 11, 2001 attack on the Twin Towers. I know how hard that day hit me, since I’d only been out of the military for a year and had been to New York shortly before the attacks happened. When A Desert Called Peace was first released, I remember some people complaining about the resemblances. It was a difficult read for me, but it also opened my eyes to just how some people are horrible beings and others can be true heroes are in our every day life. How hard was it to write the scene where Hennessey’s family is trapped in the building right after the attack?
Colonel Kratman: A few complained, apparently because of the political incorrectness of reminding people we are at war, with bad people. More thought it was just fine to remember and remind. One comment sticks with me. It was to the effect that, “I didn’t cry when the towers fell. But I did when I read about Linda Hennesey.”
It was, in any case, harder than you might imagine, because, while Carrera is not me, his first family is basically mine. Using them – and no, neither my wife nor daughters were especially pleased about that – was the necessary spark for me to delve into his madness.
(Oh, and by the way, yes, I have seen my wife, Yolanda, cause traffic jams and accidents by walking along the sidewalk. I have seen restaurants go quiet as a churchmouse upon her stepping through the doors. She was younger then, and the absolutely most beautiful person, place, or thing I have ever seen in my life. The pics on my site don’t do her near justice. And, though I married her when she was 17, she got progressively better looking for the next 20 or so years. She’s still good looking, if a bit thin, and she’s pushing 50 now. She was painful to look at it, and more painful not to be able to look at. The amusing rumor when I was in law school was that she was a Saudi princess. But, no, she’s Panamanian.)
In any case, it was necessary for me to write those scenes in a way that was extremely painful, for me, in order for me to give Carrera the motivation to do what he does.
Me: I would say you’ve touched on extremism of different types of Islam in your books, but that would be an understatement. One of my favorite books you’ve written, Caliphate, describes how the Caliphate of Europe came to be in the guise of tolerance and progressiveness. Do you really believe that the situation will be turning as dire as you portray it in your book?
Colonel Kratman: I think it’s more likely than not that Europe will at some point in time become as I portray the Caliphate. But I can’t say it’s inevitable. As for the US turning into a nasty, genocidal dictatorship? Much of that depends on how we react to a really mass casualty, megadeath event on our soil, directed at us. As, by the way, I fully expect to happen.
Me: Your first book (A State of Disobedience) was about a second revolution starting in Texas. Your following book, for me at least, was Yellow Eyes with John Ringo. I really thought Yellow Eyes was your best work until I read A Desert Called Peace. Was it difficult for you to play in somebody else’s sandbox in Yellow Eyes? Do you have any other projects in the works?
Colonel Kratman: I don’t play well with others. Just ask my first grade teacher, Mrs, Skirsky, if she’s still alive.
Jim Baen, ere he passed, had a sort of battle drill for new authors. This consisted of linking up the new guy with an older, more established author, where older author writes up an outline, new guy writes the book from that, old guy edits and embellishes, both names go on the cover, and they basically split royalties. Allegedly, he thought about pairing me with several different ones, but – “No, not Drake…the books would bleed if squeezed…No, not Weber; they’d never get along and Tom is less even tempered than John Ringo, and has more guns…aha, Ringo!”
So John did up an outline for what amounts to “Mongols in Space,” under the series title: The Drift Road Wars. I tried, I really did. But in fourteen months I managed to write about fourteen thousand words, every one of which I loathed separately but equally. Note that, when I’m really going, on things I want to write, I’ve done close to a million in a year.
Finally, John called me up and said, “You can’t do this, can you?” Me: “No. The problem is not with the outline or the story; it’s with me.” “Well, what can we do?”
That became Yellow Eyes and, since I could use my own story, I didn’t have the “don’t play well with others” issue.
Me: So what’s coming up next, besides Countdown: The Liberators?
Colonel Kratman: Right now, I’ve got several things going. I’m currently writing the follow on to Countdown: The Liberators, which is, tentatively, Countdown: M Day. Where The Liberators focused on creating a smallish military force for a limited project; in M Day that force is well established and much expanded, about to the size of a regiment, based in Guyana. Then Venezuela attacks. Yeah, one private regiment against a country, and where I am right now the regiment is getting its rear end kicked. It’s fun.
Beyond that, I’ve still got to do somewhere between one and three more Posleen books, depending on whether John does one, two, or none. He’s supposed to lead on two, under both of our names. I’ve got to finish M Day and do the next one in that series, H Hour, by January. I’ve got to do another contract with Toni Weisskopf for about five more volumes in the A Desert Called Peace series, covering the defense of Balboa against the Tauran Union and then the war with and liberation of United Earth from the Kosmos (read: Tranzis). Then, too, I get pestered regularly for a sequel or two to Caliphate. And I probably will, at some point in time, write those. There are a few alternate histories I might like to do that I research as time permits, one on the civil war, one of Germany winning the First World War, and one on Hitler succeeding in conquering England in 1940. That last would be particularly fun. I call it SeeAdler: The Oxford Pledge, and pin the blame on the people who deserve it, the left and the pacifists who were Hitler’s unwitting, indeed witless, partners in crime.
And then, a number of people think I should actually write the fictional book I allude to in The Lotus Eaters, Historia and Filosofia Moral (History and Moral Philosophy, a la Heinlein’s Starship Troopers).
Me: Despite your rabid fan base, you still have the moniker of being a “new” author. I think that’s unfair ( no new author can piss off as many people and still get contracts if they were “new”, but I digress), but at least the folks at Baen Books have been extremely supportive of your writing. Have you had many people try to come up to you and say “We should write a book together”?
Colonel Kratman: Oh, I’m kind of new, still. I didn’t begin getting hot and heavy about it until I retired from the Army, about four years ago. Since then, I’ve gotten out…hmmm…lemme think…five books. And have two more done and in the editorial queue.
But I do have a pretty loyal fan base and, better still, it’s growing. It may even be growing substantially. The Lotus Eaters, while not the first time I ever hit anybody’s best seller list (I’ll never hit the NYT, I think, and not because of sales figures), was the first time I ever did so purely on my own ticket. And that was the Wall Street Journal’s, which is way better than getting hit in the face with a wet fish, no?
Yes, people ask with some regularity. I tell them what I said above, “I don’t play well with others.”
Me: I’m not surprised. Your writing is just that damn (excuse my language) compelling. How hard is it to tell them no?
Colonel Kratman: Hard, because I remember how miserably difficult and demoralizing it is to try to break into writing. But I still can’t help it; I don’t play well with others.
Me: So are you going to be doing any book signings or appearances in the near future?
Colonel Kratman: I used to go to cons quite often. Two things happened to interfere with that. One is that my life sort of entered the world of the surreal, almost exactly two years ago. No, I’m not going to talk about it except to say that I was somehow involuntarily enrolled in the Disaster of the Quarter Club. I’d have had, oh, two more books out, I think, but for that.
The other thing was I had started growing uncomfortable with cons. More specifically, I am not without a fairly solid, but not, I think, arrogant, ego, hence don’t need or want the egoboo that comes with making an appearance. The short form of that is that I am, personally, too egalitarian in social matters to be comfortable with the distance fans seem to assume is natural. “Well, it ain’t; see?”
That said, with disasters fading into the background, I might start up with cons again in the next year or so. Not sure which ones, though. And I have to be careful about attending in states where I can’t carry and where, disarmed, I might get lynched.
Me: Well we can’t have that. Thank you, Colonel, for taking the time out of your hectic schedule to do this interview with me.
Be sure to pick up Colonel Kratman’s latest, The Lotus Eaters, as well as his next book, Countdown: The Liberators, due out this coming February 2011 from Baen Books.
Quite possibly the most bone-chilling moment for a man floating down the river in a fishing boat or inner tube is the soft, sweet sound of a banjo. The very image of it brings to mind something that Warren Beatty should never, ever be proud of. You hear certain lines, you picture… who knows what you picture. It is something that can gives nightmares to any Yankee visiting the deep South. Hell, it gives Southerners something to worry about while camping.
I don’t care how many awards it may have won.
Leaving a reader with that image is hard to do. You don’t want them to be thoroughly depressed (or scared witless) as they try to navigate the pages of your own personal Deliverance. You have a knife edge balance to maintain while writing your book, a precarious perch in which to stand on a single foot while juggling multiple subplots. Remember as you’re editing to keep in mind the viewpoint of the reader. Everyone interprets the book in their own little way (it’s why I love people who tell us what Shakespeare really means while we’re in college… I want to shake them and ask “So you spoke to Shakespeare in a non drug-induced haze of questionable smoke while surrounded by a bunch of self-proclaimed potheads?”) and while you cannot please everyone, you have to remember that target audience I keep harping about.
But beware… there’s banjo music in them there rapids ahead.
I will have a new interview up sometime in the following week. I think military SF fans will be immensely pleased with who it is.
Celebrated my 32nd birthday yesterday with friends and family. Basically went out to eat and then to rehearsals, where I managed to talk the chorus of My Fair Lady from singing me “Happy Birthday”. Phew.
That would have been embarrassing. Like that time at Libertycon when I ended up in the hospital. Yeah. Don’t ask.
One last item of note. Wish my friend Barb luck, since she recently had a good turn of fortune come her way at last. Barb, I promise to get to your new story ASAP. Really. Promise.
The first five chapters are up here, and nowhere else, for Corruptor. This is the near-final draft, with some minor edits still needing to be worked out by the managing editor. However, my editing skills (when it comes to my own work) suck. Enjoy, and please feel free to comment.
