Babel Clash

“I know Joe has a persistent need for affirmation”

Everyone knows this, though at least I don’t have an “OFFICIAL NETWORK” FORUM FOR PEOPLE TO TELL ME HOW GREAT I AM, with thread titles like, “High Praise to Brent Weeks,” or “thankyou Mr. Weeks,” or ”We love Brent Weeks so much we’re just going to burst.”  Alright, that last one isn’t true.

“and I’m a nice guy”

So you say…

“bookmark this page.”

Meh.  I bookmark THESE PAGES, to keep me SHARP AND ANGRY.

“I’m taking the high road”

Don’t pretend either one of us knows where the high road is.

“I’d like to broaden this discussion”

Very well, Weeks, I will broaden with you.  What does the reader owe his/her audience?  Well this question brings up first for me the recent and ongoing to-do that Dadawa alludes to in the comments, of readers carping about various series books that are delayed to some extent or other.  My opinion on this basically is that readers have no choice but to suck it up.  A shame, but there it is.  Wait or walk away.  There is no obligation on the reader, after all, to continue buying or reading a series.  Why must there be a corresponding obligation on the writer?

Now, of course, it behooves a writer, strongly behooves, some might say, to do various things, like finish a series once begun.  It probably also behooves him or her to deliver books in a timely manner, as much for the goodwill that it will foster with publisher and booksellers as with readers.  But the fact is no writer is ever going to deliberately delay delivery (check my alliteration, CHECK IT) except when they feel they really have to.  They are the very, very last people who want to upset their readers, defer their royalty cheques and imperil the success of the work into which they have poured years of their valuable time and effort.  But the thing that it most behooves a writer to do is to write good books, and the major reason books get delayed is because the author wants them to be as good as they can be.  And that, I think, is the author’s real responsibility to his or her readers - to write the best books possible.  Usually that means the most truthful, honest, authentic books possible.  No one gives a toss about writers who deliver rubbish books like a metronome.  They care about great books.  If they come regularly, it’s a bonus, but it isn’t one anyone should count on…

Now as far as what an author owes in terms of internet presence, I’d broadly go with what I said in my last post, namely that a writer should pick their level of involvement and stick to it.  There’s nothing wrong with having nothing to do with the internet at all.  I’m sure a writer can still be plenty successful without it, and its easy to forget when you spend a lot of time piddling about on the internet that not everyone does, by any means.  But if you are going to run a website, I think it is pretty useless, if not out-and-out damaging, to run one that’s rubbish and extremely rarely updated.  If you’re going to do something, you should try to do it well.  You wouldn’t turn up to a signing in filthy rags stinking of wee and neat scotch.  Well, I wouldn’t, anyway.  Probably.  Nor should you put your worst foot forward on the internet.  If you’re going to be involved, be involved to the best of your ability (however limited that ability may be, Weeks).

As to the specific websites you mention, the daily word thing is just a big kick in the teeth from Sanderson to every other author in existence.  It would appear the man can write a book with each hand while knocking off a novella with one foot.  He is a MACHINE.  In fact I’m starting to suspect he may be twelve different people, or perhaps he’s got a cellar full of orphans working overtime.

Oh, man, though, I’m glad you brought up that picture of me.  I could look at that picture all DAY.  Look at me SMOULDER.  But yeah, fair point, I guess the old black and white thing is a bit cheesy.  Still, it could be worse.  It could be black and white with A BUNCH OF RED ROSES OVER MY SHOULDER.  As for big authors who don’t need a web page at all, well, of course there are some.  China Mieville, as you point out, would never post on the internet.

On a slightly different but related note, and since I take your point about making you start, I received an email from a reader the other day which went a-little-something-like-this:

“do you think that the nihilistic themes and despicable characters carry a risk of alienating some of your readers? Do you think that even a slightly more moderate tone would broaden your audience? Personally, I feel too depressed to buy any more of your books, no matter how good the reviews.”

Score!  Do writers, then, as this e-mailer would seem to imply, have a responsibility to not alienate their readers?  To moderate tone and broaden audience?  Do writers of epic fantasy, in particular, owe it to their readers to give them the types of stories or endings that they expect?

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