retreat, regroup, rethink

Dave Williams

Zappa isn't frank!
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All of my published work so far has been nonfiction. For 2015 I plan to go spelunking through some musty old subdirectories and see if any of the 30-odd years worth of fiction I've written can be bludgeoned into anything sellable. But I decided I'd finish up an old nonfiction book first.

Back in the '90s there was a huge market for computer books. I'd sold a couple and started a third, and then the bottom pretty much fell out of both the computer book industry and interest in the language I was writing about.

Still, the book was well along, and I could finish it up without a major investment in time, and perhaps try self-publishing, with the full knowledge that I might sell as many as a dozen copies. At least I'd have finished the danged thing...

Hm. That plan didn't last long.

Much of it was tips and tricks for dealing with operating systems that are now stone dead, dealing with hardware in ways not useful on modern platforms, and a lot of history and tips for writing compact code to fit in limited space. Basically, as useful to a modern programmer as a "how to" for running a punch-card sorting machine.

Nobody cares. Cut.

There's not a whole lot left; language definition, some problem solving and debugging stuff. Almost all of the "practical" part is sitting in "deadtext.txt" where the reject words go. (programmers never throw anything away)

So instead of 80% of a book I have more like 30% of what could be a book if it had some particular purpose.

Hmm. I guess I'll let that one sit until I figure out something to do with it. Maybe nothing; sometimes you have to acknowledge you missed the boat.

The big thing was the realization of how much of it was simply no longer relevant. Most of the fiction I've written probably has similar problems. I expect cellular phones and the internet have made most of the mystery and adventure stories I started just as obsolete.

I'm not whining, it was just the realization that the 21st century stomped all over a bunch of perfectly good writing...
 

Virgil Contos

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Well you never know, there are some people who are nostalgic for older technologies. But I'm not so sure about "how-to" books. I'd have to agree that tips on 90's technology would be obsolete. But maybe you could find something in there that you can use in a narrative. Maybe start developing a story that takes place in the 90's?