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Christmas at Michael's Excerpted from A Writer's San Francisco By Eric Maisel
There was a time some years ago when San Francisco literary agent Michael Larsen was my agent. He liked to represent nonfiction projects, while his life partner and fellow agent, Elizabeth Pomada, represented novels. Every Christmas Michael and Elizabeth would throw a party at their Victorian flat for their clients. It was at one of these parties that the following horrible thing occurred.
I was talking to a fellow writer. He had written a novel that Elizabeth was representing, a thriller set in the Silicon Valley. He remarked that Elizabeth would be sending the novel out just as soon as he got his fiction proposal together. He was working on that right now.
"Your fiction proposal?" I said. I knew that nonfiction books were sold on the basis of proposals, and I had sold twenty books that way myself. In the world of fiction, however, the manuscript was everything. The novel sold itself or it didn't; its life didn't hinge on the author's marketing plan, credentials, platform, or other sales and marketing niceties. Had all that changed while I wasn't looking? Was the fiction proposal something new? I asked him.
"Yes," he replied in a conspiratorial whisper. This was indeed a new idea-- selling fiction just the way you sold nonfiction, by pledging the moon and throwing money at the public. "I'm going to say in the proposal that I will put my entire advance toward publicizing the novel. If they give me thirty thousand, say, I will spend that whole thirty thousand on advertising. Since other novelists don't know to propose such a thing, I am going to have such a leg up!"
Just like that, the enterprise of hawking novels to editors looked to have transformed itself. This accountant knew better than to bank on the goodness of his writing. He was moving novel-writing into the twenty-first century, making it thoroughly American. Now you could say to an acquiring editor, "My novel may not have a voice or any integrity, but I will promote it with real dollars. So take me!" How could an editor resist? Wasn't there pressure on her to sell, just as there was pressure on everybody else? How could she turn down a rabid promoter willing to throw his advance into advertising?
I must admit to a certain unfortunate bias. I see nonfiction as practical and fiction as sacred. Nonfiction is like a steam engine, pulling good words to market. Fiction is like an eagle soaring overhead. In truth, this is a myopic, muddled distinction, since beautiful nonfiction is more soulful than stupid fiction and, to make matters worse, I've written at length about the folly of making these sorts of distinctions. But I was born a novelist, and childhood romanticism dies hard. To think that fiction was to become like nonfiction, open to the highest bidder, made me a little crazy.
"Did I mention that I'm an accountant?" he said. "I'm going to put that in the proposal, too. I want an editor to understand that I'm easy with the business end of writing." He leaned forward. "I pity any novelist who thinks that he can make it on the merits of his novel!"
I remembered a move from karate, the one where you drive the palm of your hand through your adversary's nose, pushing his nose bone into his skull. How fortunate for this accountant that I had my hands full with wine and cheese. Nor would a jury of my peers have found me guilty-- a jury of novelists, that is.
I needed to find Michael and beg him to stop the madness. But Michael was already drumming. At a certain point during his parties, Michael always began drumming. Not New Age drumming on a tom-tom, but jazz drumming on a full set. I wanted to tell him, "Do not go in the direction of the fiction proposal! Do not allow it! Do not go down that awful road!" But he had his eyes shut and was brushing the drums. I didn't feel up to breaking his trance.
The accountant was sanguine that his plan would work. Since other novelists hadn't caught on yet, he had this amazing head start. He saw a clear path to six figures and-- I saw it register, the lightbulb go on-- why not seven? Yes! There were an infinite number of marketing ideas that he could cram into his proposal. There were things to give away, people to approach, brochures to create. Money begot money. He would spend, spend, spend and make his fortune at writing.
I said to myself, "There must be a Sufi tale about this." Some whirling dervish novelist somewhere must have written a fable about an accountant and the devil supping at an oasis just east of Kazakhstan. The devil says to the accountant, "You know, novelists think that it's all about the words!" They crack up laughing. They clink glasses. The accountant, tears in his eyes, replies, "And they don't even know to audit their publisher!" They howl! They slap each other hard on the back; and then the dancing girls appear.
Nonfiction book proposals remain the custom of the trade. That is the way you sell nonfiction, and I can live with that. Fortunately, fiction proposals do not seem to have caught on yet. Editors appear to be holding out; or maybe they tried a few novels written by accountants and discovered that readers couldn't be bought, or at least not bought that easily. For now, it appears that words still matter. But one day soon, since it has a market-driven inevitability to it, you will begin to hear that you can't sell a novel without writing a fiction proposal first.
On that day, the bones of novelists moldering in a million unmarked graves will rattle. It was hard enough to begin with, to write a good novel and to interest an editor in it. To suddenly have to compete with accountants who are throwing their advances at publicists is really the last straw.
Excerpted from A Writer's San Francisco © 2006, by Eric Maisel. Reprinted with permission of New World Library, Novato, CA, USA 94949. 1-800-441-2100, http://www.newworldlibrary.com
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