The Fiendish Plots of Dr. Wendy Coakley-Thompson

July 18, 2009: Bosses Behaving Badly

2009-07-18T11:03:00.000-07:00

In this twisted economy, a virulent strain of boss is emerging. A recruiter friend of mine, with over 40 years' worth of experience in her field, has even commented to me that some bosses have just lost their ever-loving minds and are bending labor laws in the most egregious ways.

I wrote a piece about it for Alphanista this week. It's especially relevant in these times of powerful search engines and social networking. Read on here:

Alphanista Career Q & A: Crazy Boss

July 14, 2009: Kindling hope or hype?

2009-07-14T00:15:00.000-07:00

Last week, Amazon decided to drop the price of its Kindle e-reader to $299. Apparently, they’ve been making so much money on the thing that they were able to pass the savings on to the customer.

In writing for Examiner.com (shameless plug!), I’ve interviewed my share of publishing insiders who herald e-readers in general and Kindle in particular as saviors of an industry floundering because of an identity crisis and a bad economy. More than one insider has compared e-readers and other technological advancements to Gutenberg’s printing press, which, as you know, sounded the death knell to monks hunched over parchment in a scriptorium.

Though Sony makes an e-reader, Kindle has gotten the most ink since its first generation hit in 2007. After all, Oprah called Kindle one of her favorite things; we all know what a ringing endorsement from Oprah can do to pretty much anything. In February of this year, Amazon released Kindle 2 with a sleeker design, longer battery life, and more storage than its predecessor. Then in May, Amazon unleashed Kindle DX, or SuperKindle, on us.

Despite the audacity of Ope, though, no one I know has rushed out to buy either Kindle. At a price of $359 for Kindle and $489 for its supersized sibling, no one in my circle of friends is eager to part with that kind of cheddar. That may all change, though, with the $60 drop in the price of Kindle. My friend and author Karyn Langhorne, with two books available as Kindle editions, has plans that involve Kindle, her birthday, and her husband’s credit card.

I, on the other hand, am a chronic late adopter. I only recently got an iPod. And I’m not alone. The folks at Electronic Village are adopting a wait-and-see approach and soliciting input from others before they commit. The reason? Their love of going to the library and checking out books and DVDs for free.

Even though my latest novel, Triptych, is available as a Kindle edition, I’ll still hold off on investing in the reader itself for now… even with the price dip. Basically, I want to see if Kindle can bear the weight of a publishing industry’s expectations on its 1/3” thin, wireless, 10.2 oz shoulders. Like Public Enemy, I don’t believe the hype just yet.

But that’s just me. What about you…?

July 2, 2009: Talking About Triptych on Sirius XM Radio

2009-07-02T18:22:00.000-07:00

The wonderful Maggie Linton had me on her show.

For folks with satellite radio, here are the times to catch my interview this Saturday and the week of 7/5/09:

The Maggie Linton Show can be heard on Sirius XM Book Radio – Sirius 117 & XM 163:

Saturday – 5pm ET / 2pm PT; Monday – 7pm ET / 4pm PT.

On The Power – XM 169:

Saturday – 6pm ET / 3pm PT; Sunday – 11pm ET / 8pm PT; Monday – 4am ET / 1am PT

June 20, 2009: Review of Triptych, Deltareviewer MySpace Blog

2009-06-21T00:35:00.001-07:00

MySpace.com Blogs - Deltareviewer MySpace Blog

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June 14, 2009: Wanted: Romance Writer. V-jay-jay Optional

2009-06-14T00:01:00.000-07:00

Disclaimer: I originally posted the diatribe below as a guest at Romancing the Blog. I post it again here for those of you who don't frequent that particular blog. For those of you who do, you'll find that this post is like cold pizza -- better the second time around.

Just like we’ve known that Victoria’s Secret is that “she’s” a man, baby, we’ve known that men have been writing romances since the dawn of time. After all, the Jennifer Wilde that introduced me to Marietta Danvers was actually a man named Tom E. Huff. But what about some of the men inhabiting bookstore fiction sections and bestseller lists? It’s getting harder and harder to separate some of their work from that of the women writing contemporary romance.

For example, Eric Jerome Dickey writes women so well that I swear someone has given him the secret estrogen handshake. No one can tell me that Milk in My Coffee isn’t a romance novel. However, the writer who embodies my thesis by far is the great Nicholas Sparks. I mean, Message in a Bottle? The Notebook? Nights in Rodanthe? If those aren’t romance novels, then I don’t know what romance novels are. Yet, you won’t see Sparks in the romance section of your chain bookstore.

Contrary to what some of my bitter single girlfriends may want to believe, men can actually relate to the themes prevalent in romance – the desire to couple, the journey to finding a partner, the ability of unconditional love to soothe the rough edges of past hurts, for example. As someone so succinctly put it recently, men are the new women. They’ve realized that there’s a life outside of sports. They’ve come to appreciate culture and the finer things in life. They’re plagued by the same insecurities once thought to affect only women. The concept of metrosexuality is a physical manifestation of this point. Just one pass through Men’s Health magazine reveals that men have their own version of body dysmophia (“bigorexia”). Men are whitening their teeth. They’re dyeing their hair. They’re having cosmetic surgery in record numbers. I live near a military base, and it’s common to see battle-hardened warriors in fatigues getting a mani-pedi. In short, we’re more alike than we’re different. The war itself might still be raging, but this particular battle of the sexes is a draw.

Slowly, though, I think that those who use gender to put genres in certain boxes and stock bookshelves may have gotten the memo. A couple years ago, when I read that Devon Vaughn Archer and Wayne Jordan were the first two men to write for Kimani Press Arabesque – without hiding behind girly pseudonyms – I sensed that there was a sea change in the offing. My cynical side asks if this is because maybe pink is the new green. I recently wrote a piece for Examiner.com about how romance is the recession proof genre, that it’s the tide that’s lifting all boats while the publishing industry at large attempts to reinvent itself.

My hopeful side says that, even though I’m not all that stoked about men having to validate the genre with their presence, maybe this is the first step in romance escaping the pink stigma. Perhaps men – both writers and readers – will realize that embracing their so-called feminine side is to embrace the human condition… while enjoying some damned good fiction in the process.

May 31, 2009: Guesting on Romancing the Blog!

2009-05-31T13:03:00.000-07:00

Romancing the Blog accepted my post for today's Open Blog Night. Here are the Cliff Notes: They open up their forum to potential guest bloggers. If they accepted the piece you submit, they post it on Sundays. They accepted mine -- a piece about how it's okay for men to write romance novels too!

This is very exciting. Romancing the Blog is a well-respected blog that takes the temperature of the romance community.

So, here's the link to Wanted: Romance Writer. V-jay-jay Optional.

May 20, 2009: Alphanista Career Advice

2009-05-20T14:10:00.000-07:00

Once again, I posted to MaryAnn Reid's blog, Alphanista.

This time, I write about how to make lemonade out of lemons. I'm dispensing career advice. Wow! I guess I know what I don't like, so that's a start.

Any-hu, here's the link. Enjoy.

http://www.alphanista.com/make-lemonade-out-of-lemons/

May 14, 2009: No advances for writers: Heresy or common sense?

2009-05-14T00:01:00.000-07:00

From Cover to Cover radio show hosts ReShonda Tate Billingsley and Pat Tucker discussed the “HarperCollins Experiment” on their May 7 show. Unfortunately, I didn’t catch the show. Nor, for some strange technical reason, could I listen to the archived version. I assume from the show’s PR blurb that the “HarperCollins Experiment” they mean is the phenomenon that sent both the MSM and the blogosphere buzzing last April, from writer Roger L. Simon, to the Future Perfect Publishing blog, to as far afield as Britain’s Guardian Media Group web site.

Basically, HarperCollins launched the HarperStudio imprint last April. One key difference from the parent company: HarperStudio does not accept returns from bookstores. But that’s not the part that drove people nuts; this is. In lieu of advances, this radical upstart gives authors a larger share of the profits from their books. Though, it does seem, from this NPR piece posted in January, that they’ve backpedaled a touch, saying that they don’t pay an advance larger than $100,000.

So, does this truly signal the death of the writer’s advance? I interviewed former Kensington Books editor Rakia Clark for my column at Examiner.com, and she says that the advance is one thing that separates publishing apart from other media. According to Clark, “The advance was traditionally set up so the author could live on it, but most books don’t earn out. With a successful book, the profit margins, in relation to that of other industries, are quite low.”

For your average midlist author, I don’t think that this is the tragedy that some envision. Only the Chosen Few of us live off our earnings as writers. Most of us have kept our day jobs. After all, over a year after HarperStudio appeared, my world looks pretty much the same. Just like Obama’s tax hikes will only affect those making a quarter-million dollars or more, this abolition of hefty advances would probably only affect those who could potentially receive them. Like Kathy Griffin, who just sold her memoirs for over $2 million to Ballantine. Or Alaska governor and former vice presidential candidate, Sarah Palin, who won’t even reveal how much she got from HarperCollins for her book, due out in 2010.

Of course, y’all know me; I have concerns. Agent Kristin voices many of them here in her blog, Pub Rants. I’m especially perturbed about #4 on her list: If publishers are not giving advances to authors, will publishers pony up extra money on their end for marketing and promotion efforts? Regardless of whatever new paradigm publishing ends up sticking with, the fact remains that the industry sells books, not drugs. And, unlike drugs according to Chris Rock, books don’t sell themselves.

Of those who weighed in on HarperCollins’ experiment with HarperStudio, writer Roger L. Simon makes a point that resonates for me.

My question then is - what’s the point of the publisher?
Well, there’s editing (which one can get elsewhere) and the fancy publishing house imprimatur, maybe a little help with production and publicity (again available elsewhere - many authors pay for their own publicists anyway). It [sic] this really enough? The author can do much better on percentages, I am sure, by self-publishing. And that same author may know his or her way around the Internet better than the publisher, when it comes to publicity.

To which, like Eddie Murphy in Boomerang when Robin Givens asks why he’s in bed with her instead of Halle Berry, I say… Exactly.

April 27, 2009: Triptych Now Comes in Kindle

2009-04-27T14:51:00.000-07:00

Hey, all.

I'm so excited to join the Kindle revolution, with my latest novel. Triptych is now available to Kindle users... at less than half the price of the print version.

Of course, to get the latest version, you'll have to spend $360 on the Kindle e-reader. Those of you who already have a Kindle, it takes less than a minute to download Triptych. For the Kindle-less folk -- myself included -- I strongly suggest buying the printed tale of death and infidelity, straight up, with an erotic twist. Half of my net proceeds goes to The Cancer Society of the Bahamas and 365 Pink Foundation.

Together, we must do everything we can to contribute to the eradication of cancer.

April 19, 2009: Art as Philanthropy. Triptych and the Reasons Behind Donating Half My Net Proceeds

2009-04-19T09:14:00.000-07:00

My third novel, Triptych, emerged in December 2008. I have committed half of the net proceeds from the sale of the book to two organizations actively engaged in the fight to make cancer a distant memory.

Why, you may ask. Like everyone, I had a general awareness of cancer itself. Like just about everyone, I had either known someone affected by or who had suffered from cancer. I’d been remotely aware of the cancer statistics. I’d had one scare when I was 26, but after a breast sonogram, my gynecologist advised me to have my first baseline sonogram at forty. Even with all that, I was, admittedly, lax about breast self-exam.

Flash ahead to the fall of 2006. I was thirty-nine, about to have my first mammogram. I had absolutely no qualms about it. In fact, my fortysomething friends who’d gone through the procedure told me what it was like and even shared jokes about it. I think that was to mollify the draconian nature of it. After all, there’s nothing remotely funny about placing a breast between two metal plates, having those plates pressed together to flatten out sensitive flesh, and then having to hold your breath through the pain as a technician takes an image of the inside of the breast. All this while you’re so self-conscious about being half-naked in front of a total stranger and worrying if you’re nervous sweat is producing its trademark funk, because preparation literature told you not to wear any deodorant for the procedure. Nonetheless, I thought I was sufficiently prepared for it all… until the technician told me that I would need to come back. She showed me the image of my right breast and said something like, “I think I see something.” As my mind tried to catch up with the moment, she told not to freak out... that this was not uncommon. She speculated that I would most likely have to return for a breast sonogram. She was right.

I traded cold metal plates for ice-cold gel and a metal probe, kneading my flesh. Another caring female technician confirmed that there was, indeed, something shadowy on the sonogram. Just as her soothing tone lulled me into thinking that this was not a matter of life and death, the radiologist – your typical insensitive male – appeared in the room to have a look at my bare breast and the sonogram, pronouncing, “You know, if this is what I think it is, about 80% of those tumors tend to be malignant.” Not what I wanted to hear, supine and exposed. “You mean benign, right?” I pleaded. As if I was a hardheaded child, he said, “No, I mean malignant.” Just to be sure, though, they promptly scheduled me for another sonogram, this one with a needle biopsy.

Reality set in at that point. I was terrified at the prospect of suffering painful, debilitating surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy. I felt weak… vulnerable… diseased. Plus, I reminded myself, I was single. If I had breast cancer, what man would want me after treatments had disfigured me? Then I imagined the worst. What would the world be like without me in it? I discussed fears with my mother, who, as a retired operating room nurse, was cool and calm. She was even eating while we talked on the phone. “You don’t know,” she simply said. “Yours could be among the 20% that’s benign.”

I tried to keep the day of the needle biopsy as normal as possible, booking it early so that I could knock it out and go straight to work afterwards. Typically, they were running behind. I was scared to death, so I wasn’t the most mannerly person on the planet… and that was before the lovely young Korean-American doctor proceeded to stick a mammoth needle in my breast. Guided by the sonogram, she would puncture the lump repeatedly and then take several samples with these loud clicks of the needle. No matter how much she numbed me, I acutely felt every moment of the procedure. Nonetheless, after the doctor covered my punctured flesh with a small pressure bandage, I went to work and began the agonizing wait for the results.
Days later, I was in a thick lather before my gynecologist finally gave me the good news. I didn’t have breast cancer. The lump was something called a fibroadenoma, a benign tumor comprised of glandular and fibrous breast tissue. They appear in 10% of women in general and in 20% of African- American women in particular. There’s no treatment. It’ll be a part of me and has become part of my baseline sonogram. Hearing that news… forget R-O-L-A-I-D-S. This was how I spelled relief!

My struggle was with the threat of breast cancer, but for others, cancer is very real. Just to give you pause, here are some sobering statistics:

According to Susan G. Komen for the Cure, “one in eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in her lifetime.”

The National Cancer Institute recently decreed that rates for certain types of cancer have not declined, but, in fact, have increased. Breast cancer has increased 4%, as has lung cancer by the same percentage. Prostate cancer in white males has increased 12%; in black males, it is up 14%. Melanoma in whites is also up 14%. Lastly, colorectal cancer has increased 3%.

The incidences of brain tumors seem to be increasing across the globe.

I felt like I had to do something. So, I chose to donate a portion of my proceeds from the sale of Triptych, the poignant story of a cancer sufferer’s struggle to protect his family, to the fight against cancer for as long as the book stays in print. I have the base to ensure that I achieve my goals of inspiring readers with a story of the triumph of the human spirit, and of contributing substantively to the eradication of a disease that is one of humanity’s scourges. I was lucky. I had access to medical care, and my situation turned out for the good. However, there are many out there without access to diagnostic facilities. 365 Pink Foundation of Plantation, Florida provides such help for the underserved. Many out there, once they have gotten sick, have to leave their families and familiar surroundings to receive treatment. The Cancer Society of the Bahamas helps provides a safe haven for them to reside, rest, and recuperate.

I chose to make a difference in this small way. That’s how change starts, as a certain man named Barack Obama recently showed us. And even if I, through my experience and my gift, help just one person, to paraphrase an old saying – to the world, I may be one person, but to one person, I may be the world.

April 14, 2009: Diversifying My Portfolio

2009-04-14T00:01:00.000-07:00

In these tough times, everyone is diversifying his or her portfolio. Actors are now doing political outreach – most recently Kal Penn, who got killed himself off House in order to go work for the Obama administration. Money experts (I use the term without laughing hysterically) show up on cable to dispense advice. Former plumbers-slash-political mascots are doing the talk show circuits.

Authors are no different. In this era of dwindling support for the midlist author from a broken industry, the decreasing relevance of bookstores, and stiff competition for the entertainment dollar, author in ever-increasing numbers are becoming generalists, not specialists, working at least one new and innovative sideline. Some turn their fiction into stage plays. Some have movies in the works. Some have turned to other genres, like YA and the graphic novel, in order to earn some kind of income at doing what they love. I, too, have joined the fray.

To increase my visibility, I've begun making the rounds as a guest blogger at Alphanista, Maryann Reid’s blog dedicated to the “Alpha Female perspective,” as the tagline says. Some of my pieces include some reasons why I’d never be a cougar, recession-proofing your mindset, and things to do once you’ve been laid off. Also, Felicia Pride, famously of The Backlist, asked for my thoughts in her inaugural column for The Root. Well, she asked eight other authors too, but hey... Check out the piece here.

Additionally, in my all-consuming quest to get paid for my writing, I've signed on as the DC Publishing Industry Examiner at Examiner.com, the online version of the Examiner newspapers in key cities across the country. Examiners cover their respective cities. My beat is, obviously, the Washington DC area.

I write locally-focused articles on our industry, from trends, to insider tips and secrets, to timely events, as well as profiles of local people and places of note. The articles show how the aforementioned impact folks in the DC area who are curious about what goes on behind the scenes of the publishing industry. So far, I've written about using art as philanthropy, about how Kindle 2 and e-readers might be the end of books as we know them, and about how mainstream authors are invading and changing the graphic novel genre.

Here's the link:http://www.examiner.com/x-6658-DC-Publishing-Industry-Examiner

If you're a local author doing something special, or if you're not local but you're heading our way for readings, signings, or whatever, please shoot me an e-mail. I would welcome the possibility of covering you in my column.

Ultimately, my hope is that these diverse investments in my career portfolio will bear steady fruit, over time, and lead me to my goals – success, security, and surety when I proclaim: YES, I AM A WRITER.

April 8, 2009: Alphanista On a Roll!

2009-04-08T12:05:00.000-07:00

I have another Alphanista article up, y'all:

Check it out here:

5 Alphanista Things to Do When You Get Laid Off

April 7, 2009: Felicia Pride Quotes Yours Truly in The Root

2009-04-07T10:34:00.000-07:00

Hey, all.

As you know, I've been getting around more than a thong bikini on Spring Break. This time, fellow author Felicia Pride recently became the book columnist for The Root. She's the founder of The BackList, and is the author of The Message: 100 Life Lessons from Hip-Hop’s Greatest Songs. Her column will appear on The Root every 1st and 3rd Tuesday. She also gave me this awesome quote for the back jacket of my baby Triptych:

"Triptych is an emotional, yet thrilling roller coaster that proves that life–and everything in between–is far from black and white.”

For her first article, Felicia wrote a piece called If We Ruled the Literary World, for which she asked nine black authors to comment on the state of publishing. I was one of the nine. I's an excellent piece... very thought-provoking.

If you like it, log in and comment.

April 2, 2009: Wendy is the new DC Publishing Industry Examiner at Examiner.com

2009-04-03T13:08:00.000-07:00

Every author has to diversify, especially in these tough times.

In my all-consuming quest to get paid for my writing, I've signed on as the DC Publishing Industry Examiner at Examiner.com. Examiners cover their respective cities; my beat is, obviously, the Washington DC area.

I write locally-focused articles on our industry, from trends, to insider tips and secrets, to timely events, as well as profiles of local people and places of note. The articles show how the aforementioned impact folks in the DC area who are curious about what goes on behind the scenes of the publishing industry. So far, I've written about using art as philanthropy and about how Kindle 2 and e-readers might be the end of books as we know them. My latest piece is about book trailers.

Here's the link:http://www.examiner.com/x-6658-DC-Publishing-Industry-Examiner

I'll still be making the rounds on the blogs of others in the industry. I still post on Blogging in Black, as well as at Alphanista. Check out my most recent piece about recession-proofing your mindset:

Look for me and please comment... just to affirm that I am not, in actuality, just talking to myself.

March 23, 2009: I'm Now An Alphanista, Y'all

2009-03-23T15:56:00.000-07:00

Hey, there.

Please don't pass out. I know that you usually hear from me on the 14th of every month, but now I've decided to step up the frequency of my blogging -- all part of my New Year's resolution to make better use of this mechanism to get my message out.

In addition to spending more time on my own blog, I've decided to guest more on the blogs of others. As if sent from heaven, my friend and colleague, author Maryann Reid, gave me a wonderful opportunity to write a piece for her blog, Alphanista. The blog's tagline says that it's "dedicated to the Alpha female prespective." And how!

The tone of the blog is fun, playful, but it spills the tea in the most hilarious ways. It was a great venue for me to get some stuff of my chest. First up -- the slowly-going-past-its-freshness-date cougar trend. Here's my take on it. Enjoy!

Ten Reasons Why This Alphanista Won't Be a Cougar.

March 14, 2009: A Stimulus Package for the Publishing Industry?

2009-03-14T00:01:00.000-07:00

A recent episode of Ugly Betty proved to be rather timely. To give you the Cliff Notes, Daniel Mead and Wilhemina Slater came to D.C. to ask Congress for a bailout of the Mead magazine publishing empire, which was slowly hemorrhaging money. The great Vanessa Williams played her role as Wilhemenia to the hilt. I practically hollered throughout the entire episode at the ludicrous premise. Until my mind took off on its own flight of fancy…

Is a stimulus package for the publishing industry all that ludicrous? If you watched the news recently, you saw every manner of industry bellying up to the government trough to nationalize their losses at taxpayer expense. In fact, John Stossel just did an ABC News 20/20 special called Bailouts and Bull, in which he talked about the very same thing. Ugly Betty explored the stimulus within the context of magazine publishing. I, however, wonder what a stimulus package for the book publishing industry would look like.

After all, it’s no secret that the publishing industry is broken. Imprints have been folding left and right or cutting back. Wednesday’s Publishers Lunch announced that National Geographic recently eliminated jobs in their book division. Reed Exhibitions cancelled Book Expo Canada, the Great White North’s answer to our BEA. Bookstores have been posting sub-par earnings, especially Borders, which is hanging on for dear life. I’m sure publishing industry professionals of all stripes would be in line if President Obama were feeling generous.

Would I co-sign a bailout of the publishing industry? Only if it came with some kind of Truth and Reconciliation Commission. With an ombudsman like the man from my neighbor state of Maryland, Congressman Elijah Cummings. I think he’d approach publishing industry powerbrokers with the same zeal he harnessed to take wayward bank CEOs and auto company chairmen to task. Of course, to get the money, they’d have to explain some of the interesting decisions that they’ve made (for example, the 1.1 million-dollar advance to a certain ex-football player to discuss the murder of his ex-wife as an anorexically veiled hypothetical immediately comes to mind). Instead of giving money to any of the Big Six major publishers, the “stimulus” part of the stimulus package would provide subsidies to small presses that look for unique voices and great stories, not the usual celebrity tell-all or warmed over formulaic stuff that seems to sell well but fails to feed the creative soul. The package would fund small independent bookstores in underserved communities… the ones that folded in the name of progress as Deatri King-Bey discussed here in her February 18, 2009 blog called “Hmm, I Wonder.”

Until some kind of salvation happens, I’m quite happy to sip on my cocoa and watch the happenings from the sidelines. Despite having no mainstream publisher, my book, Triptych, is selling well… so well that Amazon.com can’t seem to keep it in stock. For me, joining the publishing fray again right now, in the absence of some kind of restructuring, would be the equivalent of running out and buying a car made by General Motors. And, as Bill Maher recently said on his HBO show Real Time, the only way you’d get him into a GM car would be if you drugged him and threw him in the trunk.

I second that emotion.

February 14, 2009: Valentine’s Day 2009 -- Love in the Time of Bailouts

2009-02-14T00:01:00.000-08:00

Two years ago, I wrote an entry here called The Grinch That Stole Valentine’s Day. In it, I advocated boycotting the manufactured holiday just on G.P., that real love meant showing your significant others year-round how much they mean to you in more substantive ways than gifts, flowers, and candy. When I wrote the post in 2007, people weren’t flush with cash, but they still had more in their pockets than lint and chewing gum wrappers. People who thought that my advice was bunk could still manage the requisite Valentine’s Day flourish.

Well, flash ahead to 2009. If this whole sad situation we find ourselves in were a novel, it would be some magical realism faux Gabriel Garcia Marquez-esque gem called Love in the Time of Bailouts. Forget the usual roses and Whitman’s Sampler. The credit card you might’ve charged them on is either over the limit or the property of a bank that just failed. No limo; the car company who made it just filed for bankruptcy. Yes, your plan for a candlelight dinner has come to fruition, but only because the power’s off. And that peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich that you and your squeeze were sharing has given you both salmonella. It truly is enough to make your favorite R&B singer beat the daylights out of his girlfriend. Hypothetically speaking, of course…

And don’t underestimate the global reach of Love in the Time of Bailouts. I had to look no further than Facebook for validation of my hypothesis. In a clip of the Bahamian Channel 12 show, My Five Cents, the host, Kevin Curry Esq. and the My Five Cents team asked men – most of them toothless for some reason! – how the economic downturn has affected their Valentine’s Day plans. Though the tone of the piece was quite colloquial and hilarious (the magical aspect of magical realism), there was, to me, something all too real there (obviously, the “realism” in magical realism). One man said that money you might spend on flowers could feed someone. Another said Valentine’s Day is a scheme to extract money from those who are struggling daily. Yet another brothah said all his girl was getting this year was love. Pretty bleak stuff under the veneer of humor and parody.

Uncharacteristically (y’all know I’m a cynic), I’ve tried to look at the upside of Love in the Time of Bailouts. If your significant other is still with you, eating PB and J by candlelight, after the flowers, candy, and bling are but fond memories of the Clinton years, then you know that that person’s feelings for you are real. I’m trying to keep hope alive, like Jesse Jackson. And that one brothah in the My Five Cents video clip who promised that next year, his dentures would be fixed.

I have reason to be optimistic. As I write this, I’ve just found out that the 787 billion-dollar stimulus package passed the Senate by a vote of 60-38. The House had passed it earlier in the day. So, with any luck, Love in the Time of Bailouts will be another tale set in a quaint bygone era, and we’ll be back to our same shallow, self-absorbed selves come next year. Here’s hoping…

January 14, 2009: 500 Million Stories in My Naked City?

2009-01-14T00:01:00.000-08:00

Living in the DC area, I’ve been excited about the Inauguration since November 4, when Barack Obama became simply “44.”

Two months later, that excitement is now tempered by an event that is fast becoming the political equivalent of the Wagnerian Series. Every day, we get some new update on how big a seismic shock this is going to be to our collective system. The local press called the dress rehearsal for the Inauguration this past Sunday many things; “a success” was not one of them. Police are still investigating a so-called “suspicious vehicle” that resulted in the closing of a portion of Connecticut Avenue, one of the majorest of major thoroughfares in Northwest DC. Obama has decided that he and Joe Biden are going to partially re-trace Lincoln’s inaugural route the weekend before the Big Day, which is going to be such fun for rail travelers and the Secret Service alike. Then there’s the cherry on the sundae that strikes fear in the hearts of my Bahamian family coming up for the event: temperatures in the thirties. It’s enough to make me want to stay in the warm house and watch everything from the comfort of my couch. Like my colleague, Maryann Reid. When someone on Facebook asked her if she was going to the Inauguration, she said, “If DC stands for de couch, then yes…LOL.”

Typical writer that I am, though, I revel in new experiences…especially ones as monumental as this. I wonder how many stories I’ll hear as I commune with my fellow human beings, on either the National Mall or – fingers crossed for some last minute available tickets – on the parade route. I wonder who’ll be coming from where…who’ll have what hopes and dreams for how lives will change…who’ll share stories about the inner conflict of enjoying being a witness to history while simultaneously regretting that extra cup of morning coffee (only 5000 Port-a-Potties for five million people; you do the math, then invest in some Depends).

So, this weekend, I think I’ll get a hold of trendy North Face down coat, a high capacity memory stick for my video camera, and paper and pen so that I may take copious notes. If elements of Inauguration 2009 sneak themselves into my next forays into fiction, you shouldn’t be at all surprised…

December 14, 2008: Schadenfreude

2008-12-14T00:01:00.000-08:00

Schadenfreude. noun. German. Translated, Schadenfreude is the joy one experiences at the misfortune of others. I’ll get to why this is relevant in a second. Stay with me.

We’ve been hanging together for some time now, and I’ve shared my experiences as a midlist author, trying to navigate an industry that remains hostile to those who prime the pump – the storytellers. I’ve told you about editors and agents whose contempt was so obvious that they couldn’t even bother to seal the envelopes of their rejection letters. I told you about late royalty checks that, to begin with, are only cut twice a year and on a Friday. I’ve told you about how fans keep you from taking it all personally. Through it all, I kept this one fact close… that karma was a bitch.

Well, early this month, I read some interesting news from Jeffrey Trachtenberg, who covers the publishing industry for the Wall Street Journal. It seems that the trade division of Houghton Mifflin, one of America’s oldest and most prestigious houses, has stopped acquiring new manuscripts. Then the Associated Press announced that both Random House and Simon Schuster announced layoffs and were restructuring. This was around the same time that I opened my daily e-mail from Publishers Lunch to see that, among other entities, HarperCollins and Pearson were freezing salaries company-wide. Publishers Lunch was calling December 3 “Black Wednesday” and the day after “Greyish Thursday.” The first thing that came to mind was the sound that Nelson from The Simpsons makes – “Ha ha!” I know, Natalie Maines thought it first when she and the Dixie Chicks won fifty-million Grammys after having been labeled as Freedom Haters. But I’m sure she’d let me take that mantle next. There it is people: Schadenfreude.

Don’t get me wrong. The last thing I want is for ordinary folks to lose their jobs. On top of all of the reversals I’d suffered this year, on July 28, I, too, got the news that my money was indeed on the dresser and that I shouldn’t let the door hit me on the way out of the not-for-profit at which I’d dutifully toiled for years. However, under penalty of violating a draconian severance agreement I’d signed, that’s all I can say about that.

So, I feel for the rank-and-file subsumed in the 2% at Simon and Schuster and the 10% at Thomas Nelson Publishers who are going to be eating tuna fish for Christmas. I’m not alone. Check out Editorial Ass’s blog here. The ones I do hold the utmost contempt for are the fat cat CEOs and editors who oversee an industry that even industry insiders, as we share secret phone calls and stalls in the ladies room at BEA, tell me is broken beyond repair. Those are the folks who set up royalty statements meant to obfuscate (I have a PhD, and I still need my former agent to decipher mine). Those are the folks who create something calls “summer hours” so that you can’t get your editor on the phone on a Friday afternoon between May and August. They are the architects of one-sided contracts where they’re held accountable for nothing and you, for everything. They are the ones who don’t give you the tools to market your books but hold what they perceive as lackluster sales against you. Those are the folks who have got to go.

Yes, I’m getting a lot off my chest. It’s what I’d been holding back for years so that people wouldn’t perceive me as – egad! – “difficult.” I’m not taking this baggage into another year. And hey, if this catharsis prevents me from getting another mainstream book deal, that’s fine too. Honestly, I wasn’t all that impressed with the last one. I feel that it’s my responsibility to speak truth to power – if that’s what you can call the aforementioned with a straight face. Because if the publishing industry, in this shakeup, doesn’t cleanse itself of dead weight and outmoded nonsensical practices? It truly will be same shit, different day…

November 14, 2008: 44, Obama, and Nina Simone

2008-11-14T00:01:00.000-08:00

I’m sure that all of you remember where you were at 11:00 pm on Tuesday, November 4 when the networks called it, telling the world that Barack Obama had won the presidential election. It’s on the minds of everyone, including all of my fellow bloggers. After a tear-filled call to my mother, I got on the phone to my other great champion, my aunt Syl in Brooklyn, New York. Invoking and paraphrasing the slogan from Ronald Reagan’s 1984 political campaign, I said, “It truly is morning in America.” But even as I said it, it seemed derivative… devoid of the flava that our nation’s 44th president so richly deserves.

You know, in Syracuse University lore, the number 44 is considered revered… lucky. It was, after all, the number that Ernie Davis wore when he played running back for the university, as recently retold in the film “The Express.” I’ve thought about that over this past week… two pioneers… one becoming the first Black Heisman trophy winner and one becoming… well, you know… Obama’s Dream Team was on 60 Minutes last Sunday, steadfastly proclaiming that they knew they could run their campaign freely, bringing the candidate’s values to the public, because they weren’t saddled with the burden of other’s expectations.

That resonated deeply for me… running your own race… keeping your eyes on the prize… defying those who discount you. Focusing on me – it is, after all, my blog entry – I’ve shared with you my epic battles as a midlist author in the publishing industry, the most recent of which being my attempts at getting my latest, Triptych, published. I remember telling you all I would publish it myself if I couldn’t find a mainstream publisher.

Well, I am a woman of my word. Triptych will hit stores on December, my birth month and the last one in a year that has been simultaneously trying and life changing. I am, after all, a storyteller. If I stop being that, it will be my choice to do so, and no one else’s. Plus, I started in this game as a self-published author. Just like Obama, I will be able to make my own decisions, bring my own vision to the fore. And I know that no one in the industry has any expectations that I will succeed. That’s been made abundantly clear. I share this with you 44 weeks after I decided to proceed actively in this endeavor. Hopefully, 44 will bring the reverential luck that it brought to Ernie Davis and to President-Elect Obama.

All this is why “morning in America” doesn’t appropriately capture the hopes and dreams that I have for Obama, for our country, and for myself. So, I’ll paraphrase the lyrics of “Feeling Good,” by the ever-eloquent late great Nina Simone. It is a new dawn. It is a new day. It is a new life for me. And I am feeling good…

October 14, 2008: The Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations

2008-10-14T12:01:00.000-07:00

The soft bigotry of low expectations

I recently heard this phrase from one of George W. Bush’s greatest hits now being used to hit back at the Republican choice of Sarah Palin for vice president. Dubya had used it to say that holding disadvantaged children to a lesser standard was selling them short… basically dumbing down the requirements so that these kids may “succeed.” No matter what your party affiliation, saying that someone performed well in a debate because she didn’t have a complete meltdown is the embodiment of the soft bigotry of low expectations.

You’re probably asking yourself why this is relevant in a blog for and about writers. Don’t skip ahead.

Remember sometime ago, I told you that I would be self publishing my latest joint, called Triptych, joining the ranks of greats like Gloria Mallette, Margaret Johnson Hodge, and Tina McElroy Ansa? Many of you out there are self published and are acutely aware that, when you choose to go that route, you must do almost everything yourself, from writing your own copy and back matter, to designing your own cover. For Triptych, I had this beautiful cover in mind consisting of three sketches – geddit? It’s a triptych – and contacted an artist that I’d met a couple of years ago at BEA. He was bubbly and personable, and he was a brothah. I try very hard to support artists of color. I had seen his work, so obviously, he had the goods.
When I spoke to the brothah on the phone, he discussed the techniques he would use to give the drawings a simulated charcoal look … blah, blah, blah. For a writer, I’m decidedly left brained. All I cared about was his promise that he could make my really tight deadlines for the agreed-upon price. “Naturally, I can’t start until you send me half the price upfront through Paypal,” he said. “Naturally,” I said.

This fast became a Chinua Achebe novel as soon as I gave the brothah the deposit – Things Fall Apart.

The torrent of excuses began. I would leave him messages, and he wouldn’t call me back, but when, by chance, I’d catch him at home, he’d answer the phone like he was just chilling, like he wasn’t feeling any pressure to return my calls. Then I had to hear about how he and his business partner had parted ways, and she took his scanner with her, and he couldn't get a hold of her, because she had had a nervous breakdown, and how he couldn’t get to a Kinko’s, because he lived out in the boondocks. I wasn’t even trying to hear it. He asked me for a drop-dead date by which I would need the artwork. I gave it to him. He said he would call me if he couldn’t make the deadline.

The deadline came and went. No phone call. Two days after the deadline, I had to physically hold my tongue when I called him. “Oh, my wife didn’t call you?” he asked. “Nope,” I said, wondering why on earth his wife would be calling me when he was the artist. “Yeah, well… umm… we’re going to refund your money and cut you a company check.” Here are the Cliff Notes: he couldn’t make the deadline, which was moot now, because of the circumstances and because of – he actually said this next thing! – MY IMPATIENCE. I was ten minutes from Jersey, my foul-mouthed alter ego. When he told me that it would take him seven to 14 days to refund my deposit, I was five minutes from Jersey. “Why can’t you just send it back to me through PayPal?” I asked. Another torrent of excuses… the account from which he would draw the funds isn’t connected to Paypal, so they’ll have to send me a company check… blah blah blah. I was like, whatever. It was then that this blog entry began writing itself in my mind. It’s taking amazing self-control on my part not to call this brothah out right here, right now.

So, back to the soft bigotry of low expectations. Should I have suffered and cut this brothah even more slack, just because we’re “skin folk?” Aren’t we, as clients whose money is just as green as those from the dominant culture, entitled to demand the same level of service that those from the dominant culture get – regardless of the color of the person we’re contracting with to do the job? We say that we’re looking to play on a more level field. Shouldn’t we be entitled to expect that this start first with our own people? Focusing on me, no matter the color of the artist, the fact remains, my deadline is shot to hell.

I was still struggling with these questions when, two weeks later, I received the so-called “company check” – a postal money order. In the enclosed note, the artist was contrite, even promising to send me a complementary original work of art under separate cover. It’s been months now. Shockingly, the artwork has yet to arrive. I won’t be holding my breath while I wait for it to show up…

September 14, 2008: To Socially Network or Not to Socially Network

2008-09-14T00:01:00.000-07:00

This past Saturday, American Independent Writers (AIW) hosted a seminar for writers, touting ways for us to “push the electronic envelope.” As a member, pushing said envelope would only cost me $89 for six and three-quarters of an hour.

Not to disparage, but what writers aren’t already pushing that envelope? On any given day, I’m checking out what’s going on at Shelfari, AuthorNation, and the two heavy hitters – MySpace and Facebook. In July of last year, I, brimming with naiveté, wrote a blog post about how addicted I was to MySpace. Well, people, those were my salad days in which I viewed social networking through the lens of inexperience and idealism.

Flash ahead to September 2008. Inexperience and idealism have been displaced by fatigue and a feeling of being overwhelmed. Tools that I viewed as portals through which to share my work with like-minded folks have become these gaping timesucks through which I fall with startling frequency. Like a Black, dread locked Alice in a cyberspace Wonderland.

Facebook is the biggest thief of my time as of late. I log in and find that someone from one of the many networks to which I belong has lobbed something onto my page that requires my response. A guy I went to high school with has poked me. Should I poke him back, I wonder. What does a poke really mean? Quite a few people have sent me (lil) green patch requests. What does this mean? Don’t my real friends know that I am a serial plant killer in real life? Then there are the requests to take quizzes! I hated taking quizzes for grades; why would I do them for fun? Also, some of the applications on Facebook are a bit much. I can take a joke as much as the next woman, but I find an application enabling someone to bid money on me extremely distasteful, especially for someone of African descent. I’m nobody’s prude, but when someone offered me a friend f*ck, I hastily disabled that application. Some things are still so much better in person, preferably after dinner and a movie.

The good thing about Facebook is that it keeps me in touch with my fellow Bahamians all over the globe. Reading Bahamian slang in print is HILARIOUS! Someone invited me to a group called Beautiful Island Women, which flattered me to no end. In the group I seriously believe Chris Brown was robbed of his Bronze medal in the 400m, I became aware of the extent of the ire that Bahamians felt toward American runner David Neville, who threw himself over the finish line, denying the Bahamian runner, Brown, a medal in the Beijing Olympics.

Invariably, after my exploration of Fun Walls, comments, e-mails, and photos, I look up and realize how much time burned while I fiddled away online. It’s ironic that I started social networking to share my writing, and now, because I’m social networking, I’m getting precious little writing done. Quite the paradox. I wonder if the hosts of Saturday’s AIW seminar mentioned social networking time loss to the folks who shelled out $89. I bet they didn’t. Maybe the next seminar should tell writers how to close the envelope… or at least tell them how to manage the envelope once you’ve pushed it open. Now that’s something I’d pay good money for.

August 14, 2008: Essentially Black

2008-08-14T05:59:00.000-07:00

Recently, I came across Naki, the blog of friend, literary goddess, and fellow author Bernice McFadden. Check it out here. The post from Sunday, July 27, 2008 truly resonated for me. It’s called Dear Potential African-American Author, which is framed as a fictional rejection letter written by “Ms. Ann,” Senior Editor at XYZ Publications.

Giving you the Cliff Notes, Ms. Ann suggests that a novel submitted by an African-American author is way too literate and provides recommendations for said African-American author to revise in order to make it saleable. Here’s a taste of some of these suggestions: 1) Nix the PhD; the heroine must only have a GED; 2) The heroine should be a single mother, either or welfare or with a long track record of having received it; and 3) In the vein of Superhead and baby-mama drama, the book should have “sex, sex, and more sex.”

The tone of the post was playful and very tongue-in-cheek, and I hollered with laughter as I read it. As the laughter died down, though, I realized that behind the humor is a sad reality… the reality of the essentialist notions of what all Blacks should be like as a people. You’ve heard some of them, folks. All Black folks can dance. It’s easier for a woman to find a Black mate in jail than in college. And my personal favorite: She’s Black but she’s talks so White. In essence, when people think of us – non-Blacks here in America, and people of all stripes in the world at large – they ascribe to us the four verbs that the Hill Harper character, X, mentioned in Get on the Bus: Rap, Rape, Rob and Riot.

I would be the first person to agree that we as a people have our own set of problems that are unique to us. Anyone who recently watched CNN’s groundbreaking two-part series Black in America heard the most recent stats on the usual suspects – unwed parenthood, incarceration rates, health issues, etc. But those are the things that make similar a population that is as widely diverse as those in the dominant culture. As the great Angela Davis said when I saw her speak at Syracuse, we are not a monolithic people. However, the dominant culture – and newsflash, they’re the purveyors of media and of the reality they manufacture through its lens – still clings to this calcified, archaic concept of “the black community.” And they make the writer of the genre of fiction that Ms. Ann touts an accomplice to this hate crime.

Please, don’t get me wrong. If you write the type of fiction that’s selling now, go ahead and make that paper. I love it when brothers and sisters succeed. But when myopic editors prop up that genre of fiction as a reality of Blackness, it diminishes us all. I’ll share with you one unqualified assumption made by editors in rejections of my book Triptych: “…So much of the book happens in the Bahamas, and with commercial novels like this [sic] it can sometimes be tough to get readers to want to read outside of their geographic location.” Translation, if it ain’t set in America, Black folks don’t wanna read it. Don’t they think that some of us bought copies of Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner? Or Dan Brown’s The DaVinci Code, both largely set outside of the United States? Is it so far outside of the capacity of the Black reader to imagine life in The Bahamas, a country that’s a 45-minute plane ride from Miami, Florida? Whose population is 85% Black? I find it troubling that people whose knowledge of the diversity of Black culture is so limited have aggressively positioned themselves as the arbiters of it.

It’s not just me. One writer complained to me that his editor took it upon herself to change his characterization of his friend as his patna to the most grammatically correct but sanitized partner. Another writer, hugely successful, told me a story about having to explain to his editor the concept of C.P. time. She remained stymied, disbelieving that this actually existed. Much later, as they sat waiting for the NAACP Image Award ceremonies to begin, she looked over at him, wondering aloud why the start of the show was bordering on ridiculously late. “C.P. time,” he simply explained. She finally got it.

So, what’s the point of this rant? It is this: Regardless of the present climate in our fadistic (and sometimes sadistic) industry, we need to keep writing, keep pressing on as the purveyors of stories from our own unique perspectives as Black folks, keep storming our own equivalent of the Bastille. Because if my hugely successful colleague’s editor can get it, there just might be hope for us all…

July 14, 2008: Yes, Virginia, Someone’s Listening

2008-07-13T21:39:00.000-07:00

You know that I’m always questioning if what I’m doing has any impact. In previous blog entries, I’ve mused about whether an author can ever calculate return on investment (ROI). I’ve asked, in terms of my goals as a writer, “Are we there yet?” I’ve wondered whether it would take a publishing revolution for an author to get hers.

The questions were on my mind most acutely this weekend. I was one of the authors working the Divine Literary Tour booth at Alpha Kappa Alpha’s (AKA) Centennial Boule, held here at D.C.’s Walter E. Washington Convention Center. For those who don’t know, the Divine Literary Tour is comprised of a group of Black Greek authors trying to both stretch their collective marketing and PR dollars and give each other much-needed support by touring together. Check it out here.

This weekend, with the temps hitting ninety degrees in the shade, the powers that be at D.C.’s Metro decided to single-track trains on both lines I took to the Convention Center. I arrived late, hot, and sweaty, with Jersey (my rude, grumpy, foul-mouthed altar ego, lest ye forget) ready to make an appearance that would make The Incredible Hulk look like Miss Manners. Then I found out that I was going to be sharing the booth with two other authors. And you all know how I hate when plans change. I try to be as flexible as the next sistah, but Gumby, I ain’t when I’m touring. So the heat, the single-tracking, and the last minute switch-up were fast becoming my very own perfect storm.

However, one of the authors sharing the booth, a tall, attractive woman, made room and welcomed me in the cramped space. She was an AKA, which, even though I’m a dyed-in-the-wool Delta, I didn’t hold against her. She introduced herself as Latasha G. Hines, author of I Love Him Lord, but He’s Not a Christian.

What happened next threw me. She told me that I’d inspired her. As it turns out, she is an attorney, living in Miami. About three years ago, I spoke there at a National Bar Association spa day. Hundreds of powerful black women lawyers attended the event. She was one of them. She told me that she’d followed the advice I’d given her and her colleagues, stepped out on faith, put pen to paper, and published her own book.

I cannot even begin to tell you how good it made me feel to hear that. So many times, we blog and wonder if we’re just talking to ourselves. We look at our royalty statements and wonder if anyone is reading our books. We speak to crowds at banquets and speculate whether anyone can hear us over the calls to the wait staff for rolls, butter, and/or directions to the ladies’ room. It was as if God knew that I needed those questions answered, and He sent me Latasha G. Hines.

So, I have some advice for you. No matter how hot, sweaty, and pissed off you may be, behave yourself, because you never know who you might meet. And when you express yourself, do so honestly, because yes, Virginia, someone somewhere is listening and is taking on board something you have to say…

June 14, 2008: Loving Day, Huh? Who Knew?

2008-06-13T23:39:00.000-07:00

As I write this, the great Tim Russert has been gone for less than twelve hours. What I remember about him is that he prepared incessantly in order to get things right. This blog entry didn’t start out as a salute to his journalistic greatness, but trust that Russert’s legacy is germane here.

I think about getting things right quite a lot. Nothing is worse than having someone call you on facts that you haven’t gotten straight. Talk about having to have toast with the egg on your face! I thought about this last week when Barack and Michelle Obama gave each other dap minutes before Barack’s victory speech as the Democratic presumptive presidential candidate. This little love tap resulted in a myriad of dominant culture columnists trying to explain what the hell it was, from Reuters calling it a “celebratory fist-bump” to some unenlightened commenter on the Human Events web site erroneously labeling it “Hezbollah style fist-jabbing.” Again, illustrating that people can write with such brio and conviction about things of which they know or understand nothing, neglecting to get things right. Slate reporter Christopher Beam had to break it down for them here.

Then this week, my girl and former Book Squad co-host Karyn Langhorne called me up and said something like, “Hey, I’m writing this Op-Ed piece in The Washington Post about Loving Day.” Thankfully, she couldn’t see my blank expression over the phone. I say thankfully, because I, Wendy Coakley-Thompson, survivor of an aggressively unsuccessful interracial relationship… author of fiction in which the protagonists have interracial and multicultural relationships… author of a dissertation exploring the lives of biracial offspring, had no clue of what Loving Day was.

I had no excuse. I wrote about the Loving V. Virginia decision in my dissertation. Here are the Cliff Notes: On June 12, 1967, the Supreme Court struck down anti-miscegenation laws that had prohibited people from marrying across racial lines. Today, interracial couples and their children celebrate June 12 as Loving Day. There are parties and commemorations, like the Mixed Roots Film and Literary Festival jumping off this weekend in Los Angeles.

Karyn’s Washington Post piece is fabulous. Click here to read it.

I write this missive to say that, even though it took me some time to discover that Loving Day was an actual holiday, I hope that in my fiction, I have lived up to the Russert credo of getting things right, of conveying the significance of interracial relationships and how they show the importance of not limiting oneself to prescribed essentialist notions of love. I hope that my writing reflects that I speak from an informed place, illustrating that, with all its trials and tribulations, love is a beautiful gift – no matter the color of its wrapping.