Two weeks ago, I put up a poll, asking you, my dear readers, what you wanted to read here at Landless. The results came in on Saturday when the poll closed.
As you can see, the voting showed a pretty clear preference for
more fiction and
more personal insights. A secondary preference was for
more wild-eyed rants and (the default option)
more of the same. The final group is, perhaps, the most interesting. Tied for last place are
more writing advice,
more funny poems and
more porn. Note that each voter could vote for more than one option.
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| She don't want no stinkin' writing advice. |
Hardest cohort first: I conclude that my writing advice and my funny poems are as appealing as my porn. Since I don't post porn, should I interpret this to mean that people want my writing advice and my funny poems to the same extent that they have my porn i.e., not at all? Or is it that people want more of these because they think my porn would be as good as the writing advice (posted infrequently) and my funny poems (posted every Wednesday)?
In any event, these voters amounted to only a slight tick above complete blanks. I guess it's maybe not the best time to remind everyone
that I write a monthly blog full of writing advice over at Write Anything, huh? Recent topics have included effective plotting, injecting drama into a scene, writing in multiple genres, and many more. But, y'know, if you don't want to hear it, I guess I'll just go eat a bug or something instead. Is that what you want?
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| Manufactured RAGE |
Easiest cohort: More of the same is the easiest of all, but the wild-eyed rants is trickier. Rant about what? How? Typical subjects for ranting are, for the most part, outside the scope of this blog. Politics, economics, societal issues... I don't feel like wandering off and launching a screed about the venal bastards at Penn State or explaining why the Occupy Insert-Location-Here movement is a meaningless joke. I'm not like Andy Rooney, who can just think up stuff to get ticked off about and start bitching at random. Manufactured rage is a meaningless as decaffeinated coffee. Alas, I can only do a solid rant when the mood truly strikes me.
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| SemicolonMan! |
Most important cohort: Play to your strengths, sonny boy. I started this blog so many, many moons ago so I could do two things. First, I wanted to post my fiction and writings so I could a) get feedback about it, b) get better at writing it, and c) attract the attention of a top-flight agent who, amazed at his good fortune at finding such an astonishingly talented writer languishing in unrepresented obscurity, would immediately move heaven and earth to get a six book deal with VERY attractive movie and TV options. So far, I'm two out of three.
The second purpose was to talk about my experiences becoming a novelist. I wanted to relate and think out loud about the good, the bad and the tedious, to make connections with other writers, to get advice from them and to help them out to the extent I could. Throughout all this, I wanted to be funny, insightful, informative, clever, thoughtful and engaging.
Based on the results of this poll, my first thought was my best thought. More fiction? More personal insights? I imagine that can be arranged.
===== Feel free to comment on this or any other post.
You're so funny when you write like this. It's why I checked off the 'personal insights' box.
ReplyDeleteEventually I'm sure the agent-thing will come true. When it does, and you become rich and famous, will you send said-agent my way? Thanks!
I voted for more porn. But you probably figured that out on your own. ;)
ReplyDeleteHaha, well, a writer posting porn, wouldn't that be something special? You could make like adorable little comment inserts here and there, to showcase all of your talents? lol
ReplyDeleteI think I'd love it if you'd post more poll results interpretations like this, I mean I had blast (so to speak) reading it, haha.
I prefer personal insights to writing advice because it's nice to know someone is in the trenches with you. There are so many places to go for writing advice that I think some of us are burned out on it. I much prefer a good, honest, open discussion about writing style, technique, dos & don'ts, etc, than being given the rules again. And, of course, you should be flattered that we all want more of your fiction.
ReplyDelete@ Cathy: You're so funny when you write like this. Many thanks, Cathy, but my problem is that I'm not really writing like anything in this post. I'm just... writing. Nattering on. No style, no craft, no careful consideration of anything. Just me, hoop-de-doodling along. If only I could write like this all the time!
ReplyDelete@ Red: There's always one joker in the deck, eh, Red?
@ Livia: I'm glad you liked it! I don't do polls very often, so poll interpretation posts are kind of rare. The next time I do, though, I will *definitely* give you a heads-up!
@ Danni: I agree, the web is rife with advice on how to write. It's part of the reason I don't do too much of that sort of thing. BTW, believe me, I am flattered that readers want more fiction. It is nice to know that the thing I think I do best is what people want more of. 8-)
I was pulling for your porn, man. I really was.
ReplyDelete