Month: January 2011
So far, we’ve been talking in these What It Takes posts from our own point of view, from the angle of the writer and his agent and publicist. Today I’d like to turn that around. Let’s get down and dirty–in the trenches, selling books to bookstores. We’ll talk with Random House’s David Glenn, who’s one of the key sales reps working to “sell in” The Profession—and one I’ve had contact with since Gates of Fire back in 1998. SP: David, welcome and thanks for giving our readers, many of whom are writers and artists, a peek into the real world…
Read MoreHave you seen the movie, The Fighter? It’s already won Golden Globes for Melissa Leo and Christian Bale–and looks like a strong Oscar contender in a number of categories. I loved it. The movie is also–in its depiction of the psychological dynamics within the Ward family of Lowell, Massachusetts–one of the great cinematic evocations of Group Resistance, or what we might call Collectively-Enforced Mediocrity. How does Resistance play out within a family? Let’s see what the film’s writers and director–Scott Silver and Paul Tamasy & Eric Johnson and David O. Russell–have to say. A collective myth Early in the opening…
Read More[Today’s post is an interview with me in fear.less online magazine. If you haven’t heard of fear.less, it’s a terrific enterprise founded and run by Ishita Gupta and Matt Atkinson, who are two young stars of new media. [Fear.less appears once a month; it’s free; you can sign up via the link above or below. The magazine features interviews with artists and entrepreneurs, where the thrust of the discussion is to probe the individual’s inner life on the theme of fear–and the overcoming of it. It’s an idea whose time has definitely come, and Ishita and Matt do a tremendous job…
Read MoreI just came in from getting my stuff ready for the gym tomorrow–packing my bag, loading up my gear, leaving it in the car. It got me thinking about one of the most useful books I’ve ever read, Dr. Robert Cialdini‘s Influence. If you haven’t read it, I highly recommend it. In the book, Dr. Cialdini lays out seven proven ways to influence other people–in other words, to get them to do what we want them to do. One way, for example, is the Principle of Reciprocity. If Joe does X for me, I will feel an obligation to do…
Read MoreHailing from the hills of rural North Alabama, Scott Oden’s fascination with far-off places began when his oldest brother introduced him to the staggering and savage vistas of Robert E. Howard and Harold Lamb. Though Oden started writing his own tales at the age of fourteen, it would be many years before anything would come of it. In the meantime, he had a brief and tempestuous fling with academia before retiring to the private sector, where he worked the usual roster of odd jobs—from delivering pizza to stacking paper in the bindery of a printing company to clerking at a video…
Read MoreMy friend Paul is writing a cop novel (I mentioned this in an earlier post, on the subject of trusting your instincts, even the darker ones–particularly the darker ones.) Paul has written screenplays and stuff for TV, but he’s never tackled a novel, which is really his native medium. At the same time, he’s writing more from his true center than he ever has. Paul’s about halfway through and, though he puts up a brave front when I ask him how he’s feeling, I can tell from his eyes that he’s in full panic mode. He looks like a rabbit caught…
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