But what I really don’t understand about fantasy football is that apparently you don’t even put together a dream team. No, you simply pick one player and gain points based on what your player does in each game.

Just one player?

Heck, if I can only score points using one player, then I can do this fantasy league thing with anything! Or anyone. So I propose a Fantasy Author’s League.

I don’t have all the details worked out yet, but I see a point system that goes something like this:

1 Point For The Following Events:

Author has a book published in the current year, between January 1st and December 31st.

Each endorsement by someone who isn’t the author’s student, relative, best friend, or other person whom the reader couldn’t care less about.

Every review from a dedicated media outlet (book review bloggers allowed, regular bloggers not allowed).

Each award nomination (made up awards do not apply).

Each book currently in print (POD does not apply)

2 Points For The Following Events:

Each writer’s conference or publishing conference in which the author is a speaker.

Each genre award that the author, or author’s book wins in the current year.

Hitting a genre best seller list (including CBA).

Each endorsement from an author who has 2 or more books currently in print.

3 Points For The Following Events:

Hitting the top ten New York Times Best Seller List.

Winning a national award, such as any award that JK Rowling’s books boast about.

Each endorsement from a New York Times Best Selling author.

5 Points For The Following Events:

Each endorsement from Anne Rice, Nora Roberts, John Grisham, JK Rowling, Stephen King or similar.

Being Anne Rice, Nora Roberts, John Grisham, JK Rowling, Stephen King or similar.

Deduct 5 Points For The Following Events:

Each book that is self-published.

Each post that slags off readers or fellow authors.

Releasing a book about sparkly vampires, mopey teens, or having a b*tchy protagonist who hooks up with every hunk, spends her entire salary on shoes, eats nothing but lettuce, and feels justified in ditching her druggie best friend because her boss is obnoxious.

Anybody have points to add?

This post brought to you by: my mother complaining that I haven’t posted anything new, and my new found (soon to be lost) ability to finish reading my favorite blogs with time to spare.

Granted, in truth Lady Catherine meets our current understanding of the word, but at the time, condescension wasn’t an offensive description. Quite the opposite.

In America and most of the modern world, the term condescension is quite an insult. It means that the condescending person seems to think so highly of themselves that they have to lower themselves to our level. And that’s offensive to suggest that we’re at a lower level.

But think of when there was such a thing as rank. A social system where your rank dictated what you could wear, what you could do, your power in society, how you could marry, and so on. In a social system such as that, for a powerful person to condescend to the lower level was the utmost in gentility, kindness, thoughtfulness of those in a lower status than they. Not that it could never be considered an insult- a person of equal or lower rank behaving as though they were condescending from a higher rank would be the ultimate of fools. Which is why we use it exclusively as an insult today- after all, no one is higher than anyone else now. Even the President is the servant of the people- perhaps we should condescend to him?

But the truth of the matter is, we are still impressed by those who seem to truly condescend to us, even if we don’t call it by that word. Now we say “S/he’s just like a regular person” or “They’re so normal!” or “They’re just like us” and count it a compliment. Think of all the stories you hear of someone meeting a really pleasant Hollywood star, a rock god, or famous politician? How about when you work at a company where the boss is just “one of the boys”?

Rank still exists, condescension in the original still exists, but we’ve used it so much as an insult that it can no longer be considered a compliment. It’s just a shame that unless you write historical fiction, even writers are constrained by modern society’s norms. Oh well.

Dear Agent,

Sorry, I’d address you personally but I don’t actually know your name. But that’s ok, because once you hear my idea for a book, I’m sure you’ll forget about absolutely everything else!

I’m currently researching a book about SkyDiving Elephants and the Pineapples Who Love Them. The working title is “You Forgot To Pack My Trunk!”. My 10 year old is a really good drawer, and I thought she could do the illustrations. I think that would be really good for promotion too, because then kids will want to buy the book as much as adults, because someone their own age did the drawings!

I know that platform is everything, and so I’ve started a hugely successful blog. I have a lot of people coming to visit it, sometimes as many as 50 in a day. I know that 5 of them are foaming at the mouth just waiting for me to get published. I know this, because one is my mother, two of them are my best friends, one’s my brother’s girlfriend (we get along really, really well), and the other one is a stalker. I think if I tell him I’ll give him my phone number if he buys 5000 copies, we’ll have a really good start on sales.

And don’t worry, I’m totally not a noob. I’ve already found a publisher that wants me, and it’ll only cost $5000 for the first run of 250 books.

So, email me right back and we’ll get started!

Sincerely,
XOXO

P.S. Don’t try to steal my idea because I’ve copyrighted it.

(To anyone who isn’t familiar with me or my blog, please don’t flame me. This is a joke. Everyone knows that pineapples don’t love elephants, and if they did, they wouldn’t go on record about it.)

Well, one of those site building friends told me to build a freelance writer directory. I mentioned this to another site building friend who also said that I should build it “right now”. Er, that was over a month ago. I’m really good at keeping up with demand.  Can you tell?

I was told that I should make it a paid membership site, and I’m sure that would be a good business model. However, I started this whole thing to give some of my freelance writer friends business, and to give my site building friends a list of good freelance writers. And, since I’m lazy and cheap, I didn’t want to pay for automatic membership software and then spend weeks learning it. I’d rather blog about Disney.

So, I found an awesome domain, bought it, and eventually actually put content on it. I have a few of my friends already listed, and you know who you are. So, if you know you’re on the list, please check it out, find your profile, and let me know if you want anything added or changed.

If you’re not on the list, send me an email at WordVixen {at} gmail [dot] com and tell me what you want on your profile. Name and method of contact is absolutely necessary- either an email address or website/blog.  Information on what you write on, specialties, special education, etc is great.

So, for whoever’s interested, you’ll want to go straight to the freelance writer directory to find your name if you’re listed, or email me to get on the list.

BTW- Anyone who’s on the site and has a few articles sitting around that you still have the rights to and can use as samples- I wouldn’t mind putting up a few. Or, if you have some good samples on your own site or hosted elsewhere, feel free to include the URLs and I can add them as links to your profiles.

Also, if you want to help me out, links to the site with the anchors “hire a freelance writer” “freelance writer for hire” or “freelance writer directory” would be great. Or, maybe a little social lovin’?

I have been a Clueless geek since I made a bargain with my not-boyfriend that I’d watch his horror flick if he watched Clueless with me. How was I to know that I was actually displaying culture and taste instead of insipid stupidity every time I watched Cher make a fool of herself in front of the hot gay guy?

You see, Sunday afternoon I watched the Gwyneth Paltrow version of Emma, based on the Jane Austen novel, and BOOM, it hit me. Clueless is a remake of Emma of the same awesome caliber as 10 Things I Hate About you being a remake of Taming of the Shrew.

OK, I’ll grant you that a simple movie can never be as good as a classic novel such as any of Jane Austen’s. And I know that A&E and the BBC have their own versions which are probably much better. However, Gwyneth was available on the free movies on On Demand, so there. Free trumps good any old day.

And I’ll be honest with you. I’ve never been a fan of Gwyneth Paltrow, often choosing to skip movies entirely just because she headlined in them. But the woman held her own! Usually American actors and actresses show up as the gaudy, incapable things that they really are when held up against the acting of the British. Keanu Reeves in Much Ado About Nothing, anyone? The man nearly ruined the whole flick despite the awesome acting by the others. But Gwyneth Paltrow? I may have to rethink my opinion of her. She really performed well. Plus, I think she should always wear her hair up from now on. It looks good on her.

The thing is, I’ve always known that 10 Things I Hate About You. I mean, they kept the same names and attended Padua High. The cheesiness is part of what I loved! But in Clueless, yes, SOME of the names were the same, but Cher vs Emma? Not obvious (I’ll have to watch it again to see if Emma is her middle name or a silent first name or something). But still, as I watched Emma (obviously I haven’t read the book yet, though it is in my TBR pile), I kept noting the similarities and at times was able to predict what would happen next based on my knowledge of Clueless.

But while I loved the cheesy obviousness of 10 Things, Clueless shows me something different. How you can take a classic story, boil it down, and turn it into something different. While the best parts of Emma were modernized, I saw where the cast was narrowed down to make individual characters stronger. While Emma’s governess became Cher’s best friend, certain personality traits were greatly exaggerated or removed. Where Mr. Knightly was like a brother to Emma, he actually became a brother to Cher through several remarriages.

It all began sliding into place how these people had done it. Me? If I were to try to remake something, I would have immediately gotten stuck trying to find the modern equivalent. But that’s now how it was done. It was taking the basic parts of the original, and re-spinning it.

For example: Harriet got sick before the party and couldn’t go. So Mr. Elton felt free to press his affections on Emma on the drive home. Later, Emma gets stuck while crossing a stream and is rescued by Frank Churchill.

Ty gets hit on the head at the party. Later, Elton drives Cher home and tries to press his affections on her. He drops her off in the middle of nowhere, and is rescued by her “brother”.

In fact, there was even a mugging in both, but totally different circumstances and results.

But I see now how it’s done. It’s like making an outline of a story, and then writing a story based on THAT outline.  And if you get stuck, you can always go back for more details! I’ve always wanted to write my own 10 Things, and now I think I know how.

Also, I have a new review of Wild at Heart up at the site I review for.

I’m not sure what’s been going on for the past few days, but lately I’ve been meeting more and more publishing industry pros and aspiring novelists on Twitter. And along with that comes the influx of linkage.

Ok, so the single most important website for an aspiring novelist is Miss Snark. That’s a given. If you’ve never read this viciously wonderful agent, you need to. Go back to the very first post and read all the way up to her last (she’s hung up her stilettos for good) post. Take notes. Bookmark the Crapometer for when you’re getting ready to query. Read through it again. Take more notes. Follow all instructions and consider all advice. Just do it. Besides, it’s fun!

Now, Miss Snark I’ve known about for years, and have read almost every post on her site. However, #QueryFail is brand new. And it’s not a site; it’s a hashtag. In other words, it’s a stream of tweets from Twitter that are all on one subject, specially marked out using a hashtag. You don’t need to be a member of Twitter to read #QueryFail, but you do need an account if you want to respond to any of them.

What QueryFail is, is a day set aside by agent Colleen Lindsay for all Twitter savvy agents and editors to vent their query frustrations in the form of a 140 character tweet. Many of the tweets are actual lines from queries that the agent/editor rejected such as “Like my protagonist, I definitely could be described as overachiever, and I naturally have hair like Lady Godiva.”, “My book is about a friendship based upon mutual vomiting practices in high school.”, and my favorite- “This book is The Notebook meets The Lord of the Rings.”

You’ll need to scroll through several days of tweets about #queryfail if you choose to follow the above link to access it, but there’s a downloadable file of the actual QueryFail tweets from the actual day at that link.  The agents are planning to make this a regular thing, but no schedule has been set. And by the way? #QueryFail even got attention from The Guardian. No joke! There’s also a #novelfail, but I haven’t had much time to check into that.

And the third page that you may want to consider, is a 25 point list of why your fiction is being passed over, courtesy of Andromeda Spaceways. It’s funny, but not hilarious. Dirty, but not filthy. But all in all, a pretty good list.

And this past weekend, it was announced that she won the Operation First Novel Contest hosted by the Christian Writers Guild (you may notice their ads in Writers Digest). The prize? A contract with Tyndale House (if you’re familiar with Christian publishing, you’ll know that this isn’t small potatoes!), and an advance, or possibly prize, of $20,000. Yup. You know all those popular novel contests that offer a prize of a token $5k and a consideration at a major house? Yeah… this isn’t one of those.

You can imagine that with stakes that high that the competition is probably quite fierce. We were all ecstatic when we found out that she was one of the 4 finalists, but when I got that text? Yeah, I screamed out loud.

It’s funny- with the publishing contract and the nice advance, you’d think that would be the tops. But to be honest? I thought the coolest part was that the book cover art was finished and presented when the contest winner was announced. Seriously! I think that is just awesome.

So if you want to go meet the next NY Times Best Selling Author, go check out her blog, take a look at the awesome cover art, and then tell her how pretty she is. And tell her I sent you- I’m angling for a position on her marketing team.

I’m friends with a handful of peeps who build niche websites and blogs as well as peeps who build sites for flipping.

At least one of them already has a stable of writers, but he’s complaining that they’re already maxed out and he has more ideas. As a helping hand to both my site building friends and my writing friends, I’m compiling a list of freelance writers for my niche ninjas.

If I haven’t already contacted you personally about this, and you’d like to be on the list, please drop a comment here, tweet me, or email me (wordvixen at gmail {dot} com) with the email address you’d like to be contacted with, the name you’d like to use, any rates or specialties that you’d like listed, etc.

Also, please let me know if you want your information passed on to any site buyers. Remember, the new owners of those site flips will need content to keep the sites moving forward. So, not only is it potential exposure for you, but the list may be a nice incentive for bid wars.

Thing is, I received a review copy of Sushi for One by Camy Tang for review on my sushi stuff blog. That blog has received some decent traffic in the past week thanks to one or more Stumbles, but they’re mostly going to one post and then leaving. So because the author was gracious enough to not only send me a free copy for review, but signed it and everything- I wanted to give her more exposure than she would get on just my little niche blog. After all, this is fiction, and no one loves fiction more than another writer!

Lex Sakai is a devoted Christian who is seeking her soul mate with the help of a list from the book of Ephesians. The problem is, the guy who fits the list best isn’t Christian, and the Christians don’t fit the list!

That’s difficult enough, but when her Grandmother threatens to pull funding of her beloved junior girl’s volleyball team if Lex doesn’t have a “real” boyfriend in time for her cousin’s wedding in four months… Well, the pressure’s on! Mix in a new job that makes the immature boys drool, and Lex has a harder time fending off the Mr. Wrong’s than in finding Mr. Right!

To be honest, I wasn’t so sure of this novel at the start. For the first 1/4 of the book, the “hints” that Lex was recovering from rape were, um, constant.  This is thoroughly excusable to me since the beginning of a novel can be so difficult. You’re trying to get a handle on the character and story yourself, and still trying to get across to the reader what you want them to know. But like I said, it was a little off putting.

What I did like was how realistic most of the book was. Things that really could, and probably do happen. The friendships between Lex and her cousins were totally believable, and I’ve heard stories of psychotic grandmothers who would actually make threats like that to get what they want.

The pace wasn’t ramped up unnaturally. This might be a negative point to some, but honestly? When I choose a book that’s based in a culture that’s not my own- it’s because I want to immerse myself in the culture, and learn about it. It’s why I love fantasy- the cultures in them are so detailed! Now, I wouldn’t say that Sushi for One is as detailed as a good fantasy novel, but believe me, I’ve read some chick-lit that was supposed to be based in various cultures that turned out to be nothing unique aside from maybe an outfit here and there or a statue placed somewhere (or worse, a Coke drinking guru- OK, the Coke drinking guru was funny).

Sushi for One is set in/near/around San Jose (can’t remember the exact location, but I remember that Lex attends a church in Santa Clara), and unlike most chick-lit- I actually feel like I got to know something about the area! Not geography, mind, but about the area. Ya ken?

So what would I recommend this book for? If you want to learn steady pacing, if you want to learn how to write about a culture without being heavy handed or slip-shod, and if you want to learn how to write about difficult subjects like rape without making the reader geek out. She really handled that well, introducing the horror of it, and the nasty aftermath WITHOUT making you go “Ew, I don’t want to read about this anymore!”. She didn’t just magically recover in time to kiss the hero- it was a path that had to be worked through just as with everything else.

So, Sushi for One is the first of the series. Will I be reading Only Uni and Single Sashimi as well? Yup. Sushi for One was a strong first novel, and quite frankly, the cousin in Single Sashimi interested me a lot! Will I review them? I dunno. Cuz I’m putting my own money out there to order them. And sometimes I just like to read a book for fun!

For more normal reviews, read the Sushi for One review on TitleTrakk, or click the ad above for Amazon reviews.

Surprisingly- I liked it! Cheesy, yes, but fun and funny.

So, Hubs bought the last two collections left at Barnes and Noble’s for me. And we were all excited because several of the movies that he liked were listed on the back.

Well, guess what? I decided to watch GoldFinger tonight. Ripped off the plastic, and pulled out the DVDs.

And it was a totally different set.

Here I found that the correct DVDs are listed on the bottom of the box, but what was listed on the back is stuck on with that tacky gluey stuff. Either an advertisement, or someone accidentally pasted on the wrong listing.

On the upside, the collection actually has Thunderball, and someone on Twitter told me that’s one of the best ones.

I’m about 20 minutes into Dr. No right now. And I so want to get my hands on the books…