If I Weren't Crazy, I'd Go Insane

This is an experiment: workshopping my latest novel NEVЯLAND Online for readers and fans.

I'm running naked across the soccer field during the World Cup in front of God and everybody.

Am I crazy to do this? Of course I am.

But, I'm having fun, learning much, seeing Story from a different perspective, and enjoying the community of readers and writers in an organic writing and telling of Story!

One reason I'm doing this is because I live in the boonies and don't have a regular writers support group.

Another reason I'm doing this is because I still have yet to find a critique partner or two with whom he/she and I can be consistent and faithful in responding to and evaluating our respective stories. It's as much my fault as anybody else's.

And still another reason is because I value what readers think and how a reader looks at Story.

At the recent SCBWI, I heard one writer described as a writer's writer. That's really quite a mantle to bestow upon a writer.

Then I got to thinking: which would I prefer? Being a writer's writer or a reader's writer. Actually, somewhere in between would be the best place to be on the bookshelves.

The Twilight Saga is an extremely successful series with Readers despite that many Writers find much fault in the technicalities of the stories themselves; whereas, the Harry Potter series is mega-successful because it is able to run the entire spectrum of Reader-and-Writer approval and appeal to all sensibilities.

(To be honest, I really don't care which direction NEVЯLAND takes as long as the books are flying off the shelves and through the checkout line and/or being downloaded to many, many Kindles, iPads, and Sony E-readers!)

I'm inviting you not just to watch Story in the form of NEVЯLAND being created but to be an active participant--and I want to know what you think, generate ideas about the characters, setting, themes, and be an active participant in the evolution of a story--whether you're a Reader only or Writer-Reader.

The 19th Century Writers such as Dickens and Poe did this to a certain extent, often revising their novels, stories, and poems based on initial reader reaction.

The 21st Century Writer has an even better opportunity to workshop his Story to a larger audience and with much more speed and input than Dickens or Poe could ever imagine!


Feedback is welcomed, encouraged, and expected--even about the typos!

NEVЯLAND Excerpts: An Experiment in Craziness

See you on the bookshelves.

Be well!

Larry Mike

Sign My Kindle, Please

The day is soon upon us when books will become as quaint as 33 1/3 long playing records.

Someone somewhere at sometime in the not-too-distant future will want to hold a nice warm book in his hands, absorb the words on the paper, stroke the texture of the pages, inhale the musty tinge of the pulp.



Friends and family will visit him and marvel (with a bit of a silent giggle) at his row upon row of yellowed, cracked, and fusty volumes. They will eye his nostalgic clinging to a bygone era with sympathetic woefulness in the same manner we judge the senile uncle who is constantly misplacing his dentures.

Bookstores will go the way of the carriage house and the farrier. Books-A-Million, Hastings, Borders will all either close permanently, turn to other products, or will vendor only used books—have “Nostalgia Sales”.

Home bookshelves will now house bric-a-brac, electronic photo frames flashing hundreds of photos of family and friends—or remain empty—or be taken down altogether just as front yard hitching posts were pushed over.

Penguin USA ebook sales increased 300% last year. Penguin concludes that low-priced ebooks are most attractive to paperback buyers. According to Publisher's Weekly, e-book sales accounted for over $100 million in sales last year. Two years ago, sales were barely at $1 million. Makes one ponder, it does.

Saddest among the causalities will be the book signing—which, after the actual publication of the book itself, is the most rewarding event an author experiences.

No more will an author sit proudly at his table, displayed with his latest creative work; no more quick casual chit-chats with a fan who tells him how much she likes what he has written; no more cramped but happy fingers at the end of the two-hour ego-swelling book signing.

Instead, the fan will receive the prized autograph in one of two ways—perhaps both if she is an avid fan.

The first—a scrawled signature download from Amazon or the publisher or the author’s website—for a fee, of course.

The second—an actual handwritten author autograph on the front edges or the back of the Kindle or Sony e-reader—perhaps joining the signatures of other writers.

Or perhaps a slip-on cover of the book for the Kindle or Sony e-reader will come with a novel’s download. Then the author has a “Meet the Author” at an internet café or the lobby at a Wi-Fi hotel, and the avid fan will with giddy glee hand the author her electronic reader with the appropriate cover, saying, “Would you please sign my Kindle? ‘To Molly’, if you please. I’ve downloaded all your books and take them with me everywhere I go!” –Or, perhaps he sells the slip-on book covers at his table!

And with his Ultra Fine Point Sharpie in hand, the proud author presses the felt tip to the hard metallic “book” and writes, “To Molly—an avid fan—keep downloading! All the Best—Larry Mike Garmon”.