Writers’ Lives in the Internet Age

By Kay Kendall

Once upon a time the
image of a writer was someone who sits in a quiet room all day long and
scribbles, or types away like a maniac. The key point is that writers were seen
as introverts. Even at the beginning of this new century, that seemed to be the
stereotype.

Then as the decade of the
00’s advanced and publishing began to change, the digital intrusion into the
world of writers hit. The difference from 2004 to today is extraordinary. For example,
when I contacted agents in 2004, most of them would not take submissions by
email. Now that trend is reversed. If an agent wanted to see a partial or full
manuscript, then you snail mailed it. Agents’ websites (for the third that had
them back then) warned against sending attachments. They feared viruses.

Now, only ten years later,
each agency has a website. That is, if the agency survived. Literary agencies
have been decimated by the digital revolution. 
Writers can skip them as gatekeepers and submit directly to small
publishers or choose to go the self-publishing route.

I chaired a panel at Bloody Words 2014.

Once you are a published
writer—or about to become one—that’s when you must hit the marketing trail…Facebook,
Twitter, your blog, your webpage, Pinterest perhaps, and many other parts of
the internet world. This is super time-consuming, and if you skip these steps,
your sales will languish and your publisher will not be happy with you.

For those writers who are
true introverts, living in this new world is torture. All they really want to
do is sit at home in a quiet room and compose their stories. So they are torn,
and I do feel for them. I meet authors like this at writers’ conferences, where
they moan and say how shy they are, how they want to retreat to their hotel
rooms.

As for me, I love the
networking and marketing and meeting readers so much that it’s easy to forget
about the writing at the core of it all…which remains sitting alone in that
room and facing an empty screen and throwing type up on it. For me, that is
torture. Once I get past the first draft, then the rest is glorious.

Pictured left to right: Pamela Blance, me, Gloria Ferris, Lorie Lee Steiner, & Liz Lindsay

Last week I attended a
terrific writers’ conference in Toronto, Canada. It was called Bloody Words
2014, and participants came from all over North America. I met many authors who
were Facebook friends and now are real ones, not just virtual. There was a group
of four women—all writers from the province of Ontario—who made my visit
remarkably wonderful. One said she was an introvert, one was clearly an
extrovert, and two I’d judged to be in the middle. Whatever. We all had a
danged good time, and much of our chat was about the rigors of the publishing
world today. I almost called this blog piece “Misery Loves Company,” but nixed
the idea as too negative, especially when the whole conference was so marvelous
that it didn’t deserve any bad connotation.

Gloria Ferris & her book Corpse Flower

As promised here in my
previous post two weeks ago, I have included some photos from the event. Two
interesting twists to the usual mystery conference were the Books on Legs
runway walk. An author who had a book released in the previous half year would
strut her stuff while wearing an enlargement of that book’s cover. There were
no introverts visible on that runway!

The concluding banquet
was also novel. Attendees were encouraged to dress as fictional characters from
mysteries. Our group had these disguises—one biker chick, one hippie chick, one
pathologist named Kay Scarpetta, and two (count ‘em, two!) grieving widows. The
latter duo hinted that perhaps they had done in their spouses, but they would
never tell.

A great time was had by
all. Books were sold and autographed, contacts were established, and promises were
made to continue networking on the internet and at future conferences. 

But now
I’m back in my author’s lair, where the empty PC screen whispers that I’m 4,000 words behind on completing my manuscript by summer’s end. Or, as my grandmother used to
say, “There’s no rest for the weary.”  

*******

Kay Kendall is
an international award-winning public relations executive who lives in Texas
with her husband, three house rabbits, and spaniel Wills. A fan of historical
mysteries, she wants to do for the 1960s what novelist Alan Furst does for
Europe in the 1930s and 1940s–write atmospheric mysteries that capture the
spirit of the age.

http://www.KayKendallAuthor.com/about