A Slave to My Tastes

Writing class was interesting last night. The format of the class is this: the first half of the class is a lecture on some important aspect of the writing profession, followed by a break and then reading what we have written. Last night was a lecture on the supply-demand aspect of publishing, and how in many ways books are looked on as a commodity. The part that struck me was how the publishers are always looking to fill the niches of taste with product and I realized that I am a slave to my own tastes. Without thinking I have chosen to read only in a narrow vertical of the market.

So I have decided that this problem calls for drastic solutions. I came up with this idea. I am going to go into the bookstore with a 12 foot long tape measure and 2 dice. The first roll will be how far down the shelf I will go in linear feet. The second roll of a single dice will be how may feet up from the floor I will go. And at the point where the 2 axis cross, that is the book I will read. When I am finished, I will go back and roll the dice from where the last co-ordinates are and re-roll to find the next book.

Some might see this as a page from the Two-Face School of Decision Making, but I put it to you that choosing books this way will eliminate any bias created by dust jacket artwork, or whether the book is in the middle sight lines and I am guaranteed to read new work. I will start at one end of the science fiction shelf and move on towards the other end of the store's fiction area.

Right now I am reading Nightfall, by Asimov and Silverberg and then it is on to the novel, Planet of the Apes. So after these are done, I will begin the experiment.

It is an exciting prospect, this non-deterministic method of book choice, because it is going to lead me into fiction I have never read before; and I might find that I really like crime fiction or new westerns or other unknown-to-me genre , or whatever is in the shelves that I land on.

Writing a Mission Statement

Well here it is. I read it to the class yesterday, and one person asked if I wanted a temple built too. I do realize that it is dramatic, but it is supposed to be a Mission Statement, not a ToDo list. Like any author, I want the reader to read what I write and "get it."

I want to write.
I want to write ideas that are memorable, meaningful and moving.
I want to write stories that shock and awe the reader, to motivate and change and force questions, easy and awkward.
I want to write so readers who hold power over others will tremble when they hear my words and worry in their beds at night that what they do may be found out.
I want the readers who are oppressed by ideas and circumstances that enslave them to see that they do have the power of choice, and through choices easy and hard, can live the way they decide to live.
I want to write about freedom and responsibility and the rewards of virtue.
I want to write and change worlds.