Saturday, April 18, 2009

I've been getting more into blogging than I used to, but most of my posts are over on my MySpace blog, not here. I've also been doing a lot of posting back and forth with people over on GoodReads, and the subject of BSP came up yet again. BSP is Blatant Self-Promotion, and I'm for it, more or less. I have no objection with self-promotion. Before I can hope for or expect anyone else to promote me I have to promote myself, don't I?

A little bit of background here, since I shouldn't expect that any of you have followed my links above and learned all about my works. (Although you all have, right?) I'm the author of two fantasy novels, Unbinding the Stone and A Warrior Made, as well as a number of short stories. Info on all this can be found here. I started writing because the story came to me and insisted I write it. It wasn't until long after I'd finished it that I tried to get it published, and it wasn't until long after that that I succeeded. Then I wrote my first short story, on my editor's request, and then I started my second novel, and there were other requests and contests that resulted in other stories and novels, and here I am.

Notice the sketchiness of the last paragraph. It's self-promotion, of a sort, but I'm really not big on tooting my own horn beyond the bounds of propriety.

Just walking up to a total stranger and saying 'Hi, read my book' isn't my style and probably wouldn't work anyway.

Slightly less blatant is taking any conversation I'm in and twisting it to be an example of how great my book is. I've seen posts by some authors who do that and I know it annoys me, so why would I do it?

A better case is a lady I know who posts a lot and has a sig line about how great her husband's book is, but I guess that's not exactly self-promotion.

Also there are those who respond to every request for a new book to read with 'Try mine.' Not bad, but I really don't like repetition. (I suppose it's true that I can't get entirely away from it, story structure requires scenes of certain specific types. But there's no reason I have to do my scenes the way I've seen other people do them. That's why I invented the Elixir of Warrior.)

It's the 'blatant' part that I object to. Good stories should fit into, reflect, people's real lives, Just tell them how it does that. I call my story a 'making lemonade' story. Everybody gets lemons from life at times, and the important part is the lemonade we make from them. My stories are just like that, only the hero's been given a whole bunch...of fantasy lemons.

See?