My Dog Ate It, 21st Century Style

MY DOG ATE IT, 21st CENTURY STYLE I suffered over this one slightly, re-studying and re-writing it a few instances. I worry that it’ll be seen as a reaction to a particular writer at this particular time, but that isn't the case. I’m not mad at anybody right now, and no one is in hassle. I supply this as recommendation to aspiring authors, to not scold a specific working writer. Enjoy, or cringe, as the case may be. Last week’s entry had me pondering perhaps I should provide you with something much less strident and toes-to-the-fireplace, lest I frighten away anybody thinking of ever writing anything, but there’s just one more bullshit excuse I gotta get off my chest. This isn’t one you tell your self. It’s the one you inform me, and right here it is, my blanket rejection of identical: My hard drive crashed. It’s the “my canine ate my homework” of the 21st century. I’ve heard the hard drive excuse dozens of occasions, with artistic particulars thrown in to make it much more “plausible.” These are writers, after all, and could be forgiven for the occasional illumination. Over the years I’ve been regaled with tales of puffs of black smoke (which in a single case modified from black to grey, then to white over three completely different retellings), all kinds of tortured sounds starting from nails being scratched throughout a chalkboard to a steady ringing squeal like a fire alarm, and a panoply of smells from the burning [insert one thing right here conceivable would smell particularly unhealthy if it have been on fire] class. I’ve worked with greater than 100 authors, and at least 5 - 6 instances that many of their exhausting drives. Hard drives, by the way, never appear to fail three months before your first draft is due. They always fail two weeks after it’s due and you’re being bothered by your lengthy-suffering editor. I know, every little thing always breaks at least convenient time, but, yeah. Come on. Last week I recommended laptops for anyone who really wa nts to do that for a residing. To help you keep away from being pressured to seem like a liar should you ever find your exhausting drive having gone extra exhausting than drive, I’ll suggest a number of other bits of hardware, too: A flash drive. These groovy little units plug into your USB port and permit you to shortly and simply swap files. I actually have one that rarely leaves my individual. If you save your working information onto a flash drive as you go, your hard drive can crash, however you gained’t have misplaced your e-book. I’ve seen these for $9.99. CDs and/or DVDs Back your stuff up onto a disk from time to time. They last a very long time, don’t take up a lot house on a shelf, and are getting cheaper all the time. More than one computer. Do you could have a pc at work? Like me, a laptop computer and a desktop computer at house? Save your guide to as many locations as you'll be able to, as often as you'll be able to, so if one pc goes the best way of all flesh , your book won’t go together with it. Plug-in hard drives and different options. For less than $200 you should buy an enormous onerous drive that can plug into your computer and backup every little thing. Use this for more than your iTunes library. And go searching at various internet storage solutions. There are a number of providers that can basically lease you server space to backup your files. Backup is out thereâ€"it’s in all placesâ€"and it’s getting cheaper on a regular basis. There isn't any cause you'll ever have to lose quite a lot of hours’ work if your pc goes belly up. If waiting to get the computer fastened goes to eat up lots of time, borrow a friend’s laptop, rent one, or go to the library and work on one of theirs, from the file in your flash drive. The file is the important thing, not the pc. If you’ve saved your file safe, you can work on just about any machine. So, yeah, I know, onerous drives do often crash. Laptops have been stolen, cars broken int o, homes burned down, but you know what else has occurred? On uncommon events, adult professionals communicate to one another on that level and say issues like: “I obtained behind, thought I may get caught up, however I’m still behind. I want one other couple weeks.” Believe it or not, as an editor, I’m delighted to hear thatâ€"simply exactly that, with that level of detail, which is to say, little or no. I know that the authors I work with are actual folks, with actual lives, and actual challenges. They get sick. Their family members get sick. There are deaths in the family. There are injuries. There are issues with kids. There are homes being bought and bought, marriages formed and dissolved. It’s not that I don’t care. I really do care. But that doesn’t imply I can simply sit in limbo and wait, or feel okay being lied to or strung along. Talk to your editor as if he or she is a real one that really cares about you, your book, and your profession, as a result of that ’s nearly definitely true. We aren’t all certified psychotherapists or divorce attorneys, however virtually all of us can steal a day here or a week there from our schedules to get you over an unexpected hump. I’ve seen lots within the last twenty-three years since I first began modifying the small press journal Alternative fiction & poetry, then moved on to TSR and Wizards of the Coast. I have an author who lives in Moore, Oklahoma who stood on his front garden and watched the most highly effective tornado ever recorded by science wipe his city, literally, off the map. A TSR writer accidently shot his finger off. I’ve had an writer disappear off the face of the Earth, leaving no path in any respect, so I had to resort to contacting her mom just to search out out if she was alive. I’ve had an author write a guide while in a full physique cast, after narrowly surviving a near-fatal car accident. I’ve had a really freaked-out stalker name me and try to get an writer fired. I’ve had an creator have a significant heart attack. I’ve had authors just give up, throw up their arms, and tell me they'll’t end the e-book. Authors have known as me crying, and never at all times due to something I’d stated. I’ve heard of an agent who didn’t pay her clients for months because she was hit on the top and suffered memory loss. We’ve had an writer really die. Life occurs, and issues like tornados and most cancers don’t give a crap about your deadlines, or mine. I know that, and I’m able to work with anybody in any means I can to make all people joyful, and get a great guide out to eager readers as close to on time as we are able to. Just tell me the reality. And inform me simply as a lot of the truth as I actually need to know so I know you understand that I need this guide on time, but there’s a reason it’s not going to happen and we have to move to Plan B. And there’s all the time a Plan B. Sometimes even a Plan C. D is tough. E? Please, le t’s not try. But the earlier we begin on Plan B, the better it’ll be on all of us, and the fewer foolish excuses you blow at me, the happier I’ll be to work with one more in an excellent stable of creative, professional fantasy authors whose careers will survive any variety of burned out onerous drives, or, for that matter, hungry dogs. And next week, I promise, one thing less accusatory. â€"Philip Athans About Philip Athans