Apparently, HTRASG is porn, according to someone who shall remain unnamed, and my response was, Okay, so? No explanation that it's not, even according to Amazon, and no excuses. No pointing out the sex is only a bit more graphic than what you find in a Judith Krantz novel, and you can get those in the library. No arguing. No demeaning of him for his comment. My feeling was, If that's how you feel about it, fine. And seriously, so what?
I kept telling myself I wasn't going to explain my books, nor was I going to argue over what they're about...which I'm ambivalent about because they are my babies. But...they have to face the world and the people in it, and despite everything one may try, you cannot please everybody. In fact, some people will go out of their way to not be pleased.
However, this is the first time I really felt that way. Amazon banned the book for a while, when someone called it porn, and I fought like crazy against that...and they backed down, partway...but the damage was done. Sales never really recovered. The one real accomplishment of that fiasco was, I built a strong distrust of Amazon and their bullshit. That's why I won't use Create Space and Kindle does not get exclusive anything to my e-books.
But when others called it porn, I'd argue it's not and Amazon said so, as if there's something wrong about it being labeled that way. Well... there isn't. I know the book's about more than just getting a prurient rise out of the reader...be they male or female (I got my best reviews from female readers)...so if the person reading the book doesn't want to get beyond the sexual encounters, their loss. I used rape as a way to condemn injustices I see in society every day, and if you can't accept that or don't want to see it, when so many others have, fine.
I have to admit, this is a weight off my shoulders. Another step in building my writer's ego. And I needed it. The job I'm doing, right now, entails packing and transporting a massive library of genre writers...and I'm seeing books I'd never known existed by writers I had heard of and read...and not all of them were in normal format -- i.e. perfect bound in standard sizes -- and to see the variations let me start to see how much I've limited myself with my own preconceived notions and defensiveness.
If PS is to be anything meaningful, I have to shrug all that crap off. And the first step is giving it back its full name -- A Place of Safety. APOS. In Portuguese, it means After. Not sure what it means in the story, yet...but it's interesting. Dunno how Brendan feels, either...but we're still working through the stuff already done and getting it in order. That, alone, will take months...so he and I can confer on that, later. As for the rest, I don't have time for other people's attitudes on my work.
Like it or don't, read it or don't, the choice is yours.
I kept telling myself I wasn't going to explain my books, nor was I going to argue over what they're about...which I'm ambivalent about because they are my babies. But...they have to face the world and the people in it, and despite everything one may try, you cannot please everybody. In fact, some people will go out of their way to not be pleased.
However, this is the first time I really felt that way. Amazon banned the book for a while, when someone called it porn, and I fought like crazy against that...and they backed down, partway...but the damage was done. Sales never really recovered. The one real accomplishment of that fiasco was, I built a strong distrust of Amazon and their bullshit. That's why I won't use Create Space and Kindle does not get exclusive anything to my e-books.
But when others called it porn, I'd argue it's not and Amazon said so, as if there's something wrong about it being labeled that way. Well... there isn't. I know the book's about more than just getting a prurient rise out of the reader...be they male or female (I got my best reviews from female readers)...so if the person reading the book doesn't want to get beyond the sexual encounters, their loss. I used rape as a way to condemn injustices I see in society every day, and if you can't accept that or don't want to see it, when so many others have, fine.
I have to admit, this is a weight off my shoulders. Another step in building my writer's ego. And I needed it. The job I'm doing, right now, entails packing and transporting a massive library of genre writers...and I'm seeing books I'd never known existed by writers I had heard of and read...and not all of them were in normal format -- i.e. perfect bound in standard sizes -- and to see the variations let me start to see how much I've limited myself with my own preconceived notions and defensiveness.
If PS is to be anything meaningful, I have to shrug all that crap off. And the first step is giving it back its full name -- A Place of Safety. APOS. In Portuguese, it means After. Not sure what it means in the story, yet...but it's interesting. Dunno how Brendan feels, either...but we're still working through the stuff already done and getting it in order. That, alone, will take months...so he and I can confer on that, later. As for the rest, I don't have time for other people's attitudes on my work.
Like it or don't, read it or don't, the choice is yours.
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