To my surprise, Jeff emailed me out of the blue last month, and told me he had been reading my blog. In a 21st Century publishing karma twist, I could share material with one of my favorite writers before we ever met in real life. Last month, I had a chance to see him read at the monthly Fantastic Fiction Series at KGB Bar in New York City. Jeff had the standing-room-only crowd giggling like high schoolers at a Monty Python festival. He was promoting his new novel, Shriek, a return to his Jorge Luis Borges-influenced world of Ambergris.
What does all this mean? Jeff VanderMeer has struck a new sort of balance with the Internet: charming his dedicated fan base on the web, creating multimedia promotional tools for his books, and actively seeking out new readers like me in the digital crowds. For all these reasons, I picked Jeff to participate in my deceptively simple feature: Five Easy Questions. In the spirit of Jack Nicholson’s mad piano player, I run a weekly set of quality interviews with writing pioneers—delivering some practical, unexpected advice about web publishing...
Jason Boog:
You have a brand new novel out. How are you using the Internet to
promote Shriek? What are some of the key Internet publications and outlets you use?
Jeff VanderMeer:
I have a situation where Shriek came out in January in England and will be coming out in August in the United States. So I’m dividing my efforts. The key Internet publications and outlets based in the U.S. include...
Locus Online, the SF Site, Emerald City, Science Fiction Weekly, and Sci Fi Wire on the genre side, and Salon, Book Slut, and Rain Taxi on the mainstream literary side. I say that from my perspective—my publisher will be doing a lot of advertising and promotion on a variety of sites, independent of my own efforts.
Since the novel is a bit of genre, a bit of mainstream, I have to leverage both to get the optimum readers. For the UK release, I’m focusing on UK media and websites like Infinity Plus and bookstores like Forbidden Planet. For the US release, I’m going to have a website up at shriekthenovel.com, which will be pretty special.
Unfortunately, I’d rather not talk too much about the website right now for fear someone else will steal the idea, but it will include a multi-media Flash film called A Rough Guide to Ambergris that is a pretty humorous look at the setting of Shriek. The website will also help the mass market release of Shriek in the UK next year.
There will also be a short movie based on Shriek, eventually, with a soundtrack by The Church.
Jason Boog:
In your opinion as a blogger, who are the most innovative creative
writers that use the web today? Why?
Jeff VanderMeer:
That’s a tough question. I think someone like Neil Gaiman had his audience before he got serious about the web, so the popularity of his blog exists because of his popularity as an author.
I look to people like John Scalzi, Matt Cheney, and Cory Doctorow for examples of people who built up the popularity of their fiction or nonfiction in part through leveraging their blogs.
I think the most successful blogs are the ones that are not about blatant self-promotion, but express a curiosity about the world and guide you to cool books and whatnot that you might not otherwise have found. And then you wind up buying those bloggers’ novels or whatever.
Likewise, I find blogs that are basically diaries of daily life to be very boring and self-absorbed—as bad as the ones that do blatant self-promotion. And I love things like the Bookslut blog and the Maud Newton blog.
Having troubles balancing a day job and a writing career?
Want to know how to survive as an online writer in the science fiction genre?
Then tune in tomorrow for the exciting conclusion to Five Easy Questions for Jeff VanderMeer...
» Five Easy Questions: Jeff VanderMeer, Part One from ThePublishingSpot
I discovered Jeff VanderMeer while Google-ing madly for new books. Oddly enough, I found VanderWorld before I ever read a single line that Jeff wrote--but reading his opinions about books and music on his blog, I knew I’d found a... [Read More]
Tracked on: February 6, 2006 8:25 AM | Permalink to Trackback