71
I was reaching the point that I needed to write more Doctor Who
stories to serialize in the newsletter. While I had realized how to
get beyond my agraphia problem by mentally spelling out all of the
small words as I typed, I still wasn't completely confident that I
could write a full story and proof read it enough to ensure it was
error free. As I had roped the sponsor of the writer's group, Suzi,
into assembling the monthly newsletter for me using desktop
publishing software, I asked if she would be willing to be an
'Associate Editor' of The Doctor Who Report and serve as a second set
of proof reading eyes for my stories. I didn't tell her why I felt I
needed a second set of eyes on my work, instead explaining that I
wasn't worried about the smaller bits of the newsletter, just the
serialized story. She agreed, though the writers' group itself
would soon be in trouble.
Elizabeth, the member of the group who always gave us feedback of
'what other professional writers' would think of our stories instead
of giving us her own thoughts, invited a new person to join our
group. The newbie was a published writer in that she had written a
romance story and it had been published by a romance novel company
under one of their corporate author names, not under her own name.
Or so she told us. Yet joining our group, rather than giving
her thoughts for improvement or noting areas of confusion that needed
to be clarified, she instead found the core point of each person's
story and insisted it should be cut out, thus leaving the stories
pointless. At first this was taken as a coincidence until one by one
she reviewed each of our subsequent works and the only consistent
thread in her feedback was, if followed, our stories would be much
worse. At one point, with her saying the science fiction premise of
my story should be cut out of my science fiction story, I
asked her if she had ever read any science fiction before, given how
senseless her suggestion was. She returned that she had Isacc
Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine delivered to her house every
month. When I jokingly asked if she read it, she became quiet and
finally let out that it was her husband's and she didn't read it as
she didn't care for science fiction. After that confession in front
of the group, the rest of the core members no longer took her
seriously, instead drawing doodles as she gave her input at future
meetings, but as she had become a good friend of Elizabeth none of us
could bring ourselves to tell her that she couldn't bring her friend
anymore.
Still, in order to bind the group closer together, we agreed to write
a blended novel. In the style of high fantasy, the first two
chapters were started by Suzi and her writing mate Martin, Daina took
her turn, I did mine and then delivered it to my software start-up
friend Pat in Denver for him to write a chapter. For my subsequent
trips up to Denver for my three month supply of fat enzymes, I had
sussed out that, rather than making the trip all in one day, I could
make the trip as two. One day I'd visit Pat and his family and crash
over night on his couch, and the next I'd go to the hospital for my
appointment and then take the national bus home in the early
afternoon ensuring I'd be back in time for the final local bus runs.
He read over the first four chapters of the book and liked where it
was going and the little surprise twist I had added in my chapter and
would write his segment and return to the following month's writers'
group to deliver it. When he did, the book was next passed to
Elizabeth.
The next month she returned it, pointed out that we had all been
writing it 'wrong' and she had devoted her efforts to correcting all
of our work to make it 'right'. In her mind there was only one high
fantasy plot & group of characters allowed and she had fixed our
blended novel to match it. Ignoring the extensive rewrites to our
work, her own chapter was more of an outline than a true chapter of a
book. None of us were willing to affirm her changes by writing the
chapter that followed what she had written, and so the book was dead.
While none of us could bring ourselves to explain why to Elizabeth,
Suzi vented her frustration by no longer allowing us to have the
writers' group meetings at her home.
Suddenly the rest of us had to scramble and make arrangements to
rotate the meetings at our own homes, though the most consistent
volunteer of her home was the newbie who no one else respected except
for Elizabeth. Soon Suzi & Martin stopped coming to the
meetings, Pat had given up coming from Denver after the blended novel
debacle, and finally Daina & I gave up as well. With the
collapse of the writers' group by the end of Nineteen Ninety, the
club's science fiction Quarterly no longer had any steady supply of
short stories to feature and Daina & I had to bring the
publication to an end the following year.
As for myself, I was hard at work on my next speculative script for
'The Other Show' I watched and liked, but had to find myself a new
agent. While I sent off for a fresh copy of the Writers' Guild List
Of Registered Agents, I knew I couldn't afford to send out another
hundred query letters as I had the previous year. To my surprise,
they now had a Colorado based agent listed in Boulder and I decided
just to start with her. That lead to a phone call where she
explained that, actually, her husband wrote for television and movies
and she had become an agent simply to represent him and keep the
agent's cut of the money in their home. Still, if I was interested,
she was willing to expand her clientele and give a try at
representing me. I was game and sent her my newly finished script.
She liked it and sent it in.
A few months later she got the reply back that the show had declined
to buy the script and she let me know of the bad news, but noted that
they were open to new ideas if I should have some more in the future.
The thing was, I didn't and so the news hit me hard and I actually
ended up going to Suzi's house just to hang out and visit with her
family for the rest of the day as a distraction. Once night came,
the local bus routes were closed and her husband thankfully gave me a
ride back to my apartment.
My short story submissions to pulp magazines also didn't sell and I
decided that a paid writing future wasn't in the cards for me, at
least for now. So I focused all of my efforts into the coming issues
of TDWR. At least there I had recaptured my spirit and the artist
was once again pleased with my scripts for the unfolding comic
serial...!
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