This is the something
I’ve never loved the idea of reading a novel online, because novels aren’t meant to be read that way: they are designed to envelop you. Anything I see on the web, by contrast, I give my attention for a maximum of eight seconds before checking Reddit for videos of laughing dogs. Don’t say that’s just me. It’s how the internet trains us.
So rather than trying to shoe-horn a novel into a web-friendly format, I thought I’d write you a real-time serial. That means a continuing story that turns up one tiny page at a time in your inbox. It is titled “Machine Man.”
I say “real-time” because I will write it as you read it. I’m warning you about this up-front because it’s going to be a little chaotic, and Hemingway was right. Also there is the possibility that it will go so badly I nuke this part of the web site and pretend it never happened. But it’s the web, right? So I will release early and release often.
Right now you can sign up for free. If it goes well, I’ll turn it into a subscriber thing where you can buy the whole thing for $6.95.
Pages start Wednesday March 18, 2009. You can find out more here.
I hope you like it.
P.S. I’m not sure if anyone’s done anything quite like this before. If they have, and it was a disaster, please don’t tell me.
P.P.S. Special thanks/blame to Ian for haranguing me into doing this.
Comments
This is where site members post comments. If you're not a member, you can join here. There are all kinds of benefits, including moral superiority!
Danni (#357)
Location: England
Quote: "Eagerly awaiting the European Tour."
Posted: 5531 days ago
Is it bad I've subscribed to the feed, asked for emails and bookmarked the page? :P
Danni (#357)
Location: England
Quote: "Eagerly awaiting the European Tour."
Posted: 5531 days ago
Max
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Quote: "I'm my number one fan!"
Posted: 5531 days ago
Glen (#3844)
Location: Sydney
Posted: 5531 days ago
shabooty (#637)
Location: D.C./V.A/M.D.
Quote: "I will shake your foundation. I will shake the f**cking rafters. Nobody'll be the same -Danny Bonaduce ....& go visit my blog @: http://www.shabooty.com"
Posted: 5531 days ago
jk.
Jane (#321)
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Quote: "Which is worse: Ignorance or apathy? Who knows? Who cares?"
Posted: 5531 days ago
Stygian Emperor (#2947)
Location: the Stygian Empire
Quote: "Flesh is a design flaw."
Posted: 5531 days ago
David (#1848)
Location: Texas
Quote: "Delighted!"
Posted: 5531 days ago
Joe (#2270)
Location: Campbell, CA, USA
Quote: "I'm subverting the system from the inside. I think."
Posted: 5531 days ago
Rene (#2458)
Location: Austria
Quote: "To live is to die - Cliff Burton"
Posted: 5531 days ago
Anyway, I think it's a great idea and I am looking forward!
Dan Hope (#3822)
Location: Wordsley, UK
Posted: 5531 days ago
Max
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Quote: "I'm my number one fan!"
Posted: 5530 days ago
Also he abandoned it because enough people weren't paying for it. It had some pretty bad delivery mechanics, I remember.
Yenzo (#829)
Location: Secret underwater pyramid base in the Pacific
Quote: "In order to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe (Carl Sagan)"
Posted: 5530 days ago
Did I get it correctly, $6.95 will buy me the whole story? Or will it be a subscription with monthly payment? Because I have this inner moral barrier keeping me from doing monthly payments on the internet. Something about not accumulating debt in times of a global financial crisis. Just saying.
Max
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Quote: "I'm my number one fan!"
Posted: 5530 days ago
P.S.:
> The title intrigues me. It had better not be a metaphor.
Not a metaphor. Well. Not JUST a metaphor. I reserve the right to retrospectively imbue it with deeper meaning, if I happen to stumble across any of that.
Jodi Cleghorn (#3642)
Location: Brisbane, AUST
Quote: "It is by believing in roses that one brings them to bloom"
Posted: 5530 days ago
It sounds like your own self paced NaNoWriMo project without the November deadline and I'm definitely keen to see how it works for you.And kudos for exposing your first draft to the public light of day. I remember you comment to me at Byron Bay about the 80th draft etc (I'm the chick you spoke to at the Byron Bay Writers festival about The Handmaids Tale and NaNo!)
Best of luck and I will be sharing this with all my writer friends.
David Whetton (#1861)
Location: Hove , England
Posted: 5530 days ago
Jennifer M. Dambeck (#3061)
Location: NJ, USA
Quote: "Rock on"
Posted: 5530 days ago
Ajna (#3795)
Location: USA
Quote: "Judge if you want. We are all going to die one day. I intend to deserve it."
Posted: 5530 days ago
Will the 6.95 be in Australian dollars, or American (Please say Australian, because then my price is a measly 4.47)?
Lastly... I forget. I'll replace it with "Hi", because I never thought I'd actually get to talk to a published author. The only person I could talk to who'd beat you in this contest would be Robert Jordan. (No luck there, sadly. What with death, and all...)
Brittany O. (#1688)
Location: Montana
Quote: "people are kind of overrated "
Posted: 5530 days ago
Ariel (#3057)
Posted: 5530 days ago
Xpovos (#958)
Location: Washington D.C.
Quote: "Time not important, only life important"
Posted: 5530 days ago
Also, let me commend you and/or your web team. Signing up to have the pages delivered into my Google Reader was the smoothest thing I've seen on the web integrating that much across different platforms -- ever. Very nifty.
Greg Karber (#1568)
Location: gregkarber.com
Posted: 5530 days ago
People were just supposed to pay a dollar if they chose--if less than 75% of the people payed. He'd stop writing. Well, as you can imagine, that happened on like the third installment, but, trooper that he is, the man kept writing.
For one more installment.
And then he just quit, leaving the whole thing hanging in the air. No ending, no resolution, nothing even suggested, not even a quick wrap-up like Fox gives TV shows they axe unfairly. Just BAM. Done.
So, Max, I'm telling you write now: you better not fuck us. If you give up one day, then at least have the courtesy to kill the main character first.
Bushra (#36)
Location: Fremont, California
Quote: "www.caffeinatedmuslim.com"
Posted: 5530 days ago
AAlgar (#3459)
Location: Seattle
Quote: ""Don't put your lips on anything.""
Posted: 5530 days ago
Oenone (#151)
Location: Konstanz, Germany
Quote: "I don't want to lie to you, but I will."
Posted: 5530 days ago
coolpillows (#3749)
Location: new york general sort of vicinity
Quote: ""It's not working" -- Joseph Clark"
Posted: 5530 days ago
Max
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Quote: "I'm my number one fan!"
Posted: 5530 days ago
> will those lucky dogs among us who subscribed
> early get to keep it free?
Yes, if by "it" you mean, "all the parts I post before I decide to whack a price tag on it." The rest, not so much.
> Will the 6.95 be in Australian dollars, or
> American (Please say Australian, because then
> my price is a measly 4.47)?
American, baby.
> let me commend you and/or your web team
Hahaha! "Web team." This is all me. I'm just that geeky. And thanks!
> I don't know if it will pan out, but I'm up for
> it as long as it's free, and I if it starts off
> good I could probably be convinced to pay.
That sounds perfect. I hope lots of people are just like you.
> So, Max, I'm telling you write now: you better
> not fuck us. If you give up one day, then at
> least have the courtesy to kill the main
> character first.
Deal.
Hobbie (#1359)
Location: Cornwall, England
Quote: "There was a little man in his hair!"
Posted: 5530 days ago
No really, I'm looking forwards to this now it's definitely happening. Oh, and I finally got around to importing Company. I felt a little bad/stupid admitting I hadn't yet after being a member of your site for so many years.
Jeffrey (#2286)
Location: Right here
Quote: "Mathematics is a powerful language. Just look at how mathematicians destroyed the housing market."
Posted: 5530 days ago
Yenzo (#829)
Location: Secret underwater pyramid base in the Pacific
Quote: "In order to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe (Carl Sagan)"
Posted: 5529 days ago
And also: Is it just a coincidence that you were researching comic book characters for The Exceptionals and that Machine Man is also the name of a Marvel character? (Man, I sound like a brunette investigative journalist confronting some baffled stereotypical LA police chief)
If I got you right, The Exceptionals isn't gonna see the light of day, right? Too bad. I kinda got infected by your enthusiasm for it.
nate (#3848)
Location: A cave somewhere deep within th bowels of Texas
Quote: "<Insert witty dead guy quote here>"
Posted: 5529 days ago
Sophie (#891)
Location: Devon
Posted: 5528 days ago
If so, I'll probably still read it on a daily basis, but I will read it with a sense of melancholy longing.
Max
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Quote: "I'm my number one fan!"
Posted: 5525 days ago
> Considering how much you love to procrastinate over an edit
I don't procrastinate over edits; I just do a lot of them. But yes, being unable to rewrite this story is surely a good thing for me. I'm not sure if it's a good thing for YOU. But for me: oh yeah.
@Yenzo:
> Is it just a coincidence that you were researching
> comic book characters for The Exceptionals and
> that Machine Man is also the name of a Marvel
> character?
Yes. Well, it's not coincidence in that I like comic books, and "Machine Man" sounds a lot like a comic book superhero. But I didn't know of Marvel's character until I started this. Then I thought about changing it. But if I'd never heard of him, how serious an overlap can it be?
> If I got you right, The Exceptionals isn't gonna see the light of day, right?
Wrong! But it's still under wraps. In my basement. With body parts everywhere.
@nate:
> if I come see you in Austin, TX on 30 March will
> you sign my laptop so I can say I have a signed
> copy of Machine Man"?
Sadly, only if you go back in time to 2007. I think you're looking at old tour dates there.
@Sophie:
> My hopes were raised for something gender neutral and with lots of female characters.
Because of the War on He! No, I have no plans for a story with a female protagonist at the moment. I don't think you solve sexism by prodding male authors into writing female heroes. I think it works better if female authors write female heroes, and men read their stories. (Currently, male-led stories tend to be read/watched by everyone, and women-led stories mainly by women.)
As extraordinarily brilliant, talented, and handsome as I am, it's pretty hard to convince you that I'm a woman. It doesn't help anyone if I compromise a story in an attempt to do that. There's no shortage of terrific female leads in (adult) fiction.
Sophie (#891)
Location: Devon
Posted: 5524 days ago
Ive never understood why most writers are so uncomfortable with the idea of making characters female. Id love to find out. Is it because you think men and women are different in so many ways the character wouldnt be realistic? Cuz if it is, I dont feel different to alot of male characters I read about in books, can you take my word for it that were all teh same?
(sorry for veering wildly off topic ... I'll shush up now)
Max
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Quote: "I'm my number one fan!"
Posted: 5524 days ago
You're right, of course, that the sexes are more similar than different, and writers should be able to wear a variety of personas convincingly. But the further I reach from my own experience, the more chance I'll screw it up. You know how cops can't watch cop shows, and doctors can't stand medical shows, because all the details are wrong? That's what I fear.
Yannick (#3858)
Location: Heist, Belgium
Quote: "he reads things"
Posted: 5520 days ago
Anyway, this is an awesome project, you can expect my $6.95 the day after you make it subscription-only!
Comments are now closed for this post.