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A friend of the family has written a novel

I don't have any problems in these kinds of situations. I just tell the truth.

Lots of people think I am an obnoxious wanker - do you think there is a connection?
 
Badger Kitten said:
I will no doubt spend several hours writing to him this weekend, in my precious spare time, and feeling resentful that I have to do it.
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You don't need to spend hour on it this weekend. You have already written as much as you need to here. So don't let yourself.

Start with how you are unqualified. Point out where you think it fails as you have noted above. Reiterate that it is only your opinion and there is nothing further you can add to assist him and recommend the fee-paying place mentioned earlier in this thread.
 
Diamond said:
If you hand over something you've written to someone else to read then you've relinquished control and should be resigned to what happens. That's my opinion. And that's how I reckon an effective critical relationship should operate - with total freedom on the part of the critic.

But more than that, you do seem to be having a go at BK on the very tenuous basis that this individual might somehow trace his work back to this board through some long distant interviews and articles that BK wrote. It's a really thin pretext.
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On that basis, presumably you have no reason to object to my criticism? BK handed her critique of the man and his work over for comment - with total freedom on the part of the critic/s.
 
Onket said:
Currently nearly 35,000 members on these boards and there are 290 people online right now.

I think 'hundreds' of lurkers is almost certainly much less than the actual figure.
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I didn't say 'hundreds of lurkers' though, did I?
 
you've already spent a lot of time articulating what is wrong with it on here. so it doesn't seem like it's the time and effort that you are worried about.

tell him you think it is very bad, and that you can give him more detailed critique if he wants.. if he does want just copy and paste the comments made here. minimal effort, reasonable honesty and he can't say he wasn't warned in advance.
 
cesare said:
I didn't say 'hundreds of lurkers' though, did I?
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No, you said 'hundreds of people posting/lurking'. I'd say hundreds posts, many, many more lurk.

Anyway, I agree with what you've been saying and was trying to reinforce it by reminding the OP of how many people can and do view what is posted.
 
Onket said:
No, you said 'hundreds of people posting/lurking'. I'd say hundreds posts, many, many more lurk.

Anyway, I agree with what you've been saying and was trying to reinforce it by reminding the OP of how many people can and do view what is posted.
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Ah, I see what you mean now. Sorry, I misread it. *spots self getting defensive* :D
 
susie12 said:
As a writer myself I don't think it's OK to post somebody else's work on a public website without their permission. Simple as.
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Well, I'm also an author - with one published book, another in the works - and a journalist, and quite frankly if you can't handle a few pars of your work being posted on a website and criticised then you shouldn't be intending your work for publication, where it can be read and criticised by, well, everyone. Being able to handle criticism and rejection is essential if you want to write anything. If you can't, you shouldn't try to write things for public consumption. Simple as.
 
Tell him thatit might be better rewritten as a screenplay.

If it's as cliched and awful as you say it is then he probably has a Hollywood hit on his hands.

Re the council house boy going to Ixford being unlikely. Didn't Nick Hornby scrape into Cambridge despite a poor boy background?
 
Well that's a load of toss. One of my best mates was from a council estate and went to Cambridge. Not Oxford, but close enough.
 
cesare said:
You are not an anonymous poster. You have arranged book signings on here. You link to press articles about yourself on here. Many people here watched your Richard and Judy interview. You tell us what you're up to with MPs and pressing for a 7/7 enquiry. I'm not saying that's wrong - just that you are not anonymous and the only person that you're deluding is yourself if you...
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Heh, cesare you DO have a beef - I can tell with the way you have written what you have - or chosen to misrepresent it, (or possibly chosen to remember it). I have not ''arranged book signings'' , LOL - I offered to buy everyone a pint, on the occasion of the book coming out, since I was grateful to urban for its help (as detailed in book) and it would not have come about without urban. It remains the only book signing I have ever done. I do not ''link to press articles about myself'' on here. When R&J came up, I shared my excitement and delight, just as other posters share good news and surprising events - including their club nights, band performances, publication of their books, completion of their PHDS , etc.

I barely report what I'm up to with MPs, if I mention it at all it is in context of a specific P&P discussion about it. Oh blah blah blah, I can't be arsed to justify myself to you and I don't think I should have to or need to. Perhaps this is genuinely how you imagine it to be, but I really do think this is your stuff going on here not mine. This thread is just an excuse, if you are being honest with yourself.

Can we stop this '' oh, someone else who doesn't like you might possibly track down an unnamed friend of an extended family member and report back that badger thinks his book is shit'' charade, because it's ridiculous, tbh.

Anyway. This novel. I didn't want to be the critic but as he has sent it and I have read it all I will be honest and go through where the problems are since he has asked and I might as well. Although I am manifestly not a creative writing teacher or a novelist and therefore can be safely ignored if he wants to believe it is marvellous.

So I will c&p my thoughts from this thread, with some of the good suggestions from posters, and some recommended books, and I and will try and be as constructive as I can about why it is not working, with examples, and I will give myself 1 hour max to do it on sunday, and then I will have a large scotch and if he asks again, I'm too busy


Interestingly I've just had a text from the family person who asked if the would-be author could send me the book, apologising for dragging me into it . They have just read it as well and are mortified :D
 
Badger Kitten said:
Heh, cesare you DO have a beef - I can tell with the way you have written what you have - or chosen to misrepresent it, (or possibly chosen to remember it). I have not ''arranged book signings'' , LOL - I offered to buy everyone a pint, on the occasion of the book coming out, since I was grateful to urban for its help (as detailed in book) and it would not have come about without urban. It remains the only book signing I have ever done. I do not ''link to press articles about myself'' on here. When R&J came up, I shared my excitement and delight, just as other posters share good news and surprising events - including their club nights, band performances, publication of their books, completion of their PHDS , etc.

I barely report what I'm up to with MPs, if I mention it at all it is in context of a specific P&P discussion about it. Oh blah blah blah, I can't be arsed to justify myself to you and I don't think I should have to or need to. Perhaps this is genuinely how you imagine it to be, but I really do think this is your stuff going on here not mine. This thread is just an excuse, if you are being honest with yourself.

Can we stop this '' oh, someone else who doesn't like you might possibly track down an unnamed friend of an extended family member and report back that badger thinks his book is shit'' charade, because it's ridiculous, tbh.

Anyway. This novel. I didn't want to be the critic but as he has sent it and I have read it all I will be honest and go through where the problems are since he has asked and I might as well. Although I am manifestly not a creative writing teacher or a novelist and therefore can be safely ignored if he wants to believe it is marvellous.

So I will c&p my thoughts from this thread, with some of the good suggestions from posters, and some recommended books, and I and will try and be as constructive as I can about why it is not working, with examples, and I will give myself 1 hour max to do it on sunday, and then I will have a large scotch and if he asks again, I'm too busy


Interestingly I've just had a text from the family person who asked if the would-be author could send me the book, apologising for dragging me into it . They have just read it as well and are mortified :D
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I thought you wanted to drop it?

OK, fine, I'll reply later.
 
Gromit said:
The OP. Completely unrealistic was the phrase.
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No, no, sorry, I haven't been clear - it's not 'unrealistic' that a working class lad would go to Oxford, sorry if that is unclear. It's the characterisation of the 'working class lad' that is ludicrously unrealistic. In common with the characterisation of his mum, his siter, the teacher, his girlfriend and everyone else. The whole book is madly unrealistic. Example: His mum can't afford to buy him clothes so he wears his school unform blazer at weekends. People did that in the 1950's but no way would any 17 year old do that now.
 
Telling somebody to drop something doesn't work if you respond to them when they don't drop it. Basically, you're insisting that you want the last word on the subject.
 
Look, I think the only way to resolve this is for BK and cesare to fight it out.

In bikinis.

In a tub of raspberry jelly.
 
kyser_soze said:
Look, I think the only way to resolve this is for BK and cesare to fight it out.

In bikinis.

In a tub of raspberry jelly.
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That's your answer to everything.

I'm still finding pips in uncomfortable places after that spat I had with Phill Dwyer :(
 
A tub?!

pot-redcurrant-jelly_~097900.jpg
 
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