Last weekend, I went to a friend\u2019s birthday party. The friend\u2019s husband works in the music industry, as band leader for a number of very well-known pop acts. He\u2019s toured everywhere and played at every stadium and venue you can imagine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The result, inevitably, is that the standard of live music at the party was insanely high. Also inevitable: the number of genuinely cool people at the party was insanely high. Also inevitable: I was not amongst that number.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A short housekeeping digression begins \u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m going to talk more about Cool People in a moment, but a couple of spots of housekeeping first, if you don\u2019t mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Number one, next week, on 21 February<\/strong>, I\u2019m introducing a webinar, hosted by the good folks from the Self-Publishing School <\/strong>on How to Write the Story You Were Meant to Tell<\/strong><\/strong>. The presenter, Ramy Vance, started writing seriously in 2014, and has since published over 60 books on Amazon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s a bewilderingly huge number, of course, and it made me realise that we at Jericho have really very little experience of that kind of high volume writing and publishing. So partly I wanted to hear from Ramy about how that experience works for him. But also, and mostly, I want to know whether this is an area that you guys are interested in. If you are, it\u2019s an area we\u2019ll develop in the future. If not, we\u2019ll leave it mostly to one side. More details in the PSes. But if you\u2019re even half-interested in that model, then do show up. I\u2019m going to be intrigued to hear what you think.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That one point. The other is that we\u2019re in the process of hiring a new marketing whizz. If you whizz and market, and can do both things at the same time, then please take a look at the PSes to see more about the position and the applications process. Thankee kindly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And ends.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Right \u2013 back to the party.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I suppose the very first marker of Cool is what people are wearing. My wife is cool in some strange way that\u2019s at complete right angles to what anyone else wears, so she rocked up in a vintage 1960s dress with white fur cuffs and white fur collar and a general whiff of Marilyn and Jackie and Audrey and Dusty and all that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m just a middle-aged bloke with no depth of cool at all. So I wore nice jeans, a clean pink shirt, some nice shoes. Done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Things I did not wear:<\/p>\n\n\n\n I wasn\u2019t all that fussed about my lack of hats \/ beards \/ waistcoats \/ cheesecloth. In fact, I thought the opposite.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I tried to imagine myself as these others were, supposing I had access to the exact right kit. Not a new tweed waistcoat, but one aged and worn to the exact right degree. The right kind of shirt. The right trousers. The right everything.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If I\u2019d had all that stuff, and worn it \u2013 I still wouldn\u2019t have passed for one of the Cool Hordes. I wouldn\u2019t have moved right. I wouldn\u2019t have spoken right. Honestly, and this sounds daft to say, I don\u2019t think my face would have been right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There was one person there in an old blue shirt worn over a T-shirt and a pair of vaguely sculptural glasses. I do have shirts in my wardrobe much like the one he wore, so I could in theory have rocked that look. Except, his face said, \u201cI am at home with gigs like this. Indeed, I have a huge stock of gig-experience, a world of knowledge and a depth of understanding. When I move my head gently to the beat, I do so in a way that betokens deep music wisdom.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m not saying that with any sarcasm. He did have that experience and I did not. I couldn\u2019t have faked that sense of being at home in this world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now, none of this bothered me at all. On the contrary, we had a nice time at the party and came away happy. As we drove home, I said to the missus that I thought I was probably the least cool person there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She said \u2013 and these are the words of wisdom on which this email centres \u2013 \u201cIt\u2019s not what you wear. It\u2019s whether you wear it with confidence. That\u2019s what being cool is.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n And she was right! She always is, bless her. She always is, damn her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And in fact, it made me realise that the clothes have nothing to do with it<\/em>. Those music industry types weren\u2019t cool because of the clothes they wear. They just are<\/em> cool. They are, roughly speaking, the group that our culture uses to define what it is to be cool. The equation, in fact, is roughly this: These people are cool; they wear what they wear; the result is that people think that those type of clothes are cool.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But in the end, what appeals to people is a kind of centred confidence, that has nothing whatever to do with dress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n OK And the relevance of all this to you, your manuscript, your anxious pen?<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s simply this. You can\u2019t fake what you\u2019re not. You shouldn\u2019t even try. The trying and failing is way worse than not trying in the first place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So let\u2019s say you want to write a thriller. You think, yep, Lee Child is as good as it gets. His style is pared back. His hero knows everything about guns and military techniques and police procedures and all that. So I need to write like that.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n And, OK, maybe. That\u2019s one route to a good thriller, for sure. But is that your style? Or your imitation of someone else\u2019s style?<\/p>\n\n\n\n If it\u2019s yours, then fine. Thrillerland is easily big enough to accommodate a few Lee Child type series.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But what if that style isn\u2019t really you? Then you\u2019re making the mistake of being a Nice Pink Shirt wearing type rocking up to a party in a look stolen from somebody else. You won\u2019t suit that look. Somehow, in ways you can\u2019t even describe, you\u2019ll betray it. At some surface level, it\u2019ll look like you\u2019re \u2018doing Lee Child\u2019, but you\u2019ll never fool the reader. Not for long.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At that party, I wasn\u2019t one whit uncomfortable in what I wore. People would have looked at me and thought, \u201cHe\u2019s clearly not a music industry type, but he looks completely confident in his own skin.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s what you want to aim for. When I wrote my Fiona series, I was obviously very conscious of what other crime writers were doing. But as often as not, my crime series turned its back on their choices and happily did its own thing. That wasn\u2019t dissing their choices \u2013 simply they weren\u2019t mine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I think, roughly, that\u2019s the model for how any writer needs to write. You need to know your landscape. You need to know what the classic books of the genre are. You need to know what\u2019s being written today. You need to know something of what\u2019s going on in your genre\u2019s nearest neighbours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But then you put all that aside and Just Be You. If that\u2019s a pork-pie hat and a beard, then be that person. If it\u2019s a Nice Pink Shirt and Proper Shoes, then be that person.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The full confident expression of your vision will always work better than any attempt to imitate someone else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s not a licence to break the rules. You still need an elevator pitch that appeals. You need to understand where you fit in the market of today. Your plot still needs to cohere. Your witing needs to be strong, or not less than confident.<\/p>\n\n\n\n (Why do I feel the need to add that caveat? Because we still get manuscripts that are clearly unmarketable for one or all of the above reasons. When challenged the writer often says, \u201cyes, but this is how I want to write. This is my personal vision.\u201d And, OK. It\u2019s your personal vision. But you\u2019ll never get published.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s it from me \u2013 your very own Mr Cool.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Til soon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Harry<\/strong> ————————————————————————————————-<\/p>\n\n\n\n Clearly, my own output is nothing remotely like that. But no question, that high-output, self-publishing approach is a proven way to make a good living as an independent writer. It\u2019s not an area we know a ton about. Ramy does. And I\u2019m really looking forward to what he has to say.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m introducing the webinar. Self-Publishing School is hosting it. The webinar kicks off at 6.00pm London time, 1.00pm EST.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n If you want to register, the link is here: selfpublishing.com\/jerichowriters<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n And if you attend, do please let us know what you think. I\u2019m intrigued to know whether you think this kind of model we should be exploring more than we do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n PPS<\/strong>: We\u2019re hiring a new marketing manager. If you\u2019re interested, there\u2019s more information here: https:\/\/jerichowriters.com\/jericho-writers\/about-us\/meet-the-team\/#current-vacancies<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n We\u2019re a damn nice bunch to work with, and we look forward to welcoming the right candidate on board soon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
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PS<\/strong>: That Ramy Vance webinar. It\u2019s titled \u201cHow to Tell The Story You Were Meant To Tell Without Taking Years to Do So (or Compromising on Quality).\u201d But really, for me the bit that\u2019s intriguing here is the scale of Ramy\u2019s output. He\u2019s been writing seriously since 2014 and he\u2019s authored, or co-authored, over 60 books.<\/p>\n\n\n\n