frying spam: and other things to do before the rapture

Samuel Reads @ Rutgers

2010-10-14T07:52:00.000-07:00

Samuel Saint Thomas to

read @ Rutgers University. "Water: The Big Read" Oct 23-24, 12noon-12noon.
A 24-hour reading at the Zimmerli Art Museum of water themed texts of a literary, scientific, and philosophical nature in a multitude of languages. Co-organized by the Zimmerli Art Museum, the Department of English, and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences Language Institute at Rutgers.

the latest Frying SPAM news!

2010-07-08T10:14:00.000-07:00

Hey SPAM slicers,

Just a few notes on my writing adventures for your hot summer day.

At the end of the month I'll be headed to a famously outrageous NJ bookstore and music venue for an advance reading from my Frying SPAM memoir. For the first time in many years, I'll be pulling out my guitar as well to play a few flashback tunes from my two CD's. Here is the link to RSVP with the place and date and time and map and all the rest. I sure hope to see many of you that have been following my writing adventures of the years show up to support indie publishing. And of course, I'd love to meet you too. Perhaps you can even join me for an adult beverage after the show. The event is free and public, so invite all your friends on facebook. RSVP HERE

I'm currently putting the finishing touches on the manuscript and hope to have it off to New York City shortly. This revision is nearly double the length of the first version that I read at the Memories & Martinis event last fall. I've followed the suggestions of a sharp agent that is is very hot for comedic religious themed nonfiction. I'm quite happy with this version too. I am committed to seeing this through and have no doubt that you will see it bound soon. Check out the new webpage here with great new slices from all 17 Chapters!

Finally, my plan is to blow off this blog soon and move all Frying SPAM memoir excitement over to a facebook page. It will be more streamlined with everyone's activities and communications. So click here to 'like' the page and stay in the loop. And hey, I'm collecting cool vintage SPAM images, videos, and other SPAM junk there too. Show me what you got!

Stay tuned, cool things are rolling in..

Samuel

links:

FRYING SPAM ON FACEBOOK

NJ EVENT ON FACEBOOK

ALL NEW FRYING SPAM EXCERPTS

a frying spam memoir update..

2010-06-13T18:46:00.000-07:00

hey people,

just a quick one here.. i'm coming down the stretch on a final revision of the Frying Spam memoir suggested by a very important agent.. 25,000 words added.. 5,000 cut.. damn.. and i've been at it about 12 hours a day since may the 1st.. my ass is sore.. my back is sore.. my head is sore.. but.. soon i will have very good news.. and thanks for your support..

stay tuned,

samuel

p.s. and oh.. i borrowed the tired kid.. not mine..

samuel needs a soapbox..

2010-05-18T12:10:00.000-07:00

He said, "You're a nobody with a great book." And I said, That's good, right? I mean, I wonder about my book a lot. Especially after midnight and a bottle of wine. But I'm well aware of just how nothing I am. I could have used some encouragement there. But no.

Still, it was another really thoughtful rejection letter. "We had so much fun reading your manuscript... laughed our asses off... quirky and painful..." and bla bla bla. But about me? They said I wasn't big enough, well known enough. A rock star dropping the poop about how he was abused. As if that's different than a nobody dropping the abused bomb.

He used the word 'platform'. I've heard this before. Mentioned it in earlier posts. I don't have a platform. I need a platform, he said. A stage. A dias, rostrum, podium, soapbox. A makeshift elevated personality that would make me a marketing no-brainer. An easy sell for the suits and corporate hucksters.

Well, just what then is a nobody boy to do? As I've said before, it seems a published book builds the platform, not the reverse. But no doubt there is truth in having a dedicated pre-published fan base. My facebook fan page is growing, yes. You guys must be spreading my stuff around, because there has been a recent spike in "likes" from dozens of people from around the world that I don't know. It's encouraging.

And this then.. I'm wrapping up another revision soon of "frying spam" at the suggestion of another New York agent. Perhaps I'll throw in a couple more queries. Then I'll see what happens. But you know what? I've got some other cool ideas banging around in my head. Outrageously creative publishing ideas. It's still too soon to share. You should stay tuned. Definitely.

In the meantime, click over to my FAN PAGE.. like it.. then share it..

Sure nice knowing you all,
Samuel

http://www.facebook.com/samuelsaintthomas

frying spam earth day update..

2010-04-22T18:11:00.000-07:00

Having nothing at all to do with Earth Day, I heard from another high rolling book agent.. I guess he googled me.. and.. It turns out that I'm not famous! Really? Really. He means I don't have a built-in audience that a big publisher can just plug into.. It seems publishing is moving in the same direction as music did a few years back. No money to develop new acts, instead, they wait until a developed act comes along and reap the benefits. I thought it was the other way around. You get published then you get famous. And by famous I mean, sold out Barnes and Noble coffee shops coast to coast. Lines of fans winding all the way from the self-help shelf to the stack of Rachel Rays over by the bathrooms.

But to be serious, if I want to interest top level publishing people, or any publishing people for that matter, I'd better get busy on building a better network of "frying spam heads".. meaning, i'll be begging all you guys for a hand up.. that is as soon as I finish the revision that I've been working on over the winter.. and yes.. the revision is coming along.. I should be another month or so.. then I'll be in touch..

In the meantime.. here's a new unedited excerpt:

Just what was I to be grateful about? Grateful for? He never said. I could only guess I was to be grateful I had both feat. That I didn’t have to push myself to school in a wagon, in three feet of snow, uphill, both ways. It would be many years before I’d have an understanding of my ungratefulness. But I knew about the piano in the basement. I knew it was the one Dad didn’t touch. I’d never seen him play it. The piano he played when he was a sinner. Said it was out of tune now and needed hammers.
But I begged for the story. I liked it when he scratched his head, stuck his belly out and laughed and told all about the devils music and how he’d played swing and bop with his big dance band, the Kings of Rhythm.

“Never drank a drop of that swill. Not one drop,” he said. “The girls? Yeah, sure. They’d come around at all the dances and sit up there on my piano wearin’ –well— not much I’ll tell ya that. And if it wasn’t for that chicken wire up there, I’d have gotten more than one concussion. And boy-ol-boy, getting to dance halls in that big Packard. Around corners on two wheels. That was some whoopee. Some girl put her foot right through the guy’s bass drum. It’s wonder I’m alive.”

fire, wine, and psychosis..

2010-02-22T19:03:00.000-08:00

For the past few weeks I've been pecking away at some add-ons and revisions to frying spam. In some spots I realized, at the encouragement of agents, that perhaps I should go deeper in the family psychosis. Even more graphic. It's no fun. It's dark thinking, my friend. I didn't even want to admit that I came from such a place, let alone sit and brood on the crazy shit in front of a roaring fire till the small hours of the morning. Many a night I was convinced I'd lost it. I've nearly consumed my winter stash of firewood already. A bottle of wine only works for a bit, until the desired effect takes hold, after which I put my mac to sleep and step to the porch for a blast of cold mountain air on my head.

So, I'm not sharing much with you all lately. And that's okay by me. I've been living deeply with the book. I'm not certain anyone is paying attention anyway. Regardless, perhaps in another few weeks I'll be ready for yet another round of agent queries. Then I may have some stories to tell and rejection notices to announce. I'll leave you with a bit from a new chapter.

And that’s how I learned that we got things. How everyone got things. First you prayed, and then you prayed a lot. Every day until God lets you know in a dream when it’s coming. Then, like Mom and Dad, you pray some more until the day it comes. It might show up on the porch, in the mailbox, or maybe in the offering plate on Sunday. It was magic for me, just like the magic quarters that disappeared from Uncle Jim’s hand. Sometimes you even get things from God you don’t want. Lots of rain water in the basement or mice in the closets. Even when my sister sewed her finger to the sewing machine, sewed a great big needle straight through her finger, God was teaching her something. Bad stuff happened so we can learn good stuff, like how to pray harder.

For now,

Samuel

and please share..

dead of winter..

2010-01-19T21:12:00.000-08:00

On Christmas day no less, I received an email from a N.Y. agent I admire to a great degree. He has a great sense of humor and an impressive roster of clients and contacts. He'd asked a week or so before to read my manuscript of frying spam. Even though he let me down gently, it was fantastic news. Unlike the dozen or so terse "no fit" rejections I've received so far, he offered an assortment of compliments for this often discouraged writer holed up in the mountains in the dead the winter. The short of it is what he called "a close call." But "almost" is certainly a pile better than rejection, especially when the "almost" is constructive. Along with praise, he offered insight on what tipped the scale. And too, the communication is open to some degree should I decide on another revision. I also heard from another great agent. He wanted to read frying spam too. That was a month ago. I'm still waiting. So, doing yet another revision is looking more interesting by the day, especially since the winter has made a bear of me. The sun is pitched low, the trees are naked, the fireplace inviting, the wait is as numbing as it is cold outside. But the possibilities look like spring.

this just in! more good news!

2009-12-16T13:42:00.000-08:00

I received yet another request from an agent to read the complete manuscript. Hell yeah! Yes, and what's exciting about this is that he had already asked for a sample chapter. So he said they enjoyed reading that chapter and wanted the whole thing now. They want my bio and all that other stuff too. Cool. But "enjoy?" Yes.. insert drumroll here.. he used the word enjoy. Funny how I'm starting to hang on every word. Getting emo about it seems really stupid when I step back from it all. But, I mean, they don't say much, not much at all. Seems like the most popular word from agent rejections is "fit."

So forgive me folks if I'm somewhat excited. Maybe giddy? Silly? So what if it all comes to nothing in the end. For the time being, it's considered remarkable by writers that the manuscript has gotten this far in only four months and with only a handful of queries. For anyone in tall buildings and silk ties to even ask to read the beast is very cool indeed. I'm going with it folks. Santa is in my back pocket! Stay tuned.

Me Happy,
Samuel

getting all suited up..

2009-12-13T23:32:00.000-08:00

Well not exactly yet. My birthday post noted that I'd sent out another little batch of query letters. A day later I received two rejections by email. Makes one think rejections are automated. No? Two days later, a very prominent fellow with a great sense of humor asked to read my manuscript. This is a big deal, so I am told. What do I know? I've never done this before. I'm thinking maybe the Simpsons stamps are working. Anyway, there are now four copies levitating around Manhattan. Did any of them go to lunch? To the bathroom? Away for the weekend? And this latest guy, D., has an unbelievable roster of publishing deals with all the big guys. It's a large agency in the works for 30 years or so. I'll stop now before I get nerve sick thinking about it. Tomorrow I go to class and pick up a class-load of final essays. That will keep my heals from going too high in the air. Actually, a stack of essays is quite like lead.

Stay tuned,
Samuel

the memories & martinis hangover..

2009-12-13T21:18:00.001-08:00

I still have a hangover. Unfortunately not from the martinis. It's nothing that a bloody mary can fix. The Memories & Martinis celebration went so well that, well, I'm a bit disoriented. What exactly happened that day? As a rule, literary events are not that well attended, unless of course the author is well known, has a book for sale, a big promo budget, it's a free event, or all the English majors on campus are required to file in to "report" on the thing as they would on the mating habits of opossums.

None of that is true about the Memories & Martinis event. For perhaps the first time in that town, lots of people paid to sit in a seat and listen to literature. They clapped, cried, and laughed. Yes, laughed. My intention with Frying Spam was humor. And to my amazement it was a success. I feel okay now about saying I'm a humorist. Nice. Going into it I had confidence in the work. But then, there's always a chance I was deluding myself. It wouldn't have been the first time I laughed at me when no one else did.

Some of the disorientation I feel is that I don't know what's next, outside of hunting down an agent. Maybe I'll land a few cherry reading gigs for the spring, start another book, drink some more wine, and teach and carry on as I have been. Perhaps the bitter ice of January will give birth to exciting things. Stay tuned. In the meantime, check out the photo video below of the event. Even if you weren't there, you might see yourself in the photos.

A big thanks to Pocono Comunity Theater, the musicians, the readers, and all who came out. We'll do it again in 2010!

Best,

Samuel

a batch of a birthday..

2009-12-06T21:55:00.000-08:00

it's after midnight.. the lonely hours have arrived once again.. the furnace hums past like empty subway cars down there with the pots of dirt that came in for the winter.. all i get is hot air from over there in the corner.. something strange coming out of some philly radio station too.. people chanting and banging on things.. don't have the mind to change the station.. always did hate changing stations.. could miss something they got planned.. you just never know..

there's a pile of query letters on the table in their envelopes all proper and all.. simpson stamps and nice addresses.. madison avenue, fifth avenue, west this and that on the 46th floor.. i only have two floors here.. just a few steps to the top.. anyway, those envelopes will be in the mail tomorrow.. my birthday.. then i'm off to teach two writing classes.. they have no idea.. no clue.. yet.

the query moves ahead.. a full report on the Memories & Martinis event last saturday coming soon too.. so stay tuned..
samuel

the megaphone in action!

2009-11-29T12:10:00.000-08:00

Here's something you may have missed. My friend Michael dropped this megaphone off 5 minutes before my reading at the Memories and Martinis event. I just had to use it. It was perfect for the preaching lines. Unfortunately there is no recording that we know of as of yet. I'll be posting more photos as they come in. Thanks to Gwenie for this one.

Stay tuned,

Samuel

Pickled Nerves

2009-11-19T22:12:00.000-08:00

Well, as you probably all know by now, the big read is days away. Even while I continue to look for an agent that can wheel my book deal, I've made the decision to celebrate the completion of the manuscript in a public reading and martini reception. Pocono Community Theatre, a local venue, volunteered to be the sponsor. And I am humbled at the response. Even those who can't be there, from Philadelphia, Connecticut, even in the UK, have sent their regrets and even made offers for me to come and read. I can't even take that all in just yet.

My nerves are pickled. It's daunting to go naked with a big slice of myself in front of a live audience. I suppose the trick is to hold it all together between now and then. Is this what it means to live? At any rate, to the many that are signed on to the experience, we'll do the best we can to present a class show. We'll raise our glasses to the beauty of words, the sensuousness of music, and the martini gods.

Thanks for staying tuned. I'm happy to be meeting each of you. It gets really lonely out here in the cyberhood.

Be well,
Samuel

If you haven't received your invite.. it's HERE

every play a Hamlet..

2009-11-01T20:37:00.000-08:00

I said I'd be sending out another round of queries. I didn't. I was hoping for another request or two to read the manuscript. But no, nothing this week. Dead. I've read a few more stories from other writers about the hell they've gone through. Not a good idea. One girl was asked by her publisher, "Would you like your advance in gas money or postage?"

That was encouraging. Right? So what she did was start her own promotional machine and hit the road. She said it worked but still has no home to call her own. Said she needs a rich partner or maybe some endowment. And yes, there are more stories. Many. You can imagine them all. All variations on the same theme, as is every play a Hamlet or a Romeo and Juliet. There are only a couple of stories. The ones we all live and love or loath.

The author story is this. If you are one in a million, you may end up on THE list. Everyone else never sees their work in print, or, does see it in print with no support for a reading tour, advertising, promotion or the like. So its as if the author published it themselves anyway. One might even find a chunk of the expenses show up on their AMEX in the end. So I'm wondering just what all those B,C,D book deals amount to in the end. So far I see air. Maybe fog.

Tuesday. Yes. Tuesday I'll get more queries in the mail.

Stay tuned. See you on the 28th. Yes?

Samuel

design and lottery what?

2009-10-22T21:07:00.000-07:00

To date, I've sent twelve agent queries. Begging in high literary fashion. They know I'm begging. They know how many writers can fit through the eye of a needle. I can sense it in the voice of their response or even worse, in their lack of response. I sense it as I sit here with my head in my hands, staring at the query files in my macbook at three in the morning.

So far then, of the twelve, everyone in rounds one and two have rejected or never responded. That leaves four without a heartbeat. The ones that did respond from round two all sent the most pathetic form letters, as if they have no personality whatever. They break every rule for the "bad news letter" that I teach my college students in Tech Writing class, bad fonts, no salutations, no formating and such.

One thing is consistent. They all wish me good luck. What the hell is luck if not chance? Some say getting a book deal is like winning the lottery. It's not. It is not a fortuitous transaction. My manuscript is not drawn from a hat. It is decidedly by my own design and skill that I attract an agent that in turn decides to use his/her skill to convince an investor to put it on a press. The agent and publisher both decide that the book can turn a profit. So the good luck nonsense is just a patronizing way of saying run along, swim in the sea of writer angst and pathos.

I'm not waiting on a respond from round three. On to round four in a few days! They say not to draw conclusions before fifty "begs." I doubt I'll last that long before a real lottery ticket seduces me. But in the meantime I'll be celebrating my designed manuscript with a premier reading on the 28th. I hope to see you there.

Thanks for staying tuned,
Samuel

waiting for heels..

2009-10-18T20:44:00.000-07:00

I waited for three weeks to send out my next batch of queries. I was busy, lazy, and wasn't looking forward to more rejections. I'd already queried my top three choices. I reasoned it as, okay, maybe there'd be someone great underneath a vague website. And I shouldn't hold the cheesy titles they sold against them either. So I got busy again. More research. Verifying info as current. Agents move around often. I look for current interviews too, whatever I can find.

I dropped three queries on a Friday. I never heard from two of them. I heard back from L in five days. That was a good sign. Maybe because I'd mentioned M had read my manuscript. M sold the late Frank McCourt's memoir for big cash. Anyway, L sold the late George Carlin's book. She wanted my first 35 pages. I hate that. I know the drill though from the music business. If the first three seconds doesn't hit subjective pay dirt, you suck. That person thinks so at least.

Even though she had addressed the email to "Mr. Balkin," I emailed the first thirty-five pages. I heard back in six days. She said it was "an interesting glimpse into a quirky life, but considering how many manuscripts I see and the kind of competition already on the memoir shelves, I really have to fall head over heels in order to want to take it on."

Head over heels? I would deduct massive points on a student essay for that cliche. And anyway, I thought that selling a book was not about orgasm and emotion. Isn't sales about judging the marketability of product? Objectivity? Not sure I even want a business partner to think in terms of emo. Once, I saw on an agent's blog; "I am not interested in anything that contradicts a Christian worldview." I doubt she'd lift a heel either over my Chapter 10: Gay Dude Gets Gay Demon Cast Out Ha Ha! And as far as I remember, a Christian world view is, fuck it, God's gonna burn it up in fire soon anyway.

It was a depressing weekend. Next up.. Round three..

Stay Tuned.. Hope to see you on November 28th!

Samuel

first trip to the PO..

2009-10-14T17:13:00.000-07:00

I was on my way to a reading. Convent Station, NJ was on the way. I'd mail my first query letters from there. For newbies, a query letter begs an agent to, in high linguistic fashion, please love my book idea so much that you run to the biggest publishing house and prostrate yourself in front of their mahogany desk until they promise to print a million copies and line them up in the windows at Barnes & Noble. And while you're at it, make them promise a fireside chat with Oprah. Oh, movie rights and a Sarah Palin advance too.

So then, traditionally, an agent gets the author a book deal. I picked three. I'd read interviews with the agents. I'd combed their websites. I'd hashed and mashed my query letter to what I thought was perfection. One day for each paragraph. Three paragraphs, one page. No more. I'd printed on fancy paper. I arrived at the post office with three minutes to spare. Is this the way it would be, I thought. Four years in the making and I was rushing and had cramps as I wrote my return address on the Priority envelopes.

I plan to frame the receipt. Credit card numbers on a strip of paper meant I was crossing over. I was now a risk taker. The whole thing could fail. "What ever happened to that book you wrote," they'll say. Or I could, some day, be framing a page of the NYT.

My first choice agent was M. She'd sold a memoir for the most famous memoirist. My favorite memoirist. The query landed on her desk on a Monday morning. She emailed compliments to me the next day. She said she'd love to read my manuscript. Holy shit. One of the most well-known agents in the world wants to read the very thing that I sat at this very table working on for four years. I felt naked, too. As if I were allowing someone into my head, free to inspect all my private brain cells. Regardless, I had chills. I jumped up and down on the back porch.

I rode that feeling out of anxiety and depression for a week. Food tasted better. I played jazz. Even my old Volvo rode smoother for a week. But I couldn't take it anymore. I sent her an email. "Just want to keep you in the loop," I said. "I've sent off two more manuscripts." Seven minutes later she returned. "I was just getting ready to write to you about FRYING SPAM." She found my voice charming and the project appealing but didn't think it was "quite right" for her.

The other two queries? G returned a half sheet of paper that read something of the sort, "Due to the current market, we are not taking on memoir projects at this time." J ask for the first thirty pages. I never heard from him. Nothing.

Query round two?
Stay tuned,
Samuel

in the beginning there was a manuscript..

2009-10-08T19:51:00.000-07:00

I don't want to roll back to the real beginning. Childhood experiences. They're horrific. I'll start with being riddled with anxiety, thinking of readying the manuscript for agent shopping. Would they laugh? And I don't mean because Frying Spam was funny. I imagined agents wondering who the ass is that thinks he's a writer. So I worked the manuscript over and over until I thought I could get "naked" and still keep my composure. I have a lovely line editor, so that helped a bit.

Still, fearing the inevitable onslaught of rejection slips, I put off researching for the right agency. And that's the thing. I had nothing to compare it to. I'd tried not to read too many memoirs. I didn't want to cop an auto-voice from another writer. But with what I know is on the shelves, humorous religious abuse themes didn't show up. Who would want to advocate for Frying Spam, even just read it? And nobody was there to prod me either. I had to muster on my own. It's lonely, folks.

I settled after twelve drafts. Fuck it. It would be thirteen chapters. Not for any unlucky number-voodoo reasons, please, I just thought it was enough. And I have a short attention span. I'd been pecking at it for four years on and off. Besides, there's probably plenty of readers that can't sit still for long either. So I figured I was ready to buy postage. Either way, publish or pass out, my life would change, at least my view of it. I could very well end up having a very depressing year, or worse, life. Compression or depression, I had to move on it. I was in the way of me. Around then, a copy of Poets and Writers landed on my writing table.

Next up.. First trip to the Post Office..
Stay Tuned..

the manuscript adventure

2009-09-24T20:02:00.000-07:00

Hi Everybody..
Are you easing into fall? I have my hickory all stacked up and ready to go. It would be very nice if someone was jealous. I'm hoping that it keeps me toasted on all sides and inspires me to write something new soon.

On "frying spam." First, I may have to take down the excerpts on the blog here soon, especially if it has anything to do with shopping the manuscript. Most likely though, I'll be able to keep at least one or two slices on my website until the thing is published.

So then, I'm excited that the "frying spam" followers have grown fast over the summer months. The hits on the site are in the thousands now too. And lots of you want to know what's going on with the agents and New York and all that jazzy jazz. So, while I'll be taking the excerpts down, I'll be continuing the blog as a regular update on all the dancing it takes for me to get a publishing deal. I'll even let you know when I get a rejection letter. Hopefully I won't moan and bitch too much.

So stay tuned, I'll walk you through it from day one. At least I'll have something to do before the rapture.

Happy Pumpkins,
Samuel