The Dhoklu Series (Episode 2)

August 27, 2016

by neildsilva with One Comment Episode Two - Licked in the Literary Nuts

RECAP (loosely translated for my Hindi-speaking friends as: Phir se topi pehnana)

(Read Episode One: Nipped in the Literary Bud here.)

In the previous episode, we saw how Dhoklu’s mother kindled (a beautiful word, BTW – Dhoklu is going to learn so much more about the word ‘kindle’ in the near future, and… so many meanings of it!) a spark of literary aspirations in his little mind. We saw how Dhoklu’s teachers and Education Board murdered those very dreams before they started (for references, look at anyone educated in your vicinity, even yourself – 99 in 100 people are doing anything but what their “education” taught them). Then we saw how Dhoklu finally revealed his aspirations to his father who immediately jingled his cash-filled deep kurta pockets and told him to go ahead and make it large.

Let’s see now how large.

Episode 2

Licked in the Literary Nuts

(Written by Neil D’Silva)

After duly searching and researching on what ‘vanity publishing’ means, Dhoklu sat down for a breather. His dad asked him about it, and Dhoklu, like the learned man he was now told him – “Papa, paisa aapvanu chhe ane publish thai jashe!” (“Papa, we have to pay money and I will be published!”)

Papa heard ‘paisa’ and sat down. This was a part he was proficient with. There was a flurry of questions such as ‘ketla paisa’, ‘kone aapva padshe’, ‘returns ketla malshe’ (‘how much money’, ‘whom to pay the money to’, ‘what will be the returns’) and about a dozen more in the same vein, and when it was finally and fully appropriated (through highly optimistic projections) that for every 1 rupee investment there could be a return of 10000 rupees, Ranchhodbhai called up the downstairs Sankalp Pure Ghee Mithai Shop for half-a-kilo kaju katri and another half motichoor laddu.

Dhoklu thanked his lucky stars that his father had not yet asked him about which book he was planning to write. Or about its subject. Or about its characters. Or even the title. So far, Dhoklu was in safe zone. Very safe zone.

The Publisher

Next day, between 10:37 and 10:55 in the morning, Dhoklu was busy on a call. His mother duly shushed the children playing cricket on the street outside, and shouted with as loud a whisper as she could manage, “Dhoklu na Delhi thi call aiwa chhe! Chhup raho!” (“Dhoklu has received a call from Delhi! Keep quiet!”) After making sure that the neighbors had heard her whisper, she shut the window pane.

So, Dhoklu kept the phone down and the next moment, his family gathered around him. Like a man possessed with a dream that’s turning into reality, Dhoklu announced that the call was from Delhi (where else!). Actually, 113 km away from proper Delhi, but who cares for such stuff? It was a vanity publisher, who insisted on being called self publisher. He told everything that Dhoklu needed to do (except the part about writing the book, of course!) There was clear business talk about how Dhoklu would have to buy back 500 copies of his own book once they were published.

Ranchhodbhai interrupted at that point. 500 x 120 = 60000. “Rupya ne? Dollar to nathi?” No. It was not doh-lar as he had pronounced it. Then that was perfect. 60000 was less than what he had spent on feeding his entire family and their families Gujarati thalis from Maharaja Bhog on his eldest daughter’s son’s first birthday. And then treated them en masse to a show of Bajrangi Bhaijaan (most people’s sixth viewing), where the ladies sat together in the front four rows, and the men in all the comfortable back rows. This publishing thing was definitely doable. He patted his grown son’s back like a man possessed.

So, father and son deliberated for a good three hours on which publisher to contact. They went through the websites given to them by Google Baba, and finally father and son zeroed in upon one of them. Ranchhodbhai drove this decision mostly based on the fact that the homepage had the pictures of the right gods and the directors of the company had the right surnames.

The next day, the contract came on email. Dhoklu was very happy on seeing the contract, because it was about ten flimsy points on a green page, that did not even come up to half the page. The title was a blank line for now, which suited Dhoklu all the more! And the language was something Dhoklu could understand very well. It was definitely not the complex and show-offy kind he had read in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer when in school. This was so simple to grasp – “Auther does not lays claims to His books fr nxt 10 Yrs.”

Ranchhodbhai whooped with joy again. “Royalty!” he jumped. “Royalty lakha chhe! Dhoklu, tu to Raja bani gaya re!” (“Royalty is written! Dhoklu, you have become a king!”)

The next day, the entire extended family went to the post office to courier the contract, speed post no less. Firecrackers were burst on the road, and children danced on the Gujarati dubs of Bahubali songs. The womenfolk stood suitably 60 meters away from the menfolk, and everyone gossiped about how Dhoklu was embarking on something that no one had done before.

Dhoklu thanked his lucky stars no one had yet asked him his book’s title.

Dhoklu’s Friends

Now that the news was out that Dhoklu was writing the next bestseller (a word that had gained a lot of currency in that village overnight), the friends – all boys, of course – started pouring in one by one. Dhoklu’s mother had almost permanently positioned herself at the door so that the friends could suitably touch her feet before moving inside.

Every friend came armed with suitable praise – one comment each, and one for backup in case someone else used that one before them. This was quite a difficult task though, because Dhoklu had never been a popular student, and people did not know what to really say to him or about him. So, by the end of the samosa-and-Fanta filled day, Dhoklu was left with comments like, “Dhoklu is so observant! Now I know why he used to keep staring at the girls’ section in the class all the time,” and “Dhoklu has always been a man of words and not of action – remember the time you said you’d come with me to talk to Bhavani Mam and never showed up?”

Meanwhile, Ranchhodbhai had positioned himself by the window with the phone. The 31.30 minute call was to Taarakbhai, and there was definitely a purpose. The purpose was in the form of Ankita, Taarakbhai’s daughter who probably was of marriageable age now. Or maybe a little less, who cares? Hopefully she had returned from wherever in London she had gone for whatever studies she wanted to do.

Studies! Bah! These girls of today…

Come back tomorrow when we continue Dhoklu’s saga. Read about Dhoklu’s new Apple computer and broadband Internet connection on which he discovers the greatest resource for writers there can ever be – Facebook.

The Dhoklu Series (Episode 1)

August 26, 2016

by neildsilva with One Comment Episode One - Nipped in the Literary Bud The Dhoklu Series

Nipped in the Literary Bud

(Written by Neil D’Silva)

Dhoklu could have been a literary genius. His name could have been shining right up there with all the Chetan Bhagats and the Amish Tripathis and the person who wrote the Chacha Chowdhary series whose name he does not remember now (all Dhoklu’s great – and only – inspirations), but sadly it did not happen. He could have won a Booker or a Pulitzer or maybe Amdavad’s New Debut Litstar Award (ANDLA) but it never happened. And we will never know what a genius Dhoklu could have become.

It will be too depressing for you to know what Dhoklu is doing today after his literary dreams were shattered, so I shall not speak about that, but it might help a couple of us here to know what really shattered Dhoklu’s dreams.

So, these are the culprits right here.

Dhoklu’s Mother

Imagine literary murder. Nay, literary terrorism. And imagine the terrorist standing right there with the automated weapon that’s known only with its acronym and its serial number. And imagine the terrorist massacring literature in cold blood. Well, that’s Dhoklu’s mother right there.

Now, don’t get me wrong. This quintessential Indian Maa did all the right things. She doted on her Dhoklu like she definitely should have. But the moment the poor woman saw the beautiful curves of Dhoklu’s English writing in his III Standard (those were the days we said III Standard and not Grade 3 like today), which were suitably assisted with his newly-bought China pen filled with Chelpark ink, the lady went into a state of euphoric high. And then she said those brutal words that marred Dhoklu’s psyche forever – “Dhoklu, tu ketla saras lakhe chhe! Writer bani jaao!” (“Dhoklu, you write so well! Become a writer!”)

Those were the bullets that she assaulted our poor Dhoklu with, and the wounds never healed. Maa kabhi jhoot nahin bolti and all that, so how could Dhoklu not believe in it? Like Mithun Chakraborty of yore, Dhoklu took it upon himself to become a writer, by hook or by crook. Mostly the latter.

But today Dhoklu is wiser, and Dhoklu has learned. Dhoklu has understood the impact of his mother’s carelessly spoken words. That is why he almost had an altercation with his wife last week when she told their son Paatru – “Paatru, tu ketla saras lakhe…” “NOOO!” Dhoklu yelled out. “Stop it right there!” Well, Dhoklu’s wife stopped, but not before ending it tearfully with, “Pann hoon to… hoon to keval Paatru ne protsahit karwa maan aavi hati… nahitar Patel ni putri handwriting competition jeeti jashe!” (“But I was… I was only saying this to encourage Paatru… otherwise Patel’s daughter will win the handwriting competition!”)

Dhoklu’s Teachers

Oh, Dhoklu had several Taare Zameen Par moments when he was a kid. That’s not at all surprising, is it? Most of us writers have had those. Maybe we did not see animated fish in a bottle, but we have had our individual fantasies. Dhoklu had them too. And he might have worked on them as well, but his teachers, his brutish teachers…

They gave him homework. Which was nothing more than writing the chapter on Solar Energy ten times, copying it word to word.

And then there was his tuition teacher (whom his mother referred to as too-shun teacher), whose only religion was the term exams. And her only procedure was to make the student know the answers so fluently that they could say that in their sleep.

Well, once Dhoklu’s school did the unthinkable and prescribed an actual literary book – The Adventures of Tom Sawyer – for casual reading. It was a good initiative, of course, and Dhoklu could actually have seen what literature looks like, but then his teachers brutally murdered poor Dickens by making Dhoklu mug up answers to questions such as “Why is Huck Finn admired by all boys in the class?” which was suitably translated as “Chokraaon na Hook Feen kem gamay chhe?”

Dhoklu’s Education Board

Oh, why blame the individuals when the system itself can be put to shame? And deservedly so. Things would have been so radically different if there was ICSE in Dhoklu’s time. But all the poor stifled genius had was to make do with the State Board.

And, believe me if you will, this was a State Board with the most pathetic textbooks ever. It was a Board that did not differentiate between ‘Suez Canal’ and ‘Sewage Canal’. This was a Board where African natives were referred to with the N-word. This was a Board which said that astronauts go to space wearing helmets. I kid you not!

This was also a Board where the only literary pieces in the Standard X textbook were written by people of dubious merit such as Shobha De. Oh, they did have literature, but that literature was poorly-translated versions of Munshi Premchand’s stories. Like, Bade Ghar ki Beti was transliterated as ‘Daughter of Big House’.

And the Board Exams! The big sham known as Board Exams. The kind where all you do is cram, cram, cram, and go and puke, puke, puke. The Great Indian Vomiting Marathon, if you will. They didn’t help Dhoklu one bit.

Now tell me, under these circumstances, what could poor Dhoklu do?

Well, there is ICSE Board now, and Dhoklu’s son Paatru is a proud student of the Board, but sadly Dhoklu and his wife are not. Hence, half of Paatru’s proper learning is unlearnt because of his parents and his tuition teacher. Hopefully, in the next generation…

Dhoklu’s Father

Dhoklu’s father came into the picture of his literary world quite late in the day. After he turned 57, to be precise, when it was found that his blood sugar was too high to continue running around for his garment business. But by then he had earned enough and with suitable investments in all the right places, that paid him more than the average salaries of ten Indian families, he could very well retire.

That was also around the time when Dhoklu told him – very hesitatingly, I might add – that he wished to be a published writer. The guffaw that followed shook the very foundations of Gajanan Apartments for a whole ten minutes, until the neighboring Chhedas and Prajapatis came to inquire if everything was all right with Ranchhodbhai, and when they left, Ranchhodbhai asked his son if he was really serious.

Well, Ranchhodbhai had money. And a small dream of seeing his son’s name on a publication did ring a bell somewhere. He might have thought it was his contribution to the alien world of intelligence that he had never been a part of thus far, and, what the ho! He had money, didn’t he?

“Jaa, beta, jee le apni zindagi!” he said in truly filmi style and Dhoklu ran in slow motion to his computer and typed in the Google search box – carefully, letter by letter, thinking of the spelling as he proceeded – ‘how to get published in India’.

And the whole family rejoiced when they saw the top ten results. Ranchhodbhai read them slowly too, and then asked, “Dhoklu, aa v-a-n-i-t-y soo chhe?” And Dhoklu smiled back. “Search karoon chhoo, Papa.”

Dhoklu’s saga continues in the next episode. Read it here now:

Episode Two: Licked in the Literary Nuts

Writers, Don’t Let Yourselves Be Shortchanged

August 23, 2016

by neildsilva with One Comment Stand Up for Your Rights Writers

This is an open letter to all my author and writer friends, all over the world, who hope that one day their writings might be translated into film. Consider it as an outpouring of feelings rather than a letter. For, someone really had to say what I am saying here.

In all my days as a writer, and now as a short film producer as well, I have seen no part of the creative crew of the film being shortchanged as much as the writers are. This is thoroughly appalling because the writer is the person where the entire thing starts from.

Think about the biggest, hugest, most classic film that you know. Probably having the largest star-cast and a really, really big name director. One that has won several awards all over the world. Now, that film, that spectacle of splendor, would not have happened if a writer would not have bled his or her eyes out to create the story in the first place. It is the writer – the slightly potbellied crouched being on the computer desk, the one with the disheveled hair, the one whom family and friends look upon with strange curiosity, the one who’s probably addicted to coffee and a few undesirable things, the social introvert, the shy, soft-spoken person who is only too happy to take backstage everywhere – who has given birth to this grand spectacle.

Most grand creations of art, regardless of how much finance it requires to make or how much revenue it earns at the end of the day, begins in a small café or a similar place somewhere, where a writer turns up coyly, probably worrying about how to pay for an extra cappuccino if it is ordered, and has a “meeting” with someone better-placed than he or she is. Of course, some writers hit the bulls-eye, and then work comes chasing them, but these are few and far in between. And even then, these successful writers will never claim that they have received their fair due in the industry that’s all about translating their creations on screen.

If you think genius has a better standing in this industry, think twice. Most of the greatest writers of our times have died in penury, some of them without any relations or even friends to attend their last rites. Yes, some of them won awards posthumously, but in a few cases there was no one to claim those awards. I personally saw this at a writers’ conclave last month, where one of the greatest Hindi cinema’s songwriters was given a posthumous award, where there was no one to collect it for him.

So, why am I ranting here? My rant is targeted at the mechanics of an industry that places its actors and probably directors at a much higher pedestal than the writers who give these people the grist to work with. Most of the actors I have personally met vouch for the fact that the actor’s job is the easiest on a film set. And yet, it is always the actors who walk away with all glory. Even with beautifully written songs in Hindi cinema, not many people except film-buffs will really know who wrote the songs. The songs are always identified, even on music channels, by the name of the actors. So, we have classifications as ‘Rajesh Khanna songs’ and ‘Dev Anand songs’ and ‘Shah Rukh Khan songs’, but ask people who wrote these songs, and you will be shocked. Probably you don’t know it yourself.

Why should writers be shortchanged in this manner? Why should they not get their due compensation and credit? When they are the creators of the art, why are they relegated to the backseat, or sometimes even shoved in the bonnet? Why can’t there be a concept of show-runners here as has already become popular in the West?

It is sadly because, like the fabled Shekhchilli, the writers are cutting the very branches of the tree that they are sitting on. Every time a writer gets shortchanged, he or she paves the way for a hundred more writers to be shortchanged. It gives production houses the gumption to try their nefarious tricks with other writers as well.

As a writer, I had a sad and deplorable experience when someone told me they could buy “stock” writers off social media groups for their content needs. Are writers so dispensable? A media house that can invest 10 million rupees on a show balks when it has to pay a fraction of that to the writer based on whose work it will be created?

Disgusting!

Writers, stand up for your rights. Be cognizant of how the Western world respects its writers. There’s no fairness there as well, but the situation is a tad bit better than it is here. In our starry-eyed film industry, writers are given the weakest spot. Their ideas are copied spinelessly and when they protest their faces are blackened. It only happens because we are spineless ourselves.

Ask for your credits. Make sure you are mentioned the way you want to be. Ask for adequate monetary compensation – whether it is in terms of royalties, upfront payment, or profit-sharing. Understand which model suits you best. Be part of film writing associations because they will work for you when needed. And, most importantly, do not let anyone take you for a ride. Everyone on the film set has work because you wrote it, even the production houses who might put money into your vision. They will only do it because they have faith in it.

Let us stand up and claim our dignity in this industry.

After NaNoWriMo… What?

June 3, 2016

by neildsilva with No Comment After NaNoWriMo... What?

After

I was pointedly asked this question today and I felt it apt to speak about it in a blog post so that more people could read my thoughts.

I released my first NaNoWriMo winning novel, Maya’s New Husband, on Amazon Kindle in January 2015. Since then the journey has been fabulous. I feel I do have something of value to add to the question asked to me.

First and foremost, NaNoWriMo is more of a motivational community, or an organization if you might say that. It is a community of supercharged writers (well, not all of them, but most of them are) and they come together to write a novel of their own in the month of November.

The NaNoWriMo challenge is to write 50,000 words in the month of November. If you manage to do that, then you are through. You get the certificate and you can flaunt it to all and sundry.

But, are you ready to release your book yet? No! Definitely not! That’s where it gets a big hazy.

There are people who have not yet published their NaNoWriMo winning drafts that they had written half a decade ago. There could be a host of reasons for that, but if you wish to be a published writer and want to use NaNoWriMo to get that all-important start, then these are the things that you should take care of.

Things to Do after Your NaNoWriMo Month

First and foremost, remember that NaNoWriMo does not write your book. You write it. NaNoWriMo is not responsible for completing your book, much less getting a good book out of you. All those are your responsibilities. Treat NaNoWriMo only as a tool, an aid, to help you get that manuscript out of your head and on paper. If you win it, it plays no more role than that of a doctor helping a woman give birth to her child. That’s it. Nurturing the child is not the doctor’s responsibility.
The second thing is that your novel may not be finished at 50,000 words. So you might need to go beyond the NaNoWriMo month and complete your first draft.
If you win your NaNoWriMo certificate, then along with it, you will get a host of sponsored writing aids at low cost, mostly software, which could help you complete and organize your manuscript. You could make use of that. (I personally didn’t).
When your draft is complete, go back and check it once again. Read it from the start. Weed out all typos and grammatical issues. Tighten up your story. In effect, self-edit your book.
Once that is done, send it to someone you trust who could read it for you and give feedback on it. Do not be stingy about sharing your manuscript and definitely do not be paranoid about someone stealing it. We always value our stories a zillion times more than anyone else does it. These are your beta readers. Once their feedback comes in, use their inputs to make your story better. You need not accept all suggestions, and you definitely shouldn’t, but this gives you an idea about what’s working and what’s not in your story.
Now, send the story to a professional editor. Remember, this is a vital step. You might have been a grammar teacher for thirty years, but editing is not all about grammar and language. It is about plot inconsistencies. It is about story development. It is about flow and readability. There are so many issues. A professional editor, especially who reads your genre, will help you improve your story manifold. Editors have a sort of magic eye. They see the mistakes that others cannot.
If you are self-publishing, hire a professional cover designer. Heard that adage – Do not judge a book by its cover? Well, bury it. All readers, bar none, judge books by new authors by their covers. It is best if you can give a detailed concept to the artist so that they can make it better with their own inputs. Personally, I sit with my cover artist and brainstorm ideas. All authors must do that.
I suppose you have locked in the title by now. If not, then this is perhaps your chance to come in with a great one. Your title should have some zing to it, some factor that makes anyone in the street think about it twice. I’ve been told my first book’s title has that appeal. Maya’s New Husband. Why new? What happened to the old one? That’s the hook right there. In fact, tell the title to a few friends and gauge their reaction, not their words. Are they intrigued? Or are they just putting you on? Be flexible about changing the title if the need arises.
Now, when you get the first three chapters edited by your editor, you can start sending in the query forms to the literary agents. This is if you are looking for traditional publishing. You will also need a synopsis at this time. Make sure you have a wonderful one written. Look at the synopses of other books, great ones, to see how those authors have done it. You will usually get a list of literary agents on the Internet.
You can even send query letters to traditional publishers directly. However, this is not a method that really works. Very few traditional publishers will respond to you without an agent. And if they do, check out their deals. A traditional publisher who is really convinced in your work will ask for the rest of the manuscript, and if that works out too, will offer you an advance on your royalty.
A note here — if anyone asks you money to publish your book, run away from them as much as you can. Or rather push them away from you as much as you can. There are several sharks swimming in the wide ocean of our literary world. Be particularly wary of any vanity publishers who will ask you money to print and “distribute” your books. Print, they will do, distribute, fat chance. You could probably do a better job getting your book printed at a local printer’s outlet and selling it on the Internet via an online sellers’ platform.
If you are self-publishing, great! You have all the control. And when I say self-publishing, I mean SELF-publishing. Not going to the vanity publishers. When you self-publish, you get the book out yourself. You can do that for both eBooks and paperbacks. For eBooks, you could use a service like Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing platform, which has the widest reach by far. For paperback, you could go for any Print On Demand online publisher. And, one more thing — there is a growing demand for mobile publishing nowadays. Books that can be downloaded on apps on smartphones — that’s really growing. Check out these platforms too.

By the time you are done with all this, probably it’s the time for the next year’s NaNoWriMo, and onward for your next publication!

I hope that answers most of the doubts of the person who asked me the question, and of others too. If there are any specific queries, do feel free to contact me on the Comments section here, or on the following:-

Facebook Author Page
Twitter

Maddox Files: Back to Business – A Book Review

April 18, 2016

by neildsilva with No Comment Maddox Files: Back to Business Uncategorized

Genre: Paranormal investigation thriller

Author: R. J. Davies Mornix

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

Maddox

I happened to read this little book of Canadian detective fiction over the past week, titled Maddox Files: Back to Business. This book written by R. J. Davies Mornix is the start of a series and introduces a young 26-year-old female character named Dice Maddox.

When the story begins, Dice Maddox is returning to the private investigating career she has left behind. She is still trying to get over the loss of the death of a partner. The death shakes her, and makes her discontinue her private investigation career, and she even takes up a “conventional” job. However, a detective can never really stop looking closely at things. She returns to her job, and that’s when she gets her client – Ryan Winters. Ryan, with whom the story begins, is married to a woman who he believes might be much more than what meets the eye. There is strong reason to suspect that the woman might be more than human, maybe even an alien. And that is where the troubles begin.

Throughout the book, the story is brought to life with other stories such as that of Dice Maddox’s Aunt Sophie and her new partner, and her interactions with Chris and a mysterious man named Ty. As the story unfolds, we find ourselves being pulled deeper and deeper into Dice Maddox’s life.

The best thing I liked about the book is that the paranormal element does not spring up right in the face, but it grows more organically. Without giving away spoilers, I’d say we realize this book has to deal with the paranormal when some strange but insignificant mysterious hints begin to appear. Dice Maddox catches even these small clues, and that is when she realizes the thing is much bigger than it appears. This is how the book grows for the reader too – it starts slow and then takes you higher and higher into the excitement till you are right at the vortex of the big happenings.

Now, for the downsides. The book could have done with better editing. There are several language and grammatical mistakes that might at times be picked up by a discerning reader. Perhaps another round of editing will make this a much better story. Also, the story feels stretched in places, and facts are repeated at times. In paranormal detective fiction, the crisper the book is, the better.

I’d still recommend this book for its good story. If you like investigation and paranormal both, then Maddox Files: Back to Business is a good quick read. You will have fun with the book once you are in it; that’s for sure.

You could get find out more about the book on Amazon here.

‘Aspiring Writer’ – An Insult in Disguise?

March 12, 2016

by neildsilva with 2 Comments 'Aspiring Writer' – An Insult in Disguise?

Okay, so the next time someone calls you an ‘aspiring writer’, you have every right to take offense.

This is a term that has really caught on, mostly in the ads and posts that are put out by a few of the publishing companies and even – horror of horrors – a few editing services. It is one of those harmlessly-wrong-but-annoying terms like ‘widow remarriage’ that is used so commonly even in our academic textbooks. I have always had an exception to this term. I feel it should be ‘widow marriage’, because after the said woman becomes a widow, she marries. Not remarries. We actually had a debate about the rectification of this term when I was a college student and at least for as long as I was in college, the professors had corrected themselves to ‘widow marriage’.

So, why do I say ‘aspiring writers’ is wrong? Keep reading, please!

Let us break down the term ‘aspiring writer’ into its two separate words. ‘Aspiring’ refers to someone who hopes to achieve something but yet has not. Now if you couple that with ‘writer’, the term means you hope to be a writer but yet are not.

Do you see the problem here? You will if you realize what ‘writer’ means. Writer means anyone who can write something. It does not matter whether you write that professionally or not. Even when you wrote that essay in school, you were its writer. The smallest thing that you write makes you a writer, and you certainly do not aspire it anymore because you have achieved that status.

Perhaps it would be right to call a baby who hasn’t yet learned to write an aspiring writer. But I am sure none of us reading this are babies here.

Now, there is a correct term for this, and that is ‘aspiring author’.

See the difference?

An author is one who writes professionally. That could be a book, a blog post, some copy for a website, an article, anything. Yes, one could aspire to be that.

But again, once your first professional work is out, and you are mentioned as the creator of that writing, then you are no longer an ‘aspiring author’.

You graduate to being an ‘author’.

So, be careful what people call you! They might be insulting you and you might not even be realizing it.

Looking to Get Self-Published in India? Here Are Your Options

March 11, 2016

by neildsilva with 13 Comments Looking to Get Self-Published in India? Here Are Your Options

books-1099067_1920

In my interaction with several aspiring authors, I have of late come across a sordid truth – not many people know what ‘self-publishing’ really means. As in any field, ignorance leads to being scammed and cheated, and hence this post is a humble attempt to clear the air.

Basically, self-publishing is when the author puts in their own resources to get published, apart from the writing itself. These extra resources can be in terms of:- (1) time (2) marketing efforts (3) money.

The most important element to know about self-publishing is that the author needs to do everything to not only publish the book but also market it and sell it. There is little or no outside support for the actual sales, and even if there are, they are paid services.

So, let us get to the meat of this article and see the three types of self-publishing platforms that are available to Indian authors.

(Note that I am not including the option of getting the books printed at an individual level and sold on sites such as Flipkart, though that option exists as well. I am only talking of organized methods here.)

Self-Publishing on Amazon

This has gotten really huge in recent times and with Amazon’s zest for world domination, that’s hardly a surprise! Publishing on Amazon goes two ways too.

Publishing eBooks on Kindle Direct Publishing: KDP is a service that allows you to upload eBooks with a front cover page and a blurb. You can price your own book. Your book goes live on the Amazon marketplace, and you can choose the territories you want to make your book available in, internationally. To some extent, you can also price your book for each marketplace. The minimum amount for Amazon India is INR 49, and you can get two types of royalties – 35% and 70%. Visit the site for more details.
Publishing paperbacks on CreateSpace: CreateSpace is an Amazon service that allows you to print paperbacks. You submit your manuscript in its finished – edited, formatted, typeset – form and then it goes live on the Amazon marketplace. There are specific size instructions here and the cover page has to be a full cover page, which includes front, back, and spine. Again, you can price your book above a minimum.

Note that CreateSpace has a huge drawback for India currently. Since their printing offices are located in the US, the books are printed there. So, if an Indian reader orders this book, they might have to spend a huge sum (upward of INR 700 for a 250 page print book). However, if some inside dope is to be believed, CreateSpace is setting up its offices in India soon, maybe by the end of this year. When that happens, it will be a boon to Indian self-published authors as the MRPs will be quite feasible.

Print-on-Demand Publishing

Print-on-Demand (POD) publishing essentially means that the books are printed when the orders are placed. Hence, there is zero initial investment. All the author has to do is to upload a finished – edited, formatted, typeset – manuscript on the site with a full cover page. There are specifications and even templates to do this on the sites, due to which even a complete rookie can master the craft of uploading in under an hour. All you need is patience to read the instructions.

Currently, the most respectable site that provides free POD in India is Pothi. Apart from this, there are paid POD services as well.

Pothi is an award-winning service with an amazing print quality. It also has a royalty calculator, where you can put in the number of pages in your manuscript, and you get an estimated MRP that you can price the book at. With extended paid service options, you can sell your book through Flipkart and other portals as well. Find out more information on the site.

Partridge India claims to be a POD as well, but it does not really fit into the definition here as it requires authors to buy a package first (see vanity below). However, it provides additional services in the package cost also, including editing.

However, there are a few drawbacks as well.

POD can be expensive to the buyer. The reason is that copies are printed singly and not in bulk. This increases costs.
POD attracts a significant shipping fee. Pothi is currently shipping at INR 70 per book, even for the authors themselves.
If you go for their extended services (optional) of marketing, editing, cover page designing, etc., you might find they are not reasonably priced.

Vanity Publishing

Vanity publishing is the elephant in the self-publishing room that no one wants to talk about, but we cannot ignore it either.

This is the kind of publishing where you pay upfront for getting published. These are small publishing houses that provide printing (and sometimes distribution) services, and their business model is simple – “Pay us a sum of money for printing your book, and we will print them for you.” Usually it is a bundle of 200 or 300 books. Essentially, vanity publishing is a “safe” option for the publishers as the entire risk is borne by the authors. Due to this simple aspect, the vanity publishers do not do much (read: anything) in terms of promotion, distribution, or marketing.

At closest count, there are about 35 vanity publishers in India. These are the houses that charge money upfront for publishing.

It is a mystery why authors go for vanity publishing when other options such as POD and Amazon publishing provide almost the same services, and the onus of marketing in any case lies upon the author. Perhaps it is because vanity publishers have a stronger advertising voice on social media due to which new authors, who are usually quite vulnerable and gullible, see the lure in getting vanity published.

On the international publishing scene, vanity publishing is meant only for people who are looking to circulate some writing between family and friends, such as a family member’s memoir or a child’s collection of stories that has some significance for the family and no one else. It is undoubtedly strongly looked down upon in the literary world. People who get published through this mode are not even considered authors. Vanity comes from the word ‘vain’ as in ‘to be vain’. People who go in for this are generally those who wish to see their names in print as soon as they can.

As a closing word, I’d like to say that none of the forms of self-publishing mentioned here have any checks for quality. They print anything and everything that comes their way. They might have editing and proofreading services, but those are optional and paid. Hence, many authors don’t opt for them, which is why we see a lot of slipshod work in the self-publishing arena.

Better knowledge will help this world to improve. Self-publishing is definitely the new mantra of the publishing world but it can only stay if authors inform themselves better and become sticklers for quality.

Start This Now to Save Tomorrow’s World

March 10, 2016

by neildsilva with 3 Comments Start This Now to Save Tomorrow's World

time-1178121_1280 Have you ever noticed the structure of the word ‘reading’? I am not talking about the meaning of it; I am talking about its pure grammatical structure.

Consider this sentence: I love reading.

In this sentence, ‘reading’ functions as a noun – I love what? I love reading! But it is a strange noun ending with -ing, isn’t it? The -ing forms are usually occur in verbs to indicate a progressive or continuous activity.

Such nouns that end with -ing are called gerunds. But, technicalities aside, why is the action ‘to read’ accorded with an -ing noun form? (Think about it; there is no other noun form of this verb!)

Is it because the grammarians of old, or those people who made up the English language, wanted to give us the subtle message that ‘reading’ is something that has to be progressive and continuous, a never-ending activity?

I’d surely like to think so. Reading is something that cannot be done away with. It needs to always be an ongoing activity.

I stumbled across a clip of a famous movie recently in which a student asks a teacher, “Sir, why do you read?” And the teacher looks at the student with longing fondness and replies, “My son, I read because I am human.”

We talk a lot about ‘being human’ nowadays. But I don’t think wearing T-shirts with ‘Being Human’ printed on them is really being human. Instead, I strongly feel that one of the most essential elements of ‘being human’ is ‘reading’, regardless of what you wear. Or don’t.

Reading exposes us to the larger world that’s outside us. It tells us what kind of differences exist among cultures, civilizations, communities, countries, cities, and makes us more accepting. As a teacher, I often come across situations in my classroom when there is a mention of a foreign name or a tradition, and that usually elicits sniggers or derision from the adolescents, but seldom appreciation, let alone acknowledgment.

It usually goes like this: Chuwamba – what kind of a name is that? She leaves her parents to fulfill her ambitions – how selfish can she be? The man eats beef – he’s the worst sinner; kill him. The French eat cheese with worms and the Chinese eat fried insects – blech! That is what I get to hear whenever there is any mention of any foreign culture, and it does get woeful after a time.

But at least there is hope for these students. We are reading out to them. Maybe they will pick up the reading habit on their own after a while and come out of this frog-in-the-well and my-nation-is-the-best-and-rest-all-suck attitude. Maybe we teachers will be able to prevent another generation of illiterate and uninformed religious and nationalist jingoists from being created. Maybe reading is the solution that all of us are looking for.

We talk of tolerance? Tolerance comes through reading. A person who does not read becomes intolerant because, for them, only what they know is right. And because they haven’t read much, they do not know much. Everything outside their myopic line of vision is alien and therefore unacceptable and – most often – even a threat. Which is what makes them retaliate, often in brutal savage forms, leading to riots and aggressive protests that should hold no place in a civilized society.

Note also that there is no unique past tense form of ‘read’ as well, at least as far as the spelling is concerned. ‘Read’ is the past tense of ‘read’. Another subliminal message there, methinks – reading never gets into the past. It is always present, it is always continuous. What you read stays with you for a lifetime, shaping you, molding you, improving you bit by bit.

Just the right material for human progress.

So don’t keep that book away. Don’t skip that chance to enter the bookstore. Get reading. Be a part of human progress. Be human in the true sense.

How to Make Negative Reviews Sound Positive

March 2, 2016

by neildsilva with 2 Comments How to Make Negative Reviews Sound Positive

– Anirban Nanda

Anirban Nanda is an engineer by profession and writer by passion. When not writing codes, he can be found in his room with scattered books and coffee-cups, mulling over some story idea or reading books. He has published his stories in 8 anthologies till now and won few prizes. His recent anthologies ‘When They Spoke’ and ‘Defiant Dreams’ published by Readomania are in amazon bestsellers list.

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Reviewing a book is a tricky job for two main reasons:

The author is eagerly awaiting your review, and every review that they get. This is true especially for newbie writers. If the review is positive and praises the book, the writer will read it again and again and will feel sheer joy. I have felt it myself. So, in a way, the writer has expectations from you.
The reader, who is also the reviewer, has invested some emotion into the book and that is bound to reflect on the review.

The reason this is a tricky job is because of the number of emotions connected to every book and the subsequent review. But, reviewing is absolutely, completely, and definitely a professional business. You may have reviewed a work written by your friend and given a glowing review of that. But is that the right thing to do? Once you become a well-known reviewer, you should focus on being more professional.

So, let’s get started, shall we? It’ll be short, I promise.

Reviewing means ‘a critical appraisal of a book, play, or other work’ (ref. Concise Oxford Dictionary) which, upon expanding tells us: you read a book and you give honest opinion based on your experience of reading many books previously, and the opinions should be such that it’ll help the writer/artist ‘appraise’ his/her work.

In simpler words, from your review, both the writer and readers must get something of value.

Now, if the book is good, reviewing is a cakewalk and everyone (the reviewer, readers, the author) feels happy. But what happens if the book is not so good?

Basically, you have two options here:

You praise the work anyway and the author gets happy. You intentionally hide the frown factors. But after reading your review when a reader buys a book and gets disappointed, believe me, they are never going to give much attention to another review written by you.
You point out the issues point-blank. That will hurt the author brutally. He/she has spent hours (months) creating the book and getting such a review will hurt the writer’s sentiment. It’s true. No matter how mature one is, negative comments about his/her work are going to hurt. When other writers will read your review, many may get scared of your review and will not prefer to get their books reviewed by you. Because your reviews do affect sales.

But wait, there is another option.

Here is what you should do:

Point out the good things first. And do not forget to justify those with required quotes from the book as they will increase the credibility of your review. But do this without spoiling major plot points; do not spoil a book in your review.
Point out what you think of it in the context of the current society. It will help the reader understand if he really needs to read the book. (For example: when I wrote the review of ‘Voices of the Silent Creek’; I started it like this: The book ‘Voices of the Silent Creek’ tries to bring out raw truth about women hidden behind the curtains of big houses and how knowing their situation, people choose to keep their mouth shut. The hypocrisy of people calling themselves supporters of women empowerment will strike you fiercely in this novel. A very different attempt for a debut novel and definitely deserves a round of applause. Read the full review.)

While handling critical points, do it honestly but candidly. Never underestimate or insult the ability of the writer. That is the bleakest insult a writer can get. For example: if you see the dialogues are not good, instead of writing “The dialogues are very badly written and don’t interest me at all,” write, “I believe if the dialogues were constructed tautly, the effect of the story would have had more impact.” You have done the same thing but the latter option is more candid.

With that, I am listing few quick points that could be of your help in writing any review:

Do not write a summary and spoil the entire story.
Show proofs of your opinions and justify your points.
More detailed the review, the more spoilery it may become. Try to write a review that does not spoil the story but gives enough glimpses into the story to justify your point.
Personally, I do not like to rate books, but it is not a sin to rate a book either. Everyone assesses everything in this world by some certain scale.
Do not copy-paste the blurb from the book in your review. It makes it look less professional.
Try to learn something from the book because your love for books is the whole point of becoming a reviewer or a writer.
Do not promise to review more books than you can read properly. This is very important. Try to review as much as possible, not more than that.
It is preferable to restrict yourself to your favorite genres. But if you are an avid reader who reads everything that comes in your way, then you might go for more variety.

Lastly, I am listing few of my reviews for samples, which have been considered as well-written reviews by my followers.

Review of an Indian contemporary fiction — Maya’s New Husband
Review of a classic — Ceremony
Review/Analysis of Perks of Being a Wallflower

I convey my sincere thanks to Neil D’Silva for giving me the opportunity to write this guest post for his website.

—

Anirban Nanda blogs at www.anirbanigp.wordpress.com.
You can reach him via facebook (https://www.facebook.com/anirbanfreethinker.nanda) or twitter (@AnirbanNanda1). You can read his stories at www.readomania.com/viewstories/anirban007 or in his blog.

What’s in Grandma’s Suitcase? (Part 2 of 2)

February 11, 2016

by neildsilva with 6 Comments Serialized Fiction What's in Grandma's Suitcase?

Read the first part of this story here.

No one spoke with no one in my house after that. I rarely saw Eddie, and whenever I saw him, he was too drunk to see me. And mother lost all her beauty in that one day. She sat forlorn and sad, up in her room, hardly ever moving out of it.

No one had ever visited our house much anyway. The front door rarely opened, except for Eddie going in and out as he pleased. There wasn’t any food prepared in the house either. When I felt hungry, and asked mother about it, she would not respond. On the third day, when my stomach began to growl with hunger, I walked up to the kitchen myself and tried to get whatever I could.

I hoped and prayed to Jesus to make everything all right. All these things, despite all those Sunday Masses… was this because we were all living in sin in some way? But Jesus is all-forgiving, isn’t He? Yes. Hadn’t Father Jacob said at Mass that Jesus knows all and forgives all?

Would he forgive my father? Or my mother?

I do not know. I would not have forgiven them even if I were Jesus. But I wanted their forgiveness. It was the only thing that would make things better in the house.

The loneliness began to eat me up. Being undesired is one thing; being unwanted is entirely another. I would probably understand one day why my mother had not desired me before my birth, but how could she not want me after I was here? How could she shun my very presence when I was here, in front of her, in flesh and blood?

I think all her silent brooding was repentance for her evil thoughts.

Finally, the day arrived when I knew I could not stay in that house any longer. What would you do in a house where no one spoke a word to you, much less prepare food for you, or involve you in anything they did? Of what use are their tears and silence? Grandma had left the home, and then I suddenly realized—no one had ever taken my name in the house except her.

In the darkness of that night, I made an important decision.

I decided to run away from the house.

I knew exactly what to do. So, when both of them slept that night, I walked up to the door, opened it as silently as I could, walked out in the same clothes I had been wearing since the past three days, and closed the door behind me.

The night was dark, but I hadn’t expected anything else. I had chosen the night for I did not want to bump into anyone my parents knew, for there would be uncomfortable questions I did not have answers to. Thus, I stole away, my hands in my pockets, braving the cold and the horrors, and walked along the single road, which was all my village had. I hoped I was going in the right direction.

And I knew in the morning that I was right.

When the first light of dawn broke in the sky, I saw the thatched hut where the village seemed to come to an end. And the moment I saw it, I whooped with joy.

***

I had seen this hut only once before. That was when I was four, I guess, the time when my mother had come to this house—Grandma Grace’s house—to fetch her to her house. I remember she had desisted back then, but my mother had insisted and had prevailed.

What was the use of that?

My Grandma Grace was once again in that same house. Nothing had changed.

I looked around for her, and found her quite easily. She was sitting in her garden, and digging up something. I knew how much Grandma Grace loved her gardens. She had a green thumb for sure, for she knew exactly what needed to be done with her plants. As I moved ahead, I saw her digging up something in the soil, probably preparing her farm to bear fruit once again.

I did not want to disturb her. And so I sat for a long time in silence, at a little distance from her, watching her work.

Then, when the day started turning to noon, I could take it no longer and softly spoke to her.

Her ears immediately pricked up. She looked in my direction, without seeing me, and said, “W’at’s dat noise? Dang dese eyes. Can never see as I used to.”

I walked up to Grandma Grace. All I wanted to do is to hug her and let her ruffle my hair. I surrendered myself into her arms, but she was stiff. Still as a statue. Why did she not respond?

Then I got my answer.

“My Immanuel! My dear Immanuel! Look at w’at t’ey did to you. ’ow will I ever get back de Immanuel I loved?”

I looked up at her, “Do you mean you do not love me now?”

There was no answer to that. Instead, her eyes filled with fresh tears and she looked away.

I walked into the hut and saw something that surprised me.

It was that suitcase. It was still packed and placed on the bed. It was evident that she hadn’t opened it yet, and that nagged me. “What has she brought in that suitcase that’s so precious?” I wondered.

But then Grandma came inside the room and I fell silent. Soon, absolute sleep came over me and I moved on from one world to another.

The next morning when I woke up, I again found Grandma Grace in her garden. She was doing something with twigs and digging up weeds, or whatever it is that she did in the farms. I went and sat next to her, hoping that she would talk to me at least today.

But another day passed in almost silence. Was she angry with me? I really would not want to think so. The tears in her eyes gave evidence that it was not anger that deterred her from speaking with me.

Even the slightest provocation moved her. I asked her, “What are you doing, Grandma?”

And just that much brought a fresh flood of tears in her eyes.

***

Then that afternoon was the last time I saw my Grandma Grace.

It happened all so suddenly, but had been a long time coming.

It must have been lunchtime—I do not know for sure because we did not eat anything, nor did she prepare anything—when she got up from her garden and walked into the room.

She came up to that suitcase of hers and took it off the bed. That relieved me, and I told her as much, for finally we would have a proper place to sleep. The bag seemed to be more difficult to carry now, or probably it was because she was burdened with something else now.

With a thud-thud-thud, she lumbered the suitcase through the house and brought it out of the door.

What was in it that she wanted to use in the garden? Was she trying to hide her gold and jewels in the soil like she had told me once? I wouldn’t disbelieve it if that was indeed what she was doing.

“Grandma, what’s in that bag?” I asked.

But she did not answer.

All she did was take the bag out into the open, and pull it all the way to her favorite place in the garden where she had been working.

Then she placed the suitcase next to the new patch, and even as I stood behind her, I saw her opening the lock on the suitcase.

What was inside the suitcase? Now I wanted to know it all the more.

And then I saw it.

***

When Eddie had fired the shot that night, it had been a thunderously deafening noise and nothing more. But I should have felt more. After all, the bullet had been shot right at me, right in the heart. It was an accident, everyone would like to believe, but since when has death been partial to accidents?

And I had not felt anything because death had accorded me with its infinite mercy—the mercy of painlessness. When you are dead, pain is the first thing that you stop feeling.

And that’s what Grandma Grace had rushed to fight for—to make them know that they had killed me. But when she saw that no one cared for me, perhaps she knew she had to take me with her.

That suitcase. The perfect size for my little body.

“Is mine! Is mine!” I laugh at it now. That’s not what she was saying. She was saying, “He’s mine! He’s mine!” with her dropped ‘h’s, the way she always spoke.

That is why she wouldn’t talk to me. Can she even see me?

When I came back from the reverie, my gaze fell upon the little cross she had made out of the twigs she had been sizing up all morning.

On those twigs, in her handwriting, were etched the words:

My Dear Immanuel

R.I.P. with Jesus

(2006 – 2016)

I wanted to hug her, tell her that I was there with her, but it wasn’t to be. The cross was a sign that it was time for me to leave. And as I left, I saw two things. One—the dear, dear face of my Grandma Grace, the only person who truly loved me; and—two—my own decaying face as she opened her brown suitcase.

END

For more psychological thrillers and horror stories from Neil D’Silva, check out Right Behind You, a collection of 13 stories that will make you sit up and read them a second time.