Green's Hill-Amy Lane's Home - News

Friday, January 1, 2010

More Letters To the Ether..

To my darling daughter--

I'm sorry the bands on the Rose Bowl parade were not as exciting to you as they were to us. And forgive us for the miscommunication--honey, we didn't know you expected to see "Martians" there. We were only looking at the "marching" bands.

Love Mama, who used to be in a Martian band herself.


To the people who make the rules at iUniverse--

Although it's nice of you to offer me a chance to edit one last time, I ask you, what good are fifty changes going to do in a 220K manuscript? That's all you're allowing me, and I think expecting me to only make one mistake every 4,500 words or so is WAY too optimistic.

But, uhm, it's looking pretty good so far, right? (What do I know--I'm only the writer with a comma splicing addiction... all my editors are kept out of this stage. HELP ME, GRAMMAR GODS, HELP ME!)

Excuse me, I need to go have a short, meaningless fling with the Chicago Manual of Style now...

Amy Lane


To my dear husband who is trying to do home improvement around dinner time:

Please excuse me while your legs stick out from under the sink, directly blocking the stove--may I make some pizza bites to feed our family? *whimper* Nevermind.

Amy


And finally, with a little less good cheer...

To the woman who reviewed Vulnerable today:

Dear Madam--

I understand that you wish to keep from your son every hint of sexual innuendo and to never expose him to books or ideas outside of your personal scope of comfort. I do get that. However, I think that destroying my book in front of your son and then giving the book a poor review because you failed to read the information posted about the book to be excessive, violent, ignorant, and counter productive.

The book is listed under paranormal romance--that should be a big hint that something of a sexual nature should occur. Nearly every review listed--both the good and the bad--talk about the highly erotic nature of the book. There are seventeen tags of the book under 'erotica'. There is a swear word in the book description--that is a big clue that this book is not for the squeamish. The book selling site has a 'look inside' option--that there is another way for you to investigate the content of a book that you are buying for your beloved adolescent. There is NO listing under Young Adult--None. I've actively discouraged people over the internet from buying the book, based on sexual content alone. Your claim that you thought it would be Young Adult because it is part of 'The Little Goddess' series is really very disingenuous. Anne Rice puts out a lovely series of Sleeping Beauty books. Would you like to purchase those too, based on title alone?

But we'll put that aside for a moment. I don't object to people disliking my books--really. I do object to a violent reaction, and destroying books to me is the ultimate in violence. You are destroying ideas. You must be so very proud of yourself. In fact, why don't you treat yourself to a book? How about Mark Twain, Kurt Vonnegut, Alice Walker, J.K. Rowling, Jonathan Swift, J.R.R. Tolkien or Judy Blume? Oh, I'm sorry-- are those authors too inflammatory for you? Too sexually charged? That's funny--they can be found on one of your favorite websites, this one right here: The one with Sarah Palin's picture on it, (because, you know, she's such a sterling example of parenthood for our young people.) But I understand. I'd offer you a Bible, since that may very well be your leaning, except that's one of the most censored books in THE WORLD, and I don't want to offend your sensibilities.

But now you leave me in sort of a quandary. I've always firmly believed that censorship is unnecessary, and book burning is ludicrous--someone once said that the only way to fight bad ideas is with better ideas, and that's impossible to do when the book is in ashes or lining a parrot cage. Hitler's book, Mein Kampf, for example, contains all sorts of flaws in logic and terrible self-contradictions that prove that he was a madman and his ideas were untenable (in case the pile of innocent bodies doesn't do it--but you know mankind--our memory is abysmally short.) If we had destroyed that book all over the world, those ideas would still be floating around, but we wouldn't be able to prove they were less stable than cat-diarrhea on a heating grate (and a good deal nastier) and show people how they didn't add up. We might be set up to do the same bullshit fuck-ourselves mess all over again.

The problem is, this belief that censorship is unnecessary is predicated on the fact that people can be self-censoring when they have all the information. You have just proven that this is not the case, since you were too ignorant to educate yourself on what you were buying. And to add insult to irony, amazon.com won't even let me block your ignorant, emotionally unstable review from my sight! But really? I don't have to read the review. In fact, I don't plan to. I don't read a lot of things I find on amazon.com--and from now on, your posts will be on that list.

So I guess, really, it's no harm no foul. I CAN self-censor the things that annoy me without destroying the written word. I suggest you do the same.

Sincerely

Amy Lane

P.S. I was once asked to burn a trashy romance/porn by my parents, just because it was fire day and the damned thing was cluttering up the top of the refrigerator. I was aghast and spent some of my time at the fire pit, trying to see what was so bad about that book. As I watched the pages go up in flames, every forbidden word was seared eternally in my gray matter. I'll bet that any words your son read of mine have that same destiny. Since the first love scene in Vulnerable was m/m, I'm thinking that maybe you've done yourself a disservice. You certainly can't blame me anymore. Like you said--my book no longer exists in your home.

P.P.S. My latest book, title 'If I Must', features a cuddly kitten wrapped in tinsel on the front. I sincerely beg you not to buy it.

Amy Lane

15 comments:

Wendy said...

She BURNED the book? SERIOUSLY? Good god, people these days.. I'm just flabbergasted.

JenB said...

*snort* I think I love you.

No...I'm sure I do. :)

Littlewitch said...

ROFLMFAO! THAT was utterly beautiful! I still think it's a shame you can't post that to a thread on the product forum titled "Advice for the Terminally Stupid"

Unknown said...

Your blog has given me a happy. Thank you!

And may I brain the idiot woman who thought that a book tagged "erotic" but with a series title of "Little Goddess" would be appropriate for an adolescent and decided to get it for her son? Though imagining her gasping with shock does make me giggle a bit. *innocent smile* My parents (odd, conserva-hippies that they are) didn't believe in censorship, so I got to read what I wanted. Thank goodness!

Anywho, off that rant, I just wanted to say that I will now go through the rest of your blog for more cute things to give me happiness on this rainy eve.

Oh, and that Sam/Dean xmas video...many, many thanks!

Louiz said...

*stunned at some people's lack of smarts* and I echo Wendy's commment - She burnt it? Gobsmacked.

jenna-hilary said...

Burning a book is a mortal sin to me. I shudder to think of it, and cannot imagine the kind of person who would do it. The woman who supposedly did it is a wacko...but do you think it's possible it's all a hoax? I mean, who could be that dumb?

Happy New Year anyway!
Yours,
Jenna

roxie said...

I burned a book once. Because I was snowed into my apartment (two flights of ice to the sidewalk)and I was alone and young the power was out and the book was ultra creepy (the elder gods went to Cluthlu and all I got was this crappy t-shirt) and I had run out of stuff for the wood stove that was keeping me warm. Sounds like Mz UndiesBundle did her Christmas shopping on-line, late at night, after spit-shining her silverware for the holiday dinner.

Actually, a book burning is sort of a sign that you have made it as an author. Way cool, sugar! And you seem to have taken it with exactly the right attitude. Good on you!

Martian bands? Damn, and I missed them! (Was it Squishy Belle who wanted to see them?)

Galad said...

Thank you for taking a stand against censorship. I find book burning (except when needed for warmth) frightening.

I'd like to see the Martians too!

Melissa said...

Wow, touched a nerve eh?

I read the woman's review. It's quite short, she did say it was gift, it wasn't clear that she gave it to him herself, was it? Also, I don't think she said she burned it, just trashed it.

Too bad some people can't do a little more homework before they commit.

Galad's gallant daughter said...

When I was in gradeschool and was first introduced to the idea of taking books off of the shelves because their contents were deemed "unsuitable", my mother gave me a couple of books called The Day they Came to Arrest the Book and Fahrenheit 451. I think perhaps this nameless commenter should look into these titles to get a vision of the type of utopian society she seems to prefer.
The very idea of censorship is abhorrent and goes against the basic concepts of freedom of thought and expression that this country was founded upon. Perhaps if she feels so strongly about censorship she should look into relocating. I hear Cuba is lovely this time of year.

ismarah said...

am now heroically restraining myself from going on to Amazon, finding this woman and going 'mock mock mock' ceaselessly at her.

Some people are too stupid to live. But then I'll bet she doesn't believe in Darwin either. Pity.

DecRainK said...

I'm with JenB
"*snort* I think I love you.

No...I'm sure I do. :)"

And my parnts never burned my books... they just threw them in the trash and put dog poo on them :(

I learned to hide my books quick and well! So glad I'm 26 and out of their house.. lol

Sorry that lady was a bitch, your books rock...

Much much love sent out to the ether your way :)

Donna Lee said...

My parents didn't pay any attention to what I was reading so I read some, shall we say, salacious things way before I was ready for them(I didn't understand them but hey, they were books and I needed something to read). My grandmother, however, worried about this and bought me evey one of the Bobbsey Twins books (which I still have) and those I understood. I wanted to be a Bobbsey....

And I am an ex Martian, too. I have such good posture!

toplsz said...

I just finished the book "IF I MUST". Loved it!

Saren Johnson said...

Not only are you a writer but a controversial one at that. Nice job!