Kristina Villarini is a writer living in New York City. Between her day job in an office in the second finest city of the United States, writing her books, and the all too well known distractions of the Big Apple — delicious food from cultures all over the world, exclusive clubs, incredible music venues, and multiple baseball teams– she cleared some time for a few questions.
WI: Books and reading have played a huge part in my life – my mom read to me pretty much since the day I was born until I learned how to read by looking over the shoulders of my parents while they taught my older brother how to read from the 19th century McGuffey Readers. I was reading the Narnia Chronicles and the Hobbit in kindergarten and just eating up every book I could find. What is one of your earliest memories of books or reading? Why do you think that stands out in the sea of memories we all have from our younger years?
KV: In all of my experiences with writing and books, I still haven’t quite figured out what makes reading such a definitive part of the relationship between adults and children. It’s always there, and I think it’ll always be there. Whether reading the TV Guide or the tabloids, there are so many stories of reading creating a generational connection. My parents read a lot of the average “kids’ stuff” to me; Curious George, Shel Silverstein, the Bernstein Bears, etc.
If you want to talk about a profound moment, my mother used to read a book called: Why Can’t I Fly?, by Rita Golden Gelman, and it’s a little tale about — brace yourself — a monkey who desires to experience the joy of flight but sadly, cannot. He spends 45 of the 48 pages concocting various plots for flight, and failing miserably. One of the pieces of dialogue that always stuck with me was: “I can fly, I can fly!” And the sound Gelman used to describe his unexpected return to the ground was: Flop. My mother and I spent a large part of my life referencing epic failures using “I can fly, I can fly, FLOP.” It was the only part of the book we could ever remember. Four years ago, I Google’d that line and the book came up, and I bought it. I wrapped it and gave it to my mother for Mother’s Day that year. It was out-of-print, so it cost me a pretty penny to procure, but her eyes welling up when she saw the cover made it entirely worth it.
There is a marriage of imagination between people of all ages when they share the experience of storytelling and reading. There’s not really anything else like it.
WI: Right now there’s an ongoing upheaval in the old industries of music, film, newspapers, books, etc. As we’ve already seen in the battles between the RIAA / MPAA and the average person, the industries seem to be stuck grasping at empty air with their claws and only adapt to the Internet and other new technologies only as their last resort. Every town crier is on the streets proclaiming the death of the newspaper industry. What do you think about the future of newspapers, books, magazines, and other media that’s been so focused on physical media for hundreds of years?
What’s most remarkable to me about this “upheaval” is how it is coming from people working within the industries. The explosion of knowledge-sharing should’ve been an opportunity to reach new audiences. But the “suits,” as non-creative types typically do, saw this great wave and swam back to shore as fast as they could. Predictably, all of these people have been swept away, or are now asking for help. These are people who are trained to spot trends and stay on the “cutting edge,” since all forms of media are grossly competitive (due mostly in part to their own dog-eat-dog tactics for the last several years)… And they continually prove that they just don’t have a clue. I think that the evolution of media is organic, and anyone who doesn’t embrace it is going to be left behind. People ARE getting increasingly tech-savvy and people DO want their data faster, but what does that really mean? Personally, I believe we’re getting more selective as an audience.
This wealth of “one-touch-everything” provides us with all of our needs, but we also have direct access to crap. It used to be that you’d buy a book, read it, it sucked and you either would forget about it or recommend it to someone you loathe. Now, people are reviewing titles before you buy them, which I love. We’re slowly removing the middle-man from our art. How can we really consider that a death of anything? I suppose, as capitalists, it’s a death… But people are buying their news through applications on their cellular phones and streaming CNN.com at their desks all day long. I think the future for media is a bright, unpredictable one, where it flourishes. There’s no death in my mind, only a renaissance.
WI: Lab126 is Amazon.com’s hardware development company and their product, the Kindle, is an example of the industry making moves forward but still not understanding the complete shift in what people read and how things are distributed these days.
Jason Kottke explains it as such,
People read more than books. Sure, fine, make your single-use devices. But all these e-readers — the Kindle, Nook, Sony Reader, ET AL — are all focused on the wrong single use: books. (And in the case of at least the Nook and Kindle, the focus is on buying books from B&N and Amazon. The Kindle is more like a 7-Eleven than a book.) The correct single use is reading. Your device should make it equally easy to read books, magazine articles, newspapers, web sites, RSS feeds, PDFs, etc. And keep in mind; all of these things have images that are integral to the reading experience. We want to read; help us do it.
There is much discussion over the uncertain future of hardware digital devices dedicated to books, but it’s a step forward in the right direction and people eat it up. The iPhone and Kindle are insanely popular and nearly everyone who has one is happy with what the little taste of the future. One of my friends called the iPod touch “something from the future”. Do you think paper books are going to become a tiny niche and mere collector’s items while digital media and hardware will take over? What do you read these days and in what formats and mediums? In your wildest dreams (the ones where you’ve become so popular where you have become a shut-in recluse to escape the horde of fans of your work and you’re so wealthy that you have a Scrooge McDuck money-room), how are people reading what you’ve written?
KV: People seem to forget how emotions consume us. They rule everything. We will never have a library of Kindles. It won’t happen. There is a feeling that comes with buying a book, meeting a hero, getting it signed, speaking with them. We like things that are real. We like the physical ability to track our progress. Futuristic gadgets are awesome, but they’re less real than turning pages. The reality is that people are still buying books, and people will always buy books. JK Rowling has proven it, Stephenie Meyer is proving it and Tucker Max proved it. Look at any genre you want, people are still venturing out to find books. You can liken it to vinyl’s resurgence in the music industry. Younger people are looking for the “warmth” in sound, and you’re not going to get that from an iPod.
Now, that’s not to say digital media doesn’t have its place. It absolutely does. I own an iPhone and it practically runs my universe, but I still read books. The Kindle is a pretty sweet-looking device, but I can’t see myself completely foregoing the experience of reading. I don’t need my books to fit in my pocket, I love the sound of flipping pages, and there’s something great about scoping out someone’s personal library and discovering you’re both Tom Wolfe fans. Reading is as much a part of what we do as who we are.
I’m a long-time subscriber of Rolling Stone, and I’ve read Maxim for years. Details, GQ, Esquire, etc. I like looking at clothes and accessories. I read a lot online, so my phone provides me the chance to keep up with that stuff.
I truly want to believe that no matter how massive my success, I’ll be satisfied if people are seeking my words out and reading it. I wish I had the true humility to say, “I don’t care if anyone reads it,” but I’d only be telling you 50% of the truth. 50% is getting the words out of my head, and the other half was absolutely sharing it with the world. I would love to ride the subway and see someone holding my book… I might actually do a cartwheel in the car of the train. I want to know that feeling, which is something that has been given to me by my literary heroes. I want to pay it forward, so I think the end goal for me isn’t so much how they find it, but if and when.
I’m of the opinion that it’s human nature to create and share. We make things and then we want to share what we’ve made with the world. There’s a certain honesty in sharing something you’ve created with someone else that is completely lacking in most unrepentant marketing and advertising processes. If I’m sharing something with someone else, it’s because I think it’s worth sharing on its own merit, not because of some promise of being paid now or in the future. With so many multi-level marketing, chain letter zombies providing a market for pop-up advertisements and the advertisement creep (as seen on YouTube: first small ads on the side of the page, then below the video, then on top of the video, now video playing before the one you want to see), how do you plan to escape these same vices of corruption?
Artists are toeing the line with this subject, and they have been forever. There’s unfortunately a stigma attached to art, that there’s no chance you could ever “make it” writing books or selling your band’s music from the trunk of your car. I think to combat that, artists have responded by trying to “create a brand” and license / whore themselves out, depending on who you ask. Basically, you try to sustain yourself however you can, in case that Voila-moment never happens.
I want to incorporate a concept of mutually beneficial exchanges between the artist and the audience. One step I’ve taken with the help of my far more web-inclined friends is to create my own website. The goal is to update and post stories on it regularly. I will also blog random musings and using my Flip video to post videos once in a while. I want to eventually allow a donation or pay what you want style check-out for shorts, exclusive content, alternate endings, mixtapes that I made to accompany the stories or mixes that I was listening to when I wrote, companion pieces and insight on why and how I created the respective worlds and the characters within them, etc.
That’s essentially how you market yourself successfully, in my mind; you provide people with something of value.
WI: Every November since 1999, hundreds and thousands of people have participated in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). The goal is to write 50,000 words in 30 days. One of my friends has hit the 50,000 mark in 13 days now for two years in a row, while others just barely cross that mark on the stroke of midnight. I see NaNoWriMo as a great way to encourage and motivate yourself to get the first draft of a story on paper. I think it also encourages people to write who would not normally take the time out of their lives to write and learn to write. On your website, you say that personally you have “difficulty with the restriction of scheduling writing”. You’re currently working on two projects right now, a novel and a short story. What do you think about using quantified goals with deadlines? How do you gauge your progress while you’re writing?
KV: One of my closest friends is a screenwriter in Los Angeles, and his work ethic trumps mine in every possible way. He is one of those “wrote 90,000 words in three weeks” types. His method of dealing with deadlines is to schedule his “writing time,” and it’s become one of the routines/necessities of his life. His scheduled time emboldens him to create, no matter what is happening around him and I greatly admire the mechanics of that process.
The key here though, is to know your process and to constantly improve it. I’m not one of those people who can sit at a PC every day at 5 and write for an hour. Since that does not work for me, it requires me to be a lot more diligent about my expectations of myself and my projects. It feels more and more like a benefit to me that I’ve finished the first draft of my novel and to have the opportunity to still tweak at the short. It really does give me a lot of options to retreat from my ‘god complex’ as a writer and be hypercritical of myself, but in a rational and productive way. Schedule time only serves the purpose of reminding me that I haven’t generated an output, and that doesn’t foster the imaginative mental state that I require.
No two people create art alike, and I’m an incredibly moody writer. Sometimes, I’m listening to Weezer at inhumane volumes rattling away in a groove, and sometimes, I need absolute quiet to visualize that perfect setting. As far as the barometer of health for the short, it’s a Chapter a week. You definitely need to set parameters, even if they’re internal ones. You have to trust yourself to get it done.
WI: Do you prefer writing using a computer or by hand (pen/pencil/paper)?
KV: I love my laptop. It’s a piece of junk but I can’t function without it. I also have an awesome leather-bound journal that was a gift from a friend, which I attempt to take everywhere. There just seems to be legitimacy in writing by hand, though, isn’t there? It’s one of those very personal and private experiences. Nothing is coming between you and creation, not even technology.
WI: The Internet has thrown a loop into the traditional publication industry. How do intend to publish your novels?
KV: As we discussed before, the Internet really is one of those missed opportunities in media. Off the top of my head, I can’t say that there is one industry leader/guru that can say they predicted this, or at least, navigated it properly. I’m doing my part, through my website, to put my life’s work, the only thing I’m really any good at, in the hands of the people who want it. I’m taking the “if you build it, they will come,” approach.
I believe that is the true quandary for those negatively affected by the Internet is simple: people are less shackled to critics than they were ten years ago. Suddenly, EVERYONE’s voice can be heard or found, online. There are still people, who are respected in their fields in the industry, but for once credentials are starting to represent something. People are seeking out the opinions of the “everyman,” just as much as the scholar. I continue to be encouraged by that.
WI: One of my favorite authors, Cory Doctorow, thinks that digital versions of books should be released for free, and he puts his money where his mouth is and has released nearly every one of his books with a Creative Commons license. While he still sells physical copies and makes a good deal of money from that, he attributes much of his success to the open release of his writing. The idea is that in order to reach as many people as possible, something has to be easily shared. The more people that read it and enjoy it, the more people there are to buy it. It’s a solution to the age old problem that someone who doesn’t know about your book won’t buy it. Would you consider releasing your book in a similar style, and what are some things you would like to do in the future to promote your books?
Absolutely. Doctorow is right. The value is as much in what you are willing to give to your audience as the actual quality of your product. I believe if an audience is presented with something that is valuable to them, and it resonates, they are going to remember that and “pay it forward,” if you will. It builds a trust, which is sorely lacking in every exchange where there is a product involved.
One of the ideas I’ve tossed around is writing a free weekly story that would be available to read, where people could really feel as invested in the characters as any TV show. It would be scheduled, so I’d have to overcome my hurdles to get it out on time, but it would be something fun and entertaining that I think people would appreciate. You build that rapport and you indirectly say, “hey I know you’re out there, thanks” and it would give them more of an indicator of whether or not my work is a worthy investment of their time first, money second.
WI: You’ve recently setup a fundraising page at Kickstarter.com. People have used their service to raise funds for everything from record studio time to crazy vacations. Tell me a little about the reasoning behind fundraising and why you chose Kickstarter.com.
Kickstarter.com is such an interesting concept and I’m happy to be a part of it, in a very minute way, at this point. It’s one thing to throw a party and ask people to give me some beer money so I can publish a book, and it’s another to connect strangers and like-minded people and offering them something in return for your success. It’s the next generation of philanthropy.
When a kid is pounding upside-down pots in the subway, you can’t tell if he’s going to be the next Keith Moon, but most of the time you’re weary to toss your loose change in his hat. Through Kickstarter, you’re watching the kid performing rudiments, and you’re helping him get to buy his own drum set and you’re getting a copy of his demo. You’re invested, emotionally and financially, in the result. It’s absolutely phenomenal.
WI: You’re an avid fan of music, and over the years have witnessed a song or two evolve (and devolve). What are some parallels in the music industry that can apply to writing stories or novels?
KV: There truly are so many parallels, especially as a creator. From its inception to its published form, it is the noise in your head that you need to get out which is fundamentally, your vision, and what makes you do this. Then it is the need to share it which drives you to complete it, but keeps you recreating. You’re always performing a balancing act.
I definitely do not want to use this opportunity to espouse the virtues of clichés, but I do believe that people will listen to your music and/or read your story if it is the truest reflection of your self. People are a lot smarter than you think, and can smell bullshit from a mile away… And if they can’t, they have a friend who can, and news travels fast.
WI: Neil Gaiman, a favorite of mine, writes about entitlement issues, saying,
George R.R. Martin is not your bitch.
This is a useful thing to know, perhaps a useful thing to point out when you find yourself thinking that possibly George is, indeed, your bitch, and should be out there typing what you want to read right now.
People are not machines. Writers and artists aren’t machines.
So often fans of artists (music, writing, painting, games, comics, etc.) have as Gaiman puts it: entitlement issues. While I understand there are crazy people in every club, how do you think this can be minimized?
KV: Gaiman is also a favorite of mine. He hits it on the head from an artist’s perspective, naturally, but I think that fans rarely realize that they’re crossing the line with their criticisms or their expectations. I do believe artists who have essentially – made it – owe their fans the best work they can create in a timely manner. I’m just not from the school of thinking, “I’m rich now, you get what I give you. Thanks for playing.”
There needs to be a disconnection from how much of an investment you make in any art, especially your own. The only thing you’re guaranteeing is heartbreak. Rarely, if ever, do my characters end up where I hoped they would. You build the bridge and once they can walk on their own, you see where they go.
No artist is anyone’s bitch, except to their craft.
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