I have – probably naturally - a great deal of affection for fiction writers who use the internet as a means of publication. There’s a sense of pride that you can get from internet fiction that is sometimes missing when something gets published through more traditional means. That isn’t to say that print-published writers are less proud of their work – rather, it’s about the visible pride, that pride that you can see. When fiction writers get the chance to tell others that their work is available now, for free – no monies! – and that three hundred people have read it so far, there is something tangible there. You never look at the Guardian literary supplement and read about this writer who is just really, really happy that Harper Collins are offering him a two-book deal. It isn’t news. On the internets, however, that’s a pretty big thing.

At the end of this post will be some links to fictional blogs, writers who write about fiction, and that sort of thing. You probably owe it to yourself to look at them, even if it’s just a cursory glance, to see if they are your sort of thing, and to see if you would maybe buy it and read it if it were in the shops. Because, in this day and age, how can we believe that we don’t have an influence?

Case in point: someone in a comment on this here blog alerted me to The Daily Monster, which is sort of out of my safety zone, but we’ll hang convention for a second. This site features artwork of a new monster created daily by a chap called Stefan, and then the readers of the blog are invited to create background stories for the characters in the comments. Great idea. It is fictional (kind of), and community generated (which we all love, right?) and, more importantly, is going to be published. Why? Well, I’m willing to bet that it’s because it’s pretty popular. If enough people shout about something then the ‘right’ people (whomsoever they might be) invariably sit up and listen. Just look at Postsecret (which, incidentally, I am still dying to find out more about re: their problems with fiction writers, storytellers and liars – do they just assume that everyone tells the truth?).

God, look at the examples given by this year’s Blooker awards! I am very much of the Believer school of thought here – as I have said many times before – and I would rather not single out anything for negative reasons. But some of the writing of the winners/runners up is patchy at best. Some of it is great and heartfelt and passionate and actually intelligent. But some of it is substandard. And this is the benchmark completion, “our” Booker prize! Until, that is, you look at the criteria. See, it’s actually the LuluBlooker prize, and is actually sponsored by self-publishing gurus Lulu. Lulu is a great site: they claim that they aren’t vanity publishing, and use very vague terms about what they actually do, but, essentially, you give them a book, some money and a cover design and they will stick your book on shopping search engines and sell it for you. And some people are making money by selling stuff through it, and there are, inevitably, some really good writers there. But there are issues.

I’ve always been told that any publisher worth their salt will never make the writer pay for anything. There’s no such thing as “reading fees” or the like in the publishing world. And you don’t pay “preliminary editor’s fees”. They give you editors. For free. And that is the problem with Lulu, and, simultaneously, the problem with web/blog fiction: Editors.

I’m lucky. I have a PhD tutor and a really good writer friend (also doing a PhD) and a girlfriend with a good eye to help me edit my stuff at the moment. That’s three people who will see my novel before I send it to agents and publishers. But some people don’t have those people. And I think I’m a pretty good editor as well. I have two types of feedback – feedback for those who write for fun and feedback for those who want to make a career of it (and the former is mainly dominated by “Did I like the story?”, the latter by “How was the story, writing, style, spag etc, and would people read this?”). But many people either don’t an editor, or don’t actually want one – self-belief can be a terrifying thing.

And this is the issue with the Blookers. Lots of news outlets reported on them, and that’s fabulous, as there’s some real publicity for a format typically ignored by the mainstream. But then if you clicked through to the blogs and read some of them blogs that were nominated you might be put of the form forever (and there’s one, in particular, that was a runner up and is really quite appallingly written). But when you look at the remit – the top blogs that have been turned into published books – you assume that this is giving credence to their efforts. It doesn’t make it clear anywhere that they can be self-published to count! And that’s the ridiculous thing: I could turn around tomorrow and publish this very blog here via Lulu and submit it for the competition. Would that make me a ‘published author’? Only by the very skin of rather negotiable teeth!

And I think that people aren’t terribly willing to shout about quality as far as the internet is concerned. If you went onto someone’s fiction blog and left a comment that tidied up some language, or made writing tips, you’d probably be termed ‘teh troll’ (or some-such similar insult). But you’re only giving advice! So, what to do? Well, that’s well out of my hands, and yours, and probably anyone else in the world. There are very few ways to legitimise the use of the internet as a mass-publishing tool, no ways to enforce quality controls on things that you aren’t uploading to your own servers, and no ways to stop people doing things that they enjoy (as that distinction between fiction writers I mentioned before, the “for fun” and “for reals” ones? That exists here too, and, let’s face it – this is the perfect place for it). And I would never dream of telling anyone to stop what they are doing. But for those of us for whom it matters, there must be another way. Anyone want to suggest it?

*****

So, onto some links. First off, shout outs to one of the two people who have pimped their blogs in the comments of this site over the last few months. The simply-titled Stories is somebody’s blog where they write short stories. Simple idea, simply presented, and they may be your kind of thing. For myself, I think it’s great to see someone write short fiction on the net and not get bogged down by the presentation and hypertextual niceties. Next, Horton’s Folly, which I may have mentioned before - I can’t remember, such are the many words I have written for this here site - but it’s great. It’s comedy fiction, funny and stylised and, on occasion (or, actually, most of the time), veers further from the fiction than the comedy, but, regardless. It’s worth checking out. The Doorbells Of Florence is quite the thing as well, some beautifully written stories each hidden behind a doorbell. Great idea.

Then, there’s those sites about blogging that are worth visiting. Novelr is superb, and really good for keeping up with these things. Then there’s Betsy’s Journal (or, as it now seems to be called, Betsy’s Phony Bologna). Betsy and I are doing our theses on pretty much the same topic (hers is on general blog and web fiction, mine is on the corellation between blogs, ARGs and the internet and printed fiction, but, really, they do cross over an awful amount). I’m going to start sticking far more links up at the side of this blog as I really start looking at my Critical Component to the thesis and revisiting many of the blogs that I have links to and may have ignored over time.

Visit them all, and tell them I sent you. They won’t know who I am, but it might make them feel warm inside.