David Armstrong (3) (1946–)

Quite an old book now, this is more the memoir of the author, as the published author of four crime novels, than an actual 'how to'. I recognised all the downbeat descriptions of how difficult it is to get a book accepted - if you can get an agent to represent you, they might not be able to place it anyway and drop you - and if you do get one published, you're under pressure to produce a second in double-quick time. You may subsequently be dropped a few books along, as he was, by a publisher who decides you haven't sold enough copies even though all the promotion is left to the mid-list author. And then your agent does the same and you're back at square one. The best selling authors do, of course, get plenty of budget and promotion.

There is one paragraph that resonates - how you should never discuss a work in progress at the first draft stage or you will 'talk out' the book and convince your subconscious that you've already written it. That is a particular belief of mine.

The counterbalance to all this, not handled in this book which only mentions self publishing in passing as something expensive, is the whole self publishing industry which has grown up since this book was written. Marketing and selling one's self-published book is a whole discussion in itself, of course, with its own frustrations, but does at least hold out a ray of hope - more than this book, which repeatedly, in a heavy-handed 'humorous' way, advises you not to bother writing in the first place. I'm awarding it 2 stars, mainly for that useful advice I've mentioned above.… (meer)

I picked this book up yesterday and this morning I recieved my fourth rejection letter for my novel: it seemed like the perfekt time to start reading it. Even if I am so lucky to get my novel published at some point (I'm starting to lose hope, but whatever), this is pretty much what I can look forward to.

I guess it's not that bad? I did very much like that this is written by a midlist author who had stayed a midlist author (well, I don't know what he is now, but at the time of the writing. I've never heard of him before, so I doubt he's a household name these days). At first I was like "but why are YOU writing this book? You're a nobody!", but that's kinda the point. He knows what he's talking about. There's not "oh, I remember back when I was unknown and no one read my books"; he's still there. So he knows how it is.

At some points the author seems a biiit bitter about his work (especially the chapter on reviews), but I'll forgive him that, especially since a lot of other chapters were really funny. Xylophones might be the best one, but there were really funny passages in other chapters as well.

I would actually recommend it to anyone aspiring to be a writer. The title is extremely misleading (not a lot of writing advice, nothing about how not to write a novel), but it's still a good read and kinda reassuring for us non-published dreamers.… (meer)

The subtitle of this book, Confessions of a Midlist Author, is more accurate than its main title. Whilst Armstrong's book is written conversationally and light-heartedly, and contains some good advice and insight into what being a writer really means for 90% of writers, I found it to be a rather dispiriting and wearying endeavour.

First of all, it is little concerned with the act of writing: very early on Armstrong makes the distinction between writing and publishing. Book publishing comes across as a rather decrepit industry, with supply massively outweighing demand and publishers therefore feeling uninclined to even read unsolicited manuscripts, let alone publish them, nor even promote the ones they do publish. Many writers, Armstrong tells us, earn a third of the minimum wage from their novels. Getting published is evidently a different skill from writing well, and often as depressingly reliant on background and 'who you know' as the more conventional and immobile careers writers are often trying to escape from.

This alone would be a disconcerting picture for Armstrong to paint, but the fact that he does not really seek to express the joys of writing (fiction-writing is presented as an addiction rather than artistic inspiration or craft) means the book is heavily weighted towards the depressive side of the vocation. The whole business, he asserts, is "the stuff of misery and humiliation" (pg. 207) and looks "a bit vainglorious and aspiring to success in it can look rather foolish" (pg. 238). Considering many writers are insular people and write to reconcile their dissatisfaction with other things in their lives, this view, whilst perhaps accurate and certainly candid, is not the whole story and presenting it as such is unhelpful. Almost every short chapter ends with an imploration not to 'do it', usually an explicit 'don't write that book'. It's beaten into you so repeatedly that you, the reader, the bibliophile, begins to hate books.

Indeed, whilst I admired the candidness I grew to dislike the author, which is never a pleasant experience. As other reviewers have noted, he plugs his own books a lot and whilst that is justified in that this is a memoir of his own experiences in the industry, it is perhaps misguided to be so repetitive. I know off-by-heart now that his Night's Black Angels was nominated for the CWA John Creasey Best First Crime Novel Award and that another was praised in a review as "unequivocally excellent", because Armstrong misses no opportunity to tell us. But rather than encouraging me to read these books, I began to develop an aversion to them. No doubt because he is venting some long-held home-truths about the publishing industry, Armstrong's voice becomes less humorous and more passive-aggressive; he can't help but let some of his frustration bleed through. The jocularity proves if not skin-deep then at least a bit hollow.

I should point out that I was entertained for the most part and, as I say, the book contains some good insight and advice even if it's not always what we want to hear. But my aversion to the book came not from having any dreams of writing shattered but from Armstrong's one-sided approach. There's little about the goodness in writing; it's treated like an addiction and Armstrong a survivor who has emerged on the other side 'clean'. But Armstrong's lack of success (relatively speaking, for getting his books published is impressive even if he never 'broke through' in the way he wanted) can also be put down to the fact that, to put it bluntly, he seems unoriginal. He admits his base motives: "the obsessive wish to be read" and "wanting to be seen, heard and liked" (pg. 208). He tells us how at the time he was working on his first novel, he was also sending comedy skits to TV shows and comedians (pg. 152), a fact that struck me as unintentionally tragic and depressing. He tried to write crime fiction, that most overpopulated and vanilla of genres, and never seemed to have any real message that he wanted to get out there. He might have become accomplished at plot and setting and character, but lacked the thing to set him apart. He didn't really appear to offer anything, as a crime writer, that hundreds of others weren't doing. Emphasising the importance of luck in 'making it' (pg. 151) was a welcome analysis in this regard, but Armstrong seemed to be seeking approval and acclaim rather than making a lasting piece of fiction. He wanted to make money rather than make waves.

And that's fine; I have no problem with that. But that urge to write he speaks of could have been satisfied in him by success in other areas of his life, and perhaps (hopefully) has been. It's quite different from the writer who wants to change or influence the world. Both are ego-driven, but there is a distinction. I only make the distinction here because it's important to note that Armstrong's views, whilst applicable and useful to budding writers, are not the whole story. Writing generic crime fiction is not likely to result in a successful and sustainable writing career. It doesn't mean writing can't result in a successful and sustainable career. Reading Armstrong's book is useful – perhaps essential – in removing many of the fantasies and false assumptions you might have about the life of a writer. But you shouldn't allow it to completely shatter those dreams with its blunt force, only use it to inform your views. Treat it as advice and it could be very beneficial, even if only as a devil's advocate. I suppose the lesson I gained from How Not to Write a Novel – and, to give him credit, I don't think this is unintentional on the author's part – is that it's fine to walk the path as long as you know there are monsters waiting along it. And by all means read how-to-write books, as long as you know that to be a writer you don't necessarily have to do a damn thing they say.… (meer)