Monday, 23 May 2011

Full Fathom Five

I haven't seen I Am Number Four yet, but I want to. It has young, attractive action heroes with superpowers, what's not to love?

Oh, right. The author whose brainchild it is isn't allowed to claim it as his. That kind of sucks. Actually, it sucks a lot.

He's a member of Full Fathom Five, James Frey's book factory. I rather like the idea of it, in general. A writing community focused on getting things out there, with support and brainstorming from fellow writers. A think tank focused on stories. It'd be fun to work in a place like that.

But then I run into the hard realities of Full Fathom Five: the writers are overseen by James Frey, and write to his request. The writers are published under assumed names. Which'd be neat, if the whole thing were branded as a community. But it's branded James Frey, and even Oprah hates the man. Branding myself with someone else's shame isn't a particularly appealing prospect, especially since I wouldn't be making my own mark at all: I'd be contractually obligated not to.

That makes the whole concept spectacularly unappealing.

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