Dot Dead Diary

Should We Censor Ourselves?

My sister and I went over to Berkeley to see Carrie Fisher in her one-woman show, Wishful Drinking. What a life! Daughter of "America's Sweethearts," Debbie Reynolds and Eddie Fisher. Step-daughter of Connie Stevens. (What do you mean you don't remember Cricket from Hawaiian Eye?) First film playing a 1970's Lolita opposite Warren Beatty in Shampoo. Then in a life-altering role, Princess Leia Organa. Ex-wife of Paul Simon. Novelist. (You should hear her read the audiotape of Postcards from the Edge.) Top script doctor.

In the course of the show, she chats about her drug addiction, bi-polar disorder, second marriage to a guy who turns out to be gay, and good friend's death on her bed. She lowers down from the ceiling a life-size Princess Leia sex doll. She discusses her parents' break-up (Dad ran away with Elizabeth Taylor) and her mother's ill-conceived subsequent marriages. She mentions in passing one of her mother's great ideas -- that she, Carrie, should have a child with her mother's husband. (Advice not followed.) More sex, drugs, and rock & roll. One thing. Five seats over from my sister and me sat her mother. I was aghast. Carrie addressed her mom up in the mezzanine. Debbie seemed both resigned and proud. (The night before George Lucas was in the audience, and in the dressing room after the show, Carrie finally found out why he had told her on the Star Wars set that there was no underwear in outer space.)

Someone once said you should write as though your mother is dead. Carrie Fisher wasn't even fazed when her mom was in the audience. I've told my younger kids that Dot Dead is PG-32. A guy in the audience at one local bookstore asked me why the sex scenes in Dot Dead weren't grittier. I told him I was conscious that I had four kids who would read the book some day.

So I guess I do censor myself. I could never carry off what Carrie Fisher did. (OTOH, my life has not been as "interesting" as hers -- at least from a People Magazine perspective, I mean.)

Writers, do you ever censor what you write because of what your spouse, squeeze, kids, parents, or friends might think?

An Author's Got to Dream

What allows a book that sells modestly when it comes out to build momentum?  We've all heard the story of The Red Tent, which built sales through book groups and word-of-mouth until it sold millions of copies.  Same thing with The Kite Runner, which didn't take off until it came out in a trade paper format.

Of course, I dreamed of the same thing happening to Dot Dead sales.  (I also dream of the S.F. Giants winning the pennant.  What do you expect?  I write fiction where anything can happen.)  What Arthur Miller's Willy Loman says about his line of work applies to writers, too, doesn't it?  "A salesman is got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory."

Dot Dead has done well, and I'm grateful.  It's in its second printing and has a shot to go to a third.  I have not been passive in watching the sales figures.  All fall, two or three days a month, I've been out flogging the book at Bay Area bookstores.  My worst showing was 27 copies and my best around 60.  I'm probably making around $8 per hour in royalties and that doesn't count the writing time.  Still, I'm trying to get the word out and it's working.  More and more, people I talk to in these stores tell me they've read the book and enjoyed it.  Many past readers even stand with me and tell passersby to purchase the book.  Gratifying.

Despite these efforts, indicators show little chance of Dot Dead reaching some kind of tipping point.  Last fall the Palo Alto Library had 40 holds on ten copies of the book.  Now four copies have been "withdrawn" from circulation (i.e., they've been sold in the monthly library sale) and only one of the remaining six is checked out.  My Amazon.com numbers have floated up from the 2,000's to today's 131,000 and probably tomorrow's 300,000+. 

As readers of this blog know, I have finished a second manuscript.  My new year's resolution is to put my head down and get cracking on Book #3 which will be a sequel to Dot Dead.  I've got a terrific idea to hang the book on. 

I want to go out with a bang in pushing Dot Dead though.  This Saturday I will be selling and signing at Kepler's.  Head buyer Frank Sanchez thinks I can sell all 86 copies they have on hand.  Maybe.  Kepler's has sold around a thousand copies of the book.  Then Sunday I will be at the Border's at Oakridge Mall in San Jose trying to convince shoppers that Dot Dead makes a good Xmas present.  I'll let you know how it goes.

Deborah Kerr

English actors switch back and forth between stage and screen with more facility than their American colleagues.  When I lived in England, the theater was cheap and fun and amazing.  For a couple of quid, I could see Alec Guiness from the second or third row at the Oxford Playhouse (in "The National Health"), Ingrid Bergman (in "The Constant Wife"), and Wendy Hiller (in "Crown Matrimonial").  Along with these giants, I saw all-time fave Deborah Kerr in "The Day After the Fair."  When it comes to her film roles, others will remember Ms. Kerr for "From Here to Eternity with her famous beach scene with Burt Lancaster.  But for me her two best roles were in "Separate Tables" where she plays a mousy woman who defies her mother and social convention to become heroic in a small, understated way and in "Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison" where she plays a nun who resists the temptation offered by Robert Mitchum.  The "Separate Tables" cast also included David Niven, Gladys Cooper, Rita Hayworth, Rod Taylor, and the aforementioned Wendy Hiller and Burt Lancaster.  Among those stars she shined brightest.  Here's what the Times review said:  "Most brilliant and true of the performers is Deborah Kerr."  She once said:  "I adore not being me.  I'm not very good at being me. That's why I adore acting so much."

Deborah Kerr died Tuesday at age 86.  Read the Independent's obituary here.