Tuesday.
It is coming.
I get funny looks sometimes when I wear Sex Wax T-shirts. Then I look down and see I've forgotten to put on trousers.
Again.
Seriously, though, most people don't have any idea what Sex Wax is, so they assume the shirts have some subliminal prurience, which, maybe they do. If you live on the beach in California (and you surf), there is only one thing you think about when you see the familiar circular logo, though. Well, actually two, because you would also think about how great Sex Wax smells.
Anyway, not that I'm into product placements in my books or anything [Dear Mr. Zogs, I would like some more shirts - size L - and a couple pucks of your amazing-smelling surf wax], but I am definitely not opposed to naming brands of things when they are more than just generic stuff in the story.
And Mr. Zogs Sex Wax [yes, it bothers me tremendously that there is no apostrophe on Zogs, which means that Zogs is actually Mr. Zogs's name and not Zog, which would mean the brand name is not possessive in this case] plays some minor yet significant role in Stick, which is coming out on Tuesday.
I am still in the undisclosed secret location, by the way.
Over the last two nights, I have had the pleasure of having dinner and drinks with two of my trusted writing friends, Yvonne Prinz (dinner), and Michael Grant (Um... uh...).
Yvonne wrote The Vinyl Princess and All You Get is Me, and Michael wrote everything else that is published in YA. Actually, among Michael's writing credits are the GONE series, and a new one that sounds really freakily amazing called BRZRK.
Michael is so good he does not even need to use vowels.
Anyway, it's good for writers to have a few real friends who also do what they do because writing is, by nature, such a self-absorbed preoccupation, and you need to pull your head up once in a while from the ostrich hole to see if the other ostriches have been eaten by lions and shit like that.
It's been a good four days here at the undisclosed secret location.
I will be home tomorrow.
14 comments:
You need to start marketing Donato Brand: Milk of the Poppy.
And Michael is so cool it's scary. I really need to read his book(s).
I never thought to think that there may be people who don't know about Sex Wax. And that possessive thing--Zog? Zogs? Who is Zog, anyway, and do we really want to know, or is it better to keep that in the soft focus of mystery, because that is a lot more fun?
Glad you got up to some serious fun with fine people.
Actually, Kristen, I could tell you about Zogs because when I was writing the book, the whole no-apostrophe thing really bothered me. I think it bothered Anne, my copy editor, too. So I researched the history of the stuff.
Actually, I have GONE sitting here, next up in my to-be-read pile and pretty darn excited about that.
The ostrich/lions analogy cracked me up. So very true.
(By the way, that Zogs thing would make me crazy, too.)
Glad it's been such a good trip.
During our two-man writer's conference at a very nice bar that overlooked the San Francisco Bay, the city and Golden Gate Bridge, my daughter (who is somewhat starstruck by Michael) snuck down to join us. It was at that moment Michael and I realized the sheer awesomeness of overtaking the world by arranging a marriage between his fourteen-year-old son and my fourteen-year-old daughter.
This is how writing empires are established.
We'll rule the world, ah hah hah hah!
Excellent, succinct description of apostrophe-free brand names, Andrew. Yes, Mr. Zogs made me itch a bit, but thanks to the miracle that is the Internet, I made his acquaintance.
I'm curious: Have you started wearing a Saint Fillan's medal under the Sex Wax T-shirt?
As a wee lad, I remember thinking Zog had to be either a crusty, old surf rat who had lost his birth name, or an alien life form from some arid, beach-less planet.
By the way, I hadn't seen the Sex Wax logo in so many years. Thanks for bringing back the memories, Andrew.
Non
The allusions make me feel so giddy!
The allusions make me feel so giddy!
Oh wow.
M--you gotta read MG's books. It's part of the whole revolution thing.
A--I hope to have that conversation at some point.
H--Gone is literally always gone from the classroom lending library. Today we watched trailers for some of the other books in the series. Several kids: "What happens when they turn sixteen?" Me: Thank you for that show of intellectual curiosity, which I now reward by telling you to go and read the book." Then I gave them granola bars because the cute factor was really high.
A--Family alliances. Empires. The Macallan.
Hellskitchen--what a great question.
N--you make me smile.
J--I like the allusions as well.
Anne, I am going to look for a St. Fillan medallion. Also, I need one of St. Kazimierz, who is a very important character in the book I just wrote, which, by the way is the ONLY book I have written that I have gotten a tattoo of one of the characters (not St. Kazimierz) on my body. It is all quite the secret, though.
You are so full of it, Andrew. I love it.
Not making that up at all, Matthew. I will probably put pictures up one of these days.
That is the truth.
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