If you can get a book cheaper elsewhere, fine. Don’t verbalize your thoughts. It’s rude and inconsiderate. That’s like me walking into your business, taking up your time for an hour, and then saying that I’ll spend my money at your competitor. (Come to think of it, I’ll try that sometime. Just see the looks on these people’s face.)

But most importantly, don’t declare (in a fucking sing-songy voice, no less) that you can get the paperback version of a hardcover book from Amazon when the booksellers have told you that it does not exist yet.

We’re the booksellers. We have access to publishers and distributors. You don’t. If we can get the paperback version in the store, we will do so. It’s cheaper for us, and we can sell it faster than the hardcover.

Don’t you dare challenge us or question our intelligence. If our information–which has come directly from the publishers and distributors themselves–states that the paperback isn’t out yet, IT ISN’T FUCKING OUT YET. Saying that you can get it on Amazon WILL NOT MAKE IT EXIST.

Here. I’ll illustrate.

Fuckhead.

There’s nothing more mentally draining than seeing your corpulent form waddle into the store. You just have this air about you, this arrogance born from stubborn blindness and a staggering refusal to accept reality. You certainly haven’t endeared yourself to us, but I doubt you realize that… or care.

As much as I detest you, the curious part of my brain wants to dissect your personality. It wants to find out how you work, why you’re the way you are today, and just where you think you’re going in terms of your “career.” I think I got part of an answer the last time we met.

I finished a first draft of about 141K words in three months. I didn’t expect that to impress you; I’m not saying it to impress anyone, even though I’m amazed with myself. What’s more amazing is the editing process ahead. With another draft or two, my novel is going to be even better than it was the first time around. Who wouldn’t look forward to writing a better story?

Well, there’s you.

I really should not have been surprised to hear that you don’t like editing your own work. It explains so much. I can understand the frustration and agony that comes with returning to a piece of work. But how can you just leave a first draft the way it is and declare it the final one? How can you say you don’t want to even think about looking over your work? I’ve seen your novels. God, how could I not? They’re sitting on the local authors shelf, glaring at me, tempting me to read them cover to cover and soak up the stupid like I’m in some biblio-alternative version of MST3K.

And I almost did get through the first one. Oh, I tried. But it was like eating a whole pack of lunch meat that’s about to spoil: you know it’s wrong and possibly lethal, and there’s a chance that maybe it won’t do too much cellular damage to your large intestine… but in the end, you toss that sick pack of compressed meat by-products. Because it’s just not worth it. The headache, the killer gas, the violent contractions that eventually end in the expulsion of everything you’ve eaten since you were born… it’s not worth it.

The shit-poor characterization. The sloppily indented paragraphs. The cheesy-ass dialogue. The obvious Stephen Kingness of it all. God, it’s seared into my gray matter, and no surgical tool can ever scrape it away.

No wonder an agent or editor hasn’t signed you on, and it’s no mystery that either never will. If you can’t brave even a glance at your first attempt, then you’re never going anywhere. You’ve been at this for longer than I’ve been alive, and you’ve been self-published. You’re not some undiscovered genius who’s been beaten down by elitist, snobbish publishers and agents and has found sanctuary with an overpriced printer. You’re a wasteland of plagiarizing, unimaginative so-called talent.

Ugh. It’ll be a fine day when you stop coming in, and an even better one when you step away from your keyboard and give up for good.

No love,

Me

But I seem to be a magnet for people who tell me–no, demand that I read a book, and then give their reasons why:

“It’s changed my life. I’ll never look at crawfish mucus the same way again.”

“You have to read this, you just have to! Their love is so true and complete, even if they’ve only known each other for a split second!”

“Omigod, this book is so worth your time! I, like, skipped school and work just so I could finish it. Likeomigod! I totally flunked Psych 101, butIduncare!” *giggle-smack-gum-twirl-hair*

Aside from the fervent raving, these people’s demands irk me in ways you can’t even imagine. First of all, if you tell me that a book is worth my time, you’re making some pretty big assumptions about me. Aggravatingly enough, it’s always a stranger who pulls this crap.

No one in my family or circle of friends has ever told me that a book is “worth [my] time.” Not because they’re afraid of me or because I’ve blown up at them. They know me too well to try to force a title in my already swollen to-read list. But they understand my humor and tastes; they’ll tell me about the books they’ve read. They might even suggest that I pick up one of these titles.

Suggesting and telling are two totally different things, after all.

“I really enjoyed this guy’s writing. He’s hilarious! You might enjoy this one, El…” is infinitely better than “Oh, you’ve gotta read this one! Your life will never be the same again!”

Why are you telling me to spend my precious time reading a book that I might not even enjoy? You don’t even know what I enjoy doing in my spare time. I don’t follow mainstream pop culture all that much. I’ve never watched American Idol and I make no plans to do so in the future. I’m a gal who enjoys going on TV Tropes to learn obscure trivia about Disney characters. I like to watch Super Mario Bros. cartoons. I grew up on MST3K and have done my own riffing on godawful novels. I go through phases where I read mysteries, then go on to romance, and then on to historical biographies. What the hell do you know about me?

If you must rave about how Wally Lamb wrote from the point of view of an overweight teenage girl with a peculiar obsession over a whale and ends up identifying with it (this is an actual book), and how you cried like a bitch afterwards, then do so. But don’t tell me that I HAVE to read it.

Besides, Dave Barry’s spoiled me for other male writers.

The other day, I called up two customers who had ordered a book. They were pretty snippy and, if you’ll forgive the term, a bit ghetto-fabulous, so I kind of pegged them for the “leave a message quick, bitch” types.

First impressions are tricky, though.

I didn’t want to call them, but, again, part of the job description. Just one second to dial the number, and another to get the phone ringing. One ring, two rings, three… Five seconds passed.

A woman came onto the line and began singing. I was about to break in–I’ve got little patience when it comes to telling people to pick their shit up–when I realized that I was hearing the first two seconds of a thirty-second R&B music clip.

While I listened to the woman talk about lovin’ her man ’til the break of dawn, I wondered if I could persuade my boss to give me a commission for having to endure stupidity.

Then the music faded.

I waited for the beep. One second.

Then another song began throbbing into my aural canal. Baby, baby, I neeeEEEEeeEEEEeed yooouuu…

Three seconds in, I was debating whether to just hang up and let the people call or come in for their damn order when a feminine speaking voice came on. Thinking this was one of the customers, I readied my cheery patter. But then I realized that it was part of the recording.

The two melded to create a cacophany I hadn’t heard since my second grade Christmas pageant. And that was some major ear rape.

I was able to understand this much from the slow, honey-thick voice: “Hi, you’ve reached the [baby, baby, oooh] of Dumbass and Mouthbreather. [My note: Obviously not their real names] We [uh-WOOOAAAHHH] to the phone right now, so [eeeEEEEeeEEEEEeeooohhh] message and have a bless-ed [uuunnhhh] day.” Fifteen seconds.

Back to the failed siren singing about roses, or champagne, or some other romantic crap. Another fucking thirty seconds.

“All this time, I could have been reading one-star reviews for Jane Austen on Good Reads,” I said to myself.

Then the music finally, finally faded, leaving my ears in peace.

A second of bless-ed silence.

BEEP.

It took half a second to register the sound, but after that, I knew just what to say.

“Record a normal message like the rest of the fucking world,” I said in an alternate universe where I wouldn’t be fired for saying something so nasty to a customer.

I just told them their crap had come in and they could pick it up at their earliest convenience, ending with my sweetest “thank you and have a great day.” Twelve seconds.

After hanging up, I turned the numbers over in my head until I came up with an approximate figure: 1 minute and 39.5 seconds. Just to leave a damn message.

Five more people to call. Thankfully, I had no more bit parts in Phone Call: The Musical.