Dr. Hack Tees Off--Hacktastic Suckage #1

For One More Day
Mitch Albom

NOW, WHEN I SAY I SAW MY DEAD MOTHER, I mean just that. I saw her. She was standing by the dugout, wearing a lavender jacket, holding her pocketbook. She didn't say a word. She just looked at me.

[That's too bad. She should have shot you in the head when she realized you'd grow up to write terrible sentimental schlock.]

I tried to lift myself in her direction then fell back, a bolt of pain shooting through my muscles. My brain wanted to shout her name, but there was no sound from my throat. I lowered my head and put my palms together. I pushed hard again, and this time I lifted myself halfway off the ground. I looked up.

[A bolt of pain? Wow. How about this bolt from my crossbow, casually decapitating your sorry ass. Why was there no sound from your throat? Oh, right, because I just kicked you in the trachea.]

She was gone.

[Aw. My heart's breaking.]

I don't expect you to go with me here. It's crazy, I know. You don't see dead people. You don't get visits. You don't fall off of a water tower, miraculously alive despite your best attempt to kill yourself, and see your dearly departed mother holding her pocketbook on the third-base line.

[Good. I'm not planning on going with you 'here'. Dumbfuck. It's a shame you didn't try a little harder.]

I have given it all the thought that you are probably giving it right now; a hallucination, a fantasy, a drunken dream, the mixed-up brain on its mixed-up way. As I say, I don't expect you to go with me here.

[Hey, thanks for giving me about a million jumping off points here, Mitchy. The more times you tell me you don't expect me to go with you, the more inclined I am to send you on your happy way to Hack Hell all by your lonesome. And seriously, "mixed-up brain on its mixed-up way"? What kind of bullshit lame ass description is that? Oh, right. I forgot. Your reader base consists of the barely literate female rhesus monkeys that think Jesus is coming back for the faithful as soon as President Bush starts nuking the planet.]

But this is what happened. She had been there. I had seen her. I lay on the field for an indeterminate amount of time, then I rose to my feet and I got myself walking. I brushed the sand and debris from my knees and forearms. I was bleeding from dozens of cuts, most of them small, a few bigger. I could taste blood in my mouth.
[I don't care how long you were laying in the field, dumbass. Just tell me you were laying there, I get the point. This is an insubstantial sequence, don't fuck it up with a timeline.]

I cut across a familiar patch of grass. A morning wind shook the trees and brought a sweep of yellow leaves, like a small, fluttering rainstorm. I had twice failed to kill myself. How pathetic was that?

[You know, Mitch. I've walked on some patches of grass in my time. Not a single one has been familiar. I like to think I'm an observant, fairly astute guy, but if you held two blades of grass up to my face and asked me which one rang a bell, I couldn't fucking tell you. Know why? BECAUSE THERE ARE LITERALLY MILLIONS OF ACRES OF FUCKING GRASS OUT THERE, AND IT'S ALL THE SAME SHIT. Oh yeah, and the best part, your suicide attempts: Totally pathetic. Don't ask a rhetorical question if you can't handle the answer. At this point it just pisses me off that you screwed up the first time.]

I headed toward my old house, determined to finish the job…

[My Hacksense tells me, because you're Mitch fucking Albom, you'll screw the pooch, manage to live, then drone on for another couple hundred pages in truly pathetic fashion. Asshole. Use a gun next time.]

***

MY FATHER ONCE TOLD ME, "You can be a mama's boy or a daddy's boy. But you can't be both."

[Sounds like a dick.]

So I was a daddy's boy. I mimicked his walk. I mimicked his deep, smoky laugh. I carried a baseball glove because he loved baseball, and I took every hardball he threw, even the ones that stung my hands so badly I thought I would scream.

[Mitch, buddy. You're telling us about completely banal facets of our every day life like they're some deep insight. Your protagonist here is clearly male, and guess what? We all try to impress our fucking fathers when we're kids, you hooker.]

When school was out, I would run to his liquor store on Kraft Avenue and stay until dinnertime, playing with empty boxes in the storeroom, waiting for him to finish. We would ride home together in his sky blue Buick sedan, and sometimes we would sit in the driveway as he smoked his Chesterfields and listened to the radio news.

[Finally. A decent chunk of description. Know why? Because you aren't bothering to pollute it with any of these 'deep, penetrating' cardboard explorations of yours. You're just telling the fucking story.]

I have a younger sister named Roberta, and back then she wore pink ballerina slippers almost everywhere. When we ate at the local diner, my mother would yank her to the "ladies'" room her pink feet sliding across the tile while my father took me to the "gents'." In my young mind I figured this was life's assignment: me with him, her with her. Ladies'. Gents'. Mama's. Daddy's.

[That's because you were a stupid kid who probably rode the short bus.]

A daddy's boy.

[Yes. We covered that.]

I was a daddy's boy, and I remained a daddy's boy right up to a hot, cloudless Saturday morning in the spring of my fifth grade year. We had a doubleheader scheduled that day against the Cardinals, who wore red wool uniforms and were sponsored by Connor's Plumbing Supply.

[Sweet Jesus Christ, Mitch. How many different times are you going to tell us you were a daddy's boy? Fuck. We get it. Great. Did your daddy do something to you when you were a kid? Is that what all this is about? You seem to be dancing around some deep, hidden abuse. Let it out, Mitch. C'mon. Entertain us.]

The sun was already warming the kitchen when I entered in my long socks, carrying my glove, and saw my mother at the table smoking a cigarette. My mother was a beautiful woman, but she didn't look beautiful that morning. She bit her lip and looked away from me. I remember the smell of burnt toast and I thought she was upset because she messed up breakfast.

[Yeah. Because a career mom A) Screws breakfast up that bad, B) Bothers to get upset if she burned your eggs a little. Now I know why this protagonist is such a pussy: his parents are histrionic wrecks who can't even handle a couple chicken fetuses over easy, and for some reason, this is a well-known enough scenario so that Our Hero here already expects his mother to be a broken down wreck in the morning.]

"I'll eat cereal," I said.

[Whatever. When my mom was in a bad mood, I just grabbed the fucking cereal. I didn't bother opening dialog with her over my breakfast decisions. Asshole.]

I took a bowl from the cupboard.

She cleared her throat. "What time is your game, honey?"

["Fuck you, you lousy bitch."]

"Do you have a cold?" I asked.

["No, your father and I just had anal sex for the first time though, and I'm a little uncomfortable."]

She shook her head and put a hand to her cheek. "What time is your game?"

["Whatever, walk it off you slut. My game? Fuck, I don't know. Whenever I feel like showing up. The bastards are lucky to have me."]

"I dunno." I shrugged. This was before I wore a watch.

[Uh. In what universe does not wearing a watch mean you don't know the time of your game? Do you now have one of those atomic wrist watches that keep perfect time, and give periodic updates, "Mitch, your baseball game is at 3:00. Mitch, your baseball game is at 3:00," in a robotic voice? You know, when I played baseball? THEY TOLD US THE FUCKING TIME OF THE NEXT GAME AT THE END OF THE LAST ONE. I NEVER GOT THE TIME FOR A GAME FROM MY FUCKING WATCH, I JUST USED IT TO MAKE SURE I SHOWED UP ON TIME.]

I got the glass bottle of milk and the big box of corn puffs. I poured the corn puffs too fast and some bounced out of the bowl and onto the table. My mother picked them up, one at a time, and put them in her palm.

[How touching.]

Excerpted from FOR ONE MORE DAY by Mitch Albom. Copyright © 2006 Mitch Albom. All rights reserved. Available wherever books are sold.
---------------------------------

This excerpt goes on for another two pages, but I can't take any more of this. Ugh. What a piece of shit.

Need advice? Sure you do. E-mail Dr. Hack and he'll set you straight.

New Dr. Hack Feature

Welcome to the latest, greatest Dr. Hack innovation:

Hacktastic Suckage

Because there aren't enough brutally honest assholes in the world, the Dr. Hack team has made an executive decision to implement a new feature called, Hacktastic Suckage.

Q.
What is Hacktastic Suckage?

A.
Hacktastic Suckage is where Dr. Hack reviews a sample of your fiction writing on his blog, and tells you why it's awful.

Q.
This doesn't sound like very much fun. Who in their right mind is going to send you samples of their writing hoping to see it eviscerated?

A.
You are.

Q.
What are the submission guidelines?

A.
Send me a sample of your fiction, 500 words or less. If it sucks worse than a group of Greecian farm women working on a couple goats in the countryside for a low-fi porno, Dr. Hack won't blow any smoke up your ass. If it's good, he'll tell you why. If it's good in parts and bad in others, he'll praise you and tear you down in alternating strokes, because he's a little bi-polar like that.

Disclaimer: Dr. Hack's taste is totally subjective, and he hates bad writing. That means pretty much anything that he didn't write is awful.

Q.
Oh yeah? Well this is a new feature, so what are you going to do until people start sending you their writing?

A.
Sift through the web and co-opt samples from pieces of published fiction on excerpt pages, fan fiction sites, writers collectives, and other blogs.

Q.
This all sounds pretty immature, and anyway, I heard some of your comments were deleted on the Evil Editor blog because you were being an asshole.

A.
This is true. They were. However, I'd like to state here that I dig Evil Editor. Whatever he does on his blog is his prerogative. Far be it for me to complain or whine about it. He has a cool thing going on, and I'm just trying to steal some of his thunder. This is what investors refer to as competition in the free market place of ideas, which is good for everyone.

Q.
Why can't you just be constructive and helpful?

A.
Because it's not as fun.

Also, simply because the feedback will be negative for the most part doesn't mean it's not constructive. Looking deep into his empty little existential soul, Dr. Hack asks, what is constructive?

In these dark days of rampant political correctness and you-felch-me I'll-felch-you compliments, it seems to mean everyone forms a huge circle jerk and kicks off an insipid love fest full of comments like, "Oh, this is great. Really great. You're such a good writer," when in fact they really aren't. Likewise, many times people feel they have to say something nice such as, "I don't usually read this kind of stuff, and you need to lop off a couple paragraphs at the beginning, but this was actually pretty good," when in fact, it's actually full of Hacktastic Suckage, and if they just had a pair, they'd come right out and say it.

Dr. Hack says screw the kid gloves.

Returning to the question, "What is constructive?" he says anything that helps you grow as a writer, including hearing, "You suck," over and over and over again, is constructive.

It's all how you take the feedback--with a little grain of salt, if you're smart. Here's to developing some thick-ass skin.

Q.
Are we done yet, you boring, pontificating bastard?

A.
Yes. Now send me your writing samples, and brace yourself. It's going to get more bloody than a turkey farm a month before Thanksgiving around here.


Have writing questions, or need your confidence deflated? Sure you do. Send an e-mail to Dr. Hack and he'll rake you over the coals. For free.

Need advice? Sure you do. E-mail Dr. Hack and he'll set you straight.

Handling Rejection Like A Pro

Dear Dr. Hack,

I've written two novels. My first earned me a bunch of rejections, but I didn't let it get me down. I shuffled it off to the closet, then started work on my second. My latest piece of work is probably the best thing I've ever written, but it's not having any better luck than the first.

I'm getting pissed off and discouraged. I've been through at least 20 agents already. What should I do? How do I keep on keepin' on despite all these coked out assholes who won't give my novels the time of day just because I've never been published before?

--Struggling


Dear Struggling,

Am I the only one who's tired of reading the same old passel of Shiny Happy People troll away on writing websites about what an edifying experience rejection is?

Who are these people? Do they hammer nails through their hands for fun when they're not busy getting the crap kicked out of their ego?

What I'm supposed to say at this point sounds something like:

"Keep at it, buddy. It'll pay off in the long run. Think about what you can learn from those rejections. How has this experience spurred you on to become a better writer? Think positive. Then go write an article for a second-tier e-zine on how to handle being a lame-ass failure."

Yeah. Fuck that.

Here's a better idea: Get really, stupendously hammered.

Better yet, for the next two weeks straight, as soon as you wake up in the morning, take a few quick shots of your favorite hard liquor. Proceed immediately to the word processor, and begin revising your second novel. Imbibe one shot every hour, on the hour, until finished.

Write like a maniac. Write the next Great American Novel. Write deathless, rambling, sloshed literature. It worked for Faulkner and Hemingway, it just might work for you. It's all about sacrifice. Are you willing to give up that liver for immortality, or are you just another half-assed whiner who isn't willing to put in the hard drinking?

Since we're on the subject, snag some drugs too. Good ones. None of this low-impact bullshit like hydrocodone, marijuana, caffeine, or a jar or two of rubber cement.

I'm talking the heavy hitters. It's a well known fact that Bret Easton Ellis penned Less Than Zero in three weeks while high on crystal-meth. Maybe a little pick-me-up at the end of a smoking hot glass pipe is just what you need to pump some out some robust, irresistible literary genius.

And hey, look at the bright side. Even if all this debauchery doesn't up your percentage of requests for full manuscripts, it'll take the edge off ending up in the crap heap.

Need advice? Sure you do. E-mail Dr. Hack and he'll set you straight.

Publicity whores

Dear Dr. Hack,

I'm a first-time novelist who just landed an agent. I'm very excited, but there's this issue of my platform. The agent wants me to work on starting a blog and building an audience, even if it's a small one, before my book hits the shelves (she warned me selling the novel could be a long process, and that I'd have plenty of time to build a blog audience).

But I don't know. It seems like there are so many blogs out there. If you look at most of these authors, no one even comments on their sites, it's really depressing. This doesn't seem like the best way to go. Do you have any suggestions? Thanks.

--Pubhungry


Dear Pubhungry,

You're in luck. I do have a better way. That's right, it's time for:

DR. HACK'S MASTER MARKETING SERIES--METHOD 2:

Get arrested. No no, hear me out. I know what you're thinking, so I have one simple question. How bad do you want it?

Want it bad enough? Then you're only one major felony away from fame, fortune, and glory.

Now, of course, just getting arrested won't cut it. If you're pulled over driving down the highway and Ye Olde Officer finds a dime bag of pot or an open container riding shotgun, you'll just be shooting yourself in the foot.

These kind of every day misdemeanors are an occupational hazard for the would-be novelist. So you need to do something really jaw dropping. I wouldn't recommend any wanton violence; running into a convenience store and shooting the clerk probably won't cut it. You'll get your name in the local paper, maybe a small AP piece, at best.

Sitting in a belltower somewhere and picking off civilians might do the trick, but you really don't want to go to prison for life. It'll negate all the enjoyable parts of that fame and fortune.

So, what you need is something unique that has broad commercial appeal. Something the big TV networks will run with for at least a full news cycle.

In this category you have plenty of fun and entertaining options. You could:

A) Fly to Washington DC. Make your way to 1600 Pennsylvania, strip naked in front of the White House, hop the fence, and streak across the front lawn wearing only a sandwich board that says, "READ MY NEW NOVEL," until a gaggle of Secret Service grunts more pissed off than a swarm of hornets pour out of the woodwork and tackle you to the ground.

B) Walk into a major broadcast studio with two ten-round magazines and a gas cooled Armalite AR-10 (T), hold up the producers, then promote your book at gunpoint on the Today Show until the cavalry shows up. (Make sure you don't kill anyone.)

C) Hijack the Goodyear Blimp and drop pamphlets all over a major metropolitan area that say, "Cast off the yolk of your Imperialist oppressors! Rise up, Workers! Unite!" with a brief plug for your book at the end. Since the Goodyear Blimp is a major American icon, the military won't blow it out of the sky with a couple squadrons of F-14s while the whole world is watching.

See how this works, Pubhungry? Sure, you'll probably end up in the slammer for awhile, but this is the ticket.

If you've got the guts, by the time you get out of the joint, you'll not only be a worldwide celebrity, your book will have sold millions. Not to mention a lucrative non-fiction book deal, and a river of money flowing in from Hollywood execs who want to option the rights to your story for a daytime movie special.

Now get to it. The sooner you get locked up, the sooner you get out.

Need advice? Sure you do. E-mail Dr. Hack and he'll set you straight.

Moral Quandry

Dear Dr. Hack,

I see this question going around quite a bit on agent's blogs. Unpublished writers, like me, want to know what to do without publishing credits. Most of these agents and editors tell everyone that making up credits, even small ones, is a bad idea. To me though, reading these agents, since they're all pretty unanimously against it, I'm thinking this is a conspiracy. I think agents just want you to not make up credits, so when you send your query letter in stating no previous experience, they know to toss it right away. Can you help me out here?

--Scurrilous554


Dear Scurrilous,

I have some good news. As an unpublished novelist, making up publishing credits is ALWAYS a good idea. Not so much if you're a non-fiction writer, but if you write fiction, and I highly suspect you do, making up a modest list of credits is one of the best things you can do to jump start your career.

First, yes. Agents tell you not to include a list of credits because they hate newbies, and not having any publishing credits practically screams, "greenhorn, know-nothing asshole who won't make me any money even if he CAN write," and they won't even bother requesting a full.

This is one of those big "in jokes," that agents perpetuate on their journals, just to screw with everyone and keep the old guard publishing world firmly entrenched.

The reason it's a smart move to make up publishing credits is pretty simple: you're a fiction writer, you make stuff up for a living, right? What's a little white lie or two to get your foot in the door?

After you've managed to get an agent to read your full, then just go ahead and tell them you made up the pub credits. They'll be impressed at your go-getter attitude and savvy ability to bend the truth to suit your needs.

Now, we do live in the age of Google, so it's not just a simple matter of manufacturing some made up awards or magazines no one's ever heard about. Deciding HOW to lie is almost as important as deciding TO lie, and flawless execution is required so you don't raise suspicion.

Here's where you really crank it up. What you need to do is find someone who's published a few pieces here and there on various e-zines. Low-rent stuff for the most part, but if you can find someone who's been in, say, Identity Theory, one or two times, you won't be hurting yourself.

Then, open up your manuscript. Highlight the part that says, "By Scurrilous Writer," and write, "By [guy who actually has the pub credits]."

This next part is important, so pay attention: do not copy the exact spelling of their name on your manuscript. Change one or two letters that could pass as legitimate typos.

Then, on your query letter, DO copy the name exactly.

Here's a little vignette to show you why and how this works:

Agent receives your query letter. Query letter is well written (better be, I can't help you here), and a list of modest publishing credits piques interest. Agent goes to Google, types in the name you've provided in the header verbatim. Bing. A couple short stories pop up, which they probably don't read, they were just checking. They then turn to your enclosed sample pages which has your fabricated name with the intentional typo, which you will be claiming henceforth to be the correct spelling of your name. They dig the sample pages. On the strength of your query, credits, and writing, they ask for a full. Agent never notices discrepancy between spellings. [end vignette]

And that's all there is to it. Welcome to easy street. Go get 'em.

Need advice? Sure you do. E-mail Dr. Hack and he'll set you straight.

Fantasizing

Dear Dr. Hack:
Fantasy seems to be a hot seller, so I want to try my hand at it, but I don't want to have to read any of those god-awful books to find out what the fantasy story arc tends to be. Could you please give me a formula so I can just plug in the names?

--Clueless2007


Dear Clueless,

Many a writer looking to cash out after years of fruitless obscurity while laboring over some would-be literary classic ponder "slumming it," among various, low-brow genres in order to turn a quick buck.

What most don't realize is that it's no pipe dream. There are veritable mountains of easy money just waiting for a passable hack at the end of the gimme rainbow.

What keeps many of these would-be literary writers from cashing in on bad taste are minor inconveniences like standards and integrity. They believe they actually have to read the given genre first, but I'll be the first to tell you, this is a load of crap and only slows you down.

For not wanting to read any of the godawful books in the genre before setting out to cash in on the craze, I can't say I blame you. Most of it is really, truly unbearable diarrhea.

I would recommend, however, giving Tolkien's "Lord of The Rings," a try, as it's more literary than fantastic, and the entire latter day fantasy movement can be directly linked back to him. No need to read the carbon copies, when you can check out the original.

Now, if even that's too much a commitment, Dr. Hack understands. I did some research after receiving your question, and here are some resources:

In this genre, it's best to start with a title for your book. It's an open secret in fantasy publishing that the plot of an entire eight tome epic fits into one or two words with a high degree of accuracy. Look no further than Serendipity: Fantasy Novel Title Generator for expert help on this score. I turned up such gems as, "Elven Circle at Foonian," "Crystal of the Dream Heart," "The Faerie Summer," and "Goddess of Vengeance," in less than five minutes.

Next of course, is the template. I actually had a hard time digging up bona-fide, full scale fantasy models. It seems that the online movement rabidly defends a facade of originality, deriving a perverse joy in pretending its work has real value. I think they may be going for the understated, dead-pan humor approach here, and I highly suspect that underground IRC groups and private bulletin boards exist wherein fantasy denizens swap a "top secret," collection of four or five templates back and forth faster than swingers trade body fluids.

Since I didn't have time to infiltrate this seedy aspect of the Internet though, I settled for an e-zine article. In this piece, the secret formula for success is cleverly hidden in an essay on how to write "courageous," and "original," fantasy:

1. Create a bunch of interesting non-human characters like orcs, dragons, elves or dwarves; of course your hero should be human or nearly human.
2. Put them in a fantastical world filled with magic and secret places.
3. Open up your novel with something exciting to get the reader hooked.
4. Keep the action moving - insert a series of small obstacles that need to be overcome.
5. Foreshadow something really big that will happen (But make sure it doesn't happen in this novel though--so you can write sequels).
6. Come up with two big things that will happen, and when they are resolved, they cancel each other out so the plot hasn't advanced at all.
7. Make a big lead up to the next novel (promise the moon).
8. Repeat steps 3-7 in the next novel.

And finally of course, what would any flight of imagination be if you couldn't print it out on your very own fantasy themed paper?

Need advice? Sure you do. E-mail Dr. Hack and he'll set you straight.

Dr. Hack Iz L4m3

Dr. Hack,

Your retarded and your writing advice sucks. You probably dont even write anything and you probably think Harry Potter or something is good writing, lame.

Quit giving hard working writesr bad advice on your blog because it doesn't make anyone look stupid but you.

--Hater in Miami


Dear Hater,

Blow me.

Regards,
Dr. Hack

Need advice? Sure you do. E-mail Dr. Hack and he'll set you straight.