The Bayer Syndrome

Packaging is one of my bugbears and my bottle of Bayer aspirin is a prime example of packaging gone mad.The box is 3 and 5/8” long x 2”. Inside, the plastic bottle with large cap is almost as big. Open the bottle, pull out a massive wad of cotton wool, and find inside 120 teensy 81 mg aspirins. T e e n s y. The aspirin take up less than a quarter of the bottle. Obviously, the cost is mostly for packaging.

The point is, I expect to pay for aspirin, not packaging.

Anyway, it made me think of two books I bought recently and didn’t get what I thought I was paying for. I know, my thought process is convoluted, but you know how one thought leads to another . . .  Both books had excerpts of the authors’ other books; I knew that when I purchased them. However, the number of pages dedicated to the story for which I paid, and the number dedicated to excerpts, was not made clear. Book A, the story took up approximately one third of the book. That’s right – only one third! The rest was excerpts of five or six of the author’s other books .Book B, the first story was 30% of the book, the next 4% a short story. The next 66% was seven chapters from another of the author’s books.

In Book A, the excerpts were two or three chapters. I thought I paid for a novel, not a shorty which is shorter than the excerpts combined. Book B – terrific stories! – but what about the seven chapter enticer? I want to read more, but don’t particularly want to pay full price for a book when I’ve already read seven chapters.

I hope this is not a trend, because I don’t care for it. I think I’ll call it the Bayer Syndrome.

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I’m almost through the second edit of Dead Demon Walking, then it goes through the Evil S process. My friend and fellow author LK Gardner-Griffie blogged about what we call Evil S, if you want to take a look. http://blog.griffieworld.com/2010/12/the-love-hate-relationship/ Evil S is tedious, it takes an age to get through, but is worth the effort. After that, I’ll leave the MS alone for a while before I take another look.

I think I’ll ask for Beta readers for Dead Demon Walking. I’ve never done that before. I do have critiquing buddies, but I think some more outside eyes would be of benefit. I would like some opinions, ideas, criticism, whatever. Look for a request on this blog. If you want to volunteer, you may be one of the lucky readers who get to tear my story to shreds.

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So, are you ready for Christmas? Bet you are. Bet you had your tree and decorations up the day after Thanksgiving. You probably have your gifts bought and wrapped, your menu planned. I have my tree up, but only because I had kiddie visitors over the weekend and they needed amusing. I gave them the decorations and let them at it. The cat pulled half the decorations off, but at least the dog didn’t eat them.

I bid you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. May all your dreams come true. Have a wonder-filled holiday season.