Out Loud

And now for something completely different. Well, not completely different. It's still a pretty gay book.

You might notice this book has a different recommendation than I've used before. That's because, well, I wrote it. And I don't think I can in good conscience give you a recommendation because I can in no way be objective about it.

But what I can do is give you some of the background. I wrote this story because I wanted to read it! I saw a discussion on Discord about some people who try to narrate their way through ADHD problems like going into the next room and forgetting what you're doing. One of them suggested it would make a cute romance novel hook, and wrote a short story (and graciously allowed me to steal the idea) ... and it was like the whole plot just appeared, instantly, in my head. (Big shoutout to insomnia, which gave me whole extra days to write/edit in lieu of sleeping. Couldn't have done it this quickly without you, insomnia!)

I've always been a writer: this blog, I was a professional journalist for a bit, even as far back as middle school – I remember distinctly my 8th grade literature teacher encouraging/slightly bullying me (in that teacher-y "you have so much potential please for the love of god don't waste it" way) that I would write a book one day. And I've dabbled, tried and failed a few times, but I always fell down at the plotting level. Sure, I could pound out 60K words for NaNoWriMo, but I couldn't figure out how to sensibly connect one bit to the next.

It wasn't until I sat down and actually started trying to commit this story to words that I accepted the freedom of creation: I can make the plot work however I want. I don't have to make absolutely everything string together perfectly – you'll notice throughout there are several decorative geometric shapes that serve as essentially "plot periods," in that sense that periods tell a reader to take a pause.

"This is the end of this part; the next part might happen immediately after, or with a time jump" is what they're trying to tell the reader. Lazy? Absolutely. But it's also how my brain thinks of stories.

Similarly, I know that my fiction writing overflows with interiority – so much of the work is driven from inside the character's head. This is simply how I experience the world, overthinking and overanalyzing. It is almost certainly not going to be for everyone! (And, I imagine, would get tiring to read two or three works in the same style.) It's a lesbian literary bottle episode.

I'm OK with that! Because I've tried to write the other way and the story comes off (to me) as languid and limp. I actually have an entire draft of a book I doubt I'll ever go back and finish simply because I tried to write in not my style, and ye gods do I hate it.

A note on publishing: It sucks. There are lots of authors out there who are making a go of it via independent publishing (and fewer but still some number with traditional publishing): I salute them, and wish them all success.

I did my research into it and it looked like a pain in the ass. I already have one job; I don't need a second.

So this book (I think it's very technically a novel, clocking in at just over 45K words. I originally thought it would be a novella, but I was determined to let the story be exactly as long as it felt like it needed to) is available for free. You can download the epub over on the books page. (I have a books page!)

I also wanted to do a paperback edition, mostly because I wanted a copy on my bookshelf. Given that the simplest way to do that is through Amazon (and I wanted it to be available for people on Kindle, because I know sideloading is not for everyone), I listed it through Amazon at the lowest prices possible - ebook, that's $.99, and the paperback was (when I set it) something like $8.50, which was the lowest price I could use while still getting expanded distribution. (This option also theoretically allows me to tell local bookstores about it and see it on a shelf. I don't expect to make money on it, I just think it'd be neat.) It's also available for free through Kindle Unlimited, if that's your thing.

I don't like Amazon; but for my purposes, it works. And the epub is, again, available for absolutely nothing on the books page. If you're someone with Book Knowledge (or if you're an agent or a publisher or whatever) who knows of a (cheap, non-time-intensive) way to accomplish the above without Amazon, please drop me a line at hello [at] kait [dot] dev.

So yeah, here's a book from a critic. I hope you enjoy it. My goal with the whole thing was to write a story I would enjoy, and I accomplished that. If other people read it and maybe derive a bit of happiness from it, all the better.

If you don't like it, I did come up with some starter criticism you can feel free to use:

• "A pale imitation of DFW's literary logorrhea without even the structure of footnotes."
• "Never has so much been written about so little."
• "Lazy stalking, but pretend it's romantic."

I also have another book (more in the literary fiction vein, but still about queer folks) I've been editing for like six months that I may ever finish one day but, for now, I'm proud of this one.