Deja-vue all over Again

Posted on by
3

Hydrogen bomb drill during the Cuban Missile Crisis

The Cuban Missile Crisis was one of the defining events of my generation’s childhood. On October 15, 1962, US spy-plane photos revealed installation of medium range Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba.  President Kennedy ordered a naval blockade of the island – something very close to an act of war – and announced that any missile launched by Cuba would be regarded as an attack by the Soviet Union and would trigger full retaliation.  The world stood closer to the brink than it has before or after.

In grade schools all over the country, we had almost daily hydrogen bomb drills.  I was in the 5th or 6th grade, and there wasn’t one of my classmates who did not fully comprehend the absurdity of the exercise – be sure to cover your head with your hands in the event of a thermo-nuclear blast.  There was a lot of gallows humor.  The guy on the corner who dug a fallout shelter was branded a “f**king moron,” by the guy in our crowd who knew more exotic words than the rest.

I had already formulated my plan.  The papers said we’d have 20 minutes from the time the sirens went off until the first missiles struck.  I had timed myself, and knew I could run home in 8-10 minutes.  When the real alarm went off, I was going to bolt so I could die with my family and my dog.  I found additional consolation in an unlikely place.  I had a powerful transistor radio I would listen to under the covers.  Sometimes I could tune in a fundamentalist preacher in Bakersfield.  One night, quoting scripture to prove his point, he assured everyone that God had promised not to destroy humanity with a nuclear war.  I don’t remember his logic, but I do remember sleeping like a baby that night.

All this came to mind while reading of west coast fears of radiation from Japan.

I found myself wishing that preacher was still around.  I found myself also recalling my parents’ generation.  Maybe because the second world war was so close for them, they never pretended death was something you could avoid if you just managed things well enough.  Another thing that helped was all the scientific information that was published during the missile crisis.  Rather than seeming grisly, it was a comfort to know precisely what we’d be dealing with 10 or 20 or 50 miles from the blast.  Among other things, I learned that there wasn’t even the ghost of a chance that that kind of radiation could travel across an ocean.

Still, lack of credible information on what, precisely, we are dealing with, is sorely lacking now; critics of the government are right about that.

I was recalling something else I got from that preacher in Bakersfield – something I later heard other preachers confirm – that the most often repeated phrase in the New Testament is, “Fear not.”  Same thing in eastern religions; there is a hand gesture you see in pictures of Hindu and Tibetan deities that means, “Fear not.”  It looks like the Vulcan salute, (“Live long and prosper”).

It’s hard not to fear in the face of a scary unknown.  The tactics we used to cope when they ordered us to “duck and cover” under our desks won’t work anymore.  Still, when you listen to heroes they all seem to say the same thing:  they are “nobody special,” but at the critical moment, they were thinking of someone other than themselves and trying to do what they could.  That, in a seemingly small way – that maybe is a big way after all – is available to all of us.  We can give a few dollars and say a prayer for those who are suffering.  Feel free to click on the Red Cross link in the right column of this page or go to the organization of your choice.  It’s a far better use of money than buying Iodide pills.

More About Tension

Posted on by
Reply

In my previous post, I considered literary agent, Donald Maass’, statement that “tension on every page” is the key ingredient of successful fiction.  I proposed an experiment:  open a few of your favorite books to random pages, (avoiding the obvious chills-and-thrills moments exemplified by the poster) and see if there is tension on that page.  I said I would try it with some of my favorite novels.

I’ve posted about all four of these books before.  The first two are YA fantasy novels I have read and enjoyed three or four times.  The last two are recent reads, adult fiction, that I’ve only read once but found compelling.  So here (drum roll) are my results:

Lirael (2001) by Garth Nix.

Lirael is the story of a seeming misfit and washout from a magical sisterhood, who is actually destined to spearhead the defense against an army of zombies.  Although the climax comes in a sequel, Nix breaks all kinds of rules by devoting the first 450 pages to the coming of age of Lirael and her cousin, Sam.  Three-quarters of the book passes before the battle is joined.  So why have I read this book so many times, and why do I still enjoy dipping back into certain sections?

For one thing, even Lirael’s lesser battles matter and carry public as well as private consequences.  Nix also gives us regular updates on the bad guys, so we know a storm is brewing.  For the “tension on every page” test, I opened to one of many instances where Nix reminds us of the growing menace and Lirael’s nagging self-doubts:

“It’s not so simple,” interrupted a stern-voiced Deputy, bearing down on them like a huge white cat on two plump mice.  “All the possible futures are connected.  Not being able to See where futures begin is a significant problem.  You should know that, and you also should know not to talk about the business of the Watch!”

The last sentence was said with a general glare about the room.  But Lirael, even half-hidden behind a huge press, felt it was particualrily aimed at her.

As a how-to tidbit, we have a fine example of Maass’ comments on the power of threatening images to ramp up the tension in “quiet” moments.  The Deputy does not just “approach” the girls, she “bears down on them like a huge cat on plump mice!”


The Dream-Maker’s Magic (2006) by Sharon Shinn

I reviewed this favorite here on December 10, 2010.  This randomly chosen passage really needs no additional comment – it is a great illustration of Maass’ conviction that disagreement is the factor that most easily spices up dialog:

“She thinks of him as her brother,” Sarah murmured to me one day as I paused in the act of wiping down a table to frown over at Gryffin and Emily.  “There’s no need for you to be jealous.”

Now I was frowning at Sarah.  “I’m not jealous,” I sputtered.  “I’m – what?  I don’t care if they’re friends.  Jealous.  That never occured to me.”

Sarah was smiling a little.  “Oh.  I’m sorry.  Well, maybe you’re frowning because you have a headache or something.”

“I’m not frowning,” I said, giving her a fierce smile.


The Cypress House (2011) by Michael Koryta

If I had to classify this book, I would call it a supernatural thriller, which makes its inclusion here a little unfair.  After all, thrillers have more chills and thrills than other genres, by definition.  Still, we are talking of “tension on every page,” not adrenalin on every page, which is impossible.  My criteria was, tension in a spot where “nothing is happening,” and this is what I found with a random flip of the pages:

He sat there for a while and looked at the stone.  No words of sorrow or love marked Isaac’s stay in this place.  Just those dates, and too short a time between them.

That was all right, though.  It wouldn’t have troubled Isaac, Arlen knew that.  This life was nothing but a sojourn anyhow.  A temporary stay, that of a stranger in a strange land.

“Love lingers,” Arlen said, and then he straightened, put his jacket back on so that it covered his pistol, and left the graveyard.


The Forgotten Garden (2008) by Kate Morton

Donald Maass devotes an entire chapter in his Workbook to the problem of backstory as a tension-stopper, and suggests various ways around it.  One of them is to open with a minimal amount of needed history and sprinkle more in later.  That is exactly what I found when I opened this book to Chapter Fourteen, with the heading, “London, 1900,” where we meet the third of three major characters:

Despite its meanness, the room above the Swindells’ shop was the only home Eliza Makepeace and her twin brother, Sammy, had ever known, a modicum of safety and security in lives otherwise devoid of both.  They had been born in the autumn of London’s fear, and the older Eliza grew, the more certain she became that this fact, above any other, made her what she was.  The Ripper was the first adversary in a life that would be filled with them.

It was interesting to happen upon this passage as it reminds me of several writing friends who are quite averse to narrative.  I think it has to do with a misunderstanding of the advice to “show rather than tell.”  There are times when skillful telling is exactly what a story needs.  In Morton’s hands, it is hard to imagine a more economical way to paint the initial sketch of a girl who constantly battles to rise above difficult circumstances in a difficult time.  Morton later shows us in detail what she tells us here, in a scene where Eliza and Sammy play the “Ripper game” to try to deal with their fear.

***

I tried this experiment with other books too, and found the very same thing – some sort of tension, mystery, anxiety, discomfort, or unease everywhere.  Maass supplies a name for a factor I never quite saw in such sharp relief before.  Sure, I knew a page-turner when I had one, but I didn’t quite know how the magic was brewed.  Here is a concept and a field guide that makes it easier to spot the quarry, like when you suddenly notice a lizard hidden on a pile of rocks.  Maass tells me it’s simple, and in these examples, it is.  Now it is just a matter of creating this page-turning tension, one word and one page at a time..

What Is Tension?

Posted on by
1

No, I am not playing Jeopardy; I am trying to zero in on what Donald Maass considers the make-or-break element of all successful fiction.  I posted a general appreciation of Maass, agent, author, and writer-about-writing in December: https://thefirstgates.com/2010/12/07/donald-maass-and-the-breakout-novel/

In his Writing the Breakout Novel Workbook, Maass says:

Tension on every page is the secret of great storytelling.  Everyone knows that.  Practically no one does it...It’s so simple, really, and yet so many manuscripts that arrive at my office go right back to their authors in their self-addressed stamped envelopes.  Why?  The number one reason is insufficient tension.

Tension on every page works, says Maass, and low tension does not.  Good to know, but as I have considered the subject, I’ve come to think there is much misunderstanding of what tension really means.  Especially with the rise of digital special effects, you see it in movies all the time – the delusion that enough explosions can make a good story.  At the other extreme, I know writers who don’t understand that, according to Maass, tension is independent of the fictional situation:  it can happen – or fail to happen – in any situation, be it a battle or a walk in the woods.

At its simplest, tension results from anxiety over the wellbeing of a character we care about, and in the best fiction, identify with.  The Latin roots of “tension” and “attention,” are very similar, which is interesting, for as our bodies know, attention always follows tension.

One of the most interesting sections of Maass’ Breakout Novel Workbook is Chapter 22, “Low Tension Part I:  The Problem With Tea.”  In his workshops, Maass tells writers to cut “scenes set in kitchens or living rooms or cars driving from one place to another, or that involve drinking tea or coffee or taking showers or baths.”  According to Maass, “99.9 percent” of such scenes never make it into print because they:

“…lack tension.  They do not add new information.  They do not subtract allies, deepen conflict, or open new dimensions of character…Typically scenes like these relax tension, review what has already happened, and in general, take a breather.  They are a pause, a marking of time, if not a waste of time.  They do not do anything.”

Maass spends the rest of this and the next three chapters showing examples of authors who make such potentially low-tension scenes work.  How?  But creating “a mood of unease.”  In dozens of ways, conjuring “small anxieties [that] keep us on edge,” even when nothing appears to be happening.  “Mere talk does not keep us glued to the page,” says Maass, but, “disagreement does.”

***

If tension on every page is the secret of page turning fiction in any genre, I ought to be able to find it in my favorite books, the ones I have read more than once.  I have devised a little experiment I am going to try for my next post, and I invite anyone who is curious to try the same thing and comment on what you find.  Here is what I am going to do:

  • Take a half-dozen of my favorite books, especially the ones I have praised here.
  • Flip them open at random and carefully read the page I land on unless something “exciting” is going on – I want to avoid a fistfights, gunfights, or car chases, and the action-adventure genre in general.
  • See if there really is tension on that page, if that is one of the factors that makes these books so special.

In the past, I have studied these favorites for things like characterization and dialog; for descriptive language; to see how the authors deal with backstory, but I have never focused tension.  If Maass is right – and I bet he is – then this something to look for!

To Be Continued.

A Day With Edward Espe Brown: Zen, Cooking (and Writing Too)

Posted on by
3

When Edward Espe Brown was head cook and baker at the Tassajara Zen Center in the mountains above Big Sur, he had a serious problem with biscuits.  As described in the recently updated, Complete Tassajara Cookbook, no matter what he tried, he couldn’t get them “right” – right to himself that is.  Other people raved about the biscuits.

Then one day he realized he was comparing them to the Pillsbury biscuits that he had enjoyed as a kid. He actually tasted his own biscuits and was amazed at how delicious they were. Brown writes:

Those moments – when you realize your life as it is is just fine, thank you – can be so stunning and liberating. Only the insidious comparison to a beautifully prepared, beautifully packaged product makes it seem insufficient. The effort to produce a life with no dirty bowls, no messy feelings, no depression, no anger is bound to fail – and be endlessly frustrating.

The Sacramento Buddhist Meditation Group, http://www.sbmg.org/,  hosted Brown for a one day retreat last Saturday.  First you need to know that Brown is an ordained Zen priest and Dharma heir of the late Shunryu Suzuki Roshi, the teacher who, more than any other, first put Zen on the American cultural map.

Then you need to understand that Edward Brown is one of the funniest men I’ve ever met.  A lot of Zen teachers and students come off as stern and unsmiling, but Brown reminds me of Steve Martin and the late Leslie Nielsen, in his ability to crack up a room of 50 people with the lift of an eyebrow or the subtlest “Who, me?” expression.  As in his cooking, so in his teaching, Brown has gone his own way.  Learning to trust your own heart and find your own way was the core of the message he gave on Saturday.

Brown relates that one time he was the meditation leader during a three month retreat with 20 students at Tassajara.  One day, as he debated which technique to practice, an unexpected thought bubbled to the surface:  “Why don’t you just touch what’s inside with warmth and kindness?”  He spent the rest of the session in tears and left the organization not long after.

No cookie-cutter biscuits, no cookie-cutter Zen, no cookie-cutter life.  “Are you going to be a rule follower or are you just going to be you?” he asked on Saturday.  That particular quote is highlighted in my notebook for its importance to anyone trying to write.

“Are you going to be a rule follower or are you just going to be you?”

***

Edward Brown leads The Peaceful Sea Sangha.  The website has a calendar of his activities, a recent article about his cooking, and a large number of Dharma talks available for free download.  http://www.peacefulseasangha.com/default.html

Between a Plot and a Hard place

Posted on by
2

Okay, okay, so I should be pun-ished for a title like that.  This post is really about finding one’s own right brain/left brain balance in plotting a novel, but I couldn’t work that into a catchy phrase.

The topic was suggested by an article on my friend, Rosi Hollenbeck’s blog, The WriteStuff,  http://rosihollinbeckthewritestuff.blogspot.com/2011/03/thinking-about-writing-or-writing-about.html.  Like all of Rosi’s posts, there is a lot to think about, but this one happens to feature a very flattering account of yours truly.  She talks about another writing friend, the inspiration she finds in Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg, and then she describes her own process of weaving a story.

Of my approach, she says:  “What amazes me is the discipline he brings to his writing. He works very hard at learning his craft and even writes synopses before he writes the books. I suspect he even outlines. He always knows where he’s going.” (I wish!)

Of her own method, Rosi says:  “I don’t even feel as if I’m in charge. I sit down with an inkling of an idea and characters walk into my head, fully formed and usually named, and tell me their stories.”

At this time, I am re-imagining my villain and his machinations, which makes it interesting to review some tactics I have used in the past and where they lie between the poles of pre-planning and letting things happen.

Rosi is wrong about one thing:  I am constitutionally incapable of outlining.  Several times over the years I came up with ideas for novels.  Unfortunately, I thought you had to start with an outline, and the inspirations never survived the attempt.  My breakthrough came during my years with the Sacramento Storytellers Guild when I learned that accomplished storytellers do not memorize their tales, but see the story unfold in the mind’s eye and describe the the inner drama.  I discovered this is my natural way of writing too – describing the inner visions with written rather than spoken words.

The advantage of such an approach is the excitement of the unknown and the adventure of discovery, of sitting down and wondering, “What’s going to happen today?”  The downside is incoherent plots.  After 2+ years, I abandoned my first novel as a wonderful learning experience, but one that could not be rescued.  Clearly, what I had learned in the visual arts applies to writing too – the visions of raw imagination must be carefully shaped if I want them to have meaning to anyone else but me.

I set about studying plot and structure, and now my process is something like this:

1)  Write the first chapter and a one line synopsis.  While studying screenwriting, I learned that “high-concept” movies – the only ones that get made these days – can be summarized in one sentence.  I would go so far as to say that until I can do that, I don’t have a story to tell.  Here’s the tagline for Karyn’s Magic:

An apprentice magician must stop a supernatural killer she unwittingly releases from his prison between the worlds.

2) Write a one paragraph synopsis (3-5 sentences).  I do this while writing maybe the first three chapters.  This is also a tactic I picked up from a screenwriter who was telling how she pitches her concept to a producer:  setup – conflict – resolution.

3)  Write a one page synopsis.  I’m going to have to do this anyway, and since a one page synopsis will reveal any glaring plot flaws, I might as well do it when I’m 30-40 pages in rather than 200.  The one page synopsis functions like a map that changes as the story landscape changes, and often the two play together nicely.

4)  The final tool I’ve come to rely on is a scene summary, an idea I got from Syd Field’s excellent book, Screenplay.  As described in an earlier post, a scene summary is a line or two on a 3×5 card that triggers a kind of mental storyboard image of what is going to happen.  Field’s suggest 52, 3×5 cards for a movie, a number he tried because a friend pointed out there are 52 cards on a deck, and which he continues to use because it works:  13 scenes in Act I, 26 scenes in Act II, 13 scenes in Act III.  Here are the two scenes that comprise the first chapter of Karyn’s Magic:

  1. When Karyn Robinson is twelve, her mother dies in a tragic accident, leaving her and her sister Emily, destitute.  (Inciting Incident – sets story in motion).
  2. Kari, proud of her half-fairy ancestry is fascinated by magic, and seeks a prosperity spell from a gypsy.  Despite her sister’s skepticism, Kari follows the gypsy’s instructions.

***

Letting things happen and planning them out – both are valuable tools, and there’s a time and place for each, but neither is really up to my current task, re-visioning my villain.  He’s already been through several iterations – you could say he exists in several parallel universes.  I don’t need to write more universes or organize the ones I’ve got;  what I need is answers to questions I don’t yet know how to ask.

I need something more powerful than any bag of tricks, something for which there aren’t any rules.  I need a skill I had in spades when I was a kid, but which has been buried by decades of “practical matters.”  I need to drop my sophistication and get to the world of Let’s Pretend.

I guess its a little like Narnia – being grown-up keeps you out, and the entrance is seldom in the same place twice.  Meanwhile two of the dogs are fussing at me, as if they think I’ve been at the computer too long, and they are right.  They want to pretend they are wolves, and I think it’s time I helped them.  The dogs don’t think my concerns are all that urgent, and maybe they’re right.  Besides, animals know how to open the gates of other worlds.

More on the eBook Gold Rush

Posted on by
1

I live about two miles north of the American River.  In 1848, “Captain” John Sutter, who owned this part of the territory, hired John Marshall to build a sawmill on the American not too far upstream, in the town of Coloma.   On the morning of January 24, Marshall spotted some flecks of yellow metal in the mill race.  He knew gold when he saw it.  Marshall tried to keep his discovery a secret, and we all know how that worked out.

Replica of Sutter's Mill at the Gold Discovery Site

 This bit of local history came to mind when I spotted an article in Forbes called, “Who Wants to be a Kindle Millionaire?”  http://blogs.forbes.com/kiriblakeley/2011/03/06/who-wants-to-be-a-kindle-millionaire/?

I would not have bothered with another post about Amanda Hocking, except this piece is writen by a traditionally published author, Kiri Blakeley, who writes in a very measured tone about Hocking’s success and the reality of traditional publsihing:

There used to be a time, not too long ago, when traditional publishing had many benefits…Publishers…used to do all kinds of nifty things for their authors, like throw them a cool book party, send them on a book tour, get their books reviewed in the press and give manuscripts loving yet eagle-eyed editing. Now, chances are an author doesn’t get any of those things—unless she’s on a reality TV show.

Blakeley continues:

… going with a traditional publisher can be extremely expensive. Authors are generally expected to pick up costs for their book’s website, a book’s outside publicist, marketing materials like postcards, and any costs associated with readings or tours. All of this can run into the tens of thousands of dollars. Trust me, I know.

This post is also worth reading because Blakeley’s interview with Amanda Hocking shows the young author to be very savvy about the uniqueness of her success, and dismissive of all the talk about the death knell of traditional publishing. 

Still, with the flurry of articles, you have to assume that every writer, editor, and agent with a computer has heard that Amanda Hocking struck the mother lode.  I have to think that when Forbes runs an article asking who wants to be a kindle millionaire, there are writers buying mules, covered wagons, and gold pans,and  firing up their laptops, and googling, “vampires.”

I find myself humming the naughty verse to “Oh Susannah,” and trying to make up more.

Says Who?

Posted on by
1

This post is about judging ourselves negatively based on unexamined or under-examined beliefs.  What got me thinking in this direction was the recent exploration I did on ebook publishing.  I’m guessing that most unpublished writers long for the validation that acceptance for traditional publication confers:  “Now I am somebody!”  In fact, those ebook authors who have launched their careers by non-traditonal means have also done an end-run around our customary who’s-who assumptions.  New game, new rules.

I want to consider some of the ideas we use to bludgeon ourselves.  I’m not talking about (relatively) small issues:  I wish I had a nicer lawn. Nor am I considering such serious and potentially clinical issues as a pervasive, non-specific, feeling that I am just no good: I am not up to taking on original sin, in any of its many variations.

I’m talking about the dozens of ideas we or our friends have used to put ourselves down.  Reasons I am a loser:

  • Because I didn’t make the little league team.
  • Because I am dumb in math
  • Because girls think guys in the math club are nerds.
  • Because I’m not as pretty as my sister.
  • Because I didn’t get into my first choice college.
  • Because I don’t like my job.
  • Because I am not married.
  • Because my marriage is on the skids.
  • Because I don’t have any children.
  • Because the kids are out of control, which means I’m a terrible parent.
  • Because I got skipped over for a promotion.
  • Because I can’t handle my new job.
  • Because I got laid off.
  • Because I hate this town and want to live in (fill in the blank).
  • Because I can’t get get my book published
  • Because I want to be somebody.

Something in that list may bring to mind some past or present hot button issues.  Ideas like this can be incredibly painful, but interestingly, the moment our minds change, the issues and pain disappear.  We can see this by considering past ideas, the ones we no longer believe.  One day in grade school, I had a revelation:  I don’t really care about little league – I was just trying out because everyone else was. Instantly, all the inferiority vanished.  I was no longer a loser just because I wasn’t good at baseball.  Soon enough, however, new limiting ideas filled the void and I was a loser again.

That dynamic should make us very suspicious!

It made Cheri Huber suspicious.  Huber, a Zen teacher who is also versed in modern psychology, has made it one of her special missions to take on the voices of self-hate she finds so rampant in our culture.  Huber travels and teaches internationally, is a prolific author, has a regular radio talk show, and hosts workshops both online and at “The Zen Monastery Peace Center,” in Murphys, CA.  http://www.cherihuber.com/index.html

Huber is the author of twenty books, most of them published by “Keep It Simple,” an independent press she and her sangha founded back in the ’80’s.  Perhaps her most pervasive theme is contained in title of one of her most popular books:  There Is Nothing Wrong With You:  Going Beyond Self-Hate.  In the introduction, she writes:

Every spiritual path tells us that what we are seeking is inside us.  Society, the world, others, conditioning, teaches us as children to stop looking to ourselves in order to know what is so for us, and to begin to look to others in order to know what is right.  We first learn to look to parents, then teachers, then friends, lovers, husband or wife, children, Jesus or the Buddha or God – all “out there.”  The love, the acceptance, the approval is out there (emphasis added).

Huber sometimes uses the model of “sub-personalities,” to illustrate the origin of the self-hating voices.  Simplistically, sub-personalities are a series of “mini-me’s” living inside my psyche, with the power to take possession of my awareness from time to time.  Some of them hate me.  Some of them do nothing but whisper poisonous thoughts, and of these, Huber says:

You can listen to the voices that say there is something wrong with you.  It’s actually very helpful to be aware of them.  Just don’t believe them.  Most of what we have been taught to believe we had to be taught to believe because it isn’t true.  This is why children have to be conditioned so heavily!  We would never have reached these conclusions on our own!

I sat in a one day retreat with Cheri Huber in the summer of 2005, and got a sense of her deep commitment to this particular work.  It was clear from her comments that she had come from a starting place of crippling inferiority and lack of self worth.  She now seems like a joyous person, and one who believes her process is open to everyone, and judging by the numbers of people who threw themselves into the work that day, quite a few others have found it true for them.

As you learn to sit down, sit still and pay attention, you begin to glimpse that which sees through the illusion, beyond the voices of society’s conditioning, back to the original being.  And slowly that perceiving becomes more real than all you’ve been taught to believe…you begin to see with a much broader view…you begin to be the love, acceptance, and compassion you have always sought – Cheri Huber.


Read an eBook Week and Amazon in the News

Posted on by
Reply

Read an Ebook Week

This is Read an Ebook Week according to Catana, whose blog, “Tracking the Words,” is dedicated to exploring and entering the world of ebook publishing.  Check out the article here:  http://writingcycle.wordpress.com/2011/03/06/read-an-e-book-week/

Among other things, you can find special freebees and offers on Smashwords this week (a permanent link is now on my Blogroll).

And in case anyone hasn’t checked, you do not need special hardware to read an ebook.  All the major sellers have free apps for pc’s, macs, smart phones and tablets, so this might be a good time to take a look.

Amazon the Tax Evader?

A scathing editorial in the Sacramento Bee this morning condemned Amazon for refusing to pay state sales tax, and threatening California based affiliates if the legislature forces their hand.  http://www.sacbee.com/2011/03/07/3454226/amazon-refuses-to-pay-its-share.html

Weren’t all online sales initially tax free?  After that I thought it had to do with whether or not a company has a brick and mortar presence in the state in question.  Now with so many states in dire financial circumstances, I’m sure it’s only a matter of time until every online purchase is taxed.

There seems a bit much hand-wringing in this editorial though.  Noting that the state deficit is $26.5 billion, and uncollected taxes from Amazon total $300 million, it’s a bit disingenuous to suggest we blame Amazon if there’s not a cop when we need one, or if a disabled family member can no longer get in-home care.

Still, there’s the issue of fairness, and the local paper quotes the Seattle Times:  Amazon is a giant. It has helped drive hundreds, and maybe thousands, of bookstores out of business. The Internet retail industry already has a cost-of-real-estate advantage over free-standing stores. It should not have a tax advantage as well.

Given that eventual taxation is inevitable, the statement that really interested me is that Amazon “helped drive hundreds, maybe thousands of bookstores out of business.”

I’m skeptical of this one, for several reasons.

1)  I can think of several towns, like San Luis Obispo, where it was big box brick and mortar stores, rather than Amazon, that drove the appealing Indies away.

2)  Businesses big and small that ignored the web, including Tower, which I loved, are going or gone, but lavish web sites do not seem necessary to survive and thrive.  I’ve bought several rare editions from mom and pop used bookstores, with simple small-business type web sites.  You could argue that Amazon is one of the two major venues (eBay being the other) that give such enterprises a place in the virtual mall to display their wares.

These certainly are rapidly changing times.  How do you feel about it?  Is Amazon an enemy of the little guy?  A champion of the little guy?  Both?  Neither?  Email if you want more space to voice an opinion than a comment allows.