this list goes up to 11

"this is spinal tap" and 11 ways it prepared me for publishing

November kind of sucks. Can I say that? Am I allowed to say that?

For those of you who are doing NaNoWriMo this month, I wish you all the luck and am sending my most prolific vibes your way. For those of you who aren’t — or who thought you would try, but then quickly realized oh fuck this isn’t going to happen — I just want to tell you that it’s okay. Sometimes life stuff takes us away from creative stuff, and that’s just how it goes. The words and stories will be there, waiting for you on the other side. I’ve “won” NaNo many times; I’ve started and not finished; I’ve been too overwhelmed to even try.

Since I myself am in a “let me triage what I need to get done” kind of situation, I wanted to have fun with this week’s newsletter and write up a list I’ve been thinking about for a while. My body is made up of 70% water and 30% Spinal Tap references, so this was very easy to compile! All I had to do was jot down a list of some of my favorite moments from the film and then stand awkwardly in front of my TV with my phone up to take a picture of that exact moment with the subtitle on! And then I could create my very own listicle of —

11 WAYS THIS IS SPINAL TAP PREPARED ME FOR PUBLISHING

In case you don’t know, This Is Spinal Tap is a brilliant mockumentary about Spinal Tap, a heavy metal band from the U.K. that is now touring the United States but well past their prime. It features Rob Reiner as the documentarian, Marty diBergi, who follows the band around as they attend record label parties, deal with cancelled gigs and hotel snafus, get stuck inside stage props, commission laughably small versions of other stage props, get lost under the stage, and generally self-destruct among infighting and hurt feelings when the lead singer’s girlfriend Jeanine starts inserting herself into band business. I own it on DVD because the audio commentary is HILARIOUS (they stay in character the whole time and act like they’re really commenting on their band’s documentary), but I think the movie is available on Amazon Prime if you wanted to check it out.

1. Reviews. My favorite part is that after Marty DiBergi reads them a review of their record Shark Sandwich that’s simply two words — “Shit sandwich” — the band is like, “That can’t be real. They can’t print that.” If you’re an author on social media, you will get tagged in bad reviews! Some of them really hurt. Some of them are really, objectively, kind of funny! Unfortunately it’s sometimes hard to laugh when it’s about YOUR book because . . . yeah, there are feelings involved. I like to think I could laugh about “shit sandwich” one day tho.

2. Rationalization. I think EVERY DAY about Spinal Tap’s band manager Ian telling them it’s okay that their gig got cancelled in Boston, with his casual little aside: “It’s not a big college town.” Sometimes it’s difficult to tell what matters and what doesn’t, you know? And you find ways to rationalize anything to yourself. If you make a certain list, you’re like, hell yeah!!! That’s a big deal, right? If you don’t make the list, you’re like, ahhh that list doesn’t mean anything.

3. Supplies. One day I’d like to be interviewed in a room full of my unused notebooks. I’d pick one up to show it off, tilting it so you could see the pearlescent design on the front cover, the gilt-edged pages, the way the light catches on the Barnes & Noble sticker still on the bottom corner. If you tried to touch it I’d be like, “Don’t even point. It can’t be written in. All right, that’s enough of that one.”

4. Ideas. This is maybe one of my top favorite quotes. It IS a fine line between stupid and clever! And when you’re busy cooking up a new book idea, who knows where that line even is?!? Sometimes you get halfway through describing your WIP and you start thinking, “This sounds . . . unhinged . . . and I can’t tell if it’s in the good way or the bad way . . .”

5. Audiences. Marty diBergi asks Ian if Spinal Tap’s popularity is waning — a leading question, since he literally cites the fact that they used to play huge arenas and are now playing much smaller venues. And Ian is like, no, no, of course not, “I just think that their appeal is becoming more selective.” So fellow authors, take note: sales are not down! Your appeal is just BECOMING MORE SELECTIVE!

6. Critique. It’s important to have beta readers! Now personally, I am never really looking for anyone to tell me something is “shit,” but Jeanine believes in brutal honesty when it comes to David’s music. I’m more of an “ask me questions and tell me where you got confused or lost interest” kind of guy, but I’m also not dating someone who looks like an “Australian’s nightmare” (another niche favorite line of mine).

7. Specializing. The way Nigel falls out with the band and finds his way back is actually quite lovely to see, even in this silly little mockumentary. I earnestly love this part where Nigel talks about how he gets to express himself in the band because, “My solos are my trademark.” You SHOULD have a trademark! You should have something you feel you’re good at and that you enjoy doing! If you’re going to survive long-term as a writer, I think you have to find that in your own work. Put on some tight pink pants and rub a violin against some guitar strings if you have to! I love the moment where he makes one tiny tuning adjustment on the violin and then goes back to making his noise. What did that do?

8. Support. Since I just finished copyedits on The Art of Catching Feelings, I can say that I’m very thankful for people whose job it is not to be as confused as I am! For example, I totally got caught in a “Dwigt” situation where I’d changed a side character’s name and thought I’d caught every instance of it except . . . then there was a note from my copyeditor like, “Who’s Doug?” Good catch, Doug no longer exists!

9. Events. Listen, if you do events it’s inevitable. There will come a time when they will put puppet show first, and Spinal Tap last . . . metaphorically. Once, for my debut YA that came out a long time ago, I showed up to a reading at my college made up entirely of Very Literary Poets and and I felt SO out of place. It was like a heavy metal band trying to play an Air Force base’s “At Ease Weekend,” let’s just say that. People in the audience covering their ears. I’ve sat at tables behind piles of books that nobody came to ask me to sign, I’ve sat behind a table while someone picked up my book and told me to my face she just “couldn’t get into it” and “does it pick up after _____?” (NOT REALLY!!! LIFE’S SHORT I’D FIND ANOTHER BOOK!)

   Sometimes Puppet Show comes first and maybe that’s okay! I was about to say “who doesn’t love a puppet show” but then I realized that I actually don’t particularly care for puppet shows.

10. Interviews. Okay, so I know this is the whole joke. That bassist Derek Smalls is taking their “Sex Farm” song so seriously that he’s talking about it like it’s actually subversive in some way. “We’re taking a sophisticated view of the idea of sex and music . . . and putting it on a farm.” A song with lyrics like plowing through your beanfield and poking your hay.

    But legitimately! I think a lot of really smart work is being done in romance, especially in the way writers handle intimacy (whether closed or open door), and I love having conversations about that.

11. Perspective. You have to stick around for the entire credit sequence of this movie because seriously, HALF of my favorite lines are from these little bits at the end. The very last shot of the movie is Nigel talking about what he’d do if he weren’t making music. He says he might be a salesman of some kind, maybe in a haberdashery. I love how he keeps interrupting Marty DiBergi to role play it some more. “Do you think you’d be happy doing that?” Marty is trying to ask, and Nigel is still checking what size he wears and pretending they’re out of the color he wants.

    It was very easy for me to romanticize the life of a full-time writer when I was stuck in an office job. And turns out, it’s also easy to romanticize the office job now that I’ve been focusing on the writing for the last few months. They really do both have their pros and cons, and I’m still figuring out a balance that works for me. For now, I guess I’m trying to get a little better at enjoying the pros of whichever side I’m in while I’m in it, instead of waiting until I’m on the other side to look back and go, “Oh, man, that was nice. I miss that.” I’m trying to live by Spinal Tape keyboardist Viv Savage’s creed, which is “Have a good time . . . all the time.”

    I know that’s not actually possible. It can lead you down a toxic positivity path, if you’re not careful. There are many things that are objectively not a good time, many valuable lessons to learn in the struggle, etc. etc.

    But as far as life philosophies go, it’s not a bad place to start.

Currently reading . . . I read Katherine Center’s Hello Stranger over the weekend. I’ve only also read The Bodyguard by her, but I find her books so readable — like I tore through this one in practically a single sitting. I also really, really wanted to TALK about it with every single person I knew who’d read it (and a few who hadn’t but said they didn’t mind if I narrated the entire plot and spoiled everything, which ah!!! what a balm!!!). It’s rare that a book can do that and I love when it happens.

watching . . . I went and saw Priscilla in theaters! Look at me, going to a MOVIE! Sofia Coppola always excels at vibes and mood and those were both ON POINT in this one. I knew next to nothing about Priscilla Presley going in and have been indulging in my favorite post-biopic pastime since seeing the movie, which is googling things and seeing where the movie differed from the truth, why it might have done that, how do real people involved feel about the movie, etc. etc. This is such a tiny niche detail but I do wish we still had textbooks called “Mathematician’s Delight.” What a great name for a textbook.

listening to . . . I hate to inform you that the other day I said, aloud to myself, “If I don’t listen to ‘Pillar of Davidson’ in the next two hours I’m going to lose it” and I was . . . only 93% joking. 91%. 87%. Somewhere in that range. So that obsession is still going strong.

But I also got back on my You’re Wrong About podcast kick and went back to listen to a bunch of old episodes I never got to (I admit I fell off after Mike left the show). I just listened to ones on Tom Cruise and the Couch Incident, Junk Science, Martha Stewart, Serial Killers, and Online Shopping, so I’m ready with fun facts and new insights on all those topics for holiday dinners coming up.