EPTTurns out, my brother's memoir just got reviewed: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/25/books/fresh-off-the-boat-a-memoir-by-eddie-huang.html?_r=0
Long story short, he's a celebrity chef, has a restaurant in Manhattan, a show, and now a book out. And the cover of it has me, my maternal grandparents, my parents, and ofc my big brother. I'm the super fat baby in my mom's arms XD.
Now, I'm really happy for my brother (especially because he will give me some of all that book money), but I will say I've got mixed feelings about being written about by someone else. It's a really strange experience, because you have your memories about how things went and of course other people will have theirs.
But what is the truth? It really does bring me to that whole truth is relative/absolute debate. There's a whole ton of stuff in the book about his childhood, which as brothers, is obviously intertwined with mine, and I am a pretty major character throughout the first half of the book. And in some ways, he captures me perfectly, or rather he captures a perfect rendition of what I mean to him. And a lot of times, he writes about me in a flattering way which is nice. Although, he does fudge a few things to make himself look better too which is a bit -____-.
What eats at me the most though is the fact he got it published. You see, it's one thing for everybody to have their own memories and their own narrative and their own perspective on how things went down. But when it's put to paper, printed en masse, and then sold to the general public, that means ONE version dominates the rest. From now on, anyone who has read the book THINKS they know about my life, about my family, about me, etc. But really, they have an incomplete picture. It's like taking a painting, ripping off a single corner, and then trying to play like that's the whole masterpiece.
And I'm not sure how I'm supposed to react when those people try to talk to me. Should I say that what they read is wrong? Or incomplete? Or that I disagree? Problem with that is when I do that I seem combative, sour, even jealous. I get asked that now and again as well, which is SUPER annoying. See, both me and my brother are writers. Both of us are published. He has a memoir, a blog, and multiple OP-EDs in major newspapers. He's going to be a guest speaker at TED next year and is often invited to universities to give speeches. I, on the other hand, only have two novelettes published. Good news is both won major awards in F/SF. Bad news is it's been... 2 years? since I've published anything. Not because I haven't been writing, but more because I've been teaching myself the art of the novel.
Novels and short stories are very different beasts. I grew up only reading novels and never wrote a single word of fiction until my 3rd year of college. And in college they forced me to write short stories, which I wasn't used to. It took me a year of struggling to understand the elements of a short story narrative. And after I did I got published. So, seeing as how I learned the short story much quicker than the average writer, I thought I was really talented and could tackle a novel/get published really quickly.
Fast forward 3 years, and I have basically been slogging through hell as I've written somewhere in the ball park of 3,000 pages of fiction and published not a single page of it. Although, I don't take it as a failure because I haven't sent a single page of it out to my agent or an editor. Mostly because I know it's crappy and not worthy of publication. So, basically, I've been scrubbing it up and destroying my self-image of being a writing virtuoso. Am I upset? No. I was a bit depressed in my second year of writing and went on a poker, strip club, one night stand binge for like 6 months which ended in an empty bank account, a bunch of random numbers in my phone of people I don't ever want to see again, and some pretty shitty fiction which I deleted off my HD a few months later.
Oh wait. I'm supposed to have a point in all this. Right, so now I'm close to finishing a novel. One that I'm happy with. And goddamn it feels good, because I am finally proud of something I've written, after pretty much 3 years of telling myself I'm a worthless hack. But my brother beat me to the punch. Not only did he beat me to the punch, but he did it within a single year! He wrote a proposal, sold the idea to a pub house, THEN wrote the book, and then got paid huge. I can't say how much but it was quite hefty, a hell of a lot more than a first novel F/SF writer could hope to make, at least until big sales numbers come in.
Still, even so, I'm honestly not jealous. Why? Because we're very different writers. He wrote a memoir about food, his childhood, culture, etc. I have no interest in any of those things. I like fantasy. So as long as he stays out my wheelhouse everything is 100% copasetic. Now if in a single year he wrote an epic fantasy and hit the NYT Bestsellers list, I would then probably commit seppuku as it would become obvious that I am the lesser genetic variant and should eliminate myself from the breeding pool.
There is pressure though. My parents don't really understand writing. They wanted him to become a lawyer and me to become a doctor. We both became writers along with a bunch of other random shenanigans. So, to them, it's all kind of a circus. But one thing is clear to them: he wrote a book in a year and got paid big. I've been writing for three years and after breaking up with my gf moved back in with them -_-. In their eyes, it is clear who should be involved in the writing game and who shouldn't. It should probably be said here that my mother has never read a single page of anything either I or my brother has written. But she was really happy when we bought her designer purses with the money we made from writing.
Anyway, so they give me shit. It didn't help that in a fit of rage one day I signed up for the LSAT to prove to them I could go be a lawyer if worse came to worst. I got a 172 on it after a month of practice, because, quite frankly most lawyers are mouthbreathers and not very smart. So, now, I get fucking insane amounts of mail from every law school under the sun trying to get me to go to their horrible 3rd tier school so they can raise their student LSAT avg. Probably one of the worst decisions in my life, because every time something comes from some prestigious uni I just see the gleam in my mother's eyes as she waves it around in my face and reminds me that right now I could be living in Berkeley or LA or some shit training to become a slimeball.
Oh and after I went on that horribly wasteful bender, burning through what little money I had saved, I swore off girls. Pretty much the only girls I still talk to are my ex-gf, who is newly single and kind of hovering around, and this other girl who has a bf, but insists he doesn't exist when we're together. Which is really creepy to say the least because he has the same last name as me and I know a number of his friends and have been quite aware from the beginning that he not only exists but actively takes her out on dates and on vacations. But she's hot so I try not to think too much about it, except when she ditches plans with me randomly because her real bf shows up by surprise at her apt. I don't mind though, because I just go back to writing and most of the time I cbfed anyways. My libido has been vastly reduced ever since I realized I have zero intellectual interest in any of the women around me.
My dad has noticed this and constantly tries to hook me up with random Chinese girls, which quite frankly are not my type (read: not good looking). But they're "nice" girls from "good" families (read: willing to marry and rich), or they're "successful" and "intelligent" (read: have high paying jobs). In other words, I've slowly started to realize my dad is convinced I'll never make money and is trying to whore me out to random Chinese girls desperate to get married in the hopes that I can be a xiao bai lian (a male gold digger). I consider this somewhat shameful. Especially because when I confront him about it, he gets kind of sheepish and says he's just trying to introduce me to nice girls. AKA, that's exactly what he's doing and he's not going to stop until he succeeds. Recently, he even tried to have a girl MOVE INTO our house with us. She's a dentist in Taiwan and is trying to get her practicing license for the USA, and she's also the daughter of one of his best friends, so he came up with the brilliant idea of hosting her at our house while she tried to get her license!
Now, not that I don't like this girl. I think she's got a real cool personality and I think she's great as a friend, but I'm just not looking for any boom boom pow right now, nor am I interested in getting married. BECAUSE I MAKE NO MONEY. And because I just want to write some goddamned novels and be left alone.
So, long story short, my brother's super successful and I'm currently in a big rut. Or at least others see me as being in a rut. I don't think I'm in a rut. I just think things are taking a little longer than I expected. But everyone else thinks so. My big brother even sold a new novel proposal to his publishing house based on a concept about us two brothers doing something super interesting that I can't talk about because on the off-chance someone in the media reads this it'll violate a confidentiality agreement etc etc, but suffice to say he tried to deliver me a book deal on a silver platter. I turned him down. Why? Because I want to write my fantasy novel damn it! Not non-fiction! And I don't want to be treated like some kind of disabled kid who needs a food tube! But he keeps trying.
I guess what I'm trying to say is sometimes NICENESS can be a form of torture. Because I really feel bad. I want to accelerate this whole writing process and "make it" and have all that success and money pouring in already, but I know my limits and I really don't want to rush it because I don't write for money. I write for da love. That's not to say I don't write much. I write 10+ pages a day, 5 days a week. That's my minimum. But it still takes time to get it right. And I've realized, through these three years of struggling, is that everyone has limits. I can only put out so many pages a day before I start writing nonsensical mush. I have to pace myself. But I feel guilty when I do that because I feel all this external pressure. So I'll write a bunch for the day, feel good about it, then I fire up Dota 2 or Mechwarrior Online, I play like 1 or 2 games, and then I feel like I'm being a total bum because I shouldn't be enjoying myself at all, I should be slaving away doing every thing I can to make things happen faster.
But it doesn't work that way. So I just have to be patient, grit my teeth, and keep putting in work as best I can. Because when the success rolls in, it all looks like a bunch of sparkling lights and easy money and good times. But the truth is, behind all of that was years of hard work, years of failure and humility, oh and looking like a goddamned bum to everyone else while doing it. My brother's 3 years older than me. I've spent 3 years writing. He put in his years of hard work earlier than me. He's reaping the rewards earlier. And he STILL puts in a fuckton of work. So I'm happy for him. And proud. And one day, I'll be proud of my own accomplishments too
. P.S. Despite my tone throughout this blog, I love my fam and appreciate how ridiculously lucky I am to have parents/siblings who support me, care about me, and wish the best for me. But in the moment, sometimes it really can be irritating. Because as much as they love me, some of the things they do show they don't believe IN me, if that makes any sense. And that's probably the only part of all this that really cuts.
