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using words of more than one syllable?

      A: Not at all. Most kids over twelve can handle two syllables, sometimes more. But polysyllables may cause incontinence in sensitive children.

      Q: Where can I research children’s books without having to buy one?

      A: Your public library. A librarian will be happy to direct you to the shelf where the children’s books would be if they weren’t out. Or you may browse in a children’s bookstore, though some managers get shirty if you bring a camp stool.

      Q: What about nursery rhymes? Any market?

      A: This little piggy didn’t make it. The problem with nursery rhymes is that it is difficult to write any new ones without having them, under analysis, reveal the author’s sexual perversion (e.g., “Jack and Jill went up the hill” has a motivation other than to “fetch a pail of water”).

      YOUNG ADULT NOVEL

      This is a relatively new genre of creative writing: books aimed at the special market of parents who want to give their teenager something of a legal substance.

      The prototype of the young adult novel has long been the works of Horatio Alger, Jr. (1832–1899), whose boys’ books inspired a whole generation of young Americans to go forth and earn big bucks. Alger’s classic — Ragged Dick — despite the catchy title is little read by today’s teenagers, being one long endorsement of hard work as a source of wealth. Alger also gave away much of his earnings to street kids, dying poor himself. Perhaps he’s not a role model for those students drawn to YA novel writing in lieu of gainful employment.

      YA novels are usually published in soft cover, a hint that your work may not have the longevity of the Dead Sea Scrolls. And the royalties are apt to be less than what the publisher paid the illustrator. But the glory is all yours, Horatio.

      CHICK LIT

      This genre is deplored as demeaning to novels in general. These novels are typically written by female authors, read mostly by women, and critically reviewed by men who like to live dangerously.

      Unlike male-written novels, which are sometimes about something other than sex, chick lit concentrates almost entirely on relationships. It is impossible to imagine a Roberta Crusoe. Even if the castaway has email.

      The genre was formerly described as “the bodice ripper.” Perhaps because today no one is quite sure what a bodice is, there seems to be less ripping going on than in the days when women wore discernible vests. Also, the provocation for shredding a woman’s underwear (“No!”) has waned as a response to male ardour. Today it is more likely to be the guy who gets his shirt totalled by impassioned fingers. Autre temps, autre skivvies.

      To author chick lit, a woman really needs to have a personal background of bad experience with her mother. If she hasn’t had a mother, she is working at a distinct disadvantage. She will also need to have had an aunt, grandmother, or older sister to provide the oppressive regime when she is creating a female protagonist that will resonate with the reader who has relatives.

      Here care must be taken, lest a wicked stepmother emerge from the closet to sue the author for libel. In fact, the author of chick lit may need to write off all her kin, in terms of amicable relations. It is the price one pays for writing fiction that isn’t kept entirely outdoors.

      Can a male author write chick lit? What if he is a bit effeminate? Secretly paints his toenails? Hates ice hockey? Well, probably not. Virginia Woolf said that there is a spot at the back of every woman’s head the size of a shilling that no man ever sees. What she meant was that some areas of feminine sensibility are so esoteric that a guy can’t access them without straining his maleness.

      Although it is more natural for a female author to produce chick lit, the question is: Is it proper to exploit relatives for the purpose of producing a book? The answer: absolutely. One can’t work a gold mine without disturbing the terrain, creating a certain amount of detritus. If your mother didn’t want to have a daughter who uses her as the basis of a story character with the disposition of a tarantula, she should have taken proper measures to prevent conception.

      However, it is prudent to change all names to protect the guilty.

      AUTOBIOGRAPHY

      This is the story of your life (sorry, Dear Me has been taken as a title) and should include the parts you would prefer not to be made public. These will make you look human, a quality attractive to your readers. These will make you look human, a quality attractive to your readers.

      Should you change the names of persons in your life with whom you have had intimate or illicit relations? Never! Being sued for libel is the hallmark of a successful autobiography. As long as you don’t have any assets that can be seized by the court, the litigant will soon abandon seeking redress for your having publicly identified him (or her) as a sexual deviant with a lively interest in whips, chains, and power tools.

      Autobiographies are often ghostwritten, especially for celebrities who, for one reason or another, haven’t learned how to compose whole sentences. You can earn good money as a ghostwriter, and of course the bedsheet is a lot cheaper than having to buy clothes.

      TRAVEL

      People like to read about voyages of discovery to exotic lands beyond East Toronto. Unfortunately, exotic lands are dwindling in number as more natives get cable. It is hard to spin an exciting narrative out of an encounter with a fearsome-looking African who is chatting on a cellphone.

      Thus it is prudent to research how much has already been published about your destination. Mount Everest, for example, has been climbed to death. You don’t want to learn this after you have already booked the Sherpa guides (who, of course, now also have an agent).

      Second, the travel writer needs to have a camera, especially if the project is an article for National Geographic. The camera should be as small as possible. Reason: in some sheltered parts of the world the natives see the camera as a devilish device for extracting their souls. Being strung up with your own camera strap is an ugly way to go, even if the photos have good detail.

      As for financial reward, the market for your travel writing may be limited to your community newspaper, but your trip to Fiji will be tax-deductible.

      HISTORY

      To succeed in this genre of writing you need to have a good working relationship with the past. This may be why history is more popular with readers than with writers. Yes, history takes work. It involves substance. Legal substance. History requires research, a task that can propel a person into the library stacks where he ages quickly. In severe cases he is never seen again.

      Writing history also means getting intimate with footnotes, each having to be numbered by hand because your computer balks at words with a dinky digit riding on their tails.¹

      1. Like that.

      Footnotes have a special attraction for non-fiction authors with a fondness for the appendix (footnote fetish), as well as for Latin abbreviations (ibid., op. cit., etc.) that only irritate the reader who has been looking forward to turning the page. The writer should use footnotes only as required to acknowledge the sources of his facts, should his history happen to include any.

      By far the most popular type of history is that of a war, preferably a world war. The First and Second World Wars have been pretty well done to death, unfortunately, but new wars are breaking out all the time — some of them with the potential of becoming World War III and the end of civilization as we know it. Which could, of course, affect sales of your history book.

      MEDICAL

      You really do need to have your M.D. to author a bestselling book for people eager to ignore their own doctor’s advice. Luckily, there are several universities that will grant the degree after completion of a correspondence course in heart surgery.

      One of the most popular medical subjects today is sado-masochism, as a fun way of abusing the body without

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