Diary of a Mad Editor

Have you ever watched that show, Castle, about the mystery writer who helps the police solve crimes (Yeah, there’s an original concept)? Well, the other day, my mother, who watches the show, informs be that the show is "based on a real person" because "Richard Castle" just came out with a new book. I told my mother that there’s no way that show is based on the life of a real character and that if there’s a mystery novel out there written by Richard Castle, it’s just a fake publicity stunt to promote the TV show. Since my mom didn’t seem to be buying my explanation, I decided to check it out.

Well, this "Richard Castle" hasn’t written "a bunch of books" as my mom pointed-out. There is one book currently on the the market, which is the same as the fake book the character on the show has written, entitled Heat Wave or something like that. It has the same characters and same plot as the book on the show. Coincidence? I think not. It’s a marketing ploy. Nothing more. Nothing less. And it’s not a new idea. Remember Murder She Wrote? There were books on the market for a while allegedly written by "Jessica Fletcher". ABC (which televises Castle) did the same thing with the Stephen King miniseries, Rose Red. You hire a ghostwriter to pen a novel based on the show under the pseudonym which is the same as a fictional character on that show. It’s a product tie-in with an extra string attached.

Now, I was reading a discussion about this stunt on an Amazon book discussion forum in which a heated argument was going on about whether or not such a marketing stunt was a good thing or not. Most people on the forum thought is was a cute, fun idea. One guy was very angry about it. I tend to agree more with the guy who was angry about it. However, unlike the guy who was angry about it, I’m going to articulate why I don’t like it. Listen, there’s no denying a stunt like this a clever and very effective method or promoting a TV show. I’m not even going to dispute this. These media conglomerates who own most of the big publishing and media outlets wouldn’t do it if it didn’t make them money. I understand that these companies do what they do solely to make lots of money. For them, it’s not about creating art. If, on occasion, they happen to publish something that is art, it’s more by happy accident than by design — because the creative goals of a particular author happened to coincide with the commercial interests of the publisher. More often than not, the publisher and the writer are at cross purposes.

What bothers me is that I know, for most real writers, creating art is a primary concern. We wouldn’t have the many great literary works that have shaped our collective cultural lives if writers didn’t care about creating art. Even if writers care about making money, it’s not usually their primary motivation. So, when you do something so crass as to remove the artistic motivation from the act of writing, you devalue the creative act itself. You undermine it.

Now I’m not saying that Heat Wave is not entertaining — I’m sure if they got a James Patterson, or Stephen Cannell (as has been rumored) to ghostwrite the thing, it’s probably slick enough, and well-paced enough to make for a breezy, entertaining read. But, when you bring a writer into a room, filled with TV producers and other executives, hand them a by-the-numbers plot, with a cookie-cutter character and pay them to write a derivative work and try to pass it off as something original, written by a real person, you are not serving the interests of creative art — you are serving interests of the board room. It’s not cute. It’s disingenuous and very, very cynical.

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