You Can If You Want, But You Don't Have To

Thanks for perusing. The contents of this blog are selections from my books, published and unpublished.

They say you should "be the change you want to see," and I'm embracing that now that the publishing industry as we knew it is largely collapsed, and literature flattened by techno-platform-commerce into its mostly easily consumed algorithmic essence.

So: rather than authors clamoring for the attention of agents and their manuscript wish lists (#mswl), I believe authors should be in the power position, with agents seeking access to the products of their labor. If you're with me, use #aml for author manuscript list.

You Can If You Want, But You Don't Have To - Excerpts

Jul 31, 2025

You Can If You Want, But You Don't Have To is a mash-up of autofiction, essays, screenplay, and epistolary in which author Benjamin Obler goes "behind enemy lines" as a blue-stater in Republican territory where, in his in-law's basement, he campaigns editors at the APA to include Aspiring Writer Syndrome in the DSM-IV, as a recognized mental disorder.