John Scalzi was born into a lower-middle class family near Los Angeles. While not impoverished, he certainly was poor, which informed one of his first important essays, “Being Poor.” Education was always important for Scalzi, and he knew from a young age that he had to invest in himself and his education. He earned a scholarship to the prestigious private school, The Webb School of California, and later to the University of Chicago.
Writing always came easily to Scalzi, and since “everything else was work,” he studied philosophy during his undergrad. He knew from then that he would have a career as a writer, but also had a practical side. This is where his creativity begins to show, in his businesslike, entrepreneurial sprit. Scalzi looked at writing as a fun way to make a living, and was looking for alternative ways to use writing to do it. After his first post-college job as a movie critic, he began working for AOL in the infancy of the World Wide Web. Scalzi was hired by AOL to create content for the website. This was before the term “blogger” existed, but that’s what he was. During this time, he also did corporate writing, wrote non-fiction books, and contributed to anthologies of humor, like Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader.
He developed a small following on AOL, and when his work there ended, his followers transferred with him to his new website, The Whatever. Scalzi became a very popular blogger as the medium exploded in the mid-2000’s. He has written essays on many topics which drive traffic to his blog, but also finds other ways to entertain his audience there. He posts pictures of his wife, daughter, farm, sunsets, and his pets. In fact, one of the major claims to fame of The Whatever is a picture of Scalzi’s cat with bacon taped to it. The absurdity of the image created a minor internet sensation and raised Scalzi’s profile considerably.
Aside from cat pictures, the reason why people stay with the Scalzi blog have to do with the honest way he journals about his life. He writes eloquently about how much he loves his wife and daughter, his pets, and his homestead. He writes insightfully about many of the political issues of the day. He also speaks openly about the financial remuneration of authors (both good and bad), a rarity in modern America. He has no tolerance for bullies and internet comment thread hijackers, so even the comment section of his blog is well mannered and free from the typical awfulness that infects so many internet sites. He calls this “The Mallet of Loving Correction” that he uses on people who try to make his blog a less-welcoming place. This type of gentle, whimsical humor infuses and informs all of Scalzi’s work, which has the tone of a hilarious uncle telling stories to his nieces and nephews, just subversive enough to be interesting, but not so much as to really offend most people. However, his website does burnish the warning, “Taunting the Tauntable since 1998.”
Scalzi continues to find new ways to distribute his creative product to the world. He wasn’t the first person to make a novel available for free on a website, but he was an early adopter of the idea of a “pay what you want” distribution model. Since he had a fairly stout following on his blog at the time, his debut (what he called, “practice”) novel, Agent To The Stars was a financial success for him in 2005. Due to the word of mouth buzz created by the book, Scalzi was signed to TOR books as a novelist, who released Agent, and all of Scalzi’s subsequent science fiction and fantasy novels.
Even in the traditional publishing field, he finds new ways to think about writing, storytelling and distribution. With permission from the family of the original author, H. Beam Piper, Scalzi re-envisioned one of his favorite books from his childhood, Little Fuzzy, and rebooted it, calling it Fuzzy Nation. While this move angered traditionalists and fans of the original, once the book came out, almost everyone agreed that Scalzi had “done right” by Piper and created new interest in an author that might have become forgotten. Scalzi’s last two novels have been released in novella form digitally before being collected in full and published traditionally. Scalzi believes that in the digital age, authors need to keep experimenting with distribution, and since he is relatively high profile, he is willing to be the Guinea pig for some of these new models. For one of his latest books, Redshirts, Scalzi commissioned popular “geek rock” musician, Jonathan Coulton, to write a theme song for the book.
Outside of writing, Scalzi has several creative outlets. He plays ukulele, and creates electronic music. He takes photographs, which when published on his website, become an art statement of their own. For example, whenever he travels for a book tour, he posts “The View From My Hotel Window.” This is rarely a very invigorating picture, but now that there are hundreds on his site, it makes a statement. He also has become in demand as a public speaker and performer. He performs frequently on the JoCo Cruise and at Wootstock, two meccas of geek culture. He also has consulted on television shows and video games. He has performed several stunts and challenges with other authors and celebrities to raise money for charity.
Scalzi shows us that a creative mind will find a way into the world. His honesty, experimental sprit, humor, and willingness to try just about anything inspires the creative in us all.
Writing always came easily to Scalzi, and since “everything else was work,” he studied philosophy during his undergrad. He knew from then that he would have a career as a writer, but also had a practical side. This is where his creativity begins to show, in his businesslike, entrepreneurial sprit. Scalzi looked at writing as a fun way to make a living, and was looking for alternative ways to use writing to do it. After his first post-college job as a movie critic, he began working for AOL in the infancy of the World Wide Web. Scalzi was hired by AOL to create content for the website. This was before the term “blogger” existed, but that’s what he was. During this time, he also did corporate writing, wrote non-fiction books, and contributed to anthologies of humor, like Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader.
He developed a small following on AOL, and when his work there ended, his followers transferred with him to his new website, The Whatever. Scalzi became a very popular blogger as the medium exploded in the mid-2000’s. He has written essays on many topics which drive traffic to his blog, but also finds other ways to entertain his audience there. He posts pictures of his wife, daughter, farm, sunsets, and his pets. In fact, one of the major claims to fame of The Whatever is a picture of Scalzi’s cat with bacon taped to it. The absurdity of the image created a minor internet sensation and raised Scalzi’s profile considerably.
Aside from cat pictures, the reason why people stay with the Scalzi blog have to do with the honest way he journals about his life. He writes eloquently about how much he loves his wife and daughter, his pets, and his homestead. He writes insightfully about many of the political issues of the day. He also speaks openly about the financial remuneration of authors (both good and bad), a rarity in modern America. He has no tolerance for bullies and internet comment thread hijackers, so even the comment section of his blog is well mannered and free from the typical awfulness that infects so many internet sites. He calls this “The Mallet of Loving Correction” that he uses on people who try to make his blog a less-welcoming place. This type of gentle, whimsical humor infuses and informs all of Scalzi’s work, which has the tone of a hilarious uncle telling stories to his nieces and nephews, just subversive enough to be interesting, but not so much as to really offend most people. However, his website does burnish the warning, “Taunting the Tauntable since 1998.”
Scalzi continues to find new ways to distribute his creative product to the world. He wasn’t the first person to make a novel available for free on a website, but he was an early adopter of the idea of a “pay what you want” distribution model. Since he had a fairly stout following on his blog at the time, his debut (what he called, “practice”) novel, Agent To The Stars was a financial success for him in 2005. Due to the word of mouth buzz created by the book, Scalzi was signed to TOR books as a novelist, who released Agent, and all of Scalzi’s subsequent science fiction and fantasy novels.
Even in the traditional publishing field, he finds new ways to think about writing, storytelling and distribution. With permission from the family of the original author, H. Beam Piper, Scalzi re-envisioned one of his favorite books from his childhood, Little Fuzzy, and rebooted it, calling it Fuzzy Nation. While this move angered traditionalists and fans of the original, once the book came out, almost everyone agreed that Scalzi had “done right” by Piper and created new interest in an author that might have become forgotten. Scalzi’s last two novels have been released in novella form digitally before being collected in full and published traditionally. Scalzi believes that in the digital age, authors need to keep experimenting with distribution, and since he is relatively high profile, he is willing to be the Guinea pig for some of these new models. For one of his latest books, Redshirts, Scalzi commissioned popular “geek rock” musician, Jonathan Coulton, to write a theme song for the book.
Outside of writing, Scalzi has several creative outlets. He plays ukulele, and creates electronic music. He takes photographs, which when published on his website, become an art statement of their own. For example, whenever he travels for a book tour, he posts “The View From My Hotel Window.” This is rarely a very invigorating picture, but now that there are hundreds on his site, it makes a statement. He also has become in demand as a public speaker and performer. He performs frequently on the JoCo Cruise and at Wootstock, two meccas of geek culture. He also has consulted on television shows and video games. He has performed several stunts and challenges with other authors and celebrities to raise money for charity.
Scalzi shows us that a creative mind will find a way into the world. His honesty, experimental sprit, humor, and willingness to try just about anything inspires the creative in us all.