The publishing world is a crapshoot, said literary Agent Orange. A casino. After expanding the narrative working the brothel angle give me mythical cold blooded sadistic mega maniacs, corrupt politicians, civil servants, millions of poorly paid laconic Asian teachers, nurses, doctors and financially motivated international bankers, politicians practicing fraud, sexual harassment and NGO graft under the auspices of organized crime charities.
Give me gloom and doom global financial collapse with character arc de triumph and a fairy tale happy ending with revolutionary caviar and champagne.
Establish a narrative flow line where heroes or heroines conquer their unconscious fears, demons and symbolic metaphorical archetypes.
Keep it simple. Woman writer meets man. Woman faces obstacles: ice, money, sex, love, compromising her values, morals, ethics, principles, publishing her story etc.
Woman loses man. Woman sells more ice, gets more money, fucks man out of loneliness during a 5-year courtship, (he will save me) discovers blind love exchanging one form of volunteered slavery for another. Man promises her BIG money.
With resignation she gets engaged accepting that sex business is money business. She keeps writing. She sends her story out. She becomes an independent author/publisher after multiple orgasms and form rejections from blind agents. The independent woman gets her man. She introduces man to her poor family and eleven siblings. Family demands $5k as a minimum down payment. She is a valuable child bearing resource and baby production machine.
They give their daughter an engagement t-shirt.
My body is a work of art.
It’s for sale and it ain’t cheap.
Man facing family greed suffers an internal crisis of fear, uncertainty and doubt. He agrees. He goes to the crossroads at midnight. He sells his soul to the d-evil. If you want to play you have to pay.
Man pays for family engagement party. Man pays local greasy greedy officials for marriage approval documents. Man pays local shaman for blessing. Man pays for her sibling’s education. They are excited to learn how to read. Man pays for a water pump. Man pays for solar panels. Man pays for her grandparent’s medicine. Man pays for rice seeds, rabbits, vegetables. For eternity.
Parents give expensive village party impressing everyone how rich and popular they are with gleaming scheming status. Mother coerces daughter to produce many children and propitiate their poverty cycle. Give us someone to love. Someone who will work, breed and get slaughtered. Someone to take care of us. Someone to bury us.
Someone to feed us incense, said dead relative ghosts.
Ice Girl in Banlung