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merrihiatt

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Until then, self-publishing is a good place to practice writing and learn about what sells and what doesn't.

I don't grasp the idea of practicing writing while self-publishing. I'm not sure what that means. Yes, we are continually learning the craft, and yes, I believe each book I write is better than the one before, but I'm not expecting readers to pay for my practice. They deserve more.
 

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I don't grasp the idea of practicing writing while self-publishing. I'm not sure what that means. Yes, we are continually learning the craft, and yes, I believe each book I write is better than the one before, but I'm not expecting readers to pay for my practice. They deserve more.

Readers deserve more if they insist on more. There are a lot of readers out there who don't seem to really care about some of the finer points of writing - they want a dramatic plot and compelling characters and are willing to overlook the rest of it. I struggle with this as a writer - a lot of the effort I put into 'improving' my writing doesn't seem to have much effect on the popularity of my titles. Readers aren't buying based on some external rating of 'quality'. They're buying and reading what they enjoy, whether it's the best work the author will ever produce or just part of an author-in-progress.

I guess I don't see the distinction you're making between "continually learning the craft" and "expecting readers to pay for [your] practice." You don't think your first books are as good as your current books, but you still expect readers to pay for the early ones, don't you? Have you pulled them off the market?

It seems like it might just be a question of wording, rather than a question of book quality. We don't have to expect readers to buy something, but if they do, and they enjoy it - yay!
 

Alice Xavier

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I don't get why the hell I wouldn't hurry up and get my stuff out there. If people want to buy my story for $2.99 to get their rocks off, then I don't have a problem with it. If they don't like it then they can return it. In fact, my first two stories together had a 30% return rate, which is bad. It meant something was wrong. I did some investigation, read other stuff in the genre, came to some conclusions, and switched up my game. My four following stories have a collective 5% return rate, which means that 95% of the people that purchased and read them were satisfied enough with them to let me keep my $2.08.

When I talk about learning, I'm thinking more about issues of genre and marketing than the actual craft of writing. But even with the craft itself, the more you write the more comfortable you are with it and the more easily you can apply yourself to serious projects. It's like practicing your violin. You could practice alone in your room because you're not good enough to get booked by a concert hall because the public only deserves accomplished musicians who perform in concert halls, or you can go practice on a street corner with your case open. If a person enjoys your 'practicing', then they can toss you a dollar. It's as simple as that.

Besides, it's not like I'm publishing half-baked manuscripts full of plot holes, stylistic problems, and grammar errors. Anyone deserves better than that, of course.

Oh yeah, there was an interesting Forbes article posted here (opinion of it wasn't too high here) that I think raised an interesting point about a possible future of self-publishing - serving as a sort of literary minor league that publishers can pick already-proven authors from (like Hugh Howey). If that's the direction the industry takes, no harm in learning the ropes of literary marketing.
 

merrihiatt

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Readers deserve more if they insist on more. There are a lot of readers out there who don't seem to really care about some of the finer points of writing - they want a dramatic plot and compelling characters and are willing to overlook the rest of it. I struggle with this as a writer - a lot of the effort I put into 'improving' my writing doesn't seem to have much effect on the popularity of my titles. Readers aren't buying based on some external rating of 'quality'. They're buying and reading what they enjoy, whether it's the best work the author will ever produce or just part of an author-in-progress.

I hear what you're saying. I know several people who couldn't care less about spelling or punctuation (even plot holes). They want to be entertained and if they get that need fulfilled, they really don't care about the rest.

I guess I don't see the distinction you're making between "continually learning the craft" and "expecting readers to pay for [your] practice." You don't think your first books are as good as your current books, but you still expect readers to pay for the early ones, don't you? Have you pulled them off the market?

You are right, I have not pulled them. I believe they are solid stories. I also believe I get better as a writer with every book I complete. If someone knows they are putting out a story that needs more work but is okay with that because they deem it practice and a way to learn to write better, they are doing so by using readers. Some readers may not care. I, as a reader, do.

It seems like it might just be a question of wording, rather than a question of book quality. We don't have to expect readers to buy something, but if they do, and they enjoy it - yay!

It would be wiser, IMHO, to get beta readers to review the book and make comments and suggestions to the author than to use paying customers.
 

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I'll clarify and say that practicing writing is akin to practicing for a sport. You already know the sport, but if you don't practice regularly, you get out of shape, slow, and get rusty on moves/rules/whatever. I stopped writing for several years, and my writing sucked when I started up again. Writing these erotica stories is wonderful practice in that sense, and it just so happens to be that there's a viable market for them.

I'm not advocating people put stuff up and ask customers to edit for them or anything like that, but I don't think I'm being some exploitative asshole by putting non-magnum-opus works up for sale.

Anyhow, just wanted to offer some clarity. I'll stop derailing now.
 

shelleyo

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but I don't think I'm being some exploitative asshole by putting non-magnum-opus works up for sale.

You're not. As long as you know you're doing your best to write an entertaining, satisfying, sexy story and your readers aren't chucking them all back at you for a refund (which Amazon makes super simple), well, there's no one else in the equation to worry about.
 

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It would be wiser, IMHO, to get beta readers to review the book and make comments and suggestions to the author than to use paying customers.

Agreed.

I despair when I look at some of the self-published books I've been sent for review. It's not a question of them having poor punctuation or questionable grammar: they're just awful, often to the point of being unreadable. The level of general literacy is embarrassingly low, and things like plotting and character development don't seem to have been considered.

From the recent comments in this thread, I'd guess that everyone adding to this conversation is already way above that level, and might not even realise how bad many of the books are.

It makes me very sad for the people who publish the worst books.
 

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Agreed.

I despair when I look at some of the self-published books I've been sent for review. It's not a question of them having poor punctuation or questionable grammar: they're just awful, often to the point of being unreadable. The level of general literacy is embarrassingly low, and things like plotting and character development don't seem to have been considered.

From the recent comments in this thread, I'd guess that everyone adding to this conversation is already way above that level, and might not even realise how bad many of the books are.

It makes me very sad for the people who publish the worst books.

Nah, I think we know most of it's horrible. Anytime anyone is allowed to do something, most of it will be just dreadful. If they let anyone have gallery showings for paintings, most of the self-submitted stuff would look like bad paint-by-number.

I make a living writing, have for several years, and while I wouldn't call my self-published fiction "practice," I knew what she meant. I also write some erotic fiction, so maybe I have context others don't.
 

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Agreed.

I despair when I look at some of the self-published books I've been sent for review.

...

It makes me very sad for the people who publish the worst books.

But are the people who publish them sad and despairing?

I have a good job and enjoy writing, so I 'play a game' of being a writer. The rules of MY game are that I have to write my best, sell it through the best venues I can, and stretch my skills with every project. I keep score by how much money I make, but I'm only playing against myself.

I think someone else, starting at a lower level of writing skill, could play the exact same game and get the exact same enjoyment out of it. Hell, the way things are going, they might earn more money points than I do, too! Do I want to read what they're publishing? Probably not, but if SOMEBODY does, they're earning points in their game.

I'm not saying this is a great way to elevate the quality of literature or even the reading experience of the public. I don't think it is. But from the writer's perspective? If they're enjoying the adventure, I'm happy for them, not sad.
 

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But are the people who publish them sad and despairing?

<snippety-snip>

If they're enjoying the adventure, I'm happy for them, not sad.

I hope they're neither sad nor despairing: but from the emails I get, I suspect many of them are both, and wounded and confused too, from the reactions their books have attracted.

That's why I'm sad. I don't like to see people get hurt.

I'd love to think that most people do enjoy their self-publishing adventures, but I'm so often contacted by people who now deeply regret what they've done that I am not convinced that's true. I hope I'm wrong here, though, and that the emails I get about it are not representative of the majority.
 

shelleyo

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I think the overlap between regretful and unsuccessful self-publishers and people who send their terrible, early drafts to agents and publications is probably pretty great. So the same people frustrated with self-publishing are generally the same ones who would be frustrated at not getting an agent or not having their fiction published after submitting for probably a fairly short amount of time.

Publishing and getting bad reviews and poor sales is pretty equivalent to submitting and getting only rejections, for the most part. I don't feel sad for someone who publishes writing that's not ready anymore than I feel sad for someone who submits writing that's not ready. Both of them need to do the work. A pretty big chunk of these groups were never willing to do that. They thought their writing, even though they'd only been at it a short time or had never bothered to get feedback from another soul, was the exception, and they didn't work hard at improving.

And we know that some of these people wanted to get their stories and books trade-published or wanted great self-pubbed sales, all while not even being readers. This never fails to amaze me, but it's not uncommon. I've been in workshops for years reading barely passable prose by people who want to be "writers," yet they don't even read books in the genre they've written, or many books at all.

I feel kind of bad for the ones who've spent tons of money with vanity presses, but those are self-inflicted wounds, too. A little research and they wouldn't have gone down that pointless path. They didn't do the work.

If they regret their self-publishing later, it's not like it's an irrevocable crime or something. They can delist the books and try again in the same way someone who's continually rejected can work on his writing and keep submitting. Most won't, but they were never in it for the long haul anyway. They'd have quit submitting to agents or publications after a while without ever really doing the work, too.

I know there are some who do work at it and still get bad reviews or form rejections. Some of those just need more time and more work, while some just aren't cut out to be writers. I think most, however, fall into the large group of impatient people who thought it wouldn't be this hard.
 

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I think that most just aren't cut out to be writers. Curing impatience doesn't also cure a lack of ability or talent.

And I do think it's sad when writers pay vanity presses: I know one can research, but when one knows no better and falls for the hype the vanities put out? that's sad.
 

Alice Xavier

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I despair when I look at some of the self-published books I've been sent for review. It's not a question of them having poor punctuation or questionable grammar: they're just awful, often to the point of being unreadable. The level of general literacy is embarrassingly low, and things like plotting and character development don't seem to have been considered.
I have a couple of these, actually. My trade-pub author friend receives vanity press books and manuscripts all the time, and then she sometimes sends them to me. To torture me, I believe. I'd describe most of them as delusional (and maybe a bit desperate) before I'd call them sad and despairing. I mean, do these people really think that my friend will read their ponderous tome of god-knows-what and immediately scamper off and tell her agent about it?

I've noticed two types of self-publishers. There's the aforementioned kind that get impatient/indignant over query rejections and go through a vanity press to become 'published' because they think they're just that amazing (or desperate). See: Dunning-Kruger effect. Or, they write and self-publish a single book that's actually pretty good, but then they sit and wallow in it, build a whole website just for this one book, make Youtube trailers for it, do all the promotions they can, whine about how it's not selling, and then ultimately refuse to play Amazon's game, which is to sit down and write more (Amazon tends to favor large catalogs and frequent, new releases).

Then there's the kind that have started to see it as a revenue stream, either for a supplemental or main source of income. Erotica is kind of its own beast in this regard - it's pretty much the one genre where you're probably better off self-publishing, but only IF you're willing to essentially become a publisher for your work - which means thinking like a publisher (and not a writer) and taking care of cover art, distribution, and a crapton of market research all by your lonesome, and, probably most importantly, still taking your craft seriously and treat even your filthiest, most depraved pieces as lovingly as you do your 'real' work. I love all this. Many writers don't. Self-publishing isn't a good option for those who don't want to do the work on the publishing side of things.

So yeah, it's not for everyone, and it's not for every genre. I certainly don't think self-publication is the best course for my fantasy work, for instance. I'll be querying that out for reals. When it's finished.
 

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There was an AP article printed in my local newspaper yesterday, about a non-local (she's in Texas, I'm in Oregon) woman who's been successful with self-pub. I've seen some small articles about local self-pub authors in the paper, but was surprised to see one from Associated Press, about someone in another state.

Here's the link, if anyone's interested. I know success stories like this one are rare rare rare and am not saying "self-pub leads to greatness!"

http://www.oregonlive.com/books/index.ssf/2013/04/self-published_authors_books_b.html#incart_river

I must say, the opening paragraph in the article gave me pause:

"After a feverish month of inspiration, Colleen Hoover had finally fulfilled her dream of writing a book."

A month? Took her just a month (and she worked full-time and has 3 young kids) to write the book? I hope what that meant was, it took her a month to get it ready for publication with cover, formatting, etc.

She self-pubbed the sequel a month later. And both ended up on the NYT bestseller list for e-books.

I know some people write fast, but a month still seems - inadequate. But it sold well enough, so what do I know? :Shrug: And she's now quit her job, is writing full-time and has been picked up by Atria.

I've never been interested in self-pub in the past, but may try it someday just for the experience.
 
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juniper

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and treat even your filthiest, most depraved pieces as lovingly as you do your 'real' work.

Yes, I looked at your Amazon page and your books seem to have descriptions that probably would make them untouchable by most erotica publishers I've seen. So self-pub is your only option for those, maybe. :Shrug:

[ I :Shrug: a lot. Cuz there's a lot that I don't know ]
 

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Also that big publishers aren't coming through with promises anyway....

Thoughts?

Authors who aren't happy with some specific with their own publisher often condemn the whole of trade publishing, especially when it comes to "publicity". I give those the "sour grapes" discount. And of course, anything Gaughran says I ignore, along with any comments about the demise of trade publishing. But he does give a pretty complete picture of what one needs to do to self-publish. Based on his last statement, though, I wonder if he intends to continue with SP or go back to trade.
 

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/...rcame-snobbery-to-self-publish-an-e-book.html

I didn't see this posted any place. 2 things that I think stand out. 1. He says after you publish the book the work begins (I agree). Also that big publishers aren't coming through with promises anyway....

Thoughts?

Publishers have to stick to their contracts. Writers who assume they'll get things done because of a promise need a better agent.

Whenever I read articles about publishing written by people who have never worked in the trade I see great big holes in them. They get basic facts wrong, the logic doesn't stand up to the most basic of scrutiny, and the assumptions they make are really unsafe. It makes me wonder how wrong all the other stories I read are. Is all of the news presented with such a skewed agenda?
 

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That's really interesting, Polenth. Thanks for posting the link.
 

Polenth

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Is it worth the trouble of trying to get published with a small press instead of just self publishing?

This was an interesting exchange on the topic.

Opinions?

It depends on the press. Some small presses have a bookstore presence, good cover art and editing, and get widely reviewed. So they also get the sales.

But a lot if the ones around don't have all that. People sign with them just to be able to say someone signed them. I don't get that. If I can do as good or job, or better, I'm not going to sign my profits away.