Adjusting to the paid market

Creativity isn't restrained when a publisher denies content in a story; publishing is. You can be as creative as you wish and write whatever you wish, but when it comes down to having someone sell your story for you, then you're restricted. Again: Having someone sell it for you.

You can publish, on your own, anything you wish. Anything. But when you ask other people to pay for your work for them to sell so they can make money, it's all up to their rules. Publishers follow what the market has shown to be profitable, what their readers have said they prefer, and they must uphold scrutiny to keep people satisfied.

Osulagh said:

You can publish, on your own, anything you wish. Anything. But when you ask other people to pay for your work for them to sell so they can make money, it's all up to their rules. Publishers follow what the market has shown to be profitable, what their readers have said they prefer, and they must uphold scrutiny to keep people satisfied.

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Bolding mine.

Actually, you can publish anything you wish on your own, through a blog or your own website, but even third party distributors like All Romance Ebooks and Amazon have a say in what they'll allow on their site.

I think this is what the OP was talking about. It's not a strain on creativity, though, just a strain on what's accepted.

Also note that most publishers are strict with some topics due to Paypal and other payment sites that they work with.

When you publish on your own you shoulder an invisible burden in terms of legal liability. It is low risk and high cost. So you just need to be aware that even pseudo incest might be the target of a US obscenity charge. Very low probability, very high cost if it happens.

There are a few smaller presses that accept pseudoincest, eXcessica and eXcitica among them. The nice thing about going through a niche press is that they have a built-in audience that is, I would presume, just as frustrated that they can't easily access the stories that fit their kinks.

As for how that affects creativity, I see where you're coming from. Sure, you can write whatever you want and host it on your own site, but let's face it, if you're not tapped into the bigger distribution channels, it's going to seriously impact your level of exposure. That said, you're probably a lot more clever than you give yourself credit for. Rather than seeing the limitations as, well, limitations, try seeing them as challenges. For example, if you want to write something that "feels" like pseudoincest, maybe make the two main characters longtime friends and/or neighbors. Maybe they grew up in the same apartment complex or their parents were childhood friends and so they were practically raised together. That might seem like a cop-out and, in a way, it kind of is. You have options. You can either write what you want to write the way you want it with the understanding that there isn't a huge market for it or you can adapt to the more mainstream market that you're attempting to wade into.

There's a big difference between unfettered creativity and marketable.

The things that are "niche markets"? There's a good reason we use that term. Yes, there is a specific audience for certain work (pseudoincest, non/dub-con, rape fantasy, under-age, vore, scat, etc). And while it is larger than most vanilla folks would expect, it is not large enough for the bigger publishers to be able to take on the legal risk of publishing content that in many places is still illegal (due to obscenity laws).

No publisher is putting limits on what you can write. They are only limiting what they are capable of selling. (Usually for good reason.)

Quite frankly, that quote assumes that folks who write for publication are somehow less creative or less dedicated to their craft. And that's just not true.

If anything, those 'limits' have actually honed my creativity instead of strangling it. I've found better ways to tell my story, while fitting in a publisher's guidelines. I may whine in the throes of editing, but I understand legal and market limitations, too.

I have stories that will never get off my hard drive. I have stories that will never make it to actual written words. Those are not in my publishing queue, and never will be. I don't feel less of a writer because of that.

Filigree said:

If anything, those 'limits' have actually honed my creativity instead of strangling it. I've found better ways to tell my story, while fitting in a publisher's guidelines. I may whine in the throes of editing, but I understand legal and market limitations, too.

I have stories that will never get off my hard drive. I have stories that will never make it to actual written words. Those are not in my publishing queue, and never will be. I don't feel less of a writer because of that.

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YES. That, right there. Everything you just said. Particularly the part about using publisher guidelines to hone your craft. Just because you can write [what you think is] a great incest/pesudoincest/non-con story doesn't mean anyone has to sell it.

wordsmithy said:

You get used to the frank discussions of sexuality and kink, the close attention to diversity and social justice issues in the text, the unrestrained creativity when it comes to plot. The most amazing, creative, engaging stories I’ve ever read have almost all been fanfiction, and I think part of that is because there’s no limitations placed on the authors.

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Filigree said:

If anything, those 'limits' have actually honed my creativity instead of strangling it. I've found better ways to tell my story, while fitting in a publisher's guidelines. I may whine in the throes of editing, but I understand legal and market limitations, too.

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In no way knocking free sites (I built an audience through Nifty, and that audience pushed me to explore publishing, so I'll always be grateful for that), but the absence of limits can leave you with a rambling story that never really ends. Sometimes I've read the first few parts of a story and thought, yep, that's worth sticking with... then come back some time later and discovered it's now up to part 65.

Certainly, there's nothing wrong with going long and in-depth, but there's also the possibility that you lose your focus along the way. As Fil says, writing with a publisher in mind forces you to "toe the line" and, hopefully, end up with a better story at the end.

But, to say again, there is some great stuff out there that people are writing just for the love of writing it, and for their characters, and I think that's a fantastic thing.

-A.

My reading choices drift between commercial and fan fiction. I love buying books, because it means I'm supporting an author and a publisher. I love fan fiction for the sheer crack of it.

But I've noticed the same problem in fan fiction that Alex did: some fan writers don't know how to plot. Or they get sucked into fan service, and writing prompts without regard to the the story. I recently dropped a great M/M Dom/sub fan fic story because it was nearing a million words, with no clear goal in sight. Other fan writers have WIPs (single story or series) as long or longer, but I follow them because I can trust them to tell the damn story. (Those writers are all either moonlighting pros, or talented hobbyists who could easily write original commercial fiction.)

Limits are very good training for writers, once they reach the skills/career level where they can adapt to limits without 1) ego getting in the way, or 2) subsuming their creativity and self-esteem.

This week, I turned a 49K portion of a fantasy novel into a 25K self-contained novella, for a long shot gamble with a major magazine (and a chance at an $1800 sale). That meant trimming or condensing backstory, subplots, intricate details, and beloved scenes. Even if this version does not sell, it was a grueling and valuable lesson in distilling a story to its most minimally effective form. I now see all the problems other people noticed with the larger version.