Email Book Marketing: The Ugly Side of Amazon Campaigns

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This article, by Jonathan Fields, originally appeared on his tribalauthor site on 3/22/10.

When I released my The Truth About Book Marketing whitepaper (opt-in [for the free tribalauthor newsletter] to get it), I didn’t have kind things to say about what’s commonly become known as “amazon bombing” email campaigns. I still don’t. But, some people misconstrued that to mean I don’t favor tapping coordinated email or blog posts to launch a book.

In fact, email can be a hugely powerful component of a book launch.

One I’ve used and will use again with my next book. It’s not email that I was railing against, but rather how it’s being used and what’s being promised to authors and list-holders by those running campaigns that bothers me.

Here’s how a typical amazon campaign works…

A book marketing company specializing in amazon campaigns solicits a lot of people with lists, blogs and followings to mail their tribes and ask them to all buy from amazon on the same day, often the same hour. Those tribe-members are supposedly incentivized to buy at the designated time and day by the opportunity to return to a “bonus” page after their purchase and download dozens (sometimes even hundreds) of supposedly high-value bonuses.

List-holders are incentivized to mail, because when they do, they get to place a downloadable product on the bonus page and visitors to that page are required to opt-in before downloading. So, the promise by campaign organizers to list-holders is that, if they mail, they’ll grow their lists in a huge way when the people from all the other people’s lists hit the bonus page, get exposed to their bonus and opt-in to download it.

What about the authors? What’s the promise to them? Often it’s that they’ll sell a mountain of books, and hit #1 in their category on amazon for an hour or even a few. They’ll then be able to call themselves a bestselling author and that will open the door to national media, giant speaking fees and riches and fame beyond compare. All in exchange for a fee that I’ve seen range from a few thousand dollars to $15,000.

Those are the promises, but the reality is often radically different…

Let’s start with the authors.

First awakening, hitting #1 in your category on amazon for a few hours does not a bestseller make. At least not on the level that will open the doors promised to you. These days, national and even local media, conference organizers and others know how easy it is to game amazon. The first question most will ask if you present yourself as a bestselling author is “what list?” And, when you tell them you were #1 in your category on amazon for 10 minutes, you’re far more likely to get rolled eyeballs than offers of cash and fame. It just doesn’t mean anything to anyone with enough savvy to pay you serious money or expose you to serious audiences.

But, what about the promise of selling tons of books?

Here, there may be some truth. But then again, maybe not.

If you get list-holders to mail millions of people, chances are you’ll end up selling books. Truth is, though, many email lists have very low open rates, so 1 million names mailed may get 50,000 – 200,000 emails opened. From there, if you’ve got home-run copy, maybe 10% click to the book sales page. So, now we’re down to 5,000 – 20,000 people. From there, a good conversion to the amazon buy page would be 10%. So, 500 – 2,000 people make it through to amazon. Then, assuming a giant conversion on the amazon page of 25%, that leaves us with 125 – 500 books sold.

Now, that’s not chump change. And, if you get 10 million people to mail, you may actually sell enough to hit #1 on amazon overall for a few hours or even a few days and make a run at the real lists.

But, truth is, it’s unlikely you’ll get anywhere near that volume of people mailing.


Read the rest of the article on tribalauthor.

Marketing Or Selling: What’s The Difference And Why Do I Like To Do One And Not The Other?

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To sell: “to influence or induce to make a purchase” Merriam-webster.com

To market: “to expose for sale in a market.” Merriam-webster.com

People commenting on the new trends in publishing frequently say that for self-published authors to be successful they need to be entrepreneurs. In fact they often say any author who wants to be successful needs to participate fully in the selling of their own books. I heard stories for years from my traditionally published friends about going to conventions to network with book sellers, arranging book tours, book signings, and speaking engagements at local libraries, and how much they dreaded this aspect of being a published author.

Author Forums and groups like Murder Must Advertise are still dominated by similar discussions of the ins and outs of selling books, including these traditional methods. As I prepared my historical mystery, Maids of Misfortune, for publication, I found myself dreading having to actually sell it. When, miracles of miracles, I found that marketing my book on the internet was much less painful than I feared. What I also discovered was how difficult I find it to “sell” my book or “my self” through the traditional routes.

I have only approached two local books stores, asking them to sell my book on consignment, and while they both said yes, I haven’t followed up with other books stores in town, nor have I even used those two venues to schedule book signings, or ask if I should restock when the books I left were sold. I haven’t approached any libraries, and except for a talk I gave on self-publishing in general at the college where I taught, I haven’t scheduled any public appearances. I did go to the Bouchercon, and talked to two booksellers, but haven’t followed up on those two contacts. Yet every day I get on my computer, and read and comment on different blogs, forums, reader sites, and Kindle boards. I blog about once or twice a month, and I constantly work on different strategies to make my book visible to the reading public. So, the question I have asked myself is: why is it so difficult for me to sell my book through traditional means, but so easy to “market” on the internet?

I think that the answer to that question lies in the difference between the two definitions above. When I ask a bookstore owner to carry my book, or think about scheduling a book signing, or write to a library asking them to carry my book, I feel like I am trying to persuade them to sell my book. I feel that if I gave a talk, or book signing, I would be saying “Buy my Book,” thereby making them feel uncomfortable if they don’t want to do that. And I have felt uncomfortable with the idea of persuading or influencing someone to buy something that they don’t want to buy since I was a child selling girl scout cookies. Not because I think selling is bad, or sales people are bad, but because I personally feel uncomfortable doing it.

When I went to the Bouchercon, I felt like I had fallen through a time warp thirty years to when I was a graduate student going to history conventions, where I was supposed to sell myself to senior historians. You were supposed to court them, strike up conversations where you could flatter them about their work, thereby giving you the opportunity to mention your own work, in other words, “sell yourself.” All of this was in the hope that someday in the future, when you submitted an article or book to an institution where they were an editor or a reviewer, or, even better, if they were on a hiring committee for a job for which you were applying, that they would remember you and accept that article, or book, or hire you. I was terrible at this. Thank goodness I had a good friend who was better at it, so I would trail along in her wake, getting introduced to all the big names, but I doubt very much if any of them remembered me for more than a second. At Bouchercon, I had no friend to trail along behind, so I did very little selling of myself, beyond leaving some sell sheets on some tables, and handing out business cards to the few people-usually fans sitting next to me at a talk-who expressed any interest in my own work.
And this isn’t because I am a particularly shy person. I have taught for 30 years, standing up semester after semester in front of hundreds of students, speaking extemporaneously and with ease. I have run academic senate meetings, stood in front of Board of Trustees arguing vehemently to present the faculty’s point of view, and I have been the master of ceremonies at scholarship banquets with hundreds of people present. But in all of these cases, I didn’t feel like I was selling something of mine. I might have been selling an idea, or even trying to get people to fork over money to improve the educational opportunities for students, but it didn’t feel like I was selling myself, or something of mine, and I didn’t feel uncomfortable doing it.

My discomfort isn’t because I am not proud of my book, either, because I am, just as I was proud of my scholarship, or my abilities as a teacher when I did submit work for publication or applied for jobs. But I want readers and booksellers, (as I did editors or hiring committees) to make their own independent judgment on the quality of the work, not on my ability to sell it or myself.

However, when I engage in conversations on the internet, or blog about self-publishing, and mention my book, or have the title of my book as part of my signature, or have a link back to my product page, it feels different. I feel like I am marketing not selling. I am not trying to persuade them to buy my book, I am exposing my book out there to the reading public. I don’t go out and buy books from most of the people whose blogs I read or comment on, unless they happen to have written a book I would normally be interested in, and I assume the same goes for the people who are reading my comments or blogs. If they decide to take a look at my book, I then feel that the cover, and the description, and the reviews, and the excerpt will demonstrate the quality of the book (not me saying-buy this book, trust me it is good,) and I don’t have to worry that they are feeling bad because they decided not to buy it, so I don’t feel uncomfortable.

And, I don’t have to sell myself or the quality of my book to Amazon.com or Smashwords to get them to sell my book. They just do, and again, if I have done my job right, and gotten the book into the right category, and have a good cover, good blurb, good review, and good excerpt, (in other words, if I have marketed it well) the book will sell itself. And that doesn’t make me feel the least bit uncomfortable.

I am not making any judgments here, (in fact I am in awe of people who go out to those conventions, and books stores, and libraries, and book clubs, and book signings—particularly when I know for many of them they are as uncomfortable about doing it as I am.)  And, I am probably making a distinction that won’t hold up to very much scrutiny, but the distinction between selling and marketing, and why I feel like I am doing the latter when I use the internet, does at least explain my own odd behavior. In addition, the fact that whatever I have been doing to market on the internet has actually resulted in over eight thousand sales, doesn’t hurt. But, what I am wondering is, are any of the rest of you out there finding yourselves making a similar distinction or facing a similar reluctance use the traditional methods, while enthusiastically embracing the new methods offered by the internet and ebookstores? Or is this just one of my own idiosyncracies?

This is a reprint from M. Louisa Locke‘s The Front Parlor.

Why Createspace Is Better Than Lightning Source

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This post, by Robin Sullivan, originally appeared on her Write to Publish blog on 2/13/11.

I promised this would be my next blog post and since I have others I want to get to it’s time to do this one. Let me start by saying that I was Lightning Source’s biggest cheerleader. When they came onto the scene they literally changed overnight the ability for an author to get a printed book at a reasonable price and for that I’ll be forever grateful. But…business is business and CreateSpace has one up’ed Lightning Source…I’m sorry my friend but I have to align with what will make the most money for my business.

For those that don’t know these are the two big players in the POD (print on demand business). They work similarly in that they are not publishers they are printers/distributors. They take your book and put it in dead tree formats. Both offer extensive services such as editing, layout, and cover design but you should NEVER purchase these services from either organization (You can get it better and cheaper elsewhere – sigh…another topic for another day). So for the sake of this post we’re going to talk about what you SHOULD use them for.
 

  • Producing high quality printed books
  • Distributing printing books.

QUALITY
Let’s first talk about the quality. They are nearly indistinguishable. (I suspect they are using the same equipment). The covers and interiors come out as good as any book you’ll find in a bookstore. Yes the covers are done with laser “toner” rather than “cymk” ink but unless you have a printer’s loop you’ll not notice. If none of my previous sentence made any sense to you, don’t worry – it just says that the quality is very good for both and you should not be concerned.

One difference….CS (CreateSpace from here on) uses a slightly thicker paper which I like marginally better. It’s not that big of a deal but gives a “slight” nod to CS on a point that is not very important in the grand scheme of things.

Another point that should be made…especially by people who publish through the likes of iUniverse and Xlibris etc. These companies use CS and LS for their printing. In the past I believe most of the big publishers used LS but I’m sure they “shop this around” frequently and I can’t say for sure who they use now but I’d lay dollars to donuts that it is one or the other of these two companies.

DISTRIBUTION – Lighting Source
The one very attractive thing that LS (Lightning Source from here on) has over CS is they are associated with Ingram. For those that don’t know this is the elephant in the publishing industry supplying the majority of the books to major bookstore chains. (Bookstores don’t want to write 10,000 checks to 10,000 publishers – the publishers all use Ingram and the bookstores write one check to one source). The whole reason I went with them is by being in the Ingram channel your books can be in any bookstore. A great “theory” but doesn’t really translate in practice. Being distributed through Ingram doesn’t mean store shelf space it means the “ability” to buy the book (How distributors work with book stores is again a whole new subject too big to get into today – another topic on the TBW (to be written) pile.)

Since I can’t get into the nitty-gritty details of distribution let’s just say that being in Ingram means that if someone walks into a store…doesn’t find the book on the shelf…they can go to the information desk and order it. That’s how it should work but it doesn’t always. Being POD has some issues in that the “payment” needs to be made at time of purchase and in general most bookstores pay after the fact – (or in the case of Borders not at all – but again a topic for another day — sigh) sometimes 60 – 120 days later. Again…in theory…if the person at the information desk is wiling to pay now and pickup later then they MIGHT be able to get the book this way but in my experience most stores say “we can’t order POD books”.

All this is a long way of saying being in Ingram should make it easy for your books to be purchased with bookstores but my testing has shown that this is not really true.

DISTRIBUTION – Create Space

Read the rest of the post on Robin Sullivan‘s Write to Publish blog, and for an opposing viewpoint, see this rebuttal from Zoe Winters.

The Grand Conversation on Ebooks: Elfwreck (Part 1)

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This post, by "Elfwreck", originally appeared as a guest post on the blog of author Shane Jiraiya Cummings on 2/12/11.

[Introduction from Shane Jiraiya Cummings:] Elfwreck is the nom de net of an avid (some would say fanatic) ebook reader with over 10 years professional experience with digital imaging and over 25 years with document conversion and editing. She manages the [community profile] ebooks community at Dreamwidth and is active at the Mobileread forums. She lives in the SF Bay Area in California, and is also involved in tabletop RPG gaming, copyright activism, filking, and slash fandom.

“Turning Pirates Into Customers”

Part 1: Customers in Potentia

Everyone knows the title of this post is an attention hook, not an offer, right? Presumably, readers understand that if I actually had any magic button that would turn digital pirates into paying customers, I’d either use it out of the goodness of my heart and make the world a more honest, more profitable place, or sell it to Disney for ten billion dollars and retire to my own island while they completed their takeover of world culture.

I do have some ideas on why it’s important to consider pirates as potential customers and how to convert them (or rather, how to convert the leeches; the uploading pirates are often already good customers).

When I’m being technically accurate, I call it “unauthorized file sharing” because it might not be illegal.[1] Most of the time, I just call it “piracy” because that term has been embraced by several sides. Authors and publishers use it to imply they’re being raided and stolen from by people outside of the reach of normal laws; uploaders and downloaders use it to imply they’re creative rebels fighting against oppressive corporations (who did you root for — Captain Jack or the East India Trading Company?).

While the legal and moral issues of “piracy” aren’t certain, the practical truth is that it’s both frustrating and scary for authors who look at those downloads and think, “why aren’t they buying my book, if so many of them like it?” Which comes to the heart of the problem:

What authors need (and publishers, if those are involved) is not “an end to digital piracy.” What they need is more sales. They need more customers, and more of the current customers buying more ebooks. It doesn’t matter if they stop pirates; book contracts aren’t renewed based on the number of pirates stopped.

DMCA takedown notices to Megaupload and Rapidshare don’t result in more sales. Shutting down ThePirateBay doesn’t sell books. Even if takedown efforts resulted in removal of content, instead of pushing it laterally to somewhere else on the web, there’s no evidence that those people would turn around and buy the legit versions of the content they formerly pirated instead of turning to other legitimate free content online.

I’m focusing on ebooks and not including print as an acceptable substitute. The solution to “the ebook isn’t available at a price I can accept” will not be “just buy the paper version instead.” First, because some of us don’t read print, either as a matter of preference (like me) or ability (people whose hands are too weak or shaky for pbooks, or who need large text); second, because the most affordable print version is often second-hand … which still leaves the author out of royalties. Third … let’s just allow there is a third, and fourth, and more possible reasons why print is not always a reasonable substitute. Telling people they should be reading more pbooks isn’t going to work.

Might as well say, “if my book isn’t available at a price you like, read something else.” That’s a shoot-yourself-in-the-foot approach to potential customers when you stop and think about it.

Read the rest of the post on the blog of author Shane Jiraiya Cummings.

What Readers Hate

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Always striving to improve my writing, I make notes when readers complain about what they don’t like in a story. I reviewed my notes recently because I’m working on a rewrite of a new novel. Here’s a long list of  dislikes from readers on a mystery listserv I participate in:

  • portents, particularly the “had-I-but-known”
  • cliffhangers at the end of the chapter or the book
  • an abundance of coincidences
  • too little character background for series protagonists (assuming the reader has read the previous books in the series)
  • clumsy dialogue that doesn’t sound natural
  • insufficient sense of place and/or time
  • characters that are TSTL (too stupid to live)
  • rushed endings, particularly done with exposition rather than actually solving the clues to solve the crime
  • abuse to women, children, or animals…done for shock value
  • a prologue that either isn’t really necessary or that diminishes the impact later of the plot
  • characters with similar names
  • hackneyed plots
  • thin characters
  • an unconvincing voice
  • weak, bland prose no matter what the style
  • pretentious prose no matter what the style
  • stylistic repetition that seems lazy
  • badly edited texts
  • deja vu: “I’ve read this before”
  • the author trying too hard at whatever
  • the author seeming to revel in cruelty

I’d like to think my stories don’t fall into these patterns, but I confess, I occasionally use a cliffhanger at the end of a chapter.
 

Readers: What can you add to this list?
Writers: When and why do you break these “rules” in your novels?

This is a reprint from L.J. Sellers‘  Write First, Clean Later blog.

With All The Hype, Is Self-Publishing Really For You? Five Questions to Ask Yourself

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The dust is settling on 2010 self-publishing industry and the results seem promising. But are they promising for you?

You may have read some of the more compelling industry data published about e-books recently.

• The sale of e-book readers continues to grow. Gartner, a leading information technology analyst firm, predicts the global sale of electronic e-book readers will have reached up to 6.6 million units by the end of 2010. This will represent a 79.3% rise from 2009 sales figures of 3.6 million units worldwide. Further, if this rate continues, the global e-book reader sales is expected to reach 11 million in 2011.

• The sale of e-books surged after the Christmas sale of e-readers. According to Publisher’s Weekly, this holiday season Simon & Schuster reported a 150% increase in e-book sales over last year, Random House reported a 300% surge, and Kensington saw a 400% jump over 2009. E-book sales for 2010 are expected to be $966 million and some predict it will triple to $3 billion by 2015. For the first time, USA Today’s Best-Selling Books top-50 list had more than two titles in which the e-version outsold the print version. Of the top 50, 19 had higher e-book than print sales.

• Libraries saw a 200 percent increase in e-book checkouts. At the American Library Association Midwinter Conference (January 6, 2011), it was announced that libraries and schools worldwide were at the forefront of the e-book boom in 2010. More than one million new users signed on to access free e-books at ‘Virtual Branch’ websites, resulting in a 200 percent increase in e-book checkouts.

• Self-published books are flooding the market. Publishers Weekly released R.R. Bowker statistics revealing that 764,448 titles were produced in 2009 by self-publishers and micro-niche publishers. It’s likely that figure will top one million for 2010.

• Some self-published authors are generating thousands of book sales a month. According to the Kindle forum, there is an increasing membership in the 1000 sales/month club. (The average book sells 200 or less in its lifetime.) It’s important to note that analysis of the data shows that 67% of authors in the club have three or more titles available. Four genres-romance, paranormal, thriller, mystery– occupy 50% of the sales. For more detailed information, read Derek Canyon’s article at Publetariat.com.

In his blog, Joe Konrath said of 1000 sales/month club member L.J. Sellers, “…is a perfect example of all the things I’m constantly harping about: good books, good covers. good book descriptions, low prices.” With all the competing titles, of course the critical fifth dimension is L.J.’s marketing efforts. She explained in her guest spot on Konrath’s blog:

… I rerouted my promotional efforts toward e-book readers. I quit sending marketing material to bookstores and instead joined several Kindle forums, where I participated in discussions. I got more active on Goodreads and did five back-to-back book giveaways just for the exposure. I wrote a dozen guest blogs and sent them all over the Internet.

In a recent blog post at Writers Beware, Victoria Strauss advised writers to look at the hype in context. Among her comments on high-selling, self-published authors:

Many of these authors have multiple books on offer (i.e., they may be selling 250 copies each of four books, not 1,000 copies of one book), and/or are pricing them well below what larger publishers charge (which makes them extra-attractive to ebook enthusiasts, many of whom are very hostile toward trade publishers’ ebook pricing strategies). And even if, as Konrath claims, the list is only a small sampling of high-selling Kindle self-publishers, these success stories have to be considered in the context of the thousands of self-pubbed authors whose ebooks aren’t selling in large quantities.

So, with all the hype, is self-publishing really for you?

Let’s look at what it takes to write, publish, and sell your book successfully: advanced planning, time, resources, more resources, and tireless patience. Below are five questions to consider.

Are you willing to commit to the:

…advanced planning and research? Realize a book is a commercial product. Are your goals realistic? Who will buy your book? How will you reach your potential readers? Who is your competition? How will your book be better or different? What are your realistic ROI expectations? Do your homework in advance and you will save a great deal of time, effort, and stress.

…time to write a high quality content? That means knowing your audience, supplementing “what you know” with appropriate research, and knowing how to tell a good story (for fiction and nonfiction). It also means carving out the time to do the actual writing or working with a ghostwriter.

…resources to produce a quality book? At a minimum expect to pay professionals to proofread your book, design an attention-grabbing cover, and format the interior pages. You want a timeless book you’ll be proud of forever.

…resources to create your platform? Must-haves include a website/blog, Facebook and Twitter presence, Youtube channel, and other social media sites appropriate for your book.

….practice of tirelessly and patiently promoting your book and building your readership? You can pay thousands of dollars to have self-publishing companies market your book–with no guarantees. The bottom-line: you must spend YOUR time and energy communicating with your readers-consistently and creatively. Marketing can seem daunting until you learn the efficient methods for promoting your book. Realize that building a fan base likely will take a year or more.

Before getting carried away by all the e-book, self-publishing hype–and quitting your day job–take stock and determine if you are you willing to make the five major commitments for writing, publishing, and selling your book successfully.

 

This is a reprint from Patricia Benesh‘s AuthorAssist blog.

7 Links To Help Every Writer With Taxes

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Death and taxes, the two unavoidables in life. Thankfully there are people and web sites out there to help us slot all those numbers in the correct places on the correct forms and keep us from having to visit with a friendly IRS agent because we’ve gotten “creative” with the numbers. Here are 7 links to help you understand how to do your taxes:

  1. The IRS — this one seems rather obvious. It’s their forms, their rules, so it makes sense to check out their site for answers to our questions.
  2. Tax Advice for Writers by Bonnie Lee — simple to read and easy to understand with a great section on hobby-loss information
  3. A Fool And Her Money — depending on when you’ve started getting your tax-related material together, The Money Book may be more helpful for next year’s tax season, but it’s a resource worth investing in
  4. Tax Tips for Writers a guest post by Jessica Monday — more information on what can be used as a deduction including what can happen when you sell your house
  5. Tax Tips for Writers Freelance Income Reporting by Rachel Campbell — includes information on deductions and what forms writers need to fill out
  6. Tax Tips for Freelancers by Julian Block — a short, but excellent article on bad-debts that can’t be deducted
  7. Taxes and The Writer by Daniel Steven — information on accounting methods, types of income and forms, as well as another list of deductions

Doing taxes can be frightening and overwhelming, not to mention disappointing if you have to pay instead of getting a nice refund, but it’s unavoidable on The Road to Writing.

I’d love to hear from all of you. Besides checking with a good tax accountant, what other tips do you have for doing taxes?

 

This is a reprint from Virginia Ripple‘s The Road to Writing.

No, Seriously, I'm Not F**king Around, You Really Don't Want To Be A Writer

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This post, by Chuck Wendig, originally appeared on terribleminds on 1/20/11. (Editor’s note: strong language after the jump.)

You don’t want to be a writer.

No, no, I know. You think it’s all kittens and rainbows. It’s one big wordgasm, an ejaculation of unbridled creativity. It’s nougat-filled. It’s pillows, marshmallows, parades. It’s a unicorn in a jaunty hat.

Oh, how sweet the illusion. My job, though, is to put my foot through your dreams with a high karate kick.

Consider this your reality check. You’ll note that I do this periodically: I’m here, standing at the edge of the broken bridge in the pouring rain, waving you off — it’s too late for me. My car’s already gone over the edge. I’ve already bought the magic beans. I’ve already bought into the fairy’s lie. I tried to pet the unicorn in its jaunty hat and it ran me through with its corkscrew horn, and now I am impaled.

See my hands? They’re shaking. They won’t stop. I’m like Tom Hanks in Shaving Ryan’s Privates.

I am too far gone.

You, on the other hand, may yet be saved. I see a lot of you out there. An army of writers. Glistening eyes. Lips dewy with the froth of hope. You’re all so fresh. So innocent. Unmolested by the truth.

And so it is time for my annual “Holy Crap The New Year Is Here And Now You Should Reevaluate Your Shit And Realize You’d Be Much Happier As An Accountant Or Botanist Or Some Fucking Thing” post.

More reasons you do not — awooga, awooga, caution, cuidado, verboten — want to be a writer:

It’s The Goddamned Publipocalypse And Now We’re All Doomed

The meteors are coming. Tides of fire are washing up on beaches. Writers are running scared. The publishing industry has heard the seven trumpets and it wails and gibbers.

It’s bad out there.

You know how many books you have to sell to get on the New York Times Bestseller List? Four. You sell four print copies of a book, whoo, dang, you’re like the next Stephen King. Heck, some authors are selling negative numbers. “How many books did you sell this week?” “Negative seven.” “I don’t understand.” “My books are like gremlins. You spill water on them and they multiply. And then pirates steal them and give them away for free. Hey, do you have a gun, because I’d like to eat it.”

Borders pissed the bed. Editors are out of work. Fewer authors are being signed and for less money up front. Jesus, you have a better shot of getting eaten by a bear and a shark at the same time.

And e-books. Pshhh. Don’t even get me started on e-books. Did you know that they eat real books? They eat them right up. That’s what the “e” stands for. “Eat Books.” I’m not messing with you, I have seen it happen. Plus, every time an e-book is born, a literary agent gets a tapeworm. True fact.

I’m cold and frightened. The rest of us writers, we’re going to build a bunker and hole up in it. Maybe form some kind of self-publishing cult and wait out the Pubpocalypse in our vault. We’ll all break down into weird little genre-specific tribes. Horror slashers, elf-fuckers, steampunk iron men, and space whores. But it’ll be the poets who will win. The poets with their brevity and their stanzas. And their bloody claws.

Eventually Editors And Agents Are All Going To Snap (And It’ll Be Our Fault)


Read the rest of the post on terribleminds.

The Grand Finale

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This post, by Lydia Sharp, originally appeared on The Sharp Angle on 11/24/10.

And now we come to one of the absolute toughest parts of any story — the end.

At the break into Act Three the main character(s) has made a proactive decision to go forward with a plan to fix everything that had been ruined up to this point. Looking at Blake Snyder’s beat sheet, there’s only two more beats after that — The Finale and The Final Image (aka the denouement).

The Finale is almost the entire third act, in ONE beat. So… um… what exactly do you do there?

Pretty much whatever you want. This is the part of the story where you take everything you’ve presented in the previous 3/4 (acts one and two) and use it to maximize everything you feel is important about this story.

Which is why I suggested going back and reading through the story before writing Act Three.

By this point, you have a better idea of your theme. You know your MC’s strengths and weaknesses. You know precisely why you felt the need to write this story, and you’ve gotten this far, so now you want to finish it.

This is where all your previous clues become blatantly clear to the reader. You revisit actions, dialogue, thoughts, etc. to drive home the pivotal moment of the climax where everything is set right again.

A superb example of this is in Lauren Oliver’s BEFORE I FALL. The book is only seven chapters long, but each chapter covers a full day in Sam’s life, the same day she keeps re-living. Every day she sees the same things and different things. All of these are clues to the reader, some more obvious than others, that give the ending MAJOR IMPACT. The reader is able to somewhat guess what’s coming, while still being knocked out of their seat when they get to that point. Seriously. I’m personally not super-keen on how that book ended, but I can’t deny how perfectly executed it was… and when I really think about it, it couldn’t have ended any other way and had the same effect. I just don’t like death. (and saying that someone dies at the end doesn’t give anything away, trust me)
 

Read the rest of the post on The Sharp Angle.

The Secrets To Pace In Your Novel

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As you write your novel, you’ll find conflict is a key tool in developing the readers’ interest and conflict goes hand-in-hand with the pace of your scenes. If what I call the Read-Speed is slow, the impact of your conflict is much diminished. Further, as an author, you should pay great attention to the speed at which your novel reads. If it’s overall pace or Read-Speed is tedious, the reader will set your book down. Now, there are any number of techniques by which an author can increase the pace of his story and I’ll cover some of the best in this blog post.

One often ignored practice is to manipulate the amount of white space on the page. To clarify what I mean, imagine a sheet of paper filled with text, top to bottom, side to side, one line after the other without breaks. You can visualize how this would overpower the reader, slow the pace and make for difficulty when reading. In contrast, white space makes for a faster read and a better rhythm. The mere fact the reader flips the pages more often also gives the illusion of speed.

Write in short, choppy sentences, in particular when employing dialogue. Your sentences should be meaningful, of course, but quick lines make for faster reading which, in turn, increases the tempo.

One secret often missed is working with sentence fragments, which work well to increase the pace of your writing. Of course, fragments are frowned upon in the writing world, yet the judicious use of them can be quite effective. In those nail-biting scenes that hinge upon the conflict in your novel, well-used and well-positioned fragments can increase the excitement, and thus, the pace of the conflict. Always. Every time. Like this. Use discretion, however, for you can lose control if you’re not careful. In fact, I reviewed a book the other day and put it aside after reading the first paragraph. Its one-sentence construction covered at least two inches of page space, contained four hyphens and three semicolons. It was absolutely unintelligible. The moral is exercise caution when writing in sentence fragments.

You can utilize shorter words to boost the tempo of your story. Anything that slows your reader, slows the pace. Review your four or longer syllable words and consider replacing them with diminutive, or rather, shorter and easier to pronounce synonyms. For example, you might reconsider the use of the word, “antagonism,” when “anger” will suffice.

Be cautious of argot the middling may not twig. That is to say, don’t use terminology your average reader won’t understand. When you force them to take their mind off the story and focus on individual words, their reading slows to a snail’s speed.

Consider the power behind the words you choose. (How many times have we heard this one?) Does your character dream in nightmares or is he haunted by them? I think you can see the power in the word, “haunted” when compared to, “dreams.” As to verbs, consider the difference between someone who “falls” to someone who “collapses”. Falling could mean anything from tripping to going over a cliff. In contrast, “collapse,” assuming it fits the scene, indicates loss of bodily control. If there is no chance your reader will misinterpret what you wrote, they won’t have to reread a sentence to make sense of it. Anytime they reread anything, your pace suffers.

Don’t retell information. Your reader already knows what happened in prior chapters. To loop back to an earlier point in your story will simply slow the reader, and your plot.

Use active voice. Passive voice is a slower read. “He was planning to do the work,” reads slower and with less strength than, “He planned to do the work.” Take your time to learn about active voice. It’s a powerful tool to use when writing your novel.

For more about this subject, consider THIS POST by Gail Martin in her blog titled, “Novel Journey,” or THIS ONE by Roz Denny Fox at her romance blog, “Desert Rose.”

Look to the pace of your novel and your audience will offer better word of mouth advertising in return.

As always, I wish you best-sellers.


This is a reprint from C. Patrick Shulze‘s Author of Born to be Brothers blog.

Interview With April Hamilton and Zoe Winters

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This article, by Kristen Tsetsi, originally appeared on Inside The Writers’ Studio on 2/7/11.

Once  looked down on as a path for the untalented, self-publishing (or independent/indie publishing) is becoming an increasingly more respectable way for authors to get their work into the public eye. Some have used it as a stepping stone to a “traditional” publishing deal, while others are content, even happy, to do-it-themselves. Some authors have even found self-publishing to be a viable way to make a living.

April Hamilton and Zoe Winters are two writers who were at the forefront of the “Indie Author” movement. April is the founder of Publetariat, “an online community and news hub built specifically for indie authors and small, independent imprints.” Zoe produces a humorous animated YouTube series called Zoe Who?, which seeks to combat the stigma that still surrounds self-publishing.

In addition to their own works of fiction, April and Zoe have each published informative guides for writers who are considering self-publishing: April’s is called The Indie Author Guide: Self-Publishing Strategies Anyone Can Use and Zoe’s is Smart Self-Publishing: Becoming an Indie Author (click on the pictures for links to purchase). Today, Inside The Writers’ Studio talks to April and Zoe about their books, about the conflict between the traditional and indie publishing worlds, and about what makes a good self-publisher.

PAPER RATS: When did you start writing your book, and how long did it take?

APRIL HAMILTON: The Indie Author Guide began life as a series of free how-to guides I wrote and offered for free on my website. As I kept cranking them out, it wasn’t long before I realized I had more than enough material for a book and decided to collect everything I’d already written, plus a lot of new material, and publish it as a book. All told, it probably took me about five months to author the material and one more month to deal with editing, formatting and publishing.

 

ZOE WINTERS: I really don’t track that sort of thing. Becoming an Indie Author had been a concept for awhile. Then when I took a break from the Internet in October, I decided to get serious about finishing and editing it. Because it spanned a bit of time and sat unworked on for awhile, I don’t really know how long it took. I’m like that about most books. I don’t clock them. They just take as long as they take. I don’t even know how long Blood Lust or any of the novellas took. Time becomes sort of meaningless when you’re on your own schedule.

RATS: Where do you live?

APRIL: I live in Los Angeles, California.

ZOE: Planet Earth. Though there have been rumors I live elsewhere.

RATS: What would you say is the primary focus of your book?

APRIL: The main thrust of The Indie Author Guide is to provide clear, detailed, plain English, step-by-step directions in self-publishing and author platform/book promotion tasks. If I’ve succeeded with this book, anyone with a modicum of computer skills and a willingness to learn can use its content to self-publish in print and ebook formats, and then go on to develop or optimize an author platform and book promotion strategy. The Indie Author Guide is all about empowering individual authors and micro-imprints to tackle publishing and book promotion by providing them with the specific information and instructions they need.

ZOE: Attitude. I give a lot of tips and how-to, but the main focus, besides stripping away all the extra fat to basically say: “okay, this is what you REALLY need to know to get started. Here’s my process…” was the concept of having the right attitude. A lot of the book had personal experiences of mine along the way as well as a lot of troubleshooting and mistakes I’ve made. A lot of it is about this idea that you don’t have to be perfect to do well. You’re going to make some mistakes, everybody does. It’s what you do with them that makes a difference.

RATS: Please share the chapter titles that appear in your book.


Read the rest of the article on Inside the Writers’ Studio.

Self-Publishing Index: Criteria Explained

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I thought with the release of the February 2011 Self-Publishing Index that I would try and provide a little more detail behind how the Index is put together and what criteria is used. Each month, I publish a graphic spreadsheet showing the latest Index and how it has changed from the previous month.
 
Here are some of the criteria we use to achieve that Index list:

 
 The latest Review Rating for all author solutions services listed on POD, Self-Publishing & Independent Publishing
This rating (0.00/10) is attributed to all services and can be found at the bottom of all the reviews we publish on the site. It is not set in stone, and can vary as an author solutions service develops and revises its services on offer to authors. At the bottom of every review is a link to updates on the company’s progress – as an example – service price changes, new publishing packages, expanded distribution platforms etc. At the core of all reviews is the ideal basis we look for in all author solutions services, but in reality, the requirements of individual authors will always differ, and therefore a search for an author solutions service scoring 10/10 is purely subjective.
 
 The number of years a company is in operation
This area of the industry has a tendency to see far too many new start-up companies open for business, only to disappear a year or two into existence. As a rule, though we may publish a general overview of a new author solutions service, we do not review and rate companies in existence less than one year.
 
 The cost and value for money of a company’s services
This is entirely arbitrary and always a difficult criteria to nail down. It is not acceptable to say that because company A is cheaper than company B, therefore, they must provide a better service for an author. Likewise, I know companies who charge four-figure fees and provide an excellent service, just as there are companies who charge their authors thousands for a poor book product and exorbitant and pointless add-on services.
 
 Comments and feedback on all author solutions services
Again, this is a complex and large area of appraisal. All published reviews on POD, Self-Publishing & Independent Publishing are open to comment and feedback, as a way of authors expressing their experience and opinion on a company’s services. These comments are freely available at the bottom of all reviews on the site and can often be more telling about a company’s value and reputation than any review, no matter how thorough. It is also an area where the company itself has a right to reply, and many of the reviews have discussion and input from the company in the comments section. I also receive a great deal of feedback privately from authors and companies – week to week – often information I cannot share publicly on the site because of issues of confidentially, including (arbitration or mediation between parties; impending class action law suits or legal process; impending company developments by way of sale, acquisition, administration or bankruptcy).
 
 Titles produced/published per annum
While the Index takes into account the output of any given author solutions service – this criteria is the one we have had to adopt the most complex formula for evaluation. We cannot punish a company producing 10 titles per year over a company producing 1000 titles, but what we can and have done is link it into the company’s review rating, years in service and feedback received. What counts most here is the negativity of a small company’s inactivity over a prolonged period of time, or the negativity of a significant jump in a large company’s publishing output over a relatively short period of time.
 
 Physical product assessment
When we review author solutions services, some are co-operative and will send us titles to review, but this is open to the selectivity of that particular company to choose their ‘best product’, and I prefer to review titles of my choice for paper quality and editorial quality, but that is only of value if the input and financial outlay of the individual author can be ascertained in the first instance.
 
All of the above data is revised and fed into the Self-Publishing Index every month to provide the latest up-to-date Index ranking. New companies are added on an ongoing basis (flotation), and it is advised that a period of time is required to evaluate the true stable ranking of any new company.

 

This is a reprint from Mick Rooney‘s POD, Self-Publishing and Independent Publishing.

Opportunity Doesn’t Knock, It Pounds!

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This post, by Mike Shatzkin, originally appeared on the Idea Logical Company blog on 2/5/11.

In a recent post, I contemplated the developing ebook markets around the world, and particularly in Europe, and observed that ten years or more of digitization efforts in the English-speaking world would have a sizeable impact on the ebook markets in other language countries. When I wrote about this earlier, it was to enumerate the challenge I think publishers in other languages should expect to see arising in their own local markets.

Today I want to view that same circumstance from the opposite perspective and consider the opportunity from the standpoint of the English-language publishers, Indeed, it is possible that it is so substantial that it will postpone Armageddon for large general trade houses, whose challenges from the inevitable decline of bookstores have concerned me for several years and which has been the subject or subtext of many posts on this blog.

I want to describe an opportunity which is devilishly difficult to size precisely. We want to know how many candidates to read books in English are in the US, in the rest of the English-speaking countries, and then in the non-English countries. Wikipedia says the world contains 914 million English speakers, of which 251 million are in the US, 232 million in India, and 168 million in the non-English countries in Europe. But that data has provenance of no consistent timing, and the US data, for example, is from the 2000 census.

One source I talked to recently who holds a statistics-oriented job and who has reason to know, insists the world has 600 million native English speakers and 1.4 billion English speakers in other countries. If that were true, the US would have less than a sixth of the total within its boundaries.

The US, by almost anybody’s measure, contains fewer than a third of the world’s English-speaking people. And everybody seems to measure “English- speaking”, not “English-literate.” But the English-literate market in non-English countries, whatever it may be today or when it was measured, is almost certainly growing faster than the native markets are. So if we accept the premise that ebooks ultimately put these potential ebook readers within reach of publishers in America (and Britain, Canada, Australia, and other English-speaking countries, of course), we are watching the access roads being built to a customer base that could double or more what has really been available previously.


Read the rest of the post on the Idea Logical Company blog.

The Ebook Quandary

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Last week marked the occasion for the 6th annual Winter Institute presented by the American Booksellers Association for their independent bookseller members. There was a lot of important information shared. I’d like to address how the technology and concepts of e-books are affecting the book industry. First, lets compare the different e-readers from the perspective of independent booksellers.


iOS-based (iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch:
Price= from $499 (iPad) from $99 w/contract (iPhone) from $199 (iPod)
Availability: Apple Store, AT&T, Best Buy, Walmart, etc.
Google Ebooks Compatible: Yes – Google Books App available through App Store
Ingram Ebooks Compatible: Yes – Palm/iPhone format compatible with eReader app (available thru App Store)
Should I recommend it? PROS: Best experience for indie ebook buyers. Both Google and Ingram offer easy access paths to eBooks on iOS devices. Huge existing install base.
CONS: Expensive.
 
 
Android-based (Motorola Droid, Samsung Galaxy Tab, etc.)
Price= from $49 with contract (DROID) $169 (Galaxy)
Availability: Various retailers, online
Google Ebooks Compatible: Yes – Google Books App available through Android Marketplace
Ingram Ebooks Compatible: Yes – Palm/iPhone format compatible with eReader app
Should I recommend it? PROS: Inexpensive, availability of Google
Books app means easy access for your customers. Early reviews are good.
CONS: Not as many of these in the wild yet, and few being used as
e-readers. Expect a lot of growth in the # of these devices in 2011.
 
 
Nook, Nook Color
Price= $149 (Nook) $249 (Nook Color)
Availability: B&N, also Best Buy, Target
Google Ebooks Compatible: Yes – Use Adobe Digital Editions Download option
Ingram Ebooks Compatible: Yes – Adobe Digital Editions format
Should I recommend it? PROS: Both Nook versions have received good reviews. Customers who prefer a dedicated e-reader will find much to like. CONS: Adobe Digital Editions is not nearly as easy to use to sync indie ebook purchases as iOS apps. Wireless download is B&N only.
 
 
Sony Reader
Price= from $149 (Pocket Edition)
Availability: Sony Store, Best Buy
Google Ebooks Compatible: Yes – Use Adobe Digital Editions Download option
Ingram Ebooks Compatible: Yes – Adobe Digital Editions format
Should I Recommend It? PROS: Some unique features (smaller size, touch screen). CONS: Some say these are difficult to use. Adobe Digital Editions sync. Wireless store (on Daily Edition) links only to Sony.
 
 
Kobo
Price= $139
Availability: Borders, other retailers
Google Ebooks Compatible: Yes – Use Adobe Digital Editions Download option
Ingram Ebooks Compatible: Yes – Adobe Digital Editions format
Should I Recommend It? PROS: Inexpensive. CONS: Limited market penetration, Adobe Digital Editions sync.
 
 
Other ereader devices (e.g., Pandigital Novel, COOL-ER, etc.)
Price= Varies
Availability: Varies
Google Ebooks Compatible: Most do support Adobe Digital Editions. For a complete list, see: http://adobe.ly/cgNsDr
Ingram Ebooks Compatible: Same
Should I Recommend It? PROS: Some could be extremely inexpensive. CONS: Wildly varying user experience. Some devices may be buggy. ADE sync.
 
 
Amazon Kindle
Price= from $139
Availability: Amazon, Best Buy, Target, Walmart
Google Ebooks Compatible: NO
Ingram Ebooks Compatible: NO
Should I Recommend It? Customers will not be able to buy books from you for their Kindle.
 
One important factor of the above comparisons is that the very popular Kindle has been purposely limited to Amazon ebook formats only. Obviously this works just fine for Amazon. Last year Amazon sold more ebooks than print books. Another important factor for publishers is that you need to produce your ebooks in all the above formats. That can be expensive if you have to purchase all the format translators. A better way to go is with SmashWords.com. They have a translation software that takes a Word file and automatically translates it to 7+ ereader formats and then distributes them to Amazon, BarnesAndNoble.com, Apple, etc.
 
 
The major publishers have jumped on the ebook bandwagon in a big way. Let’s see who the major players are:
 
Random House 22%
HarperCollins 15%
Hachette 13%
MacMillan 13%
Simon and Schuster 13%
Other 24%
 
 
The top categories are:
General Fiction 12%
Literary Fiction 11.5%
Mystery/Suspense 8%
Sci Fi/Fantasy 7%
 
 
The Average Price Point was $10.83

Pricing of ebooks by publishers has become a major issue arising in two approaches. The Wholesale Model is the traditional approach where the publisher sells to distributors and booksellers at a discounted wholesale price, who in turn resell it. Instead, some publishers are using the Agency Model, where the publisher sells directly to the public and gives an agent commission to the booksellers enabling the sale. Here is how these two models split out last year:

Agency= 55%

Non Agency Discounted= 15%

Non Agency Full Price= 30%

The top ten bestselling ebook titles last year were:

  1. Freedom (MacMillan)
  2. Autobiography of Mark Twain (University of California Press)
  3. Cleopatra (Hatchette)
  4. Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk (Hachette)
  5. Unbroken (Random)
  6. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest (Random)
  7. Moonlight Mile (HarperCollins)
  8. Object of Beauty (Hachette)
  9. Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter (HarperCollins)
  10. Room (Hachette)

Competition is driving some interesting steps forward for ebook selling. Now giant Amazon is being directly challenged by giant Google with their 3,00,000 ebook titles. These will be sold by independent booksellers who use the American Booksellers Association IndieBound.com web hosting system. Ingram is being challenged by their major rival, Baker and Taylor Distributors, who will be selling ebooks within the next two months.

Up till now, small presses and self-publishers have had a fairly clear playing field because their non-traditional capabilities to react to developing technologies quickly. Now the big boys have waded in and are trying to recapture market control. Still, the big guys are still flailing. As a proponent of long-tail marketing, I think the little guys still have the advantage in supporting niche markets. The secrets of future small press successes will be to: keep on top of developing technologies and continue to take advantage of your quick reaction time to industry changes. Indie booksellers have a much more difficult challenge to keep providing beloved print books while figuring out how to sell ebook downloads against Amazon et al.

 

This is a reprint from Bob Spear‘s Book Trends blog.

Free Fiction And The Value Of Our Efforts

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The advent of the internet has had many effects, not least of which is giving a voice to pretty much everybody. We’re all sitting at keyboards making noise, like a flock of a billion seagulls fighting over one bag of chips. It’s not a bad thing, as far as I’m concerned. The really strong voices lift above the white noise and everyone gravitates towards those voices that interest them. It’s a big world and an infinite internet, so there’s room in this sandbox for everyone. However, another aspect of that easy online voice is a million wannabe writers posting their stuff online and hoping people will read it. Again, not necessarily a bad thing, but a potentially damaging one for a writer’s career in the long run.

I’m one of those voices, obviously. I’ve got some of my own fiction posted here for anyone to read. I’ve engaged in the Friday Flash phenomenon. Is this damaging for my career? I don’t think so. I think it’s helping my career, by giving potential readers an insight into some of my stuff. I’ve had some nice comments from people about stories they’ve read here. But I’ve engaged in the practice with careful forethought.

I decided to write about this after reading this post on Benjamin Solah’s blog. You may remember that Benjamin guest posted here about a week ago, talking about his experiment self-publishing an ebook of his fiction. The power of the internet gave him some pretty solid and honest feedback very quickly. It can be summed up quite well in these comments on Ben’s post by Jason Fischer:

My two cents is this: trunk stories belong in your trunk. You either take them apart and make them good enough to sell, or you leave them there. Why would you want anyone to see a piece of your writing that isn’t working? If your career takes off, do you *really* want these out there?…

There’s so much fiction out there for the reading, even more with the new e-book markets. As such, it is remarkably easy to slide into the infamous “90% of everything that is crap” of Sturgeon’s Law. You should be aspiring to be in the other 10%, not taking the path of least resistance and self-publishing your unsellable trunk stuff.

Work on the nuts and bolts of your writing first and foremost. Be brutal with your own writing, edit, and edit some more. If you can’t get it to work, trunk it and try something else, and LEAVE IT IN THE TRUNK. You can promote something till the cows come home, but if it’s no good, no-one will want it…

These comments are culled from a longer conversation and it’s worth reading Ben’s post to see the whole discussion. Jason is someone worth listening to – apart from being a top bloke, his advice comes from great experience. He’s made many quality short fiction sales and is a recent winner of Writers Of The Future, among many other awards and nominations. Check him out here.

I agree with his sentiments. So how is what I’ve done with fiction on my site different to Ben’s experiment? There’s one simple difference – all the fiction I’ve made available to read here is previously published somewhere (with a couple of exceptions that I’ll talk about in a minute). Some of it is older stuff published in non-paying markets, but it’s still stuff I’m proud of. Other stories are published in better markets and the links here are directly to sites where the story can be found. The point is that it made it past an editor, so I’ve got unbiased, third party confirmation that it’s worth a read. For that reason, I’m happy to direct people towards it and say, “Here’s some of my writing for you to check out, I hope you like it.” If I wasn’t able to sell that story to an editor, even “sell” it to a for the love market, then I certainly won’t put it up here with a pouty face and a “well, I think it’s good enough” attitude. Because it’s not. Writers are the worst possible critics of their own work. Of course we love everything we write – we wrote it!

If people do like it, with any luck they’ll seek out some of my other stuff, they might take a punt on my novels. Hopefully then they’ll enjoy my books and recommend them to friends or buy copies to give as gifts. Using the same hypothesis, the first three chapters of both my books are available here (just click on book covers to find them) so that people can try before they buy.

The other exercise in free fiction I engaged in was Ghost Of The Black: A ‘Verse Full Of Scum. In an effort to generate return visits to my site and more interest in my fiction, I wrote a 30,000ish word novella in a series of episodes, which I then posted here every Monday during 2008. This was a conscious decision to write a piece of fiction that I had no intention of trying to sell. Rather, it was a deliberate exercise in giving something away to showcase my writing. It’s still available on the Serial Fiction page and it’s also available as an ebook and print book, that I’ve self-published. On the whole it’s been very well received and garnered a few decent reviews. Whether it’s really done much to enhance my career is hard to say, but I certainly don’t think it’s done any damage. Whether I leave it here indefinitely is also hard to say. For now, I’m happy to leave it for people to enjoy. I may take down the Serial Fiction page one day, and just leave the ebook and print edition available for people to buy. I may take those away too at some point. (Leave a comment if you have a particular opinion about that – I’d be interested to know.)

What I haven’t done is post here those stories that I couldn’t sell. Believe me, my story trunk is a dark and nasty place, full of things I really don’t want anyone else to see.

Another example of free, unpublished fiction here comes from my occasional jaunts into the Friday Flash meme. This is essentially a community of writers that post flash fiction on their websites and promote it with the #FridayFlash hashtag through Twitter and Facebook. A lot of those people don’t care about getting published, they’re just happy to be part of a community of likeminded people. Things that I’ve posted on Friday Flash are stories that I’ve decided are a good idea and an entertaining little yarn, but one that I don’t want to spend time trying to sell or expand into a longer piece. They’re all taster stories, exercises in writing and storytelling.

For me, writing is a very serious business. Friday Flash was a brief hobby. I don’t mean to denigrate the community by this statement at all, it’s just my own personal situation now. I’m not likely to post any more Friday Flash – I agree with the comments on Ben’s post that it’s a time-sink and I intend to spend that time on sellable short stories and novels. I’ve had fun with it, but now I’m moving on.

These days I only approach semi-pro and pro markets with my work. I know I can get stuff published in other places, but I’m improving my craft and expecting better results from myself. If I can’t sell a story to at least a semi-pro market, I won’t sell it at all. Nor will I post it here on my website. As the things on my site here attest, I was happy to get acceptances from much smaller markets before. Every writer starts somewhere. But I won’t stay there. I want to improve as a writer and I want to sell my work to better and better places all the time. I intend to be a pro writer, as in, get paid pro rates for my work, and I’ll keep working towards that. Recent sales are bearing out the worth of this endeavour – I’m making better sales all the time. I’m still yet to crack the big time pro markets, but I will one day.

In the meantime, I’m happy to leave the stuff here that I’ve already posted. I may well decide to take it all away at some point. Who knows?

What do you think? Do you appreciate free fiction as a taste of a writer’s work? Are you a writer for or against the idea? Have you had good or bad experiences posting fiction on your site? Do you think I should leave free fiction here or take it away? Leave your comments – I’m interested in people’s thoughts.

 

This is a reprint from Alan Baxter’s The Word.