Think

Opinion pieces offering commentary on various aspects of book culture, publishing and self-publishing.

Reading to Have Read

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This post by Ian Bogost originally appeared on The Atlantic on 3/14/13.

Spritz doesn’t strive to fix speed reading’s flaws, but to transcend reading entirely.

If you’re a person who reads, you may have read about Spritz, a startup that hopes to “reimagine” reading. Like most tech startups, reimagining entails making more efficient. Spritz promises to speed up reading by flashing individual words in a fixed position on a digital display. Readers can alter the speed of presentation, ratcheting it up to 600 words per minute (about three times the speed the average reader scans traditional text).

This method, called rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP), isn’t new, but Spritz has added an “Optimal Recognition Point” or ORP to this display technique. They claim it helps readers recognize each word most effectively by focusing their attention on a red letter representing its optimal point of recognition. Public response to the technology has been tremendous. According to Spritz, over 10,000 developers have already signed up to develop “Spritzified” products.

Does Spritz work? Well, it depends on what you mean by “work.” As Olga Khazan wrote here at The Atlantic, speed reading has long been accused of sacrificing comprehension for convenience. University of South Carolina cognitive psychologist John M. Henderson further explains that Spritz’s ORP doesn’t improve matters:

 

Click here to read the full article on The Atlantic.

 

Identity and the Writer

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This post by J.A. Konrath originally appeared on his blog on 3/10/14.

Who am I?

What do others think of me?

Identity is a very important, and terribly difficult, concept to grasp. What makes us who we are is fodder for philosophers, and perhaps biologists, not for this blog.

This blog is about publishing, and it is written for writers. But I’m going to take a stab at discussing identity anyway.

Lately I’ve seen a lot of stuff on the internet that falls under the umbrella of what I call “identity issues.” There are a lot of writers, and a lot of people in the publishing industry, who believe they have clearly defined identities, and who believe they have the ability to understand the identities of others. Identities that may be embraced and accepted, or dismissed and derided.

Let’s take a look at some of the things I’m referring to.

Years ago, Barry Eisler used the word legacy to describe traditional publishers. This word is apt because publishing fits the definition of a legacy system. Since Barry began using this, it has fallen into the common vernacular, but only in the shadow industry of self-publishing, used by self-published authors. Legacy publishers don’t like to be thought of as “previous” or “outdated”, even though they indeed are by any definition, so they reject the term because it conflicts with their personal identities. They believe they are relevant, forward-thinking, guardians of culture. They are wrong, but their identities are so entangled in these labels it may prevent them from doing things that could improve their bottom line, like treating authors better, innovating, and using new technology to reach more readers.

 

Click here to read the full post on J.A. Konrath’s blog.

 

The Author Monthly Planner: A Freebie to Organize Your Writing and Marketing Life

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This post by Toni Tesori originally appeared on Duolit on 3/11/14.

We’re stuck in this cycle where, for at least one week every month, one member of our family is sick (I blame Olivia for bringing home the germies from daycare, BTW).

While being sick doesn’t rate highly on the ol’ fun-o-meter, it did give me an awfully convenient excuse to skip out on my regular cleaning routine.

After catching Olivia practically wading through a pile of books in her bedroom, however, I decided that enough was enough. It was time to get back on my game.

So, I made a to-do list. A looong to-do list. Pretty reasonable, right?

The result? My house is still a mess.

Wanna know why?

To-do lists suck.

Listen, if you’re one of those folks who make perfectly reasonable to-do lists and attack them daily with gusto, I envy you. I wish the doggone things worked that well for me!

Personally, I’ve always found to-do lists a bit mocking. Appealing to the procrastination side of my personality, those lengthy lists just beg me to move some of the items to tomorrow’s list. As long as the tasks get done eventually, right?

Hint: those moved items never get done. Because more and more tasks are added and fewer are crossed off. Before long, I simply despise the sight of that stupid list! I become completely overwhelmed with the number of tasks, and my brain decides that surfing Tumblr is a far more appealing use of my time.

Does any of this sound familiar? If you’ve ever used such a list to keep track of your author-ly life to-do’s, I bet you’ve experienced the something similar.

 

It’s Not the List’s Fault

I’m being awfully hard on the humble to-do list, when it’s not the fault of the list itself. The fault instead lies in the to-do list process. Since the list is, by design, a running list of tasks to work on right now, it offers no perspective; it doesn’t tell me why I’m checking off the items. There’s no birds-eye view of where I’ve been, where I’m going or any kind of final destination.

This is especially important for authors: most of us don’t work on this authoring gig full-time, and jumping in and out of an ever-mounting task list is difficult/scary without an overall plan. We need a status update reminding us why we’re doing what we’re doing, where we’re trying to go and what we need to work on right now to achieve those future goals.

Basically: instead of tasks, we need focus.

 

Focus in a PDF: The Author Monthly Planner

 

Click here to read the full post, which includes a link to a free, downloadable author’s monthly planner in PDF format, on Duolit.

 

Ricky Gervais Tells A Story About How He Learned To Write

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Did you know Fast Company now has a special “Create” site, dedicated to the arts and creativity? And that there’s a special subsection there called Creation Stories, where writers and other creatives share their stories? From the site:

“Stories are an elemental form of human communications–they are how we understand each other and the world. With that in mind, we wanted to bring you…great stories!”

“Creation Stories are stories from the minds and mouths of some of the most creative people around–stories that entertain while shedding some light on the creative process.”

The series launched with Ricky Gervais talking about the most important lesson he ever learned about writing. From the site:

“Here, in the inaugural episode, Ricky Gervais (whose new Netflix series, Derek, debuts September 12) shares a story about an early creative turning point that forever informed the way he writes and works. It has to do with a teacher, a cheeky kid who maybe watched too much TV, an elderly neighbor and an unexpected creative lesson. Of course, it being Ricky Gervais, he delivers the story with some inimitable extras.”

 

Click here to watch the video on Fast Company’s Create site.

 

How to Know When You are Boring Your Reader to Tears

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This post by Jean Oram originally appeared on her The Helpful Writer site on 3/11/14.

Ever wondered why your books maybe aren’t getting purchased? Finding an agent to rep them? Or just plain and simply catching on?

There are a ton of reasons why books don’t connect. Timing, luck, voice, content, etc. Some of these aren’t controllable. But one thing is.

Boring your reader to tears, death, or worse…having them put your book down in disinterest.

It happens. We can’t connect with every reader. And if we try, well, chances are we’ll end up with a book that connects with even fewer people. (Not everyone liked Harry Potter, believe it or not. They just stay in hiding.) But there ARE things we can do to increase our chances of connecting with our readers and one of the big things is not boring them.

I know, right?

 

How to Know if You are Boring Your Readers and What to Do About It

The easiest way to figure out if you are boring your readers is to see if you are boring yourself.

Seems too basic, doesn’t it?

Right now there could be some of you thinking, “But there isn’t a stitch of boringness in my whole story!” Could be true. Maybe you wrote The Hunger Games. If so, you’re excused. However, the other several billion of us did not. So, dig deep and fall out of love with yourself for a moment (shouldn’t be too hard–we are artists, after all where self-doubt and loathing is as common as cheap bar soap).

Here are a few inklings that things aren’t as tight and as exciting as you might wish them to be in your story and you might be boring your reader.

 

Click here to read the full post on The Helpful Writer.

 

How To Love Book Marketing

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This post by Bryan Cohen originally appeared as a guest post on Joanna Penn‘s The Creative Penn site on 3/9/14.

Opening note from Joanna Penn:
I teach a lot of authors about book marketing and many start the workshops with dread, knowing they have to learn this stuff, but not really wanting to do it.

My aim is always to change their mindset to one of happily incorporating marketing into their daily lifestyle, and generally, by the end of the day, most authors are much happier! In today’s article, Bryan Cohen talks about his own marketing change of heart.

 

If you had fun marketing would you be looking for advice on a book marketing blog?

Probably not. I imagine most people search these blog posts for a magic bullet. A marketing solution that takes less time and energy. A tactic that leads to increased sales and more time for writing.

I’m not sure this post fits the bill, but I will tell you what I’ve done to make space in my life for publicizing my books.

 

Stranger Sales

The summer after I graduated from college, my favorite acting professor invited me to New York City to run the marketing for her show that was part of the New York Fringe Festival. I’d had some success promoting student plays, once packing a 250-seat house to the brim by promoting an unknown but lewd play as an age 18 and up affair. My professor hoped I’d fill the seats in New York, but despite my best efforts, I failed to get the word out.

I understood what worked for marketing on a college campus to my friends and peers. Using flyers, Facebook events and cheap/free tickets, I was able to pack the house. The same tricks didn’t work in the Big Apple, especially given the 50+ other shows going on at the same time. I’d failed to learn an important marketing truth:

What works for your friends and peers won’t always work for strangers. And without strangers on board, your sales will be severely limited.

 

From Chore to Reward

 

Click here to read the full post on The Creative Penn.

 

Writing—So Easy a Caveman Can Do It

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This post by Kristen Lamb originally appeared on her site on 3/7/14.

Recently a Facebook friend shared a post with me regarding Indie Musicians versus Indie Authors. It appears our culture has a fascination and reverence for the Indie Musician whereas Indie Authors face an immediate stigma. We authors have to continually prove ourselves, whereas musicians don’t (at least not in the same way). My friend seemed perplexed, but to me it’s very simple.

We’re not even going to address the flood of “bad” books. Many writers rush to publish before they’re ready, don’t secure proper editing, etc. But I feel the issue is deeper and it reflects one of the many challenges authors face and always will.

People give automatic respect to a musician because not everyone can play an instrument or sing. Simple. It’s clear that artist can do something many cannot.

As writers, we have an insidious enemy. People believe what we do is easy. If we are good writers, we make it look effortless. I recall being a kid watching the Olympics. The gymnasts made those handsprings look like nothing. Being four years old, I dove in…and broke my arm…twice (because I’m an overachiever that way).

The blunt truth is everyone has a story to tell. They do. Every life can be fascinating in the hands of a skilled author. Every idea can be masterful in the hands of a wordsmith. Ah, but the general public assumption is that the only thing standing between them and being J.K. Rowling is merely sitting down and finishing the story. Many believe that, because they’re literate and have command of their native language that they can do what we do.

 

Click here to read the full post on Kristen Lamb’s site.

 

Is Kindle Countdown the new Free? Keeping Books Visible in 2014

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This post by M. Louisa Locke originally appeared on her blog on 2/25/14.

For the past year there has been a good deal of hand-wringing over the question of KDP Select free promotions. Have they de-valued fiction, do they attract negative reviews, do they even work anymore? As anyone who regularly reads my blog posts knows, I have been a strong proponent of offering ebooks free for promotional purposes, and free promotions have been very good to me in terms of increasing my reviews and keeping my books visible and selling.

However, I also believe one of the distinct advantages we have as indie authors is our ability to use our own sales data to respond innovatively to changes in the marketing environment. As a result, in the past year I followed a number of different strategies to keep the books in my Victorian San Francisco Mystery series visible, including beginning to experiment with the new promotional tool, the Kindle Countdown, that has been introduced as part of KDP Select.

In this post I am going to:

A. Review how successful the strategies I pursued last year were for selling books in 2013.

B. Address whether or not Free is failing as a strategy.

C. Compare the Kindle Countdown promotions to Free promotions.

D. Assess whether or not Kindle Countdown promotions can replace free-book promotions as my primary promotional strategy for 2014.

 

Click here to read the full post on M. Louisa Locke’s blog.

 

That Damned Anonymous Panned My Book!

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This post by Pete Morin originally appeared on his site on 3/10/14.

In the past week, there has been a great deal of exposure of a petition to Amazon seeking to remove anonymity from all Amazon book reviewers. With a great deal of help from author Anne Rice’s nearly one million Facebook followers, the petition, initiated by one of Rice’s fans, has garnered over 5,000 signatures.

In the scheme of things, 5,000 is not a lot of signatures, but I am still baffled that this many people – I might assume many of them are authors and Rice fans – could put their names behind the mandate expressed in the petition.

Before we get to the petition itself, though, I want to point out a few things.

I’ve spent a fair amount of time in the Amazon forums, and perhaps out of morbid curiosity, followed and reviewed the history of many of the more egregious instances of author versus author, author versus reviewer, and perhaps the worst instances: author fans on reviewer. These nasty encounters occur in the dark recesses of the Amazon book world, more commonly surrounding self-published works of erotica, romance and paranormal romance. As I read none of those (I swear), I am a mere wide-eyed spectator.

Let me say that one of the worst examples of this kind of gang attack was perpetrated by Ms. Rice herself, who posted a one-star review on her Facebook page, for all of her nearly 1 million fans to see, with a link to the review. You need no imagination to know what happened.

So then, this petition was submitted by one Todd Barselow, an independent editor and avowed fan of Ms. Rice, last week. (Mr. Barselow once attempted to raise money via gofundme to pay for a trip to New Orleans to visit the author and her son.) In just a short period of time, news of the petition – and more importantly, Ms. Rice’s championing of it (complete with PR photos)- has reached a variety of press outlets, all liberally using the press package delivered to them. Interesting! Still, with all of that worldwide press coverage, the petition still stands at just 5,280 signatures.

 

Click here to read the full post on Pete Morin’s site.

 

How Do Hitmen Operate?

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This article by Ryan Jacobs originally appeared on The Pacific Standard on 1/28/14, and will be of particular interest to authors of crime, military and espionage thrillers.

British criminologists claim that hitmen are more boring than we make them out to be, but their analysis can’t account for the behavior of “Master” killers.

If a hitman excels at his craft, he’ll operate quietly and without incident. In theory, the whispered meetings will be held in secret, the job will be executed with precision and grace, and no one will witness the escape.

For those reasons, the few criminologists who do attempt to study these misdeeds acknowledge the thorny methodological problems associated with examining “a secret world” to which they have no access. Of course, that hasn’t exactly stifled their ambitions.

A group of researchers at the Center for Applied Criminology at Birmingham City University in the U.K. has recently analyzed newspaper articles, court records, and a series of “off-the-record” interviews with informants “who have, or who had, direct knowledge of contract killings” in order to construct what they term a “typology” of British hitmen. For the record, these social scientists “define a hitman as a person who accepts an order to kill another human being from someone who is not publicly acknowledged as a legitimate authority regarding ‘just killing’.” The results of their detailed search of British cases that matched this description in the period between 1974 and 2013 only turned up 27 contracted hits or attempted hits “committed by a total of 36 hitmen” (there was only a single “hitwoman”), but the researchers used the sample to tease out the details and profiles of typical killers-for-hire.

The main thrust of the paper, which will be published in the Howard Journal of Criminal Justice, is that hitmen do not operate with the drama, professionalism, or glamour that mob films and spy novels afford them. In actuality, the majority of killers select jejune settings for their crimes, have occasionally bumbling performances, and are often hired by contractors with lame motivations.

Here’s the profile of an average British hitman, who seems more confined by the boxy restraints of reality than the undulating arcs of fiction:

 

Click here to read the full article on The Pacific Standard.

 

Scribd.com: Opt-in, Turn-on, Opt-out?

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This post by Rich Meyer originally appeared on Indies Unlimited on 3/7/14.

For those of you who may have missed the news, Smashwords.com is now distributing their books to Scribd.com, an online e-book subscription service. If you’re not familiar with Scribd, think of them as the Spotify or Netflix Streaming of e-publishing: Subscribers pay a monthly fee and then can download and read as many books as they want. Authors will get a percentage of that, depending on how much of their book was read by the end consumer.

Here comes the first kick-in-the-pants for authors. If you compare things to, say, Spotify, the popular on-line music service, you’ll easily find references on the Internet to popular performers having their songs played millions of times and getting royalty checks in whole TENS of dollars. Supposedly, if Scribd is anything like the Oyster service, Smashwords authors will be getting 60% of the price of a book borrowed by a reader, as long as nearly 20% of the book is read. So unlike the great deal where an author using Amazon’s Kindle lending library through KDP might get $2 per lend for a 99-cent e-book, a Scribd book will net a writer 59 cents. And that’s only if the person reads 20% of it. Which is something I will come back to in a bit.

Scribd has actually said things will work out fine “if most readers read in moderation.” Umm … a reader who would consider a subscription service for books is more than likely not one that would read in normal “moderation,” whatever the hell that is. I consider myself to be a slightly-above average reader, and I’ve already read over sixty books since the first of the year. Imagine how many some of the power readers could do? Of course, if they read the whole book, then at least the author gets a bit o’ dosh for it. Unless … well, again, more later.

 

Click here to read the full post on Indies Unlimited.

Then, to get Smashwords’ side of the situation, please also see this post from Smashwords founder Mark Coker announcing the Scribd distribution deal and explaining the particulars.

 

Neil Gaiman on the Hugo Awards Controversy

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When Jonathan Ross was invited to host the Hugo Awards this year it caused a huge rift in the British Science Fiction community. Many felt the choice of Ross was totally inappropriate, as Ross is not involved in the community of Science Fiction authors and publishers, and some concluded it must be a cynical grab for more American attention.

A huge firestorm of criticism erupted on Twitter, with personal attacks being hurled not only at event organizers, but at Ross and his wife as well. In a post made to his Neil Gaiman’s Journal yesterday, Gaiman reveals that he had acted as the go-between for Hugo Awards organizers in reaching out to Ross in the first place, and goes on to comment on the whole mess. From Gaiman’s Journal:

Twitterstorms are no fun when people are making up things about you or insulting you for things you didn’t do or think or say. When scores of people from a group that you consider yourself a part of are shouting at you, it’s incredibly upsetting, no matter who you are. And these things spill over and get bigger — I was saddened to learn that Jane Goldman, Jonathan’s wife, one of the gentlest, kindest people I know (and the person who, with Jonathan, got me onto Twitter, back in December 2009) had deleted her Twitter account because of all this.

I was seriously disappointed in the people, some of whom I know and respect, who stirred other people up to send invective, obscenities and hatred Jonathan’s way over Twitter (and the moment you put someone’s @name into a tweet, you are sending it directly to that person), much of it the kind of stuff that they seemed to be worried that he might possibly say at the Hugos, unaware of the ironies involved.

 

Click here to read the full post on Neil Gaiman’s Journal.

 

Books, Just Like You Wanted

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This post by David Streitfeld originally appeared on The New York Times Bits blog on 1/3/14.

Anyone can publish a book these days, and just about everyone does. But if the supply of writers is increasing at a velocity unknown in literary history, the supply of readers is not. That is making competition for attention rather fierce. One result: ceaseless self-promotion by eager beginners.

Another consequence is writers’ thirst for more data on how they are being read, so they can shape their books to please their readers more. This is something novelists have always done, using sources like fan mail, personal appearances, reviews and sales. Technology is starting to give them data that is much more precise, and thus potentially more helpful.

“If you write as a business, you have to sell books,” said Quinn Loftis, a very successful self-published writer for teenagers. “To do that, you have to cater to the market. I don’t want to write a novel because I want to write it. I want to write it because people will enjoy it.”

But my article last week outlining how the digital book subscription services Oyster and Scribd plan to collect and share data with writers like Ms. Loftis resulted in little enthusiasm, at least among potential readers. Nearly all the comments on the article expressed dismay about where the trend could go.

 

Click here to read the full article on The New York Times Bits blog.

 

L.A. Times Festival of Books Partners With Amazon

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This article by Wendy Werris originally appeared on Publishers Weekly on 3/5/14.

When the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books unveiled its list of participating authors on Tuesday, the event caused a stir among local booksellers who immediately noticed the list featured buy links to Amazon. That the festival would partner with Amazon instead of the IndieBound affiliate program is not sitting well with the bookselling community that has long supported the literary event.

“Exhibitors at the Festival put an enormous amount of time and money into making this event a success for their stores,” said Mary Williams, events manager of Skylight Books in Los Angeles, “and for the authors who appear, while serving the hundreds of thousands of people that attend. Having sales siphoned away from that effort is disheartening, to say the least.” Williams hopes that the Festival staff will consider adding the IndieBound program, which allows customers to order through independent bookstores’ websites in advance of the Festival’s author events.

The Festival of Books launched in 1996 on the campus of UCLA and has grown considerably over time; for many Los Angeles bookstores it is the biggest event of the year. The L.A. Times successfully moved the location of the Festival to the University of Southern California in 2010, and it will be held there April 12 and 13.

 

Click here to read the full article on Publishers Weekly.

 

The Business Rusch: Addendums, Rights Grabs & Agents (Yet Again)

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This post by Kristine Kathryn Rusch originally appeared on her site on 9/25/13.

Recently, I got e-mail from another career writer, talking about a rights grab from a traditional publisher. I saw the document in question; it’s egregious. I do not have permission to talk about this particular document nor would I, since it’s proprietary, but it’s the kind of document I’ve seen at least six times in the last two years.

These documents are addendums to publishing contracts. Since the rise of e-books, publishers have issued the addendums frequently and often en masse.

Before I go further, let me remind you that I am not a lawyer nor do I play one on TV (or in internet videos, for that matter). I have opinions about legal matters as they pertain to publishing, based on thirty-some years in the business on almost all sides of the business, but I am not an authority on this topic nor does anything in this blog substitute for legal advice.

Got that?

Okay.

Once signed, addendums to contracts become part of the contract. All well-written addendums have language that explains the addendum’s relationship to the contract. For example, the addendum might say something like “nothing in this addendum will supersede the terms previously granted in the contract.”

Or, as I’m seeing in all these publishing addendums, they’ll have clauses that say things like “if there is a conflict between a term that is specifically defined in this addendum and a definition of the same term is in the contract, then the definition specified in the addendum governs.”

In other words, the addendum will not only become part of the contract; it will make parts of the contract null and void.

Some addendums I’m seeing are pretty straightforward. They grant e-rights to contracts so old that ebooks did not exist when the contract was signed. Those addendums generally add the ebook information, how the royalties will be calculated, how ebooks are defined—basically the same stuff that would be in a contract if it were signed in 2013 instead of 1983. I know a lot of you traditionally published career writers have signed addendums like these—and many of you have refused, keeping the e-rights for yourself.

That’s all well and good, and is typical business.

But the addendums I’m writing about today are rights grabs.

 

Click here to read the full article on Kristine Kathryn Rusch’s site.