In the old days, meaning more than four years ago, the path to becoming a professional fiction writer was pretty simple to understand. You wrote stories and novels and mailed them to traditional publishers directly. When the story was rejected, you kept the story (or novel) in the mail until someone bought it. 
Well, not so much anymore. Fiction writers now have that dreaded word: Choice. And so, the path to being a successful fiction writer isn’t so clear anymore. In fact, I would call it downright muddy.
So I’m going to update this article that I did last year because there are so many people coming to this place now that weren’t coming last year, I figure it wouldn’t hurt. If you read this last year, you might want to read it again for updates. I will put two other articles here on this same topic over the next two days.
Warning: Some of you early-career fiction writers may not like my suggestions or observations. Just remember that there is no right way and there is no one way for all writers to take.
I’m just going to try to put some road markers up to keep a few of you out of the ditch. Follow or not follow. It’s your career. Your choice.
The Major Choices
Let me detail out what I see as the six major paths that a fiction writer can take in 2014 when starting out.
1… Follow the myths, write one novel, rewrite it to death, then spend all your time tracking down an agent.
This path seldom leads to a decent sale or decent writing, but most beginning writers still follow this path like blind sheep. I keep hoping I will see signs of this changing, but alas, I just don’t.
2… Write a novel and mail a submission package for your book directly to editors. Then while that book is in the mail, write more novels and mail them as well while working on becoming a better storyteller.
Keep learning from everywhere. This is the way it’s been done forever in publishing and is still valid. (Only difference now from ten years ago is that now you need an IP attorney to work on your contract instead of an agent. Contracts are much more difficult these days and if you get a small deal, chances are they will want all rights forever. But you can worry about that after you get the offer.)
3… Follow the myths that have developed over the last few years. Write a novel, rewrite it to death, pay a gad-zillion bucks to have someone put it up electronically for you and then take a percentage of your work, then you promote it to your 200 friends on Facebook until they start fleeing out of disgust.
This path seldom works, but it is part of the promotion myths.
4… Write a novel, learn how to do your own covers and formatting, put the novel up yourself electronically and in POD and then write the next novel and work on learning and becoming a better storyteller. Repeat. Do not promote other than telling your friends once each book is out.
This is more of a standard, traditional path that will work, but takes time as you learn how to tell better stories that people want to read. Plus there is a learning curve on learning how to do covers and layout interiors that many find very scary, even though not once in the process can anyone come to your house and threaten you with an ax.
5… Follow #4 and #2 at the same exact time, telling the editors in the submission package that the book is published by your press and send them a copy of the paperback in the package.
Very few beginning writers are trying this method because they are afraid traditional editors will come to their houses and break their fingers (or some other fear just as stupid.)
6… Forget novels completely and only write short stories, selling to traditional magazines as well as publishing indie.
This method has a lot quicker feedback loops and is a good way to learn how to tell great stories, but it takes a mind set most beginning writers do not have or will ever have. And you must learn how to do all the indie publishing work yourself. This method was never a path to making a living writing fiction, but now it is possible if you really, really, really love short fiction. Otherwise, just write a few stories here and there to help your novels. Remember, unless you are scary creative in marketing, short fiction does not sell well indie.
That’s the six major paths I see toward making a living selling fiction in 2014. (You won’t make a living starting in 2014, but they are all paths toward making a living in five to ten years time.)
Or you can come up with your own slight variation on those paths.
#1 and #3 don’t work unless you get fantastically lucky.
#2 and #4 lead to long careers, but take time to build.
#5 might get you to making coffee money a little faster, but it will still take years, as it should.
#6 only if you love short fiction with a passion that not even your friends understand..
In my opinion, all writers these days should be writing, selling, and publishing some short fiction along with writing novels. The short fiction market is booming and short fiction should just be a part of any business plan for a fiction writer. (Yeah, yeah, I know, you can’t write short fiction. So learn and stop whining.)
The Problems New Writers Face in 2014
Let me list a few of the big ones.
1) Myths.
These are everywhere, and are mostly flat stupid. But all beginning fiction writers (me included in my day) buy into myths because beginning writers look for the secret handshake, the shortcut, the way to sell books without learning how to tell good stories.
The truth is that the best way to sell books is write a lot, work on learning how to be a better storyteller constantly, get your work in front of editors or readers or both, and plan for the long haul. But new writers ignore that advice, especially the long haul advice.
I have an entire book coming out called Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Publishing. I put them all up here for free, but here are some examples (not all by a long ways) of some major myths in 2014.
a) You need an agent to sell a book.
b) You need an agent to sell a book overseas.
c) You need an agent to sell to Hollywood.
d) Traditional publishing gives you better quality in production and editing.
e) If you lower your price on your only novel, you will make more money.
f) As an indie publisher, you can’t get your books into bookstores.
g) You can pay someone to help you sell a lot of books.
h) You need to promote your book.
Again, there are many more, but those are what I consider the top eight killer myths for writers starting off in 2014.
2) Reactions to information.
In this high-speed world of the information age, any person can offer an opinion. This blog is no exception. The problem early fiction writers face is what to believe, what to listen to, and what to ignore. Now granted, this was the problem when I came in as well back in the 1970s, but now the information is out for everyone to see no matter the source. In my day, we only had to sort out what the established professionals were saying. Now anyone who has a few short stories up can blog about how they did it and what everyone should do.
And there are scammers out there who have never written a word of fiction, but think they can teach you how to write fiction.
How to solve this problem of where to get good information? I have no easy solution.
One suggestion is set up a writing computer that is only for creation of new words. Have no games, no email, no internet connection on that computer. Make it only a writing computer. That way the creative side of things has a line between it and the information overload and opinions flooding at you from everywhere. It honestly will help and be worth the few hundred bucks for a new computer.
Second suggestion is to only listen to people who have more than twenty or thirty or more novels in print and who have been in the business for more than twenty years. Also, make sure this person is also versed in both sides of the business of publishing, both traditional and indie. Some of the old professionals still have their heads in the sand and can hurt you worse than listening to a person with a few titles out indie only. Find the balance between the two extremes.
Third suggestion is listen to your little voice. If it sounds wrong to you, it might be. But if the advice coming at you makes business sense for you, then explore it.
In other words, it’s your career and there are no right answers. Learn to think for yourself. And learn business as fast as you can.
3) Getting in a hurry.
This is the area that is also normal for early fiction writers. And I honestly don’t know the reason why, but I was no exception to this problem when I started out. Now, with the indie publishing, this problem is no longer hidden in each writer’s office, but is out on full display for the world to see.
When watched from the outside, and from a point of distance like I now have, this all seems laughingly funny to me. I watch new writers, who have managed to complete their first novel, promoting the life out of their “book” because they believe they should (myths), and then complaining when there are very few sales.
From a place of perspective, this is like watching a brand new violin player stride onto the stage at Carnage Hall with their very first recital piece and wondering why no one showed up to listen even though they advertised their concert to everyone they knew. Let me simply say, “Duh.”
So one of the worst problems new fiction writers have now is that inability to see that the fiction writing profession is an international profession and it takes years to learn, both on the craft side and the business side. Yes, I said YEARS!!!
And, oh yeah, it takes years of practice as well. (Lost all English majors right there.)
The solution to this is take a deep breath, focus on the writing and learning to write better stories and put the books out either indie or to editors or both and leave them alone. If you get a few buyers, great. If not, no big deal. Trust the audience and the editors to decide when you have graduated to professional-level storytelling.
Again, to be clear, mail or publish your first work and then keep learning. And publish the second and the third and so on. Follow Heinlein’s Rules right from the very first story.
They might not sell, but the problem comes is when you, the writer, EXPECT them to sell. Just put them out after you do the best job you can and move on. They can not hurt you. (It’s a myth that they can kill your career because you don’t have a career. Duh.)
The Path in 2014
I’m going to give flat out advice right now. Please understand this is only my opinion and please take or leave what you want.
My advice to fiction writers starting out for 2014:
1) Spend 80% of your focus and time on producing new fiction. Not rewriting, not researching, but producing new words on the page. Period. (Follow Heinlein’s Rules to the letter.)
2) Spend 15% of your time on learning craft and business. Both a little at a time. In any way you can. We do a lot of business workshops here besides craft workshops. So do other major fiction writers.
3) Spend the remaining 5% of your time mailing finished work to editors or getting your work up indie published or both. (The #5 path above I believe in 2014 is the best if you have the courage, but most won’t try it.)
4) Think five and ten years out and set production goals. (Not selling goals, you are not in charge of those, but you are in charge of your own production and how much you learn.)
That’s it.
Simple.
The writers who follow my suggestions are following a path well-worn by generations of professional writers. All of us did it just slightly different in the details and time depending on our background, but we all walked that same basic road.
Even with the indie publishing side of things, which can help cash flow a little, this new world has not varied from the time it takes to learn how to tell a decent story.
Telling a good story is an art form. As with any art, the art takes time to learn.
Make writing new words your main focus. Make learning business and craft your secondary focus. And get your work out for people to read right from word one.
Don’t get in a hurry.
It really, honestly, is that simple.
And that hard.
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Copyright © 2013 Dean Wesley Smith
Cover art copyright Philcold/Dreamstime
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Very good advice. I’m an erotic romance writer who reads successes by other erotic romance writers who made a lot of money in less than a year. One author made the NYT bestseller list 11 times. I tried a sample of one of her works. I can’t say I liked it but her readers sure did. It does put stars in your eyes.
I also been looking at their formatting and they aren’t doing anything special. It’s all pretty plain. But it doesn’t seem to matter to the reader. They love the story and I guess that is what counts.
Right now I’ve been on path #4 but now that I think about it #5 might be interesting to try. I’ve hesitated mainly because of the horrible contract terms I’ll probably receive if I happen to receive an offer — I’ll almost certainly end up simply rejecting the deal after spending some money on an IP lawyer. But I guess on the plus side it’s another way to get feedback and there’s no harm besides the cost of postage and the spare paperback for the submission package.
I have a very minor bone to pick with not the recommendation, but the stated rationale, in one small area above:
Excellent conclusion that is spot-on. I can count on one hand, without using all of my fingers, the number of literary agents of any real standing out there whom I’d trust to negotiate even a seemingly simple contract without referring the matter to a qualified IP attorney… and they’re all IP attorneys on the side.
The rationale, however, is flawed by a bit of nostalgia. The transactions have always been inordinately complicated, even in the days of two-page contracts for novels. Just because that complexity doesn’t appear in the text of the contract doesn’t mean that it isn’t there, lurking, waiting to bite people in the butt (or other more-delicate places). Consider, for example, the “standard” Random House contract of the 1960s through early 1990s for a book-length work, which granted the right to publish “in book form.” Fast-forward to the late 1990s and ask yourself whether “in book form” includes “e-books”… and, more particularly, ask yourself how much it’s going to cost to get a definitive answer to that question, in both time and money, and whether or not everyone agrees on that answer.
That was a simple and obvious problem. They’re usually not that simple or obvious. Just consider what it really means to agree to arbitration before a single arbitrator in New York to resolve any dispute between the publisher and the author. How many agents actually know what that costs? What the arbitrator can and cannot do? How long it takes? etc., etc., etc. (Sadly, some IP attorneys don’t know, either… but they know to ask someone who does, and usually know who that is.) Similarly, without understanding the publisher’s business structure and its implications, one cannot see whether one should insist on a three-year (the ordinary limit for filing commercial insurance claims) or a four-year (the statute of limitations for mail fraud) lookback period for royalties instead of the boilerplate one year… and, more to the point, whether it’s not even worth asking for four years because other legal restrictions based on the publisher’s business structure mean it can’t agree to that (even though that’s the real limit, and that’s four years from discovery by a reasonable person).
I’m not quite as anti-agent as is Our Gracious Host — I think there are some who can, and do, provide substantial benefits for authors at a price to the author less than the benefits provided, under some circumstances, for some authors and/or authors’ estates. That said, I disagree that only in recent memory have things gotten so much more complex that the agent community’s competence in negotiating (and policing) contracts was so wanting that it needed specific, qualified, specialist legal advice. It’s been that way since the seventies — the eighteen-seventies — and that’s just concerning the copyright and directly-IP-law-related issues.
Some of us are listening closely, and following #4 with a vengeance. Though I wish sales had more velocity, I forego much of the publicity trumpeting that others tell us to do, and concentrate on producing more quality work, as you keep telling us (thank you). Am working long and short, and have the work in print, ebook, and now audio, which is a delightful new income trickle. But why should I still consider a trad contract, if I’m going to reject their bad terms anyway? Seems like a waste of time and money for the satisfaction of telling them no.
Dale, it is if you understand. Better to let them come to you. But I was talking to the people with a great need to be “stamped valid” by a traditional publisher. In other words, I was trying to give people who believe in the first path an option. Nothing more. (grin) Heck, I’ve seen the contracts and unless a publisher comes to me waving some nice money, I wouldn’t do it either.
I’ve been agreeing with you for a long time, but a major problem for new authors is, they see that New Author X (indie-) published his/her first book and got some massive success. And then the new authors think, why can’t I do that? Maybe if I just followed his/her promotion strategy…
What the new authors can’t see is that very often, these “sudden wonders” either got lucky and can’t sustain that success, or there was a lot of “behind the scenes” writing that we don’t see – multiple novels or stories that were written but never published, or written under a different pen name.
Exactly ARW.
Dean: Good advice as always. In a way I’m pleased that a trad publisher just rejected my cozy mysteries. It frees me to self-publish those two books and write the third in 2014.
Dean,
I find your advice useful, and I have been following a mix of #4 and #6 (mostly novellas and short stories) except that I have a little problem with “Do not promote other than telling your friends once each book is out.”
My problem is simple: I don’t have friends. Not friends that would buy my books anyway. I don’t think I personally know a single person who’s in my intended audience. My brother comes close, but not quite. And, really, I’m not into making new friends — what I want is readers.
After selling less than 10 copies of my (many) ebooks since 2011, I’ve decided to make a few changes – I changed my name, book covers, and I decided to try some paid advertising and review services (like indieReader.com). I’m still waiting for my reviews and ads to come out…
It seems more sensible to pay for some exposure (even if it doesn’t drive many sales) than losing time trying to socialize with random people in the hope they can someday become my readers. It only takes a few minutes to buy those services, and I wouldn’t mind spending a couple hundred bucks a month on promotion. Even if I had to do it for years. In the end it’s about having time to write while not feeling that my books are just rotting in the vast virtual slush piles out there.
What do you think about it?
L.N., I think it will be interesting to see how it works. Let me know after you try a few things. There are many writers who just let their writing speak for itself and don’t do any social networks and they sell just fine given time. So keep having fun. And try what sounds reasonable and let me know how it works, if you would. I’m always trying to learn as well. Thanks.