I have numbers of worries and fears about this new world of publishing where writers sometimes create their own publishing company or even publish a story or novel under their own name.
And not one of my fears deals with money and how much can be made. Or about cutting through the “noise” as everyone calls it. Or about the problems of beginning writers putting up slush-pile level fiction. I have no worries at all about those and think they are just straw dogs, to be honest.
And let me be very clear, I am excited beyond belief with this new world that is shaping up. I believe this new world will allow stories now blocked to find readers and literature will be better served in the long run because of that. And I believe it will free up writers to write more and more.
But just because I am excited and teaching people last week and this week how to take advantage of this new world doesn’t mean I don’t have some worries at the same time.
So let me outline what are my biggest fears about this wonderful new world of publishing.
Fear #1
Writers will spend their writing time publishing their old work and not create new.
Now, for me or Kris, this is not a worry at all, even though we both have massive backlists of fiction that need to get out. Both of us are having the opposite problem, actually. Suddenly, with the freedom that this new world gives us, we suddenly have a ton of projects that were pushed aside as not being marketable that now are demanding to be written. I’m writing more Poker Boy stories and a second novel, Kris is planning to continue The Fey series.
But over and over I have heard about writers, especially writers who don’t have much writing time to begin with because of day jobs, spending their time and energy publishing stories. That scares me, because simply put, the only way to make a name and a living at fiction is write the next story, the next novel. I’ve taught that for 15 years now and I will continue to teach that, no matter what publishing system the writer uses.
Bluntly put, if you are not writing the next story, the next novel, you are not writing and thus not a writer.
But that said, the small-publishing side of this is so much fun. Seeing a book go live on Kindle is a blast, seeing your story or novel at B&N.com is great fun. But a book cover can always be worked on more to make it look better and a manuscript fixed to make it cleaner on Amazon. In fact, publishing takes time. It’s why there are so many people who work in those large buildings in New York.
Compared to just a few years ago, self-publishing is easy. But it still takes a learning curve that takes time. Doing a cover, formatting an already written short story and putting it up online can only take a couple of hours if you have done it a number of times. But if you only have a few hours of writing a day or a week, then by putting that old story up you are taking time away from your writing. And maybe that next story, that next novel that you don’t write would have been the one to make you rich or famous.
My suggestion:
Again balance is the key. Don’t let the publishing time cut at all into your writing time. Ever. You are a writer first, a publisher second. Hold that line and you will find a balance. Any of us can always carve out a few extra hours each week to get up a story online. Just don’t give away your writing time. Creating inventory is more important than anything else. In the long run, a lot of inventory will be the only thing that will draw readers.
Fear #2
Writers will get discouraged far too quickly in this new world of publishing.
I can’t begin to tell you how tempting it is to watch “the numbers” on different sites. Put up a couple novels or stories and then wonder why you are not making Konrath numbers in two days. So instead of continuing to write and put up new work online and sell to traditional publishers, you get discouraged and quit. You think rejections are discouraging, watching the numbers every couple days make dealing with rejection from traditional publishers seem easy.
I hate to break this to all you new writers in a hurry, but publishing takes time. Both sides of this take time, both online and traditional publishing. And small publishing of your own work online and in POD takes even more time than the years it takes to develop a career in traditional publishing.
To make decent money in electronic publishing, you must build an inventory. And I don’t mean just a few novels and six short stories. You must have a lot of work up there for readers to find. Otherwise the numbers never will grow. Konrath had a long-term career in traditional publishing before he switched over to electronic. He spent years slowly building readers and when he switched, his publishers already had things up electronically. He just added into it and kept building. But overall it took him years, not to build readers, but to build inventory.
If you are not into this new world for the long haul, meaning starting your publishing company with a ten-year plan and a bunch of long-term goals for your writing, run now. You will just be disappointed and then go online and discourage others who should not be discouraged just because you are impatient.
Building a writing career takes time. Building a publishing business also takes time.
My suggestion:
Watch the numbers once a month. Never more. And record each total to see how the growth is from month-to-month. There will be some down months, accept them and expect them. Plan for the long haul. And expect small numbers until you get past 15 or more products for the first jump, then expect still low numbers until you get up into around fifty different titles of short stories or novels or collections up. Then it will jump again.
Fear #3
Writers will want someone else to do all the work and be taken by scammers.
Trust me, building a cover and formatting a book takes time and some learning curves that 95% of all writers won’t want to take. So they will turn to others to help them and scams are already building.
Scam #1: The Agent Scam
Yup, here I go again worrying about agents, but across this country agents are starting to see that their jobs are on the line and are starting to step in and offer to take care of these “chores” for the writers. That means that those agents have stepped across the line and become a publisher. And taking 15% or 25% as one agent is charging of a book that sells even small numbers (say $1,000 a year) FOREVER (meaning the author’s life plus 70) is a ton of money for a few hours work. All because the author was too lazy to do the work and wanted someone to take care of them.
And, of course, the agents will want to get all the money and paperwork first, because the writer needs to be “taken care of” and trust me, that’s exactly what the agents will do for your money, but you won’t see much of it. You think it’s hard to track publishing money from overseas and large corporations, try tracking money dripping in from fifty different sources for electronic publishing.
Simple solution to this one:
DO NO LET ANY AGENT EVER BECOME YOUR PUBLISHER!!!
Scam #2: The New Packager
Again, most writers as I have disgustingly discovered want someone to take care of them, so they will give these over to some upstart business who claims that for a flat fee or a percentage they will do all this work for them. CAUTION!!!
There will be good and bad of these new businesses. How you can do this right means that you still have to take some responsibility. For example, there are a ton of great freelance editors out there to help you. Go to them or use your trusted first readers for that. As far as covers and layout, a friend of mine set up this service for writers and she set up the service in the ONLY WAY I AGREE WITH. She has a menu. You as a writer, if uncomfortable with doing say a cover, for a set price can get a cover from her company. You know up front what a cover will cost and you pay half ahead and half when satisfied for the service. No percentage of forever sales. Then you can do the rest. You can pick off the menu what will help you and your small publishing company. That works for the writer who needs help. It does not work for the writers who want someone to take care of everything.
Summary:
Those are my three major fears for writers in general. Electronic publishing and POD publishing with the opening of the distribution channels has allowed writers to set up small publishing companies and write what we want. If it doesn’t sell to a traditional publisher, we can publish it ourselves. We have the freedom to write and publish how we want now. And the future looks bright. But there are huge problems with this future as well. What would have happened if J.K. Rowling had given up when her agent wanted her to give up and self-published that first book? Would we have that wonderful series? Maybe, but maybe not.
Stay balanced and if you are going into this new world, take the responsibility of doing it yourself and watch out for the scammers. And for heaven’s sake, never use your writing time to do publishing chores.
Use this new world to push you to write more. Then we all win.
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Copyright 2010 Dean Wesley Smith
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At some point, just as with the Killing the Sacred Cows of Publishing series, I will publish this series as a book. And this installment is now part of my inventory in my bakery. (Confused on that, read the Killing the Sacred Cows of Publishing post about making money with writing.) I’m giving you this small slice as a sample. I’m giving you a taste, but not selling any of the pie.
And if want to read back installments of this series, check out the top of the web page for the site link.
If you feel this helped you in any way, toss a tip into the tip jar on the way out of the Magic Bakery.
If you can’t afford to donate, please feel free to pass this chapter or any of the earlier chapters along to others who might get some help from it.
Thanks, Dean
Dean wrote: ” I hate to break this to all you new writers in a hurry, but publishing takes time.”
I think this is the dose of reality that’s habitually overlooked and under-discussed with regard to most neep about the electronic self-publishing revolution.
The Cinderella scenario has always been the dominant motif among aspiring writers. Which is understandable since it’s not only very appealing, it’s also relentlessly promoted by the media: the idea of overnight success with ONE book.
Overnight success with one book is =exactly= like Angelina Jolie adopting a baby: Yes, it really happens. And it’s incredibly high profile and much-touted when it happens. But the salient fact is that it only happens once in a while, and the vast majority of children in the world do NOT get adopted by Angelina Jolie.
Unless you are (statistically speaking) Angelina Jolie’s newest adopted child, building a readership, profile, name recognition, and an audience of people looking for your next book takes years. Self-publishing doesn’t erase that portion of the equation or that challenge of the writing life.
One of the key reasons that most novelists disappear forever from the biz within two books is that most people who think they want to be writers aren’t prepared to go the distance. (Yes, ANOTHER reason is that so many new writers get dropped by publishers. But a large number of new writers simply DON’T WRITE more than a book or two. And that isn’t just a statistic—I’ve personally met lots of people who only wrote a book or two. I imagine Dean has, too.)
This isn’t JUST about those evil, nasty, ptooey-we-SPIT-on-them! “gatekeepers” (i.e. editors and publishers) who’ve become the reviled scapegoats of the pro-self-publishing crowd on so many poorly-informed blog rants currently decorating the internet.
This is also about YOU—I’m using the generic “you” here. Except for a few writers who get (metaphorically) adopted by Angelina Jolie, what career writers live with is still being unknown, unrecognized, unlauded, untrumpeted, and unable to quit their day jobs after their fourth, sixth, or eleventh book—and they keep writing in pursuit of achieving those goals, which are goals that only long-distance runners (and Angelina Jolie babies) ever reach. Most people who think they want to be career writers are actually sprinters, and they just can’t go the distance.
The three people I currently know who are making the most in the self/e-publishing market… are three long-haul career writers with high profiles, large audiences they’ve build over the course of one-to-three decades, and (key point noted by Dean) LARGE BACKLISTS in their newly-released e-book repertoires, so that they’ve got 10-20-30 backlist titles out there in e-book formats, now generating new income on the basis of years of audience building, while meanwhile continuing to pursue their successful frontlist careers in professional publishing. (And, no, I’m giving their names, because their earnings are communicated privately to me. They don’t blog about it.)
What Laura said. This takes time and slow build. In fact this morning in the current marketing workshop we talked about just this topic. To survive in this business you must write, #1. And number two you must never give up. You will get sidetracked at times, sure, you might quit at times, sure, publishers will treat you poorly or you will make some agent mistake, but the writers who survive all that crap are the ones that just keep going and never give up. It takes time.
I also agree with Laura that the writers I see making pretty quick money on electronic and POD books are writers with lots of product just lost in drawers. We are all slowly getting our stuff out and stunned at the money. This is ALL so new it is scary. This morning I was looking over notes I had for this day of the marketing workshop last March, just seven months ago, and NOTHING I had down to teach applied anymore. Nothing. The stuff I taught seven months ago is now old information. That’s how fast this is changing.
Fear #2 is the one to which I’m most susceptible, but apparently I’m a lot more patient when it’s only my own competence in question. I’m either overconfident or too resigned.
I do have to agree it’s been a lot of fun to do all this small-publishing, even just starting out with six short stories as my grand publishing experiment. Once I’ve tested the waters for myself a bit more, I’ll surely expand on that.
And then I can learn InDesign. There’s always something.
Nice post, Dean. Along with fear #1, it isn’t just spending time on getting the book uploaded, but also the time spent trying to promote and market the book that can cut into writing time. I’m afraid some writers may put up one ebook and then spend all of their time trying to push that one book instead of writing more or making the time to put any other inventory up. I think you’re 100% right that we need to keep focused on getting our writing done first.
I also like the suggestion on watching the numbers. Each month I record the sales for each retailer and title. That gives me the information I need.
For me it is all Fear #1 all the way, and I think there is one more leg there as well. You’re right, I’m one of those who carves out minutes to write, not hours. And I have the skills to do all of the pub work myself. But the additional leg there is marketing / industry research. I created a blog, which takes attention. I follow other industry blogs, including this one, which takes attention. I try to gather a following on a couple LinkedIn groups, which takes attention. I’m contemplating Facebook, which takes attention. (Go and read Konrath’s latest post on “Draculas.” Yoiks! Brilliant, but takes a serious time investment.)
My advice, especially as I just spent a fair amount of my precious writing week focused doing this rather than writing, is make a plan. A writer, especially one who is being a publisher as well, needs a business plan, because, well, you’re a business. A business plan let’s you know at a glance what your priorities are, your deadlines, and your goals… as a matter of fact, now that I think about it, that will make a good blog. I’ll work on that for next week.
For me personally, Fear #2, I haven’t given up in 15 years, I’m not about to give up due to low numbers. Though it is good to be reminded that just like traditional pub, initial lack of success in e-pub isn’t long term lack of success. And Fear #3, yup, they’re out there and pouncing. Good list, Dean. Thanks
Thanks for a great post. Your posts have been informative and helpful to so many.
The literary agent part hit home for me. I had a freelance editor and a top New York Literary Agent scam me over four years and got a cool $10,000 out of me. This isn’t a joke. I write about it in detail in “Publishing Exposed: The Sedore Report” so other writers can see exactly what they did to me.
I’ve written over 12 books and a few short stories with five of them at Amazon and Smashwords.
The reason I say that is to affirm your words: it takes time. Sales are good, in the hundreds, but not Konrath numbers. (Although one book has only been up 5 weeks and the rest, 1 week).
I’m in for the long haul and currently writing my 13th novel.
Thanks for a great post and timely reminder. Have a great weekend.
Perfectly reasonable fears; I’m sure we differ on some of the details (for example, if the parties go into it ahead of time with an appropriate level of knowledge, there’s nothing wrong with a commission-on-sales basis for cover design… if the commission in question is on the close order of 1-2% and cuts off after a set number of years), but the fears themselves are well taken. And appropriate for this pre-Halloween season.
There’s a fourth fear that I have, though: That authors in the self-publishing process will repeat the mistakes of commercial publishing by listening to anecdotes instead of analyzing verifiable, replicable data. Let me give you two examples from the world of cover design to show you what can result:
(a) “Green covers don’t sell.” This myth arose in the 1960s, because books with green covers were not flying off the shelves. It continued well into the 1990s; I heard that aphorism from the Vice President for Sales more than once during cover meetings, even to the point of a demand that we reshoot the cover for a book on tennis (model for the day: Pete Sampras… so this wasn’t trivial!) on a clay court so the grass wouldn’t dominate! The problem with the aphorism is that it was only ever valid concerning newly built bookstores with 1960s-technology fluorescent tube lighting shining on semigloss dustjackets printed with 1960s inks; the interaction was bad initially (washed the green into chartreuse), and the interaction between the particular pigment chemistry and the exposure to the dominant wavelengths in those tube lights, when left bare as was the style, resulted in relatively rapid fading.
But nobody uses those tubes any more; their own internal chemistry was changed in the late 1970s, and it actually became illegal to manufacture or sell them in the mid-1990s. Neither has anybody used the particular ink chemistry in question since the early 1980s, for both technical and environmental reasons. Similarly, the coatings used on commercial-printer covers these days (whether dustjackets or otherwise) would inhibit the particular fading, and the optional (cheap) UV coatings would do so even more.
Nonetheless, walk into a cover meeting today and somebody will spout forth the green-covers myth… without any supporting data whatsoever.
(b) “We’ve had a lot of success selling YA novels with Caucasian girls on the cover.” Oh my. You can view the long version on my blawg; the short version is that an off-hand remark by a major chain buyer found its way into official memos at a publisher, and then the fun really began as that memo became all of the evidence that was ever presented. Sadly, by the time the memo was being circulated, that buyer was on her way out at the major chain… and some questions have been raised as to whether she was accurately quoted in the first place, although after the firestorm rightly started by Justine Larbalestier memories are being subjected to “retroactive continuity adjustment.”
Unfortunately, this meme seems to have a life of its own… but that would involve hijacking Our Gracious Host’s blog for my own sharkly interests, which Is Not Appropriate. Again, the short version is that there was little, if any, verifiable data supporting the initial conclusion, but that herd mentality (if that isn’t too self-contradictory for this early) changed an off-hand comment into Received Wisdom. If you’ve ever worked in corporate hierarchies, you know how hard it is to refute Received Wisdom… and you also know that it never stays where it started, but oozes into all the cracks available and ends up outside the hierarchy, too.
What these two examples are intended to point out is that raw sales figures tell only one part of the story that an author needs to consider before telling her own stories in print.
Fair comments, but as most posts on the subject of Self Publishing, I think you have focused too much on the negatives.
Fear 1: Yes, I agree, but then the writer should be able to identify this. The ones with real talent, and a bright future will, and quickly.
Fear 2: I disagree and agree. Writers should be using these independent publishing routes to build a readership and seek out a reaction from the general public to their work – not seek financial gain. There are few who will be able to have the industry knowledge and business acumen to market a SP book effectively to make any real money. Hopefully, those who aspire to be a successful author will recognize it can be used as a tool to build a readership/following over a prolonged period of time. To prove you are worth a publisher taking a risk on.
Fear 3: With every new venture there will be those who try to make a quick buck. Like you say it is easier than ever to self publish, and if a writer cannot use the tools without seeking help, they should stick to a much more traditional route of getting a reputable agent, and focus in improving their writing in the meantime.
My main fear – the writers who really did get “missed” by agents and publishers will become drowned out by sub standard work. As Independent Authors, we need to ensure everything we self publish is of the highest quality to dispel the fear mongers.
Very interesting post and definitely food for thought. Now into my second sold book with my editor I’m beginning to appreciate what Dean and Kris have been teaching for years. Managing your time is critical and even more so now with self publishing thrown into the mix.
For anyone who hasn’t been to a D&K workshop they often say, “When you start selling you will trade up for new problems at each level of success.” (albeit mostly good problems)
From my experience so far I can tell you this is very, very accurate. You juggle your time and continually prioritize but the bottom line is you have to fit in time for new pages. Dean is 100% dead on, to be a writer you have to be creating new fiction.
I’m still learning but my saving grace is I have excellent teachers who cautioned me this would happen so I was armed with the information before it happened.
Being a published author is not what you imagine it is, and it is not for the lazy if you want to be successful.
Daryl wrote: “I had a freelance editor and a top New York Literary Agent scam me over four years and got a cool $10,000 out of me.”
Alas, I have a feeling I know who that is. Someone who has been taking advantage of a high profile professional reputation (for the time being, at least) as an agent in order to take advantage of writers in a lucrative “steer authors to ‘editor’ with whom I have a fiscal relationship” scam.
Dean wrote: “This morning I was looking over notes I had for this day of the marketing workshop last March, just seven months ago, and NOTHING I had down to teach applied anymore.”
I’ve been thinking about this kind of dilemma, too, since I write a monthly column for NINK (where the business-end of being a writer is among the topics I regularly address) and since I’m currently updating the public-speaking portion of my website (where I offer some writing-business topics in my speaking repertoire). And whatever I work on now, in that respect, I find myself wondering, “Christ, is this stuff still current? Will it still be current next month? Next WEEK?”
I jsut delivered a column on my thoughts about the brave new world of electronic self-publishing, etc. (fairly similar, in theme, to message #68 that I wrote last night on Dean’s previous “New World of Publishing” topic)… and I find myself anxiously hoping that nothing changes, thus making that column out of date, between now and when it’s published in NINK, i.e. in another week or two. Seriously.
For myself, I’ve found that I deal with Dean’s Fear #1 by creating a publishing schedule for myself … ya know, treating this like it’s a business.
I have a novella I’m planning to digitally publish in December, so I’m editing that at the moment. After that, I’ve got an older novella I’m going to rework some, edit and publish by February. Then it’s writing time again for the next novel, which should be written, edited and ready to go by Spring. Then I’m breaking out an older horror novel I never completed despite the fact I got 70,000 words into it.
Meanwhile, a lit agency has asked to see a literary novel I’ve finished, and I should hear about that within the next month or so (but one never knows for sure). And I’m waiting to hear about some definite publishing times from my print publisher for a novel next year.
Basically, in digital publishing I’m switching back and forth between new projects and older projects, all while waiting to hear about print projects. And my schedule is working out great for me. I’m actually about a month ahead so far, but I don’t want to jump the gun because anything could happen.
Fears #2 and #3 I’m not concerned about for myself. Compared to waiting the years upon years it used to take to write, edit, edit some more, submit to publishers and/or agencies, then wait and wait and wait for them to get back to you … well, compared to all that, today’s digital publishing world is a breeze. For writers who are too impatient to wait for even a small amount of success, I don’t know what to tell them. “Be patient” is the best I can do, with the rest being up to them. Perhaps I could also say, “hey, you need to be doing some self promotion for yourself and your products.”
For example, there are a ton of great freelance editors out there to help you. Go to them or use your trusted first readers for that.
Is there a difference between a freelance editor and a “book doctor”?
When going to an editor, what should I be looking for — someone to edit content, or just a copyeditor?
Finally, what’s a reasonable price to pay for a 90K-word novel? Or, to ask another way, at what price are they trying to screw me?
Jeff, let me be blunt (ahh, that will be new for me, right? grin). If you don’t know the difference between a book doctor and a freelance editor, don’t try to find one. Your question is a good one, but there are NO SUCH ANIMALS as book doctors in professional publishing. And those that call themselves that (that you can find) will not help you much on a professional level manuscript, even if they have a heart of gold, as a couple that I know do. They are not professional editors. Even though they get paid for editing, they are not top professional editors. So don’t bother.
Stay with a couple of trusted first readers. Or find a list of professional editors approved by a major writer’s group like Novelists Inc. (NINC) The professional editors who work on the top level work for New York and are sometimes called “book doctors” because they help fix a finished manuscript to get it to publication level. I have done this twice in my career, once helping the writer fix the book, once just rewriting the book completely using the writer’s ideas. The big corporations hire those of us at that level and trust me, you can’t afford me or anyone working at my level. So again, don’t bother. Just stay with trusted first readers. Kris and I have found a wonderful woman who lives here locally who is a very tight reader and finds all sorts of problems we have missed. She is not a writer and retired from another job and loves doing it. Look for someone like that.
As for what is a reasonable price? Depends, of course, is the answer. You can’t afford me or anyone working at my level because we are hired by big publishers to work on big projects only. But I have a hunch that a good “edit read” like a New York editor would do would be in the range of a thousand, a good copyedit would be in the range of a couple hundred to five hundred if found locally. One more time, stay with trusted first readers.
Oops, Jeff, make that three times that I have done that. I just helped a very good writer work on a book this year, actually, as a sort of ghost and book doctor, helping tone in a final manuscript for a very large project. I loved the project and wanted to be a part of it and still do and enjoyed the process and working with the very talented writer and I gave the publisher a deal and it still cost the publisher for my services on the north side of thirty thousand. See why I am saying stay with trusted first readers? (grin)
This is a timely post, as I just lost my publisher who apparently rechecked his priorities and time and decided he couldn’t be a publisher, and so backed out, and now my book won’t be coming out in Dec. as we had planned.
Back to the hunt for me on that book, but I was thinking about creating an ebook publishing company. Not necessarily for this book, but I have done my own ebooks, I can get them out fairly quickly. I put both my books on Kindle and one of them is on other places via Smashwords. I sell ebooks I created at my website store. I’ve yet to see anything big from it, but then I don’t have a huge inventory yet.
So this was a good post to make me think through this. Covers are the only thing I might need help creating. But the rest I could do myself, and fairly quickly. But, I do have a day job and limited writing time. So that is a concern.
Thanks for highlighting these issues. A big help.
R.L., covers are easy and fun. (Yes, I know, graphic designers…there are skills, but to do a cover that is seen in thumbnail, it is easy and I stand by that.)
Just go to your Microsoft Office folder and find PowerPoint, then for $25 for one month sign up on Lynda.com and take a couple of tutorials on how to use PowerPoint. You will be doing covers in less than an hour in short order. Scary, but true. Then print them off and compare to professional level covers and tweak until it looks nifty and your friends think it looks nifty. Remember, BIG AUTHOR NAME, big title, and find free art or photos or take a picture yourself.
Have fun.
Dean, I LOVE your blunt advice. Not only is there no room for confusion, but it’s teaching me to TRUST MYSELF. I had a deep suspicion that a freelance editor and a book doctor weren’t the same thing. But I tend to doubt myself. Who am I? What do I know? More than I think, it turns out.
Like you, Dave Wolverton, in one of his recent newsletters, advises those who want to self-publish to find a good friend or two to copyedit your work. If you don’t have any that can do it, he advises to call the English department of a local college and see if there are any students/professors who’d be willing to do that kind of work for a reasonable fee (a couple hundred, I think).
I’m fortunate in that my wife is in marketing, and has been for the past 15 years. She’s not only a master at powerpoint (so I’m good on ebook covers when I finally decide to go this route), but both she and some of her employees are very good proofreaders. They all edit each others PR work that go out to the local papers and magazines.
Fear #1–You mean, unlike traditional publishing when you are only expected to spend an entire year promoting your book for them? The same amount of work for 70 percent instead of 8 percent? Sounds like a business to me.
Fear #2–Please, any writer that can quit, be my guest. Better to be happy than a writer.
Fear #3–Pay cash for the freelance services you need (assuming you can’t learn them yourself or find peers in trade for the things you CAN do).
Dean, I dig your style but I know a couple of writers making six figures this year on ebooks who were never published in traditional publishing. Sure, they are “Angeline Jolie babies,” but there WILL be some. I believe the same number of writers will make the same amount of money in this new system as the old–the difference being, a lot of them will be different writers…
Scott Nicholson
Scott, yes there will be some, but when I do that math on a book small published, I figure it bumping along the bottom selling very few copies per month and then instead of taking a produce approach, I take a ten year approach and figure the numbers. And even those numbers are amazing. And we are only at 9% of the market right now.
Why would ANY writer spend ANY time promoting a book???? In either system. Sigh, I am really, really beginning to hate that myth. Not as much as the silliness going on with agents at this moment in time, but coming close.
You’re using POWERPOINT for covers? (Sacrilege! cries the graphic artist in me
:) Um. Really? I mean, not even Gimp? I have Photoshop, which is what I’d use – although I get that not everyone has $700 to dump on an art program. Hmph. Maybe I should hang out a shingle as a cover artist…
Dean & Laura both (Laura, your first comment was superb), thanks. I think I’ve been at risk for #2, and that’s not where I want to be. Thanks for the reminder and the wake up.
Jeff, one place to find out more about freelance editors is my Writer’s Resource Page:
http://sff.net/people/laresnick/About%20Writing/Writers%20Resource.htm
There’s a whole section there listing reputable, legitimate freelance editors. There’s also a link there to the Editorial Freelancers Association, which is a good place to research services, standards, and fees for legitimate freelance editors.
The list of reputable freelance editors on my page isn’t comprehensive, it’s just what I can vouch for. Because freelance editing is a field plagued by scam artists, I’m VERY careful about what I’ll put on this page of recommendations: I either have to know the editor personally, or know someone who knows the editor personally. NO ONE gets on my list just because they’ve got a website or blog set up as a freelance editor, and no one even gets on there because they worked as a staff editor before going freelance. Specifically, I have to get some form of personal verification or I won’t put them on the list. This doesn’t mean that an editor NOT on my list is not reputable; it means that I am vouching for the legitimacy of anyone who IS on my list.
As to which of those editors would suit which individual writers or projects–not my department. I just ensure the list itself is valid.
Jeff,
Dean pretty well covered how a book doctor differs from a freelance editor. Two totally different creatures. A book doctor isn’t something a writer would ever really deal with, and it’s a rarified practice.
A typical example of how a book doctor would be used is: A publisher contracts a book from a celebrity, and when it’s delivered, it’s so bad they can’t publish it without losing their shirts. So they pay a book doctor to fix it. This sort of thing almost always involves secrecy and confidentiality clauses, and the info is only shared on a need-to-know basis. It’s also almost exclusively done when there’s too much money or profile invested in the book (such as a celebrity project) for the publisher to let the deal fall apart on the basis of a wretched MS and, simultaneously, the original author, for one reason or another, can’t be counted on to fix the book (often because that person wasn’t an author and should never have been contracted to write a book).
Laura, yup, that’s what I do at times. Ghost or fix. The last one was a wonderful book done by a great nonfiction writer who just hadn’t learned all the fiction chops yet, which is why I was hired.
Book doctors, at least the real ones, only exist through publishers and are far too expensive for a regular writer to hire. Trust your first readers or maybe go to the list on Laura’s site. Thanks, Laura.
Oh, yeah – fear #1. That’s why I decided to jump on Sarah Hoyt’s challenge – one new story a week for the next six months. Between life rolls and the e-pub learning curve, my production of new stuff has been way down. Well, that’s enough of that.
Balance. I’m getting there.
I’ve got to admit, I’ve got my own late night vision, as a starting author:
Here’s what the future of publishing will look like, at least on those sleepless nights:
The surviving publishers will stop accepting submissions from new authors altogether.
Instead, they will watch the lists at Amazon, Apple, and whoever else remains, and whenever an author reaches some level of sales that indicates they are an acceptable risk, the publisher will offer to take over those “tiresome publishing and marketing tasks,” and “take the author to the next level” such that the cut the publisher takes will be trivial compare to the massively increased income the author will (presumably) see.
When the author doesn’t meet sales goals, the author will be dumped, probably with his/her sales now encumbered by industrial contracts that weren’t there before.
The reason this is a late night vision is that us newbies are going to have to learn to self-publish regardless, just as musicians have had to learn to produce their own tracks. We may want to write and improve our craft, but that will be irrelevant. The slush pile will be on Amazon, and climbing out of it will mean not just impressing an editor or two, but selling to thousands of overwhelmed readers. Oh, and we’ll need to find time to write more work, too.
heteromeles, I also can see that version happening in my crystal ball. But my crystal ball has a remote control clearly in control of someone else, since every time I think I have a clear picture, something changes again. Exciting, that’s for sure, and your late night vision is very possible IMHO.
Laura: Thanks for this info. I’ll be sure to check out your links to freelance editors. When I finally decide to get my feet wet, I’ll probably just use those trusted friends who Dean spoke of. However, it’ll still be nice to gather the information. Always learning, as Dean recommends.
I want to say a big THANK YOU to Dean — not only for the topics you’re willing to cover, but also for opening up these threads, inviting questions and comments, and for taking your time to answer our questions.
And a big THANK YOU to Laura for taking her time to join in this discussion.
I’ve learned more here than I ever realized possible.
Jeff
The reason I created (and still update) the list of freelance editors on my Writers Resource Page actually has nothing to do with self-publishing e-books, though it may be useful in that context (I have no idea).
The reasons it arose are because of changes in professional publishing in recent years:
With the economic spiral that publishing has been in for several years, a number of good editors have been laid off and/or left their day jobs (sometimes because they were leaving New York, sometimes because they were cutting back) or added freelance by night to their workloads by day. So, in a field plagued by scam artists and cons, here was a cool opportunity to list -actual- editors in my Writers Resources, experienced professionals with a legitimate service to offer, who were going freelance.
Meanwhile, also as a result of economic conditions, combined with how easy the computer age has made it to write and submit a book (thus tripling the size of slushpiles in the past 20 years), the workload of editors has increased geometrically over the years while, meanwhile, the size of editorial staffs keeps getting slashed. The upshot is that most books need to be nearly production-ready upon submission or delivery. (This phenomenon has a lot to do with the rise of the “editing agent,” because it’s become much harder than it used to be to sell a book that needs some work.) So aspiring writers and -also- published professionals started seeking the services of freelance editors to help them improve the condition of their MSs, whether they wanted a copy edit, a line edit, or actual story notes. Which meant that I saw a need arise for a listing of reputable, legitimate freelance editors–which need was sort of a new thing a couple of years ago. Though, with the advent of self-publishing as a common phenomenon, freelance editors may become even more in-demand hereafter.
Heteromeles, I think part of your scenario is correct, in that it may become a more common practice (its frequency is currently wildly exaggerated by the blogosphere) for publishers to monitor self-published sales lists and step in to make offers to the most successful books/authors.
But I think it will be just ONE way that publishing deals occur–and I don’t believe publishers will ever stop accepting submissions from new authors.
It’s well worth keeping in mind that virtually all of the commentary that one sees on the internet reviling the “gatekeepers” of publishing (specifically, editors and publishers) is by people who’ve never sold a book, or by (a smaller number) of people who sold books but whose sales weren’t strong (quite possibly through no fault of theirs or of the work) and/or whose ability to regroup after a career nosedive and sell again elsewhere (as I have done 5 different times in my career–and which is why I -have- a career) was also not strong. So there’s a lot of personal agenda, a lot of fog of emotion, and a lot of plain old ill-informed nonsense and half-truths about how publishing actually functions driving most-or-all of those comments and commentaries which claim that professional writing (i.e. selling books to publishers) is all about “seeking the approval of gatekeepers” and that publishing is run by “elitists” in Manhattan who keep good books out of the marketplace, etc.
I’m not one to go around defending publishers, by and large–and, indeed, I wrote an entire book on the inquities of being a writer working with them (in which book I sometimes refer to them as “pirates, rapists, and thieves”). So it’s not as if I’m wearing rose-colored glasses about publishers and editors. OTOH, I’ve worked with publishers and editors for 22 years, so I know quite a bit about how they and their businesses function–which is more than can be said of anyone whom I have so far seen who describes selling a book to a professional market with some version of “seeking the approval of elitist gatekeepers,” blah blah blah.
And some of the actual truths about publishing, compared to the nonsense pervading chatboards and the blogosphere these days, is that publishers are always seeking new blood, new work, new authors. Not because they’re altruistic, but because current writers don’t last forever. In fact, MOST current writers don’t even last for LONG. We have a really high turnover rate. Yes, ONE reason is beacuse our good books are badly published and then, having screwed up our careers, our publishers dump us. That does indeed happen a lot.
But here are some other reasons, equally common: Writers just STOP WRITING; writing a novel is a marathon, and many people only have 1-2-5 marathons in them, then they can’t go the distance yet again. Writers burn out; they have good careers for a while, but then fall apart in one way or another, and either never write again, or stop writing for 10 years, or slow down to a glacial pace whereby they’re only delivering once every 3-5 years, instead of twice a year. Writers DIE (darn us). Writers get so ill they can no longer write. Some writers (not many, but some) retire. Novelists get interested in writing something ELSE (plays, movies, journalism, short fiction, a doctoral thesis, political speeches, etc.) and, while still writing actively, are no longer sending novels to their publisher. Writers are flaky do crazy things that interfere with their producivity like, er, spending a year crossing Africa overland (DARN us!), attending grad school full-time (DARN us), or intern at a news bureau in a war zone (DARN, DARN, DARN us!). Some writers slow down (or stop writing for several years) because they suddenly decide to give birth; sometimes, they even do this MULTIPLE TIMES. (Ex. A buddy of mine has just sold two books after taking a ten yera hiatus from her formerly busy writing career to raise three babies she had all in a row.)
Publishers have worked with writers for decades. They know that we’re not machines. Our expiration date is unknown (could be 40 years from, could be in 6 months), and our productivity is unpredictable (could be Nora Roberts, could be Margaret Mitchell), and our reliability and stability are subject to chaos (could be a bestselling vampire writer who turns religious and won’t write vampires anymore; could be a comedy writer who goes through depression and can’t write comedy anymore; etc.).
So they are ALWAYS looking for new blood, and the self-publishing e-book revoluation won’t change that. Ergo, even if publishers do make a steady habit of monitoring the self-publishing market for new blood… they got no reason to STOP accepting submissions from new authors, in very much the way that I’ve got no reason to stop consuming protein: I need protein to live, they need new authors to supply product, and we each KNOW our needs.
Finally, all the people who do NOT get discovered and acquired by “gatekeepers” are evidently wholly unaware, in their resentful commentary, of just how EXCITED editors get whenever they find a new writer they can acquire. Editors LOVE that (unless they’re the sort of apathetic, worn down, jaded burn-out who should really get out of the biz, but who won’t because they’re not capable of getting another job, let alone of competing in another field). I have seldom worked with ANY editor who didn’t burble with excitement a couple of times per year about having just acquired a brand new writer s/he was really excited about.
So it’s not just that they nEED to find new blood. They also WANT to. The LOVE it.
So they’re not likely to give it up.
You may want to add a subsection to #1: Writers spending all of their time self-promoting instead of writing new work. (This isn’t just something that happens to self-published authors, either.) I worry sometimes when I see new writers spending more time developing social media/online platforms than they do focusing on their writing. Just a thought.
Oh, I agree completely Colleen. I think it is just silly for a writer to do any big promotion for a book, especially a new writer. So agree completely.
I see one possible issue with Heteromeles vision… namely the “thousands of overwhelmed readers” part.
There aren’t thousands of readers. There are hundreds of thousands (I’m counting print here, of course, though the ebook reading share will just keep growing since e-readers are only going to get cheaper). I don’t think they’ll get overwhelmed, IMHO. The sample feature and the blurbs alone on ebooks are enough to help weed out what a reader doesn’t want, allowing each reader to make a decision.
And I’m not sure I see a downside in that vision for authors either. Either 1) popular self-pubbed author is making so much money that s/he laughs at the trad publisher’s offer or 2) popular author gets offered a huge deal. Also, while whatever work the popular author sold to trad publishing might be tied up by publisher contracts, that doesn’t stop that author from writing new stuff and putting it out to the big audience s/he already has. (Look at Konrath, he’s got books under contract and in print, but that’s not stopping him from writing new stuff and making money on both).
So while I see the late night vision as possible (especially publishers watching the lists to pick up the best-sellers), I don’t know if it has a downside for authors (or readers…). Maybe I’m missing something?
@ izanobu: I agree. I don’t see a downside. Indeed, Dean has talked multiple times in this blog about the wisdom of a writer developing multiple income streams, which is a strategy I completely agree with (and one which I’d say many/most long-term, full-time, breadwinner or self-supporting writers agree with and implement). The advent of affordable self-publishing and electronic distribution is opening new revenue streams for writers, but there’s certainly no reason to turn one’s back on existing revenue streams (such as professional publishers) on any occasion when the opportunities offered by a such a market are right for the writer and/or the project in question.
@ Dean and Colleen: I agree, too. I usually hesitate to comment on this, because self-promotion strikes me as the ULTIMATE “there is no right answer” subject, and no matter what your stated position, you can find an impressive range of credible examples to completely confrim it -and- to completely refute it. Which makes my little blonde brain hurt.
But a very common phenomenon which strikes me as so ill-advised that I scarcely even know what to say each and every time I encounter it (which is often) is when an aspiring writer tells me they’ve completed a book, and so now they’re working on (or figuring out how to work on) their website and/or blog to promote the book.
And when I say (about this exact same novel), in response to this: “Has the book sold to a publisher?” the answer is, “No.” When I say, “Where is it in submission?” the answer is VERY OFTEN, “Nowhere yet,” or “One house,” or, “I’ve started querying agents.” If “nowhere” or “one house,” when I say, “What’s your submission strategy or plan?” I get a blank stare–because there isn’t one. And when I say, “What are you writing now/next?” I get another blank stare.
Yes, I think a website of some sort is important (I’d go so far as to say “essential”) for a professional writing career these days. But here’s something you need even BEFORE you need a website: a writing career! And you get =that= by writing and selling books.
Dean, regarding your comment about covers, I would be very wary of using pictures that you didn’t take yourself even if you paid for them. There are sites out there that will charge you for “royalty free” images when those images actually are drawn from somewhere else like Getty Images. The latter frequently sues, and the poor writer who paid someone else for the image has to pay again and then seek recourse from whoever sold it to him.
@Laura: Actually, I should clarify. I’m not reading that part of the blogosphere any more. That particular dread I dreamed up myself.
No, I was coming at this from the “creeping idiocy” viewpoint. I’m assuming that sooner or later, either due to cost-cutting and/or greed, some publisher is going to fire their acquisitions staff and all their editors. They can justify any book they get on contract on the basis of its existing sales, and without editors, they will increase their overheads. For a multinational whose business model is effectively strip mining intellectual and artistic production (as opposed to strip-mining coal), this looks like a great idea, right? Heck, it’s just an extension of what Dover and Penguin do already.
Personally, I’m with you, in hoping that at least some publishers realize that they can make a reasonable return on investment by nurturing talent and relationships, instead of trying to maximize greed. We’ll see. I’m not sure what will make loyalty trendy again, but I suspect we’ll find out sooner or later.
Hello Dean!
Thank you for your usual perceptive look at things.
Over here at http://www.LongShortStories.com, I have been following a path that you have just outlined. I write short stories for inventory, one every twelve days, to keep my subscribers happy and my electronic publishing machine running smoothly.
At this point in time, I am closing in on my 80th story and find myself energized by my self-imposed deadlines. It keeps me sharp and always looking for the next new story idea. While doing my own writing, on a parallel track I host two short story contests annually and read a lot of electronic submissions in a given twelve month period. I must admit, much of what I receive seems like old ideas being recycled as new. But when I see something come through that knocks me out, it is a joy to behold, and I reward that writer handsomely.
I must admit, I “watch the numbers” much too often, but after nearly four years that LongShortStories has been online, the five year plan that I started out with has found the necessary traction to move my writing to the next phase. I have learned what my readers enjoy most and have been giving them more of that. What is so gratifying is that with digital publishing, the reader feedback is real-time or nearly so.
While many writers fear (even detest) the business side of bringing their work to market, I am blessed with a marketing degree and over 35 years of real-life experience selling services and learning my way around a negotiating table. Just by commenting on your post here, I am, in a way, self-promoting my writing career, just as so many other wise writer/promoters do. The beast must be fed. Ha!
Thank you for sticking a pin in the happy balloon of quick fame and vast riches touted by the writer media. The REAL writer knows that all good things come to those who wait and to those who have been systematically cultivating their little patch, lovingly weeding it, fertilizing it, and bringing sustainability to it over the years.
I enjoy your take on these things and look forward to your next sharing experience.
Regards,
Wayne C. Long
Writer/Editor/Digital Publisher
http://www.LongShortStories.com
Where the short story LIVES!
Dean,
When I first read fear # 1 I panicked. I am one of those writers who must measure daily (sometimes even weekly) writing time in minute, not hours. I want to get in on this self-publishing revolution but have no one else to edit, format, or otherwise prepare my work for online publication. Nor can I afford to hire anyone. I have to do it all myself. Who is he, I thought, to tell me I’m not a writer if I have to put aside one task for a time to do another? I don’t want to accumulate produce without time to market any of it.
But then I realized the wisdom of your advice. And at the end you sum it up nicely: balance. I will set myself a (necessarily modest) daily word quota and will not work on publishing until I reach it. I’m sure I can get both done.
Thanks again for sharing this advice with us.
LOL, John, glad I could help some. I wasn’t telling anyone what to do, just talking about my fear and suggesting that if my fear hit home, be aware of the problem and work on a balance, which is what you seem to be doing. So many of us early in careers were down to tracking writing time in small chunks of minutes. I started doing a short story a week while working three jobs, so I remember very, very well. And mailing time to traditional publishers takes time as well as putting things up through your own publishing business.
On another topic, I had one person contract me off list and complain about having to spend the $39.00 plus the postage to get the proof and other copies of POD to them through CreateSpace. I reminded the writer that number was less than the cost of ten novel submissions to traditional publishers through snail mail. No matter which way we go, there are small costs. On the publishing side the costs can get bigger if you hire a proofer or hire your cover done or something like that, but if you do it all yourself, folks, the costs come close to balancing and are very minor. And in our early years of writing, low costs are critical. Just spending the time is sometimes too much.
Of course, if you are submitting to New York traditional publishing and also putting books through POD, then you double your small costs, but also double the chances of doing well.
Dean,
I also have a novel and about twenty-five stories out to traditional publishers. All the stories in my self-pub effort are reprints. Modest, I know, compared to the efforts of some I read of, but one does what one can.
John, wow, that’s a great start. Not modest at all. Keep firing!
Laura -
You’re dead on. One of the most frequent questions I used to get as an agent when I would speak at writing conferences was how much more time a writer should put into his or her online presence. And mind you, these were ALL unpublished writers. It baffled me.
Often as an agent, if I read one manuscript and it wasn’t quite there yet, but I really liked the writing and the voice, I would write back to the author and ask them what else they might have to show me. (In two cases, I offered representation to the writers and sold the books based on the second project shown, not the first.) Many of the agents and editors I know will ask the same question. But so often the response from the writer is “I don’t have anything else finished”. Meanwhile, that same writer will have an elaborate website, a Twitter, a blog or two, and might even be podcasting and guest-blogging on other writers’ blogs.
I would love for writers to understand that there needs to be a balance between self-promotion and creation new material. Because the former is useless without the latter.
Colleen, wow is that spot on the money. Thank you!! Well said. Everyone, read what Colleen said. “I would love for writers to understand that there needs to be a balance between self-promotion and creation new material. Because the former is useless without the latter.”
Yes, I agree one thousand percent.
Dean,
This was good advice and timely for me. Each one of these was a issue for me. Made me think you were somehow peering into my mind or reading my brain waves from afar. (And I mean very far, Ukraine far.)
I think I might have to go find the tin foil. I wonder if a cap of it is enough or do I have to make a whole helmet?
Thank you, thank you.
Scott
In my head, I said all that without typos…
What Colleen said reminds me of one of the first things I learned when doing screenwriting is the old maxim “It’s always harder to write the second screenplay than the first.” Reason: The first is a labor of enthusiasm, the second (at least after the first sale) is almost always a labor-to-spec (even if you yourself developed the spec). So, this maxim has a corollary in the form of a rule: “By the time your first piece goes to market, the second should be finished at least to the rough-draft stage.”
When I shifted focus to spend more time on novels, I had to re-learn this maxim, but since I did things have run much more smoothly (creatively, as well as business-wise). Having just one property to show seems a foolish way to run a store, whether you’re selling picture frames, cars, screenplays, or novels. And having more than one finished book to talk about to interested parties takes some of the negative pressure off the creative process without diminishing the positive pressure to improve and hit the deadlines (since one is then not tempted to talk away one’s enthusiasm about the projects in the works).
For what it’s worth…
-Dan
Dan, I agree completely. And I have to keep reminding people that writers are people who write, not promote something they have written.
Writers are people who write. Authors are people who have written.
I’m a writer.
I know PowerPoint pretty well, and I never even thought about using it to make covers for e-books. On the other hand, my wife is an artist and former director of marketing, so she uses fancy software and did so to create my first cover for my first book I plan on self-pubbing.
But if I can get that stuff done myself, I can get more of this materiel out on my own schedule (she runs her own business and doesn’t have time to work for me on demand.)
I’m very, very new to this, though. And probably a bit away from getting my book up. Can you recommend any other resources for learning to format for Kindle, Smashwords, etc.? Or was it already mentioned and I missed it?
If you’re curious, you can find a copy of the cover of my upcoming thriller here: http://cheekydiapers.com/Red-Run.jpg
I was a writer, then I was told to be an ‘author’ and not even start to write the next book until I had self-promoted and marketed the first book and had a success. As you say, balance is the key here. I need to set aside some time to be a writer again…