Carpe Annum--Can the Smack Talk

I'm  having a blast with the Carpe Annum--Seize the Year! theme. There's a giddiness that comes close to inebriation in letting the shackles fall to the ground, shrugging off the old way of thinking, and following the simple path of your own creation.

I call it a simple path not because it's easy, but because a home-grown path is likely one less riddled with rules, rankle, and recrimination than those created by industry.

My simple path this year includes backing away from all the smack talk that happens in publishing. I'm as tough skinned and opinionated as ever, but instead of yapping my head off online about, for instance, what I think about Jerry Jenkins starting a vanity press where hopeful writers can lay down ten grand to have their book published (ooh, bet ya want to weigh in on that, eh?), I'm saving my energy to forge my own path.

That is what I think is at the root of all the smack talk you hear floating around the industry: different writers making choices about their work and then feeling the need to defend their position.

I'm all for the first part: make your own choices about your work.

Want to vanity publish? Self publish? Keep knocking at the closed doors of traditional publishers? Something in between?

Go. For. It.

As long as you are making the choice you need to make, and you've thought out the long term consequences (inasmuch as that's possible), and you're not motivated by fear--do what you need to do.

Hold the phone.

Fear.

The greatest foe of creativity.

This past week I've done some career stuff that has me pretty afraid. I had to make hard decisions that, while simultaneously fighting a stomach bug, had me shaking in my boots (oh, okay, I'm a writer so I was shaking in my bedroom slippers.)

Fear is everywhere.

Fear of missing that opportunity with that agent.

Fear of messing up a relationship with a publisher.

Fear this. Fear that.

Fear wants you walking on tip-toe, holding your breath.

Fear keeps you focused on the "what if" and the "I can't."

Fear tethers you to the rules that no longer work for you.

Fear will keep you from producing honest work.

Fear begins every sentence with "What will so-and-so think?"

Fear smack talks other people's choices.

Truthfully, it doesn't matter what I think about other people's publishing choices. It's not my decision. The only thing I need to worry about is how to wrestle my fear to the ground. That should take all my creative time and energy and I'll have none left over for dissing other people's walk.

And once I get that sucker under control, I'll be able to look around and see that everyone else is doing the same thing: fighting their fear. And all I will be left with is admiration, and a sense of honour to be among these courageous souls.

Carpe Annum with courage and grace, friends.

Burn the "How to" List--2013 Belongs to You

Due to the high volume of spam in the comments section, we've had no choice but to institute the "verify identity" safeguard. This means you will be asked to type in a word verification along with your comment. We're sorry to add this extra step simply because of a very few goofballs out there with nothing better to do with their time. Our apology.

Welcome back to Novel Matters. We have a great year of blogging ahead and we're thrilled to have you join us. Cheers to a new year!

I spent some time last week splashing through the info swamp of the “how to” of writing and publishing. It didn’t take long before my hip waders flooded and I was over my head. The volume of advice is more avalanche than rushing river. Micro info dumping about the industry of publishing (which is either doing just fine, or is a dinosaur long extinct it just doesn’t know it yet, depending who you read) sends writers into a panic.

Why panic?

Because the underlining message of all these articles, blogs, websites, books, and essays is this: Writer, you don’t know what you’re doing. You’re getting this all wrong.

Jane Friedman, in an article called How Long Should You Keep Trying to Get Published? encapsulates this mantra perfectly (with help from Chuck Sambuchino):

 ‘“Good” gets rejected. Your work has to be the best. How do you know when it’s ready, when it’s your best? I like how Writer’s Digest editor and author Chuck Sambuchino answers this question at writing conferences: “If you think the story has a problem, it does—and any story with a problem is not ready.”

It’s common for a new writer who doesn’t know any better to send off his manuscript without realizing how much work is left to do. But experienced writers are usually most guilty of sending out work that is not ready. Stop wasting your time.”

This is good advice—you shouldn’t send out your work until you know you’ve done everything possible to make it the best it can be—but the way the advice is worded leaves you (and me) with the understanding that writers are just creative screw ups with no real understanding of story structure, book markets, or what’s selling.

This makes writers sad. We hate getting it wrong. We hate being industry idiots bumbling around in the dark with nothing but our imaginations to keep us warm. We just keep writing stories with problems!

Hold it.

A story with a problem . . . What kind of problem, and who decides it’s a problem? And, apparently, this will only worsen with experience. We will actually get worse at the whole writing thing the longer we write.

Goodness, we’re an unruly bunch.

Well, if we can’t please the publishing bigwigs, there’s always self-publishing, right? Surely there’s happy news and clear skies over at self-publishing info depot, that rugged station of independent thinking, or flying in the face of convention, of hitching your wagon to a star of your own creation. Ah, yes, breath the fresh air of fresh thinking.

Or not.

Typically, the advice given to self-publishing writers is identical to that meted out to writers hoping to find a home in traditional publishing. Seth Godin is the go-to guru for self-publishing writers, so I spent some time perusing his advice. A great deal of his energy is spent explaining why traditional publishing is dead. If you’d like a list, check out his site (he focuses on non-fiction ventures, but much of what he says can be generalized to other types of publication).

But.

Godin's “short list” of 19 points of advice for writers hoping to self publish reads identical to any list produced for any writer hoping to publish in any format. None of it is “bad” advice it’s just not terribly original.

Why?

Because original is impossible to categorize, list, and package. Original defies explanation, yet draws people in by touching the exposed nerve we all have but cannot name. Original is you being your unruly, creative, messy, exceptional self—no excuses, no holding back—and then releasing it all.

Are there steps to follow to becoming a bestselling novelist? Maybe. Is there a list out there that we should enslave ourselves to in order to achieve stardom? No.

I’m going to give you the best writing advice there is: 2013 is your year. That’s my advice.

You’re bigger than any list. You burn too bright. That list will burst into flames in your hands.  You are a writer—and that means you are an artist, poet, priest, lover, fighter. You feel, you live, you watch and then you turn all that over on its back, invert the whole thing, and write about a world familiar yet strange and we all just sit back and say, “Wow. Do it again.”

And it’s because you live and love and express the power of both in ways that leave us breathless that you will, in your own way, find your way—whatever that means and whatever that looks like—to the place you craft. Your place. Traditionally published, self-published, or some place in between.

You are an artist.

Stop reading lists.

Go. Own 2013 in your own way.

Write.

Be fierce.

Be fearless.

Marketing 101 or How to Kill an Author Without Trying

With my dear Novel Matters friends as witnesses, I would like to formally apologize to the marketers of books, one and all. Bless their little pea-pickin' hearts.

I'm not proud to admit this, but I was pretty sure they spent too much time at the water cooler, if you know what I mean.

I was wrong.

I wanted them to do more, to try harder, to find my unique set of elusive readers. Instead, they asked me to write books (historical romance would be nice) to make their jobs easier and certainly more profitable.

Now that I'm officially my very own marketer and publisher (Authors are and always have been their own marketers, but Indie publishing forces me to give up my delusional dream that someone is sweating over my sales numbers and calling important people to garner endorsements, interviews, and movie deals. This is my job and my job only.)

Marketing a newly released book is a tough job. I recognize that now. If I can make my book stand out among the 1.5 million books released each year, I'll be successful. Piece of cake.

But I live in the middle of nowhere. How am I suppose to reach the world with my masterpiece?

Simple, become a marketing genius by reading books written by marketing geniuses. Easy.

Not so easy. The marketing geniuses (MG) don't agree on much. Some want you to build a tribe. Others encourage building loyalty by giving things away. (Nothing like a little guilt inducing to sell a few books. I should be brilliant at this. After all, I'm a mother.) Another promises making a killing on Amazon without blogging, tweeting, or updating my status on Facebook. Frankly, that's appealing.

Since marketing is the job of the author, whether we publish with legacy publishers or go independent, won't you join me? I'm consulting the MGs and cherry-picking what makes sense for my sanity and my book's audience. I'll be doing this the next few times I post.

Let's start with James Scott Bell's ebook on marketing, Self Publishing Attack! The 5 Absolutely Unbreakable Laws for Creating Steady Income Publishing Your Own Books. I was attracted to Bell's book because I've met him, he's making a living at writing, and because he says there are only 5 unbreakable laws.

I have the attention span of a gnat. This sounded doable.

I love Bell's writing style. I felt like I was sitting across from him in a coffee shop. He's on my side. He wants me to succeed. And he's a great cheerleader. I was dipping my quill in ink before the end of Part One.

Here's a rundown of his laws and my reaction:

Law #1: You Must Think Like a Publisher

This, in large part, means writing a book that people will want to buy, preferably in a genre that's popular. My genre--women's fiction--doesn't make Bell's list of popular genres. So far, I'm not off to a promising start.

But Bell presents a side to ebooks that I'd not thought of before. Say I decide to write a mystery. And since this is my fantasy, it sells pretty well, and my readers look forward to my next caper. But true to form, I get a literary bee in my bonnet and write a molasses-paced Mid-Atlantic plaster restoration romance. My readers are disappointed and barely glance at my next blood-and-guts murder mystery. Silent scream. End of fantasy.

This kind of genre jumping doesn't have to mean publishing suicide with ebooks. All that's required is a nom de plume for each genre I try. This could be a fun way to try on different genres to see which one--and this could be surprising--makes my heart beat faster and actually sells. In fact, Bell is big on self-determination in his book, which really appeals to my artist self, but he's also practical: "Spend your time developing the books you want to write most, but which also have the potential to sell to a large audience." It's all about balance.

Law #2: You Must Write the Best Books You Can

No argument here. Bell quotes another ebook author, Mark Coker, The Secrets of Ebook Publishing Success: "Eighty percent of your books' success will be determined by the quality of your book. The other 20 percent is distribution, marketing and luck." Bell gives pointers to beginners, intermediate, and advanced writers about how they can sharpen their storytelling skills to increase their chances of success.

My goal is to write a better story each time out. Publishing as an independent doesn't change that goal. If anything, I'm working harder than ever to make my story stand out by investing cold hard cash on a highly qualified editor. The very good news is that I control 80 percent of my book's success. I like having that much control. Note: This doesn't bleed into other parts of my life.

Also in this section, Bell gives the clearest instructions on how to develop a heart-grabbing pitch I've ever heard or read. It's worth buying the book just for his pitch pointers.

Law #3: You Must Prepare Your Book With Quality Controls

Bell caught me off guard in this section, in a good way. I'd completely forgotten about the back of the book, and that the copy--after the cover--is what really sells the book. In fact, he gets into the nitty-gritty of the front and back copy, all the boring stuff like copyrights, formatting, and an author bio. He also touches on the all-important art of categorizing your book on Amazon to get paying customers to your book page. (Next time I post I'll be talking about another book that does a more scientific and thorough job of assigning categories to your book.)

As for covers, Bell highly recommends working with a professional to avoid a cheesy cover. I have to say that I worried most about my covers. When the reader first sees the cover, it's about the size of a postage stamp. The cover shoulders the job of attracting a reader by setting the tone of the story and clarifying the genre in a tiny space. The cover is my foot in the door, so I hired a photographer and graphic artist to help. 

Law #4: You Must Develop and Work a Marketing Plan

Bell contends that every marketing plan, at the very least, consists of a pricing strategy, social media presence, newsletter/email program, and reviews, interviews and guest blogging. This section  made me tired. For instance, besides writing your own blog, Bell encourages authors to make thoughtful comments on other author's blogs, all for the purpose of building a relationship that becomes mutually beneficial. When my release date looms, that author will be more inclined to have me as a guest blogger, and I can invite him/her to do the same. I like this sort of partnership.

But have you noticed how many author blogs there are? The trick is to find author blogs that appeal to your audience, read them faithfully, and yes, make thoughtful comments. This will be my dead-of-winter January project.

In short, Bell takes a mainstream approach to marketing (social media, newsletters, email lists). There's nothing in this section I hadn't heard before, but he does refine and give first-rate advice for success. I'm thinking I need a mini me to get all of this done.

Law #5: You Must Repeat Over and Over For the Rest of Your Life.

Holy cow, Bell! Over and over? Now, I'm really tired.

Not only over and over but more and more. "...the more books you have available, the better you'll do."

Bell suggests short fiction and writing, writing, writing. Actually, I like the idea of writing short stories. They're an especially fun way to experiment with other genres, but would that mean 23 different nom de plumes?

I appreciate all that Bell includes in his book, so much more than five laws, and I highly recommend this ebook for all authors. Thanks to Bell, the important stuff will get done (he has a great section on priority setting) and I may dabble in other genres. Let's see, a nom de plume? How about Brenda Paris? Zaleena Hopstetter? Buck Tumbleweed? Jetta Stargazer?

Silliness aside, what's your marketing plan? Who are you listening to? What works? What doesn't? Help!