Category: Writing

It’s almost done. Really. I promise. In fact, that’s the reason why you haven’t seen a lot of activity here in blog-land lately. With a job and family, there’s only so much time in each day left for writing (which I’ve complained about enough).

If I’m to have the slightest chance of having this book ready for Christmas, the next month will be a little intense. So there won’t be much activity here unless something really catches my eye for a quick posting…like the Camaro Hot Wheels edition, for instance. Maybe Dodge will step up and do the same thing for the Challenger, which is already pretty Hot-Wheelsy.

I’ll try and update at least once a week, and post a few more sample chapters for your test-reading pleasure.

In the meantime, here’s an example of what I’m thinking about for cover art:

Here’s a great New York Times story on how Amazon is disrupting traditional publishing by signing authors to their own imprints. From the article:

Amazon executives, interviewed at the company’s headquarters here, declined to say how many editors the company employed, or how many books it had under contract. But they played down Amazon’s power and said publishers were in love with their own demise.

“It’s always the end of the world,” said Russell Grandinetti, one of Amazon’s top executives. “You could set your watch on it arriving.”

He pointed out, though, that the landscape was in some ways changing for the first time since Gutenberg invented the modern book nearly 600 years ago. “The only really necessary people in the publishing process now are the writer and reader,” he said.

Author Michael Stackpole has more: Is Amazon the Sauron of Publishing?

Publishers really can’t ignore that this is a shot across their bows—though I imagine they will. Just the fact that Amazon pays on a monthly basis makes authors look on them favorably. Their willingness to promote is another plus. The fact that they’re willing to let authors publish what they want when they want, regardless of whether or not a committee thinks it will be a blockbuster, is a third factor in their favor.

Plus this perspective on fears of Amazon becoming a monopoly:

For authors, Amazon (and electronic publishing), looks very good. We earn 70% of a retail price we set, and we get the money in sixty days. Amazon spends a lot of money convincing people to buy empty boxes and allows me to supply the stuff they’ll put in those boxes. While some might fear that Amazon—once it establishes its monopoly—will cut the pay rate or otherwise upset the apple-cart, I believe that worry is premature. Amazon’s plan for complete vertical integration requires the compliance of authors. They need what we supply.

Emphasis mine. Not much more to say here, the links are worth reading in full.

Why, indeed?

This has been eating me up for a while, and by coincidence there was a lot of discussion about it today at some favorite writing blogs. Many, many links follow.

For now, a few points to consider:

• During one of last weekend’s author discussion panels, I asked the participants about sales they could attribute to online outlets like Amazon. Without a hitch, they all said it was the overwhelming majority. And these were traditionally-published authors.
• The latest check of Amazon’s Top 10 Sci-Fi shows that 4 of the 10 are self-published, including the current Numero Uno. This changes daily, so your mileage may vary.
• Recall from my previous post, those self-pubbed authors are pocketing 70% of the gross from Amazon. The traditionally-published authors are getting 25% of net for e-books, of which their agents also get their percentage. And remember, “net” is apparently a very elastic term in the publisher’s eyes.

None of this would be happening if the industry was still dominated by physical books sold in brick-and-mortar stores.

John Scalzi made an interesting prediction: mass-market paperbacks will be replaced by e-books within 10 years. Hardbacks will always be around, but the production and distribution costs mean they’ll remain the domain of the surefire bestselling authors.

I’d wager that it happens even faster once Amazon gets the Kindle down below $100. That will be to publishers what iPods were to the recording industry. But here’s the problem for most of us noobs: mass-market paperbacks are typically where we’d end up. If we’re being driven to e-books, well then…where does that leave us? Lemmings being herded over the cliff, that’s where.

Former agent/current author/apparent surfer dude Nathan Bransford chimes in with an excellent post on this subject (via Passive Voice, another great resource):

“I think publishers are going to have to think long and hard about what exactly they will actually be providing authors in an e-book world. There needs to be a major mindset shift from a gatekeeper-oriented “You’re lucky to be with us” mentality where authors are treated on a need-to-know and your-check-will-arrive-when-it-arrives basis to a service-oriented “What else could we possibly do for you” mentality.”

Yep.

Now, I’m still quite open to a traditional publishing deal because it’d be nice to see my work in hardback on a shelf at Barnes & Noble. One agency is still interested in seeing the revisions to Perigee, so I’ll send it along and see what happens. Who knows, maybe they’ll find a sucker publisher who thinks I’m the next Crichton and forks over a seven-figure advance. Or monkeys might fly out of my butt.

However, I’ve also worked for a couple of businesses that were irreversibly sliding towards bankruptcy, and can tell you that ordinarily upright executives will make some shockingly crooked decisions out of sheer desperation. You’ve got to think that at least a couple of publishers are going down the tubes in the next few years. It would be a nightmare to have the rights to my novels tied up in that environment.

At the risk of being repetitious, the internet has broken down tremendous barriers in distribution, sales, and marketing that have dominated publishing until recently. Now, as long you have a good story that’s well-written and professionally edited, the readers don’t care whose imprint is on the title page. They’re accessing the DIYers just as easily as the big names. More on this phenomenon at Daily Pundit.

Marketing is, of course, the real trick. I could write the next Lord of the Rings and it wouldn’t make one cent if nobody’s aware of it. More on that later, as I figure it out for myself…

UPDATE: This is a popular subject this week! Vodkapundit Stephen Green weighs in at PJ Media. Also recommend following his link to a righteous rant by Sarah Hoyt.

Spent the weekend at the Context 24 convention, which was also my first sort-of writer’s conference. There were several good workshops and info panels, plus some noteworthy authors (most notably, John Scalzi. Nice guy).

One thing that I couldn’t escape noticing is how few attendees (that is, other aspiring novelists) were on board with the whole self-pubbing thing. Not sure what I expected, but it was surprising nonetheless.

Perhaps it shouldn’t have been. During any major paradigm shift, the first people to recognize it as such are probably going to be in the minority. I was absolutely clueless about it until very recently, and am still uncertain.

Is the new normal asserting itself, or will this be just another internet fad? Is it the right thing to do, or is it still career suicide?

I dunno. The big publishers are not doing well in the current environment, and neither are bookstores. This is reflected in the increasingly common stories of brazen rights grabs and agency contracts that are awfully close to indentured servitude.

It sounds like agents are freaking out more than publishers. As intermediaries, their business models are inextricably tied to getting a percentage of author income. If advances are dwindling, and more writers are going it alone with Amazon, then they have to be asking themselves where they’ll fit in once the dust settles. My guess is not many of them are liking the answer to that question.

Thus, more and more agencies are venturing into the e-publishing business. This is a bad, bad, bad idea, which was brought up during an author panel this weekend. Oddly enough, I don’t recall hearing anyone come right out and say “conflict of interest.” An author cannot know if his agent has truly done all he can to pitch his manuscript to the pub houses if the answer is, “I tried, they wouldn’t bite, but hey…you can always publish with us.”

Did I mention it’s a bad idea?

Periodically checking Amazon’s sci-fi and thriller lists, one can easily find a few do-it-yourselfers in the top 20. Making the NY Times top 20 would be better (I think), but it’s still nothing to sneeze at. Especially considering that just a few years ago, self-pubbing meant you laid out a ton of money to produce a garage full of comparatively cheap-looking books, most of which never left said garage.

These days, the DIY’ers are pocketing 70% of gross versus 25% of net for the traditional authors. Assuming you’ve produced good work (professionally edited, of course) and can successfully market it, that’s the difference between full-time authorship and keeping your day job.

But it’s still scary. And exciting. I like the idea of essentially setting up my own business as a writer. The idea of control over my career is particularly attractive, because the query-wait-reject rollercoaster eats away at one’s psyche. The thought of leaving all that behind to chart my own way is hard to ignore.

Granted, a lot of people have traveled that road and failed. A few have done very well in the last 18 months. Electronic media has broken down an enormous barrier to entry, because I wouldn’t dream of doing this all by vanity press and having a garage full of unsold books.

More thoughts on this soon. Yes, I’m done with my current-events rants for now. Back to writing and all that goes along with it.