Category: publishing

I don’t like to talk about non-writing related things here on the ranty writing blog. In the sense of I like talking about writing (the art) as opposed to writing (the career). It’s why I rarely talk about publishing, marketing, agents, publicity, any of those after-issues. I’m a big believer that there’s not much point in me worrying about any of the career stuff until I’ve actually done the art stuff. Like I talked about a few weeks back, if you’re here, you’re 100% interested in the art, but not necessarily in the career.

But these are interesting times, and as I find myself navigating a path through them, I figured I might as well drop a bird crumb or three. Or beat the whole loaf into crumbs and just dump it out here. We’ll see which one turns out to be the better approach…

In case you missed it, the human embodiment of the Dunning-Krueger Effect spent an ungodly amount of money to buy a company he had absolutely no idea how to run. What followed next was kind of like a car crash I was once in. Another car slammed us into the side of the freeway, our car kind of bounced off the concrete wall, but momentum and a jammed steering wheel guided us back into side of the freeway again, where we bounced off again, slammed into the wall again, and continued doing this for maybe a full minute/ three or four impacts before the car finally came to rest a few hundred yards down the freeway. And no, the other driver never stopped, just shot off down the 405, looking for another car crash to cause.

So that’s what Twitter’s been like for the past couple of months.

Really, even before the Muskrat, things weren’t looking great. In general, the social media landscape’s been looking more and more like some bombed out no-man’s land during World War One. Algorithms have made sites less and less usable, while a complete lack of algorithms have made other sites less appealing. At this point, the only thing social media shows you is ads and the only thing you can easily find is outrage.

Where does this leave us all now?

Not in a great place.

I’m hardly the first to say it, but I think the age of social media may be over. It’s crumbling fast, at the very least. Yeah, there are a few places that have tried to step up and fill the gap, but none of them are moving at a good speed, either in growth or management. Bluesky’s probably my favorite right now, but it’s still got huge issues. Plus, if they shift to the federated idea, I think that pretty much kills them right there.

Yeah, federation’s just weird. It feels like a buzzword too many techbros are leaping at, even though it pretty much boils down to “social media, but with less reach.” It also feels a lot like “look, we invented subreddits!”

Anyway…

Hopefully it’s clear this really sucks for artists of all types. For a while now publishers (of all types) have kind of been leaning on artists to get their own message out. After all, through social media we can reach everyone pretty much everywhere, right? So… reach! New book coming out, book signing this weekend, anthology story in November, con appearance next month!

BUT… we all hate it when artists just say “buy my stuff” again and again. And most artists hate doing it. That’s why we’re usually just trying to… well, be ourselves. Show you other stuff we’re interested in. Movies, cooking, photography, LEGO, exercise, toys, pets, whatever. I think most people appreciate that honesty, even if it’s not something they might not be interested in themselves.

(like, for example. two writers I know from the fleshworld talk a lot on social media about Magic the Gathering, a game I know absolutely nothing about past “you play it with cards.” But I love their passion for it. It doesn’t matter that I’ve got no clue about it– I can enjoy their love of it)

Worth noting—I’ve never heard of an author not getting a deal because of a small social media following. I don’t think any publisher’s ever said “Wow, it’s the most amazing thing I’ve read this year and we think we can easily move 100K copies BUT you’ve only got 200 followers on Twitter. So sorry. Please try again later.”

I have, however, heard more than a few stories where blame for a book’s failure is quiiiiiiietly shifted to the author. They should’ve promoted more. They should’ve talked about it more. Clearly their fault. Nothing we could’ve done that would’ve changed things.

And the key thing here is it’s been shown time and time and time again that big social media numbers really don’t, in any way, translate to sales. There are famous examples of people with millions of followers who can’t even sell 500 copies of a book. I mentioned a while back how Nathan-freakin’-Fillion tweeted how much he liked the first two Ex-Heroes books and it barely bumped the needle on sales.

So all of this should be inconsequential! Social media collapsing really shouldn’t be the giant source of stress that it is for so many creative folks. But we keep doing it because… everyone expects us to. And we all have this nagging worry that if we don’t do it maybe sales will go down. Maybe my feeble attempts at keeping your attention really are where a third of my sales come from. Which would be sad on numerous levels. For all of us.

Plus… I made a joke about this a while back and Chuck Wendig actually just did a whole post about it over on his site. Most artists are exhausted by all of this. This whole collapse and trying to find a new place and… all of it. Seriously. I mean, we need to use social media—to some extent—as a business tool. So imagine having to move your whole office to another building. The office you’d spent years getting settled into and arranging, where everyone knew where you were and all your clients and associates knew right where to find you. But now you have to move.

So you pack everything up, move it all, get everything unboxed, start moving it all around, figuring where everything’s going to go, you give everyone your new phone number and new address and WHOA hang on, turns out this place has a ton of security issues. Sooooo pack it all up again, move again, get it all unboxed again, give everyone your new-new phone number and address and HOLY CRAP this new place is also owned by a narcissistic billionaire? Okay… pack it all up again, find another place, set it all up again…

And of course, every time you do this you lose something. A few photos. A little memory. There’s one or two people you forget to tell you’re moving. Five or six people who just can’t find that new address. Another five or six who refuse to drive to that part of town.

Again, that’s what the past few months have been like for most artists. Exhausting.

Which leads us to… what can we do?

Well, first off, a lot of it’s going to depend on you and what you can tolerate. What you want to be part of. What you want to support.

Past that…

I think, personally, if you like an author, an artist, a franchise, a toyline, whatever… you should probably bookmark their site now. Not their Twitter page or Instagram account—their site. Every writer and artist I know is trying to let everyone know where they’re going, but there are so many barriers in the way. We’re all scattering and some people are going to get lost. So ignore all the random platforms and just go straight to their little corner of the web. I guarantee you they’ve got something out there, even if it’s just 83% placeholder. So bookmark it, try to check it now and then. Like in the olden times, when the internet was just stone tablets that we threw at each other.

If said artist tells you they’re going somewhere… try to follow them. I screenshotted so many Bluesky addresses before I got an invite. All those folks saying “find me over here.” And when I finally got a code… I found as many of them as I could. Newsletters? Probably not a bad idea to sign up for those, too, if that’s your thing. Do you need a Bluesky invite? Seriously, I’ll just drop codes here if it helps people get away from Twitter. Because none of us can depend on it anymore. For anything.

I don’t know. This is feeling rambly. I have so many thoughts, and I’m also worried nobody’s ever going to read them. Because social media’s collapsed and I have no way to tell you I’ve put up a new post here on the ranty writing blog.

I guess we’ll all just have to see what happens.

Next time, I think I’d like to talk about how little time it took Usain Bolt to win an Olympic gold medal. Unless you’d like to talk about something else? Feel free to leave any thoughts, suggestions, or comments down below

And until then… go write.

Okay, so…

I’ve been fascinated with ancient Egypt since I was very little. Not sure what sparked it, but by the time I was ten I could rattle off the names of a dozen Egyptian gods and their relationship to one another. My fifth grade science fair project was a model pyramid with numerous “reconstructed” tools and a chart of heiroglyphs.

Many years back I was dating a woman and maybe a month into our relationship she mentioned she was going to Egypt in a few months. Would I want to come along? Spend a few weeks traveling Egypt with her?

I tried not to seem too desperate when I said yes.

As someone who grew up in New England, I was used to the idea of having history around you. Not just grandpa’s history or old family history, but serious history. Lots of buildings and landmarks in my hometown in Maine date back to the early 1700s, and the town’s history goes back even further.

But wow… getting to Egypt? There is HISTORY there. Thousands of years of it. I wasn’t ready for the crushing awe of it. And the scale of it. It’s one thing to read about how big some of these monuments are, to see them on television, but you honestly can’t grasp the size of them until you’re right there. Or in some cases, until you realize what you’re seeing in the distance.

I was very lucky that we had no set schedule, so we could go somewhere and just… spend the day. We traveled from Cairo down to Aswan. Stopped for several days in Luxor. I’d just stare at temple walls, statues, and sometimes tombs. One time I just sat for an hour or so on a small cliff above the Valley of Kings and watched boats on the Nile.

Anyway, another thing I saw a lot of in Egypt was folks who spent a lot of time… well, today we’d probably say “taking selfies.” They’d pose in front of this or that, stand with this guide or that guard or hey, look, a camel! And then they’d race off to find the next thing to take a picture with.

It took me a while to realize these folks weren’t really interested in seeing Egypt. They were more interested in telling people they’d been to Egypt. They wanted to show off the photos and tell stories. For them, it was more about the secondary aspects of taking the trip. The after-effects, if you were.

So, while I’m sure this is incredibly fascinating to some of you, I’m sure far more are wondering what all this has to do with writing?

When we talk about writing, I think one thing that gets skimmed over a lot is what our actual goals are. What do we want out of this? Our endgame, so to speak. And this is important because if I don’t know what my real objective is—or I’m not being honest with myself about it—it’s going to be tough to find the right path to reach it.

Like, I’m willing to bet at least one of you reading this has thought “the goal is to get published.” Okay, cool. But what does that actually mean? Do I just want to be able to say someone paid me for a story and it saw print? That’s cool. I think for some folks there’s a degree of validation that comes with getting published, and maybe that’s all they need.

Maybe I just want to tell stories. That’s all that matters. Getting these ideas and situations and conversations out of my head and down on paper (down on electromagnetic bubble? Down on flash drive?) and sharing it with the world somehow. Or not sharing it. Maybe I just write because it’s what I do and it’s therapeutic on some level. Maybe I write a ton of stuff that nobody will ever see, and I’m totally cool with that. Nothing wrong with that.

Or am I hoping to maybe make money? Nothing wrong with that, either. More than a few folks write as a sort of side job. They’ve got their full-time career and writing’s what they do on weekends or the occasional late night, selling a short story or novella or even a full book. Or maybe the goal is to make writing itself the full-time career. To make enough money stringing words together that I can pay my bills, live in semi-comfort, and don’t need to do anything else.

But maybe the money’s irrelevant, and so’s publication. What I really want is for people to recognize that I’m good at this. Very good. Masterclass good. Maybe I want the accolades and the starred reviews and the numerous awards where I get to stand in front of people who understand how talented I am.

Or look, maybe I just want to be a writer because I want to be part of the club. That group gathered at the bar at the con. Those people online making clever comments to each other. I want to be in with them, and maybe I want people to look at me the way they look at those folks. It might sound a little silly but there are clearly people who only want to be writers for this… the same way those folks only wanted to say they’d been in Egypt. The want the destination, not the journey.

(yes, this may be me talking about a current hot topic)

Y’see, Timmy, there’s a ton of different reasons I may want to write. And whichever one is my reason… that’s fantastic. But I think it’s important to be aware of why I’m doing this. Because there are a lot of paths open to writers these days, and I don’t want to spend time and energy on a path that’s taking me away from what I really want.

So be honest. With other folks and yourself. What do you want?

Next time…

Actually, before I talk about next time, I wanted to bounce something off you. How many of you use the “categories” there on the side (also sometimes called tag or labels or…)? I was thinking of paring the list down a bit to make it easier to use. None of the tags will actually go away, they just won’t be in that list anymore. I was thinking I’d snip out all the proper names—nice easy way to lose twenty or thirty lines, and it’ s probably one of the least-used ways to search for things, yes?

Anyway…next time I’d like to talk a little bit about the devil. Specifically, the one in the details.

Until then, go write.

A week or so back on Twitter I was asked to comment on a question that needed a little more response than 280 characters allowed. I tried to give a quick, simple answer, but it gnawed at me for a bit, ‘cause I’ve seen this question many times before (from several angles), and it always feels like the answers it gets are very simplified. So a few days later I added it to my list of topics for here.

“Anyone know whether publishers will pick up a book that’s
already been self-published for a new edition?”

Like so many things in this industry, this is one of those questions that sounds really simple, but there’s actually a lot more to it. I think this is really a few questions that’ve been Voltroned together and then demanding a single, comprehensive answer. Which is why the answers it gets tend to always feel a bit over-simplified and off. To me, anyway.

For example, even if we’re just asking how many self-pubbed books get picked up by traditional presses, this is a loaded question. Because most people don’t consider smaller traditional presses in that—they’re really just interested in the big ones. And small presses are, generally speaking, more open to picking up a formerly self-pubbed book. So viewing things this way already skews my answer.

Plus, it depends on just how we’re phrasing things—slightly different questions can get very different answers. If I’m asking how many Big Five books started off a self published works… the odds aren’t horrible. I mean, just personally, I know enough people it’s happened to, and I have a good enough sense of how many books get published, so I feel comfortable saying yeah, there’s passable odds it can happen. It’s not exactly common, but I’d be willing to bet out of the thousands of books the big presses put out each year, more than a couple were previously self-published. And, as I just said, the odds get even better if we bring in smaller presses.

However… if my question is what are the odds of a self published book getting picked up by a big traditional press… well, those numbers plummet. Because now we’re talking about hundreds of thousands, possibly millions of self published books each year and (as I said above) maaaaybe a dozen of them get picked up. So I can end up with a very different picture of things depending on what I ask. And, to be honest, how people want to answer. There’s a lot of wiggle room here to make the answers fit what somebody wants to believe. Or wants you to believe.

All that in mind… why don’t we try to break this Voltron-question down into its three (or maybe four) component lion-questions and answer each of those.

First off is the big one. Is my book something a traditional publisher would even want? Let’s be honest—anything can be self-published. Absolutely anything. The most illiterate, nonsensical garbage can be self-published. So right off the bat, I need to have actually written a good book. Something a publisher might’ve picked up if they’d originally seen it. Something with a very solid structure, good characters, and strong dialogue. In this aspect, it’s just like any other book they’d be looking at, and they’re probably going to have much higher standards than… well KDP.

Not only that, but odds are they’re going to be looking at my actual self-published book. I mean, I’m now a small press trying to convince a big press to take on one of my titles, so is it shocking to think they might look at it? Is it edited and copyedited? Does it have a nice layout? Awful as it sounds, does it have a halfway decent cover? They’re not going to judge on any one of these things, but they’re all going to have a degree of influence. I’m asking them to pick up this book, and if it looks like a crap book… well, they’re going to notice that.

Second is the money side of things. Is it worth it for a traditional publisher to pick up my book and republish it? Again, one aspect of this is going to be like any other book—is this the kind of thing the publisher usually sells? Not a lot of historical romances coming out of Tor, and Ballantine isn’t picking up a ton of splatterpunk. And even if I’ve written a straight sci-fi book, is it so sub-sub-niche that Tor might only sell a few hundred copies altogether?

That’s actually a good place to bring up a sort of second-and-a-half point. There’s also some math at work here. See, if my self-published book’s only sold sixty or seventy copies, it means it’s not getting any interest or word of mouth… which means it’s probably not worth it for a big press to republish it. But if the book’s sold too many copies, that means I’ve actually eaten into the potential audience. Every book realistically is only going to sell so many copies, so if all the market research says my book might appeal to an audience of ten thousand and I’m telling them it’s already sold eight thousand self published… that also means it’s probably not worth it to them to pick it up.

Also (what are we up to, my second and three-quarters point?) right now, as I’m writing this and you’re reading it—okay, maybe not as you’re reading it, depending—publishers are actually having meetings about what’s going to be on sale for Christmas 2022 and even talking a bit about spring of 2023. Seriously. They’re working that far ahead. Which means, on a lot of levels, they’re not as interested in what’s going on right now. So I might think this is a fantastic time for my book to go big, but as far as they’re concerned… that time was fifteen months ago.

Third is what am I expecting to get out of this? Mass distribution? Book signing tours? A futon stuffed with twenty dollar bills?  Welllll… remember that math I mentioned above? How much they think they can make off my republished book is going to affect how much they’re going to pay me. I can’t expect to get a huge advance off something that’s been out there selling copies for a year or two now, so if I’m demanding a six or seven figure check out of this… get used to disappointment.

And them paying less money means they need to make less of an effort to recoup that money. So no book tours. Not on their dime, anyway. I’m probably still going to be pushing this a lot myself. It’ll be more available, and it’ll have a little more weight behind it, but I’ll still probably be doing the same level of self-promotion I was doing when it was self-pubbed.

Also worth noting that the days of piecemeal rights deals are pretty much long over. I can’t be thinking I’ll ask the traditional publisher to take over just print and audio rights, but I’ll still get to put out the ebook. Doesn’t matter if it’s my choice or because things are locked up in some previous deal. It’s extremelyunlikely someone’s going to accept very limited rights for the book, especially a big publisher. I might be able to make it happen with a smaller press, but even they’re going to be a bit leery about it.

And all that’s kind of a broader answer to “will traditional publishers pick up a book that’s been self published.” There’s lots of ifsand buts in there, and I need to figure out where my book (and where I ) sit with all of them to get a real sense of an answer. And again, that’s just to get us to whether or not it’ll happen. Y’see Timmy, ultimately—like any other publishing venture—my journey of getting a self-published book picked up is going to be different than your journey, and odds are neither of us are going to get a deal like she did.

So… very long answer to a deceptively short question.

Next time, I want to talk about cake.

Until then… go write.

 Hey, remember when I said if you post questions in the comments I’d try to answer them?

Well, last week, Tantilloon asked,..

“Do you think it’s still possible to get a book published without any social media presence? Asking because I finished a manuscript. I’m just opposed to social media in general, so I’m sort of wondering if my book is DOA just because the idea of using something like Facebook is a deal breaker.”

Not word for word, but that was the thrust of their question. And questions get answers!

Okay, I’ve seen variations of this floating around the interwebs for a few years now, and it’s come up once or thrice at the Writers Coffeehouse. Y’know, back in the before-time. When we all met in person.

I’m getting my second shot next week. How about you?

Anyway…

This isn’t an easy yes or no question, but I’ll try my best. As always, this is based off my own experience, but I’m also considering what I know/have seen from other authors, things I’ve bounced off a few agents I know (including my own), and talking with some editors.

First, the answer depends a lot on if we’re talking about fiction or non-fiction. Overall, it definitely helps a non-fictionbook if I’ve got a good-sized social media presence. Simple reason why—if I’m writing a non-fiction book, the implication is I’m an expert in some field, and a strong social media following shows that people are interested in my expertise. Yes, it’s possible people are just following me because they’re interested in my novels even though I’m an expert in all behind-the-scenes, non-fiction things related to Rom Spaceknight, but the overall assumption is still going to be that a strong social media presence is a very big plus for a non-fiction book.

So a big following on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, or… I don’t know, is Tumblr even still a thing? A big social media following isn’t strictly necessary for a non-fiction book, but it’s definitely going to help if I’ve got one. And what counts as “big” is going to depend a lot on how niche my book is. If I’m writing a political book intended to reach half the country, I probably want a larger following than if I’ve written a book on, say, the psychology of Rom embodying the sci-fi trope of paranoia vs. trust.

If we’re talking about fiction, this is kind of flipped. Most agents and editors neither require nor expect a big social media following. They don’t. Honest. Because, realistically… why would I have one? I mean, sure, I’ve got family and friends, and maybe a dozen or so people follow me for my insightful takes on Rom, but that’s still only going to add up to what… fifty or sixty people? Those publishing folks are aware that one aspect of being an unknown author is being, well, unknown. Seriously, think about it. If I’m not a known entity, why would I possibly have an online following of a size that could notably affect book sales?

Plus, sad truth is… social media doesn’t sell a lot of books. Either partaking in it or advertising on it. It sells one or two, sure, and it lets the fans I already have know I’ve got a book coming out. But let’s be honest—you and I both get hit with promoted tweets and Facebook adsevery day. Well, okay, I deleted my Facebook account over a year ago. Instagram ads, then. Point is… we ignore them most of the time, don’t we? And we ignore that guy who’s always going “Hey, buy my book! Buy my book! Buy MYbook! Buy my BOOK! HEY! MY BOOK! BUY IT!”

It’s just not what most of us are on social media for, and publishers know this. Because they’re people too. And their business is selling books.

True story—almost exactly ten years ago Nathan Fillion tweeted a few times how much he loved the Ex-Heroes books. Seriously, he did. I think he had a little under two million followers at the time. So let’s just say a million people saw him say how much he loved the books. One million potential readers.

We barely saw a ripple in sales. The book sold a little more that quarter, but it was selling a little more every quarter. Even with a million sets of eyes, there wasn’t a big spike we could call “the Fillion Effect” or anything like that.

Now, in all fairness—a publisher usually wouldn’t be upset if I did have a few hundred thousand followers and I liked hanging out on social media. It does make getting the word out there a bit easier. But again, it’s not going to affect if they pick up my book or not, because it’s not really going to sell a lot of books.

And if it does affect how a publisher’s looking at my book… that’s a little bit of a red flag, in my opinion. If they’re that concerned with my social media, it might be a sign they’re expecting me to do all the marketing and publicity. And since social media doesn’t sell books (see above), that’s not really a winning strategy.

So, no. Absolute not necessary to have a social media account.

Now, let me toss out one last bit of advice that kind of applies either way…

Social media is about, well, being social. Honest interaction. When people interact with me on Twitter or Instagram or whatever’s coming next, they’re expecting to interact with me. Not my assistant. Not my sales plan (as mentioned above). Not my month of pre-scheduled posts. They just want a sense of… me. That’s why most of my Twitter and Instagram is about interacting with friends, toys, cats, and B-movies. Occasionally some tabletop games or politics (if I’m especially frustrated by something). And most people seem to like it. That’s just who I am, and I enjoy sharing the stuff I’m interested in and/or love. I’ve got friends who put up pet pics, some who play random games, some who like taking weird photos of the world or themselves. It’s whatever you enjoy doing, because that honest enjoyment shines through.

If someone’s not really into social media, if they don’t want to deal with that interaction or whatever level of responsibility they think it needs to be… fine. Don’t do it. Seriously. People will sense that insincerity, that I see this more as an obligation than an honest interaction. And they won’t be that into it. Better to honestly not be on social media than be on it in a dishonest, disinterested way.

One last thing, which ties back to that insincerity. Let’s say I decide I don’t want to leave anything to chance. If a big follower count only increases my odds of getting picked up by 0.83%, I’ll still take what I can get! In this scenario, it might be tempting to do a lot of things in an attempt to artificially boost my follower count. Following back everyone who follows me, for example, trying to jump on whatever trend I can, or maybe even paying for likes and followers.

Editors and agents can spot this stuff just like you and I can. Again, they’re people. A lot of them have social media accounts of their own. And if they see I’ve got 50,000 followers but I’m following 49,892 people… well, they’re going to have a good sense of how wide my reach really is.

But again… it doesn’t really matter for a fiction book.

Anyway… regular post on Thursday. Clowns and true love. See you then.