Obligation To Blog?

As folks know - or at least both folks who routinely read this blog - I post twice a week.  I once did three times a week, and if I ever become successful enough at this writing gig to do it full time, I'll get back to that.  However, life gets in the way if I want to do funny stuff like "eat" and "spend time with my family."  The posting contracted to once a week a while back, but I think I can maintain twice a week for now.

But that still got me wondering how much of an obligation I have to post.  I've had to go on several extended blogging vacations due to life circumstances, and I wonder if anyone noticed.  After all, no one is paying me, and I didn't get loads of hate-mail for my absence, so would I really be missed?

Blogging is more of a way to keep the audience up to date with what's going on, as well as provide some content between books.  Folks like to feel like they're engaged, and blogging does that for me and both of my fans.  I like to do it when I get time(and get in a groove), but breaking that inertia can be challenging.

I'd love to know what everyone else thinks - what are your thoughts on the obligations of blogging?  How consistent/often should it be, and does it draw in people?  Or is it just a waste of time that should be limited to big news(like a book release)?

The Cycle Starts Anew...

Wrongful Death came out a week ago today.  However, that doesn't mean it's time to sit on my ass and wait for the big bucks, movie offers, and talk-show invitations to begin to roll in.  Instead, it means it's time to get geared up for my next release.

Homecoming is a bit of a departure from my first three releases.  My first few novels have all dealt heavily with death and the afterlife in some manner, but Homecoming is a science-fiction novel set in the distant future.  Some might wonder why I'm going so far afield, but sci-fi has always been my first love.  In fact, the first novel I ever wrote through to the end was a sci-fi novel(and you'll never see it - looking back, I'm embarrassed at how bad it turned out, despite my thinking that it was absolutely awesome when I first finished it over 18 years ago).  I've been looking for a way to get back into sci-fi, and Homecoming is it.

Set more than 6,000 years from now, it follows the story of humanity's return to Earth after being driven off by a genocidal race that seeks out and destroys technology different from its own.  The journey starts out as an idealistic crusade but turns into a check on everything the survivors thought they knew since their ancestors apparently weren't as innocent as they'd been led to believe.

Written in journal format, it's told from the point of view of a historian traveling with the re-conquest fleet.  The marauders that took Earth are the most obvious challenge, but are they the biggest?  Some humans left behind managed to survive, as did others who escaped and didn't follow their friends to the same world.  There's also another alien race that stands in the way - they were once feared but time has finally given us an edge.  Will we use that edge in arrogance or in the search for justice?

I recognize that science-fiction is usually either terrific or god-awful.  I still have to go back through this book to make sure it meets my vision, but it's time to start putting it all together.  Homecoming is set for release on March 28, 2019.

Figuring Out Amazon

I had a problem last week when Wrongful Death was released - my ebook and paperback weren't searchable through one page.  To begin with, my paperback was out first, but my ebook was being held up.  For the first time ever, Kindle was demanding me to prove I was the author.  I wrote them back and provided what proof I could, and then I waited.  And waited.  Then I waited some more.  They never wrote me back to tell me all was good.  Instead, they just put it up on KDP Select.

Then the books weren't linked.  What I mean is that usually different versions of the same book are linked, so that you can go to the paperback page and do one click on a Kindle link to get to the ebook.  That wasn't happening.  Therefore, I wrote them again, and again I waited.  After no return email saying I was good, my book simply showed up on my page and both versions are now available on one page.  Maybe I'm just too insecure, but I like getting responses so I know someone at least heard me.  For the company to just assume I'd know everything was good is frustrating.

I'm also trying out KDP Select for a bit too.  That means that Kindle is the only ebook platform I can use for Wrongful Death.  That's right - the novel is not available on Nook or Apple iBooks.  This is so that I can be a part of the KDP Reading Fund, whereby authors dip into a big KDP pot for profits based on how much is being sold and looked at.  I say looked at b/c folks can check out my book for 30 days for free, something that unnerves me a little.  After all, I'm trying to make some money here.  However, I've been assured that this will get me into a higher algorithm and will help my sales in the long run.  I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Wrongful Death Release!

Wrongful Death is now available from Amazon!  You can find the print book here, and the ebook here.  If you do check it out, please write me a review.

A Literary Reminder

I was speaking last week with an old friend of mine named Kevin.  Several years ago, Kevin was a potentially up-and-coming author who’d secured a literary agent for his book Paws On The Ground.  The book is about his time as an MP working with dogs in Afghanistan, and the title is a take off of the military phrase “boots on the ground.”  It’s a way to say that you have to be in the thick of things and physically present to have an impact.

Kevin had gone to a writing conference and an agent was impressed enough to sign him.  That’s when he learned that maybe literary agents aren’t the best route to go if you want to get your message out to the public…

His first agent(I’ll get to why he was the “first” in a second) kept giving him edits and corrections to make.  Don’t get me wrong – if something can be made better, then I’m totally open to someone pointing out what that might be.  What I’m not open to is someone who supposedly works for me – and yes, literary agents work for the writer, not the other way around – insisting that his or her suggestions must be taken.  I’m the writer, and I get to decide what works best for the story.

There was lots of back and forth, and tons of new “suggestions,” but the agent never tried even once to submit Kevin’s books to publishers for sale.  Finally fed up, Kevin fired the guy and turned to a new agent.  This one didn’t offer too much to change, and he sounded like he was enthusiastic about Kevin’s book.  Then…nothing.  The guy just disappeared, as if the Earth had opened up and swallowed him whole.  Kevin hasn’t heard from him in more than two years, and he has basically given up on anything happening with his work.

Those who know me know of my antipathy towards literary agents.  I think, for the most part, that they’re useless.  To start with, they’re supposed to be selling your work and negotiating a contract, but every one I’ve encountered has no background in business or intellectual property law.  Most, in fact, have MFA or English degree and appear to simply want to be writers themselves without running the risk of putting their own work out there.  No, they’d rather criticize actual writers behind the scenes and then take credit for what someone else wrote.

Were I to ever decide to go the traditional route for my work(the offer would have to be really high for me to give up the freedom of indie publishing), I wouldn’t need another literary critic.  I’ve got beta readers and people I respect for critiques.  Since reading taste is subjective, I have to be the final arbiter of whether or not a suggestion makes sense.  What I need instead of another critic is someone familiar with intellectual property law.  What rights do I retain?  When do the rights revert back to me?  Is the publisher insisting on a right-of-first-refusal for my next book?  What will the publisher do from a marketing standpoint and what does that publisher expect me to do?  MFAs and English degrees are great, but they don’t credential someone to determine whether or not a contract offer is to my advantage.  And since the main advantage most of these agents offer is access to a traditional publisher, it’s more in an agent’s interest to get better terms for the publisher than for me so that the agent can stay in the good graces of the publisher.

Most agents rely on the naiveté of new authors to yoke them into their corral.  This had its merits…25 years ago.  However, in the new age of indie publishing, all it takes is some initiative and common business sense to get what an agent could.  If you want a traditional contract, then get an intellectual property attorney for your contract.  You can hire your own cover artist, your own editor, and market your book yourself.  Sure, it may not have a big-time publisher’s name attached, but a lot of successful books don’t have that.  Remember that The Martian and Fifty Shadesof Grey both started off as indie-published.  It wasn’t a literary agent or traditional publisher that made them successful.  They were successful the same way IAm Legend or The Shining were successful – they captured lightning in a bottle and caught a break(luck and timing are the biggest pieces an agent won’t talk about, pretending instead that they can make you the next JK Rowling rather than acknowledge that most books, even those represented by a traditional publisher, don’t earn that kind of money).

If you want the comfort of having a literary agent, go ahead, but know that you’re likely making a mistake.  Most agents I’ve encountered think they run things rather than that they work for their client, just like a lawyer or interior decorator.  If you want to retain your freedom and not worry whether or not someone who has an MFA but has likely never published in their life approves of you, then eschew the agent route and put stock in your own abilities.  After all, you have some control over those.

You Are Not Special

So many people, when they hear I have a few novels out, ask me what it's like to be rich.  Of course I'm rich, they think, because I've published books, just like Stephen King and JK Rowling.  I have to patiently explain that most writers don't sell many copies, and that it takes a break of some kind to get the kind of notoriety that Rowling and King get.

Unfortunately, lots of writers also have the idea that once they publish something, the world will be their oyster.  Far too many expect that readers will simply find their work and buy millions of copies so that the writer can retire to some Caribbean island.  I hate to break it to those of you who believe this, but that's nowhere close to the truth.

Yes, occasionally you can capture lightning in a bottle, but that's exceptionally rare.  What the vast majority of success takes is lots of hard work and a great deal of luck(although I've discovered that the harder I work, the luckier I seem to get).  You have to market yourself, enter contests, make connection, and so on.  There are literally thousands of books published every single day, and thinking that yours will stand out just because you wrote it and you know it's brilliant is not planning - it's fantasy.

I recently spoke to a fairly successful writer and asked for some advice.  Yes, I have a marketing degree, but the particulars of the writing market are coming slowly.  He gave me some great advice that I plan to implement shortly, and I'm trying to get noticed in a few other ways with folks who have access to greater publicity.  On top of my "day job," that can be exhausting.  However, it's worth it.  Regardless of whether I become uber-successful - which I, of course, still hope to become - I love writing and hearing from those who enjoy my work.  If I didn't love it, it would be too much of a grind.

But you have to love it, and you have to work hard.  Most of us aren't famous, where we can write something and people will gravitate towards it based off of our name(that comes after initial success, when that success becomes self-sustaining).  We may think we're special, and our friends and family may have told us we have great skill, but that will not get us an audience.  So stop sitting around waiting for breaks to come your way just because you feel you deserve them - go out and work so you earn them.  Otherwise...you can always write down your fantasy - maybe it'll make a nice book.