Kristen Lamb's Blog, page 15

Deep POV: What IS It & Why Do Readers LOVE It So Much?

Deep POV. Deep, man. So…um what is it? Maybe you’re bee-bopping along on the inter-webs, clicking on blogs, checking out writing resources when you see the term ‘Deep POV’ drift across your tweet deck.

Or perhaps you’re at a writing conference looking all intellectual and stuff, and in the conversations this phrase Deep POV keeps floating past. Deep POV. Deep POV. You keep hearing it, seeing it…

And, if you are anything like me, you don’t want to look like an idiot so you don’t ask that question burning inside you.

Um, what the heck is Deep POV?

***Note to self. Google Deep POV at home under cover of darkness.

What’s Deep POV & Why Do We Need It?

If you’re a writer who has a goal of selling books, it is wise to remember that audiences are not static. They change.

Their tastes change with the times and we need to understand what is ‘trending’ if we want to connect and entertain.

Many new writers look to the classics for inspiration and there isn’t anything per se wrong with that. But we must reinvent the classics, not regurgitate them.

Even if you look at the fashion trends, sure some styles ‘come back around’ but they are not exact replicas of the past. They’re a modernized version.

But keep in mind that some fashion styles never come back. They’ve outlived their usefulness and belong in the past.

Same with fiction.

Deep POV & Story Trends

Story trends and fashions change along with the audience. For instance, the novel Moby Dick spends an excruciatingly long time talking about whales. Why? Namely because the audience of the time probably had never seen one and never would.

If we did this today?

Sure, feel free to walk around in a literary gold-plated cod piece, but er…

#Awkward.

Epics were once very popular as well. Follow a character from the womb until death. FANTASTIC STUFF!

Why?

Because no one had Netflix.

Books were a rare indulgence usually reserved for a handful of literate folks with the money or connections to get their hands on…a book.

Also, since writers were paid by the word, their works were padded more than a freshman term paper. Their motto?

No modifier left behind. 

These days? We have to write leaner, meaner, faster and cleaner.

We’ve talked about POV before, and which one might be the best for your story. I can’t choose for any of you. Alas, before we talk about Deep POV, I want to mention that POV is affected by audience.

I also believe POV trends—the shift to Deep POV—is a direct reflection of how connected we are as a society.

Deep POV & Culture Shifts

You guys may or may not know that POV has changed along with communication and connectedness.

Waaaaay back in the day, omniscient with a god-like narrator was all the rage. But people didn’t travel at all. Most humans lived and died in the place they were born and in isolation from other communities.

Sort of like West Texas, but with knights and plague.

With the early epics, stories often had a narrator who was separate from the events.

Dear Reader, come with me for a tale of AWESOME…

Later, after the Dark Ages, people got out more, traveled more, etc. We see the narrator merging into just general god-like presence.

Then, after the printing press was invented, more and more people were literate and took up reading. Additionally, a lot of monks were out of a job and went off to start the first microbreweries.

Don’t argue. It’s history

Pitch Perfect: Can You Sell Your Story in ONE Sentence?

The pitch is one of the most vital components of any kind of sales, book sales included. Now, I know a lot of writers either start having apoplexy at this moment or they mentally check out.

Sales has nothing to do with my story. I can just pay someone else to worry about sales.

Um, no. Sales has everything to do with our stories, and ultimately we’re responsible for success or failure. It’s okay, though. I’m going to walk y’all through this.

We actually sell all the time and don’t even realize it. Sales is built into our nature.

You like my dress? Thanks! It has POCKETS! I got it on sale over at Dress World.

I love my electric mower. Trick is to hit Home Depot on Labor Day. End of summer. Best deals.

We sell ALL THE TIME. The trick with book sales is simply learning how to sell with intention and skill.

Plain truth is that, if we cannot convince someone our book is worth forgoing binge-watching Netflix, meeting the girls for mani-pedis, killing zombies on X-Box or watching funny cat videos? Then we won’t make it very far as authors.

The pitch is a key component of survival in, well…everything. Have a crush? Want that date? The pitch better be good. Why should he/she go out with you and not someone else?

Car companies pitch us with luxury, comfort, safety. Insurance companies pitch us on lowest rates or that they’ll take care of us when we’re in a jam.

Cosmetic companies pitch long lashes, smooth skin, full lips, and grocery stores pitch value, freshness, and time-saving additions like ordering on-line.

As writers, our pitch should have a lot in common with all other successful pitches. Notice I used the word should. The pitch that goes the distance has a very clear structure. Those who believe they’re the exception or cut corners do so at their own risk.

Anatomy of the Pitch

All successful pitches should be able to quickly and clearly answer a potential consumer’s key questions.

What are you ‘selling’?

What’s in it for me?

Why you (your product/service/company) and not another?

Too many authors fail to answer any of these questions, largely because they never stopped to ask them in the first place.

They rely on ads, marketing, social media badgering and spam and, when the book(s) fall flat? They’re mystified.

The interesting thing about ‘the pitch’ is it is the foundation of ANY business proposal. Ironically, the absurdly high failure rate of new businesses (like new books) can also be attributed to failing to answer these core questions and, instead, relying too much on (ineffective) marketing and ads.

If I am opening a restaurant, then what KIND of restaurant is it? What sort of food am I serving? What’s the atmosphere? Why is a customer going to come to MY restaurant?

Will they be coming to my establishment primarily for a lunch break, or for a date night or special occasion?

Will my restaurant’s customers be drawn to the clean tables and friendly staff trained to hustle and get the food out while still hot? Or is it about the crisp white table cloths, extensive wine list and Friday-night string quartet?

Why would a consumer choose MY restaurant over another? Location? Award-winning chef? Drive-through with double-lanes so they can get back to work with time to actually eat their lunch?

Notice how all along we are STILL talking about restaurants, but they are vastly different establishments. Same in all businesses and books are included.

Failure to Thrive

As mentioned above, one of the primary reasons most business fail is they lack a solid core business plan. The problem is that core identity and mission defines everything else.

If I don’t clearly define WHO I’m selling to and precisely WHAT I am selling in the first place or WHY they’d want my book over another book or activity, then how can I hope to be effective finding and ‘marketing’ to my customer?

WHAT exactly am I pitching in the first place?

Before the digital age, non-fiction (NF) authors had to be able to answer all these questions in a book proposal. This was one of the reasons NF, historically, has held an edge over fiction.

NF authors were forced to define the product, identify the market and who would buy their book (as opposed to another similar title) ahead of time. They also had to be able to prove they had a platform and present a cogent plan for how the book would be marketed and to whom.

NF writers had to answer all the hard questions before the publisher gave the green to even begin writing the book.

Fiction writers are wise to do the same.

WHAT Are You Selling?



Okay, but what IS IT?

One of the single largest mistakes I see in the book business is that writers (and publishers and bookstores) fail to understand what they’re selling. This is why the industry is in such a mess right now.

NY mistakenly believed they were in the paper business and forgot they were in the story and information business. HOW a consumer purchased then consumed said story and information was irrelevant so long as they PAID for the privilege.

While all the major houses were defending how readers would always want paper books, Amazon didn’t care if we wanted stories on paper, ebook, audio, or acted out by mimes if we (the consumer) were willing to PAY.

Amazon, ironically, understood the book business better than those who’d invented it. Bezos knew the consumer. Consumers wanted to be educated or entertained.

Bezos also knew humans. We wanted to be educated or entertained instantly, affordably, and we didn’t want to burn brain cells to find what we were looking for.

Really, WHAT Are You Selling?

When it comes to fiction, we (writers) are selling an experience. The pitch must account for what sort of an experience our story offers. This is why understanding genres is so critical.

One of the first ways readers (code for customers) look for a book is to use genre as a guidepost. Yet, I’ve lost count how many times I’ve heard authors snub the idea of being forced to slot their story into any genre.

‘Literary’ writers use the word ‘genre fiction’ as if it’s a dirty word. Yet, this is silly of we think about it, especially these days when audiences are deluged with a gazillion options.

Why would we want to make it HARDER for our potential fans to find us?

Genre lets the reader know what KIND of experience they’re in for. Do they want love? Adventure? Where do they want this adventure? In the past (historical), in outer space (science fiction), in another world entirely (fantasy)?

Are they wanting to remain on Earth in our time, but add in supernatural elements or magic? If so, then urban fantasy might be a great fit.

Or, are they wanting to get lost entirely in another world that is vast and intricate? High fantasy fits that bill rather nicely.

***Movies use ‘genre’ to entice audiences, so why wouldn’t we? Could you imagine trying to search Amazon Prime or Netflix for something to watch and they just lumped all movies together? It would be a nightmare.

Once we choose a genre, genre helps us understand the audience expectations. We’ll know that if we claim our book is a romance, it better end with an HEA (Happily Ever After) or at least the more modernized HFN (Happy For Now).

The two separate parties, though at odds initially, must unite forces to solve the core story problem and also end up together.

If the two individuals are not a couple by the end of the story? NOT a romance.

Refine the WHAT

After we choose a genre (or genre fusion like mystery-thriller, historical romance, dark fantasy, etc.) then we need to refine the experience another level. This helps us pitch to the right group of people.

How long is our work? How dense? What book(s) are most like ours? Do we specialize in long, heavily researched books with a lot of world-building (Michael Crichton) or are we prolific, focused on shorter works of fiction that cater to those who inhale pulp novels (Louis L’Amour)?

Or are we somewhere in between? Maybe we do both?

Crichton didn’t compete with L’Amour. They had vastly different audiences with diametrically opposite expectations.

***No one expected Crichton to release multiple books a year. Conversely, L’Amour wouldn’t have become a legend if he’d only released a book every eighteen months.

This step keeps us from wasting time and energy pitching to the wrong audience. When we fail to succinctly define what our product is, we’re left to pitch everyone.

Problem is, everyone isn’t your audience. Or mine. Or any author’s. It is impossible to write the story everyone will love. So if everyone can’t love your story, who definitely will love your story?

We answer these questions because the WHAT informs the WHO.

This is the peril of trying to write the story utterly unlike any other. It’s virtually impossible to pitch because we’d have no basis for comparison.

Rather, we WANT to know what authors/books your title resembles most. This is how you (and algorithms) sell someone who doesn’t yet know you on your book.

Readers who enjoyed Sue Grafton will like my mysteries.

My trilogy is a high fantasy that’s somewhere in between J. R. R. Tolkein and George R.R. Martin. It offers the epic storyline of Lord of the Rings but with a far less gratuitous adult material than A Song of Ice and Fire.

Readers who like a fast-paced spy book like Robert Ludlum’s ‘Jason Bourne’ books would also enjoy my series.

See how comparing our book to something else helps the pitch? It helps those who’ve not read our work get an idea of what our book/series has to offer.

Pitch the Product: What is it ABOUT?

What’s IN it? Would you buy food that didn’t have a list of ingredients? What about medicine? Would you trust a cold medicine that just had COLD MEDICINE on the bottle, but didn’t tell you what was in that ruby-colored liquid?

Would you buy a car without looking under the hood? Trust a clothing designer who refused to reveal what the fabric was made out of? A computer with no specs about the processor or memory?

Almost every product we buy, we want to know WHAT IS IN IT? Books are the same. In fact, this is one of the most vital parts of the pitch.

Ideally, we should be able to tell anyone who asks what our book is about in one sentence. In fact, we should be able to articulate what our book is about in one sentence before we even start writing.

I call this the log-line.

An example:

A fraidy cat romance author must travel to the jungles of South America and partner with a shady ex-pat in order to rescue her sister from jewel thieves before the thieves butcher her sister.

With this ONE (long but effective) sentence, I’ve made it clear that this is an action-adventure and a romance.

I may not know how the MC gets to South America or how the ex-pat helps her rescue her sister, but I know there is a ticking clock, high stakes, and the core story goal is crystal clear.

Save sister.

I also know where and how the story ends. Probably in South America defeating jewel thieves and rescuing sister.

Doing a log-line is one of the most effective ways to see what is right or even wrong with your story.

For instance if I wrote: An author living in NYC travels to South America where she’s accosted by jewel thieves, it’s clear I don’t have a story.

I have a bad situation.

Why does she go there? What sort of person is she? An ex-cop turned author is different from a sheltered urbanite.

She’s accosted. Okay. But what is her goal? Why is she there? How will we know the story is over?

In the first log-line, we know the story is over when she (and ally) save her sister. If sister dead at the end? She’s FAILED. Everything in the story that sets our duo back from saving the sister makes us worry. THAT is how we KNOW we have an actual story.

*nods to Romancing the Stone*

***If you want some more posts on log-lines, go HERE, HERE and HERE. I also am teaching a class on log-lines THIS THURSDAY. Use pitch10 for $10 off.

Moving on…

Pitch What’s in It For THEM?

Sales is always, ALWAYS about the customer. The essence of all sales is to solve a problem. Books solve problems, too.

Stuck in an airport for the next five hours? Job require a long commute? Want to get more out of your time? Have a stressful job and need an escape? Need a way to unwind your brain at night?

There’s a book for that.

I love audiobooks and recommend Audible so much I should get commission. As I see it? I have to adult anyway, so why not adult while listening to a book?

Sure, it took some time to get used to listening to a book, but now when I do laundry, wash dishes, weed the front garden or mow?

I listen to books.

Audio books help me work smarter not harder. I listen to a lot of fiction because mowing the yard in Texas in August SUCKS. It’s hotter than the hammered down hinges of hell. Good way to take my mind off that? A mystery where I have to pay attention for clues.

My brain cannot simultaneously process complaints AND pay attention to a good story.

Think about your book. What’s in it for the reader? Will it remind them of the warm fuzzy feelings of love? Will it challenge them to pay attention? Is it an escape? Does it take them on an adventure? Is it a glance into another world?

Why YOUR Book and Not Another?

Obviously, our brand and platform are our major lifelines. People buy from who they KNOW and who they LIKE.

Contrary to popular opinion, most people actually DO read. They’re just far more likely to read the short form (articles and blogs).

Blogs are still popular and always will be. Blogs are a great way to connect to our audience and cultivate a fan base.

True, most people only read a book or two a year. Who cares if those books are YOUR books?

Blogs build rapport. Those who read our posts get a sense of our personality, voice and style. Also, if readers know they can trust us for a quality blog (not some rambling mess filled with typos), they’re far more likely to give our book a try.

I had people buy my debut novel even though they didn’t read the genre. They bought it for friends or family who did.

Why my book and not another? I was a known quantity as opposed to a writer who had no social media presence, never talked to anyone on-line and didn’t have a blog.

I’m fairly sure there were a lot of books out there better than mine, but if no one knows they exist?

We can gain an edge with our brand and platform, with quality books, and even by going the extra mile for a story. If we’re writing about a world people might find intriguing, mysterious and want to know more?

Do the hard work!

I think this is why well-researched books about law enforcement, private detectives, funeral homes, espionage, morgues, and the military always sell well regardless of the economy (thriller is the next best selling genre after romance).

For instance, I spent a year working with an ATF agent researching for my mystery-thriller so I could add in as much accuracy as possible.

That’s all part of the pitch.

A Pitch Pitfall

As a person who worked in sales for fifteen years before I switched to writing full-time, I can tell you the absolute worst place to compete is on price.

This is true in any industry. It’s easy to lower prices, but a bear to raise them again. This is why it’s critical to understand how to use FREE and pricing as a strategy, not as standard operations.

The problem with FREE or cheap is it always devolves into a race to the bottom of who can give the most for nothing, and there is always someone willing to give more than we can.

When we offer too many free books and/or super cheap books, we can unwittingly cultivate the wrong sort of fanbase.

I want you guys to find fans who are willing to pay for your hard work, not a bunch of takers and users who blast you with one-star reviews because you decided to raise your ebook price to $2.99 instead of $1.99.

The FREE or nearly free book was a brilliant strategy in 2013 when e-books were new and we were trying to encourage readers to use their new Kindles. Offering up free and cheap books worked AMAZING when only a fraction of authors used this method.

But, in a marketplace that’s struggling to absorb over a million self-published books per year? Low prices are the absolute worst place to compete. Now more than ever.

Besides, remember this:

Cheap doesn’t automatically translate into value.

In our busy modern world, time is precious. Cheap/FREE, more often than not, is a massive time-waster that ends up costing more time and money in the long run.

Ever bought a pair of pants that fell apart after one washing? A phone charger at the Dollar Store that worked all of three days then almost caught fire? How many times have you been lured into something cheap only to end up having to go BACK and spend MORE TIME and MORE MONEY?

This is a HUGE reason I recommend honing your craft.

When readers discover a solid storyteller they can depend on for quality? They’re willing to pay retail. Also, deliver a quality product in a sea of detritus, and readers—happy readers—turn evangelical.

In a nutshell? Happy readers sell A LOT of books.

Pitch Perfect & Thinking Like a Non-Fiction Author

Remember in the beginning of this post I mentioned all the questions the non-fiction author has to answer before they even BEGIN the book. Now, y’all certainly don’t have to do any of this. But how much time, money and frustration could you save?

Think of opportunities that you might take advantage of just doing some of this? For instance, the late great Blake Snyder in his fabulous book (that every author should own and study) Save the Cat: The Last Book on Screenwriting You’ll Ever Need, talks about the elevator pitch.

Whenever he had an idea, he’d whittle it into a pitch, essentially the log-line. The elevator pitch (story in thirty seconds or less) allowed him to see if his concept piqued interest in others…or if they merely looked confused. This tactic saved him from working months on a screenplay no one would buy.

It ALSO gave him the advantage of being prepared for opportunity.

What if you happened to run into someone in the movie industry, a literary agent, an editor, and they asked what your book/series was about? Could you tell them in thirty seconds or less? What if you could?

Stranger things have happened, and fortune favors the prepared.

Ultimately, if we take the time to craft all aspects of the pitch, we’ll work smarter not harder. We’ll spot weaknesses faster and know where our strengths are.

We’ll save time talking to the right people and cultivating the right relationships—those that will form OUR audience. And, when we’re prepared for opportunity? It has a strange way of crossing our path

In It to WIN It: How Committed Are You to Being a Successful Author?

When it comes to being successful in anything, one personal quality decimates everything else. Success doesn’t necessarily go to the rich, the talented, or even the super smart. The truly committed are who dominate the highest levels in…well, everything.

In my experience, ‘winning’ seems to have two camps.

There are those who believe in blind luck (who soon find out how fickle Lady Luck can be and wash out). Then, there are those those who appreciate that the harder/smarter they work, the luckier they’ll get.

I’ve been part of the writing world for almost two decades. Over the years, I’ve learned countless simple, yet difficult lessons and today I’ll share one of the most pivotal.

A smart person learns from his/her mistakes, but a wise person learns from the mistakes of others

Amazon Publishing: The Road to Conquest & How Bezos Razed New York

Amazon Publishing might be the new normal of the 21st century book business. Whether this is a good thing or a bad thing remains to be seen.

I’ve always wanted NY Publishing to survive and thrive. Sure, I had nostalgic reasons. NY was (is) a cultural institution, with pedigree and history.

Amazon didn’t seem to possess the love for the written word. They sold camping equipment, soldering irons, plastic dog poo and massage chairs. How could they care about books? About literature?

Simply calling themselves Amazon Publishing did little to sway my opinion.

Change is Scary

I’ve been blogging on these business changes since 2005 (my first blogs were on one of the very first what-we-would-recognize-as-a-social-media-site, Gather).

I wrote post after post until I started feeling like that crazy guy downtown. You know the one I’m talking about? Guy wearing an ad board with THE END IS NEAR spelled out in duct tape or glitter.

Alas, the digital revolution has taught a lot of painful lessons. One of the hardest? We’re either architects or artifacts. True for publishers as well as authors.

If we hope to thrive in the next evolution of change, it’s critical to understand the larger picture. Without context, there’s no way to be strategic.

The 411 on Amazon Publishing

For the past twelve years or so, Amazon Publishing has been playing to win, as opposed to NY, who was playing to ‘not lose.’

Huge difference.

Instead of being on the offense, sticking and moving and learning how to play the new game or even invent their OWN newer game (and make Amazon hustle for a change)…the powerhouse publishers ran down to Blockbuster and rented You’ve Got Mail for the six-hundredth time.

Change at the Speed of Wi-Fi

By all indications, NY Publishing didn’t grasp that they only had a very small window to act if they wanted to survive (forget thrive).

Instead of redoing their business plan, they wasted precious time trying to rekindle ‘The Good Old Days’ and protect their besties Borders and Barnes & Noble…at all costs. 

The Big Six (namely the multi-national media conglomerates in charge) couldn’t fathom a world where they weren’t the ballers. Anyone who claimed differently was deemed a lunatic, a hack, a poseur, delusional, etc.

Fast-forward to today (no VCR required because only my mother still uses one).

Borders is a ghost, and Barnes & Noble is now at the mercy of Elliot Management—the hedge fund that purchased them this past June.

Elliot Management, should they stick to their playbook, will shut down most of the large stores and part them out into smaller stores more reminiscent of the mom-and-pops Barnes & Noble pulverized on their way to power.

#Irony #Comeuppance

Good news is B&N shouldn’t go away completely. Bad news is those massive multi-million-dollar orders and preorders that financed the large NY houses just went bye bye.

So how did we all get here in such a short time? To answer this question, I’m going to cite the original personal coach/self-help guru…Sun Tzu.

Amazon Publishing & The Art of War

Jeff Bezos dreamed Amazon would one day replace The Big Six publishers and that he could completely reinvent the book business. He wanted the system to be more egalitarian.

Bezos believed consumers needed more say in what books they liked instead of relying on gatekeepers, AP reviewers, and (pre-negotiated) book displays to tell them what they should like.

Bezos had a plan to take out traditional publishing, and this plan is one I’ve done a fair job of predicting.

***gets cramp patting self on back***

I’d like to claim it’s because I’m super smart, but I had help. Anyone who’s read Sun Tzu’s The Art of War—and paid even MILD attention—could see the proverbial ‘writing on the wall.’

Every move Amazon has made over the past two decades or so might have appeared random, but to the trained eye? There has been NOTHING random about Amazon’s strategy.

But, Amazon couldn’t have secured the Iron Throne book market domination if traditional publishing had taken them seriously from the get-go and believed Amazon to be an actual threat.

Had the multi-national media conglomerates been paying attention, this might have ended very differently. Alas…

Pretend to be weak, that he (your enemy) may grow arrogant.
~Sun Tzu

Or, if you’re Amazon taking on publishing: Pretend to be a nut who believes that everyone will one day shop on the Internet…so that your competition will remain arrogant.

While NY argued over their favorite stock paper and mocked Facebook as a ‘passing fad,’ Amazon prepared for conquest.

They first dedicated massive resources to salvage the remains of Web 1.0 after the dot.com debacle. In 2002, Amazon launched AWS (Amazon Web Services), one of the first cloud-based systems able to track web site popularity and patterns and aggregate this information for marketers and developers.

In simple terms—who clicked what site when and why and how many times? Kind of an awesome thing to know if you want to sell stuff.

Then, in 2006, Amazon expanded AWS. My POV? Bezos (among other visionaries) wanted to ensure the infant Web 2.0 would have all it needed to grow into the leviathan it is now.

AWS added EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud) and S3 (Simple Storage Surface) in order to expand their cloud storage and virtual computer capacities exponentially. Several years later (in 2012), Amazon purchased Kiva Systems (now Amazon Robotics) to streamline order fulfillment.

***More proof Amazon IS actually SkyNet. Alas, at least I know when the machines come for me, I get free shipping…because (DUH) I have Prime.

Anyway, improved search capabilities and data aggregation (better algorithms to predict and guide purchase habits), stronger safeguards against fraud, and increasingly faster shipping (using ROBOTS) all formed the foundation for Amazon’s future conquest.

On-line shopping had work efficiently and seamlessly or nothing else mattered.

The easier, safer, and more convenient Bezos could make it to buy from Amazon, the more the everyday consumer would trust them with their business. Bezos understood knowledge was power…literally. Whoever held the purchasing data from the web, held the keys to the kingdom (publishing kingdom included).

What I find uniquely interesting is this. Bezos built the early Amazon infrastructure offering products that weren’t culturally sentimental.

Consumers didn’t have the same emotional attachment when it came to electronics and sports equipment. Bezos appreciated that books would hit us in the feels.

Going there too soon would’ve been bad strategy. He waited to hit fast and hard.

Speed is the essence of war. Take advantage of the enemy’s unpreparedness; travel by unexpected routes and strike him where he has taken no precautions. ~Sun Tzu

Trust me, NO ONE in traditional publishing anticipated the Internet sucker punch. Traditional publishing didn’t even believe on-line shopping or ebooks would ever be viable, let alone a threat. They made no plans, took no real precautions.

Instead, they held onto their mantras:

Readers will always want paper.

Only techies and early adopters want audio and digital books. These formats will always be a fringe market and not worth the effort.

Readers don’t want to order on-line. They want a BROWSING experience with a latte.

Amazon Publishing might as well have been a campfire ghost story or urban legend in 2006. But, when Amazon released (unleashed) the Kindle?

$#!t got real.

If he is taking his ease, give him no rest. ~Sun Tzu

Amazon launched the Kindle and, with that, offered deep discounts on digital books (all books, actually). When some of the NY houses refused to lower prices on digital titles, the ‘BUY’ buttons on all their titles mysteriously disappeared.

It was a glitch.

Suuuure.

Glitch or not, it doesn’t take a business expert to realize that losing even a DAY of on-line sales probably hurt…a LOT.

Since NY had only recently started learning how to use email, one can imagine that algorithms, cloud computing and analytics weren’t exactly part of their wheelhouse.

Treat your men as you would your own beloved sons. And they will follow you into the deepest valley. ~Sun Tzu

Before Amazon launched the Kindle, though, they made sure to capitalize on a massive tectonic shift that had already split the book world years earlier.

Amazon Publishing understood the deal NY had made with the devils (Borders & Barnes & Noble). The big-box giants promised unprecedented wealth and success…which they delivered.

All NY had to do was to sacrifice their mid-list authors.

There was no ‘room’ for these authors. The big-box bookstore model relied on the selling power of household names (literary blue bloods).

With limited shelf-space, the plan worked better to shelve mostly author royalty, then pepper in new authors to give the appearance the big chains actually cared about the written word.

Ah, but a lot of authors had made The Big Six into the giant it had become (not just the blue bloods).

The author middle class had dedicated years, even decades to their ‘masters.’ Yet, NY unceremoniously cut them loose without so much as a ‘thank you for your service.’

…and Amazon was more than eager to publish these authors’ vast (and vetted) backlists and offer absurdly generous royalty rates. Not only that, but these authors could publish as many books as they pleased. Heck, they could write in any genre they wanted.

Be free!

What the big-box model tossed into the dirt, Amazon picked up, polished and sharpened to a razor edge.

If his forces are united, separate them. ~Sun Tzu

First, Amazon cleaved the body of authors into passionately divided camps—pro-indie versus diehard traditional. But then, Amazon Publishing also took advantage of the rivalry between Borders and Barnes & Noble.

These two big-box chains, in an act of unrepentant greed, had almost single-handedly destroyed the indie and mom-and-pop bookstore model. Once those ‘competitors’ fell away, they set their sights on each other.

#Brilliant

They built more and more giant stores, sometimes even across the STREET from each other. The more they built and battled, the more expensive it became to maintain an edge.

Soon, it devolved into a race to the bottom of who could give away the most stuff/books the cheapest. Which one could add in cards, records, movies, toys, and mani-pedis to gain an advantage.

This plan doesn’t work well with that kind of massive overhead.

Meanwhile, Amazon kept pounding on both of them and Borders fell first, namely because they mistakenly believed they could go it alone in cyberspace.

Back in 2001, Borders Group made a deal with Amazon and agreed that Amazon would co-manage Borders.com. Then, in 2007, Borders thought they’d go it alone with their own online bookstore and yeah…

It didn’t work out.

Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected. ~Sun Tzu

Amazon has spent the past seven or so years testing different models in cyberspace: Amazon Worlds, Amazon Scout, Kindle Unlimited, and Kindle Direct Publishing to name a few.

With the massive influx of indie and self-published authors, Amazon has been using writers and our books to improve ways to connect readers with books THEY love.

Amazon Publishing learned how to better detect and destroy anyone gaming algorithms. They’ve been willing to take risks to see what worked, what failed, and what could be salvaged and reinvented.

But, what Amazon REALLY was doing was perfecting its algorithms so they could take out the critical piece to dropping NY to its knees—Barnes & Noble.

Checkmate

Amazon Publishing has always been the ‘other woman in the red dress,’ but (as I claimed in a 2012 blog) this ‘other woman’ wanted a ring and to be considered legit.

Seven years ago, I posited that Amazon Publishing would soon open brick-and-mortar stores…and got flamed in my post’s comments. Everyone at the time believed Amazon to be perfectly content to remain in cyberspace.

I didn’t agree.

Bezos had ALWAYS wanted to take down publishing. He would not be content to remain an on-line book retailer. He’d want a place to showcase Amazon Kindles, and it could hardly be called a victory if he launched brick-and-mortar Amazon bookstores only to display mostly NY titles.

No, that wouldn’t do. Amazon stores would show off AMAZON authors.

When it came to Amazon Publishing, Bezos wouldn’t settle for anything less than total conquest.

How did I ‘know’ Amazon would open brick-and-mortar stores? Because NO ONE believed/expected they ever would.

Yet, it made sense. Amazon Publishing would have browsing space they could smart-stock using the data collected via their algorithms. They’d have enough information to know what books sold well and where.

This would drastically increase sales while simultaneously reducing waste.

***Remember, Amazon started out dominating the business of gathering and sorting information.

I suspected Amazon Publishing was waiting for Barnes & Noble to close a certain percentage of stores before they pounced.

According to Forbes, between 2008 and 2017, Barnes & Noble was closing an average of 21 stores a year to remain afloat.

Amazon opened its first physical store in 2015.

Dismissed as coincidence…

When Barnes & Noble fell? Checkmate.

Feign disorder, and crush him. ~Sun Tzu

This is where I don my large hoop earrings, polish my crystal ball and speak in a bad gypsy accent.

It was obvious to me (and anyone who could do math) that once Barnes & Noble fell, whatever remained of NY publishing would be in serious danger.

Without those massive preorders to fill shelf-space in oversized stores, NY publishing would be in a real financial pickle.

Recently, I blogged about the chaos in the publishing world. Currently, there are a million plus books self-published every year, and this number is climbing. On top of that? NY hasn’t had a breakout novel in SEVEN years.

To add insult to injury, that last breakout novel was 50 Shades of Grey.

To put it bluntly? Readers are fed up being used as unpaid gatekeepers.

When we buy a novel, our goal is to be entertained, NOT to determine if the writer could pass English 101.

***When reading a novel feels more like grading 8th grade papers? We’ll just watch Netflix, thanks.

There is a part of me, however, that believes Amazon has allowed this chaos to flourish for the simple reason that it serves their original goal—REPLACE NY Publishing.

Deviating a bit from Sun Tzu, the current mayhem in the book world is a scene straight out of Plato’s The Republic.

The Downside of Book Democracy

Democracy is a byproduct created when those disenfranchised in an oligarchy (writers overlooked, snubbed or rejected by NY) finally revolt (go indie or self-publish).

Freedom for the sake of freedom becomes the imperative. Every participant is permitted to live and act as he/she pleases (write whatever they want, even if it makes no sense and readers don’t want it)…because, FREEDOM.

These and other kindred characteristics are proper to democracy, which is a charming form of government, full of variety and disorder, and dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequals alike.

Plato’s ‘The Republic’

According to Plato, though initially a pure democracy might seem appealing, the state comes to be ruled by people who are unfit to rule.

In reference to publishing, the market comes to be dominated by those unfit to be published.

Pure democracy—which, letting anyone with a keyboard and internet access to be an ‘author’ surely is a pure democracy if I’ve ever seen one—ultimately devolves into bedlam.

Once this happens, Plato asserts that the population (market) will become SO vexed, they will welcome anyone who promises they can establish some form of order.

The New Era of Amazon Publishing

A few years ago, I speculated Amazon was waiting for the publishing industry to almost completely devolve. Only at that point would Amazon Publishing strike the coups de grace.

Amazon Publishing has already lured in the disgruntled/betrayed mid-list authors. They’ve also attracted most of the bright-eyed newbies who’d never even consider publishing with NY (some can even write).

Ah, but Amazon Publishing’s final move? Seduce the author blue bloods to the winning team.

Check

July 22, 2019 Publisher’s Weekly announced that mega-author Dean Koontz signed a five-book deal with Amazon Publishing’s Thomas & Mercer imprint. 

It was one thing when Amazon seduced the mid-list New York Times and USA Today best-selling authors. Dean Koontz is a whole other creature.

According to the article Koontz Inks Multibook Deal with Amazon Publishing:

The deal follows a string of agreements Amazon Publishing has struck with bestselling authors recently; in 2018 alone, Thomas & Mercer inked multi-book, seven-figure deals with Barry Eisler, T.R. Ragan and Robert Dugoni. Other top authors to come on board include Sylvia Day and Patricia Cornwell…

…Koontz said that Amazon ‘presented a marketing and publicity plan smarter and more ambitious than anything I’d ever seen before.’ He added: ‘The times are changing, and it’s invigorating to be where change is understood and embraced.‘

~Rachel Deahl

Just…ouch.

Dean Koontz has worked with Brilliance Audio (a division of Amazon) as well as Amazon Original Stories for the past few years. Yet, this new deal is certainly a landmark event.

According to Fortune, Koontz is the biggest author to sign with Amazon to date.

Since the late 1990s, Dean Koontz has predominantly published via Penguin Random House’s Bantam (more than 45 releases).

Dean Koontz’s jump to Amazon is a hard, if not mortal, blow to one of the remaining large publishing houses. Not only that, but this changing in alliances can’t help but be a harbinger of things to come.

How long until other mega-authors follow? My guess?

Not long.

Brave New Amazon Publishing

It’s been a long road through dangerous and uncharted digital territory. I know I’ve posted plenty of frightening articles/predictions.

Hey, change is scary. We can’t plan for what we don’t understand.

Yet, I’ve insisted all along to remain calm and just keep writing, learning and improving. Focus on the quality of the PRODUCT. The pendulum always swings back the other way.

Whenever there is innovation, a wild and massive market shift, pandemonium invariably erupts. This happened with the introduction of the Gutenberg Press, the railroad, the automobile, airplanes, radio, television, 24-hour news, cable TV, personal computers, video stores, affordable Spanx…and on and on.

The old goes through denial, digs in and finally whatever industry it happens to be can no longer sustain their outdated ways and they die off. The new emerges until IT becomes the old and the cycle repeats.

Humans LOVE stories. It’s why we—authors—are pretty much always ‘safe’ so long as we focus on being the best at what we do. Sure, we go through changes, too. Lean times, terror, change…and then a new normal arises from the ashes.

Ultimately, I was confident new gatekeeping would emerge.

It HAD to.

There is simply no way to sift through a million-plus books per year for the gems.

Now that Amazon has a system for smart-stocking, has now begun building brick-and mortar stores, and has managed to recruit the ‘one ace in the hole’ NY had left (their household name authors)?

Game Over

I don’t believe what remains of New York publishing will go away for good (at least not soon). Amazon won’t wipe them out completely if, for no other reason than to avoid being called out as a monopoly.

It seems obvious that Amazon Publishing will implement a similar but VASLTY updated publishing model that will (ideally) have the capacity to get good books into the hands of readers.

How this will look, exactly? I don’t know.

Audible followed a suggestion I made in a 2012 blog (whether they got it from me or not, I don’t know but will totally claim credit

Science Fiction—More than Just Gizmos

Science fiction has always been a popular genre, but, like most other genres, it has peaks and valleys. These days, science fiction has exploded in popularity, making it a great genre to write.

We’re now living in a world humans never believed actually could (would exist).

We have 3-D printers, drones, and Alexa devices that we can ask to find us a marinara recipe while we’re elbow-deep washing dishes. In an age of texting, wifi, virtual reality, and self-driving cars, humans are now faced with all those sticky moral questions posited by the original science fiction authors over a century ago.

This is why story is so critical. Today, I have a special guest, Maria Grace, author of twenty-three books and contributor to Putting the Science in Fiction. She’s here to give us some simple tips to launch our science fiction into SPACE!

Take it away, MG!

***

A Brief, but Nerdy History

I grew up on science fiction. From some of the worst stuff imaginable (I’m looking at you Lost in Space), to what would become some of the most influential franchises in history.

Star Wars and Star Trek? I was there from the get-go.

I probably shouldn’t confess this, but I cut my nerdy ten-year-old chops on a manual Smith Corona typewriter…writing Star Trek fan fiction. 

Wait … wait … don’t click away, I promise I’m normal now. No wait, what did I just say? Never mind. I’m a writer and we’re not normal, ever.

And we lie.

But I digress.

All these years later, I still drool over some of those gadgets. Who couldn’t use a Universal Translator when talking to their teen-aged children? It would work for that wouldn’t it?

And the replicator? Oh, I want a replicator.

After dinner, wouldn’t it be a dream to just toss everything into the bin and not worry about all that cleaning and scrubbing? Be still my heart. And a transporter …

*wipes drool off keyboard*

You know what’s even better?

I Now Get to INVENT Those Gadgets

*rubs hands together and cues maniacal laugh*

Oh, the things I can create. I want a 3-D printer to craft my bluejeans so they fit just right every single day. How about a flying car? The Jetson’s promised me a flying car, and I want one now yesterday.

Point is, there are so many possibilities that it’s easy to get carried away. And there, my friends, is a major pitfall that can trip us up when writing science fiction.

Too. Many. Gadgets.

Tell me it isn’t true. No such thing as too many whizzbang-humdingers, right?

About that…

Sorry to break it to you, but it’s dead Jim, dead…wait no wrong line—right idea, but you get the gist.

Tell Me It Isn’t True

When we venture into the brave new world of writing science fiction, its easy to get caught up like Augustus Gloop in Willy Wonka’s factory, crafting one shiny doohickey and an even shinier thingamabob.

Pretty soon we end up running right off the cliff and into the chocolate river to be sucked out by the extraction pipe to the dreaded boiler room—and on one wants that—right?

Just because we CAN, doesn’t mean we SHOULD. So, take a deep breath fellow writers and step away from the sonic screwdrivers.

Science Fiction Secret Sauce

Hold off tossing the digital tomatoes. I can already hear the protests.

Blasphemy! Science fiction needs tech and you’ll only get my light saber when you pry it out of my cold dead hands.

Of course science fiction needs science—it wouldn’t be science fiction without all those science-y fiction-y toys. But—and of course there had to be a ‘but’—there’s something more.

A secret sauce.

Come close my pretties and learn the extra special sauce recipe that will bring your science fiction to a whole new level.

*drumroll*

Are you ready? Wait for it….

Tell an amazing story.

Good Science Fiction Contains FICTION

Um…it’s in the name for a quick and simple reference.

It’s so easy to get caught up chasing shiny bits and bobs that we forget science fiction includes fiction (which is a STORY). All the structure and techniques that apply to writing great fiction also apply to writing great science fiction.

A solid story problem is the core of every great science fiction work. When we strip away all the blinking lights and things that go ‘boop,’ what we’ll find are basic human problems that drive the story.

Dilithium crystals are totally your call.

Look at Tony Stark (Iron Man) from the Avengers. Sure his suit is super-cool, but it’s actually Stark’s flawed and complex character that piques our interest. Mix Tony’s more-than-carry-on emotional baggage with an intriguing story problem plus some end-of-the-world stakes? And that’s a formula that keep us going back.

Movie after movie after movie…after movie.

Just how many Star Trek incarnations are there now? Doesn’t matter. My point is simply that, sure, it wouldn’t be Star Trek without starships, transporters, replicators, emergency medical holographs, and, and, and…

But take a moment to reflect over each incarnation. Focus on the main characters driving the story ship line: Kirk, Picard, Sisko, Worf, Spock, etc.

Remember the problems they faced: being overrun with vermin (Tribbles), wrestling with what it means to be ‘human’ (Data), the struggles that go with being a ‘half-breed,’ the progeny of two diametrically opposite races (Spock).

In science fiction, all problems are human problems.

Science fiction is two words—science + fiction. Subtract the gripping story and memorable, dimensional characters (fiction), and that leaves only science. Science without a story is called a textbook, not a novel.

Granted, science can be fun. In fact, those of us who are drawn to the science fiction genre likely were the nerds eager students who couldn’t wait for lab day.

Please understand, I love my microwave, my tablet, and the T.V. remote my husband bought me that I can’t figure out how to work (but keep trying anyway). Alas, those are all ‘things’ I can put down, walk away from, even lose—and all are simple to replace.

And that’s the crux of the matter. Superlative fiction has no simple replacement. Science fiction crafted properly shouldn’t have a good place for a bookmark.

When we draw readers into our story, they should feel as if they’ve been snagged by a tractor beam, and no amount of thrust can free them (and frankly, they’re happy to be taken captive).

Two Tips for Riveting Science Fiction

If we want to make our science fiction totally binge-worthy, as in stay-up-all-night-even-though-there-is-a-big-presentation-tomorrow binge worthy, there are two big things we can do.

First, we need to craft a story that can stand up on its own, without all the glittery gizmos.

Take Killjoys—Hubby’s and my current guilty pleasure. Here’s my log-line for the show:

A bounty hunter with a mysterious past and her team discover the Company’s deadly intentions and now her dark secrets hold the key to saving the world from the Company.

Read that again. What do you notice? Take your time. I’ll just be here, waiting patiently.

*cues Jeopardy theme*

So, what do you notice about that log-line? I’ll give you a clue: it sounds like a fantastic story, but it also could be set just about any place, during any time.

Sure, Killjoys is set in a system of four planets, complete with space travel and all manner of cool doohickeys, but the log-line doesn’t depend on all that ‘stuff.’

The same story could be set in the Wild West, the Australian Outback, or today in any major city and it would still work.

*mind blown*

Now, before anyone protests, I agree changing the setting also changes most of the story details. If we set it in the Wild West we’d have horses instead of spaceships and the Company’s secret would be salient to the time period. But, let’s just refit the log-line and you’ll see…

*sounds of sonic screwdriver*

A bounty hunter with a mysterious past and her team discover the Company’s deadly intentions and now her dark secrets hold the key to saving the unsettled western territories from the Company.

Granted, the Wild West version is no longer science fiction, but the core players and the goal are roughly the same.

In terms of the underlying story though, those aren’t the important details—the core of the story stands.

That’s why we can retell fairy tales in the modern day, or rewrite classic stories (I’m looking at you Jane Austen buffs) into the modern day and they work.

The core story doesn’t depend on the setting.

Sure, there are facets of the stories that might make them work easier in one time period or setting than another, but they can still work.

That’s the point: Good stories just work.

But then what’s the point of writing science fiction when
you can just plunk a story down anywhere, wind it up and let it go?

Here’s where the magic—oh wait, here’s where fantasy…I mean science happens.

Oooo Science!

Once the bones of our story are all fit together and standing on their own, now we flesh it out with all those awesome gizmos we love. Notice I didn’t say ‘dress it up’—that implies something that isn’t really important to the story—and that’s far from true.

Tech is vitally important and a large part of the science fiction ‘magic.’

But, the deus ex machina—the sonic screwdriver than can perform any task to save the day can make it too easy on our characters.

Add in those mindless MacGuffins that only serve as convenient plot devices, those are just too easy on us as writers (we can be more creative than that).

Great science fiction tends to treat techy-shiny things in one of two ways…

Foreground vs. Background







Foreground

On the one hand, we have Dune where the spice Melange (used by the navigators for intergalactic space travel) is foundational to the story problem. 

Everything in the story revolves around who will control the spice. Getting rid of the spice would fundamentally change everything about the story world. That is what makes Melange solidly part of the foreground.

I, Robot is another good example where the technology is in the backbone of the fiction. Pull it out (um, ouch), and we’ve got a lot of dry bones lying on the floor in desperate need of being wired together with something else.

This is the go-big-or-go-home version of tech.

Background

Another method is what we’ll call the Star Trek approach to technology. In most of the Star Trek episodes and franchises, the replicators and transporters are simply part of the everyday world like our cellphones and automatic doors today.

***Remember those were largely science fiction not so very long ago.

In this case, the gizmos define how day to day lives work, but don’t attract any more attention than our cellphones would today—unless they suddenly quit working in a way that’s essential to the plot. Essentially, the gizmos reside in the background and remain there.

Hold on. Don’t shout me down, yet.

Star Trek had characters—Data and the emergency medical hologram—who WERE technology. What can be more whizz-bang than that?

That’s absolutely true. But, when we take a closer look at
these mechanical marvels, we can see those technologies that created the
characters always resided solidly in either the foreground or the background.

In certain episodes, the core plot problem revolved around the technology—usually asking the question of what it meant to be a sentient being who is ‘alive.’

More often though, their nature was just part of their core traits and these characters played the same kind of role that the other characters did. The marvelous technology that created them then returned to its place as part of the background.

So what’s a writer to do?

Avoiding the Mushy Middle

As we’re building our fantastical science fiction worlds and filling them with the devices we most wish we could possess as well.

Seriously, I want that thing to print jeans that actually fit…

This said, it’s wise to avoid that mushy middle ground. The mushy middle is that soggy place in the center of the back yard where the mud puddles form after a good thunderstorm. That dip that bogs down the lawn mower every time because it’s a place that never seems to dry out.

When we run our thingamabobs through this area, they get stuck. They sputter, churn, and kick up mud until they finally run out of gas (or burn up the engine). Pretty soon our back yard is full of interesting lawn ornaments.

Then we get the call from our Home Owners’ Association…

‘Kondoing’ our Science Fiction Gizmos

It’s essential that we learn how to streamline our story-house with Marie Kondo ruthlessness.

For those who aren’t yet familiar with Marie Kondo, she’s a world-renowned organization and efficiency expert. What works for finally decluttering our office can also work magic for our science fiction.

Trust me.

Using the Kondo method, we should look at every piece of tech we introduce into our science fiction, then ask, ‘Does it spark joy?’ then ask, ‘Are these gizmos visible, accessible and easy to use and put away?’

Does it spark joy? Does the gizmo/tech make our plot sing and create something unique and beautiful in our story?

Is it visible, accessible and easy to use and put away? Does it fit seamlessly into our story world, creating a fleshed out setting without calling unnecessary attention to itself?

If we can answer yes to both these questions, then polish that puppy up and keep it in the story. If not? Follow Kondo’s advice.

Thank it for its service and get rid of it.

Once our glittering tech is polished up and sitting in the right places in our stories–squarely in the foreground feeding the plot problems or in the background creating the seamless backdrop upon which our story happens, then the all important FICTION bit of our science fiction can come to life.

***

THANK YOU, Maria Grace! I hope y’all will give her some love in the comments. Any questions, thoughts or opinions are ALWAYS welcome because we really do love hearing from you.

As for me? I am a hopeless nerd and can’t get enough science fiction, and I found it fascinating to learn what goes on ‘behind the curtain.’

I’d never thought of science and tech being foreground or background.

Anyway, this post is mere taste of the brilliance MG brings to the table. If you love science fiction, you want learn how to write it or even how to take your existing science fiction to entirely new levels…then seriously grab your slot in Friday’s class, More Than Crop Circles: Intro to Science Fiction.

In fact, use the discount code tinfoil10 for $10 off. Seriously, $35 for TWO HOURS of awesomeness and a FREE RECORDING to study and enjoy afterwards?

Also, for anyone interested in learning how to write another hot, hot, hot genre (okay, genre family) that actually never stops being popular (Um, hello? James Patterson?) make sure to join me tomorrow for The Edge: How to Write Mystery, Suspense & Thriller. Use the promo code thrillme10 for $10 off.

Remember that The Summer ON DEMAND CLEARANCE ends TONIGHT at MIDNIGHT EST, so there are only a few more hours to grab up these deeply discounted classes (scroll down or go to the On Demand Page).

***F.Y.I. Cait Reynolds is still alive and part of the team. She’s in the middle of a cross-country move from Boston to Los Angeles…and the thought of that is enough to give me a panic attack.

About Maria Grace:

Maria Grace is the author of 23 books. She has a PhD in Educational Psychology and is a 16-year veteran of the university classroom where she taught courses in human growth and development, learning, test development and counseling. None of which have anything to do with her undergraduate studies in economics/sociology/managerial studies/behavior sciences.

She has one husband, earned two graduate degrees and two black belts, raised three sons, danced English Country dance for four years, is aunt to five nieces, is designing a sixth Regency-era costume, blogged seven years on Random Bits of Fascination, has outlines for eight novels waiting to be written, attended nine English country dance balls, and shared her life with ten cats.

Available until July 17th, 2019



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The post Science Fiction—More than Just Gizmos appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Gatekeepers & Good Books: Trophy Fishing in a Literary Tsunami

Gatekeepers have always served a crucial function, albeit a function we (readers) might not have paid much attention to until recently.

I liken gatekeepers to dams. Manmade dams serve multiple functions. They keep the good contained (e.g. robust populations of fish), and they also give us a way to control water flow and prevent disaster.

In Texas, we get a LOT of flash floods.

Rainstorms almost always hit hard and fast—too fast for the ground to have time to absorb all the water. Flash-flooding can do tremendous damage…which is why we build dams.

When a storm hits and dumps six inches of rain in a half hour, the lakes and rivers rise at terrifying speeds.

The dam is what keeps that water contained until it hits a dangerous level. At that critical point, the dam starts slowly releasing so many millions of gallons of water into special canals and floodplains to prevent the lakes and rivers from breaking their banks (or the dam).

Without a dam, the lakes and rivers could rage out of control and wipe out everything nearby—homes, businesses, animal habitats, etc.

Gatekeepers Contain the Good

I spent most of my youth—and my babysitting money—in a B.Dalton or a Waldenbooks. Back then, I had no idea how much I took for granted.

Sure, I ran into my fair share of bad books, but bad books back then meant something entirely different.

A ‘bad book’ in 1987 was one that didn’t resonate, or, for some reason, failed to hook my interest. Maybe the characters were too shallow or the plot was too predictable. I might have put a book down because I didn’t care for the voice or style.

All that time, a book being ‘good’ or ‘bad’ was almost always wholly a subjective construct, a matter of opinion.

Thanks to gatekeepers, I never had to quit reading because a book had so many typos I couldn’t concentrate. I never once gave up on a book because the horrendous grammar made my brain bleed.

If I read a mystery, I could expect the story to possess an actual mystery plot (structure).

Bad thing happens–> MC gets involved–> clues here–>red herrings here–> ends with mystery solved.

I couldn’t have imagined I’d one day pick up a mystery written by an author who didn’t even know mystery possessed its own unique structure (yes, that has happened).

Authors understood genres and knew where their stories would fit and why and the standard expectations from readers. Today?

*weeping sounds*

The Modern ‘Bad Book‘



Down is up and up is down.

The digital age changed everything. And before anyone shouts me down, I believe self-publishing has done a lot of good.

The problem, however, is we may have hit a point that self-publishing could start doing irreparable harm to our industry. A bad book from 1999 is not the same creature as the bad book of 2019.

Gatekeepers caged the bad book in 1999 and put it down before it could bite anyone, unlike the bad book of 2019.

Nope, that sucker’s laying eggs.

It’s a series.

To put it bluntly, it’s always been an uphill battle to get people excited about reading.

In an age with texting, social media, video games, YouTube, Candy Crush, and Netflix, it’s possibly harder than ever.

But, here’s some food for thought.

Twenty years ago, teachers, librarians, publishers, authors and readers bemoaned how people didn’t read. Yet, when I was a kid almost ALL the books in stores and libraries had passed the gauntlets of the gatekeepers.

Think about it. Publishing had to hustle and pray for readers even when the pool of books to choose from had all been thoroughly edited, proofed and vetted.

Now, people still aren’t reading, but the pool of books is a) exponentially larger and b) the general quality is embarrassingly low.

These days, I’m not putting a book down because of a stylistic preference. I’m throwing books across the room because the author didn’t bother doing basic research—research that didn’t even require a trip to a library.

Just GOOGLE it!

Many of these ‘authors’ skip learning the most rudimentary basics about how to write fiction (or even non-fiction).

Then, to give me a paper cut and pour lemon juice in it? They flood my email with marketing and newsletters. What’s worse? They don’t write or edit their newsletters any better than the tripe they package as books.

Seriously. I wish I were exagerating.

Here are two screen shots (below) from an actual author newsletter. I received this in my business email last week (a newsletter I didn’t sign up for, for the record).

Um….what????



Why was your dad’s @$$ hissing? He should really get that looked at.

This author’s newsletter promises to show me how to make the most of my time, but the author doesn’t even value my time enough to run a simple spell check.

The industry push for authors to churn out this massive, unrelenting barrage of content has piled up into a tidal wave that’s now careering across the publishing landscape faster than the speed of wifi.

LOCK THE GATE!

Y’all know what tsunamis are full of?

Trash, junk, dead things, garbage, fecal matter, disease, and pretty much anything dangerous, deadly or disgusting.

Literary tsunamis aren’t much different…except they keep coming bigger and bigger with no sign of stopping (short of unplugging the Internet).

Gatekeepers & The Literary Tsunami

We NEED gatekeepers. Just last year, there were over a million novels self-published.

Before the digital age, publishers only released a certain number of books per year per genre, and for good reasons.

Limiting titles gave them time to perform proper editing and proofing. It also prevented over-saturating any one genre, or flooding the market with too many choices.

Perhaps the author querying actually had a fabulous vampire book. Problem was, the agents knew they wouldn’t be able to sell it to an editor, because the publishers had already bought five other vampire books.

Agents don’t make money unless an author makes money. For an author to make money, her books have to SELL.

It was already a challenge to sell a vampire book with three, five or even ten other competitors that same year.

What about now? With three hundred other vampire books released in the same year? Or three thousand?

One of the most glaring weaknesses in the modern publishing business model is the lack of stopgaps to control the flow.

Kristen Lamb (quoting herself)

We cannot keep dumping the slush pile on readers and task them with hooking the book we all want to read.

Why not put them in a boat and ask them to reel in a nice swordfish to hang on the wall while riding on a tidal wave of cars, homes, and overturned septic tanks?

Readers as Gatekeepers

Let’s suspend reality for a moment and pretend that the million books self-published in 2018 were all the same quality as books in 1987. Cool.

But it’s still over A MILLION NEW BOOKS.

In the comments on the last blog, there was a lot of discussion about readers as gatekeepers. I totally agree that the old way of gatekeeping was far from perfect. A lot of excellent books (authors) fell through the cracks.

Self-publishing has breathed new life into old genres and resurrected the short and long forms from the dead (e.g. poetry, essays, short stories as well as epic high fantasy, epic historical, epic any story that requires 120,000+ words to tell).

Alas, despite all the good, we must face the bad.

There’s a reason the last runaway breakout novel was in 2012. I firmly believe the success of Fifty Shades of Grey spurned an explosion in self-publishing (the bad kind).

This Literary Power Ball Winner not only encouraged green writers to skip even learning the craft, it also attracted scammers, counterfeiters, and algorithm con artists.

All this aside, though, I find it more than a little appalling that we (writers) should expect our consumers to be in charge of quality control.

It’s like opening a restaurant, and instead of the owner checking inventory, he makes it the customer’s responsibility to ensure the chicken they ordered isn’t rotten.

Author Gatekeepers & First Line of Defense

WE are the first gatekeepers. It’s OUR duty to learn our craft and create a product worthy of a spot in the marketplace. Authors hold a moral obligation to make certain we’ve done all we can to ensure our product is fit for reader consumption.

Anyone who’s a new (pre-published) author? Take classes, read craft books and study writing blogs. Get professional feedback. Trust me. You’ll save time and money by learning how to write well.

For those who self-publish? Self-publishing means you’re the publisher and you make all the profit, but also incur all the expenses.

***Just so you know, editing and proofreading are two completely different things.

There are various types of editing we might need—substantive editing, developmental editing, line-editing, etc. This is NOT cheap (though it is a business expense).

Y’all can look here for the industry standard rates. Make sure to check websites and organizations who keep track of scammers and seek recommendations from people you trust,

Normally, I’d recommend Preditors and Editors, but they’re rebuilding their site. In the meantime, y’all can refer to The Science Fiction Writers Association’s Writer Beware page.

Editor Gatekeepers

An excellent editor can make all the difference in the world and keep us from publishing too soon.

Editing will be expensive if your MS requires a lot of substantive or developmental editing simply because it takes incredible skill, patience and TIME to repair flawed plots or faulty character arcs.

Keep in mind that it takes an average of 12-15 hours to read a book. This is the time it takes to read a fully polished work.

With a draft, we (editors) have to slow down…a lot. And, when I edit, I will read that book at least three times. This is why I rarely do long edits. Most writers aren’t prepared for the expense…and I’d also rather play in rush hour traffic.

Granted, there are ways to mitigate this cost.

Sure an editor can fix typos, punctuation, subject-verb disagreements, remove echoes, repair punctuation, and evict passive voice, but that only makes the bill that much bigger.

Kristen Lamb (quoting herself again #NotWeirdAtAll)

Knowledge is power, and skill is a GIANT EDITING DISCOUNT.

Publisher/Mega Author Gatekeepers: The Next Line of Defense



They’ve been around a LONG time for good reasons.

I made this suggestion years ago, but it seems the only one to somewhat listen to this suggestion has been Audible (which is Amazon-owned).

Our author brand is our lifeline. A brand is any time a name alone drives sales. Traditional publishing is in big trouble, but they do have a way to recover. They still own almost all the current household brands.

My suggestion?

Ditch the ghostwriters/’coauthors’ approach and start authentically investing in the next generation of authors.

Thus far, in my POV, publishers have just been been devaluing their mega-brands and mega-franchises.

In an effort to keep pace with Amazon, the remaining publishers have been using ‘coauthors’ to pump out a gazillion titles all bearing a household name.

Sometimes, this ‘coauthor’ gig means the mega-author oversees the book and the process (e.g. James Patterson). Other times, the ‘coauthor’ is pretty close to a ghostwriter (unless Robert Ludlum has been sending messages from the other side since he passed away in 2001).

The problem isn’t necessarily with using a known brand to help sales. Rather, my criticism has to do with presentation.

If you look at the covers, these books are continuing to build brands that are already household names, while the writer (who probably did most of the work) earns only a small spot at the bottom.

Robert Ludlum passed away eighteen years ago. He doesn’t need anymore help building his name. But Joshua Hood? Joshua sure could use a break.

Same with this book (below). The cover ALREADY states James Patterson is The World’s #1 Bestselling Writer. Great! So why not throw Brendan Dubois a bone? Too much to ask?

Granted, they’re doing a little better. This is the latest James Patterson and we can actually see the coauthor’s name.

What if there was a way to maintain/build James Patterson while simultaneously building/grooming David Ellis to one day be just as big as Patterson?

Wait, there is! I blogged about it in 2012.

Designer Publishing

My idea is an all-round winner for all. The mega-authors maintain their legend status and use their influence as a nursery to grow the next generation of household names.

Legacy publishing can put out quality books, revitalize their stable of authors, and make readers super happy.

My main gripe with the current pseudo-ghostwriting approach is that there’s no solid consistency. I never know what I’m going to get.

For instance, I used to read a lot of James Patterson books. Unfortunately, it got to the point that the voice (and even quality) varied so vastly from book to book that I simply gave up. I didn’t have time to mess with a grab bag approach.

As to Ludlum, when a monarch dies he/she passes on the crown. In publishing, why should a mega-author get to keep his or her ‘crown’ forever, even after leaving the mortal coil?

Admit it. Kinda unfair. Okay a LOT unfair.

If Kylie Jenner Can Do This, New York Can

If Kylie Jenner can put her brand on everything from tooth whitening strips to lipgloss to clothes, then NY can do something similar.

Use brand trust in a good (modern) way.

The Slush Pile Sorting Hat is a disaster, and Jason Bourne only has so much mileage left. Use the big fish to protect the little fish until they can get strong enough to thrive on their own.

Work Smarter Not Harder

Audible is doing it. If they can have a Reese Witherspoon Book Club, then why can’t traditional publishing have a Stephen King Masters of Horror Club?

***Not that I am dissing Reese Witherspoon’s taste in books, but I want to read what makes Gillian Flynn, Tana French, Neil Gaiman, or J.K. Rowling stay up all night reading.

Anyway, agents locate the books and pitch them to the mega authors (or their agents). Then, the mega-author gets to say yay or nay on a book they’re endorsing.

The new authors have the honor of landing THEIR books in a premium line. What’s better is that the new author has a far greater chance of selling a lot of books.

Bookstores can even shelve these designer lines in the same areas to make it easy for readers to discover a new favorite author.

With a nudge from a big brand, the new author can build his/her own name, brand and reputation until it’s successful.

These designer lines could include everything from short works (novellas) to longer works (series). The main difference would be the unknown author’s name would be in GIANT font.

The literary gene pool gets fresh new author DNA. The megas make a percentage off of royalties in their line (and can also write their own books). And the best news?

We now have a new form of gatekeepers, so readers will have at least ONE place they can look for a quality read. Algorithms are vulnerable to fraud and can be gamed. This method, however, allows authors to once again earn a respected title.

I have more ideas, but we’ll leave those for another day.

Suffice to Say…

Self-publishing can continue on. If our MS doesn’t make it past the gatekeepers then we can see how it fares self-published.

But the idea of reaching out to trusted names and letting them assist as gatekeepers holds a lot of appeal (does to me).

Just reimagine Oprah’s Book of the Month. Make it J.K. Rowling’s Book of the Month. Can’t hurt to try. The mega-authors then can be part of the solution to this growing problem.

Seriously, if I am a trusted brand, I’d be really picky who received my endorsement. And I’m fairly certain that if I recommended great new books/authors? My existing fans would love me for saving them from the tidal surge…the glowing one that’s teeming with three-headed fish books.

What Are Your Thoughts on Gatekeepers?

I LOVE hearing from you. Maybe y’all have some ideas to throw out about how we can add some sort of quality control. I know the old way had a lot of flaws but this new way is giving me apoplexy.

Let’s crowd-source this problem, LOL. It’s certainly an issue that needs to be remedied.

***Btw, if you look to your right in the sidebar, we have some brand new classes coming up. Bad Lamb Academy is replacing W.A.N.A. so I can merge all the sites in one spot. And, since I am a well-known troublemaker, Bad Lamb works.

Refuse to behave.

Anyway, I’m teaching a BRAND new class about How to Write Mystery, Suspense & Thriller this coming Thursday, and I recruited a fabulous instructor to teach an Introduction to Science Fiction on Friday. We also have more classes next week. Recordings are included for free.

Y’all will meet Maria Grace next post! She’s not only a brilliant craft teacher. She’s published twenty-three novels and is crazy good at the business of this business.

Short notice, I know. But we’ve been working eighteen hour days moving everything into one spot to make it easier on everyone.

Just FYI, I’m extending the CLEARANCE sale a little longer, until new classes begin. We need to test the new Event Espresso license and this site’s functionality (we’ve updated everything). If you need a good plotting or character class, NOW is the time to get it.



I have to free up space on our servers. All my classes are detailed and average 2-3 hours. These are On Demand classes you can watch at your leisure and have fun while you learn (for classes, scroll down).

****For NEW classes, look in the footer.

This not only is to help you guys get the training you need (affordable summer school), but it will open up room for the new recordings of new classes.

Please take advantage of the sale! I rarely drop prices this low.

After July 17th, these classes will no longer be for sale (and will be slated for deletion).

Some, I will offer again later in the year. Others? I won’t be offering again the same way (will be likely splitting them into two classes because they ran long).

Thanks so much for your support!

ON DEMAND CLEARANCE ON BRANDING & CRAFT CLASSES!



Available until July 17th, 2019



CLEARANCE Branding, Social Media & Sales Classes

ON DEMAND T.K.O. BUNDLE: Branding, Blogging & Sales for Authors

$99 (Regularly $165)

ON DEMAND Brand Boss: Branding for Authors

$35 (Regularly $55)

ON DEMAND Sales for Writers: Sell Books Not Your SOUL

$35 (Regularly $55)

ON DEMAND Blogging for Authors

$35 (Regularly $55)

Also Offering:

ON DEMAND Social Schizophrenia: Building a Brand WITHOUT Losing Your Mind

$35 (Regularly $55)

CLEARANCE Craft Classes

Plot Boss: Writing Books Readers Want to BUY!

$35 (Regularly $55)

Fiction Addiction: The ‘Secret’ Ingredient Readers Crave

$35 (Regularly $55)

Story Master: From Dream to DONE

$35 (Regularly $55)

The Art of Character: Creating Dimensional ‘People’ in Fiction

$35 (Regularly $55)

Beyond Bulletproof Barbie: Creating Strong Female Characters for a Modern World

$35 (Regularly $55)

The post Gatekeepers & Good Books: Trophy Fishing in a Literary Tsunami appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

The Breakout Novel & Why Publishing is Desperate for the Next BIG Thing

The breakout novel. All authors want to write one, and all agents want to discover one. Why? Because the breakout novel is the story that tips the scales.

This is the novel that not only ignites avid readers to read MORE, but it also propels ordinary people to do the unthinkable.

It makes them want to read, too!

These stories turn those who normally wouldn’t read a book—unless it was required or there was a test at the end—into book evangelists.

****These people may claim they ‘hate to read,’ but they told everyone who’d listen about Twilight

Inner Demons: Soap Opera Drama vs. Story Drama

Inner demons can be one of the toughest concepts for new (and even not-so-new) authors to grasp. Yet, inner demons are essential to create a riveting story that connects with the audience.

Frankly, characters with no blindspots or baggage are B-O-R-I-N-G.

Bad decisions make great stories.

We humans tend to resent perfect people and, instead, connect more intimately and authentically via shared flaws. Audiences love rooting for their favorite character to overcome his weaknesses and come out the other side better and stronger than when the adventure began.

It’s like when they win, we win.

Without this internal angst, a story falls flat and characters become forgettable, interchangeable plot puppets.

In all my years working with writers, one of the greatest weakness I’ve witnessed is that new writers mistake melodrama (soap opera drama) for story drama.

Yes, this really is related to inner demons.

Melodrama works well for soap operas, but spells death for a novel.

Soap operas don’t require a solid core story problem with definitive structure…just great hair, fabulous makeup, and a cast with more issues than every Dr. Phil guest combined (and little or no interest in getting rid of those issues).

In soaps, it is perfectly acceptable to point out personal demons with neon lights.

Why? Because while problems are constantly being talked about (via fights, gossip, confessions)…nothing is ever fully resolved.

Ever.

And I am in no way dissing soap operas. There’s a good reason they’ve lasted as long as they have. Come on, Days of Our Lives has been around since 1965.

Yet, this type of storytelling is designed to hook in a very superficial way. Also, what audiences will tolerate in a television show will drive them bonkers in a book.

STOP TELLING ME THINGS I ALREADY KNOW!

NOTHING IS HAPPENING!

*primal screams*

In soaps, the characters have personal demons, but not really INNER demons. If the demons are obscured (as is necessary in a novel) then audiences couldn’t miss two…ten years of episodes and yet still be able to catch up in a week.

This is why there’s a lot of ‘As you know, Bob’ dialogue. The repetition is there to help anyone who’s missed some episodes to get back on track with the show.

Soap Opera writing is designed to be overt.

Storylines are crafted to keep going on and on with only enough ‘closure’ to introduce a new hook (evil twin, amnesia, insider trading, hostile takeover, murder, infidelity….*looks to drop-down menu*).

Novels, on the other hand, don’t have the luxury of rambling on for decades. Unlike soap operas, novels have to actually end.

***Wow, the things I learned with my first novel.

This means we (the author) must introduce a core problem (early) that we’ll resolve—fully or at least satisfactorily—by the final page.

Sudsy Demons

Why am I bothering to talk about soap operas? Because I see A LOT of soap opera writing in new manuscripts, and I want y’all to understand why this style works on screen but not in novels.

In soap operas, it’s perfectly acceptable for a character to wax rhapsodic about his or her personal demons in cheesy monologues.

It has to do with the medium.

Soap operas got the name ‘soap operas’ because the stories were originally created for housewives to listen to when doing the wash or cleaning.

Initially, these stories played on the radio, but the storytelling style didn’t change much even when soaps shifted to television.

Writers scripted stories and dialogue in such a way that the audience didn’t have to be LOOKING at the screen to keep up (which is why you’ll notice there are a lot of characters calling one another by name which—in life and in a novel—is plain weird).

‘As you know, Anastasia, the reason Fabio and I had to run away to Cabo is because Dr. Fandango has been hiding the fact that Fabio has multiple personalities. And yes, I confess. I helped Fabio escape Dr. Fandango’s facility. Why? Because Dr. Fandango refuses to admit he’s my biological father. I know abandonment, Anastasia. And I want Dr. Fandango to know it, too….’

*dramatic music here*

As a Texan? I LOVE me some Telemundo. Telenovelas are da BOMB! Everything is over the top, and even though my Spanish skills are rudimentary at best, I can become easily addicted in ONE episode…

*White girl squeal*



Unless We’re Writing Episodes of As the World Turns…

We’ll need to deliver those personal demons with a little—okay a LOT—more finesse. We can’t be as blatant or the story will be…um, weird.

This means we must have a solid plot because the problem with inner demons is they are, well…inner. The author’s job then, is to draw the demons out (via a STORY PROBLEM) so they can be overcome.

Plot and structure is how we do that.

Did I Mention Inner Demons are INNER?

Many new writers begin their ‘novel’ with a character doing a lot of internalization and thinking and thinking and more thinking and pondering over personal issues.

That, or the MC is fully self-actualized and well aware of his/her ‘issues’ and talks about them…a lot.

This is problematic for a number of reasons.

First, the entire POINT of the story problem is to shove the MC out of their comfort zone and into a place where he or she has no choice but to face the inner demons or LOSE BIG.

When we begin a story with an MC who’s already fully aware of his shortcomings, this character will quickly grow tedious and ring false. This is also a formula for a character readers will HATE.

How many of you LOVE people who KNOW they have a problem, but still do dumb crap anyway?

What, no takers? Thought so.

Secondly, revealing inner demons too early—and spelling them out in Crayon—spoils the mystery/adventure. Part of what readers love about a good story is that, like a therapist, we see what the MC’s issues are long before they do.

The main reason we turn pages until three in the morning is we want to find out if the MC figures out their problem before it’s too late.

Thirdly? When we introduce the story with inner demons—our MC droning on about emotional damage—it is too SOON. We (readers) just don’t care.

Love you, Soraya Montenegro….

Nothing personal, but we have our own problems. We don’t have the time or energy to give a fig about a stranger’s drama.

The story problem is what hooks us and makes us care. So about these inner demons, remember…

Demons Hide in the Blind Spot

One key thing to remember about inner demons is they hide really, really well. If they didn’t, then shrinks would starve and be treated like writers. 

Wow, you’re a psychotherapist? Really? What’s your ‘real’ job? Seriously, people PAY you to listen to their problems? 

This is another reason we don’t begin with a protagonist thinking about her inner demons. Odds are, she is oblivious they are even there. She isn’t yet that self-actualized.

Denial is more than a river in Africa.

In fact, the stronger the denial, the better the story (or, if you’re a therapist, the better the $$$$$). This is why your protagonist, if pitted against the antagonist in Act One, should lose. He/She has not grown enough in order to defeat the core story problem

Plot is What Exorcises the Demons

The plot is the crucible that will fire this demon to the surface so the character can then defeat it. This is why understanding plotting becomes so vital. A great plot problem is going to sprout directly from that inner demon. Why?

Because fiction is the path of greatest resistance.

What good is a plot problem unless it pits the character against her deepest flaw?

Some weaknesses might be fairly obvious—grief, betrayal or addiction. The problem, however, is no one wants to read 300+ pages of someone whining about a loss or a compulsion. We would probably want to smother such a person to get her to shut up.

Whining is not a plot.

Also remember that there is a reason for the grief, feeling of betrayal or addiction, and THAT is the real inner demon that must show its head.

There has to be an outside challenge that forces the character to eventually choose to remain the same or to evolve (Act III).

You gonna keep hiding in a bottle? Or are you gonna face/defeat WHY you drink so you can walk your daughter down the aisle?

Not all inner demons are as obvious, though. In fact, the tricky demons can look a hell of a lot like our greatest strengths.

Remember that every character strength has a corresponding weakness.

***For a SUPER efficient way to find interesting blind spots, check out Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi’s AMAZING Positive Trait Thesaurus. There’s also the Negative Trait Thesaurus. I recommend you just treat yourself and buy the entire collection. You’ll thank me later.

Anyway, inner demons can be a real bugger to spot because these ‘strengths’ have served the character really well (or at least the character believes they have).

In fact, these inner demons might be the very reason the character has always been successful…until you (Evil Author Overlord) hand her a problem where the old tools no longer work.

New level, new devil, baby

Fiction Addiction: How Great Storytellers Put the “Meth” into “Method”

Fiction, when crafted to hit that psychic sweet spot, is highly addictive. Which is why soap operas, daytime shows (e.g. Judge Judy & Dr. Phil), and ‘reality’ programs are all going strong with no sign of slowing down.

‘Days of our Lives’ is more like ‘Decades of Our Lives.’

Drama is always in demand. In fact, we’ve even added a brand new term to our cultural lexicon to reflect this modern reality—‘binge-watching.’

Between Amazon, Netflix, Hulu, Vudu, Google Play, and the bazillion specialty channels delivered via Roku? Then add in all the devices where audiences regularly inhale ebooks, podcasts, audiobooks, blogs, videos, etc.

Let’s just say cultural appetites for stories in all their forms—from hard-boiled documentaries (Making a Murderer) all across the spectrum to the epic high fantasy fiction (Game of Thrones)—has never been so insatiable.

***I know we’ve spent the past couple posts deep-diving the publishing industry, and I PROMISE to blog about other changes ahead. Alas, I figured it was time for something a bit lighter, and yet still salient to being successful in this industry.

Good news is that audiences crave stories, and they are always hunting for their next fiction addiction no matter WHAT is going on in the publishing world.

Wired for Fiction

Every culture on every continent has used stories to pass on information of every kind for thousands of years. Why? Because human brains are wired for story.

We might not recall straight facts, but story has a way of embedding into our minds and remaining with a tenacity rivaled only by music.

There’s a reason the two (story and music), when paired together, have double the power.

Stories that resonate make all those dopamine centers light up in our brains, and the experience offers a high similar to drugs, nicotine, alcohol, sex and more drugs.

Suffice to say there IS a difference between fiction we read and soon forget and the fiction we read…then promptly forfeit eating, sleeping and showering until we’ve finished ALL THE BOOKS.

Sane people don’t stay up until 4:00 a.m. when they have to be up for work at 5:30 a.m. That’s addict behavior.

Even KIDS are not immune. Every parent knows there’s the stack of books that don’t have so much as a crack in their spines.

And then there’s that book—*coughs* Dinosaur vs. Bedtime—the one with sticky, wrinkled pages, the story we’ll read so many times it’s committed to memory.

Everyone’s memory.

But back to my music reference. With some training, patience and practice, good writers can craft excellent stories that lodge in readers’ heads exactly the same way as great music.

Granted, a song or story can become addictive by accident, which IS an option (and one I wouldn’t recommend). Then, there is the other option.

Great storytellers create addicts (fans) with intention and design.

Story as Music

It’s interesting that patients with advanced Alzheimer’s often lose the capability to remember family, friends, names, dates, but can sing a song from their youth and recall every lyric. 

I never cease to be amazed how I might forget where my keys are, yet I can hear a song from thirty years ago and sing every line.

One reason some songs are addictive is because many of those great songs also tell riveting stories.

***Every Eagle’s song…pretty much ever.

The second way to make a song more likely to be addictive is to deliver in a structural way that hooks, then binds into our gray matter.

***Opening riff to Queen’s Under Pressure or Ozzy Osbourne’s Crazy Train.

Great fiction behaves in an eerily similar fashion. An incredible story idea, while a good start, isn’t quite enough.

The goal is to deliver that story idea first with a strong HOOK, then with a structure, pacing, tempo, and timing that keeps the audience hooked. All this should finish with an ending (climax) that will remain with the reader long after the final page.

Just as music must possess a certain kind of intrinsic structure in order to optimally resonate (e.g. a hook in the lyrics/chorus), superlative fiction does this as well.

We Got the Beat

Narrative structure is a critical skill. The single biggest reason most novels flop? Structure. Pretty prose does not a novel make.

Yes, today I’ll be mixing metaphors more than a 90s DJ but y’all are sharp and can keep up.

My goal is to equip you with the fundamental skills essential to honor our craft, regardless if we are plotters, pantsers, or plotsers.

Taking a Moment Here

I don’t even care to discuss plotting, outlining, pantsing, notecards, spreadsheets, serial killer walls with newspaper articles and red string, etc. Why?

Because those topics are not salient to what we’re discussing here.

HOW any writer utilizes structure is ‘process,’ thus completely up to the writer and none of my business.

I don’t care if your process involves a salt circle and channeling a spirit guide for nifty ideas so long as, at the end, there’s a finished novel that respects and values the reader’s TIME.

If your process involves body glitter while reading chicken bones and wearing a T-Rex suit…I DON’T CARE.

***Unless you’re turning out mind-blowing, amazing novels readers inhale…then PLEASE share precisely which body glitter, chicken bones (do free-range work better?) and T-Rex costume is helping you do that… because I have Prime, free shipping, and no pride.

What I do care about is that you, me, all of us respect what we do enough to learn how to do it with excellence.

Anything less is intellectual laziness and disrespectful to ourselves, our art, and our readers. 

*tucks away soap box*

Don’t Want No Scrubs

No, I don’t want no scrub. A scrub is a book that can’t get no love from me.  Tweeting out the messenger side of a free web site…tryin’ to holler at me.

Where was I? Oh yes…

Anyway, structure is one of those topics that I feel gets overlooked far too much, which is why Amazon is bulging with ‘scrub fiction’ that talks a good game, but, in truth, has nothing to offer readers (unless one counts buyer’s remorse).

There are a lot of workshops designed to teach new writers how to finish a ‘novel’ in four weeks or three or two or whatever. And that is great…if a writer possesses a solid understanding of structure.

If not? At the end of four weeks, you could very likely have a fifty-thousand-word word mess that no editor can fix (but that may require a salt circle to protect the unsuspecting world from it escaping).

Some of you might be in the midst of having to face some hard truths about your book. If you’ve been shopping that same book for months or years, and an agent has yet to be interested, likely structure is the problem.

If you went ahead and self-published, but sales are lackluster? Likely ‘promotion’ not the problem, product is.

Many of you might have a computer full of unfinished novels. Yes, again, structure is the most likely culprit.

Oops! I Did It Again

Been there *fist bump*. Plenty of my own bright ideas languishing in literary limbo, which was why I made it my mission to understand everything possible regarding narrative structure.

Good news is that most fiction can be fixed, although many times that requires leveling everything to the foundation and using the raw materials (original idea) to begin anew…the correct way and killing a lot of little darlings along the way.

A while back, I wrote a blog post Structure Matters: Building Great Stories to Endure the Ages that I strongly recommend.

In that article, I broke some ‘bad’ news.

Novels have rules. Sorry. They do. I didn’t make this stuff up. When we don’t follow the rules, bad things happen.

Just ask Dr. Frankenstein.

Authors who break the rules do so with a fundamental understanding of rules and reader expectations. They ‘break’ rules within certain confines.

For instance, Jimi Hendrix revolutionized the music industry and reinvented rock music by adding previously undesirable sounds (e.g. feedback distortions) as part of the actual music.

But, he first had to learn to play guitar. Then, he studied and practiced and worked with the equipment pushing and playing and testing what new sounds he could create.

Even with all the innovations, though, he STILL played what one could easily recognize as rock and roll (with an edge of blues).

Hendrix built off what audiences already knew and offered the same…but different. He didn’t come completely out of nowhere with something so odd no one recognized it as music or even had any idea what KIND of music it might have been.

It was definitely rock, but a different sort of rock.

Writers can do the same with structure and story.

Readers have expectations. Deviate too far and we will have produced a commodity so far off the standard expectations that readers won’t touch it, which is why agents won’t rep it. They are in the business of creating best-selling authors, not most-clever authors.

***FYI, one pays way better.

This said, I can tell if a writer understands structure in ten three pages. So can an agent.

Oh, and so can a savvy reader.

Doctor, Doctor!

Can’t you see I’m burning, burning…?

Yep.

Agents, editors, proofreaders, craft experts. We can tell almost immediately if a WIP is a Dumpster fire. No, we don’t need to read the whole book. Really.

Much like audiences don’t need a degree in music to know if a singer is off-key, is missing notes, or has gotten off beat, readers know when something is wrong with a book.

And they pick this up pretty quickly. No credentials as an editor required.

A lot of regular ‘readers’ sense something is…wrong. They might not have the training (and vocabulary) to articulate WHY they put a book down (e.g. tense shifting all over, head-hopping, rampant word echoes, etc.).

They’ll simply say things like, ‘I was too confused,’ or ‘I couldn’t get into it’ then move on and forget.

The Three Act Structure

Though I do teach classes on non-linear plotting, most books use the good old three-act structure and for sound reasons. First of all, Aristotelian structure has worked for a couple thousand years.

Why fix what isn’t broken?

There are variations of this three-act design, sure. But there’s something fundamentally resonant about three acts.

Beginning, middle, end.

Cut off a song halfway through a chorus, and a toddler will call foul. Stop a bedtime story in the middle. A four-year-old won’t fall for that trick.

How does it END?

We can get creative, but get crazy at our own risk.

Parallel timelines, non-linear timelines, looping timelines all have a place and work well with certain genres. But, here’s the rub. Even crazy timelines like Josh Malerman’s The Bird Box, Tana French’s In the Woods or Lianne Morairty’s Big, Little Lies can be pulled apart, the scenes lined up to create a linear three-act structure.

Also remember what your goal is when writing a story. If our end game is to sell a lot of books, then we need to entertain a LOT of people.

Get too squirrely with structure and that’s more likely to confuse readers than anything (since most readers are used to three-act structure).

If the story does gain a following, usually it’s a niche one. Nothing wrong with that, just be aware of the risks.

For example, probably way more people hated Pulp Fiction than loved it. 

We’ll Be Counting Stars

Let’s stop counting dollars, let’s start counting stars….

I understand that this is not a hard and fast rule, but still fairly safe to assert good books sell better than crappy books. How, then do we write a great story?

Ideally, our story will hook hard and deep, then the tension will steadily build from the beginning to end, with only minor troughs to catch our breath. Pressure should progressively intensify until the grand finale, much like a symphony.

But for a more visceral explanation of story, I’m switching metaphors here.

I prefer to compare the larger story structure to roller coasters.

People line up for great books for the same reasons they stand in withering summer heat to ride the latest roller coaster, and even pay extra for fast passes to skip to the front.

They yearn for a THRILL.

The Thrill of It All

I want you to envision the best roller coasters, how they are put together. All thrill rides begin with an immobile metal bar that closes over your lap. No getting off the ride now (the story hook).

Then there’s an initial slow, creeping up, up, up a hill where your gut twists from fear laced with anticipation (Inciting Incident that introduces the story problem ahead), a small dip to catch your breath, and then (turning point into Act One) you’re committed to the very end when the bar unlatches.

If the biggest loop, wildest twist or tallest hill is at the beginning of the ride (story), the rest of the ride cannot help but be a complete letdown because of poor design.

Engineers know this (great writers do, too). This is why no thrill ride is even built until there is a prototype/design that satisfies investors that park patrons will LOVE it.

Writers are wise to do this as well.

I Hate You, I Love You

Great stories and great rides. We hate them and love them and hate that we love them. Now, let’s go and WRITE one

The Death of Ye Olden Bookstores & the Author Identity Crisis

My last post, Barnes & Noble SOLD: Goliath Has Fallen & What This Means for Writers, was a long and detailed journey explicating precisely how we’ve all ended up at this spot in history—writers, readers, bookstores, booksellers, publishers, investors, etc.

The big-box bookstores are dead for good until some @$$hat forgets what a bad idea they were and resurrects them again.

In the meantime…

Now that Borders is a distant memory and Barnes & Noble a recent casualty, many of us find ourselves balancing, terrified, on the precipice of the unknown.

This time of transition possesses a particularly acute terror reserved for pre-published and published authors.

Yet, in light of all this upheaval, I challenge authors to learn from New York Publishing’s—‘The Big Six’s’ mistakes.

One mistake in particular.

Authors are NOT Bookstores

New York failed to remember its identity, and that was the critical node that set off the cascading system failures.

Legacy publishing (namely the multi-national media conglomerates calling the shots) forgot that publishers were in the STORY and INFORMATION business.

As mentioned in my previous blog, legacy publishers were NOT in the ‘protect the paper industry’ or the ‘prop up incompetent book retailer’ business. This mission drift was a fatal one that steered them straight into the metaphorical rocks.

Publishers forgot they existed as edification and entertainment dealers. They had a simple three-part mission:

I. Explore, unearth and expand any and all forms of potentially valuable content.

II. Connect that content to any media distribution channels with potential for profit.

III. Nurture profitable avenues and locate any stagnant business tributaries. If these sluggish channels couldn’t be revived expeditiously, eliminate them before they festered.

PRIME DIRECTIVE: Publishers existed solely as gatekeepers, winnowers, distributors, and cultivators. They were there to PROTECT their RESOURCE (the authors), so as to best SERVE the CONSUMERS (audiences).

That was IT. Yet, they forgot their purpose and it cost them dearly.

Storytellers, Educators & Entertainers, Lend Me Your Ears….

Now, talking to my fellow creatives and content creators. I’ll simply use the term AUTHORS from this point on for the sake of simplicity.

Authors do love bookstores, but we are not in the bookstore business.

Yes, this is actually vastly important to remember.

Bookstores exist because of us and not the other way around. Authors existed long before bookstores and we’ll be here long after bookstores.

To reiterate. Authors are in the content creation business. Distribution is a whole other matter.

I know a lot of commenters expressed feelings of depression, dismay, discouragement after reading my last post. Today, I want to remind you who you are.

Authors, this is not our first rodeo…personal extinction.

My POV? Storytellers are actually the oldest profession. Or how else could the other alleged ‘oldest profession’ get enough business to brag about being the OLDEST profession?

But I digress….

Authors didn’t start out with large publishing houses that possessed a global distribution network to disseminate our work printed in fancy paper books to stores.

We evolved from bards, crones and sages who passed on stories and knowledge orally, namely through song (e.g. Psalms) then later via theatrical performance (e.g. the Greek tragedies).

In other parts of the world, some clever folks invented pictograms and ‘authors’ adapted. We either learned how to draw or made fast friends with someone talented enough to tell our stories using pictures of CATS.

Pyramids? Talk about EXPOSURE.

Later, Western civilization adopted this thing called ‘an alphabet’ from the Phoenicians.

***This alphabet gave authors the unique ability to point out how dismally ironic it is that the word ‘phonetic’ is in NO WAY spelled phonetically.

#HukdOnFonixWurkdForMe

With symbols, authors crafted the epic poems like Beowulf:

Authors have evolved from stories held only in memory to capturing them in pictures, to finally adopting abstract symbols that represent words and concepts.

Yes, it’s witchcraft. Can’t have spelling without a SPELL.

Think of it. To this day, authors create people, places, events, universes, empires, and religions that have never existed before we thought them up.

We do ALL this using various combinations of twenty-six letters.

More like twenty-three letters because Z, X, and Q are next to useless. Q always needing to borrow U to get anything done.

***rolling eyes***

The plain fact is that authors have ALWAYS had to find new ways to sing for their supper. In the beginning? We LITERALLY did this.

As time went on, we learned to attract patrons then publishers and producers who would financially support our art.

Suffice to say, we’ve had our world shift plenty of times and we’re still here and always will be (for those strong enough to survive the transition).

Bookstores & the Death of a Dream

A major reason Barnes & Noble’s fall has hit many so hard it is represents another dead dream. We’re grieving. It’s hard enough to do what we do without also fretting over the business side of the business (especially when they can’t seem to get their act together).

I think it’s fair to claim most authors have been in a perpetual state of terror (peppered with brief windows of hope) for far too long.

If you’re like me, maybe your sparkle’s been dimming and it’s taken everything not to give up.

Was writing even worth it anymore?

The big-box bookstores that were supposed to be so wonderful, only managed to crush our childhood dreams.

We mourned as we bade farewell to the bookstores that kindled our earliest desires to write. After the long good-byes, we moved on to a new normal.

I know I spent hours wandering the aisles of Barnes & Noble reconceptualizing what ‘making it’ looked like. Okay, so I’d never see my books in B. Dalton’s or Taylor’s or any of the small mom-and-pop bookstores from my youth, but that was life.

Fair was a weather condition.

I don’t know about y’all, but I imagined book signings, launch parties, my novels on pretty displays in actual bookstores. Yes, even Borders or Barnes & Noble.

Then Web 2.0 and the digital revolution arrived. NY and the big-box stores had every opportunity to maintain dominance. Instead, they rearranged deck chairs on the Titanic and pretended everything was jolly.

The Band Played On…

Like most pre-published authors, I fantasized about real author events, the ones where I’d read aloud to devoted fans from my latest book. I’d hug, shake hands and answer questions as I signed beautiful copies of my work fresh out of the box.

Those were the dreams that kept me going in my darkest hours when it made no sense to keep on writing. When everyone called me foolish and told me to get ‘a real job.’

I don’t think a single one of us daydreamed about favorable algorithms, a massive email newsletter list with a solid open rate, or a depressing spot for ten copies of our book on a Costco bargain table.

And I sure as hell never dreamed of working like an organ-grinding spider monkey for fractions of KU pennies.

None of us did.

This was why I wanted to point out how LONG ‘authors’ been around. We’ve been through major changes.

We took our lumps, hunkered down and waited it out as we learned how to thrive in a world with new rules. Every time our world has been turned on its ear, we survived and thrived…because we ADAPTED.

***For some eye-opening history of our industry, I recommend my posts ‘Real’ Writers Don’t Self-Publish and ‘Real’ Writers Don’t Self-Publish Part Two.

Change is Scary but Necessary

Publishers have faced similar apocalypses as well. Just think of all those monks who had to start hipster microbreweries once Gutenberg came on the scene.

Thanks a lot, Johannes. Now EVERYONE can be published.

***throws up quill and inkwell***

That, or they had to go to Vatican night school and learn how to type set.

While it’s impossible to wholly ignore the recent thanatoid shroud that’s settled over our industry, keep in mind that endings aren’t always a bad thing. Authors, of all people, should appreciate this.

Without endings, there can be no beginnings.

Any system that grows unchecked is wide open for disease, decline, and death. This is true in nature, in business, and even with bookstores.

Personally, I am GLAD Barnes & Noble finally bit it. They’ve been ‘dying’ for a like a friggin’ decade…so fair to say I’m way past over it.

Yes, it’s the end of an era—blah, blah, blah—but now we can finally move on!

The System is SICK

I’ve already relayed the long list of chronic ‘illnesses’ that plagued NY and spelled the decline if not death of The Big Six.

***Which originally was comprised of Penguin, Simon & Schuster, Macmillan, HarperCollins and Hachette and other large traditional publishers, for those who don’t know.

I think the only issue I didn’t explore in any depth was in regards to the negative impact of so much talent pool inbreeding. Sure, being a blue blood has plenty of perks, but plenty more perils to go with them.

By publishers and elite lists propping up The Author Aristocracy decade after decade, there weren’t any new authors being folded in for younger generations to fall in love with.

I believe this is why we saw such an explosion in the Chick Lit and YA (Young Adult) categories that neatly paralleled the overall decline in numbers of readers.

Younger people didn’t want to read the same authors their parents loved. They couldn’t relate to the worlds, characters, and story problems in a Danielle Steele romance or a Clive Cussler techno-thriller the same way previous generations had.

There’s a fascinating article, Bias, She Wrote: The Gender Balance of The New York Times Best Seller List.

Take a look at The New York Times top authors by decade from the 1980s to present day. You’ll see the same names over and over, the list shrinking and almost no new talent and NO young talent making it to the top.

Seriously

Obviously, this puzzled me, so I asked my super smart friend Cindy Dees who’s a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of fifty suspense and thriller novels (and a hybrid author) about J.K. Rowling and why she didn’t appear in these metrics.

Cindy’s answer?

‘J.K. Rowling blew up the NYTBS list so hard in 2001, they created an entirely new category for her to pry her out of the #1 spot.‘

A Tale of Brick-and-Mortar Bookstores & Bias

We already know that the big-box chains pre-negotiated which authors and what books would be allowed in the stores.

Yet, even as they were dying, Barnes & Noble continued to largely discriminate against indie authors and their books…even those that were selling better than their traditionally published counterparts.

My early social media books We Are Not Alone: The Writer’s Guide to Social Media and Are You There, Blog? It’s Me, Writer were top performers.

Yet, I can’t tell you how many times I received frustrated emails from fans who’d gone into their local B&N to order a paper copy and were sent away (even though my books were listed with Ingram and had the appropriate ISBNs).

My perennial branding guide for authors, Rise of the Machines: Human Authors in a Digital World has never graced a B&N shelf even though it’s earned almost a hundred and eighty positive (4 and 5 star) reviews.

I’ve actually keynoted at large events where the on-site B&N bookstores refused to order my books.

…which is kinda weird when you’re the one people have paid to see.

I know I’m not the only successful indie author who’s faced this challenge with brick-and-mortar stores (even ones that weren’t Borders/Barnes & Noble).

Brick-and-mortar stores are going to have to be open to selling good books, and stocking authors readers love and want regardless of pedigree.

First, we need fresh blood in the literary gene pool if people are going to ever get excited about reading again. That and our profession is about to marry a cousin and start playing banjo.

Secondly, consumers are searching for something fresh. What are the really getting? This meme says it best….

Great! They have all of James Patterson’s twenty-seven new releases here, too!



Digital Disease

Traditional publishing isn’t the only entity that’s created a mess. Sure, legacy publishers bred a certain kind of author to the point that, while they’re super pretty, they’re also prone to hip-dysplasia, neuroses, and they bite.

JOKING!

…mostly.

In the digital realm?

Amazon and other digital outlets have allowed untrained, unvetted, unteachable wanna-be writers to breed book titles faster than bunnies on fertility drugs.

In permitting this, they’ve dumped ‘History’s Largest Slush Pile’ into the readers’ laps.

The past several years have marked a time of unparalleled fraud where one’s ability to game algorithms and probe for cheats in the system for profit has trumped learning craft.

There are too many ‘writers’ more interested in mastering advertising and marketing instead of buckling down and learning about story-craft. They churn out ‘book’ after ‘book’ and can’t understand why readers aren’t lining up to throw money at unreadable junk.

An author’s job is to inspire, enlighten and entertain. We serve the reader (audience), not the other way around.

Audiences are under zero obligation to financially support poorly written, unedited wish-fulfillment fraudulently packaged as a novel.

The reason most ‘books’ aren’t selling has less to do with any lack in marketing or advertising budget, and a hell of a lot more to do with these so-called ‘books’ being an affront to the English language (and possibly other languages as well).

Spray paint a dog turd gold and all you have is a golden turd. The book industry stinks because we’re all up to our chins in literary turds hiding under fancy covers.

We all long to discover a new book, not step in one and have to scrape it off our Kindles.

Invasion of the Professional Amateur

This is a message for creators as well as publishers and bookstores.

Consumers will not tolerate a marketplace with such poor self-governance much longer.

Not when Netflix exists.

Amazon (and other digital outlets) need to get their act together and put in some sort of EFFECTIVE gatekeeping to restore faith with consumers.

As far as I can tell, the desire to offer some semblance of quality control was (is) a major force behind Amazon’s push to open brick-and-mortar stores.

The objective is to smart-stock stores regionally. Stock local authors and titles that sell well in that region regardless of pedigree.

Even Barnes & Noble 3.0 is looking to employ similar tactics in the near future. Waterfords’ C.E.O. James Daunt managed to resurrect the dying U.K. giant by changing how they did business.

He ditched the cookie-cutter standardization and let the managers of each store run their location almost like the owner of an independent bookstore.

According to a recent article on Inc. Hedge Fund Buys Barnes & Noble. It Could Be Very Good News for Customers by@MindaZetlin:

It (Waterstones) also pays close attention to what customers want in different locations—including a Russian language bookstore within its Piccadilly store, staffed entirely with Russian speakers.

Daunt plans to do the same with Barnes & Noble 3.0.

Wow! Who would have thought? A Barnes & Noble with books translated into Spanish staffed with Spanish-speaking employees in El Paso, TX?

***clutches pearls***

Meanwhile, Control What We Can Control

Yes, the publishing industry is a complete mess, but this mess is temporary.

A lot of the chaos today was the inevitable consequence from decades of bad business decisions (as well as the largest shift in communication since the invention of the Gutenberg press).

For generations, authors didn’t have a voice in the business of our business.

Now, we do.

I’ve been preaching since 2008 that WE ARE THE BRAND. Our brand—comprised of name, reputation and products (books)—is our most valuable asset. When our name alone can sell books, we don’t care who’s in charge because readers will come to US.

Does anyone really believe Stephen King, J.K. Rowling, Nora Roberts, George R.R. Martin or Debbie Macomber will suddenly have their careers capsize because Barnes & Noble isn’t what it used to be?

Of course not.

Fans will simply search out bookstores and sellers who carry their favorite author brands.

Guess What? Writing is a JOB

Authors are in the entertainment business. Note the second half of that word is business. The new bookstores want to stock great stories/books readers want.

Our job?

Write the great stories/books readers want and build an online brand that cultivates a following and makes us easy (for bookstores) to find.

Brands are VITAL, especially in an age of a billion options. A brand is a promise. It guarantees a certain level of quality without the consumer (readers or bookstores) having to do a ton of research or thinking.

A good brand saves TIME.

In a world with limitless choices, we default to who we know and who we like.

Consumers look to Maserati, Honda, Ralph Lauren, Spalding, Harley Davidson, Levis, Hellman’s, MAC, Bulgari, Rolex, Apple, etc, etc. because they trust the name says it all. The name implies a certain level of implicit quality.

Case in point: Bergdorf’s versus Walmart.

Brands allow time-starved consumers to quickly locate what they want/need. Most of us are willing to spend the extra dollar or two on Heinz 57 ketchup instead of trying the cheaper catsup.

We don’t want to risk being disappointed.

The beauty of a brand is that we (authors) no longer have to compete solely on PRICE. Our names become valuable, so we can avoid the race to the bottom of who can give away the most for free or nearly free.

We DO OUR JOB & Help Bookstores Do Theirs

If we want to be a successful (or at least respected) author, it’s incumbent upon us to learn the nuts and bolts of our profession.

I can’t count how many ‘published books’ I’ve seen that wouldn’t pass high school English, let alone a NY gatekeeper.

Yep. This is me.



Serious authors learn grammar and how to spell (or hire those who can correct it for them).

I get there are those who are hopelessly dyslexic or who simply never mastered spelling or grammar. But, professionals are aware these are weaknesses and plan accordingly.

They don’t use ‘I’m a terrible speller’ or ‘I don’t understand grammar’ as a pass to publish books that give readers a brain bleed.

Serious authors embrace education and training.

There’s that old saying, ‘What do you call a writer who never gives up? Author.’

Great quote but VASTLY outdated. It’s from a time there were gatekeepers to pop bad writers on the snoot until they either gave up or got better.

These days, practice is essential but we need training, too. Practice is not enough.

If I go hit ten thousand golf balls without any training on how to swing a club, it doesn’t make me Tiger Woods. It makes me an idiot who likely needs a good back surgeon.

And before anyone shouts me down, if you were accused of murder would you hire a person who never attended law school to represent you?

How about hiring a mechanic who’d never successfully changed oil to repair your transmission?

But he’s seen every single Fast & Furious movie twenty times! Why so judgmental?

And yet, there are writers who brag about never reading fiction (even their own genre) and gloat about how they’ve never read a craft book or taken a class.

Too often these same ‘writers’ are mystified why their books are not selling.

Must be the marketing plan. Not a big enough budget.

Anyway, once we learn how to write, and create a superlative product(s), we then have to cultivate the platform and create the brand.

Though hopefully you’re doing all this simultaneously.

Trust me, you do NOT want to have a book ready for sale and no platform and no brand. What is a brand?

A brand is when a name alone has the power to drive sales.

Fair point.

Tiffany & Co.

Neil Gaiman.

Deepak Chopra.

Again, writing great books is a HUGE part of the job, but the other part involves creating a platform and brand. This is also where I hear the wailing and gnashing of teeth.

But all I want to do is write the books.

Don’t we all?

A properly constructed brand only grows stronger over time. Authors with a solid brand have freedom, flexibility, resilience, and they also have a lot of very lucrative ways to bring in income other than books.

J.K. Rowling became a billionaire because of her brand. She didn’t make over a billion dollars on book sales alone.

Her Harry Potter brand earned (and continues to earn) hundreds of millions from movies, merchandising, and The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios, and more.

There are some amazing changes in the industry, and a solid brand is what makes the difference between missing the train and driving it. Within the next few years, it will be the best time in history to be a trusted author.

I won’t discuss all those avenues here, though I do detail some of them in my classes.

The Bookstores of the Future

Will have the same goal as all bookstores in the past—connect readers to books they’re willing to BUY…then come and BUY MORE.

Suffice to say that bookstores will have to be able to FIND an author before they can decide if they like the author.

Barnes & Noble has already proven that stocking shelves solely with legacy published novels is no panacea. Too many known and beloved authors are not coming from the traditional path.

Bookstores will have to get a good mix of authors from all origins if they hope to be competitive.

This means that those managers in charge of the new Barnes & Noble stores, the upcoming Amazon brick-and-mortar bookstores, as well as the managers of those indie bookstores that have been thriving despite the on-line competition will stock the authors (books) they like and KNOW (code for they have a brand).

This could be any one of you guys, so no long faces anymore.

I truly believe we will see new gatekeepers emerge and the up-and-coming bookstores will do a lot better job. Hard to do a crappier one.

Eventually I believe a spot in bookstores will be part of what separates the professional from the poseur.

This said…

An Insider Tip: Publishers haven’t had a major disruptor (a runaway game-changer) in over FIVE years. 50 Shades of Grey was the last dark horse, and publishers are desperate for that new author who breaks in and turns the world inside out…in a good way.

This disruptor could be you. Why not?

In the meantime, our job is to write excellent books readers will love and cultivate that on-line brand and platform.

Feel free to get a copy of Rise of the Machines: Human Authors in a Digital World if you want a step-by-step book how to build a resilient brand that grows as you grow.

I created the book to be evergreen. It doesn’t rely on technology and is technophobe friendly (and funny). Social media changes, but humans never do.

OR you can scroll down and I have a long list of On Demand craft classes AND social media, sales and branding classes on CLEARANCE. Summer sale!

Everything y’all need to make your mark in this next phase of bookstore history