Michael Jensen's Blog - Posts Tagged "wool"
"Wool'"s Hugh Howey Shows How it's Done
Over the past several months I've read a great deal of self-published fiction. While much of it has been passable very little of it has seemed worthy of the sorts of attention each has received. That's led me to conclude that much of the success for many successful self-published authors has less to do with the quality of the writing than the author's ability to network and/or use social media to build an audience.
I'm not saying those authors are doing anything wrong finding different ways to become successful (hey, we all need a gimmick!), but I don't want to read a book that is successful mostly because the author has managed to build a big Twitter following as opposed to having written a great book.
So I confess to be little bit leery when I sat down to read Hugh Howey's "Wool." After all, Wool is the quintessential self-published author story (along with 50 Shades of Grey, I guess).
But my fears were misplaced. "Wool" is a fantastic book, its quality all the more remarkable because Howey wrote it without an editor, copy editor or any of the rest of the perks that come along with being published by a major house.
Indeed, "Wool" isn't just the best self-published book I've ever read, it's one of the best sci fi/dystopian novels I've read in a very very long time. The fact that Howey was able to have it become a monster hit without the benefit of Twitter/Facebook gives me hope that when it comes to what makes a book successful, quality is still the most important thing.
I'm not saying those authors are doing anything wrong finding different ways to become successful (hey, we all need a gimmick!), but I don't want to read a book that is successful mostly because the author has managed to build a big Twitter following as opposed to having written a great book.
So I confess to be little bit leery when I sat down to read Hugh Howey's "Wool." After all, Wool is the quintessential self-published author story (along with 50 Shades of Grey, I guess).
But my fears were misplaced. "Wool" is a fantastic book, its quality all the more remarkable because Howey wrote it without an editor, copy editor or any of the rest of the perks that come along with being published by a major house.
Indeed, "Wool" isn't just the best self-published book I've ever read, it's one of the best sci fi/dystopian novels I've read in a very very long time. The fact that Howey was able to have it become a monster hit without the benefit of Twitter/Facebook gives me hope that when it comes to what makes a book successful, quality is still the most important thing.
