P.J. Fox's Blog, page 26

Despicable Me?

Someone found my likening Blythe Harris’ experience to rape “despicable.”

To which my response is: as I point out in the comments, “As a survivor of rape, I feel entitled to make those comparisons, which feel authentic to me. And really, is judging how a survivor, of any violent crime or personal intrusion, responds any less despicable? I’m sorry that not all survivors of rape have the ‘right’ response, according to your arbitrary standards, but that’s really not their–or my–problem. Maybe you should get off your politically correct high horse, pay attention to what a real person is saying, and actually learn something.”

But, more to the point, perhaps one of the problems we have as women, and as a feminist movement, is that we’re too busy rushing to judge each other to actually understand each other. Understanding, of course, takes time–time that, of essence, takes away from the thrill of judgment. Which, of necessity, involves a rush.

In short, why yes, as a survivor of rape I DO feel the right to contextualize my own experience.

Telling women how they’re “allowed” to feel about what’s happened to them is contributing to the problem, in that it’s operating under the assumption that there is an “allowed” response for a woman to have.  That “good” girls respond one way and “bad” girls respond another.  That while one survivor gets praise, another is “despicable”–because, presumably, her skirt was too short she didn’t do what good girls do.

If you have a problem with that, then fuck you.

The Best Mailing List Ever

Or, as I like to think of it, the only mailing list in the world.

I have a mailing list.  I’m told that this is a good thing to have; that periodically spamming my followers will somehow increase book sales.  I don’t know.  But I do know that I have an awesome mailing list.  Here are some things about it that contribute to its awesomeness:

I only send something out maybe once or twice a month.  If that.  I hate spam.  And I can speak with some authority on the topic of spam, having eaten the real thing.  Because, you know, food pantries.  It’s actually not bad, cooked in the oven (or fried in a pan) with brown sugar.  Ah, the joys of American poverty…
There is exclusive content.  Which will mean, going forward, exclusive first chapters of The Black Prince (look for this sometime after Christmas).  And yeah, excerpts from other books too but I’m pretty sure no one cares about those as much.
Free things.  Or, at least, access to free things.  I’ll let you know about free promotions through Kindle and such.

Or you can just, you know, not get spammed and just read my books (or not) as they come out.

Also if you reply directly to your mailing list, it goes straight into my (real, actual) in box.  Which makes a much more convenient mode of delivery for hate mail.  Or questions.  Or whatever (I’d appreciate more whatever and less hate mail).  So there’s that.

Things You Need To Succeed As An Author (Other Than A Good Book)

Ice T was right: it’s a fun job, but it’s still a job.

Yesterday, at our ward’s “trunk or treat” activity, a friend of my husband’s asked what I was doing about book tours.  When was I going on one?  Why wasn’t I going on one?  I did my best to explain that, for most of us (i.e. those of us who aren’t Neil Gaiman), book tours aren’t really a thing.  He seemed pretty discouraged by this answer.  Everyone–including us writers, I think–sort of expects that once you publish a book you’re golden.  The gatekeepers have been appeased, Paradise lies beyond!  So the idea that, no, publishing one book only means that you’d better hurry up and publish another one…it’s not what people want to hear.  It’s disappointing.

More than once, I’ve had people tell me that they think they should write a book too, as it’s an “easy” way to “make a quick buck.”  I’ve gotten over the fact that this is sort of insulting to me and moved on to just wishing them good luck.  And I do wish them all the luck in the world.  They’ll find out for themselves that it isn’t as easy as they think it is–and that completing your first manuscript, far from the end of the road, is only the beginning.

But it occurred to me this morning, when I woke up with a terrible cold (nursing my family back to health has its rewards!), decided I wasn’t going to church, and decided instead to dwell unproductively on my latest bad review.  And then I thought I’d do something slightly more productive, and write this (hopefully illuminating) post on things you need to succeed as a writer–other than, of course, a decent book.

You need:

A thick skin.
A work ethic.
Self control.
Realistic expectations.
Self confidence.

Last night, I was talking to a friend of mine and wound up telling her about the “less strong, independent women, more bulging…wallets” dynamic in historical romance.  She’s a highly intelligent, compassionate individual with many wise points to make on a variety of subjects, so her advice is always welcome.  We talked about the role of women in fiction for awhile, and what women want out of fiction, and I wound up also telling her that I was currently writing a modern retelling of Beauty and the Beast.  “Another one?” she said.  She proceeded to list off all the other retellings which, in her mind, had cornered an already exhausted market.  After which she, perhaps realizing that this might be upsetting, rushed to point out that she was certain there must be something left to say.  Somewhere.

But what she didn’t realize was that this, from my perspective, was a great thing.  At least someone was actually talking to me about my work.  My work.  The actual, you know, thing I care passionately enough about to do every day.  Not my sales, or when I was going on a book tour.  Or hadn’t I really sold my car, because I couldn’t sell any books.  There’s a fairly large subset of the population who wants you to justify your life choices to them, life choices that have absolutely no impact on them.

And then there are the trolls.

Or, simply, the people who just plain hate your work.  Every paragraph, every line.  And they aren’t kind (or articulate) about it, either.  They absolutely live to excoriate you.  Some of them fancy themselves to be connoisseurs of the arts; some of them are frustrated writers, making themselves feel better about their own lack of production by criticizing people who actually have managed to get their act together enough to publish a book.  It’s a lot easier to nitpick someone else’s efforts than it is to get off your duff and do something.  To make something of your own.  Even so, it hurts.  No amount of abstract intellectualism can make up for the fact that being attacked sucks.  Whether it’s people telling you that your work is terrible–your work that’s your baby, that’s part of you–or telling you that you personally are terrible.  Which also happens, and probably more often than you’d think.

I defend other (and mostly more successful) authors like Stephenie Meyer; not because I love Twilight so much (although I did enjoy the books), but because she, too, has striven to create something.  And if everyone else really thinks they’re so much better, then why haven’t they published their own books?  The attacks on Stephenie Meyer are, I think, indicative of a larger, systemic problem within the writing world: that people tear each other down rather than build each other up.  That instead of learning from, say, Ms. Meyer’s success, they respond to it by denigrating her work.

And if you publish a book, especially an even moderately successful one, it’ll happen to you.

So the first thing you need is a thick skin.

It’s really, really easy to let the criticisms get you down to the point where you just want to give up.  To stop writing, or doing anything creative at all, because the whole stupid, thankless mess seems like such an uphill battle.  Only instead of ever reaching the top, or any top, you’re stuck mucking around in the foothills like Sisyphus.  Whatever it is, you have to be able to shrug it off.  Again, and again, and again.  Learn to have a sense of humor about it.  Don’t let it make you bitter.  And don’t…

Let it stop you from writing, because the next thing you need is a work ethic.  Being a one book wonder is like being a one hit wonder on the radio: hard, but not as hard as you’d think.  The real challenge comes in translating that hit into a career.  Because, again, as Ice T observes, each single doesn’t last very long.  And it doesn’t.  Even if your first book is exceptionally well received and sells many thousands of copies…so what?  Fans are fickle.  They’re now waiting for you to come out with your next book.  Keeping the fans you have means continuing to entertain them.  Moreover, it’s going to be very hard to pick up new fans if you’re not consistently producing new work.

Part of what makes you interesting to fans is that you’re permanent.  They want to know that a) your next book will come out, reliably, within a reasonable frame of time and b) it’s any good.  The best sellers, long term, are the ones who can produce a consistent product.  Even wildly successful authors have significantly reduced, or even lost their fan bases, because they started phoning it in.  Permanence isn’t simply an issue of throwing new material at the world but of carefully curating that material.  I write in a couple of genres, which is both a blessing and a curse.  People tend to like one genre, or the other; relatively few of my fans read everything I write.  But whether paranormal romance, erotica, or horror, my books are all of a consistent quality–consistently wonderful or consistently terrible, depending on who you ask!

Resting on your laurels, in any field, is pretty much a one-way ticket to failure.

You also need self control.  Don’t be like the crazy woman who showed up on her fan’s doorstep.  Part of maintaining self control is maintaining perspective.  One is crucial to the other.  Whether one feels that a person is somehow “hiding” their identity online is irrelevant to the discussion–and to the larger issues spawning that discussion.  So, someone didn’t like your book.  So, she potentially posted the review under a fake name.  So, who cares?

We’ve all been there; anyone who’s encountered the internet has encountered someone we believe, rightly or wrongly, to be a complete idiot. The answer is never to make others responsible for one’s own behavior by adopting the, “she made me do it” attitude but, rather, by stepping back and counting to ten.  Moreover, given that this woman thinks showing up at someone’s house is a completely normative reaction, I’m not at all surprised that she didn’t recognize rape in her own book. Part of the problem with rape, and all other crimes that involve a boundary violation, is that not everyone agrees that the other person has a right to boundaries in the first place; “she made me do it” can take many forms–from “she made me do it” by making me angry so I “had” to start stalking her to “she made me do it” by wearing a short skirt.

Years ago, I wrote a (professional) review for a (professional review) website, discussing the treatment of rape in a fantasy series. The author of that series tracked me down and made my life miserable. My response was that, while I was dismayed that she didn’t like my review, her response did absolutely nothing to convince me that I was wrong. Attacking someone for disagreeing with you is never a smart move; the internet is a public space, with real people behind each and every computer screen. This author would do well to remember that; and to rethink that, if she can’t keep herself together at the idea that someone might not like her book, she might want to pursue a different career. Being in the public eye, to any extent, is no fun–but it’s also the price you pay when you decide to pursue a career in this field.

Other people are NOT responsible for your ego.  Yes, getting a bad review sucks; and reading the comments from other people applauding that bad review sucks, too.  But guess what: publishing a book is optional.  Putting your sacred personal experience out there for total strangers to shred is optional.  If you don’t want to have this experience, then great.  It’s really easy to avoid: don’t write for public consumption.

Yes, people write reviews that seem “inaccurate.”  I mean, DUH!  The only “accurate” review, to the author, is the one that matches the author’s internal monologue.  Which, again, I refer you to the point above.  And yes, people publish reviews without finishing the book.  Which is, in of itself, an important aspect of the review!  THEY DID NOT LIKE THE BOOK ENOUGH TO FINISH IT.  THEY ARE UNDER NO OBLIGATION TO YOU, THE AUTHOR, OR TO ANYONE ELSE TO FINISH IT.  THIS IS NOT A HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT AND YOU ARE NOT THE TEACHER.  Get over yourself!

Unlike Mr. Cormier, I’m not “in the middle” on this.  As the survivor of a violent crime, after which I was hospitalized for some time and almost died, I’m fully aware that the people who stalk, rape, and even kill their victims have what are, in their own minds, perfectly viable rationalizations.  That they might “realize,” perhaps with the aid of public pressure, that their behavior was dysfunctional–conveniently after the fact–doesn’t erase the trauma they’ve caused their victims.  I will bear the scars, internal and external, from what happened to me for the rest of my life.  And I wasn’t all that interested in hearing, after I left the hospital with a plate in my head and my eyeball reattached, that my attacker felt like I “made” him do it by “being a bitch.”

Where does it end?  At what point do our excuses for not maintaining self control become ridiculous?  At what point should we stop expecting others to see things from our point of view, merely because we have one?

Maintaining self control ties, too, into having realistic expectations.  That everyone will love your book, or that if they don’t love your book, they’ll be sure to post their negative reviews under their own full names along with their personal contact information so you can thoughtfully “correct” their nonconforming point of view is not a realistic thing to expect.  And yet, apparently, many authors, and would-be authors, do.  Catfishing?  You want to talk about catfishing?  How many authors write under assumed names, because they’re looking to protect their privacy?  The term “catfish” applies an intent to defraud.  People who catfish are hiding their identity in order to achieve a very specific purpose.  Merely using a pen name isn’t “catfishing.”  I write under a pen name–so what?

I’m not lying to anyone about who I am, or what I believe.  Everything I write, in the nonfiction sense, is true.  I’m perfectly open about the fact that I don’t use my legal name, because I want to protect my privacy.  And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.  Any more than Robert Jordan, Ayn Rand or Ann Landers were catfish.

And clearly, the fact that if you’re not careful people will show up on your doorstep, or send you death threats GamerGate-style, amply proves that there is reason for caution!

The “catfish” debate is a red herring.  People have the right to their privacy, and to establishing their own boundaries.  This is non-negotiable.  Whatever boundaries they establish are, themselves, non-negotiable.  A reader doesn’t need an author’s permission to write a bad review, or to decide that the book is so bad they can’t finish it.  The idea that you somehow have the “right” to someone’s personal information–especially to use it for ill, as tracking someone down to confront them surely is–is, in of itself, a form of violation very akin to rape.  It’s castigating someone for presuming to set a boundary; for presuming to say no–and for, gasp, not even realizing that they “should” ask for permission!

Deciding that people have no right to withhold from you…stay home.  If you’re afraid that you might rape someone, then lock yourself in your bedroom.  If you’re afraid that getting a bad review might send you over the edge, then don’t publish a book!

Which brings me to my last point: you need self confidence.

Accepting “no” for an answer requires a lot of self confidence.  People respond with fury to “no,” in all its various forms, when their psyches are so brittle that the mere concept of rejection is shattering.  Learn to say no.  Learn to hear no.  Learn to recognize that someone else’s “no” isn’t a comment on you.  It’s their choice–for them.  How they lead their lives is no comment on you; it has nothing to do with you.

Do what you have to do, to keep writing about writing.

Don’t Read If You Don’t Like Medieval History (Or Feminists)

One of the principle criticisms I’ve received about The Demon of Darkling Reach is that there’s too much middle ages and not enough everything else.  As in, less descriptions of cheese-making and more sex, already!  If that’s your bag, then I highly suggest you read the forthcoming The Prince’s Slave trilogy.  Which is excerpted here.  Expect a longer excerpt soon.  In the meantime, don’t buy a book about the middle ages and then be depressed that it’s about the middle ages!

The Demon of Darkling Reach is set in an historically accurate reimagining of England’s high middle ages.  If that floats your boat, then you’ll like this book.  But if you’re looking for princesses in turret hats and unicorns then no, Isla’s struggles will completely turn you off.  She’s not a damsel in distress and there are no white knights.  There’s sex, but the primary purpose of this book isn’t to be jerk off material but to tell a good story.  A feminist-positive story about an empowered woman who, through her own choices rather than the intervention of some man, takes control of her own destiny.

Another issue that some people have is with the fact that this is a trilogy.  As in, the story isn’t complete in book one.  Well no.  It says right there on the cover, book one.  The story arc doesn’t conclude until book three.  As in, you won’t find out what happens, ultimately, to all of the characters until book three.  And yes, a lot happens that doesn’t involve romance.  Or sex.  Isla isn’t some Mary Jane, waiting around for a man to sweep in and give her life purpose.  Her life has purpose when she meets Tristan; she’s running a manor by herself.  In this, one of the things I hoped to illustrate is how the plight of women hasn’t really changed.  Many women are still holding down the fort, today, as the overworked and under-appreciated heads of single parent households.  The parts of Isla’s life that don’t have to do with Tristan are relevant because, well, her life doesn’t revolve around Tristan.  Or any man.

We, as women, need to start expecting a little more of ourselves, and our literary heroines, than singing “some day my prince will come.”

Today’s Good Deed

I don’t know this woman from Adam, but I and a couple of other bloggers and internet types are sharing her story in the hopes of helping her out.  Her, and her children.  My viewpoint is, if you only help those you know, then all you’re really doing is limiting the circle of people you can know.  Limiting the circle of your influence and thus, ultimately, the people who are some day going to be in a position to help you.  Dieter Uchtdorf observed that while “the what informs, the why transforms.”  And the why of helping anyone is always the same, or should be: to pay it forward.  Regardless of what form Deity takes in your life, whether you conceive of it as a God, or Gods, Mother Nature or higher reasoning, Deity has already blessed you.  That you have the ability to sit here, right now, reading this is a blessing in just about every respect.

Which is also, I suspect, why President Uchtdorf counsels us too that “by becoming the answer to someone’s prayer, we often find the answers to our own.”  All too often, we limit our participation in the world around us: out of doubt, or fear, or simple greed.  But here’s a woman, a family, who needs your help and for whom your Starbucks run fun money could mean the difference between life and death.

Let’s be the change, people.

So How Should I Market My Book?

My post yesterday has left a number of people wondering, so if I’m not supposed to pay for advertising, then what am I supposed to do?

And that’s a good question.  Also important to remember, however, is that when it comes to these issues there is no “one size fits all” solution.  People sometimes come to me, and others, asking for a sure-fire route to success.  An answer that works for everyone, in every situation.  And there is no such thing.  Or, not understanding my advice, or feeling as though it might not pertain to them, they immediately discard it.  Neither of these approaches is best.  No third party, however well-intentioned, can swoop in and save the day.  We all have to take responsibility for our own success by knowing who we are, what we’re about, and what we’re trying to accomplish.  In writing terms this translates into what we’re writing, why we’re writing it, and who we’re writing it for.  These are questions that no one else can answer for you; and that their advice seems unsuitable to you doesn’t mean, necessarily, that it’s bad advice or even that it is unsuitable to you.  It might merely be advice more meant for another author in a different situation.

The best step any of us can take, as authors, is to commit to being proactive.  If a certain piece of advice seems confusing, or inapplicable, then ask.  Don’t assume.  Ask.  It’s not up to an author who’s never met you to somehow dispense the advice that’s just right for you.  That’s magical thinking.  Moreover, even if they do just so happen to dispense that advice…in what kind of time frame?  Waiting for the universe to come to you is a nice idea, but not a practical one in terms of achieving success.  If you have a specific problem, then blog about it.  Discuss it in a forum.  Ask a trusted friend, whose own success you admire.

Also, keep in mind, too, that no amount of getting your name out there–however you do it–can guarantee anything.  Yes, some things are statistically proven to be more effective.  But when it comes to you, those statistics mean absolutely fuck-all.  Why?  Because a book isn’t a product, like a coffee maker.  If people like a certain brand of coffee maker, say a Keurig, then maybe they’ll like a coffee maker that does the same thing in half the time for half the money.  But when it comes to books…this is a purely personal, purely emotional connection.  It’s a lot less like hawking a coffee maker and a whole lot more like falling in love.

And predicting who’s going to fall in love…it’s about as logical as trying to predict the results of a coin toss from the last coin toss.  As in, you can’t.  All you can do is hedge your bets by trying to present yourself as the best candidate possible.  Which means doing certain things, and not doing others.

As far as what not to do, do not, and I repeat DO NOT become a sales-bot.  No high pressure sell!  More and more, Twitter has become a repository for the truly senseless when it comes to this issue.  Do not do this, or this.  Do not do this, either.

DO give your book away for free.  I shared an excerpt from our forthcoming self publishing tome yesterday.  I still maintain that this is absolutely the best advice either I can give, or you can take.  Letting people actually read your work is the single best thing you can do to get your name out there.  It’s the ultimate “free lunch,” no pressure–not sales, but information technique.  People can read your book, or not.  They can love it, or hate it, or forget about it.  No interaction with you is required, and neither is any commitment–on your part or theirs.

Are you going to see this tactic employed with traditional publishing?  No.  Which is unfortunate, since these days 98% of traditionally published authors are also responsible for marketing their own work.  Which is why I rejected a traditional publishing contract and told the Big Five to go suck an egg.  Among other things, I didn’t want to be hamstrung by being a) responsible for getting my name out there while b) not free to experiment with different ways of actually doing that.  Traditional publishing is, as a whole, concerned about its bottom line.  These aren’t charity organizations.  Your traditional publisher won’t take a lot of the risks that can result in overall better sales, and better long-term career establishment, because while YOU care about your long term career they care about their short term bottom line.  They have no financial incentive to take risks, and to potentially lose a fair bit of money, in the hopes that you’ll some day be a breakout success.  You, on the other hand, have all the incentives–financial and otherwise!

These people are not looking out for you.  They are not “invested in your success.”  They are invested in their own success and will help you to the extent that helping you benefits them.  Imagining that they’ll take a risk on you because that’s what’s “supposed to happen” is magical thinking, and dangerous.  Don’t bet your career on some complete stranger’s supposed goodwill toward you, a complete unknown.

No amount of telling people, “I have a great book” is going to distinguish you from all the other thousands of people claiming the same thing.  There’s something in the order of fifteen million books for sale on Amazon right this minute.  Trying to establish name brand recognition without a product is putting the cart before the horse.  People only care who you are after you’ve given them a reason to care.  Telling them “care who I am” is not giving them a reason.  Which is why the first thing you have to do is make your writing available, and for free.

On Amazon, taking advantage of Amazon’s free promotional deals.  On your website, which you should update early and often.  And where you should pay very close attention to this advice.  All websites are not created equal.  Don’t be 1997 fabulous and don’t write drivel.  Your writing here is an entree into your work.  It’s yet another answer to the age-old question that all good marketing should answer: what’s in it for the other guy?

For example, let’s take our upcoming Self Publishing Is For Losers.  The title being, obviously, a jab at the lingering myth that self published work is somehow less.  Just the other day I got a review on one of my books, commenting that it was “surprisingly good.”  Because, you know, all self published work is (supposedly) drivel.  And that’s a viewpoint that we, as authors, also have to get over.  But I digress.  I could sit here telling you, day after day, right here and on Twitter, that this is a great book and you should buy it and blah blah blah.  What would that accomplish?

Since it doesn’t work on me as a reader, I can’t imagine it would work on anyone else.  First, my idea of “great advice” might not be yours, and if you’re anything like me then you’ve received a lot of “great advice” over the years that was actually terrible.  Second, there’s more than one way to skin a cat–and more than one kind of good advice.  The best advice in the world on, say, growing heirloom tomatoes wouldn’t be terribly useful to me as I’m not much interesting in gardening.  I pay someone else to keep my yard looking nice!  And third…most people really are not sheep.  Even if the claim piques their interest, ultimately they’d like the opportunity to decide for themselves.

So by making excerpts available here, as well as consistently discussing various facets of both the writing and publishing process, I’m giving you a preview–in more ways than one–of the kind of advice my book will contain.  Of the kind of advice that my book on how to write a book already contains.  I’d rather have you buy my book–any of my books–because you’re interested in what I have to say than have you buy it, feel like you were misled about the contents, and be disappointed.

Which is the same approach you should take to fiction: your goal isn’t willy-nilly to sell your book, but to connect your book to the right audience.  That being, the people who already want to read it.  Which brings us back to my “falling in love” analogy.  Take a page from He’s Just Not That Into You and stop beating a dead horse in terms of trying to convince people that they “should” like your book.  They will or they won’t.  Tricking them into buying something they don’t want is only going to end in bad reviews and tears.

So apart from social media, blogging, and of course sharing your work, what else can you do?

Those three are the cornerstone.  Everything else is, to quote an old professor of mine, just gravy.  The crucial point to remember, here, is that building a meaningful following–i.e. not just followers on a Twitter account, or “likes” on a Facebook page, but people who will actually care whether you’ve published your next book–takes time.  A lot of time.  Expecting results overnight is one of the things that leads authors to act stupid and drive away what followers they have.  Or, indeed, spend money they don’t have to spend.

Another great thing you can do is connect with other authors.  Unfortunately, all too often these kinds of interchanges turn into a gigantic pissing contest.  People aren’t so much interested in learning from each other as they are in offering (often useless) critiques in order to prove something to themselves about themselves.  And I’ve got to tell you, I’m not that impressed when I, as a sometime modestly bestselling author, get a boatload of “you’re doing it wrong”-style advice from someone who hasn’t yet completed a manuscript.  Or a short story.  I don’t think, “wow, I’m so impressed, that person must really be able to write.”  I think, “that person is a buffoon.”

It’s sad, too, because authors can help each other.  We can learn from each other and we can promote each others’ work–which, all too often, we don’t.  Blurbing other authors’ books, reviewing those books on your website, offering other authors advice…these are great ways to connect with them, their fans, and potentially new fans for both of you.  Because the more you have to say, particularly online, the more opportunities there are for people to find you.

Which brings me to my last point: be an interesting person.  Be someone whose whose website, whose contributions to the world at large, people actually want to read–irrespective of whether they ever actually buy a book.  On this blog, I talk a fair bit about writing and publishing-related matters, yes; but I also talk about myself.  My family.  My views on the world.  There are people who come here solely to read about my adoption-related posts, because that’s a topic that interests them.  They could care less about my actual books, or the fact that I’m an author at all.

Is this throwing pennies into the pond?  Yes, of course.  But it all is.  The idea that there’s some special way to develop, as Bruce Lee said, “laser-like focus” and be so aware of the world around you that you just hone in on all the sales overnight is a myth.  You’re a writer, not a comedian or a fitness personality or whatever.  Ultimately, people are going to buy your books or not buy your books based on whether your books are any good.  Everything else you do is in service to that: making it as easy as possible for people to decide, for themselves, whether your books are any good.  For themselves being the key thing here.  If “buy my book” were all it took, then a whole lot of people would be a whole lot more successful than they are.

Self Publishing Is For Losers Excerpt: Give It Away

The following chapter, which is excerpted from the forthcoming Self Publishing Is For Losers, addresses in more detail (one of the many forms of) free advertising as opposed to paid.  My advice–both that paid advertising can do more harm than good, in emptying your bank account without providing much in the way of reward–and the supposition it’s based on, that you can’t control your sales, are unpopular with some people.  Because really, this isn’t the advice any of us want.  We’d all rather hear that there’s an easy and certain path to success and that our hard work, vision, and ambition will be rewarded.

But the whole premise of this book, and of this website, is that my job isn’t to give you the advice you want but the advice you need.  My goal, here, is to help you succeed.  Because I want you to succeed; I want me to succeed.  I want us all to make it and I believe that, if we work together, we all can.

Chapter Fourteen

Give It Away

So let’s say that, up until this point, you’ve been following our advice. You have an awesome website that you update regularly, with your thoughts on all sorts of interesting topics. You’re forging new connections with other writers and potential readers. You’re making a conscientious effort to limit your time spent on writing-related activities and instead to focus the bulk of your writing time on actual writing. You’re committed to building up your backlist, and with books of the highest quality possible.

Now what?

People are visiting your site, and reading your posts. They’re beginning to know who you are. But how do you convince them to read your books?

By giving them away.

Yes, really.

Many writers are extremely hesitant to do this, fearing that by giving their books away they’re denying themselves the chance at ever making any real money. This attitude is symptomatic of what’s known as the scarcity mentality: the view of life as having only so much. Only so much success to go around, only so much happiness. Give away a few free copies of your book, they reason, and you’re giving away your opportunity to ever earn those dollars. Unsurprisingly, people with this mentality have a very difficult time with the whole idea. Writing posts seems like doing something for nothing; tweeting seems like an equally pointless waste of time. And giving their books away, most of all, seems like failure.

You need to reject this mentality. This mentality will prevent you from succeeding. Instead of seeing other writers as colleagues and sources of support, you’ll see them as competition. Instead of being generous with your wisdom, you’ll guard it jealously in the fear that helping someone else will only help them to surpass you. And in so doing, you’ll isolate yourself.

You can’t succeed, if you’re closing yourself in like this.

So instead you need to adopt the abundance mentality. The abundance mentality is a worldview, which accepts that there’s more than enough success to go around. That by sharing of yourself—your wisdom, your time, and indeed your writing—you’re giving success to the world. Success that you’ll one day earn back, in spades. Whereas the scarcity mentality looks at success as something you take, the abundance mentality looks at success as something you give.

You are in charge of your own success.

Remember that, because it’s true.

Giving away free books, or sharing your wisdom about writing, or the publishing process, isn’t going to limit your success because you are in charge of your own success. Your success flows from you. From your attitude. From your choices. And when you realize this, you’ll realize too that sharing yourself with the world doesn’t limit you. In fact, quite the opposite: it opens doors to all kinds of new and exciting creative possibilities.

Ask yourself: are you worried that the ten, or even hundred books that you give away would have been the only books you ever sold? Are you hoping to sell just ten, or a hundred books? Or are you hoping to sell thousands? What are your goals for your career, not just for today or this week—but within the next five years?

The next ten?

Right now, you’re a newbie. Nobody is going to buy your books on the strength of name recognition alone. Nobody, that is, except maybe your mother. As far as most of the world is concerned, you don’t exist. And you’re not going to prove to them that you’re awesome by spamming them with ads—however fancy those ads may be.

Instead, your goal should be to show them that your writing is awesome. And the best way to do that is to make it as easy as possible for them to access your writing. Is asking someone to pay three dollars really that much different than asking someone to pay nothing? Psychologically, yes. Three dollars is a cup of coffee; on the other hand, everyone likes free. Getting a freebie makes people feel special, and the sheer fact of something being free makes it seem more exciting than it otherwise would. Like a present!

It’s a lot easier to get people to take a chance on you when you’re giving away presents than when you’re coming to them hat in hand and begging.

Think about how many copies of Fifty Shades of Grey had to circulate the internet before anyone even knew what it was, or who E.L. James was. Did making her writing free to read on various Twilight fan fiction websites hurt her sales? You decide: E.L. James earned an estimated 95 million dollars in 2013.

So what should you do?

First, at a bare minimum, I’d advise making the first at least five chapters of each book available on your website.

For some reason, many writers are convinced that doing so will prevent people from actually buying their books. Which, if that’s the case, then there’s something wrong with their books. Tricking someone into buying a book that they will then dislike is not a good marketing strategy and it certainly doesn’t make for repeat customers. Which you need, if you’re going to make a living from this.

Plenty of people buy a book, think well, this is terrible, and stop reading. And guess what: they’re not going to buy the next book in that series, or the other books in your backlist. Which kind of obviates the point of having a backlist, no? Whereas if someone really likes your preview, even if you’ve put up every chapter but the last, they’ll buy the book just to find out what happens in that last chapter.

In addition to making samples available on your website, you should also offer your book itself for free through Amazon.

When you’re enrolled in Amazon’s Kindle Select program, you can make your e-book available, for free, for limited periods of time. Which is a good idea all the time, but a particularly fantastic idea if you’re writing a series. Every time you release a new book in your series, you can celebrate by making the first book in that series free.

I do this, and it works. Why? Well, think about it: people who’ve never heard of me are that much more likely to read that first book if it’s free. Which is awesome for them, because they’re getting a freebie, and awesome for me, because it’s potentially introducing a new audience to my work. And, even better, if they like that first (free) book, then they’re all the more likely to buy the second—and third, and fourth—installment in the series so they can find out what happens. Far more likely than they would have been, if I hadn’t made the first installment so accessible. It’s the old drug dealer adage: the first hit’s free.

When The White Queen came out, the second volume in The Black Prince Trilogy, I made The Demon of Darkling Reach free for five days.  The Demon of Darkling Reach is, of course, the first book in that series. During that time, I averaged somewhere in the 500’s (or above) per day; when I reached 3,000 free books, I stopped counting.

Which, yes, that’s quite a lot of books—which represent, at least theoretically, quite a lot of missed earnings potential.

Except it’s not money I, therefore, somehow missed out on making.  The people who picked my book up for free are several thousand people who never would have heard of The Demon of Darkling Reach except for it having been free in the first place.  My actual sales greatly increased after the free period was over, because my gamble paid off: people liked the book.  It was, and is, a good book.  Most of them went on to buy the sequel.

And that’s the false dichotomy: the choice wasn’t, make six thousand dollars in five days or lose six thousand dollars in five days but, rather, sell a handful of books because no one’s ever heard of you or help the world to know who you are.  Worrying about your earnings potential before you’ve developed any name recognition is putting the cart before the horse; before you have name recognition, you have no earnings potential.  Focus on letting the world know who you are and on convincing them that you’ve produced a quality product; worry about how many thousands of dollars you can make later.

Within days, my sales figures for The White Queen matched those of The Demon of Darkling Reach. I did end up selling thousands of books—books I wouldn’t have sold but for first achieving name brand recognition. But interestingly, within six weeks, many more people had purchased The Demon of Darkling Reach than had ever downloaded it as a free e-book.

This is the power of name recognition.

Remember that your goal, here, shouldn’t be to score a couple of bucks in the short term but rather to attract a passionate, committed reader who’s excited for your next book. These readers are, over time, going to make the backbone of your career. Courting them is the single best thing you can do to ensure long term career growth. If that means giving away a few books, then so be it. In the long run, you can only benefit.

Yes, this approach takes patience. Sometimes more patience than you’ll feel like you naturally possess—or can summon. Building a readership is not easy. And if succeeding as a writer were easy, then everyone would do it. Recognizing that it might be years before you have a readership sufficient to generate any kind of reliable income can be discouraging.

But the important thing to remember is that this is the key to your success. No amount of gimmicks can, or will, replace the fruits of these labors. Which, unfortunately, is something that a lot of writers just don’t want to hear. They want immediate results, not to spend months or even years building a foundation. That’s boring.

So instead, they spend money. What blows my mind is how many writers aren’t willing to give away even a handful of books, even to friends and family, but are willing to spend tens of thousands of dollars on advertising. Sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Why?

What do they think that advertising campaigns will achieve, that actually letting people read their books won’t?

Another mistake that writers make is spamming their readership—or, even worse, their friends and family—with demands that you need to buy this now. Do not, under any circumstances, do that. Make your book free to download; tell people it’s free to download. Maybe three or four tweets to this effect per day are sufficient. And then leave it alone. Do not put your loved ones in a position where they feel as though they’re supposed to carry you. Financially or otherwise. They are not running a charity and, if you take yourself seriously as a writer, you are not trying to start a charity.

The bulk of your book sales aren’t going to come from people you know, anyway. Or, indeed, people who follow you on Twitter. Those people already know who you are, which is one more reason that spamming your Twitter feed with pleas to buy my book is a mistake: you’re preaching to the converted. They’ll buy your book, or they won’t. All that pressuring them can accomplish is awkwardness and, at worst, lost relationships.

Rather, amazing as it may seem, your sales are mostly going to come from people who’ve never heard of you. People who searched Amazon, or wherever, for a good book to read and who just happened to find you in the process. Your goal isn’t to earn a few bucks off of Uncle Max, or to guilt your mom into buying twelve copies but to reach a completely new population of people who don’t know you and have no reason to care who you are.

Unless you give them one.

Which is what giving your book away accomplishes, in spades.

Once you understand this, you’ll have a much easier time with the whole concept of “free.”

Why Paid Advertising Doesn’t Work

AUTHOR’S NOTE: There are follow-up posts to this one here and here.

As an author, if there’s one thing you should avoid, it’s paid advertising.

Well, truthfully, there are a lot of things you should avoid.  But most of these things, authors seem to know they need to avoid.  At least in theory.  Like writing a bad book, or foregoing copy editing.  Typos are bad.  We know this.  Plagiarizing someone else’s work, that’s bad, too.  But what about, post-writing, post-production, actually selling your book?  That’s where, for the most part, people seem to run into trouble.

The concept of paid advertising represents, in and of itself, a fundamental disconnect.  If you show them the book, the reasoning goes, then they’ll want to buy the book.  The disconnect lies in the complete absence of a logical tie-in between if and then.  If X, then Y–but why?  Why should knowing of the book’s existence have this effect on people?  People pour a lot of money into advertising without any real sense of how it’s supposed to work.  There’s a certain, “and then a miracle occurs” mentality, with the supposed “miracle” replacing logic.  Nobody’s really sure how throwing money at the problem is supposed to sell a book, but there’s a general consensus that it does.  Most of the “logic” here centers on justifying the decision to spend, rather than on rationally analyzing whether it’s a good one.

In real life, I’m a huge fan, both personally and professionally, of Peter Lynch.  His investing philosophies are, of course, very well known and can be summed up in the nutshell statement of invest in what you know.  Famously, the basis of his Magellan Fund was all products that his wife used.  Living with her had taught him why no-run pantyhose were a thrilling invention, why Tampax was the superior tampon brand and what a wonder bra was and why anyone cared.  Investing might be hard, and take a certain degree of specialized knowledge, but it’s also not magic.  Behind the layers of financial calculus are concrete, rational principles that make sense.  If, then.  X, then Y.

What makes you, as a consumer, want to buy a book?  If you haven’t personally bought a book, because an ad popped up in your Facebook newsfeed, then don’t sink money into a Facebook marketing campaign.  If you aren’t personally already trolling the various “promote your book” services, looking purely for something to read, then don’t sink money into that, either.  You, the consumer, are the single best determiner of what actually sells books–because you’ve been buying books your whole life.

Listen to yourself.  Yes, every Tom, Dick and Larry seems to have some “sell more books now”-type gimmick, and they’re all hawking it at you.  And yes, they’ll all tell you that this works!  This produces great results!  But, realistically, what are they doing to say?  Give us your money, because we want iPads, too?

Recognize that there’s no such thing as a free lunch.  People aren’t out to “sell your book” for altruism.  If they were, then they’d be doing it for free.  They’re trying to make a buck, just like you are.  And if this service is really so great at connecting readers and books, then how come you’ve never heard of it purely as a reader?  How come you’re not already using it?  The temptation is to ignore these questions, because they tend to suggest that there might not be a simple way to ensure sales.  Which, of course, there isn’t.  And that’s a frightening prospect to new authors.  Which is why it’s important, too, to understand that to some degree marketing is always going to be predatory.  The point of marketing is to sell something; only in this case, a great many companies and individuals are taking advantage of your uncertainty by selling their products to you.

They’re tapped into what makes you tick.  Just like all those Palace Pets ads are tapped into what makes the average Disney Junior viewer tick.  Or how I always end up buying the same brand of (Gap) jeans, because they promise to reduce my butt.  Or, indeed, how I ended up buying the TreadClimber.  These products may work, or they may not, but their pitches all rely on the same principle.  Still, common sense is how you end up with a TreadClimber instead of an Abtronic.  The statement that “this will work” should never be taken as de facto proof of the advertiser’s claims.  Again, what are they going to say?

When you want to sell a book, make like Peter Lynch and go with what you know.

Don’t engage in the same magical thinking that has led people to lose their shirts in the stock market, buying into the fantasy that there’s some “secret formula” for success that you just don’t understand.  That’s snake oil.  People are always selling snake oil.  Recognize that risk is normal and healthy and a frightening, if also necessary, component of success.  Anyone who promises to sell your book for you is like someone who promises a certain fixed rate of return: a liar.  Your book may sell or it may not; no amount of advertising can fix the game or even the odds.

So what can you do?

You can do the same things that work for you, and on you, as a reader.  You can offer a high quality product, at a reduced rate or for free (more on how to do this in the upcoming self publishing guide).  You can wait patiently for reviews to come in.  You can learn from those reviews.  You can build a web presence, over time, relying on meaningful content rather than gimmicks.  And you can, of course, keep writing.

None of the marketing tactics I outline on this blog, or in Self Publishing Is For Losers, require money.  I don’t believe in paid advertising, because I don’t believe that it works.  And, when Self Publishing Is For Losers is released, it’s going to be free for the first five days.  So you won’t have to pay for that advice, either.

Why?  Because I really am serious when I say that we writers should stick together.  That there isn’t enough interest, broadly, among writers, in helping each other.  We can be a parasitic bunch, operating on a scarcity rather than an abundance mentality.  I don’t want to trick anyone into buying my books; and when it comes to my nonfiction, I really just want to share what I know.  What’s going to make my books sell, or not sell, isn’t having access to some secret, specialized knowledge but writing a good book.  And I am, first and foremost, a novelist; I want to make a living, because people genuinely like my stories.

I hope this information is helpful.

I know I have a lot of readers out there, but most of you rarely, if ever comment.  Tell me: what topics would you like to see me cover?  Either craft-related, or about my own books, or about my own life?  What would you like to know more about?  I’d love to hear your input.

Update: A Dictionary of Fools

A Dictionary of Fools is written, and has been for some time.  Welcome to the world of publishing!  Seriously, though, DOF is at the copy editor right now and should be returning sometime around the end of next week.  After which point, you can expect a release date of…I want to say before Thanksgiving?  It’s tough to speculate on release dates, until they’re actually set, but I can say with certainty that DOF is definitely hitting shelves sometime during the holiday season.  I will, of course, keep you updated.

In the meantime, part of Kisten’s story, which appears in DOF, has also been released as a separate novella: The Prisoner.  The Prisoner is both a stand alone story, for those who have no interest in the larger House of Light and Shadow cycle, as well as an intriguing look into Kisten’s past.  The Price of Desire picks up some years after where The Prisoner leaves off; the events in The Prisoner shed some light into how he became the man he did.

But A Dictionary of Fools tells a broader story: of love, choices, and intrigue.  Of deception, war, and pain.  Of families during wartime, and the saga that is empire.

Zombie Apocalypse?

People ask me all the time why we have so much food storage in the basement.  Or rather, they don’t ask; they tease, based on a certain set of assumptions.  “Are you preparing for the zombie apocalypse?”  “How do you think the world is going to end?  They’re invariably disappointed when I confirm that, yes, we have 12–18 months’ worth of food storage in our basement at any given time and no, I don’t think the world is going to end.  I’m not preparing for the end of the world, or for anything in particular; except tomorrow.

I’ve said before that, at least for someone who writes about demons and cannibalism and incest all day, I’m surprisingly boring.  In real life, when not dwelling on whether I’ve achieved the right sex to story ratio for the upcoming modern-day romantic trilogy, I worry about things like budgeting.  Probably at least in part due to the circumstances of my childhood, I have a morbid fear of running out.  Of not having enough.  No, not enough purses and makeup; I could care less.  Enough food.  Enough water.  Enough roof over my head.  So naturally, food storage–like all sensible methods of preparedness–helps with those that, in that it is sensible.

The simplest way to think about food storage is as a second bank account.  One, ideally, should have both an emergency savings of cash and an emergency savings of food.  So that when tough times hit, you aren’t relying on your credit cards to get by.  The principle is simple, not to mention old as the hills: put some by in times of plenty, so it’s there in times of want.  I read and re-read the Little House books when I was a child, and The Long Winter in particular made a lasting impression on me.  Laura’s future husband and his brother survived handily, while others starved, because they’d saved.  They did not, however, share.  And, regardless of one’s religious (or political) beliefs, I think a decent person should share.  Why this woman would have grown up to marry a man who’d felt no guilt, eating his dinner, while he knew perfectly well that she was starving…well, that’s a topic for another day.

These days, tough times revolve more around job loss, and unexpected expenses–medical bills, etc.  It’s a good thing, to be able to help people by bringing them groceries.  Groceries from my basement, yes, but groceries nonetheless.

My husband and I have been together a long time now.  We’ve been impoverished students, unemployed parents, successful attorneys.  And through it all, we’ve had food storage.  Which, at times, we’ve had to rely on.  That was a long time ago now and, I’m grateful to say, a comparatively short period in our lives; far more often, we’ve been grateful for our food storage because it meant not going out in a blizzard for milk.

I’m not going to lie: living frugally takes discipline and, much like being on, say, a long term diet, there are times when you mess up.  Fall off the wagon.  Sometimes you get right back on, and sometimes you don’t.  Making the decision that what you can afford to spend isn’t simply the number in your bank account means going without some things that other people in your life are going to have.  I know people, mainly through my old job, who constantly post pictures of themselves in exotic locales.  Do I feel a stab of jealousy?  Of course!  I know that many of these people are up to their eyeballs in credit card debt (because they’re not making a secret of that fact), but it’s still hard.  Being able to say, I have no credit card debt at all is cold comfort, when the green-eyed monster is upon you.

When we bought our house–it was a short sale, and we also own it free and clear–it was a disaster.  I mean, there was a reason no one else wanted this house.  Fortunately for us, the problems (re: Reynolds Wrap wallpaper) were all cosmetic.  The house had good bones, it was just hideous.  So we put our painting and woodworking (and cleaning!) skills to use, and a few years later the same people who’d ridiculed us for buying the place were overcome by how awesome it looked.

Which is a useful metaphor for writing a book–for doing anything, really.  You have to be able to visualize why you’re doing this, and perceive benefits in the actual process rather than in simply the reward.  Because the reward may be a very long time in coming.  If you don’t know why you’re saving a quarter of your income, or why you’ve got so much wheat in the basement, or why you’re spending a portion of each day writing a book, then you’re never going to do anything useful with any of these things.

Food storage, like writing, like saving, like everything else, is about potential.  Freedom.  The freedom to live according to your own standards, to make choices according to your own heart.  It’s not the zombie apocalypse at some far-off time but taking a leap and publishing a book today.  Deciding to quit your day job and write full time today.

PS: For those of you interested in learning more about the brand of food storage we use, click here.  For those of you who’d like to chat with our friendly consultant, who’s been a tremendous help to our family in assessing and planning for our food storage needs, click here.  I don’t sell Thrive Life (I couldn’t sell air conditioners to Hell) and am not affiliated with Thrive Life in any way; I just like their food.  It tastes good.  And it kept me fed while writing The Price of Desire, which I did while bedridden during my “near death” phase.