Confessions: Fandom Style.

You know that question, if no one’s around and a tree falls in a forest, does it make a sound? Last year I had a similar question, if an author publishes a book, with zero promotion, a cheesy title, cover and pen name will anyone read it?

Okay, okay, let me back up.

There are times as an author that you hit low points. Your books are just not really doing anything. Your readers seem sort of “meh.” You watch those around you gaining popularity (book deals and selling movie rights) that seems to come from some sort of wishing well of luck. Last February I hit a low point. I was tired. I’d written several books and published them. I had one out with my editors. I was bored. And frankly, as I watched another former fanfiction author gain a gazbillion (estimated amount) dollar publishing deal I felt defeated.

I’ve spoken openly about my thoughts on pull 2 publish. I’ve always been a bit middle ground. Back in my querying agent days I was told NEVER MENTION YOUR BACKGROUND IN FANFICTION. Instant rejection. It was sort of ingrained in my head that this was not the route to take. Keep the fanfiction in one part of your writing life and keep original fiction in another. Which really wasn’t hard. Once I started in the world of original fiction I couldn’t imagine turning back. I didn’t have the energy to immerse myself into a fandom like that (I even toyed with an Arrow fic for a minute before I went back to OF). For me, writing original fiction was where I wanted to go in storytelling. P2P seemed like the easy way out. Cheating. Lazy.

Obviously, my BFF AG feels this way, times a million. There have been times that we’ve disagreed on it to an extent. At some point after 50sog hit it big I had to say, “Whatever,” because Simon and Shuster DOES NOT CARE. In fact, they care so little they just keep doing it. I realized even more that this was the case this year at Dragon*Con and NYCC that no one cares as I passed booth after booth of derivative books. In fact, they actually slap this information across the front and stock it in Target.

Sigh.

Last year I found myself angered and depressed to know that what I felt was “right” was something the industry was more than willing to cash in on. Also? Increasingly, it felt like every P2P announced gained more attention and notice than the original fiction writers in our former/ongoing community. So what did I do about this anger and emotion? Well, I broke out my laptop, pulled up my documents and opened my favorite short story, The Merman.

What’s The Merman? Several years before, when I was in the middle of writing Wraith and FanGirl a friend asked me to enter a fanfic short story contest. 10k words, the theme was Boys with Boards. It was midsummer and if you know me at all, you realize I have an infatuation with summer, pools and lifeguards. This gave me an opportunity to write something for fun. Ten thousand words was the limit and the funny thing is that I could write about these characters forever. No, not Bella and Edward. I realized I only had their names in the story once or twice each. There was little canon. I based it on my imagination, my pool and the hottie lifeguard my friends and I had been stalking for years. The MC wasn’t Edward. He had another name entirely. Dialogue was taken directly from conversations I had with my friends. Was it fanfiction. Yes. Was it original fiction? Yes.

So hostile, depressed and tired of my regular work I cracked open this story that I loved so much and messed with it. I added 20k words in two weeks. I sent it to a beta (the only person who knew I was doing this.) And then I decided I was going to experiment with the publishing world.

If an author publishes a book, with zero promotion, a cheesy title, cover and pen name will anyone read it? Even better what if it was an erotic romance? Half-naked guy on the cover? THE most cheesy pen name in the history of pen names? I decided to give it a try. I told no one but two friends. One other author and one of my betas. They’ve kept my secret to this day.

I even documented my situation. How I felt about it (guilty). My fears (AG would never talk to me again). My hypocrisy (TOTAL HYPOCRITE). IF AG started talking to me again would she forgive my covers? Sigh. I’d toed the line for so long and it had gotten me nowhere but treading water in a pool of books. And in my heart of hearts I LOVED The Merman story. Loved it. I hated that it was out of my reach.

In early March 2013 I posted The Merman under another name and a fake pen name. I set up a Facebook and Goodreads account. I have a second twitter. I go to each of them about once every 3 months. I do not cross promote off my Angel Lawson page. This fall, once I finished the first draft of Wraith 3, I pulled it out the characters and wrote a second novella to add to the first one and published it a couple weeks ago.

So the big questions were this? What happens?

Did I sell books? Yeah. I sold books. I sold more of Taboo than I did of Vigilant. I sold more of Taboo than I did of FanGirl. It sold more with zero promotion. No advertising. No friends retweeting. No blog tours or Facebook giveaways. Nothing. In fact, it has sold double than those books did where I DID do all the blog tours and asked for reviews, and used my street team.

Did it make the best seller list? Not even close.

Does anyone notice? Well, two people noticed. They separately DM’ed to see if it was me writing it or was there a plagiarizer out there. Nope, just me being shady as hell.

So how do I feel now? Well, the world didn’t turn on its axis. I left The Merman up on FF.net because I’d added 20k words (now about 45k words with book 2). Will people hate me for being a lying liar and a hypocrite? Maybe. Will AG ever talk to me again? OMG I DON’T KNOW! (I’m too scared to tell her. Honestly, telling her is the one thing that has made me keep this secret for so long. I don’t want the blow back to fall on her because trust, she didn’t know and those P2P police are nasty.)

So there. I’ve confessed. I feel better but in about ten minutes I’ll feel horrible. At this point probably no one cares but me.