UK Amazon Kindle Forum discussion
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Why do you write?
With different characters, and a different plot, maybe...
I write so my ideas aren't stolen telepathically my other authors. I'm still reeling about that blonde woman on the train who brain hoovered that idea I had for the potty school of wizards.
Ha! I love your response, Darren. (YES!! I'm blessed!)
Tim, I had that problem with my last book.I retained it all and with a bit of effort it can be reworked. Whatever you do, don't junk it!
I dumped about 30k from my last novel too, just because I was fickle about the story and it didn't fit anymore. On the other hand, I'm really enjoying writing with pen and paper at the minute and finding it quite liberating having no idea how much I've written.
Tim wrote: "With different characters, and a different plot, maybe..."Still worth a quid on kindle :-)
Don't you believe it, Jim. Strictly Murder (all 75K of it) sold a steady 5 - 6 copies a month at £2.99 on Amazon. I reduced it to 99pence in early December - since when it's sold a steady 4 copies a month. Doh?
Jim wrote: "Tim wrote: "With different characters, and a different plot, maybe..."Still worth a quid on kindle :-)"
Not with my selling ability!
I had a drop in sales when I did a Countdown deal. Maybe if I double the price I'll sell double the books?
I have only been releasing work since December. I want to build a fan base, but at the moment I must admit I just want to write. I'm not sure where I can find a fan base, especially for my Bumpkinton stories. I can't pin down what category those would fall in to.Some are cutesy and village-y, the one I'm writing now is a little bit ruder and I fear could scare away the readers of the first expecting them all to be all very cutesy.
I suppose I'll find a middle ground, hopefully for readers who just like gentle humour with the odd risqué joke thrown in.
I'm really enjoying my writing at the moment. I don't think about becoming a millionaire. That's a dream and I know it'll never be realised. If I can get a group of fans who really are enthused by my stories that would be an amazing feeling, knowing that something that starts life as a small idea blossoms into something people can't wait to read.
It'll be along road, but a worthwhile one I think :)
I've got a fan base. Trouble is, I'd also like some fans to go on it... ;)
One of your fans has a substantial base. I've never fallen over when sitting down!
Matthew wrote: "I have only been releasing work since December. I want to build a fan base, but at the moment I must admit I just want to write. I'm not sure where I can find a fan base, especially for my Bumpkint..."I find it best to just write for myself and hope readers come along with me. Writing for what you think your fans might like leads to formula and that's only good for American babies to throw up.
I do write for myself. That doesn't mean I wouldn't like to find a readership. Although I mention that the next story is different from the 1st in the series, I just hope it doesn't put people off buying the third in series as the first 2 are quite different.Other than that, I write for myself and enjoy it. I don't write specifically trying to please certain types :)
Will wrote: "Dear Mrs Styne.Not only are you wrong, but I am arranging for your entire Pratchett collection to be confiscated as a penalty.
Sincerely,
Sue Grabbit and Runne, solicitors and bookies' runners.
"
If I was you, I'd reconsider. Most of our Pratchett books belong to No. 2 daughter.
She bites.
I think, at heart, we all write for ourselves, to get these stories out of our heads. However, if we want to make any money or a career out of a writing, then we have to consider our readers.An author once said, 'the reader is God.' Okay, not quite, but I do see what she means. I'd soon lose readers if I did something (in my books) that they didn't like. Kill off a favourite character, have my heroine constantly jilted. No, I know what they're hoping for in each book of mine, and I'd better make damn sure I deliver it.
I've always set out to write something I would enjoy reading myself. I'm quite certain that my tastes are far from unique, so, based on that, I assume that if I like the stories I write, others out there will like them too. The difficulty is getting those others out there with the same taste as me to be aware of the books I have written.
I have thought long and hard about this question and my answer is this.I write because I can't help it because however distressing and hard it is, I can't not. And what I want for it is simple, one day I want the action figures lined up along my desk to be my own characters.
Cheers
MTM
Action figures have to be as good a reason as any :~)
Yeh, if I can't have a real snurd, I'll take a model.
I think that's a particularly bleak picture but I can believe it... sigh.
Interesting read, Jim although my sympathies for Mr Thomson were lessened by the picture of him outside his office on the South Bank. Don't complain about having no spare money if you're renting office space in the heart of London.
I'm glad I'm not the only person who picked up on that bit Andy. My sympathy evaporated almost entirely at that point!
Yeh, I agree. I can believe there are a lot of writers who are not weathering the credit crunch well but that read to me like someone trying to make a point that isn't really there. Personally, I think he does have a point but that he was the wrong author to choose for that example. Better would be that bloke who wrote Apocalypse Cow, who won the Terry Pratchett novel prize and was clearly given a lot of very bad advice (don't do a book tour etc) so got very little out of it.Cheers
MTM
I write because I love it and becuase otherwise all the stories would explode out of my brain.
What gets me is I never even knew there was a boom time. Freelance journalism never had one
Random ideas unfolded in my mind last night for a story I'm not even gonna start writing for about 6 months yet. So, I was up late making notes to get them out of mind so I could sleep! :)
Jim wrote: "What gets me is I never even knew there was a boom time. Freelance journalism never had one"I didn't either, all I heard was how it was getting harder and harder to get an agent, that no publishers were open to submissions, that most agents were closed to submissions too... in short that the fist was gripping tighter and tighter and we were all spilling out through the cracks between the fingers. Just displays another inconsistency in this article, I guess.
Cheers
MTM
One of my characters has a boom time. It occurs shortly after the words, "three... two... one!"However I note that of the various "things I do", writing takes by far the most time, and brings in virtually nothing in return. But I do enjoy it. It does worry me how long I can afford to keep doing it though (i.e., not very).
Tim wrote: "One of my characters has a boom time. It occurs shortly after the words, "three... two... one!"However I note that of the various "things I do", writing takes by far the most time, and brings in ..."
I hear you Tim. At least when I wrote corporate puff I earned something.
Patti (baconater) wrote: "Or, more to the point, why do you publish?Reading this article that Will posted in the morning thread got me wondering.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014...-...
Is it the fame? The riches? The adoration of your fans?"
None of the above apply...
I write to explore my ideas on fiction, it's relation to reality and to try and show the almost endless possibilities of language and narrative form that that has barely been touched by the novel apart from when the literary modernists were writing. Anyone who joins me for the ride is a bonus.
Tim wrote: "One of my characters has a boom time. It occurs shortly after the words, "three... two... one!"..."Well, the do say a mine is a terrible thing to waste.
I say mine a lot, usually when pointing at shiny things. Doesn't work though!
Tim wrote: "One of my characters has a boom time. It occurs shortly after the words, "three... two... one!"However I note that of the various "things I do", writing takes by far the most time, and brings in ..."
Yes, I've earned more from one article on Summer Mastitis than from any of my books :-(
I write because it is inside work with very little heavy lifting.
Hard to take an author who was given £100k for 2 books seriously when they plead poverty...
Darren wrote: "Hard to take an author who was given £100k for 2 books seriously when they plead poverty..."I made 26p yesterday...
Awesome!Can I have a sherbet fountain, please? I've never had a sherbet fountain.
That's 26p more than me, Tim - but I did leave you a review for SFC. :)
Tim wrote: "Darren wrote: "Hard to take an author who was given £100k for 2 books seriously when they plead poverty..."I made 26p yesterday..."
Serious money that. Lucky we writers are used to big money situations. I once calculated my income from full time agriculture and realised that during the previous financial year I'd been working for 9p an hour
I'm glad you're not doing dairy anymore Jim.Tesco is screwing them, big time.
Actually it's getting funny now. A lot of English Dairy farmers have joined Arla Foods which is a Swedish-Danish cooperative. (Now Swedish-Danish-English) If the price of UK milk drops the co-op just moves it to its European plants. All farmers, in whatever country, get the benefit.
So this January, when the UK milk buyers were talking the price down, Arla actually put their price up. This means that Tesco (who buy some of Arla anyway) has to put its price up or its suppliers will just shift to supplying Arla.
The current milk price war is even more interesting, as for one, the retailers fighting it cannot just pass the price cut onto their suppliers, because their suppliers have somewhere else to go :-)
Oh but how the tears have poured down my withered cheeks :-)
That's great! I was completely unaware of that!I wonder what's happening in Canada.
DD is there. Stuff will be happening.
Lynda wrote: "That's 26p more than me, Tim - but I did leave you a review for SFC. :)"Just seen it - thanks Lynda :D
Will it re-work as a 'stand alone' story?