I have no problem with a sample chapter or two or a detailed synopsis. That’s always been available and books can be read for free if borrowed from a library. That’s fine and I have no problem with that. I know all about samples (and a lot of wineries–the one where I work included–charge a small fee for a tasting program) and how they can generate sales.
What bothers me most about the free offers of any kind of artistic work–music, movies, books, etc–is that it gives many people the idea that the created work now belongs to the public at large and paying for it seems like highway robbery. The outcry against piracy is treated like a joke or the artists demanding pay for their work are considered to be greedy. I also have a big problem with buying used media (books, music, movies) for the same reason. I want my favorite authors and artists to continue to create and, unfortunately, it takes money to make a living. I’m not expecting my writing to support me right off the bat, but if getting paid royalties helps me to eliminate one of the other two jobs (yes, writing IS a job) then I can perhaps devote more time to the writing. I doubt I’d still be selling wine or decorating cakes for the sheer joy and artistic expression if I weren’t getting paid for it. I have to eat and pay rent, too.
And while no pay will not keep me from writing, it will, after a while, keep my publisher from publishing.
Sorry, Ed, I know this went off on a tangent, but my writers’ group met last week and one woman who writes a lot of online fan fiction (another pet peeve of mine, but enough for now!) made the comment that she would much rather have a global audience than make big bucks for her work. This was after I had given everyone in the group an invitation to my book launch party and signing. The fact that part of her success was due to the fact that she was basing her stories on wildly popular characters created by someone else and that most online fanfic sites don’t have an editor apparently did not cross her mind. And big bucks isn’t why I got into writing in the first place. I fought the temptation to self-publish for a long time. I was fortunate enough to find a friend and mentor in an author from an independent publishing house whose work I liked and he encouraged me to keep working and submitting. And you are right, promo work is actually a lot harder than WRITING the book in the first place! I’ve spent a lot of time getting the word out about my novel and praying like crazy for enough commercial success for my publisher to keep wanting to publish my books so I can have time to write them!
We can’t let other people’s ideas of fame distract us. It’s good that you have found a friend and mentor, and publisher. When me and friend got into publishing, we only knew we loved telling stories. We learned off the seat of our pants. I called around, in those pre-internet days, to get the best price and quality printing. I tracked down the distributors, my friend learned the business end, which included promotion and legal matters.
We hoped to make a living doing it and we did. But as things changed over the last two decades, we had to keep up with the business side (thank you, Wall Street, for the Second Great Depression). So some of our books are print on demand and some are traditional press runs. The print on demand books cost more but the quality has gotten to the point that they are very close to the regular press copies. If we didn’t do this, there would be holes in our backlist, and we pay less money by not doing a standard press run.
Promotion is based on a simple question: “Based on the subject matter and genre, who is most likely to buy my book?” I’ve compiled a list of places to promote what we do and we have our own web site and online store. I had to a lot of research to find those places. Thanks to the strange decision of one national book chain to go out of business and another’s desire to kill itself by small cuts by selling a reader, things have gotten strange. I walk into a bookstore filled with books, magazines and newspapers. A gentleman comes up to me with a device and basically says, “You see all that paper here? You don’t have to buy it. Just buy one of these.” To which I would like to respond, “Then close your doors now, because you are purposely killing yourself by having to rent/lease a store.”
But cooler heads have prevailed. The ridiculously crazy hype over e-books has settled and independent bookstores are doing just fine. I guess it didn’t occur to anybody that the average person has only so much time in a week to read X number of books, even if they’re free. The literacy rate has not gone up either.
So I say, take a chance, keep writing, and take it a day at a time. It took us several years to get off the ground, and about five more until the money was really rolling in.
And I get phone calls on a regular basis from people looking for a bookstore (we don’t have a retail store). People want paper. People do not want to spend their day staring at a screen, only to go home and stare at another.
And mentors - people with experience - were invaluable to us. Our local artist and writer contacts helped a lot.
If you have any questions, feel free to ask. But I just want to stress that just because others do it their way in no way reflects on your work, or should influence your goals.
Ed
