Monday means I'm home

[kinzel]

Had a blast at AlbaCon and was sorry that this time around I couldn't stay the Sunday night ... on the other hand it was a beautiful ride home, amazingly trouble free, with blue skies, blazing colors of red green gold on the trees and traffic that just flowed, even around Boston.

Got back to the state O' Maine at sundown -- pretty exactly sundown. Which means I came over the border-marking  Piscataqua River Bridge,  which was brightly sunlit at the top but elsewise in shadow, descended into shade, and pulled into the first  tree-lined rest & welcome area, stretched, and the GPS went from day view to night view, telling me I was 2:00 hours from my destination.

Saw lots of old friends and folks at Albacon and met some new ones; got a chance briefly hang out with various of the writers, which was good, and had a small Liaden Lounge, complete with banner, which I failed to to document. I think there were some folks with cameras in the room -- if so, can you point me to photos?

So anyway, now I have all these piles of things to take care of, which  I guess I should do.

Eventually I need to talk at length about my thoughts on "publishing and social media"  ... they've been jelling over the last few conventions.

One  immediate point: I believe that mavens like Cory Doctorow -- inadvertence at work or not I can't say -- has convinced people that being a celebrity equates being a success as a writer, and that one can, in fact one ought to skip the stages of "normal" publishing.

Thus we have some young writers (that is, new or wannabes in the field, no matter their age) spending more time on "building their base", "interconnection", "branding", than on writing or creating.  Right -- it is useful for a writer to have a Facebook presence or to have followers on twitter. Want to follow my tweets?-- I'm Bechimo -- you can. You may have already found my LJ, and I'm building another web presence, too ... but to spend the first three years of your career telling people that you're going to be a writer worth following is leaving something out: a real reason for readers to be interested.  I mean John Scalzi was an overnight success, right?  I've seen and heard him pointed to that way, but overnight success?  Ummmm, no. That success was more than 10 years in the making ... and it came through real hard work, not from being viral.

So John gave people a reason to read him, and so did Doctorow, and so can any writer who writes, has talent, and who can reach the people. Reaching the people doesn't start the process -- having 17,000 Facebook friends doesn't mean you can write your way out of a paper plane.  Worse, the more would-be writers who crow their success stories before they have one, the less likely readers are to follow any single one.

I/we have been accused of being among the Oft Published Elite, and thus of being willfully In The Way of The Coming Thing.  But, you know, part of that being in the way is the weight of a few million actually published words, a few unsolicited awards, and guest convention appearances across North America, and readers willing to trust us with their hopes and money because we 1) have time in grade and 2) have performed more or less to spec for over 25 years.

And that's one immediate point because a publisher is waiting for our next three proposals, and I've only got one in the can.

Comments

[jonquil.livejournal.com]

"being a celebrity equates being a success as a writer, "

Yes, THIS. And the publishers have bought into this. I know someone who sold her first novel and got, mirabile dictu, serious attention from the publicity department. Not only did they want her to have a Twitter and Facebook presence, but they felt her existing blog didn't brand her well enough and wanted a redesign.

For a book that the publisher was pushing hard in marketing and publicity -- yes, I know, she's a unicorn -- they felt a social presence was required. Which is a heavy burden on a writer; not only do you have to write, but you have to be charming online.

[laurajunderwood.livejournal.com]

Thank you. I published my first article in '73 and my first short story in '88--and my first novel in 2002.

Over 300 pieces of publishing (spanning nearly 40 years) and I wait patiently for success and recognition. ;-)

Oh joy!

[(Anonymous)]

A publisher wants THREE proposals? Oh, joy!

Anne in Virginia

[elektra.livejournal.com]

I went to a bunch of the panels at Albacon. While some seemed to point that way (and I agree with you 100% about cart before the horse), others had a lot of good ideas about how to get folks to look at/read your books, once you actually have some published.

All in all in was a really good con, with definite high points of a very social Liaden Lounge and an almost private reading from Ghost Ship.

Here's hoping that both of our favorite authors will make it next year.

[green-knight.livejournal.com]

My browser crashed, so I can't recall which writer on my flist wrote this some time yesterday, and don't have the spoons to look for the words, but their agent said something along the lines of 'if a new author doesn't have 500 facebook friends, we're not interested'.

Which *hurt*. I don't use FB much (too many privacy concerns) but I've kept the numbers deliberately low so I can read all posts, should I choose to read FB at all. I don't 'friend' people intending to block their content because I want to read my real friends' updates, and I don't have two hours a day to spend on 'building a platform'.

I'm a) working on earning a living and b) spending my time _writing_. You know, the thing where you put words on a page and then try to put better words on more pages? That. Despite being at this for a number of years, I am not there yet - partly because, well, getting there takes time, and partly because I don't write the kind of book where people see the synopsis and say 'this has a built-in audience' - if I want to sell, I need to become good enough that it will get bought _anyway_. I've reached 'love this, but can't sell it' with more than one person - and 450 extra facebook friends won't change that. Becoming a better writer just might.

Equally, agents tell non-fiction writers that they need to have a platform, need to be known, have engagements, spend their time building a career that a book will then be a part of-

.... whereas in the real world (I'm a copy editor. I market myself to publishers. I read publishers' websites. Lots of them. Most of them say 'if you have an interesting idea, contact us') there might be a small market segment where 'platform' sells books (cooking, self-help) but there *still* are publishers, even in those segments, who'll look at the content and the credentials and decide whether to publish or not based on that.

Yet, if you read agency websites, you sometimes get the impression that writers - people who spend their energy writing books - need not apply for a writing career. This isn't helping the industry, because ultimately, readers aren't stupid. They'll buy only so many bad books.

We know *exactly* how many copies pure self-marketing sells. Every self-published title proves it. To go beyond 500 copies, you need to have a good product, a book that other people *want* to reccommend to _their_ friends.

Sorry for the rant.

[damara.livejournal.com]

"And that's one immediate point because a publisher is waiting for our next three proposals, and I've only got one in the can."

I have only one thing to say: YAYYYY!

[(Anonymous)]

While I can understand the business thought process of using a screening tool to determine which writers to works with, I thought that using the inadequate proxy of web site flash, bang and gang instead of evaluating the real product (words that readers will pay money for) only makes sense if you advertently understand the purpose of the exercise. I thought the selection process was supposed to be part of the value add- that only authors I have a high probability of liking make it to the shelves. As a rule, when choosing specialists, one doesn't grade them on other proficiencies.

I suppose its part of the current trend where every person has to always market themselves and extroverts have louder voices in the decision making process.

I once listened to a discussion on small businesses and the speaker made the point that isn't the product that matters, beyond a minimal point, it was marketing and delivery and ....

This reminds me of the industrial food movement, where food items are bred to be easy to process and ship, not be healthy to eat and taste fantastic.

Arrogance is not the same as competence.

Bob

[gilraen2.livejournal.com]

I am SO glad you said this, Steve! I'm not a writer, I'm a reader. I buy books that I want to read. I read about 100 books a year. I buy about 50-80 books a year. I follow you and Sharon on LJ because I am interested in you as people - not necessarily because you write books that I know I will enjoy. I like the fact that you talk about cats, weather, the day job, books YOU have read, and the number of day lilies in the garden. I don't follow people who just talk about what they are writing even if I intend to buy their book when it comes out. And you know, before there was an internet, I still bought and read books. If the internet stopped tomorrow - I'd have even more time and money to buy and read books.

Rock ON

[(Anonymous)]

Welcome back - I just got back from toasty warm (?!?) Wisconsin myself.

I always get VERY uneasy when I hear someone try the non-traditional publishing route - even if they are a semi-established mid-list author. Getting books into the distribution chain is HARD when you have no connections. (I'm speaking as a bookseller.)

Now, the social media thing is pure marketing and it's a flash-in-the-pan. These publishing-marketers are looking for authors who can do their marketing job for them. Lazy bums. Now the author has to hire a publicist for this stuff. Used to be the publisher did this kind of thing. 5 years from now it won't be facebook and twitter - it'll be something we haven't seen yet.

One last thing before I get off the soapbox...flash is not ADA compliant (in addition to being a blight on good taste) and will make your website inaccessible to a number of demographics you'd want.

3 book proposals? Can I just say, SQEEEE?!
Now to try and stop drooling - these are probably 2 years out, right? OKfine.
Lauretta@ConstellationBooks