10 ms·
Show HN: I'm looking for science fiction writers
- mojoe 11y agoCompelling Science Fiction is a self-funded hobby -- I want to support the creation of great science fiction. Ultimately I'd like it if the project became self-sustaining, which would allow me to pay more authors more money and promote more stories. If you REALLY like this idea and would like to be a "slush pile" reader, my email address is in my profile!
- japhyr 11y agoI hope you repost this when you've got your first round of stories selected. I'd love to see the quality of writing you receive. How are submissions going?
- mojoe 11y agoI will! We just launched, and have a handful of submissions so far.
- Vivtek 11y agoEmail sent. I'm totally on board.
- toufka 11y agoreddit has some pretty good sci-fi writers' subs. I've seen people submit and ask others to review their work plenty of times. See what they think. https://www.reddit.com/r/sciencefiction/ https://www.reddit.com/r/sciencefiction/ [check the sidebar for smaller, more relevant related subs]
- eamann 11y agoI like the idea, but it's a bit disheartening to submit stories to an unknown organization whose website includes zero details about who the publisher will be or how the stories will be published. I get that it's a "self-funded hobby," but it could just as well be a scam by a nameless, faceless group of con men. Considering the domain is registered anonymously through Amazon, there is absolutely no information available for prospective writers to vet the "we" referenced on the only 2 pages of the site. I'd love to be wrong, but I've been burned enough in the past that, for this site, I'll be an observer only.
- nkrisc 11y agoEven if there is no malicious intent, well-meaning hobbies have ended in heartbreak before. I hope this is legitimate and succeeds but the skeptical side of myself is always there.
- mojoe 11y agoI'm disheartened that my site seems scary to you -- the "we" referenced is myself and some friends who have signed up as slush readers. I'd really appreciate it if you could let me know what information I could publish that would give you confidence in the site. It sounds like I should put up an 'about' page with some information about myself and my readers. For now, here's my linkedin page, to put a face to the facelessness: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joestech https://www.linkedin.com/in/joestech
- embwbam 11y agoWriters are paranoid. I played around with a self-publishing site last year (http://webfiction.co http://webfiction.co) and was surprised more than once by how worried writers were about getting ripped off, losing control of their work, etc. I think there are so many shady characters in the space that everyone has been burned. Basically everyone wants someone else to take a chance on you to provide social proof. Consider tracking down a well-regarded writer and commissioning something?
- mojoe 11y agoGetting some social proof is a great idea. I have some author friends in real life, so maybe having endorsements from them on social media will help instill confidence. I think the first few months will be the hardest, but eventually we'll have a track record.
- bozdar 11y agoNo, don't do that. Writers do not need social media endorsements for publishers. Show yourself and if you are new in the field then what's your roadmap? Have you raised any funds? If yes, how and if no then how you'll pay. Your website has only two pags mentioning nothing about you at all. If your website is hosted on a shared-hosting then it'll be taken down by your "human and bot" visitors collectively after publishing your first issue. Precisely, tell writers your raodmap so a trust bond can be created between you (as a publisher) and writer. Do you agree?
- dotsamuelswan 11y agoWhat's the plan for publishing? Number of pieces Weekly/Monthly/Quarterly? Selling them, or posting them free, etc. Threw your link in the "almost sfwa" submissions bucket for now, but certainly interested in hearing more.
- mojoe 11y ago4-5 pieces per month, posting them for free on the site but charging a subscription for kindle and other e-reader versions. Since this is a hobby all proceeds can go back to paying more authors and buying ads to promote. If that model doesn't work I may have to change it down the road. I'd also like to eventually have pieces read for a podcast, but not initially.
- presidentender 11y agoThis is very promising.
- mkrfox 11y agoThere are many excellent, paying science fiction/fantasy collections out there. You need to set yourself apart in a way that convinces people to trust their stories to you (who we know nothing about) instead of someone else. Especially since the established collections prefer/require first publication. Why should we risk that you'll publish and fail to pay?
- mojoe 11y agoIt is a risk to trust stories to someone who doesn't have a public track record. I'm guessing that the majority of my initial submissions will come from authors who know me in person, and know that I'll pay them and publicize their work. Hopefully after the first few issues it will be clear that I'm serious about supporting this genre!
- krapp 11y agoBack in the day I was trying (and failing) to be a published sf and horror author, ralan.com was the go-to resource for the market and going rates[0]. It may still provide a good benchmark of what such publications offer and what their sites generally have in common and what information they offer potential authors. It certainly wouldn't hurt your credibility to be listed there. [0]http://ralan.com/ http://ralan.com/
- dotsamuelswan 11y agoIf you're writing a lot, it's not a risk. You've got something sitting in a folder that you haven't touched in five years. Blow the dust off, polish the edges, and maybe you make a couple bucks. Lining up those SFWA ducks will be important. At that point, even as a new publication, if they're easy to work with, they'll quickly become a great second or third stop for fresh stories. They won't get first submissions for awhile, because you can't compete with Terraform's (and others') 25c/word rate. But that's okay. Gems fall through the cracks. Loads of great fiction out there looking for a home.
- SolaceQuantum 11y ago
- gboudrias 11y agoYou know, 600$ for a 1000 word story actually sounds pretty good. If I was a native English speaker I would submit some stuff. Edit: Brain fart, it's 60$ for 1000 words. I'd still do it.
- dotsamuelswan 11y agoYour math is a little off, but you should seriously consider brushing up a bit and writing. SFF (and speculative fiction as a whole) has a diversity problem.
- Wildgoose 11y agoDiversity problem? Nonsense! Just look how many succesful Speculative Fiction authors are female: Andrea Norton, Susan Cooper, Connie Willis, Ursula Le Guin, Julian May, Nancy Kress, Octavia Butler (black, as well as female) and dare I say it, J.K. Rowling - all off the top of my head. Then there are well known award-winnning gay authors such as David Gerrold. And I've just finished reading last year's Hugo Award winning novel "The Three Body Problem" written by Cixin Liu, a Chinese SF author. If anything, SF is the field of fiction which has the least problems with "diversity" - its readers are open-minded almost by definition!
- dotsamuelswan 11y agoIt's certainly been getting better. I have no argument there.
- bryanlarsen 11y agoIt's "Andre Norton", not "Andrea Norton". Her real name was Alice. It'd be nice to think we'd advanced far enough that females wouldn't feel it was necessary to use male pseudonyms, but it's "JK Rowling" not "Joanne Rowling" to avoid scaring off the boys.
- nommm-nommm 11y agoYes, Joanne Rowling was asked by her publisher to publish Harry Potter under two initials because they thought boys might not want to read a book written by a woman. Not having a middle name she choose K as a nod to her paternal grandmother, Kathleen.
- 6stringmerc 11y agoInteresting; I've always had a bit of an issue with the lines between Science Fiction and Fantasy, in that the former is far more interesting to me than the latter. For instance, I enjoyed the movie Lucy as entertainment using a science fiction anchor, and was utterly bored with Guardians of the Galaxy which is a fine and dandy space/fantasy type of thing. I love Hackers as entertainment in spite of its drastic flaws that were obvious then and still are in the 'scientific' context. Asking for a buddy: Would a computer/technology driven crime and character driven story be applicable in the 'science fiction' wide definition? Hope you get what you're after and help break some new folks into the scene. Nice that you're up front about the rights too. I know my buddy would love to get paid and then take that money and register his story with WGA West in case of screenplay potential.
- mojoe 11y agoI definitely like near-future stories that are character driven -- If computers/tech are crucial to the plot (and especially if the software/technology doesn't quite yet exist in the real world) I'd definitely be interested in reading his story. Thanks for your comments!
- 6stringmerc 11y agoOkay cool, just wanted to run that by real quick because there's so much leeway in the perspective. Best of luck to you and the team for sure.
- bozdar 11y agoAs soon as you publish your work online -no matter how promising the security of the platform is, you just don't know how and who copied your work then translated somewhere in taiwanese and started making the £££ which should be in your account. Writers, why you just don't stop writing for Internet? Self-publishing can be more promising than online publishing, ain't?
- DennisP 11y agoThe author of The Martian started out publishing it as a serial on his own website. Seemed to work out pretty well.
- herge 11y agoThat might be the better argument. Sure, you might be skipping out on the handful of $'s that that small Taiwanese market might bring you, but would they have bought your published book anyway? However, when Hollywood needs to film rights, they'll have to come to you and buy the license according to your terms.
- riffraff 11y agoand not to forget: "fifty shades of gray started" out as a sexy internet fanfiction.
- 6stringmerc 11y agoEasily one of the most lucrative IP infringement cases in recent memory as well, but people walked away happy with pockets full of money so no hard feelings.
- 6stringmerc 11y agoNot really. Copyright in the US at least permits a base-level of protection, and should domestic or international plagarism occur, then having the original file(s) and correspondence would be excellent evidence. 'Copying ideas' like gets brought up often in lawsuits against movies are essentially non-starter cases. Ideas can't be copyrighted, simply the telling of the story. In my circle of people, self-publishing is simply still a 'vanity' project and commercially not viable. Being part of a reviewed, curated, and edited publication benefits the writer and reading public much in the same way that certain record labels (ex: Hospital) release materials that fit within their mold of quality.
- sandworm101 11y agoI smell hollywood. Is this a solicitation for science fiction stories, or is something fishing for movie concepts/treatments? I would be very hesitant to share anything without some sort of guarantee that your ideas (ideas aren't subject to copyright) will not be taken and turned into a film script. The descriptions of what the website is looking for seem like the outcome of an LA focus group. Be careful. Read the contract before committing anything.
- mojoe 11y agoI've never been called hollywood before :) If you look at my HN profile, you can see my submission history and my linkedin. I appreciate your feedback, I clearly need to add detail to the submissions page.
- joeax 11y agoI am a coder by day, but I'm nearing completion of a full length novel (100,000 words) and ready to self-publish on Kindle and possibly Smashwords. I'll have to take a look at this for some other works. I have some other short stories I've been kicking around. I particularly like the bias against dystopian fiction as I feel the same way. I also eschew themes like moral decay in the future, since as humans I believe we'll evolve emotionally and intellectually. To put it into perspective, if you look at recent human history you will find slavery, concentration camps, overt racism, all of which have been mostly wiped out.
- mojoe 11y agoCoding (data science applications) is my day job as well! Please send me a note when you self-publish your novel, I'll buy a copy. My email address is in my profile.
- joeax 11y agoThanks I took a note of it. Once I publish I'll send you a link to a free copy. I've been writing since I was a kid and just recently discovered how enjoyable it is working on this novel.
- mkrfox 11y agoDraft2Digital is much less of a pain. They'll even handhold problematic manuscripts through the process.
- joeax 11y agoI checked out D2D. Although an awesome idea on the surface, I'm a bit suspect of their pricing model. 10% of all sales? The problem with that is if you have a bestseller that sells a million copies you're basically subsidizing other books with languishing sales. I'm not sure if you're affiliated with them or not, but a better model would be to charge 10% up to the cost of proofread and copyedit + a profit. Let's say these services typically cost $3,000 (like on CreateSpace). D2D could charge 10% of sales up to say $5,000 ($2k profit). If you're book doesn't hit its targets the author would still owe a remaining balance up to $3,000.
- waterlesscloud 11y agoDon't let the ridiculous paranoia on this thread discourage you. Writers you actually want to publish will look at your terms and submit. 99.99% of the people with "concerns" don't have anything you'd publish anyway. Looking forward to your launch!
- aerovistae 11y agoAnecdotal at best. Can you link to a study?
- jff 11y agoPoe's law strikes again with this post...
- mojoe 11y agoI appreciate the encouragement -- I have received some great feedback from this thread!
- kbenson 11y agoYou may want to check out the HFY subreddit[1]. The skill level varies greatly, but there are some fairly good writers there, and some are 100+ posts into stories. It's often fairly trope-heavy (as is the point), but there are some real gems in there. Looking at some of the curated lists, or the top all-time posts will give you a good idea of the quality. 1: https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY
- personjerry 11y agoIf I submit a series of short stories, would I still retain the right to collect them into a book and have it published elsewhere, like Asimov's Foundation?
- gelisam 11y agoMy best work of science fiction is much shorter than 1000 words, but here, enjoy it anyway: http://gelisam.blogspot.ca/2013/09/the-first-two-years.html http://gelisam.blogspot.ca/2013/09/the-first-two-years.html
- thomasctm 11y agois it common to pay authors by wordcount? or is there a minimum number of words for a book to be published? i often have the impression that the books i read are longer than they should be.
- exolymph 11y agoPaying by the word is very common for magazine fiction and print journalism. Books aren't paid by the word, although usually the contract has a general length requirement.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- lsc 11y agoIf your primary incentive is the per-word fee, I imagine hacker news is not your target market. I mean, don't get me wrong, there are a lot of programmers who enjoy sci-fi, both in creation and consumption, but the differential between market rate for programmer time and writer time is so great that until you are huge, what you get paid as a writer is symbolic if your dayjob is at a bay-area tech-company. I am a wanna-be writer of fiction who works as a computer nerd. I have written a technical book, so I have some experience, and I really want to write some fiction. (I have a whole series of elaborate fantasies surrounding the idea of rejection letters) - but I write for ego, for self-actualization, whatever you want to call it. I write for emotional, non-financial reasons. Sure, sure, if I do luck into a '50 shades of grey' I want a piece of the action, but in the ordinary case, any payment is symbolic. If you want to compete for my work (and I'm not saying you do; my fiction, so far, is so bad that I'm not willing to admit to any of it,) then you have to compete on something other than money. Assuming you aren't going to assign me an editor who will ride my ass until I finish the goddamn thing[1], the things I will look at are prestige and distribution. The prestige you give me is largely dependent on how good the other authors you publish are. Distribution is also an incentive; but you have to convince me that more people will see my work if it goes through you than if I just release it for free online. I mean, I guess the plan is to release an issue #1 with either known-good authors or really good unknowns... but between now and then, I'd suggest talking up your distribution. [1]If you are willing to do that, I'm sold. Sign me up.
- gravypod 11y agoI wish there was a service like this for programmers. It would be really convenient for college students, like me. If I could go some place in my free time, look up a list of problems like "implement X feature into a language" then I'd definitely have some nice spending money.