4 ms·

FWIW I work as a fiction editor for a publishing house. I only mention that because I'm really not that a technical person. I'm more on the arts side. I accept

by scandox 10y ago

FWIW I work as a fiction editor for a publishing house. I only mention that because I'm really not that a technical person. I'm more on the arts side. I accept that some bad books succeed, but this really is vanishingly rare. Subjectively even many so-called bad books have really excellent qualities - especially in narrative structure. So there are Bad Books and then there are BADly written books. I agree also with your point: build it and they will come doesn't work. Marketing is essential. But ask people to swallow an unreadable book - which is most books people write - and all the marketing in the world won't save you.

zhubert 10y ago
I definitely agree with your initial post, I'm just not able to offer advice on how to write a good book as I may, or may not, know how :) In the writing groups I've participated in, there seem to be a number of authors that are scared off by the process of getting their work out there. I'm hopeful that this post will help them overcome the technical hurdles in doing so.
- joeax 10y ago
  There is a book out there called "Writing the Breakout Novel" by Donald Maass. The book was a tremendously help for me in deconstructing my plot and characters. I rewrote and even rearranged entire chapters. I had subplots that had no closure that I rewrote to provide an ending. I invite you to check out my novel's Amazon page and read some of the reviews. Even the negative reviews praise the story itself, while slamming my writing style :)
  - mkaziz 10y ago
    Would you mind answering a few questions? I'm curious how you published your novel (self vs traditional), how you marketed, what your sales were like, etc.
    - joeax 10y ago
      Yeah no problem. Find my contact info at timecrossers.com
  - zhubert 10y ago
    Awesome, thanks! For my major edit, I went through The Story Grid approach by Coyne. Very helpful and appealed to my techie brain.
    - joeax 10y ago
      Thanks, signed up. I used the info from Maass's novel to create a plot diagram for my story. In the end that's what we are - story engineers.
j_s 10y ago
I really appreciate the practical advice you're sharing as someone in the trenches of this specific process. What is the first action that should be taken by someone wanting to self-publish? Something about getting the product in front of a critical audience ASAP to prevent wasting time creating something that even marketing can't save?
- scandox 10y ago
  Well I don't want to oversell my wisdom here. I have a specific outlook on all this and commercial success is low down on the list of priorities I think about. That said: The trouble with getting stuff in front of a critical audience is that you don't get many chances. If you run after friends and family with a manuscript, you may also find your circle of acquaintance rapidly shrinking. So, I don't think you can treat it exactly like an MVP :). However, to talk in "HN" terms the equivalent of an MVP in the literary scene is probably a short story. If you can write one good short story, the chances are you've cracked a great number of the problems of writing a novel. So I always strongly advise people to write short work and share it. And that is less intimidating to your potential audience. Also it's likely you can get feedback from magazines and so on. With a novel - it's very hard to get feedback in a timely fashion, or with any detail. Now, of course, novels have significant other challenges, but at least you've addressed style/voice and basic story-telling. What I find about technical people (even mildly technical people such as myself) is that we have a big disadvantage: rationality. The thing is that being reasonable often makes for bad story telling. You need to have a little bit of cruelty and unreasonableness to generate an emotionally convincing world. I find writers with a technical background portray rational actors and lack a sense of drama (I do anyway). To give an example, they resolve conflicts too early. They find using "miscommunication" to be a kind of cheat. They don't like information hiding (ironically!)...And these are all staples of provocative fiction. Anyway, sorry I haven't really clarified much there.
  - j_s 10y ago
    No apologies! Thanks for taking the time to flesh out a first action that could easily spare a future author some heartache.
  - 10y ago

by scandox 10y ago

zhubert 10y ago

I definitely agree with your initial post, I'm just not able to offer advice on how to write a good book as I may, or may not, know how :) In the writing groups I've participated in, there seem to be a number of authors that are scared off by the process of getting their work out there. I'm hopeful that this post will help them overcome the technical hurdles in doing so.

joeax 10y ago
There is a book out there called "Writing the Breakout Novel" by Donald Maass. The book was a tremendously help for me in deconstructing my plot and characters. I rewrote and even rearranged entire chapters. I had subplots that had no closure that I rewrote to provide an ending. I invite you to check out my novel's Amazon page and read some of the reviews. Even the negative reviews praise the story itself, while slamming my writing style :)
- mkaziz 10y ago
  Would you mind answering a few questions? I'm curious how you published your novel (self vs traditional), how you marketed, what your sales were like, etc.
  - joeax 10y ago
    Yeah no problem. Find my contact info at timecrossers.com
- zhubert 10y ago
  Awesome, thanks! For my major edit, I went through The Story Grid approach by Coyne. Very helpful and appealed to my techie brain.
  - joeax 10y ago
    Thanks, signed up. I used the info from Maass's novel to create a plot diagram for my story. In the end that's what we are - story engineers.

j_s 10y ago

I really appreciate the practical advice you're sharing as someone in the trenches of this specific process. What is the first action that should be taken by someone wanting to self-publish? Something about getting the product in front of a critical audience ASAP to prevent wasting time creating something that even marketing can't save?

scandox 10y ago
Well I don't want to oversell my wisdom here. I have a specific outlook on all this and commercial success is low down on the list of priorities I think about. That said: The trouble with getting stuff in front of a critical audience is that you don't get many chances. If you run after friends and family with a manuscript, you may also find your circle of acquaintance rapidly shrinking. So, I don't think you can treat it exactly like an MVP :). However, to talk in "HN" terms the equivalent of an MVP in the literary scene is probably a short story. If you can write one good short story, the chances are you've cracked a great number of the problems of writing a novel. So I always strongly advise people to write short work and share it. And that is less intimidating to your potential audience. Also it's likely you can get feedback from magazines and so on. With a novel - it's very hard to get feedback in a timely fashion, or with any detail. Now, of course, novels have significant other challenges, but at least you've addressed style/voice and basic story-telling. What I find about technical people (even mildly technical people such as myself) is that we have a big disadvantage: rationality. The thing is that being reasonable often makes for bad story telling. You need to have a little bit of cruelty and unreasonableness to generate an emotionally convincing world. I find writers with a technical background portray rational actors and lack a sense of drama (I do anyway). To give an example, they resolve conflicts too early. They find using "miscommunication" to be a kind of cheat. They don't like information hiding (ironically!)...And these are all staples of provocative fiction. Anyway, sorry I haven't really clarified much there.
- j_s 10y ago
  No apologies! Thanks for taking the time to flesh out a first action that could easily spare a future author some heartache.
- 10y ago