475 Hours [a Repeat post from 2012]

[I first posted this on my Indie Arts blog on 17 January 2012. There are only a few posts there, so I'm saving a few before deleting the blog, trying to downscale.]
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475 Hours (or.. authors, know thy craft!)

On the average, it takes 475 hours to write a novel (bookstatistics.com).

Of course that’s your average-sized novel and your averagely experienced writer. Size matters (in writing time, it does!) and so does experience. As I’ve progressed in my writing career, I see that it takes less and less time to create each new novel (averaging out by length). Does that mean I’m putting less effort into it? Not at all. It means practice works, that exercising my writing muscles make them function better, that stories come out more smoothly than they used to so there’s less starting and stopping.

Either way, 475 hours divided by 40 hour weeks equals right at 12 weeks of work, or roughly 3 months. That’s for an average length novel, remember. Most self-pubbed authors average around 200 sales of one book. If you figure an average of $2 royalty per book, that’s $400 for 3 months of work. Some make drastically less. Some explode (very few, mind you) and make drastically more. But on the average, keep in mind that $33 a week “salary” from the book you spent 475 hours writing.

Still interesting in being an indie author? Great! Then go for it! If the numbers scare you, walk away very slowly and search for a different route or a different job.

[Please be aware this is a very unscientific assumption based only on what I’ve heard passed around as far as sales. It is NOT meant to be quoted as statistical fact; it’s only for demonstration purposes.]

So, if you’re still hanging around and considering the self-pub path, you have very large … uh, amounts of determination or belief in your work or both. Good for you! There will be many, many times you’ll change your mind about both of those things while walking (or trudging) the path. We all do. Okay, 99.89 percent of us do (as a guess, of course; I didn’t do a survey).

What’s the point, here? The point is that with the odds so against you and with the simple fact that there are more indie books every year, you need to do what you can to help yourself, and the rest of us.

How? STUDY your craft!

Please.

I understand why self-pub authors have such a bad rep. It’s because it’s terribly easy to put out your own books these days and there are no filters other than savvy readers who know to check the publisher before they buy, and honestly, too many of these books are not worth more than $33 a week income. Sorry, but facts are facts. They aren’t worth more because too many authors just jump in and decide to write a book because they “can” without stopping to check on the “how” it should be done.

Like anything else, writing a novel is small part talent, large part technical skill. Or it should be. If you have this turned around, please do us all a favor and stop, listen, and learn. Take a class. Read a lot, preferably in several genres, not only your interest. Get critiques from strangers (not from loved ones). Know what POV, climax, denouement, plot, characterization, setting, mood, and theme mean and know how to use them. Things like poetic speech, sentence flow, and why you probably shouldn’t head hop are also good to know. Rules – please know the rules. Breaking the rules in fiction is fine, but know them first and know why you’re breaking them. Take a class! Yes, I said this already, but it deserves repetition (also know how to use repetition properly). There are a myriad of online learning classes for writers and specifically for novelists. Some are free. Many published authors will gladly give some free advice if you’re willing to listen. BE willing to listen! If an author says something like, “I’d like to discuss a couple of points about your book,” say THANK YOU for your time and then LISTEN. Don’t say, “Well, I don’t really want to work on this more.” Okay, then. You’ve lost respect and support and more importantly, you’ve lost potential readers who may catch what that author wanted to tell you and decide not to bother again.

This is a tough road. Don’t make it even tougher on yourself, or on the rest of us. Know your craft. Study it and then continue to update your knowledge. READ! An author who doesn’t have time to read is an author who is not terribly read-worthy. If you never read fiction, don’t try to write it. If you never read horror, don’t try to write it. But do read outside your writing genre.

Indie publishing is not the easier path. It’s harder. It’s an uphill battle through swamp land and gators and ticks and leeches and other warriors trying to jump in front of you with more armor and more training. It’s also full of nay-saying critics who believe indie authors are those who couldn’t make the cut. Be ready for that. And be ready to defend your territory with the knowledge that you’ve spent the time to prepare for battle and can fight fire with fire instead of with a barely glowing sparkler.

And then, go out and break a leg!

Publishing: How I Got Started

I’ve been asked often by other writers how I got started with publishing my books. Fair question. The publishing business is a complicated one, with many paths and many branches stemming from each of those paths. Now that Blogger has the option to add tabs to blogs, I thought I’d take advantage and use it to gather some of my thoughts and experiences with publishing. The main focus will be on indie publishing, since I am indie and haven’t been contracted. Maybe I can pull in some author friends who have been contracted to help fill that part of the information.

For the beginning of this series here on my blog (although I’ve been giving info to my On Our Own group for years), I’m starting with the few basics.

Back while I was working on Finishing Touches, which wasn’t my first written novel, but the first finished, I was asked what I planned to DO with all the writing I’d been working so hard on. Also a fair question. I didn’t start writing with the idea of publishing. I wrote because I’m a writer and that’s what I needed to do to be fulfilled. Did I want to publish? I wasn’t so sure about that one. It’s a scary thing, putting your work out there for readers to view and possibly tear apart. A novel is a part of a writer’s soul, at least mine are. Of course they are fiction, but not entirely. Much of who a writer is can be found better in her fiction than with normal activity. Did I want to share that much of me?

Not so much.

However, I loved my characters and my stories and yes, I decided I did want to share them. The question then was HOW?

I learned research methods in college, and I did plenty of it. That gave me a good general concept of where to start in publishing: research. So I did. In between writing and continuing to study the craft, I researched the publishing business. Now, I’m no expert. I don’t ever claim to be. But I did do my homework first and found I had three major options as to how to go about it:

1) Traditional

With traditional publishing research, which is where I started, I learned that not only would I have to do queries and synopses to mail out, that most don’t accept multiple submissions and can take weeks to months to answer before I could send it elsewhere if it was rejected, but I would also either have to search through to find the “right” publishers for what I wrote or find an agent to find the right publishers. Either one would take a good amount of time to find the match I needed. After that, it could take 2 years or so, IF my book was accepted, before it would actually come out. A good agent, as I found, is as hard to find as the right publisher. (And never, never PAY an agent! Legit agents make money when they sell your book, which is why they won’t accept you if they think they can’t sell you.)

Other than the time problem I had with this, I also had a problem with the “right” match issue. I don’t write to a commercially marketable genre, aka what’s “in” right now. I do my own blend of different genres and often they are very long. Most publishers will not accept more than 100,000 word manuscripts from new writers and many want no more than 60,000. Not a good match for me.

Also with traditional publishing, control is taken away: cover art is hired out with the author often having no say, how you market and where you sell is restricted, how long it takes to be available widely varies, and it’s always possible to get a contract only for the publisher not to bother ever putting it out. It’s happened. I didn’t want my hands tied. Not to mention the royalty rate is very low and many authors never get more than the advance. Advances are hard to come by these days. This method was not the right fit for me. So I moved along.

2) Self Publishing

Actual self publishing is when the author does all the setup herself, providing cover art (often purchased) and properly formatted text files, and then takes them to a printer (brick and morter or online), and pays all expenses to have them printed. It’s a risky way to publish, especially if your printer insists on you buying a large print run (sometimes 1,000 copies) that you then have to store. Doing this with an online printer is a safer way to go. Still, it’s an incredible amount of work and the author must BE a publisher, with publishing company name and the legalities that go with that.

3) Publishing Service

Many call them vanity publishers, but companies that will take your text files and assist you in producing and distributing your books save a lot of time for the indie author. They will also create covers for you, but I strongly suggest using your own, hiring that out to a good amateur artist if you don’t have the skills to do it yourself. Be careful doing it yourself. A good cover is very important. Also be careful about which company you choose, as there are a plethora of these places and many are more hurtful than helpful. Many, though, have good reputations, and this can be a viable way to get your feet in the publishing door.

I decided to go this way with my first books. Before I chose one, I did … more research. I compared fees with service, listened to what their authors had to say about them, skimmed message boards for good and bad of any I was interested in, and wound up choosing a small moderately priced company with all the services I wanted. It turns out that Infinity is now one of the top 2 recommended Publishing Services. Booklocker is also well recommended. Another that gets good comments from its authors is iUniverse. If you’ve gone this route with another company you’d recommend, please feel free to add it in the comments.

My latest book was done with an online printing/distribution service, using my own company and ISBNs. It meant taking the time to learn what I needed to know and do all the setup and the legal necessities, but if you have the time and ability to learn it, this is a good way to go.

There are benefits and drawbacks to each kind of publishing, and I’ll focus more on them in later posts. All of these will be gathered as links under my “Indie Publishing” heading at the top of my blog. Let me know if there’s anything in particular you’d like me to address.

As I said, I’m not an expert and cannot be liable for the way anyone uses this information. Do your own research! Be prepared before jumping into this business, because publishing IS a business, although writing is an art.
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Smashwords Supports Operation Ebook Drop

Anyone who has known me for any time knows I'm highly military supportive. So when I found this new project yesterday that combines my support of the military with my support of literacy (and love of reading in general), I had to sign on.

Operation Ebook Drop, formed and run by indie author Edward C. Patterson, allows independent authors to donate free copies of their Ebooks to deployed servicemembers. [I'm unsure about contracted authors -- you would have to check with your publishers.] I signed up last night and already have a list of names to contact. Only five weeks into the program and there's a long and growing list of servicemembers looking for books to help fill down time, and over 70 indie authors signed up. If you have a loved one deployed who would like to be included, or if you are an author interested in signing up, more info is at the link below.

Smashwords: Smashwords Supports Operation Ebook Drop

I'll be sending out emails today and will post updates as to how it's going. If the link doesn't work for you, contact me directly at info @ lkhunsaker.com (take spaces out) and I'll send you the info you need!