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Has anyone done a short story lead up to a novel? I'm writing a contemporary vampire novel. My novel features four protagonists. There is one main protagonist who holds POV for most of the novel. There are three other vampires who are part of his gang. POV switches between them, depending on the limits of the story. The main thrust of the story is these vampires come to a new city, and become involved in a struggle for control of blood magic. One of these vampires is a blood mage. All four of the vampires have their own issues which a good portion of the novel will explore. I have started writing a short story for the blood mage. It will detail how she became a vampire: how she met her sire, why she agreed to become a vampire (some vampires are forced into changing, she has to agree which will be detailed) and her immediate struggles post-vampirification. My plan is to have four short stories published for each of the protagonists, detailing how they became vampires by the time the novel is released. I've never published anything before (and aside from matters of how good my writing actually is) I can see a few upsides to this. First off, it might win me a few sales at launch of the novel but I can't quantify this. I also imagine it's better to have a marketing push with some writing extant on your Amazon page rather than to go cold into it with nothing there until your main novel is launched. These short stories could become a hit (however unlikely that is.) After I publish my novel, these could also provide a small cash boost as people read the origin stories for their favourite vampire. It could also provide holding material for any fans until I publish a follow up novel. It could help keep awareness and enthusiasm for a follow up novel higher than what it would be otherwise. Basically, does anyone have advice on publishing origin stories for my vampire protagonists while I write my main vampire novel?
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May 15, 2015 20:38
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I published my first story on Amazon last night. I'm delighted with it even if the only people who have read it are other authors in the IRC channel. One of them even gave me a great review (of their own volition.) That actually had me tearing up a little. I'm now at the point where no-one is reading it. I guess the next thing is to write a second short, publish it, promo the first one with mail-shots and hope people move on to the second. I do have worries about how well I'm targeting the market. However, I also don't want to write anything I'm uncomfortable with, or that I wouldn't read myself. Now that I have something published I plan on doing my writing as well as immersing myself in the appropriate communities, and getting to know the markets better. I just feel at a little disadvantage because I have no obvious 'gimmick' for my novels. I want them to be about real people, with intelligence, emotions, reactions (justified and unjustified) and it seems that a lot of authors, although they may do this also hook their novels on something whether it be witchcraft, vampires, billionaires, or historical periods. These worries are only minor though. I plan on continuing writing and I know I need to keep publishing to internalise and become fully aware of the things people talk about in this thread. It's all learning for me.
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May 25, 2015 15:39
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I had my first real-reader sale today. And she posted a Five Star review to Amazon and Goodreads. One part that really made the review for me was, "The heroine's reaction to the conflict 100% was what I would have done. She was so realistic, and I really related to her pain." Now I'm dealing with second book nerves.
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May 25, 2015 22:24
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Is everyone in this thread purely working a writing assembly line to make money?
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May 27, 2015 21:22
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Blue Scream posted:This thread focuses on mainly the business side of writing (and as such I have found it very useful), but that doesn't mean people here don't care about telling a good story, or developing realistic and interesting characters. Writing is hard and monetary rewards are uncertain at best, so anyone who approaches it as a purely mercenary venture has bad ideas and should feel bad. I'm pretty sure most people here really enjoy writing (when it doesn't also make us all I didn't mean to make any judgement with that. I've had one goon contact me to say, and maybe their sarcasm didn't come through, that "i literlaly only care about making money." I don't think that's a bad thing. I know commercial photographers (in a non-photography jargon sense) who have no consideration for art and treat their work as something to put food on the table. They're good at what they do, and they have a lot of clients who love what they do. They put a lot of effort into their photography, it's a job they enjoy and they do feel there's creative endeavour in it. They just don't feel artistically fulfilled by it. I don't think creativity is about endless suffering and being "true" to your vision while you starve. I really was just wondering if the majority of people here see it as an "assembly line" of producing words for whatever markets are more profitable. I'd also hate to think that there are people reading this thread who are writing something they truly want to write, and who want to get eyes on their labour of love through self-publishing, but are turned off from it because it's not easily marketable. There's room for "I literally only care about making money" and "I want to sell my loved creation." There has to be people who self publish because they feel they wrote a great novel that they wanted to write, and they feel it's worth money (and I'd imagine selling your book will get you more readers than giving it away,t he reader will want to feel the author values themselves.) Whether they squeeze the industry for every last dollar may not be their top priority, but they can still care about selling their book.
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May 28, 2015 01:28
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) and want to produce quality work. I've read some great stories by goons.
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I hope you don't mind, but I took the liberty of attempting an edit. I think it conveys Miranda's disposition a bit better. Miranda walked into the room, hate clear her face, ""Is everyone in this thread purely working a writing assembly line to make money?" Everyone was making more money than her.
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May 28, 2015 02:01
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My apologies for getting pissy. I took things said elsewhere into this thread. I have no issues with someone earning megabucks from a novel written with a straight out of market research, and I know that doesn't mean it's badly written or written without attention. I'm not at the point where I want to do that. I followed advice that was wrong for me and what I've written. It's my own fault for not paying heed to my own judgement and getting my own balance between business and what I want to do wrong. I shouldn't have said what I said. Edit: And I understand that Sean. I've started writing romance and I am enjoying doing it. I shouldn't have implied it was different for anyone else.
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May 28, 2015 02:16
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EngineerSean posted:whoa whoa we were talking about Miranda, not Mrenda. I really related to Miranda. She felt really fleshed out and acted exactly how I would have if I was in her situation. I hope she gets her HEA in the next in the series. 4/5 because I don't like cliffhangers.
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May 28, 2015 04:34
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I've just uploaded my second short to Amazon and it's being processed. When you have two shorts out is it the time to start buying presence on mailshots? My first has sold two copies, and three KU borrows from other Goons. I have three good reviews, one five star from a goon, one four star from a beta reader and one five star from someone who went on to sign up to my newsletter. Her review actually made me smile. The first is a romance with a steamy scene, and my second is straight up romance. They're both 10k shorts as part of a series and I'm starting the third tomorrow. Will the fact that I haven't written one short and disappeared, and have a follow up coming to Amazon make any difference?
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May 28, 2015 23:39
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When you set a free five day promo on Amazon, whose timezone does it match to? Will it set different free times for the different days according to the marketplace? So all of the UK would be the same, but if someone from the US views it they could be East Coast or West Coast. And does this make a difference? Edit: I should have just checked the KDP help site. It has it covered. Promo times are based on PST, midnight to midnight. Second Edit: So obviously this has implications for you if you're using a non-PST promotion. An e-mail shot might hit your customers, especially in the UK about eight hours before there's a change in the price. Hopefully, the fact it happens at midnight PST would mean it's working by 8am GMT, so most people shouldn't have read their e-mail about an offer, but it's something to keep in mind. Amazon also says their systems can lag and it can take anywhere from a few minutes, to a few hours for the change in price to take effect. Mrenda fucked around with this message at 14:16 on Jun 3, 2015 |
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Jun 3, 2015 14:11
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I love that I try.
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Jun 5, 2015 03:23
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Woo! The BKnights gripes start just after I pay for them to handle my promo. Does anyone know how to sell a Sweet Romance, so a story with nothing explicit at all in it. The constant feedback I'm getting from anyone reading parts of the work in progress is, "That's so sweet" and "this will sell as a sweet romance." A few of the non-Amazon sites have "Sweet Romance" categories that are distinct from "Inspirational" which seems to be predominantly Christian Romance. However most of my income so far has come from Kindle Unlimited. This is my first novella and I'm not sure I can justify selling it a rate that would match my KU royalty on those other stores, even if they're set up for the Sweet Romance category. Plus everyone says sales are small on them, even though Amazon doesn't have a built in category for sweet romance.
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Jun 12, 2015 01:00
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Sundae posted:Is it a contemporary romance, sweet or otherwise? Contemporary romance and put sweet romance into the keywords / blurb / model your cover after other sweet romances. That's pretty much the advice I've gotten elsewhere, from sweet romance authors. They say there is a market for it and the market on Amazon know how to use their keywords without having a specific category. Thanks. 
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Jun 12, 2015 02:50
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Welp. Amazon have just hosed short story writers.
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Jun 15, 2015 17:45
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That's what every novelist I'm talking to is predicting. This is a way to pay short story writers less and Amazon will get to push for all novel length Kindle books to be at the $2.99 rate, no matter who it comes from.
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Jun 15, 2015 17:58
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Even before this I was thinking of throwing in one of my sweeter shorts, the one that tanked as a "sweetener" at the end of my novella. It's similar in tone to my novella, if I get the pages read it shouldn't really make a difference once these changes come through. It also makes anthologies and bundles a lot more attractive.
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Jun 15, 2015 19:00
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I'm betting this will come in line with the standard rates from royalties and the associated pricing. And it's to force people to the 99c, $1.99, $2.99 price plan. Short story 10k words: 99c - 30% Royalty means about 33c a sale- KU will give a 30 to 40c payout. Novel: 60k Words + - $2.99 - 70% royalty at $2.99 means about $2 a sale - KU will payout between $1.80 and $2.75 depending on length. Novella: 17k to 40k words - It doesn't really work with the royalty system, some go for $1.99 some for $2.99. - KU will payout somewhere between 0.80 and the current payout depending on length, I'm guessing around $1 for 30k words up to $1.50 for 50k words. That'll push people towards KU for stories that would previously have a hard time battling between the 30% and 70% royalty rate. I think this is about pushing novels towards the $2.99/$3.99 price point for Kindle Books, which would be a huge plus for Amazon. It'll see an uptake in KU novels but they still won't attract the very big names unless their borrows can guarantee bonuses, but more of the middling ones might join.
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Jun 15, 2015 20:16
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I released my first urban fantasy novel over the weekend. So far I've had sales, to friends, in limited amounts. I have a BKnights and free promo scheduled for Thursday, so hopefully that builds up a little momentum. The reviews I've had from pimping ARCs and Beta Reads to various forums I'm on have been good, and I've encouraged them to post to Amazon. I've had a couple of responses along the lines of, "I'd have more to say but I rushed to the end because I was engrossed." The best response so far was from a guy I met in the pub who wondered what I did, and wanted to see some of my writing. He said he read it in one sitting even though it's not his normal genre, and he pushed my Facebook page to his friends. I think this is genuinely the best thing I've written. I put a lot of effort into addressing my flaws and avoiding my usual pitfalls as I wrote it, which took a fair amount of effort and concentration. I think it has the potential to gain some traction, if I can get it in front of people. It's not perfect, but nothing I ever write will be. It's the best of what I've done though. From the reviews, "...from the beginning I was drawn into the book and I read it from beginning to end in one sitting. Her conversational style is natural and very readable, and the narrative has a tight, clipped pace. I felt drawn to the characters, especially the lead, and they are surprisingly believable, which is quite an achievement given the genre." And "For a first novel, I think it is really solidly written. It is a new spin on the supernatural fantasy stuff with a little post apocalyptic world view for good measure. It started a tiny bit shaky but by the second chapter I was totally engaged in the main character and her story. If you like stories about Witches, Vampires, etc I would recommend giving this new author a try. "
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Sep 1, 2015 11:32
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angel opportunity posted:lol post the link You should have seen it. I've been talking about it in #selfpub for the past week. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B014N0S84M Edit: I'm genuinely going crazy from nerves, and a lack of sleep last night. I was talking to an author about her series title and I kept on thinking why is she talking about "chickens?" Turns out she was typing "children." Mrenda fucked around with this message at 13:15 on Sep 1, 2015 |
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Sep 1, 2015 13:05
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Also be very careful about showing a stock image model's face in an erotica book. Their license and the model release often doesn't cover anything related with sexual media. Whether books fall into that category is debatable, but it's a risk that isn't dismissed by just flashing the license agreement and could be argued in court. As the focus goes from pure sex, to romance, and other genres with romantic scenes there's less of a risk.
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Sep 2, 2015 18:44
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angel opportunity posted:Also I know this isn't really too amazing, but I broke 1k rank in the paid store for the first time today That is pretty great, actually. Congrats.
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Sep 2, 2015 19:20
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After my free promo launched yesterday, with a push by BKnights I'm already sliding back down the free lists. It reached the top 20 Free Paranormal and Urban Fantasy books in the Free Kindle Store (US) and top 300 of the overall Free Kindle store. And top 20 contemporary fantasy in the UK. Now I just have to hope this converts into sales when the promo ends Monday some time. There's no new reviews, and nothing on Good Reads, but I have had two people read the story via Kindle Unlimted (Exactly the page count came up on two consecutive days.) I imagine a large proportion of the people who downloaded it are just hoarders, who collect free books and might never get around to reading them. But if even 10% of the free downloads result in a sale in the future I'll have done well.
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Sep 4, 2015 15:55
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I don't know how common this is but does anyone else feel lonely in publishing/writing. I read something from some author I don't remember the name of (possibly from On Writing, possibly not) about how writing is you locked away in a room with yourself for months and sometimes even years. And you find out if you're an author when you know you can stay locked away without going crazy. I was thinking earlier I'd like if I had a publisher, or an agent, someone to reassure me during all this. Really I don't know how useful they'd be. My novel is getting good reviews, four and five stars on Goodreads and Amazon, and people are talking about how they couldn't put my book down once they started. Buy all this has an effect that barely lasts minutes. I want that KDP graph to hit the hundreds, but even still I'm wondering if that will make a huge difference. I have my social life. I go out for beers and meet friends for coffee so its not like I'm bring denied something or sacrificing anything. I think it's that with writing you really are all on your own. Theres always the next blank page.
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Sep 12, 2015 03:35
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I think what triggered all this was releasing my novel, after a huge amount of work then being hit with a big wall of nothing. I'd get excited about good reviews but it'd fade and I'd just be left thinking "That's it? This is what I've done all this for?" And at the same time I met an author at a poetry night a few days ago. She was the guest poet, but she's published some novels as well (including romance) and it was so good to be able to talk to someone who just instantly appreciated the whole thing of writing. Especially as she was someone who treated writing with the relevant severity, but she wasn't a tortured artist working on a manuscript for four years without showing it to anyone.
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Sep 12, 2015 21:53
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Has anyone noticed Amazon being incredibly slow these past few weeks? I've had a sale listed in the excel sheet, "Generate Report" document for at least two hours and it's still not showing up as a sale on the report page graph. Then the royalty listed at the bottom takes ages to update. And this all seems to be effecting the Book Report app thingy because that takes even longer to update with sales and reads. I know I shouldn't be obsessing over hour-to-hour type stuff, but it's nice to see some actual movement for once. (I've had the equivalent of five people read my book in KU today, which is my best day ever by far, and one sale.)
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Sep 13, 2015 18:25
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How "on brand" do you have to be on Amazon/Kindle? Last time I looked at this you had to be extremely rigid in how you targeted your audience, and any deviation you took from what you were trying to establish was a massive risk. Unless you were pivoting to a new big market/trend within the wider ecosystem of the style of stuff you published. (This was all the various styles of "romance.") I wouldn't be going after this for serious money, just beer money. In fact serious money could actually cause me more problems than it'd solve, unless I suddenly became a top seller with every book I publish. At the moment I have enough for two decent length novels within the area I'll be publishing. The plan would be to make those free, maybe publish short story anthologies within that universe, along with a novella, for money, a kind of bonus for hardcore fans (readers at the moment are responding well to what they've seen.) Then there'd be another book/series that combines the main genre with another, one far more "challenging" and with crossover appeal into another market; this is doing well with readers of both genres. I have plans for a third series back in the structure of the main genre I'm writing, this could be a money maker, if I nail the angle on it correctly. The style I'd be writing has already proven a staying market in other areas. I figure I'd have about three books ready to go by the time I start this, maybe four, and another two in the works, which would allow me some space to time releases. Staggering things I feel like I could hit a release every two months, across different series, along with me building a bank. Like I said, I'm not aiming for this to be a living, rather a bonus for something I'll be and am writing already, and which has some fans already (a few of them being authors in the area, so cover/blurb quotes could be something I have if I ask for them.) On a separate topic what's it like with paying for covers now? Again, last time I looked at this it ranged all the way from people throwing text on stock images they paid for, people using fiver and the likes, and some people paying $500+ for a cover. Not looking for trends, I know what the trends are in the area I'm looking at. More about the pricing and how people are approaching the actual securing of covers.
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Mar 5, 2024 16:49
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Leng posted:Hasn’t changed a lot. Brand under the same pen name if you think there’ll be a decent overlap between audiences for your books, else do separate pen names. This is a judgement call depending on what you write. I’ve seen romance authors spin up different pen names just to distinguish between steamy and non steamy, or type of relationship, even if it’s all under a similar umbrella like small town romance or whatever. Thanks for all this (and the rest of the post.) Seems it hasn't changed much since I was doing it, just refined, a lot. Is it possible to do an Iain (M) Banks yet, with KDP, or is that simply him brute forcing the Amazon search results through the weight of his two names? Basically having one parent pen name and two variations under it. One for one style, one for another, but both within the recognisable name. It'd be possible to do it with covers, images and text, etc. but from what I can recall it's not possible to have two different names represent the same author.
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Mar 6, 2024 04:02
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