For the last few weeks (months really, or years,) I toyed with the idea of what to do with this blog. On one hand, I thought about keeping it strictly related to my books and fiction. In short, keep the blog focused on my stories. On the other, I’m part of a growing list of independent authors and have plenty to share with other writers in my position.
The more I think about it, the more I believe my story may help others so I’m going to make my move. Figure now is the best time, to set that expecation early instead of waiting until I’m neck deep into the Mythrar War series to do it. By then people may look at my work and say… well yeah, he is doing well as a writer because… I wan’t to erase those reasons now.
To be honest, I’m not much further along than many others on the journey. Sure, I have over a million words to my credit (not all of it published,) but my results have been abysmal until recently. I stumbled upon a few books that have changed my life, and writing, for the better.
The above is a chart of my sales from late November until January 5th, the day I launched Endeavor. As you can see, I got the occasional sale or borrow, but nothing solid. I’d show you my page reads, but that graph is pretty much a straight line.
No. It IS a straight line. No page reads for months.
To be fair, I hadn’t released anything since Echoes of Tomorrow. The flop of 2016. But that was only part of the problem. Problems I’m sure I’ll go into at a later date.
As you can see, January 5th changed my life for the better. One little book somehow found its mark and is doing well. It is important to know those stats are WITHOUT promotion. And yes, it has sparked life in my older work, but to the tune of a consistent sale or three a month instead of per year before.
In case you are jumping onto this blog for the first time, January 5th is the day I released Endeavor, the first book in what has the potential to be a very long series. There was a lot of setup done for that novel to hit the way it did. Some people would consider this small fish, but to me it is something I can build on. One small brick in a house. My 10-20 sales today can easily escalate to dozens or more after a few more books and when I add in promotion and marketing.
How was this possible?
I wrote the book to market. I spent close to a year reading books in the genre, learning what readers liked and what they didn’t. I understood the types of characters that needed to be in the book, and how they needed to act.
Most people will look at that list and call me a sellout. That’s fine. I can deal with it. I write in a genre that has a review that roasts damn near everything. A thick skin had to come with the territory.
But the thing is, writing to market doesn’t mean a canned product. I knew enough about the market and books to know where I could get creative. Little places I could add in my personal touch to make it mine.
To own it.
In Endeavor’s author notes, I go into detail on where I started with the characters and cast. As far as I could tell, there was one primary character archtype that needed to be present. Another was nice, and showed up often, but not necessary. The first type was the aging captain. This guy is usually an outcast, but for some reason the top leadership likes him.
The second, optional, archtype was the cocky pilot. Tegan “Bobcat” Bradley fills that role. The thing is, she isn’t as headstrong and cocky as most the pilots in the genre. She is in another story I started, but not in Endeavor. But the rest of the crew knows how good she is, which is just as important.
In truth, I always saw the Mythrar War as being Tegan’s story. Through two books, and the planning into the third, she has changed the most. And I can tell you, she still has a lot of growing up to do.
The next things I payed attention to were the cosmetics. Namely the cover and blurb. I spent hours reading and rewriting blurbs until I became confident I could write one for the book.
Could it be better? Sure. Does it sell decently with the one it has? Yes. So for now, it will stay. I have tweaked it a little, but not enough for most people to notice. Once again, a story for another time.
Finally the cover. I’m working on a budget, as in I need things to be cheap and easy. I’m willing to reinvest every dime I make on the books to make them beautiful, but I needed to be able to create a good product in the meantime. That meant I needed to create a cover that looked like the best in the genre, on my budget. I think Endeavor delivers. The prequel cover is weak, in comparison, but still works in the short term.
That being said, there are points that I missed the mark. Namely with editing. Part of that goes along with the bootstrapping problem. Working on a budget forces you to evaluate every one of your options. If you only have $X to spend on production of the book from start to completion, you have to evaluate where every dime goes. While I had an editing budget, the amount I had to spend showed… and damned quick. This seems to be one of those things where you get what you pay for, and from my limited experience, it shows.
The positive point to the editing issues in the first edition of Endeavor is that it made me refine my personal process. I added three extra layers to my process to help find additional issues. These are processes that will remain in place well into the future as the product is in a much better place now than before.
That said, hiring a better editor is on my list of things to do. The budget is still an issue for a few more months, but is growing every day.
Other than the dings for the editing woes, the feedback on the story has been positive. There is one exception, but he hates about everything in the genre… yet reads it all. I can almost promise he’ll be hitting me with one or two star reviews the rest of the way out, because he likes to read it all… even if he hates it.
And after 1100 words of drivel, here comes the point of the post. Facing your fears.
I’ve written over a million words of fiction, and still deal with fear on a daily basis. It is strongest on the days I’m starting a new book, or finishing one. Today has been especially trying because I put the final touches on Infamy while starting the first draft of Reliant. It’s the fear of doing something new combined with the fear of putting something I wrote out on the market (Infamy will be released Thursday, for those keeping score.)
During those times it is typical for me to question my story, ability, and desire. Steven Pressfield calls this sensation Resistance. It is the external force that pushes us away from creative work. It is our critical brain’s way of keeping us safe from our rambunctious creative brain.
Talking to other authors, this fear never goes away. Instead they learn ways to deal with it. As an ex-smoker (going on 10 years) I can relate. Ten years later and I STILL get cravings. But now I have ten years of experience dealing with it, allowing me to brush it off with ease. Ten days in, the struggle was worse. Ten hours in and I swore I was going to die. Today, I couldn’t tell you what it felt like to smoke. I can’t picture myself with one in my hand, or a pack in my pocket. Fear is the same way.
On the days it hits hardest, you have to find a way to push through. It doesn’t matter if you got a horrible review, or are having the pre-launch jitters, you have to keep going. Keep pushing hard enough and you might see a blip like I had above. It took me 13 titles (21 counting individual Echoes episodes) to make a decent blip. I pulled two titles from my shelves for differing reasons, and I’m about to pull another. This doesn’t count the dozens of partial manuscripts littering my hard drive.
How many of you have written 90k words to a story and stopped? I have. And while it hurts, it would’ve hurt more to finish that book (which was quickly showing to end around the 300k mark) and have it flop. I have ways I can use parts of that story going further, but that is down the road, when I can do this gig full time.
Down the road, I’ll do more of these posts. I can’t promise how many or how often. It is more important for me to write new fiction in the short term, so that has to be the focus. Once I can start tackling my massive debt and start relegating the day job to part time status, that can change.