Monday, October 10, 2011

It Sucks To Be A Fire Hydrant In A Pissing Contest

Yes, authors have been in an uproar lately. Over self publishing.

It doesn't feel like that should come as a surprise, but Chuck Wendig's rant gave birth to a phrase:

(Don't put) the publishing cart before the storytelling horse.

I agree. And I'm going to take a slight detour here, and admit I've been feeling a bit nostalgic lately, a bit disconnected. I remember the good ol' days, when a lot of friends had blogs, and it was easy to keep in touch, and have a sense of connectedness. Now, most of the blogs I frequented once upon a time are gone - my solo blog included - and active discussion on the existing author blogs isn't what it used to be, either.

But there's something else I remember from back then, when I first started blogging. There were a lot of blogs that dispensed writing advice. And writers were almost always clearly on one side of the publishing line. They were either traditional, or they were self published.

Technology changed, and that line between the two camps started to blur. And, as more writers got on board with self publishing for Kindle, the stigma of self publishing eroded. Authors who once railed against the folly of self publishing uploaded their backlists, short story collections and even original manuscripts.

The rise of viable self publishing and borderline legitimacy coincided with a decline in blogging, and writers who were blogging started talking more and more about e-publishing, and how to succeed.

Although it may not have occurred in the way the naysayers who linked self publishing with the demise of quality writing predicted, the rise of self publishing does seem to have coincided with a significant decline in discussion about the craft of writing.

Now, back when I first started blogging, there were a lot of blogs where people dispensed writing advice. In some respects, it was a bad thing, because sometimes it was a case of the blind leading the blind. People with no publishing credits to their name would set up shop and dispense advice and build a flock of followers ready to drink the Kool Aid. Heaven help anyone who came along and questioned the adviser, or their advice.

I have mixed feelings about the shift in focus, because I am glad that I see fewer of those blogs. Then again, perhaps I'm just not looking hard enough.

I also appreciate that there's a time and place for advice on the business side of publishing and writing, and I have benefited from some posts about e-publishing.

I am also concerned by the fact that there seems to be a lot less interest in the craft of quality writing.

Having said that, I'm still left to wonder how we regulate quality. Just considering my own work, the same book that has six five star reviews and six four star reviews also has two one star reviews on Amazon. Your mileage may vary. There have been books others have loved that I've loathed.

My latest title, Harvest of Ruins, was recently pegged by Charlie Stella as my best to date. This is a book that's reduced reviewers to tears and brought me some of my greatest compliments, lags far behind all my other titles in sales.

What can I conclude? I don't have enough information to make any definite conclusions, but I am wondering about a lot of things. I wonder if readers feel more confident with my other titles because they were traditionally published first. I wonder how much the number of reviews on Amazon translate into sales. I wonder if it matters that you write a great book, because the only real force for sales is word of mouth. I mean, The DaVinci Code outsold every single work by Dennis Lehane, so quality writing doesn't always translate into popularity or sales. As I recall, The Bridges of Madison County was a NY Times Bestseller. Making the list only means you're popular; it doesn't mean you're a good writer.

And that's the rub. We've all known that. A book may sell phenomenally well, but that doesn't mean the writing is great. It doesn't even mean the writing is good.

There are some things about being a great writer, and a great storyteller, that you can't really teach. A writer either has the instincts and the aptitude that enables them to develop as a writer, or they don't. So many people want the shortcut to success, and so many writers are blind to their own mistakes and weaknesses. I think that's the real fear I'm left with. I'm not afraid of someone self publishing. I'm concerned that people don't take the time to let their work breathe and go back with fresh eyes, and really take advice and feedback to heart so that they can grow.

It's our fast food microwave culture. We don't want to wait, we don't want to put in effort. We want what we want and we want it now.

Part of me thinks that the reason so many people have shifted focus to sales and marketing and succeeding in e-publishing, is because selling successfully is concrete, while much of the art of writing is subjective, and you either have talent or you don't.

The question is, where do we go from here? How do we raise the level of discourse and foster useful discussions about writing? Is it even appropriate? I always feel that if I'm just writing about writing, I'm excluding the readers from my posts.

And that leaves me as lost as ever when I sit down to think about what I want to share here. What do you guys think? What should we be talking about?


PS: Happy Thanksgiving, my fellow Canadians.

8 comments:

Jay Stringer said...

I agree (with both you and Chuck) that there's been too much of a shift from craft to publishing.

You need to learn to make the sausage before you learn to sell it. Both are important steps to me getting a hot dog, but I think one is getting preference over the other.

Funny thing is, I've always been hesitant on craft talk. I don't do it much because I don't feel qualified to preach to others, and when other folks do it I take it with a grain of salt. And we don't do much craft talk here on DSD (for my part, again, it's not because I don't have craft talk to give, I just don't feel qualified to do it.)

But how to change the balance? Well, I think supply and demand must come in to it more than we think. More and more people are writing about the publishing end because more and more people want to read about that.

The only way we can shift it back, I guess, is if we get down and start producing a higher volume of craft talk, and give folks the other thing to read.

Maybe November, a time when half the internet will be doing nanoonimoowromomomimmo, DSDers should sign up to a full month of craft talk? Try and push the content balance back a bit?

Dana King said...

I hadn't thought of a correlation between less craft talk (I've noticed it, too) and the recent e-publishing spike, but now that I do, you're right. They did occur at about the same time. Maybe we're thinking the sun rose because the rooster crowed, but it's food for thought.

You and Jay are both right about the change in proportion of craft vs. publishing advice on blogs. The quality of comments seems to be down, too. That could be because talk of writing provokes thought, and talk of selling provokes arguments.

John McFetridge said...

A while ago Dave White nailed it: tell me what you like and why.

I think you're right, people talk about sales because that's something you can measure and assign a number.

When it comes to craft I think it's like music. Lots of people can learn to play a musical instrument and some people will write new music that other people like. You can learn to write the same way you can learn to play already written music - that's craft. The next step is the tough one.

If we could figure out what it is, we could talk about it ;)

Sean Patrick Reardon said...

To me, it's all about story, whether it's from a self-pubbed author or a famous one. I just discovered a tremendous author, who was tradionally published, had an agent, screen right sales, etc... but ended up pulling his latest from submission and self-pubbed it. Best damn crime / heist story I have read this year.

The anti-self pub sentiment is still very much alive and well around some writer forum sites, where so-called experts are dishing out advice, and not in the kindest of ways. I find that these types are the same one's who follow agent blogs, kissing ass, with the hope of getting noticed.

If it is a good story, I'm in, doesn't matter how it got published.

circuitmouse said...

That post title would be a helluva great short story title (I don't know about a book, though).

You have no idea how much solace you provide to writers out there wherever-they-are that can exhale knowing someone else is saying what they're thinkin'....

pattinase (abbott) said...

In the early years, most visitors to my blog were other writers so I talked a lot about writing--not advice but what I was wrestling with.
Now my readers are mostly readers so I am reluctant to talk about writing very often, knowing it excludes them. I just posted one about writing for later in the week, knowing it will exclude some of them but sometimes I really have question.

Mike Dennis said...

Thoughtful post, Sandra. However, it reads like a sad dirge, a requiem to good times gone. In fact, the best times, IMHO, are ahead.

Now that I think about it, you've inspired me to write a blog on this topic for my own website.

Sandra Ruttan said...

You know, maybe a month of craft in November is a good idea, Jay. I'm with you - I have a hard time coming off as a know-it-all. I have to view it as passing on advice from what I've learned in my own experiences.

Dana, great summary. Selling talk always produces arguments.

I'm not ashamed to admit that I have a problem with Pepsi, and it's 100% because of their ads. Coke's ads are nicer and Pepsi's are cutthroat, and I don't like the nastiness, so I'm hard-core loyal to Coke. So much so that today, when the Coke machine was down, I decided to go without caffeine.

LOL, John. It does make it hard to raise the level of discourse, doesn't it?

Sean, I do think story is critical. I think I'm a better storyteller than writer, per se, but am always striving to improve. I can't stand books where people are showy with words that don't actually say anything.

Circuitmouse, I'm just glad to know I'm not alone. That's what I always liked about blogging - a sense of connection.

Patti, I have that exact same dilemma. I don't know how to find the balance.

Mike, I think we can shift things, and that the best times are ahead... but we have to recognize that there's a fork in the road, and one way leads to a washed-out bridge and the other leads to paradise. :)