Naturally, when I did finally get published, it was assumed by many that I would immediately begin a series.  I even considered an expanding universe, turning Rockwood of Gil’s All Fright Diner into my own little playground with recurring characters and continuity.  But then my publisher kept buying other books, so I lost interest quickly.

And now, eight books published and my ninth manuscript just about done, I don’t see any reason to go back to what I started.  I could write a sequel to something, and I’m sure it would sell well.  If anything, by playing hard to get, I might have increased demand for it.  And, for the record, I’m not a big fan of sequels or series novels, but many are done well and have achieved a justifiable hardcore fan following.

The idea of a continuing universe or the further adventures of Character X works just fine for many.  But as an artist (if I might indulge my ego for a bit), the pitfalls are many.

Tron Legacy was the sequel fans have been waiting decades for.  And it wasn’t very good.  But perhaps it would be wrong to place the blame on those who made Legacy.  Maybe it’s just one of those stories that is perfect the way it is and no sequel could work.  Allow me to be charitable to the filmmakers for just a moment and suggest that the Tron setting really isn’t good for many stories.  The original is a neat film with cool ideas, but it doesn’t lend itself to much outside that.  The world of Tron wasn’t designed with sequels and series in mind.  Hence, the difficulty in creating any sort of continuing story about it.  This would explain why Legacy mostly meanders its way through a muddled plot, stealing bits and pieces from other fantasy films, in hopes that they can be cobbled together into something worthwhile.

Let’s call it The Highlander Dilemma.  What do you do with a story that was never intended to be expanded?  You can add a weird alien background, a strange futuristic setting, and contrive reasons to bring back characters, but you’re still basically trying to push a boulder uphill.

Actually, Tron Legacy and Highlander 2 seem to be poster children for this particular problem.  Or Men-in-Black 2.  Or Hangover 2.  Or Pirates of the Caribbean 2-who knows how many they’ll make. Heck, even the Star Wars prequels fall victim to this.  They aren’t necessary, don’t add anything new to the story, and exist mostly because popularity and financial success demand it.

That’s the dilemma.  Because whether or not I enjoyed any of those films listed above, they were all commercial successes.  And people enjoyed them.  I might think Legacy and Hangover 2 are dreadful, but my opinion is just one and hardly one that matters.  Box office is what counts, and it should.  A big, mainstream movie costs a lot of money to make, and who would bother if they didn’t think they’d get some return on their investment?

Another storytelling medium that continually suffers from this are comic book.  Specifically comic book superheroes.  I used to love comic books.  But superheroes are always struggling between the need to tell ongoing stories and a contrary need to keep things exactly the same.  No change in comic books is permanent.  All characters will return to their original form.  Given enough time, Barbara Gordon will get out of her wheelchair and walk again.  Hal Jordan will somehow return from the grave and become Green Lantern again.  Spider-Man will have his marriage magically undone, and everything will be exactly the way it started.

That doesn’t bother me.  Not exactly.  Although it is why any sort of ongoing continuity is always going to screw storytellers in the end.  Because if you don’t change the characters / worlds, the audience can get bored.  But if you do change the characters / worlds, the audience gets hostile.  You really are damned if you do, damned if you don’t.  Given a long enough timeline, every continuity becomes a yoke around the storyteller’s neck.

Comic book superheroes have struggled with this dilemma for at least 30 years.  Ever since comic book fans started reading compulsively and cross-referencing every bit of dialogue and display of power.  Comic books are going through a hard time now, and I don’t think it’s solely because they’ve taken stories about flying people in long underwear and turned them into violent, blood-soaked fantasies.  (Though that doesn’t help.)  It’s because there’s really nothing new being done in comics.  It’s the same characters, fighting the same villains, in the same way over and over and over again.  While it’s easy to be critical, it’s also true that there’s just no clear way out of the continuity trap.  Other than perhaps creating new characters and supporting them long enough that they might become a new generation of heroes and villains without decades of baggage already attached to them.  But that’s not going to happen.  Mostly because a new character would probably have to be supported for at least a decade before making headway against the much better established ones.

ASIDE: This is why I read and recommend Atomic Robo by Red 5 Comics.  He’s a new character in his own universe.  He doesn’t come with fifty years of backstory.  He isn’t going to get shanghaied into some silly epic crossover.  And while the comic does have continuity (and even uses it deftly and effectively), it’s also a great read without any of that.  Atomic Robo is the comic book that makes me want to be a better writer and is just plain awesome.  Pick up any of the collected graphic novels.  You won’t be disappointed. BACK ON TOPIC

If my livelihood depended on sequels, I’d write them.  I admit it.  But as a novelologist, I’m lucky enough to have choices.  I’d most probably be doing better at this stage if I was on book eight of an ongoing series, though I can’t say that for sure.  I don’t rule anything out, but I’m earning a living writing standalone books.  And I love the freedom it gives me in terms of storytelling.  And I like being able to offer an alternative in a world full of sequels.

I’m damn lucky to do what I do, and maybe I’ve just been slipping below the radar up to this point.  Maybe one day, the publishing police will bust down my door and smack me around until I relent.  But until that day, as long as people keep paying me for writing what I enjoy writing best, I won’t complain.

Fighting the good fight, Writing the good write,

Lee

The hullaballoo about the new Harlequin Horizons self-publishing imprint gave me an excuse to post some thoughts on self-publishing in general.  You read right, gang.  This isn’t a blog about Godzilla, board games, or the coolness of robots and cartoons.  Although I’m not promising that one or more of those topics might rear their head along the way.  They tend to do that in my internet postings, and I’ve just learned to live with that.  But onto the topic at hand.

Self-publishing (or vanity publishing or whatever the hell you want to call it) is a tricky proposition.  I’ll just go on record here and now and say that self-publishing is, in my own opinion, a lesser form of publishing.  There’s no rule that says a self-published book has to be bad, but this is true more often than not if we’re honest with ourselves.  But there’s also a hell of a lot of bad professionally published books out there too, so what does that really mean?

I’m not against self-publishing if you really, really, really want to get published.  But there’s a lot of pitfalls to self-publishing, a lot of mistakes made by aspiring writers who seek to self-publish.  We should lay those on the table right now.

If you want to publish so badly just to have a book in your hand that you can show people, maybe sell a few copies here and there, then self-publishing is fine. If, however, you think this will make you a “real” writer, think again.  Most self-published books have a hell of a time achieving any kind of market penetration.  No matter how good the sales pitch a self-publishing company will give you, a self-published book faces a variety of obstacles a professionally published novel won’t.  And considering how hard it is for a professional published book to make an impression on the market, that should tell you something.

Booksellers know the difference between a self-published and a traditionally published book.  And, whether you like it or not, they do hold it against you if your book is self-published.  Space is limited in a brick-and-mortar store.  If they can order ten more of the latest bestseller or one copy of your brilliant self-published book . . . well, do I really need to finish that sentence?

Vanity publishers will lie to you.  They will tell you that your book will have every advantage a traditionally published book does.  Do NOT believe them.  They might even be sincere, but no matter how successful a vanity press is, it is and will always be a vanity press.

Maybe you don’t care about brick-and-mortar stores.  Maybe you’re thinking I’ll sell on Amazon and the magical internet.  No competition for shelf space there, right?  Sorta true.  Except that the internet is a ginormous marketplace, and in that marketplace, most everything except a fortunate few exist in shadowy darkened corners.  Someone might discover your book about the history of Eskimos.  But odds are good that there are likely about a dozen Eskimo history books available on the internet right now and they’ll probably all pop up on a search engine before yours does.

Promotion is key, and while authors have more power to reach out to their audience than ever before, this hasn’t leveled the playing field.  Because EVERYONE gets to reach out to their audience now.  It’s like wordprocessing programs and electronic submissions via internet.  These have made the nuts and bolts of writing easier than ever before and creating more competition than ever before.  So it is with the internet.  A million voices are all shouting for attention, and between the porno ads and the snuggie pop ups, standing out ain’t all that easy.

Self-promotion is grueling, difficult, rarely rewarding work.  I know several self-published authors, and I have tremendous respect for the hard work they do.  I don’t work nearly as hard in that department, but I do outsell these folks.  One ad in a magazine (paid for by my publisher) or one interview on a popular site (arranged usually by my publisher) will reach more people than I could ever on my own.  Monster, my 6th novel, sold pretty well.  I’d like to say that this was all because of my talent and hard work, but there’s no doubt in my mind that it has more to do with the fact that this was my first book to be put up front in the store.  This was arranged entirely by my publisher influence.  Without a publisher, this wouldn’t have happened.

Let’s just lay something out on the table here.  Anyone can be a self-published writer.  ANYONE.  But if you’re writing a book, you don’t want to be just anyone.  you want to be more than that.  You want to stand out.  You want respect.  You want money.  You want to reach people.  And all those things are almost impossible to do as a self-published author.  Hard truth.  End of story.  No arguments from the peanut gallery, please.

At this point, I’m sure all the self-publishing advocates will mention the few people who have been successful via the self-publishing path.  Good for them.  You will not be one of those people.  Okay, you might be one of those people.  But you also might wake up tomorrow to find the world has been consumed in nuclear fire and that you are a god worshipped by the new race of mutant snailmen.  It might happen, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

Every aspiring writer strives to be an anomaly.  Getting paid as a professional writer is a small miracle.  Getting self-published is just about writing a check.  Getting that check to turn into a writing career isn’t just a small miracle.  It’s parting the Red Sea level divine intervention.  Almost.

And here’s another ugly truth.  Vanity publishers might give you a big salespitch about how much they care about your book, how they believe in it, and how they’ll help you sell it.  But, really, most of them just want your money.  That’s the real difference between vanity press and professional publishing.  Both are in this business to make money.  One’s looking to make it from readers.  The other is looking to make it from aspiring writers.  Ask yourself before you self-publish.  Are you a writer?  Or a customer?

My agent has “The Gatekeeper” rule.  It’s a great metaphor for the situation.

Imagine there are two guards at a gate.  Both guards allow people into the city at their discretion.  Guard A gets no money for letting people in.  In fact, it costs Guard A $50 for every person he lets in.  Then he gets a percentage of their earned income for the next year.

Guard B gets no percentage.  He gets a flat $5 from everyone he lets into the city.

The metaphor is clumsy and obvious, but it illustrates the situation.  Guard A has to be discrimating.  Guard A probably is even willing to help everyone he lets in find a job because it’s in his best interests.  Guard B, on the other hand, benefits from letting everyone in and then just forgetting about them.  His best interest is just letling in as many people as possible.  Once there inside though, he couldn’t care less.  He might tell everyone how great the city is, how easy it is to make a living inside its walls, and how they’d be a sucker to pass up the opportunity for a mere $5.  He might even be right.  But that’s irrelevent to Guard B.  All he cares about is his $5.

Now, not every vanity press is like this.  I’m sure that there are honest, hard working self-publishing companies in existence, but I gotta figure that these companies are just as hard to find as a professional publishing house.  So you might as well go for the real deal.

This is running a little long.  I am not dead set against self-publishing, but I do think it is a decision that should not be taken lightly.  The only thing worse than a constant stream of rejection from editors and agents is to have a published book in the market that fades away into obscurity without a real shot.

In brief:

Vanity publishing will always have much harder time finding an audience.

Vanity publishing is rarely likely to make its writer any money.

Since these are the only two reasons I can imagine anyone wants to write a book, I think we should be up front about it.  Still want to self-publish?  That’s your call.  I wish you all the luck in the world.  Just don’t come cryin’ to me if it doesn’t work out.

Fighting the good fight, Writing the good write,

Lee

It got me thinking.  So many aspiring writers just don’t seem to “get” query letters.  A while ago, I wrote a blog post about it.  It ended up getting deleted when my website went through a spot of trouble, but fortunately, I had a backup at the ready.  I guess we could classify this a rerun blog, but hey, if you haven’t read it before, it’s new to you.  And more importantly, it’s something I think every aspiring writer should take a look at.

So without further ado…

Being a writer is tough.  Being an aspiring writer is tougher.  It seems like there are a million pitfalls, and you can never be sure if you’re doing the right thing or not.  So in search of inspiration for something to post about, I’d like to present a semi-formal feature where I address some common questions.  The kind of questions that I hear all the time.

Today, let’s talk about QUERY LETTERS.

Plenty of aspiring writers break into clammy, cold flopsweat about query letters.  You’ve put your heart and soul, blood and sweat, into writing your novel.  Then you have to figure out how to sell it in a one page letter.  It’s like meeting the guy / girl of your dreams and having 30 seconds to convince them that maybe a date is worth a shot.  Good luck on that.

Here’s the good news.  It’s not nearly as hard as you think.  I’m not suggesting that there’s any such thing as a perfect query letter or that after you read this you’ll be getting requests for your manuscript with every letter you send.  That just ain’t gonna happen.  Rejection is part of an aspiring writer’s life.  Even yours truly, gifted and talented as I am, had so many rejections that I can’t even remember them all.

Here’s the first thing, the most important thing, you need to remember about a query.  It’s a sales pitch.  A tiny, tiny sales pitch, but a pitch nonetheless.  All you’re trying to do is get the reader interested in hearing more.  It really doesn’t matter how you do it, but there are a couple of solid notions I adhere to.

QUESTIONS: Queries aren’t about answers.  They’re about questions.  Think about it.  You don’t go to a movie or buy a book because you know what’s going to happen.  You go because you want to know.  Or, if the sales pitch is really good, because you NEED to know.

Many aspiring writers tend to spell out their plot in their query letters.  Bad idea.  Most stories sound uninspiring when spelled out.  It just doesn’t matter how cool your story is.  It’ll sound dumb if you describe it in three or four sentences.  Or contrived.  Or, perhaps worst of all, uninteresting.

A great example available to all writers is found on the back of nearly every paperback book on the shelves of any bookstore.  The next time you’re in a bookstore, go ahead and pick a random genre and just start reading the back of books.  You’ll discover the perfect query letter format.  Colorful, intriguing, and mysterious.  They give questions, not answers.  They pose complications, not solutions.

Now most query letters should be shorter than what is written on the back of books.  But the principle is still the same.  Tease and intrigue.  Don’t explain.  Just pose questions and complications.

UNIMPORTANT DETAILS:  Don’t give unimportant information.  Don’t open your letter with details about yourself.  Even if you were a supermodel, ninja, jewel thief, rocket science, nobody really cares.  You’re selling your story, not yourself.  The first paragraph should really get right into your story if it can.  (Unless you’ve met this person before, in which case a sentence reminding them where they met / heard about you is a good thing to do.)

Don’t give the technical details at front.  Don’t tell your word count in the first paragraph.  Don’t tell how long it took you to write the book.  Don’t say that this is based on your life experience.  As my own agent once put it, if you’re writing something about yourself, what do you do when you run out of experiences to write about?

Remember that you’re trying to sell your book.  You are expected to be honest, but you aren’t expected to tell them stuff right off the bat things that will discourage them.  Word count is a great example.  If your book is 10,000 words longer than what the agent / editor wants, they might overlook that if your query letter was sufficiently interesting.  But if the first thing you do is tell them your book is too long, they’re likely to put it aside before even getting to your sales pitch.

THREE PARAGRAPHS / HALF A PAGE:  The shorter, the better.  When in doubt, cut it down.  My queries tended to get great results (though rejection followed after), and I kept mine down to three paragraphs / half a page.  The first paragraph was usually the tease, less about the story and more about something unique about it.  For GIL’S ALL FRIGHT DINER, for example, I listed the more fun and memorable elements of the supernatural: Zombie Cows, Magic 8 Balls, Pig Latin.

The next paragraph gave brief character mentions along with the weird situations they find themselves.

And the final paragraph gave the technical details, page count, genre, etc.  Done.  Don’t overstay your welcome.

ANOTHER IMPORTANT DON’T: Avoid strong comparisons to established writers.  It’s okay to mention a similarity, but it can be dangerous to make too much of it.  Sure, everyone’s looking for the next Harry Potter, but everyone is also writing the next Harry Potter.  In other words, it doesn’t really distinguish your novel.  It just makes it seem like another copycat.  And you’re better than that.

Well, look at that.  An awfully long entry for an awfully short subject.  Just remember.  It’s not as hard as you think it is.  And a bad query letter is better than no query at all.  So don’t get discouraged.

Just get to it.

And remember, I’m rooting for you.  Just as long as you don’t sell more books than me, that is.

Fighting the good fight, Writing the good write,

Lee