Failures In The Field Of Writing
Diverse readers make bad writers. This is the lesson that I am learning even as I embark on putting into print yet another one of my stories that won't ever achieve that goal beyond a printed version within my house.
I note this at the outset, not having put a single word down yet, not out of an attitude of defeat, but a simple recognition as I examine the aspects of the story in question.
One of the most important aspects as far as the ability to publish and share your stories is the marketability (i.e. readability) of what you are writing.
When the author is a fan of Steven King, Nora Roberts, Laurell Hamilton, Harry Bosch, John Grisham, Anne Rice, David and Leigh Eddings and countless others whose names don't rise to the surface at the moment, one realizes something. (A realization that might take some research on the parts of the rest of you as I am at this point too tired to go to the effort of linking every one of the above authors for those who are unfamiliar.) That author is a huge fan of good writing regardless of genre. The problem is that this presents a difficulty in writing. As often the genres mix in the writing at hand.
This makes things wholly unmarketable. You have to have the genre to sell your book to. Love stories sell. Fantasy and Hi-Fi stories sell. Mysteries sell. Science Fiction sells. The problem is when you don't have a market to attach your publication to.
A mob story will sell. A love story will sell. A story about witchcraft will sell. A story about top secret military units will sell. A story about mutants will sell. What genre do you put all of the above into if they exist in a single book?
In my latest: How exactly do you make a dreadnought love story marketable? (In this case you, by my design given the public domain here, may not know what a dreadnought is, since I created the race in question.) Suffice it to say the fantasy and love story would be difficult enough. David Eddings meets Nora Roberts. It would be more difficult given the fact that dreadnoughts only come in one gender. More still since the world in which they exist would have to be created first, which is the fundamental failure in my last book as I created the story then wrote the first book that was the background.
So the truth is that I will never be a writer. Not for the inability to process complex issues, but the reverse. I can't dumb it down to a genre. Perhaps soon I will reach that last stage of commitment to the realization of this and create a spin-off blog like Dawn Is Coming devoted to my fiction, so that which does not sell will at least provide thoughts and details to others who can dumb it down for a willing audience.
My only even semi-well known writing will be here. That sucks, but it is life, or something close to it.
I note this at the outset, not having put a single word down yet, not out of an attitude of defeat, but a simple recognition as I examine the aspects of the story in question.
One of the most important aspects as far as the ability to publish and share your stories is the marketability (i.e. readability) of what you are writing.
When the author is a fan of Steven King, Nora Roberts, Laurell Hamilton, Harry Bosch, John Grisham, Anne Rice, David and Leigh Eddings and countless others whose names don't rise to the surface at the moment, one realizes something. (A realization that might take some research on the parts of the rest of you as I am at this point too tired to go to the effort of linking every one of the above authors for those who are unfamiliar.) That author is a huge fan of good writing regardless of genre. The problem is that this presents a difficulty in writing. As often the genres mix in the writing at hand.
This makes things wholly unmarketable. You have to have the genre to sell your book to. Love stories sell. Fantasy and Hi-Fi stories sell. Mysteries sell. Science Fiction sells. The problem is when you don't have a market to attach your publication to.
A mob story will sell. A love story will sell. A story about witchcraft will sell. A story about top secret military units will sell. A story about mutants will sell. What genre do you put all of the above into if they exist in a single book?
In my latest: How exactly do you make a dreadnought love story marketable? (In this case you, by my design given the public domain here, may not know what a dreadnought is, since I created the race in question.) Suffice it to say the fantasy and love story would be difficult enough. David Eddings meets Nora Roberts. It would be more difficult given the fact that dreadnoughts only come in one gender. More still since the world in which they exist would have to be created first, which is the fundamental failure in my last book as I created the story then wrote the first book that was the background.
So the truth is that I will never be a writer. Not for the inability to process complex issues, but the reverse. I can't dumb it down to a genre. Perhaps soon I will reach that last stage of commitment to the realization of this and create a spin-off blog like Dawn Is Coming devoted to my fiction, so that which does not sell will at least provide thoughts and details to others who can dumb it down for a willing audience.
My only even semi-well known writing will be here. That sucks, but it is life, or something close to it.
posted by Wanderer at 10:28 PM
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