IWSG Day Question: What steps have you taken to put a schedule in place for your writing and publishing?
Can I just state first of all that I am loving these monthly questions? It really takes the hassle out of figuring out what I'm going to write about each month. And they always seems to be especially relevant to me. But I digress...
I've spent the past few days trying to decide what will be happening with this writing and publishing thing that I appear to have decided to do. I've mentioned previously that I published my first and only novel in September 2015. Since then I've allowed myself to go off on a tangent and write all kinds of other novels in other series. As an indie, I can tell you now, this is not good practice. Any traction that I had with my first novel is now gone. The few people on my mailing list probably don't even remember who I am anymore and the face of indie publishing has changed so much in the past 2 years that when I do publish again I'll have to essentially relearn everything from scratch.
I guess what I'm saying is that I went into this whole publishing thing with my eyes tightly shut, hoping to just wing it on luck. I'd been writing the same novel for over 4 years and was thoroughly sick to death of it and just wanted it out so I could work on other things. Which was all well and good except that I had nothing to follow it up with. There's a saying that the best way to promote your novel is to write the next one. Well I broke that rule right off the bat.
The other night someone on one of my FB groups shared this blog post about sustainability as an indie author. It's all about treating your writing as a business and setting long term goals so that you don't burn out. There's advice in there about how to sustain the business now that the indie market has matured and it got me thinking about where I eventually want to go with my writing career. How much I can write a year, every year, to sustain my love of writing. I haven't quite figured it out yet but what I do know is that I can't be one of those writers who chases trends and writes what the market demands. It's just not who I am.
I guess I'm lucky in some ways because when I do write (Mostly during NaNoWriMo months), my word counts can be staggering. I could probably comfortably write 4-6 novels a year if I really needed to. I've realised too that the drafts I write are pretty clean so editing, though mentally tedious, isn't as awful as it once was. I think it's the marketing and self-doubt side of things that makes me pause and want to stick my head in the sand. That's the part that I need to focus on this year. I have about 9 novels in various stages of readiness to publish. If I don't do them soon, it's never going to happen. So I guess that's my rough plan for this year. Publish as many novels as I have ready and figure out what a sustainable number of novels I can write in year will be.
I guess what I'm saying is that I went into this whole publishing thing with my eyes tightly shut, hoping to just wing it on luck. I'd been writing the same novel for over 4 years and was thoroughly sick to death of it and just wanted it out so I could work on other things. Which was all well and good except that I had nothing to follow it up with. There's a saying that the best way to promote your novel is to write the next one. Well I broke that rule right off the bat.
The other night someone on one of my FB groups shared this blog post about sustainability as an indie author. It's all about treating your writing as a business and setting long term goals so that you don't burn out. There's advice in there about how to sustain the business now that the indie market has matured and it got me thinking about where I eventually want to go with my writing career. How much I can write a year, every year, to sustain my love of writing. I haven't quite figured it out yet but what I do know is that I can't be one of those writers who chases trends and writes what the market demands. It's just not who I am.
I guess I'm lucky in some ways because when I do write (Mostly during NaNoWriMo months), my word counts can be staggering. I could probably comfortably write 4-6 novels a year if I really needed to. I've realised too that the drafts I write are pretty clean so editing, though mentally tedious, isn't as awful as it once was. I think it's the marketing and self-doubt side of things that makes me pause and want to stick my head in the sand. That's the part that I need to focus on this year. I have about 9 novels in various stages of readiness to publish. If I don't do them soon, it's never going to happen. So I guess that's my rough plan for this year. Publish as many novels as I have ready and figure out what a sustainable number of novels I can write in year will be.
That is the secret - follow up a book with another book.
ReplyDeleteYou have several ready, which is good. Space them out and work smart and you'll kick start that career again in no time.
I always did wonder why, with all the writing you’ve been doing, you never did anything with it. Perhaps invite some of those people on your list to be beta readers, to start with? Invite other people in the “indie” community to do the same and check out people who have been treating it as a business. Back in the old days, before anyone could publish ebooks and print on demand, people who self published often did it to fill a niche that no one else was filling, usually non fiction, and they did have to treat it as a business or run the risk of having a living room full of unsold books.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I have an unfinished prequel to Wolfborn, which I abandoned due to all the classes I had to prepare and when I realised there was no villain! I may have to give it a good scrubbing, but now I can do it.
I'm glad you managed to publish in 2015, despite getting fed up while writing it. I'm sure you will get the writing buzz later and then nothing will stop you.
ReplyDeleteSelf publishing and all that implies would scare me so I don’t blame you. I hope you get more books out there. Can’t wait to read them.
ReplyDeleteThis whole self-publishing thing is a lot harder than either of us ever suspected back in the beginning, eh, Lan? But, it doesn't mean we give up. We just have to figure it all out and we will together! I think we both are already starting to figure it out. ;)
ReplyDelete