Amazon's self-published success stories

[Kumabjorn]

I can't exactly recall where I read it, hence no link, but I think it was on something called Io9 (could be mistaken though) Anyhooo

The article listed the great success stories of self-published Amazon titles. I noticed that their common denominator was paranormal romances. Werewolf or Vampire love stories that kind of genre.

Now that begs the question, is that a genre that the Big6 hasn't responded to? What is the pent up demand for these kind of stories? Does this implies that those that have made it in that sector has done so thanks to their choice of genre rather than their ability to create a fascinating story?

Since I don't read that kind of material I have no idea what is going on. I was just perplexed at how closely related all those successes where as to their topic.

[Ninjalawyer]

The link is here if anyone is interested in the article. One of the main examples in the article is the series Wool, which has been optioned to maybe be made into a movie, so not all are paranormal romances or vampirotica.

The comments to the article are really good as well, with a few posters explaining their personal experiences with going the self-published route. Here's a very nice write-up:

I'm not one of these best selling writers, but I thought I'd share some of my experiences slowly climbing the heap, in case anyone's interested in seeing what the other side of the curtain is like. I apologize ahead of time for the length.

First, a little bit of biography: I'm a half-latin kid from a staunchly liberal, middle-class family. I grew up in the SF Bay Area in a house where massmarket sci-fi books and copies of Omni were always kicking around underfoot, and it's no surprise that I've been in love with both science-fiction and fantasy since before I could read. Also being an excessively wordy little bastard, I knew from an early age that I wanted to spend the rest of my life making up weird worlds of my own.

My friends, family, and teachers all seemed confident I'd make it someday. No one ever talked about "if", but rather "when"... and in retrospect, knowing what I do now about the publishing industry, that's a hell of a thing to do to a kid. It's like casually assuring them they're going to win the lottery someday.

Like most new writers, I'd originally intended to go the traditional route. Everyone wants their book to earn its place on those dusty shelves, and I'm sure each of us have taken a moment away from browsing to find the spot where our own books will fit in. Mine was was just left of Melanie Rawn, and I used to push her books an inch to the side to make way.

So, I spent my late teens and early twenties trying like hell to finish an avant-garde fantasy novel that was doomed to failure (hindsight being 20/20 and all that jazz). When that book finally breathed its last breath, I kicked its bloated, pustulant corpse aside and started work on the space opera that would eventually be my first completed novel.

Fast forward to late 2007. After having chained myself to the desk for three straight months, I found myself in possession of a finished manuscript, a good attitude, and a hunger to get started. I did my homework, hammered out a synopsis and cover letter, and received my very first form-letter rejection from an agent in December of that year.

For the next month or two, I avidly followed agents' blogs and studied their mysterious ways. When one of those agents opened her box for submissions again (ooh, that sounds wrong), I fired my packet off (still sounding wrong) and waited. I was immensely pleased a week later to find a request for a 50-page partial manuscript in my email.

Sitting there with a drunken smile on my face, I was at that moment blissfully unaware that I would spend the next six months waiting in terrified silence for her to make a decision. I was on the hook, aware that I'd been incredibly lucky to attract an agent's attention on my second swing, and also adamantly set against simultaneous submissions for fear of ruining my reputation among the people who controlled the future of my career.

Those six months sucked. They really, really sucked. At the end of it, she sent me a very kind rejection letter that assured me the book was marketable, but just not for her. It wasn't me; it was her.

I remembered all the stories I'd read about the sci-fi greats of the '50s and '60s. Some of those books had been rejected forty, fifty, sometimes a hundred times before finally finding a home. I did some very rudimentary arithmetic and I realized I could die from old age before striking paydirt. Even if I'd written the greatest sci-fi novel in history (and I most assuredly hadn't), it didn't change my chances. I was playing a lottery, and I'm not a notoriously lucky guy.

I wrote some shorter fiction and submitted to magazines in hopes of starting a little lower on the ladder, but magazines were in the process of imploding, and it was difficult to even figure out which venues were open to submissions in any given month.

The picture kept getting more bleak. I watched a good friend go through hell traditionally publishing three books that never found any traction in the market. His last was published by a press owned by Barnes & Noble, and he couldn't even get Barnes & Noble to stock it. I'd like to say I became disillusioned with traditional publishing, but "militant" is probably a more appropriate word.

Then, in late 2009, I noticed the ebook revolution beginning to gain momentum. With my head all full of anger, resentment, and a bunch of Cory Doctorow's scribblings on copyright, I began to rethink my plan. I set my pride aside and gave up on the dusty bookshelf, and in return I got to be in charge of my own success. Such a thing is truly a blessing for someone with my luck.

I started small in 2010 with a novella, something simple that I could use to get my feet wet and figure out how the system works. Later that year, I ran a failed Kickstarter in hopes of raising advertising funds, but paying for banner-ads didn't capture the public's imagination for some reason. Then I released my novel that Fall under the terms of a fairly permissive Creative Commons license, and I've been plugging away at it ever since.

There are now more than 20,000 copies of my debut novel out in the wild, although the vast bulk of those (>95%) have been free downloads distributed through Feedbooks, torrent sites, and promotions at Amazon. In fact, my most recent free sale at Amazon (just this past Tuesday) served another 3,600 copies, briefly placing me at #1 for free space opera and #103 free overall in the Kindle marketplace.

A year ago today, I was making around $30 a month in royalties, plus an occasional $20 donation from generous readers who wanted to thank me for a free book. This year, I'm pulling down closer to $400 a month, and the numbers are trending upward. That growth has come about entirely thanks to Amazon's Kindle Select Program, and the free promotions that come with it. Every sale has been more popular than the last, and I see a huge surge in real-for-money-sales after each one. Bouyed by this last promotion, I'm currently #64 on Amazon's space opera chart, wedged between Lois McMaster Bujold and a Star Wars novel.

There are worse places to be.

Of course, the whole task still feels like pushing a big rock up a steep hill. Amazon's ecosystem is an echo chamber designed to maximize the visibility of already popular works, but it does virtually nothing to gain exposure for the vast sea of undiscovered books sloshing around at the bottom of the charts. As a seller, you're constantly fighting against the surge of other books' sales, and it seems like you're only ever an hour away from slipping down the hill and back into obscurity.

Other opportunities for promotion are thin or non-existent. Reviewers have little interest in self-published works. Forums that are popular with readers are sick and tired of self-published authors flooding the network, and they now enforce strict rules against self-promotion or else keep self-pubs safely quarantined from the rest of the site. I can't blame them at all for that, honestly; conversation and community suffer horribly under the assault of a bunch of self-obsessed hucksters.

I've experimented with buying ad space, but it's been about as effective as prayer. At least prayer is free if you skip the live animal sacrifice.

And that just about sums up where I am right now. Sales are okay and improving. I'll have another free promotion in three weeks, and another three weeks after that. Eventually, I'd like to transit away from Amazon's market and build my own system--something engineered to pull good books up out of obscurity, rather than promote what's already popular--but that's still a way off. In the meantime, I'll be here writing and looking forward to the day when my name pops up in one of these articles.

If you made it all the way through this gargantuan post, you might be interested in some of my work. You can find my Amazon author page here: [www.amazon.com]

If prices seem too high, you can always wait a few weeks for a sale, or just pester someone for a copy. It's all CC licensed, and pirate friendly.

Cheers!
~Chris

[Kumabjorn]

It was a while since I read it, the point I, unsuccesfully, tried to make was that the success stories comes in what, at least to me, are slightly obscure genres. There are no great mysteries, regular romances, pure literature, avengers, family dramas etc. Fantasy, sci-fi and paranormal seems to be genres that traditional publishing isn't serving well.

Thanks Ninjalawyer for finding the article.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

There are no great mysteries, regular romances, pure literature, avengers, family dramas etc. Fantasy, sci-fi and paranormal seems to be genres that traditional publishing isn't serving well.

Self-published ebooks are still an "alternative" publishing channel fed by what is not funneled to the traditional publishers. As such, they tend to boldly go where the mainstream won't.

Traditional publishers have pretty deep pipelines; it takes them 18-24 months to get a book out the door from the moment they *accept* it and they often build up queues 4 years long. Because of their big investments, they have to be very conservative and they don't have much room for experimentation these days. And when a new concept or style captures the masses' fancy, by the time the big publishers can respond, the fad just might be over. In the end, pig publishers don't often stray from well-trodden paths. (Think of Rowling's problems finding a home for the Potter series.)

With ebooks in general and self-published ebooks in particular there is room to experiment and when an experimental title proves successful, there is room to *quickly* copy.
(Like last year's Zombie and mash-up fads...)

Right now, a lot of self-published ebooks are inspired by, yes, Twilight, Hunger games, and the Zombie tropes. Look carefully, and you'll find the beginnings of a 50 shades or Wool wave. If somebody comes up with a great Sherlockian pastiche, we'll see consulting detectives right behind them. If I had to guess, I'd say we're due for a wave of superhero stories this fall, all inspired by Whedon's AVENGERS success.

Another reason why we're seeing more self-published genre ebooks is that the genres have always inspired more people to try their hand at writing. So many that most publishers stopped accepting unsolicited manuscripts. There have always been more stories (and more good stories) floating around than available publishing slots. (I don't think you'll find too many people who upon finishing FINNEGAN'S WAKE will be inspired to move on and write a novel in a similar vein.)

And, of course, it is easier to experiment in the genres than it is in the more "staid" categories that rely on prose and emotion more than idea and plot.

[xg4bx]

i have no idea how paranormal is an unfilled niche, when i go to the bookstore thats all i see. for quite a few years there it completely took over fantasy/sf sections and actually finding a book in those genres was rarer than hens teeth.

[carpetmojo]

Originally Posted by xg4bx

.............................. actually finding a book in those genres was rarer than hens teeth.

Unlike the other pointy, non-hen teeth that filled some of the adult shelves, usually with blood on them, and on expanded YA sections......

[xg4bx]

Originally Posted by carpetmojo

Unlike the other pointy, non-hen teeth that filled some of the adult shelves, usually with blood on them, and on expanded YA sections......

when bookstores, barnes&noble in particular, have an entire section solely dedicated to YA twilight clones, yea theres too many . especially when sf/fantasy/horror are ghettoized into a dusty corner somewhere near the back of the store.

[RainingLemur]

I hadn't read that article before. That was interesting.

[charlesatan]

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

Now that begs the question, is that a genre that the Big6 hasn't responded to? What is the pent up demand for these kind of stories? Does this implies that those that have made it in that sector has done so thanks to their choice of genre rather than their ability to create a fascinating story?

I don't think it's that Big6 hasn't responded to these genres (BTW, romance is also one of the most popular genres, print or eBook, and outnumbers science fiction/fantasy) but it's more of a genre that fans respond to on a direct level.

For example, literary fiction is a genre being pushed by the academe and "literary" imprints, but it's not honestly a thriving genre (at least as far as I've seen--feel free to correct me) in self-publishing, as opposed to Romance, Crime/Mystery, Science Fiction/Fantasy, etc.

[Kumabjorn]

Originally Posted by xg4bx

i have no idea how paranormal is an unfilled niche, when i go to the bookstore thats all i see. for quite a few years there it completely took over fantasy/sf sections and actually finding a book in those genres was rarer than hens teeth.

Living in different countries may explain the discreapancy. Or perhaps the kind of bookstores we visit, who knows?

[dadioflex]

Paranormal romance is huge. It's not that the traditional publishers are ignoring it, it's that their business model isn't able to keep up with demand.

As mentioned, for at least the last 4-5 years paranormal romance has dwarfed pretty much every other genre. In fact we're in such a post-boom state that only Lost Girl and True Blood seem to have survived the TV cash-ins that were all the rage a few seasons back.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by dadioflex

In fact we're in such a post-boom state that only Lost Girl and True Blood seem to have survived the TV cash-ins that were all the rage a few seasons back.

Well, BLOOD TIES wasn't helped by running it on LIFETIME.

But I'm not sure the genre is all that played out:

VAMPIRE DIARIES has lasted to a third season.
(Though SECRET CIRCLE didn't graduate to a second and AWAKE was DOA.)
SUPERNATURAL seems to be aiming at SMALLVILLE's record for longevity.
GRIMM got renewed and ONCE UPON A TIME is also continuing, making it *three* still ongoing shows playing in FABLES turf.
The US and UK versions of BEING HUMAN both seem to be going on strong.

I still haven't seen what the fall season will bring so there may be more attempts coming. (I heard DEADMAN might be an option.)

Hollywood tends to lag on memes and fads so I don't think we've seen the end of "paranormal" on TV.

[DrNefario]

General fiction and literary fiction have to stand on the merits of the actual book. Every book is its own genre of 1, so can't benefit from group promotion. Genre fiction is bought by the yard.

Genre fiction by unknown authors is a commodity, in a way that literary fiction cannot really be, I think.

I read literary fiction, occasionally, but I'm reading specific works that I've been put onto by recommendations or reviews or prizes or whatever. I will stick to my chosen genres if I'm just looking for a random read.

I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. The good stuff will still rise to the top, on average. If a lot of SF fans like a piece of SF, that's probably more useful to me than a lot of lit-fic fans (is there even such a thing?) liking a piece of lit-fic, because I know where the SF fans are coming from; I'm better able to judge whether I'll like the book.

[elemenoP]

That is an interesting way to look at it, DrNefario. I never thought of it that way but I think you're right.

I have another theory for why sales of romance novels are so high. I think that romance readers READ MORE. They chew through those books really fast. So they constantly need more (and need to get them cheap, too!).

eP

[Kumabjorn]

There is probably a lot of merit to that argument. I don't have any scientific data to back me up but I do believe that women tend to read more and faster than men.