12% of ebooks are self-published; most are rubbish, claims editor

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

Hmm... I guess my standards are more subjective. When I am going through a large selection of books, online, at a bookstore, at the library, whatever, I am trying to find a book that I am sufficiently interested in, to buy it.

Ditto.
I'm more interested in a new, different experience, or one that takes me places I haven't been, intellectually or emotionally, even if slightly flawed--David Weber's famed datadumps--than a book an english professor might hold up as an example of fabulous wordsmithing.
But then, I'm not into lit-fic, but rather SF, where the primary object of the story is ideas and meaning, not style.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

That only applies if tastes are universal and absolute.
Sampling is about testing a book for suitability, to see how it matches with *your* tastes and expectations. Friends and reviewers can only tell you what *they* think.

Sampling is testing to see what *you* think.

Relying on others only gets you part of the way to a good/fun read. Sooner or later you have to read and pass judgment yourself. It can be before or after paying, before or after reading the first paragraph; that is strictly up to you.

No, the only way to see in a paragraph if a book is bad is if there are typos or bad language.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

Hmm... I guess my standards are more subjective. When I am going through a large selection of books, online, at a bookstore, at the library, whatever, I am trying to find a book that I am sufficiently interested in, to buy it. I am not very much interested in rating the books by some measure of their "Quality", just if the book might be fun to read or provide useful information. Imperfection is not an issue. Relative measures like "Mediocrity" effect me, not at all. I certainly would like it if the majority of "mediocre" ebooks were ones that I enjoy. It must be very limiting, if the only books you want to read are the few (by definition) "Extraordinary" books that you can find.

I wonder if, for some of you, your motto might be: "Life is too short to ENJOY a mediocre book!"

Luck;
Ken

For me it is that I follow certain authors and I read award nominated works to follow the genre. But I only read 50-100 per year so if I am going to read something new it has to be very good since I already have enough to read anyway.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Ditto.
I'm more interested in a new, different experience, or one that takes me places I haven't been, intellectually or emotionally, even if slightly flawed--David Weber's famed datadumps--than a book an english professor might hold up as an example of fabulous wordsmithing.
But then, I'm not into lit-fic, but rather SF, where the primary object of the story is ideas and meaning, not style.

I read mostly SF and crime. I got bored by Weber after 4-5 books. I have in my reading queue books by Neil Gaiman, China Meiville, Ian Banks, and so on. So a new author really have to be better then the books that are waiting to be read.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by tompe

I just do not get it why people in this thread seems to be happy with mediocre books. Why not try to read what you think are really good books?

I'm not happy with mediocre books, but I'm willing to read quite a few samples of mediocre and even lousy books to find the good ones, especially to find good ones that are outside the scope that mainstream publishing deals with.

Finding really good books that I like by mainstream publishers is no easier. I grant that the general literary quality is higher, but "well-written with good plot and characters" doesn't mean I'll have any interest in reading it. If it did, I'd never have to look beyond Project Gutenberg for reading material.

[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

Hmm... I guess my standards are more subjective. When I am going through a large selection of books, online, at a bookstore, at the library, whatever, I am trying to find a book that I am sufficiently interested in, to buy it. I am not very much interested in rating the books by some measure of their "Quality", just if the book might be fun to read or provide useful information. Imperfection is not an issue. Relative measures like "Mediocrity" effect me, not at all. I certainly would like it if the majority of "mediocre" ebooks were ones that I enjoy. It must be very limiting, if the only books you want to read are the few (by definition) "Extraordinary" books that you can find.

I wonder if, for some of you, your motto might be: "Life is too short to ENJOY a mediocre book!"

Luck;
Ken

I don't know if mediocre is the right word. I enjoy a good plot and good writing, I enjoy an exciting story, witty dialogue, or characters that I can relate to in some way. I also like books that are based in different cultures, different times where I gain a little bit of insight or knowledge.

It is a rare book that has all of these factors but there are quite a few with several of them. Probably I enjoy a lot of what you term as mediocre, and occasionally I fall upon a rare gem, that is so good I get endorphin rush while anticipating reading the rest of it or more works by this author.

Strangely there are some books that I would term mediocre if I was to examine them for literary merit or even for the things that I listed above, that I get a really good feeling anticipating reading them and of course in the reading itself. and vice versa.

I like the majority of books I read, even those found at a bus stop, and that is enough for me.

Helen

[cfrizz]

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

Hmm... I guess my standards are more subjective. When I am going through a large selection of books, online, at a bookstore, at the library, whatever, I am trying to find a book that I am sufficiently interested in, to buy it. I am not very much interested in rating the books by some measure of their "Quality", just if the book might be fun to read or provide useful information. Imperfection is not an issue. Relative measures like "Mediocrity" effect me, not at all. I certainly would like it if the majority of "mediocre" ebooks were ones that I enjoy. It must be very limiting, if the only books you want to read are the few (by definition) "Extraordinary" books that you can find.

I wonder if, for some of you, your motto might be: "Life is too short to ENJOY a mediocre book!"

Luck;
Ken

THANK YOU!!!!

Most of you people seem to spend all of your time doing your best to pick books apart rather than just reading the damn things. Reading is something I do for pleasure to de-stress from long days at work. My brain is usually perfectly capable of figuring out what is an enjoyable book to read and whether or not I'll have fun reading it.

I don't spend a whole lot of time trying to find the PERFECT book, I look at books in the genres I like, read the blurbs (no blurb no read) if the blurb sounds like I'll like it, I get the book, I have very seldom steered myself in the wrong direction.

If anything I will have a favorite author like Anne Rice that I have a lot of books, but all of a sudden she goes off the deep end so I have to quit buying her books. I've had that happen more often then buying a book that I didn't enjoy.

But then, I wasn't trying to be a flippin editor, grammar officer, stylist or whatever with every book I have ever read.

I feel sorry for all of you that are so hung up on the details that you can't just sit back and enjoy reading.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by tompe

No, the only way to see in a paragraph if a book is bad is if there are typos or bad language.

Really?
Cause I can get a lot more...
...and we are *supposed* to get a lot more.
If there is one thing that writers get hammered into their heads is that you need a strong lead; either a quick hook or a clear narrative voice, preferably both.

One paragraph was all I needed to know that Gaiman's STARDUST was going to be a jewel. I was a tad skeptical about Harry Potter (an adult-friendly book that was also supposed to be age-appropriate for ten year-olds?) but the dickensian tone settled that question right away. Asimov's THE GODS THEMSELVES opening with Chapter Five, Heinlein's BEYOND THIS HORIZON opening with the protagonist tallying up "sourpusses" in a utopia...

I'm not scared of the odd typo or bad grammar (in a first or second-person narrative) per-se, but I do demand a good opening.

Grammar or not, they don't get much better than this:

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair."

Except maybe this:

He was one hundred and seventy days dying and not yet dead. He fought for survival with the passion of a beast in a trap. He was delirious and rotting, but occasionally his primitive mind emerged from the burning nightmare of survival into something resembling sanity. Then he lifted his mute face to Eternity and muttered: "What's a matter, me? Help, you goddamn gods! Help, is all."

[caleb72]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Uh, it pretty much is just that.
Shutting down an imprint isn't just a branding exercise; it usually involves "pink slips" and people going away.

The process began way back in the 80's, the time when they started firing proofers and editors, after the first big mergers.
(The *real* content editors, not the project managers that now bear that title.)
Here's just one outfit that has been freelancing since then:
http://www.freelance-editorial-services.com/staff.php

More recently, the corporate types have been turning to low-cost bidders globally but that still dates back well before indie publishing. In fact, it is that ready-made pool of freelance pros that the corporate publishers created with the firings that *enables* dilligent Indies to put out a quality product on their own.

Plus as the corporate types made clear, way back; if most of your losses come from the "prestige" titles and all your profits come from the "commercial" titles, any "good" MBA will tell you to put your time and effort into the future "bestsellers". The rest is just window dressing in their eyes.

That mindset has been in place for decades.
"Quality" has been declining for decades.
Scapegoating Indies for what the Corporate Publishers choose to do is going to run into the inescapable fact that the Corporate publishers have been "Devalueing" literature long before commercial ebooks ever existed, much less indies.

Absolutely. And I don't think you have to know anything at all about the publishing industry to take a stab at that being the case because it's evident in many industries. A publisher is not a cultural guardian or a patron of the arts, it's a business.

Now my complaint about the self-publishing industry isn't so much about poorly edited works as in most cases, that's relatively easy to avoid although I do appreciate the frustration having been stung before. My problem is that in some ways, it's too much like the business it attempts to replace.

It's a selfish complaint for me because I have certain ideals about what self-publishing was going to mean to me. I love the fact that the shackles of traditional publishers over my reading material has been broken because I lost faith a long time ago in them choosing what I may like to read. This has been exacerbated by what shelf space retailers choose to assign to published works (the two issues being closely related).

A combination of self-publishing and ebooks to me means an infinitely broad contribution to culture - potentially. I personally think that publishers were rapidly losing the ability to provide this benefit and I believe we have also seen a sliding in quality as has been mentioned a couple of times in this thread.

I'm having to face the evidence that when given complete freedom of expression and having removed the restrictions of McDonalds publishers, that indie authors have tended to adopt a "follower" model rather than a "leader" model. It's probably unfair of me to think that the reverse was going to be universally true given the individual time and money investment to only maybe get a return, but I had naively hoped.

The gems are there - just have to dig a bit.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by cfrizz

THANK YOU!!!!

Most of you people seem to spend all of your time doing your best to pick books apart rather than just reading the damn things. Reading is something I do for pleasure to de-stress from long days at work.

I watch TV for that. Reading I expect to give me much more than just relaxation.
I expect it to make me think about new ideas and so on.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Really?
Cause I can get a lot more...
...and we are *supposed* to get a lot more.
If there is one thing that writers get hammered into their heads is that you need a strong lead; either a quick hook or a clear narrative voice, preferably both.

One paragraph was all I needed to know that Gaiman's STARDUST was going to be a jewel.

Of course you did not know that. It is a standard technique of authors to spend a lot of time with the first paragraph and the beginning of a book because they know that a lot of people read that in book stores. So you were lucky that the rest of the book held the same standard.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by tompe

Of course you did not know that. It is a standard technique of authors to spend a lot of time with the first paragraph and the beginning of a book because they know that a lot of people read that in book stores. So you were lucky that the rest of the book held the same standard.

Good authors *know* that. Bad writers or "deluded" ones don't.
Great openings signal great writing.

Besides, it's still a matter of taste.
But if all the externals (cover, blurb, promo) are promising and the opening grabs me, I can safely buy the book. And I do.

I know my own tastes so I don't need reviewers to tell me that a book is fit to read.

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by tompe

I read mostly SF and crime. I got bored by Weber after 4-5 books. I have in my reading queue books by Neil Gaiman, China Meiville, Ian Banks, and so on. So a new author really have to be better then the books that are waiting to be read.

That is a pretty high standard to meet!
If you haven't tried them, I'd recommend Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan and the Revelation Space series by Alistair Reynolds.

[mbovenka]

Originally Posted by murraypaul

That is a pretty high standard to meet!
If you haven't tried them, I'd recommend Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan and the Revelation Space series by Alistair Reynolds.

Quite . I second both Morgan and especially Reynolds. Peter F. Hamilton is good too.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by caleb72

Absolutely. And I don't think you have to know anything at all about the publishing industry to take a stab at that being the case because it's evident in many industries. A publisher is not a cultural guardian or a patron of the arts, it's a business.

Now my complaint about the self-publishing industry isn't so much about poorly edited works as in most cases, that's relatively easy to avoid although I do appreciate the frustration having been stung before. My problem is that in some ways, it's too much like the business it attempts to replace.


I'm having to face the evidence that when given complete freedom of expression and having removed the restrictions of McDonalds publishers, that indie authors have tended to adopt a "follower" model rather than a "leader" model. It's probably unfair of me to think that the reverse was going to be universally true given the individual time and money investment to only maybe get a return, but I had naively hoped.

The gems are there - just have to dig a bit.

AHA! This is interesting. By following do you mean the same old story, same type of stories?

Or something else?