Gemini Rising

Thoughts on Writing & Current Publishing trends

There are a couple of agent that blog which I like I read. One guy is Nathan Bransford.

You can find him at http://www.nathanbransford.blogspot.com/

He comes across as honest, decent and departs a lot of practical knowledge about the traditional publishing arena which I'm trying to break into.

He put up a link to an article in the NY Times were it was talking about books and publishing. Over 400,000 books were published last year, up from 300,000 the previous year. Self-publishing was the driving force of it. The article implied though you might not get the quality you're looking for if you do self-publishing because there's no quality control. Anyone can publish a book, using that mind-set.

It was pointed out that Self publishing makes publishing affordable. Susan Driscoll, IUniverse's CEO said that a majority of writers using IUniverse barely sell over 200 books.

Heck - and I can tell you this - IUniverse has a wonderful publishing system put in place, but the marketing falls back on the author and most authors find it hard to market. They're simply out of their water, or if they do understand it, it's too time consuming to pursue - they'd rather get back to writing!

I have to admit, that's the driving force for me to find a traditional publisher. I have no time to focus on marketing and I'd rather be writing. I've just wrapped up a paranormal romance I've been working on, but the 5 agents I quiered said, "Not what I'm looking for." Reader's Views offers help with book proposal so I'm hoping they'll be able to help me out here.

Is self-publishing the wave of the future? I think there's a strong demand to it because people like the concept of being "published" but I think traditional publishers are going to stick around because they offer the quality control that readers can count one.

Whewww.. That said, let's move on to something else. I'm curious -

A - what was the LAST book you read?
B - what book are you reading now?
C - what genres do you like to read?
D - where did you buy your last two books?

Me? A - Last book I read was "Rehearsal," by LK Hunsaker. It was over 600 pages and a time consuming read partially because reading time is limited.

B - I am currently reading "Against A Crimson Sky," by James Conyrod Martin. The book is about 300 pages. I just started and am about 50 pages into it. It's about a polish noblewoman in the late 1700's when the Russian invaded and partioned Poland. It's something a little different for me, but it's historical and that's the appeal.

C - I like to read, romance, supernatural, true crime, true life stories.

D - I bought my last two books online. It's too hard to get to a book store with little ones.

Smiles,
Steph