Category: Uncategorized

A Big Decision

I should start by wishing everyone a Happy New Year! I haven’t been blogging much for a while, which is mainly because of a holiday where I had some trouble gaining access to the Internet (only my Blackberry), but also just really busy with editing work for IFWG Publishing. Things are going well on that front.

I finished before New Year editing The Wicked Heroine, by Jasmine Giacomo – a truly excellent writer and a great fantasy novel. What sparked me to make a big decision was the fact that the novel was about 120k in length, and was part 2 of a duology. Now, I haven’t actually asked the question of her whether she originally wrote a larger work, and chose to split it, but her decision was right regardless. If there was a single universal truth about the publishing business, it would be that publishers (and consequently agents) simply don’t want to publish large tomes. Refer to this link that describes it succinctly.

So I got thinking. I always knew that my first novel, The Sceptre and the Orb, had an uphill battle, because it was 200k in length. Industry looks toward about 100k, and for fantasy, due to world building, up to about 140k. I got figuring that I needed to cut my novel into two, and do a duology, like Jasmine.

Of course, things aren’t that simple, especially if I am restructuring on the fly. I found that the obvious split point was 120k into my novel, leaving a small 80k for the second. This isn’t good. So I need to think about expanding my second half, without making it waffle.

This is my challenge. The consequence of a big decision.

A Poignant, Pregnant Pause

Wow, just a few observations, mainly internally focused.

Last night I was doing my usual Twittering, and one of my followees retweeted something that shocked me to the core. A woman who Tweets, asked for everyone to pray for her baby who just died. I needed to know more, but I could barely make myself click the relevant links. It turned out she was in the back yard of her home and her two year old son fell in the pool and died in seconds. It absolutely killed me and I wept – hard. I can only barely imagine what she went through.

I know that since having my own child I can barely see or read about children who suffer. It wrenches my soul, because I can so easily superimpose what it might mean for me. This is what got me more than anything, but also the immediacy of it. This woman used Twitter to impart her grief, and perhaps, seek some sort of solace. I am sure it had mixed results for her, for surely nothing can give her solace, and if there is some comfort, it would be from her own family. Also, the negative side of social networking tools is that weirdos and downright evil people come out of the woodwork, and I believe this woman was hounded by a few such despicable individuals.

I suppose this blog is more about me. How I react. Tragedies occur every day, and this poor woman is one of many parents grieving due to tragedy or worse. But it showed something about me. I have become sensitive – super-sensitive to child suffering and death, and this is because I love my little daughter to bits.

I know I would trade my life for hers without hesitation.

I Want to Get Published – What Options Are There?

I wrote the following in answer to a fairly similar question posed in a writing forum that I am a member of. I wrote it quickly, but when I reread it, I realized that I said a lot, with relatively few words. So, here it is!

It all depends on what you want to do with your story, and with your career.

1. You can try to publish your work through small presses – some are more picky about quality and polish than large presses, but there are also fringe/specialist presses that aren’t fussy. If you find and befriend the latter, you might be able to publish quickly. If all you want is to see your work printed with limited market penetration, this is one way to do it.

2. If you are dead keen on getting street cred in the publishing world, without compromise, you have a long journey and you should just keep trying until you get the break. In that case, it is NOT smart to show more than a few pages of your serious material in public access Internet sites (like this) – otherwise you lose what some publishers consider important – "first publishing rights".

3. You can self publish. There are options here. You can do it all yourself, buy your ISBN, get copyright, go through services like Createspace and end up spending fairly small amounts of money and you have something someone can buy through Amazon. It doesn’t market your product – that is up to you, and there is no professional polish, formatting, editing, done. For the vast majority of people who do this, they will have sub 100 units sold, the majority by you, family and friends. But you might think this is ok

4. You can self publish through a self-publishing company. They use Createspace, Booksurge, Ingram and other services, depending on how the company is set up, and many of them are mercenary. They will charge quite high for the services and they will not be fussy about the quality of your work. If your work is unpolished or (forgive me) crap, they wont care, and it will be reflected in the product. They will not edit your work unless you pay for it, and the editor isn’t always THAT good. If you pay for cover art, they will provide it. If you want it marketed, they will do it for money, otherwise, the vast majority will do nothing. Sales are rarely good, much like doing it yourself. Again, this might be what you want.

5. There are a few companies out there that offer a form of hybrid service – you pay them to publish you, and they look after full service, and may even refuse to publish you until a minimum standard is met, despite the client’s willingness to pay. This is the best of both worlds. Again, sales are not necessarily great, but at least you are given the equipment to optimise your chances.

With regard to self publishing, it has a lot to do with the final product. How good it is. Traditional publishers will openly say that a self-published work spells the doom of the title ever transferring into traditional publication. Bullshit. Matthew Reilly, Christopher Paolini and Grisham are examples of the contrary. The fact is that if you sell between about 2000 and 5000 units, agents and publishers will start showing interest. Having said this, boy do you have to work to get your stuff marketed, and also… it has to be good. There is no quick way there.

Also, those of you who want to hold out to get the traditional path break – think long and hard about that too. Luck aside (hey, I would like to win Lottery too), it is a long journey. Most specialised small presses will publish you but is it success? Look at the quality of their work – many are as nearly appalling as most self-published works. Limited. Almost worthless.

Now to dispel the biggest myths. First, if you actually get the break and publish your work through a tradpublisher, don’t give up your day job. On average, a successful writer needs about 10 novels drawing in royalties before a reasonable income can be got. Secondly, when a traditional publisher offers to publish you, they will probably invest about 50K worth of print run (about 5000 units) and spread it among the 120,000 outlets (work that out) and then they will wait and see. Most outlets will try a new author/title out for about a week or two, and if no sale, they will return it for pulping. If it isn’t received well within about 2 weeks, a publisher will simply let the title go to pasture – and the publisher owns the rights to the novel, so the author can’t do anything with it, except try to drum up interest. That’s it, you see, tradpub or not, new writers need to do the work. Publishers will not invest marketing money (beyond about 10k) if your name isn’t Dan Brown.

So where do you go? I think it is relatively simple. You give yourself every chance possible to get your name out there, and do it smartly. Most self-publishing activities, if handled well – the right publisher, the right polish, the right marketing, and the right product – has to be good, will never harm your chances to get traditionally published, but at least you get a foot into the industry and you LEARN from it.

Research every step of the way.

When “Too Good To Be True” Is Just Plain Wrong

Over recent days I have been surprised by some of the reactions I have been hearing about my new company, IFWG Publishing, by the writing community around the world. It was not what I expected. I was, perhaps, a little naive. I can sum the general responses in one sentence: "It’s too good to be true!" I feel compelled to dispel that stink bomb.

IFWG Publishing was created by writers for writers, and we believe that we are giving authors the best service they could find anywhere, whether it be in self-publishing, or traditional. We term our services as ‘hybrid’, because we don’t fit the mold of either traditional or self-publishing, mainly because we are author-centric. Other blog items covers that stuff 🙂

What got me was our quarterly contest. Listen folks! Every three months we run a short story contest where up to 33 finalists get published for FREE in an anthology, and will get marketed. The winner will also have one of his or her major works published for FREE, and will get marketed. Every three months!!!! And some people think we are scamming. Sheesh.

We are running this contest for two reasons. Firstly, it gives authors a real chance to experience publishing and get some of their material into the industry and reader world. It helps them, and it costs them very little indeed (time and creativity). For us, it draws in (theoretically) hundreds of talented writers and we can tap into this group, and help publish genuine talent. Authors make money, we make money. Simple business. Symbiosis.

So why so cynical, writing world? I suspect there are a lot of reasons, but perhaps the biggest is that the publishing industry, almost more than any other, has a dismal track record, where there are in fact scammers galore trawling the seas of lost and disillusioned authors. I can’t really blame them.

We are a new company and our first titles are just about to roll off the presses. We are running our very first quarterly contest, and so there are no previous awards to demonstrate our street cred. The starting gun had only fired fourteen days ago. When I responded to one particularly cynical writer, I ended up being quite brief. I asked him to visit our site and pick up what our ethos is all about, and if still not satisfied, to bookmark our site and visit it in 3 months. That is what it is all about. We need to prove ourselves by delivering.

However, there is a bit of a dilemma in play here. We still need enough material to allow delivery. We need authors to believe in us and we can produce quality titles. We need entrants to our contests so that the field is outstanding. We need people to understand what we are about and put their trust in us.

I hope you are one such person.

Recipe: The Best Tomato Sauce for Pasta Ever!

One of the things I have improved in is appreciating simplicity and clarity of flavours in cooking. This is probably the best example.

Ingredients
1 Can of diced tomatoes (or fresh, if you are willing to skin and seed)
1 eschallot
1/2 cup small diced pancetta (not round, but the flat variety – if you can’t find, substitute with quality speck)
1 tbs quality olive oil
1 tbs Fresh chopped rosemary
Worcestershire Sauce
1/2 tsp sugar
1/2 cup quality red wine – robust, like Shiraz
1 cup chicken stock
1/2 cup grated Reggiano parmesan cheese

pasta of choice

Method

Separately prepare pasta.

1. Heat olive oil in a solid frying pan and saute eschallots, garlic and pancetta until well browned.

2. Add red wine and reduce, constantly stirring.

3. Add full contents of tomato can and the stock, stirring in sugar, chopped rosemary and two dashes of Worcestershire Sauce.

4. Cook on medium to high heat until reduced to a thick, but still runny sauce. Take off heat.

5. Spoon contents over pasta, and sprinkle a generous amount of grated cheese.

Enjoy.

Commentary: I am an author – how do I get published?

It all depends on what you want to do with your story, and with your career.

1. You can try to publish your work through small presses – some are more picky about quality and polish than large presses, but there are also fringe/specialist presses that aren’t fussy. If you find and befriend the latter, you might be able to publish quickly. If all you want is to see your work printed with limited market penetration, this is one way to do it.

2. If you are dead keen on getting street cred in the publishing world, without compromise, you have a long journey and you should just keep trying until you get the break. In that case, it is NOT smart to show more than a few pages of your serious material in public access Internet sites (like this) – otherwise you lose what some publishers consider important – "first publishing rights".

3. You can self publish. There are options here. You can do it all yourself, buy your ISBN, get copyright, go through services like Createspace and end up spending fairly small amounts of money and you have something someone can buy through Amazon. It doesn’t market your product – that is up to you, and there is no professional polish, formatting, editing, done. For the vast majority of people who do this, they will have sub 100 units sold, the majority by you, family and friends. But you might think this is ok

4. You can self publish through a self-publishing company. They use Createspace, Booksurge, Ingram and other services, depending on how the company is set up, and many of them are mercenary. They will charge quite high for the services and they will not be fussy about the quality of your work. If your work is unpolished or (forgive me) crap, they wont care, and it will be reflected in the product. They will not edit your work unless you pay for it, and the editor isn’t always THAT good. If you pay for cover art, they will provide it. If you want it marketed, they will do it for money, otherwise, the vast majority will do nothing. Sales are rarely good, much like doing it yourself. Again, this might be what you want.

5. There are a few companies out there that offer a form of hybrid service – you pay them to publish you, and they look after full service, and may even refuse to publish you until a minimum standard is met, despite the client’s willingness to pay. This is the best of both worlds. Again, sales are not necessarily great, but at least you are given the equipment to optimise your chances.

With regard to self publishing, it has a lot to do with the final product. How good it is. Traditional publishers will openly say that a self-published work spells the doom of the title ever transferring into traditional publication. Bullshit. Matthew Reilly, Christopher Paolini and Grisham are examples of the contrary. The fact is that if you sell between about 2000 and 5000 units, agents and publishers will start showing interest. Having said this, boy do you have to work to get your stuff marketed, and also… it has to be good. There is no quick way there.

Also, those of you who want to hold out to get the traditional path break – think long and hard about that too. Luck aside (hey, I would like to win Lottery too), it is a long journey. Most specialised small presses will publish you but is it success? Look at the quality of their work – many are as nearly appalling as most self-published works. Limited. Almost worthless.

Now to dispel the biggest myths. First, if you actually get the break and publish your work through a tradpublisher, don’t give up your day job. On average, a successful writer needs about 10 novels drawing in royalties before a reasonable income can be got. Secondly, when a traditional publisher offers to publish you, they will probably invest about 50K worth of print run (about 5000 units) and spread it among the 120,000 outlets (work that out) and then they will wait and see. Most outlets will try a new author/title out for about a week or two, and if no sale, they will return it for pulping. If it isn’t received well within about 2 weeks, a publisher will simply let the title go to pasture – and the publisher owns the rights to the novel, so the author can’t do anything with it, except try to drum up interest. That’s it, you see, tradpub or not, new writers need to do the work. Publishers will not invest marketing money (beyond about 10k) if your name isn’t Dan Brown.

So where do you go? I think it is relatively simple. You give yourself every chance possible to get your name out there, and do it smartly. Most self-publishing activities, if handled well – the right publisher, the right polish, the right marketing, and the right product – has to be good, will never harm your chances to get traditionally published, but at least you get a foot into the industry and you LEARN from it. Research every step of the way.

A Simplified Analytical Model Describing the Differences Between Traditional and Self-Publishing

This is a copy of a blog post I placed today in the IFWG Publishing site.

I have been involved in many discussions of late, on the differences between Self Publishing using (Print On Demand technology) and traditional publishing, and I have read so many commentaries on the topic on the Internet, that my own views have solidified somewhat, and I feel an urge to discuss them.

I also want to dispel some myths.

I don’t want to dwell on self-publishing efforts by authors who do much of the logistics by themselves, but I believe that this analysis does largely cover the same challenges and opportunities as companies that provide self-publishing services.

A good focus point for this discussion is to try to think of publishing, for an author, as a simplified linear equation:


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Title Success refers to the end goal – to have a title that sells well and contributes to the success of an author;

Quality of Title is self-evident – the better the creative work, the better chance it will sell well. This is not a given though, as it is my belief that many excellent titles just take too long to be recognised, if at all.

Quality of Publisher. This factor represents several elements – it refers to the publisher’s requirements to ensure polish of text, printing, cover art, etc. There needs to be an expectation in the industry that a given publisher delivers.

Publisher Marketing Effort. This refers to the extent to which the publisher will support marketing the title to the industry and reading public.

Author Marketing Effort. This refers to the extent to which the author makes an individual effort in marketing the title, both in terms of assisting the publisher, as well as pure individual effort.

There are other influences, but they collectively cannot match any of the factors represented above. Luck is one, and there is little point in discussing it. The best example is the alignment of some titles, and their coincidental exposure, with a world fad – the Dan Browns, the Harry Potters. If it happens, then it happens. Winning lottery happens too.

Each of these factors that collectively contributes to Title Success behaves differently between traditional and POD publisher effort. The following table discusses them:


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Success Factor

Traditional Publishing

Self Publishing

Quality of Title

Publishers are generally conservative & will only publish titles from “tried and true” authors and celebrities. It is notoriously difficult for new authors to get a notable publisher to publish them. While dependent on the publisher, titles are generally of high quality, in line with the conservative model.

Most publishers have no interest at all in the quality of the title. They will publish anything the author wants, as long as it is paid for. Authors are in the difficult situation of having to judge the quality of their own work, and unfortunately most of them are seriously biased due to lack of professional help or experience.

Quality of Publisher

Leading publishing houses have professionals who will polish titles to an excellent standard, and provide artwork, including covers, of high grade. There are also notable exceptions to this, depending on the maturity of a given company, as well as their target readers.

Publishers vary in quality, and many should not be in business. Because most work on an authors-pay basis, they have little, if any, interest in polish. There are countless examples of titles that are self-published with appalling typeset, grammar, spelling errors, and artwork.

Publisher Marketing Effort

Publishers tend to spend minimally on new titles, and rely on their sample effort to determine if further spending is required. Often, this initial effort does little to further the title’s progress. The author is stuck with the publisher’s effort because the title is under complete control of the publisher.

Publishers will only market if they are paid to do so, in most cases. Even then, it is relatively minor and they tend not to have the market penetration of traditional publishers. In most cases, however, the title is not bound to the self-publishing effort – the author still has control.

Author Marketing Effort

Good publishers will work with the author, but at a minimal level. There is an expectation that the author will work hard to market the title and it is in fact in the author’s interest to do this, as it may assist in getting the sales needed to attract publisher interest to continue with it.

Publishing companies will make it clear to the author that marketing is generally up to them, and that success will be determined by that effort. This locks the author into a great deal of time commitment, and perhaps money. This does not bode well for authors who have little aptitude for this discipline.


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As you can see in the table above, most categories, be they traditional or using the self-publishing paradigm, have negative features. Few have positive. The industry is geared toward business, not the author. This is obscene, and it has been like this from the very start.

However, I think the industry is changing – mainly due to technological innovation, where some of the negative factors are being undermined, re-evaluated, if you will. For example, self-publishing started off as vanity presses, where the author would have to cough up a great deal of money in order for print-runs and binding to take place. This was the only way printing could take place back then. These businesses worked with models where only a small number of customers were needed. Then came the Internet, digital printing, just-in-time printing technologies. Suddenly it was a lot cheaper and faster to publish a book with high grade printing, paper and binding. This is goodness. This phenomenon, along with others, doesn’t per se improve the authors’ lot, but it enabled the industry to be flexible enough to allow for the possibility of better deals for authors.

From the perspective of traditional publishing, there is a proliferation of new small publishers who genuinely want to publish new titles from new authors and are willing to find them. They work hard and don’t necessarily make a lot of money, but they are able to publish, because it is cheaper to do so. I respect these companies to no end. My own company, IFWG Publishing, intends to go down that road with a new imprint within a year.

With completely different dynamics, there is a small subset of the POD/self-publishing industry that is also looking to provide a better deal for authors. I call it hybrid publishing. This is where the publisher chooses to make policy decisions that provide a stronger emphasis on authors’ interests. In the case of my company, IFWG Publishing, this entails:

  1. Not accepting just any title for publishing. It has to have a minimum standard. The philosophy is really very simple: authors can only grow if they can lift their standard to a publishable level; and our company will have better market penetration for titles if all the titles have a reputation of quality. Symbiosis.
  2. Minimum marketing. Our company must provide a reasonable level of marketing support, even if it only entails good working relationships with authors and the provision of good advice. We can and do more than that.
  3. Decent pricing. We simply believe that if we have highly competitive pricing, then we will attract more authors, and more authors will be able to afford to publish their work.
  4. The company authors are authors themselves. We want to help authors grow and we know their motivations. This adds support to the growth of author careers.

I really don’t know where the industry is going to settle, if it will ever settle. What I do know is that the two classic models of publishing, which have existed in one form or another for many years, are not working for authors. This seems incredibly stupid to me because it is clear that readers (whether they be e-readers or print readers) are insatiable and love good new work. It’s what makes writers write, and many publishers publish. If tapped, it can also make publishers run successful businesses. I believe in my company, in part because I we can contribute to changing this injustice.

A Call For A Children’s Book Illustrator! – CLOSED

This request has closed – an illustrator has been appointed.

Hi there!

One of the nice things about being in the publishing business is that I can pick and choose what special projects I want to be involved with. This is such a case.

A very good friend of mine, and an excellent author, has written a short children’s piece. It is about 5000 words long and takes the reader through a futuristic, phantasmagoria of a journey. It was conceived to be heavily reliant on excellent artwork – and a fair amount of it.

This isn’t the type of work that should commission an artist – it is as reliant on the imagination and skills of the illustrator as it is with the writer – and I have advised my friend that what he needs is an artist who works in colour to collaborate with him. 50/50 royalties, in actual terms.

If you are an artist and want to work on a part-time project, to collaborate with my friend on this book, please contact me. Leave your email via a comment on this blog entry, and I will make contact with you. I can look at your credentials (sample art etc), and if you look like you are well matched with my friend, then I can get you to look at my friend’s story. The next step would then be for you to get in contact with the writer and see if you are happy to work together. I know that my friend is happy to allow a lot of your creativity to influence the work – again, a collaboration.

I am a publisher, and my friend has committed to turn to my company first when the work is nearing completion. I am also happy to provide some detached, publishing comments on the journey this collaboration will follow. All goodness, I believe. I believe this effort will take months – at least six.

Just to reiterate what I inferred above. This is the creative phase and is not a commission. My friend did this work for free, investing in the possibility of publication. The artist will need to follow the same path. However, if the product turns out as exciting as I think it will, the artist will have equal share of royalty returns.

Please! If you think you can do this, leave your details!!!

Gerry
Chief Editor
IFWG Publishing

Personal: My Little Annoying Curse

I have a rather nasty condition called angioedema – a lot of people think it is related to the heart – which it isn’t. It is related to hives, but is a lot worse – it manifests itself a lot deeper and in weird ways.

I have had it for about 20 years, maybe longer, and the first time it happened I didn’t know what it was. I was doing some gardening and then one of my feet swelled to about 130% normal size. Could hardly walk and took a bus to the doctor. He thought it was a spider bite and gave me cortisone, and it went away over the next day or so (not before the other foot swelled). Then, periodically, my feet, my hands, my face, my tongue (or half the tongue), lips, or localised areas almost anywhere (and I mean that) would swell. For a while I thought it was some lingering poison from a spider bite. Hmm.. you can convince yourself of everything.

Eventually I got to see an immunologist and he diagnosed the condition within minutes – that was about 5 years ago.

My immunologist is great, and a leader in his field. He was a mixed blessing for me – he got me to understand what I have, but at the same time realise that it was nigh impossible to know what causes the allergy, and so I had to reconcile myself to drug therapy to control it. And over the next year or two that is what he did for me.

Over the last few weeks I had a nasty batch of attacks. It turned out that my lovely little child gave me a virus, that turned into a throat and ear infection, which crashed and burned my immune system, causing the angioedema to win the day against the normal drug therapy. So I had everything – including the thing I dreaded the most – throat swelling. I spent 7 hours this morning at Royal Melbourne Hospital casualty, getting pumped with hydrocortisone and IntraMuscular adrenalin.

I still hope this is the after effects of my infection-hit. If not, I have to carry an epi-pen with adrenalin nearby. Not good.