One of those old Greeks said there were only seven basic characters and seven plots, so stories do recycle, and humans might be down to five characters, more likely than nine.
Even my animals fit a basic plot and character. Reality might be limited, or just my brain.
Jane Austin brings us the Novel, Edgar Allen Poe the Detective Story, Jules Verne Science Fiction, or Mary Shelly, but it all was fairly recent.
I have Jane's Problem, the personality of a half dozen girls, which is an over supply. Each of these types can be put in any story, which will change things, boys I think have less range of character.
So most writers have a limited supply. There are limits that the reader can deal with, she was a stock car racer and he was a nurse.
So we are selling to the reader, they have to want to go for the ride. While plots and characters are limited, readers are worse. We are selling a fomula that has limits. Harliquin Romances have it down, mass selling, but limited range. It is emotional and paced, they are all alike, all different, and readers have read hundreds.
Science Fiction was hot, but ran down quickly when some wrters saw it as a social change platform, or a defense of science, when what sold was an action adventure story, with a litte science.
Manga has come back as a mix of action adventure, with an emotional content, Kagomi and Innyusha, with a fairy tale quality. It is what is selling, nothing deep, easy to follow stories. It touches on other issues, but lightly. As Kagomi put it, " I have seen you without your demon power, you have seen me naked, I say we call it even."
Other Manga goes deeper, each has a market. I like Cowboy Bebop, an action adventure story with great music, artwork, Fay Valentine as the bad girl, has it all and uses it, always in trouble, deal with it, and Radical Edward, the girl child with more brains than the rest combined, who mostly relates to her laptop. Spike and Jet would rather risk their lives for money than work. Males have a limited range, but the other males they hunt are worse, and the rest in the middle are shown as broom pushing dorks.
In all of it is the range between the charcters, Fifteen year old school girl, and the son of the Dog Demon, bounty hunters, the amoral Fay, and the girl geek Edward. They will all have a different view of everything, but something draws them together, action adventure, None want the boring life.
I find I can only use a few characters at a time, I have more, but most only come forward sometimes.
Bebop has two males, a retired older cop, and a retired younger Yakusa, and two female, one getting by on brains, and one any way she can. Inyuasha has four main characters.
Readers do not seem to keep up with more, the characters are a way of viewing the story, the range.
The setting, the characters, are background, still need a good story.
The Greeks again, said that while character was limited, what made the story was the character type had a flaw. The dynamic of the story is that flaw, and how it leaves them blind or weak to what even a reader could pick up. If he would just see that she... but then we would not have a story, we would have an ending.
Spike and Fay are the same, she flys her own ship, does combat flying, lives for adventure, they are the same age group and both hot, and bounce off each other. So much the same they have a brother sister relationship. She is a realist, he is a romantic, doomed, but drawn together. They really are the same character with a sex change, and how male and female would differ in playing the same role.
As for series, I found the best feedback on book one was book two. Just as a story builds chapter at a time to a high point then ending, book two is post ending, and the lead up to it can go in book one. As a series it should be a consistant read, further adventures from a world you know. Thousands of years have gone by, but they start from the same foundation. Humans hardly change.
As for publishing, failue is in the mind of the beholder. Getting finished and in print is a step forward.
Writing is one art, getting all that out of your head, Editing for the reader is another art, making a meaty story that catches the reader quickly, holds their attention, and gives them their moneys worth.
Marketing books is a whole other problem. A publisher will only take it on if they are going to make most of the money.
Self published, Lulu Press you can get in print cheaply, but they do seem to get almost all of the money.
A non promoted book does not sell, no one ever heard of it. Being a writer is like being a band, you have to tour so people learn you exist, and nothing can replace it. Anyone can be on Amazon, have two copies in each Barnes&Noble, if you have the money, and that does not sell books.
Working your market sector sells books, and slowly. Most self published sell 200. They may be great works, but 100 read them, and they die. There is some magic number, since books and people vary, perhaps 1,000, that takes hunting down the type of reader and making them remember your name. It is a lot of work, but then the fire gets started, for they know people like themselves, same tastes in reading, and being readers have shallow empty lives with little to talk about, so they tell others what they read, and this word of mouth is what sells books.
It might take years to build a readership, some books have been around for five years before sales take off, when they reach the critical mass of readers and it spreads. You can try to jump start it, for only $35,000 you can be reviewed by The New York Times, publishers send out 5,000 copies to book reviewers and those who buy for libraries. 5,000 more will stock Barnes&Noble, and a major book launch costs $100,000.
It still takes promotion by the writer. TV shows, radio, are alway open to filler, signings at book stores, talks, conventions, schools that teach writing, Book Clubs, to build a name. We must teach the consumer product awareness.
First books are hard, but it all is still there for a second book, and few know how many sold. So from the best sell writer of book one, now comes the thrilling follow up of book two! This is the power of a name, for if you tell people you are a writer enough times, they will believe you, and will repeat the dirty rumor to others. People buy what they have heard of.
First book readers are a built in market for second books, and book stores will go for works that are offered below the usual 60%. In a special promotional package I will speak and sign, and you can get it for 40%.
For the constant and low budget, take a stack of ten, and go sit in a coffeee shop for an afternoon. You may sell enough to pay for the coffee, even a cake! You will build a name, as most who sit in coffee shops are boring losers or would call the police if you spoke to them. Tip well.
Promotion counts a lot more than great writing, That personal visit and free copy to the local paper book reviewer, is worth much more than a mailout press package from a publisher, Someone came to see ME!, I am a real member of the Lit World!
Local interest can get radio and TV guest slots, some people even listen to those things, but it all gets put on your, I Did This, list, that goes in the scrap book with all the press clippings, do get a tape, and if later you are talking to a major, it shows you get out and work the product.
No one is taking on new work even from writers they have published before, unless your name is John Grissom. Many have been turning to Lulu Press, and Kindel. Print or digital it still takes making people hear about the product.
I find Lulu expensive, the better deal is a print run of 3,000, for a quarter of the per copy price, about $2, so you can afford to give them away, and when you do sell, you make something.
Being a machine head I set up my own, and can print and bind for $2, it was expensive, fills a room, and takes me to keep it running, but it can turn out one or a hundred a day. It is a smaller scale version of Lulu, since writers starve, those who print for others might do better. Production, Promotion, and the shipping and handeling is where the big money is.
Reality is, bad books sell, lots of them, and good work is rare, and still has to overcome the same problems. I sell on ebay, listing more works, some sells, I don't know why, but my marketing set is about the same for one or a hundred, with more, I can pay someone else to keep up production, and get back to writing.
Effective web marketing is my next goal because I hate people, strangers, and places. I can exist as a Max Headroom character, I would rather write myself than be myself, and self employed, I would quit.
This does give me a potential to market the WP types who write but would not leave the house. The market is changing, the web is the future, or the only one I am willing to deal with.
A Recluse Guide to Marketing, I will work on it, but one way or another, books must get to readers.
I can speak to thousands, just not three. I rarely speak to any.
Still, it can be done, it can be fun, and not much else would work for me.
There are a lot of ways of getting out there, a full range of how much that will cost, and you have to pick what works for who you are.
I built my publishing on selling reprints of old motorcycle manuals and parts lists, the machines grew, the income paid for it, and that type of market is broad and long lasting. Something to cover the costs while trying new and possible markets. I can now bind books up to 700 pages, better than you can get at a copy shop, so I am in the broader turning paper into books line.
The way I see it selling 10,000 over five years works. Being publisher, printer, binder, writer, I then get the big shipping and handeling money. Selling five a day, it will pay. Best sellers sell 50,000 a week.
I too fear success, I would take the money, but not the life. I would come up with some story, I am 113 and live in a cave, or I am nine and my mother won't let me. Anything that sells, I will be going to a web press, and keeping production up. Digital and the web can connect the writer and reader like never before, and the money, so the future will be different.
We can only try.
24 Apr 2010, 10:23 pm
I changed the boy in the story to a girl and the girl to a boy. Not sure whether I'll keep them that way. I blush to report that seeing the events I have written so far from that altered perspective was enough to raise all sorts of new possibilities in the storyline. As much as society has tried to make male and female the same, we'll never really see it that way and thank goodness for that. But anyway, this change has solved some plot issues and may need to become permanent. It does no harm to other books I have sketched out in the series, so why not? I hope that if I can finish one, I'll be able to finish them all. We'll see. If I never publish, I'd at least like to have finished them.
