Candice Hughes

A good marketer always wants to know the competition. For aspiring authors, how much competition is there? The numbers are closely held and hard to pin down. However, I decided to take a stab at it.

In 2004, one source gives the number of books published in the U.S. as 190,000. For 2006, another source (citing BEA statistics) gives the number of books published in the U.S. as 172,000. Sounds like stiff competition so far, right? In fact, out of the 172,000 books, 93% sell fewer than 1,000 copies. A successful book should sell at least 5,000 copies to earn out a modest advance.

More recently another source indicates that in 2007, about 62,000 fiction books were published. This seems to suggest that more than half the earlier totals were mostly nonfiction with some other categories.

The numbers suggest that the number of books published by traditional publishers probably hasn’t changed much or has even declined in the past 6 years.

Self-published books count for a large number of total books published. They haven’t been included in the above numbers, but offer some competition. Lulu claims it publishes 4,000 books a week, which comes to an astounding 208,000 books a year! That’s just for one self-publisher. The vast majority of self-published books only sell a hundred or two hundred copies to the author’s friends and family. For fiction, self-publishing is useful if all you want to do is see your name in print. Most people shouldn’t consider it a money making venture since self-publishing costs anywhere from $5,000 to $25,000 and up.

For more on self-publishing challenges, see http://reviews.cnet.com/self-publishing/

For new authors, these are sobering facts. I have seen estimates that between 700 and 1,000 people in the U.S. make their living as novelists. Some will write more than one novel per year. Let’s assume that 1,500 novels each year come from full-time novelists. That leaves 60,500 novels to be written by those not making their living as novelists. This is good news in that it means there’s some chance to break into the field. But not so good in terms of earnings or a long term career.

So where to go from here? I highly recommend any aspiring novelist join a writer’s association to learn about the industry. Also, think deeply on your writing goals.

“It’s all right. I came back.”

Sorry wrong play. In this one, it’s Anne Writer, in a black shift, moaning and pulling her hair out (while rocking on the floor surrounded by fluttering pages thick with type). Anne Writer turns to her mother (in slinky gold gown with black lacquered cigarette holder causally dangling from her exquisite hand). “Why won’t any one read my 500,000 word epic poem on the atomic bomb?”

“The slush pile passed on in 1991, darling. Stop throwing paper into the coffin. It makes you look mentally deficient.”

“JK Rowling was rejected 12 times. I think I can…I think I can…publish.” Anne glares at her mother with a wild look in her eye.

“She had an agent, darling. Now rub the ink stains off your fingers, we’ve a nice young man coming for dinner.”

And there’s the crux of it…Thank you Wall Street Journal for telling us writers we need an agent. Many more thanks for the lovely interviews with Joshua Ferris and Joyce Carol Oates.

By now many of you have woken up hearing the cacophony of  Book Wars. Amazon and WalMart battling it out.

Book Wars can help authors by placing their products (books) front and center in the news and in people’s minds. Think of books, see books, buy books. At the price of $10 or $9 (or who knows, maybe the price has dropped further since this morning), readers can afford to buy stacks of books. Think about it- how many Christmas gifts can you buy that will last hours and only cost $10 (or less)?

Of course on the down side, authors may make less money with their books being sold half off (or more). But sales depend on price and volume. So selling more units at a lower price could yield similar revenue.

So, which is Darth Vader and which is Luke Skywalker? I’ll let you decide.

All readers of this blog know that it is absolutetly the best writing blog out there (ahem, wink, wink).  But I thought in these tough times, we all need as much help as we can get so why not share blogs (even if PR gurus consider redirecting readers to be akin to seppuku).

One blog I enjoy reading is the BookEnds literary agency blog http://bookendslitagency.blogspot.com/. This blog covers all sorts of topics for writers at all stages of their careers, especially newer writers. Recent posts covered writer’s block (a concept I struggle with) and writer’s rules (wouldn’t it be nice to find a secret formula just like the elixir of life?)

Another blog that this blog has linked to for some time is PubRants http://pubrants.blogspot.com/. Agent Kristen Nelson has fantastic advice for writers and good publishing industry information. A recent post was about a Florida Attorney General suing a guy scamming writers by posing as a literary agent. Just the sort of information writers need to know.

A third blog that has an edgy feel is Evil Editor (http://evileditor.blogspot.com/). If you post on this blog, be sure to have a healthy ego with lots of self confidence. Don’t expect ohs and ahs over your wonderful prose. I must admit, sometimes the posts have me scratching my head and saying, huh? Or simply a drawn out, OKAY….. But, there’s plenty of amusement to be had in reading it, as well as  plenty of solid writing advice.

Hope you enjoy getting to know these awesome blogs! Bernacke has now declared the Great Recession of the 21st century to be over so it’s time to start smiling again (and buy books, lots of books)!

Bookmarked: The Naming of the Dead by Ian Rankin

Warning- This post has absolutely nothing to do with Michael Jackson (despite his having recorded an album called Thriller).

I was sitting here typing my thriller when I suddenly wondered, just how popular are thrillers? I decided to conduct a completely unscientific review of thriller popularity. Logging into Amazon, I found some interesting information about thriller popularity.

Here it is:

The number 1 most popular book tonight in both the literature/fiction and the mystery/thriller categories is (unsurprisingly) The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown. The number 6 position in literature/fiction is taken by Alex Cross’s Trial by James Patterson and Richard Diallo. This book is number 3 in mystery/thriller. Next at number 11 in literature/fiction and number 4 in mystery/thriller categories is The Shack by William Paul Young. After that comes the number 13 book in literature/fiction and number 5 in mystery/thriller categories is Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. (The number 2 thriller didn’t place in the overall bestseller list.)

These numbers suggest that mystery/thriller novel popularity compares well to that of other types of books. The overall best seller list has a good number of mystery/thrillers in it with the current number 1 book being a mystery/thriller. (Granted, it’s not every day that a new Dan Brown book comes out but he’s got plenty of colleagues on the overall bestseller list).

What beat out thrillers in the bestseller list? Several political nonfiction books (one a memoir of Ted Kennedy), a book on french cooking, and the manual of the American Psychological Association. Suggesting that if you want to write a book that really tops the charts you should write a thriller with a hero who is a liberal Senator and a heroine who is an insane french chef, both of whom should go on a religious quest.

Now that I’ve told everyone the best selling plot of the year, I’d better call it a night.

CraftFest and ThrillerFest is over for another year. This year’s meeting was as enjoyable as last year’s. I am continually astounded by how generous leading authors are with their time in teaching up and coming authors the tricks of the trade. Today I will highlight a few tidbits that stuck with me from the conference.

Andrew Gross gave tips for how to keep readers turning the page. One tip was to focus on the essentials of each scene. Don’t get bogged down in unnecessary description, explanation or character definition. Short focused chapters also help. With that said, there is also a spectrum of “pace focus” in thrillers. Some authors voice will call for more description/characterization/atmosphere than others. Writers through exploring their work will find their comfort level in the spectrum. But at the same time writers must realize that the more the book focuses on atmosphere, etc, the more the pace will be slowed down. Readers will gravitate toward authors whose pace is comfortable for them as well.

James Rollins advised writers to set a target number of pages to be completed each day and do it. I find myself that if you focus on a large project in it’s entirety, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed. So I agree with his focus on daily small goals to achieve a larger goal.

On marketing of thrillers, attendees heard from Robin Cook about his innovative “prequel” movie that was released in installments before his recent novel (Foreign Body). (Note, this is not an inexpensive undertaking so you may not want to try this at home!)

That’s the wrap up for ThrillerFest. I better get to work on my target pages!

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking on pitches recently. You need to pitch to sell your novel. What makes the perfect pitch? Having an attention grabbing hook is key. The hook is a short (1  sentence) summary of the essence of your novel. After the hook, you want to give your audience (either agent or editor) a feel for your characters- who are they and why would they do what they do in the novel. Additionally, you want to summarize the essential plot of your story from beginning to end in paragraph or two of content. The pitch lasts three to eight minutes generally.

Three to eight minutes might seem like a long time if you hate public speaking. (Regardless of whether you pitch one or five people or more, I consider a pitch public speaking. It differs substantially from an everyday conversation where there is a lot of back and forth and generally lower stakes like locating the nearest highway ramp or finding out if a seat in a theatre is taken).

On the other hand, you may feel three to eight minutes will be a breeze. A few minutes- how hard can it be? My advisor once told me, “I can give an hour talk, but I don’t have time for a ten minute talk.” As I began giving presentations myself, I understood how accurate he was. The shorter the presentation, the more critical each word is. Distilling ones thoughts down to a concentrated nectar and then presenting this nectar intact and with style is tough.

The only thing that works for me is the brute force slog. Get the words on paper and rehearse, rehearse, rehearse. After a long time, the words seem to flow naturally. They carry passion and elegance. When a presentation is perfect, it seems to take no effort at all. The words just flow out as though the speaker just stopped in for coffee and just had to put his/her two cents in. But we who present know differently.  We know the secret. Rehearse, rehearse, rehearse.

ThrillerFest is coming up soon and a lot of writers are wondering if they should pay the fairly substantial fee to attend. Last year I attended the CraftFest and AgentFest portions of the ThrillerFest conference. Based on my experience, I recommend that any writer who focuses on the thriller genre should attend this conference if possible.

CraftFest emphases basic writing techniques as well as pointers for selling your manuscript. Lectures at CraftFest are given by well-known authors, agents and editors. If you you want to learn or brush up on technique, you will benefit from this portion of the conference. You will also have the chance to network with industry professionals.

I highly recommend AgentFest. I don’t know of any other opportunity to pitch to 40 top literary agents at once. That said, the agents do not accept every manuscript pitched to them. Expect that some will say no based on suitability of your novel to their interests. What you will get at AgentFest is experience in pitching and the chance to meet agents who might be interested in your work. I recommend researching the agents before pitching to them. Select those most likely to be interested in your specific story. That will make the experience better for you (the writer) and for the agent. If you haven’t finished at least one full draft of your novel, I recommend not pitching. It’s hard to pitch if you don’t know what happens in the story. (Unless of course you have several published novels that sell well but if that is your situation, you could likely contact agents outside the pitch room.)

To attend AgentFest, you must attend CraftFest.

Good Luck and Happy Pitching!

Bookmarked: Dust by Martha Grimes

This month our fantastic CoLoNY Chapter hosted Deb Werksman from Sourcebooks. While the industry as a whole is in a rough patch, Sourcebooks is thriving. They publish 300 new titles per year with a third of them being fiction.

Deb affirmed that it’s harder than ever for new authors or even mid-list authors to gain traction with their manuscripts/new novels. She noted that 93% of books sell 1,000 copies or less. Only 5% of the general public even goes to a bookstore each year and that doesn’t factor in whether or not they actually buy a book.

Sourcebooks focuses on romance, historicals, and women’s fiction (sadly they don’t acquire thrillers or mysteries currently). When acquiring novels, Deb follows Philip Larkin’s rules that a book should be readable, believable and (should I? Oh, why not.) careable. By the last, I mean that the reader should care about the characters and what happens to them.

It was clear from listening to and speaking with Deb that she has a great passion for books and is supportive of her authors. She cited the strong marketing focus at Sourcebooks as an advantage and benefit for their authors.

By the end of the talk, I was certainly sold on the fact that Sourcebooks is a great place for writers to be. Now if only they would change their mind about thrillers….

Cynthia Crossen in The Wall Street Journal recently wrote about when and what triggers her to give up on reading a book. From her comments and from those of the person writing into her column, one gets the impression that a lack of enthusiasm or just not feeling “hooked” is a trigger to stop.

Cynthia says she has gotten as far as 300 pages into a book and been unsure of whether to continue (this was a 720 page book- for many other books she’d be closing the back flap by then). Her reader says after page 50 she would stop, although she’s heard some people stop at page 1.

This column and reading a book that I was unable to get through got me thinking about what really makes me or anyone else stop reading. I agree with the lack of enthusiasm concept but it’s so vague I find it entirely unsatisfactory. What causes the lack of enthusiasm? I’ll give you my thoughts. For one thing, it could be plot. A meandering, muddy plot without constant tension and action is a sure book closer for me. Sometimes, the plot has tension but it’s either a totally unbelievable circumstance or it’s the sort of tension that has no resonance with me. For example, a woman stands in front of a pair of Manolo Blahnik’s and a pair of Prada’s and is down to her last $500.00 and what on earth does she do? Sorry, but I’d rather worry about the clerk handing her the shoes who works part-time as a janitor in a nuclear power plant and found the reactor control code in the boss’s trash can last night.

But sometimes, it’s not the plot. Sometimes, it’s the characters. Either I just don’t like them or I am so neutral as to be unconcerned about whether they get blown up in chapter 6 or not. Sometimes, the characters themselves who are unbelievable. For instance, what about  five-year-old who speaks in complete sentences with multisyllabic words and tries to advance new equations for Einstein’s theory of relativity when he’s not in nursery school? Sorry, don’t buy it.

I think some of the reasons people stop turning pages are universal but others are unique to the reader. As a writer, I try very hard to not put in universal stop signals. But, I believe other stop signals are coded in the reader’s DNA- unknowable and unavoidable since the next reader may love that part of the book. For example, some may love reading about shopping crises and some may attack a 720 page book with enthusiasm whereas others may run from the room screaming….

Happy Reading!