Present word count of WIP: 43,781
I’m almost over my cold and hoping my chapped nose (I knew I was blowing my nose too much!) will have recovered by Sunday. Oh, and if anyone out there can tell me why, all of a sudden, I lost all my Google Followers, I would appreciate it greatly. I don’t think it was because they were afraid I was contagious. Seriously, what’s up with Google (besides that whole privacy issue)?
In the meantime, here’s Seth Godin’s next piece of Advice for Authors:
14. Consider the free PDF alternative. Some have gotten millions of downloads. No hassles, no time wasted, no trying to make a living on it. All the joy, in other words, without debating whether you should quit your day job (you shouldn’t!)
I don’t know about you, but offering free PDFs of my stories would be problematic for me. While I got on the Kindle bandwagon early, offering THE RECKONING on Kindle shortly after it came out as a paperback on Amazon, I didn’t do the actual formatting. I paid the people at BookSurge (now CreateSpace) to do it for me. As a result, I don’t have a PDF version of the final manuscript, formatted for print with all the chapter headings and fancy images.
If any of you know how I might get hold of such a PDF version, I might be interested. But then, you come to the question of the value of your work. How many readers value that which they get for free?
Personally, I’ve purchased some 200-300 books on my Kindle and I’m having a tough enough time getting them read, let alone any free books I may come across. Which books do you imagine I’m going to value more and read first? You got it. The ones that cost me money.
In my opinion, money earned from a book is a lot more meaningful, in terms of gauging your fan base, than the number of downloads. While the idea of no hassles and no time wasted is appealing, it’s not very realistic. True professional authors have to work hard to make a living at what they do…but the reason they continue to do it is because they love the writing.
I stopped myself today in the middle of writing a scene that ended up taking me in a whole new direction and thought, “This is just too fun! I am so glad I can do this!”
Sometimes, Godin thinks too much about the money/marketing end and not enough about the joy of writing.
I know how you feel. I recently finished my first book, sold it to a publisher, then got the handed the book on marketing and social emdia. Really? I thought my job was over when I typed “the end”
sigh.
I’d heard those days were long over and your comment proves it. Out of curiosity, who’s your publisher?
The marketing seems more time-cosuming than the writing. Maybe that’s because I don’t like it as much!
It IS time-consuming…and a lot less fun, but once my son graduates from high school in a couple of months, I’m going to have a lot more freedom with my afternoons. I figure I’ll devote two afternoons a week to reading up on the latest marketing ploys and trying to implement those that seem do-able and worth my while.