Before dismissing that statement as being melodramatic, just hear me out.
It was 2010 and I was thinking that I might actually be interested in maybe someday pursuing a writing career. I was receiving Dave Farland’s Daily Kicks, and he mentioned he was putting together this seminar-thing (okay, he was far more eloquent than that) with a bunch of other top-notched and top-selling fantasy writers about everything you needed to know about the publishing industry, but no one was willing to tell you. The other instructors–Kevin J. Anderson, Eric Flint, Rebecca Moesta and James Owen–all have equally impressive resumes. The seminar-thingy was the Superstars Writing Seminar. I figured what the heck, I’d been going to “skills” seminars for about five years now, maybe it was time to get an insider’s look at the industry I wanted to be part of.
Best (professional) decision of my life.
Why?
The information and insight into the publishing market, including the self-publishing v. traditional publishing debate, was invaluable. Knowing the risks inherent for a publisher in taking on a new writer, I understood (and could work to circumvent) the barriers to publishing.
The time with the instructors was unprecedented. Remember that I said I’d been attending seminars for five years. Even with instructor-intense workshops, there wasn’t a whole lot of out-of-class time with the instructors. Superstars blew that distance out of the water. We went to lunch with the instructors. We went out drinking with Kevin Anderson. If you wanted a few minutes of their time, all of them where happy to oblige.
The instructor time ties in with a very important point. They are some of the nicest and most open people you could ever want to meet. They genuinely want to help other writers succeed. They are invested in helping them do so. They have a wealth of information on many disparate topics and are more than happy to share that knowledge, whether it’s publishing, queries, hiking, micro-brew beers, mafia, European history or whatever. For the price of asking, they gave us hours of their time to help us Superstars attendees move forward in our careers. And the guest speakers are just as open and wonderful as the regular instructors.
Then, of course, there’s the connections you form with the other attendees. The Superstars attendees are as amazing as the instructors. A group of the 2010 Superstars alums formed the writing group that grew into Fictorians. The picture to the right is of some of us at World Fantasy 2012. In addition to Fictorians, Superstars alums have an active Facebook group. We encourage and commiserate with each other. We are our own best cheerleaders. That network of people going through exactly what you are going through is invaluable. It’s also how I found my publisher.
Most of all, what Superstars did for me was give me the confidence to say, “I am going to be a professional writer.” It’s not a crazy dream. It’s a goal. Superstars gave me an understanding of the business side of the industry that I couldn’t get anywhere else.
Seriously folks, if you are interested in a writing career or maybe you’re already pursuing one, you are doing yourself a disservice by not attending Superstars. I highly recommend you attend Superstars Writing Seminar, which will be held May 14-16, 2014 in Colorado Springs, Colorado this year. Prices go up on May 1, 2013, so sign up now.
I hope to see you there.
If you’re still on the fence, check out another great posts on this site about the Superstars Experience:
In this article, I plan on covering how an Indie author would go about taking an idea for a story, and cover some of the primary items an author should consider when they begin what might be a massive undertaking. Since there is a good amount of data that I’ll be covering, this article will be split into two bite-sized sections. The first covers topics such as knowing your audience, novel research, and realistic time allotment. All the things necessary when you consider writing that first draft.
The second part will cover the logistics of the publishing process: the author/editor relationship, creating of a book cover, acquiring an ISBN, and formatting of your manuscripts. I hope by the time you’re done reading the second article, you have a fair idea of what to expect, and sufficient pointers to get started on going from concept to completion.
For many would-be authors, the task of writing a novel may seem daunting. Let’s face the facts that 95% or more of the people who start writing a novel never finish.
“Why?” you might ask.
Well, I certainly can’t speak for most people — heck, I can barely speak for myself, but I do have a few opinions on the matter. A lot of this has to do with lack of pre-work and not realizing the investment of time that is required.
Let’s speak briefly about some of the things that a typical author needs to consider when they initially undertake the writing of a novel-length book.
Initial Concept
Most books start with a concept, some kind of idea that makes the author go, “Hmm! I’d love to write a story around that.”
That’s usually the easy part.
Who is your audience?
Some elements of what come next really depend on your audience.
Some people are confused about who they are writing for. Let’s realize that you are unlikely to write something engaging for a 2nd grader that is also entertaining for a college-age student. Your novel is unlikely to target everyone, so keep in mind what the demographic of the typical reader is that you are shooting for.
The age of your audience affects some of the things you have to worry about as an author. For instance, if you are writing for young children, they might be quite forgiving that you don’t know the difference between an arc-welder and a brazing torch.
Understand that if you are writing for certain age groups, there are taboos.
The easiest example is the introduction of certain mature topics in a children’s book. For instance, if you are writing MG, the concept of alcohol use is usually a no-no. I’ve had people criticize my work because I had thirteen-year-olds holding hands and give an occasional kiss on the cheek, with lots of blushing tossed in. Most people in the United States don’t realize how puritanical their audience is.
Many caveats are cultural. Sometimes we can’t help but stumble into things that are considered rude in other cultures. For instance in Thailand, if you touch someone with your left hand, that is somewhat equivalent to sneezing in their face. It’s considered unclean and rude.
Research
The older the audience, the more likely you are to have to research some things. Let’s face it, most of us aren’t experts in thirteenth century metalsmithing. However if you are going to write about someone who is a metalsmith, you can be guaranteed to find yourself being critiqued by readers who have been doing that stuff for forty years and feel you’ve maligned them in some core way by incorrectly describing the annealing process.
The thing to be certain about is your accuracy in the concepts you describe, and maintain a level of consistency across your story. If you are inconsistent, people will catch it and you’ll lose readers’ interest quickly. An example would be if Sonja’s hair is blonde in one chapter, auburn in the next, then back to blonde for the remainder of the story without any explanations. You’ll have readers harp on you incessantly. Rightfully so.
Organization
Architects vs Gardeners
How you organize your story is a somewhat religious topic amongst authors. I’ve heard Brandon Sanderson use the terms architects and gardeners when describing how people organize or plan their stories, and I think that’s a very fair way of describing it.
As an architect, you tend to create an outline of sorts (the level of detail varies) which plots the inevitable storyline that you are creating. I find that this method is very useful for going through the mental exercise of where your story is going, and helps you avoid the pitfalls of writing yourself into a corner. Like Brandon, I happen to be one of these types, and can lay blame for my natural proclivity for it on my engineering background.
Stephen King, gardener.
As a gardener, you start with a beginning and oftentimes a destination, and you grow the idea of your story more organically. You aren’t sure where it will take you, but you start writing and you continue to write until your story hopefully comes to a satisfying conclusion. I suppose the risk of this method of writing (which MANY people swear by) is that you are more prone to writing yourself into a corner. You might find a thread in a story that, once written, you realize doesn’t fit the rest of your overall book and either needs to be scrapped or rewritten.
As an architect, you’ll typically end up with a bunch of research, storyboarding, notes and miscellaneous fodder to begin the writing process.
Doing it
Time
Most people don’t realize how much time it really takes to write a novel. It’s easily hundreds of hours, minimum, for an average 90,000 word novel. That’s why people oftentimes start, get a couple pages into it, maybe a chapter or two, then discover that they really enjoy fishing instead.
Real Life
Your real life must be able to support the time required for doing it. This means that family has to be supportive of your investing time away from them. Let’s not forget most authors have a day job when they are starting out. Heck, many authors have been publishing books for decades and never stopped their primary job.
Now that you’ve gotten to this point, as an indie author, there are several logistical hurdles and processes that you need to undertake to go from the first draft to a distribution-ready book. We’ll discuss those at length in part II of this write-up on Friday.
Mike has had a long career as an engineer and has well over 200 issued patents under his name spanning all topics across the technology spectrum. He’s traveled extensively and has been stationed in many different locations across the world. In the last fifteen years or so, much of his writing has been relegated to technical books and technical magazine articles.
It was only a handful of years ago that his foray into epic fantasy started, but Mike is a pretty quick study. He’s completed a trilogy, has a prequel under consideration with editors, and is actively working on another series.
In the meantime, if you want to see his ramblings, he lurks in the following social media portals: Twitter – @MichaelARothman, Facebook, his blog, and his books.
I want to thank Joshua Essoe for inviting me to write an entry today! I’m going to talk with you about visual artwork for your book-for most, this means cover art. Unlike many bloggers here, I am a visual artist, and not an artist with words, so if you make it to the end, pat yourself on the back.
Before I begin, I wish to make clear that I am going to focus on those writers that intend to self-publish, or publish with smaller independent publishers. Large publishers tend to have their own artists that they work with; sometimes the author has little say in who illustrates their cover. Exceptions to this might be illustrated children’s books and things like graphic novels, that have a lot of art on each page. That is a subject for another post entirely. Pressing on….
You have a great story. You stand behind it, and you are ready to publish. Time to slap some art on that thang and call it done! The theory is simple; you want something that instantly tells the reader something about your book… perhaps a mood, or a key scene, or even just a mysterious glimpse to grab their attention. The cover is your product packaging, so some care must be considered beyond “put a nice picture on there.”
Okay, so you knew this was coming: “You can’t judge a book by it’s cover.” This is, of course, true about the story, but it is hardly a good reason to dismiss the cover. While I am admittedly biased, I am sure that if you asked around, I am far from alone: people notice the cover. The book is not defined solely by its cover, but certainly a cover can greatly influence who notices your book, how many people notice it, and why they notice it.
Check out this quote: “The cover may very well be the single biggest piece of marketing that book will receive,” says Paul Buckley, the Vice President Executive Creative Director at Penguin Group USA. “For first time authors and writers that have not yet built up a big following, the cover may be the only thing that gets a reader (or reviewer, for that matter) to physically pick the book up.” (source below)
While e-books have started to pick up steam, both book types benefit from having eye-catching art on the front. In fact, some suggest that e-book covers are just as important than those on physical books, because online buyers are presented with a myriad of thumbnail images when browsing on the most popular sites. The most eye-catching images in the thumbnail soup can have a big impact on what pages readers open up to further investigate. In the physical world, I cannot begin to count the number of times I have picked up a book based on the subject matter on the cover. Whether I was delighted or disappointed with the contents of the book is beside the point–the cover got it in my hands and got my eyes reading that wonderful text inside….
For much more reading on the importance of covers, check out this article.
Well, you’ve decided you want a cover, and you have the freedom to select the artist you want. Where to begin? Some of you might have an artist in mind for years, or some of you might have no idea. One way to start out is to consider your genre and begin your search that way. There are many websites out there; some are direct galleries on personal artist websites, and some are a huge mosh pit of everything. Browsing and searching might take some time, so kick back and enjoy the visual roller coaster.
Jennifer Miller’s artwork for Song of the Summer King by Jess Owen.
Once you find someone that tickles your fancy, pay close attention to their subject matter and style, and imagine that style on your cover. Visualize what subject matter you want–is it radically different from anything the artist has in their gallery? One thing that surprises me as an artist is that sometimes I will have someone in love with my style, but pays no attention to my subject matter… or, someone that is in love with my subject matter, and pays no attention to style. By all means, artists do branch out, and it never hurts to ask! But… do not be surprised if the photo-realistic artist is not keen to paint an anime-style cover for you, or if the artist that paints landscapes says ‘no’ to your cyber-punk cover. You may be pleasantly surprised, of course, but observing the artist’s strengths can only help you find someone that will mesh well with your project!
Another important consideration is time. For some artists, rolling out a complete painting in a short period of time is no big deal, and some people do work better under stress. For most artists though, we have a great many projects that have deadlines throughout the year. Asking for a fully detailed cover painting just days before you hope to publish is a good way to get a “sorry, I cannot…” letter in return, or… at the very least, some pretty stiff “rush fees” to cover the all-nighters that such a project entails. Different artists can work at different speeds, but a really nicely-detailed piece can take me more than one hundred hours. This is not counting the investment of time in research, and communication to make sure everything is on track. It is not unreasonable to consider contacting your potential artist at least six months before you have a deadline; some high-profile artists might need more advance warning than that.
Cost is something I am only going to touch on lightly because, frankly, this is a wild variable. I like to think that artists and writers have a sort of brotherhood (I think of it as the Brotherhood/Sisterhood of Underpaid Creative Persons). We both know what it is to do something you love and probably not get paid much for it. We both know what it’s like to be self-employed, and how much of our money just flies right out the window to the tax man and bill collector. Just as you would hope that someone would be willing to pay fairly for your time, please consider paying an artist fairly for theirs. I have found that most writers are amazingly cool about this (go, Brotherhood!), but I have had a fair number of rude individuals that tried to convince me that my time and skills were worth nothing. There is an artist out there that will work for any cover budget you have, but you will probably get what you pay for. Investing in a good cover is one of the most important investments you place in your book. However, don’t be deterred if you can’t afford much. Look for artists whose work is simple and has less time invested. If your artist has any sort of following, consider the amount of traffic simply having them do the cover might bring you. Once they have art published on your book, they have an investment in your book now too.
Rights and contracts: this is something that a lot of authors don’t consider until their artist is asking, “What rights do you need to buy?”
Our Forests – Digital.jpg by Jennifer Miller
Uh, what? Now, I am not a lawyer, nor do I play one on the internet, but this is always, always, always the time for contacts. It doesn’t matter if it’s your best friend, or your sister’s boss, or your grandma. Get a contract written. Be clear what is expected from the start, and who gets what rights, and what those rights cost. This can, and has, saved many a proverbial rear-end in the past. Authors don’t often think, “Well, this one will end up on the bestseller list, and get turned into eighteen movies, and will sell millions of action figures, and t-shirts at Hot Topic.” But… sometimes, just sometimes, this actually happens. Research some the high-grossing current authors and you will soon realize that they rarely knew something was going to make it big. Knowing who owns the art for what purposes is a big deal when this sort of thing happens, and the only thing worse than being enemies with your artist is fighting each other in court. Don’t do this. Be friends, and write contracts. If you need help with this, there are a lot of websites out there than can help you, and some even provide contract templates. When in doubt, ask a copyright lawyer.
Communication is always important. This is where an artist-writer relationship can be made or broken. Of course, be polite for goodness’ sakes… but don’t waffle. Be clear about your expectations from the start, what you want, when you want it, and if you want fries with that. Expect your artist to do the same; if you need to, ask them to please describe the process so you know what to expect. Don’t be afraid to ask questions, and remember that even if you have a very clear mental image of the artwork, the artist cannot read your mind. You are a writer, by George! Use your words to paint them a picture so they can paint you something you are pleased with.
When author and artist really mesh and have a good time with the process, it is a beautiful thing. Mutually helping one another through all parts of the process, and beyond, is part of the wonderful community building that bonds creative people together and keeps them from going completely off the deep end. We are the Brotherhood of Underpaid Creative Persons, darn it, so let’s make something wonderful together!
Jennifer Miller resides in NY state in a rural area, surrounded by parrots and chickens. She’s an award winning professional artist that specializes in fantasy and wildlife artworks. Her work is sported on the cover of several published fantasy novels, as well as children’s books and a few anthologies. In the past she has freelanced for Nickelodeon magazine and Baen publishing. You can find more about her and see her work at www.featherdust.com.
A follow-up by Jess Owen to yesterday’s post on typography.
When I set out to self publish Song of the Summer King, I knew I wanted everything to look “traditional.” I wanted it to look polished and professional, like something put out by one of the Big Six. I invested in the artwork by hiring a freelance artist who’s well known for her fantasy, wild life and particularly gryphon artwork. I invested in an editor with a great track record who I believed understood my goals for the story. I had plans for a big Kickstarter fund raiser, and wanted to hire a printer instead of going POD.
With all that done, somehow, I still thought it was fine to slap some letters on the front in a free, “medieval-looking” font, and call it a day. Fortunately my friends had my back. Josh Essoe sent my cover art around for some critiques from some pros, and very honestly told me, “You’ve invested too much in this book not to get some professional lettering on the cover. Talk to Moses Siregar; he’s put the same kind of effort into his work.”
So thanks to the power of author friend networking, I contacted said successful self-publisher and he gave me the name of his typographer, Terry Roy. She seemed excited about the book, I liked her portfolio, and so she put together a package deal to not only do lettering on the front of the e-book and the hardback edition, but to handle the interior layout and format the books for printing and uploading to Amazon. And thank goodness she did.
I think sometimes we self-published authors think we have to do everything ourselves. But just as I would hire a professional to tune up my car, I now know the value of investing in professionals to wield their magic over my stories. It’s a matter of time, energy, and expertise.
I’m so happy with the final product and with the team that fell together to make it happen. I truly believe all writers need a master mind group to make their work really stand out, and I know for my book, I couldn’t have asked for more. Below you’ll find my cover before and after the professional typography and design.
AFTERBEFORE
Jess Owen has been creating works of fantasy art and fiction for over a decade, and founded her own publishing company, Five Elements Press, to publish her own works and someday, that of others. She’s a proud member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators and the Authors of the Flathead. She lives with her husband in the mountains of northwest Montana, which offer daily inspiration for creating worlds of wise, wild creatures, magic, and adventure. Jess can be contacted directly through her website, or the SOTSK facebook fan page.
invested in helping them do so. They have a wealth of information on many disparate topics and are more than happy to share that knowledge, whether it’s publishing, queries, hiking, micro-brew beers, mafia, European history or whatever. For the price of asking, they gave us hours of their time to help us Superstars attendees move forward in our careers. And the guest speakers are just as open and wonderful as the regular instructors.
