Hard to Market, But It’s Okay
Recently I had a good friend (one of my best actually) stay with my wife and me for a few weeks while he awaited his move-in date for a new apartment. It was great. We talked about TV and movies and books and writing (when I wasn’t sleeping off the end of the school year, that is). One topic that came up a few times in our conversations was a group he was in on social media about how to develop a backlog of books that would sell.
The end result of those conversations was me usually pushing back against trends and best-seller, copycat, popular fiction (yes, I’m a literary snob, but don’t act like you didn’t know that already). But it did reinforce for me the kind of writer I am.
I’m the kind who is difficult to market in the existing publishing world. This is because of several reasons, all of which make me who I am as a creator.
First, I can’t stand to be restrained to a genre. Just look back at my publishing history, and you’ll see super-hero stories, pulp action heroes, hard-boiled detective fiction, literary shorts, zombies and ghoulies and ghosties… you name it. I like to write and read the same way I like my music playlist — as varied as possible. Just like I love my music jumping from Vivaldi to AC/DC to the Archies, I like my fiction to jump from horror to mystery to pulp.
Second, I can’t stand to copy trends. I was taught once that by the time you spot a trend, it’s too late. The world has moved on and is looking for the next one. I was dumb enough to believe that and I still do.
Third, my stories begin with questions that intrigue me. Not marketing questions, such as “What is selling well now?” or “What are publishers looking for?” Instead, I begin with questions like, “What if rain turned into a human being and developed amnesia?” or “What if a young rocker still reeling from his father’s abuse found a way to turn that anger into raw power?” or even “What if Josie and the Pussycats had been a lot darker — a lot darker?” Then, from these kinds of questions, stories develop and bubble into soup inside my brain, never once thinking about the genre or category ramifications.
Yeah, I know, totally backward to the way publishing works from the other side of the big desk.
Read the full article:
https://seanhtaylor.blogspot.com/2022/06/hard-to-market-but-its-okay.html
