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There's been some mention of this in Romper Billson's literary agencies thread and the subject of self-publishing a novel and promoting it was discussed, but I'm interested in how the same applies to short stories. Finger, how did you (or anyone else who's done this) go about marketing your short stories? Do you have a blog/website/etc? How did you come up with the cover? Did you create it yourself or pay someone? I'm just curious as to how much time/money investment is appropriate for the promotion/marketing of, say, a 6000 word story. I imagine the mechanics are very different than for a novel, so I want to get some input from you or anyone else who's delved into it firsthand.
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Mar 27, 2011 18:04
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I actually haven't put any money into promotion. Not yet, anyway. The big thing is to haunt the community boards on Amazon and make connections there. There are actually a lot of folks hawking short stories. And most of the conversations I've had with other authors seems to solidify the idea that there is a market for shorts on the Kindle (the Nook seems to be a waste of time for me in that regard). As for my covers, thankfully, I'm friends with an artist (David Graham) who likes the weirdness of the stories enough to do the covers for free. The other thing that I've started is approaching sites that review stories for eReaders, since they can drive a lot of potential buyers your way. Places like http://www.theunreadreader.com/ Part of it also depends on how much you think you could get for your story by selling it to a magazine or other outlet versus self-publishing on Amazon. Edit: On that note, I use http://www.duotrope.com/ to find and sell to magazines. It's free and awesome. FingerbangMisfire fucked around with this message at 19:30 on Mar 27, 2011 |
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Mar 27, 2011 19:10
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FingerbangMisfire posted:The big thing is to haunt the community boards on Amazon and make connections there. It's also good to be an active member at third party communities like KindleBoards and MobileRead. If you aren't there to only pimp your goods, they will take a chance on you and if it is good, they will spread the word. Boyd Morrison is a good example (some would say an anomaly since he already had an agent before he was signed) http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/boyd-morrison-kindle-author-lands-major-book-deal_b11943
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Mar 27, 2011 21:12
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Sporadic posted:KindleBoards and MobileRead Ah, brilliant, thanks.
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Mar 27, 2011 21:39
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I'm totally keeping an eye on this thread.
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Mar 27, 2011 21:56
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Baffled Vegetable posted:I'm totally keeping an eye on this thread. Well, I certainly hope something comes of it -- though the thing seems to be dying out rather rapidly.
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Mar 28, 2011 08:33
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Weird thing about self publishing is that you only really hear about the statistical outliers who are doing it. On the one hand you've got several people on Amazon selling to the Kindle that have made loving boatloads of cash, and then the other end of the spectrum (where most people sit I suspect) people who have put their stuff up and sold nothing at all. Self publishing isnt really even the issue. Yes you can self publish. Its not difficult to actually do it in the slightest. But being successful via self publishing looks pretty damned hard. It seems to me to be more of an exercise in self promotion than anything else really. So it boils down more to a question of "How do I promote my work?" and "How do I get noticed in the crowd?" One of the major issues I see with self publication right now, particularly in Ebooks, is that the quality is all over the place. You've got everything from the fifteen year old kids terrible fan fiction type stuff, to writers who are actually decent, to the real pro's who are just sidestepping the regular publishing process. Unfortunately there's no way to tell who is who. So you really have to develop a name and get recognized by your audience or your work just never gets on the radar. That seems to be the biggest key currently. The normal publishing process has some of this built in. Get an agent, get your work picked up by a publisher, and they'll have the routes in place to get your work seen by the people that might buy it. Book tours, reviews in various publications, signings, interviews, retail store space, all that stuff. They know how to get your work seen. Going the self publishing route, you have to somehow match that. Really get the word out on yourself and your work, and hopefully you can build an audience from there. What I'd be most interested to hear about is the guy that put his work up, and is selling say 50-100 copies a month. The guy selling one 99c copy a month wouldnt seem to be doing it all that successfully, and the guy selling 50,000 copies a month is successfull enough that he's probably going by name/brand recognition/word of mouth alone at that point. The guys in the middle are the ones that are really working on finding ways to build their audience so they would probably have the most practical advice. Then again, those people might want to keep their secrets and tips to themselves lest they suddenly start drowning in a sea of copycat self advertisers.
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Mar 28, 2011 09:41
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Sedgr posted:Weird thing about self publishing is that you only really hear about the statistical outliers who are doing it. On the one hand you've got several people on Amazon selling to the Kindle that have made loving boatloads of cash, and then the other end of the spectrum (where most people sit I suspect) people who have put their stuff up and sold nothing at all. I have never done it but I have seen alot of people come up through self-publishing. There is no surefire way to success. The most important thing is to have good work. After that, the key seems to be getting on to the Kindle bestsellers list and setting your price low. Being on the list will give you exposure, the low price will get people to take a chance on you. Once you are on it, it takes on a life of its own. Some authors use a cat and mouse type pricing. 1) Set the price low 2) After promoting, it is hopefully on the bestsellers list 3) After getting on the bestsellers list, the sales continue to rise 4) When the book is high enough on the bestsellers list, they raise the price so they get a bigger cut of the higher price 5) It starts to fall off of the bestsellers list 6) Go back to step 1...rinse, wash, repeat. Some authors price one story low or free and put up their other stories at normal price. Same idea with trilogies or a set of connected books. Some authors latch on to a genre and shovel out a ton of stories (Amanda Hocking with Paranormal Romance is the biggest example of this http://www.usatoday.com/life/books/news/2011-02-09-ebooks09_ST_N.htm) Community support, like I posted about earlier, is a good way to get on the bestsellers list. Those people are always looking for new stuff to read. Twitter, blogs and the sort are another good way to open yourself up and connect with fans (who will hopefully spread the word)
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Mar 28, 2011 21:05
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Can't hurt to pimp my stuff, I guess. Long story: I wrote a book years ago. Essentially it was a precursor to the graphic novel Kick-rear end, way before Kick-rear end was a comic/movie. About a kid, end of his rope, decides to "be a superhero" to get reward money from old ladies. Ends up getting noticed and gets a publicist, becomes a sensation. Interest starts to die down, so he needs a new gimmick, and he pretends to be someone else, a villain, to give himself a nemesis. Not everyone knows the supervillain is fake, however... I went around to agents trying to sell the book years back, and got pretty close. I got a surprisingly large number of handwritten (or non-form) letters back. Most agents just didn't know what to do with it. It's not sci-fi or fantasy, as it's all grounded in reality. Had a great conversation via email with one agent who really seemed to like the idea, but not as a novel. This agent, who is pretty well known, told me I should pitch it as a high-concept commercial novel. Changing my wording actually got me a lot of immediate notice, and several partial manuscript requests. One smalltown publishing place actually requested the full manuscript and I got to the last round of voting. Unfortunately, I needed the three owners to unanimously vote for my book, and I got two votes. I eventually gave up on traditional publishing and went for the Kindle route a few years ago. Sold like three copies. Lowered the price to $1.99, but I am not a marketer, so I don't really know how to sell the drat thing. Anyway, if anyone is curious, it's here. (Yeah, I know, it doesn't have a cover because when I wrote it I was poor and didn't know any artists who would do me favors). Whew that was a lot more than I intended to write.
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Mar 28, 2011 21:36
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Sporadic, if you don't mind my asking, have you self-published anything? You are certainly a (much appreciated) wealth of information. Myrddin, pimp away. I like the premise, and I've had similar experiences with my too-many-genres SciFi/Future/Horror/Humor book. Once I get some spare cash, I'll be a happy buyer. But, I would definitely whip up a cover, if I was you. Even if it's just a photoshop job with the title and your name. Seems to me that the cover is really the first advertisement for a self-publisher. Need to catch potential readers' eyes.
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Mar 28, 2011 23:00
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FingerbangMisfire posted:Myrddin, pimp away. I like the premise, and I've had similar experiences with my too-many-genres SciFi/Future/Horror/Humor book. Once I get some spare cash, I'll be a happy buyer. But, I would definitely whip up a cover, if I was you. Even if it's just a photoshop job with the title and your name. I definitely think you're right there. I might try to whip something up but I am so confused about what pre-made images I'm allowed to use, as I'm not really a graphics person at all, just minor knowledge of Photoshop. Also if anyone does get it, could they please leave a review? Positive or negative I don't care, I just feel like my first Amazon review is my first stamp of legitimacy.
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Mar 28, 2011 23:36
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I've been working as an author within traditional publishing for years, and so I always discounted self-publishing as a way to get a wide readership. But all the buzz lately around Amanda Hocking especially has been making me reconsider my preconceptions. I'm not jumping ship from traditional anytime soon, but I'm curious to see how this develops in the next few years, so I'll be keeping an eye on this thread. Today, former agent Nathan Bransford put together an interesting post on the potential monetary gains of traditional vs. self-publishing that should be of interest for those of you considering one or the other: http://blog.nathanbransford.com/2011/03/self-publishing-vs-traditional.html Myrddin Emrys posted:I definitely think you're right there. I might try to whip something up but I am so confused about what pre-made images I'm allowed to use, as I'm not really a graphics person at all, just minor knowledge of Photoshop. Check out some stock photo websites and read up on their terms of use for their images. You can usually find some pretty cheap stock photos you can use for a cover. Definitely don't just grab something off of Google image search. Hef Deezy fucked around with this message at 23:43 on Mar 28, 2011 |
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Mar 28, 2011 23:37
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Myrddin Emrys posted:I am so confused about what pre-made images I'm allowed to use, as I'm not really a graphics person at all, just minor knowledge of Photoshop. Before I enlisted the help of an artist friend, I used http://www.shutterstock.com because I'm familiar with them for my job. http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/ seems to have more variety in terms of pricing, though I'm not familiar with them. The key thing is to find royalty-free images and then manipulate the poo poo out of them until you're happy. As for image guidelines, those depends on who your publishing with. I've found Amazon to be pretty forgiving. On the other hand, there might be some folks here in CC who will help you more on the graphics end. The friend who does my covers does so just happy for design credit in my works. Hef Deezy posted:http://blog.nathanbransford.com/201...raditional.html Very interesting. I also find Joe Konrath's blog to be a good read: http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/
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Mar 28, 2011 23:58
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Hef Deezy posted:Check out some stock photo websites and read up on their terms of use for their images. You can usually find some pretty cheap stock photos you can use for a cover. Definitely don't just grab something off of Google image search. Where does Flickr images stand, with the CC license?
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Mar 29, 2011 00:00
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Myrddin Emrys posted:Where does Flickr images stand, with the CC license? I wouldn't use anything from Flickr. Like Google image search, you have no idea who really owns anything there.
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Mar 29, 2011 02:05
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FingerbangMisfire posted:I wouldn't use anything from Flickr. Like Google image search, you have no idea who really owns anything there. Ugh, I've been browsing stock photography sites for a while and everytime something catches my eye it's ridiculously expensive, or extremely complicated to license. By extremely expensive I'm talking $900. Or $1200 but only if you use it in 50,000 or less internal newspaper pages, etc.
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Mar 29, 2011 02:31
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Myrddin Emrys posted:Ugh, I've been browsing stock photography sites for a while and everytime something catches my eye it's ridiculously expensive, or extremely complicated to license. By extremely expensive I'm talking $900. Or $1200 but only if you use it in 50,000 or less internal newspaper pages, etc. Good lord, that's insane. Can you link me to an example?
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Mar 29, 2011 02:54
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FingerbangMisfire posted:Good lord, that's insane. Can you link me to an example? It was something fancy on iStockPhoto. Anyway I found a generic city-at-night and made it slightly stylish as a temporary placeholder. Just to have something up there.
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Mar 29, 2011 03:24
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I actually kind of like that temp cover. Definitely curious to know whether or not you get a couple more sales because of it. EDIT: You know, I'm a pretty good hand in terms of graphic design. It's part of my job. If you'd like to send me a PSD or something to work with, PM me and I'd be glad to help. FingerbangMisfire fucked around with this message at 08:38 on Mar 29, 2011 |
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Mar 29, 2011 07:12
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Speaking of Amanda Hocking, she just got a contract with Macmillan to publish her books (not sure if it's her future books or the ones she's already got out) traditionally for a cool $2 million. Not bad, though I wonder why she'd want to give up the revenue of self-publishing (though I can understand why she would want to focus solely on writing rather than marketing, design, and everything else that a traditional publishing house takes care of) -- at one point she was selling something like 200-300,000 Kindle copies a month, at $1 a pop, which is no small amount of change. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/25/books/amanda-hocking-sells-book-series-to-st-martins-press.html It's interesting that the well-publicized authors like JA Konrath and Barry Eisner who leave traditional pubs for self-publishing get a lot of press, whereas there's much less fanfare about people like Amanda Hocking and Cory Doctorow who start the self-publishing route and then leverage that into a traditional publishing contract. Is this just the self-publishing evangelists not wanting to publicize this sort of thing, or what? Also, there might be huge repercussions for self-publishing if Apple gets really aggressive about demanding 30% of all profits from sales made through apps on Apple devices. Right now, Apple doesn't get a cut of ebooks sold through, e.g., the Kindle app -- it's something like 70% author/30% Amazon. If Apple starts skimming that 30% off the top, then it will surely come out of the revenue shared with the author -- which makes it a lot less worthwhile to go through the trouble if your profits are almost halved. A lot to think about, and to me it means that there's still a lot of uncertainty about self-publishing -- which means that there's opportunity out there for some people, of course, and a lot of risk that you might make no impact whatsoever.
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Mar 29, 2011 09:58
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Romper Billson posted:Also, there might be huge repercussions for self-publishing if Apple gets really aggressive about demanding 30% of all profits from sales made through apps on Apple devices. Right now, Apple doesn't get a cut of ebooks sold through, e.g., the Kindle app -- it's something like 70% author/30% Amazon. If Apple starts skimming that 30% off the top, then it will surely come out of the revenue shared with the author -- which makes it a lot less worthwhile to go through the trouble if your profits are almost halved.
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Mar 29, 2011 13:16
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Romper Billson posted:Speaking of Amanda Hocking, Seriously, if my story sells 1% of what her crap sells I will be ecstatic. poo poo, .1% would help, honestly. Thanks for this thread, I'll be sure to pimp my stuff when it's finished (and it will even be professionally edited!) Two questions for the group: 1- does self-publishing on Amazon hurt your chances with a traditional publisher? Obviously if you sell shitloads they'll love it, but should you hold off self publishing until you get rejected from Dead Tree Press, or what? 2- steampunk fans, where are they? They're the demographic I'm going after but I have no idea where to talk to them about my stuff or how to spread the word. Also, how soon should I start doing that? Now, or not until the story is done?
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Mar 29, 2011 13:54
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Arnold of Soissons posted:1- does self-publishing on Amazon hurt your chances with a traditional publisher? Obviously if you sell shitloads they'll love it, but should you hold off self publishing until you get rejected from Dead Tree Press, or what? Depends on what you mean. For the book you're self-publishing? Forget about it. A lot of places have "first digital rights" these days as a bargaining chip and that's gone. Plus, there will be a lot of questions about why you self-published, how many you sold, etc. If you sold a lot of books, then future books are probably going to be easier to sell to an agent, as you've demonstrated you can be profitable. If you sold nothing, like me, then it's not even worth mentioning unless you have to, as it's going to be a huge black mark on your record.
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Mar 29, 2011 14:07
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Arnold of Soissons posted:1- does self-publishing on Amazon hurt your chances with a traditional publisher? Obviously if you sell shitloads they'll love it, but should you hold off self publishing until you get rejected from Dead Tree Press, or what? Don't self-publish until you're sure that Amazon/Smashwords/BN is where you want your story to live. As Myrddin said, when you sell a story to a publication, that publication gets first rights (which do eventually revert BACK to you). So, if you want to sell your story to Dead Tree Press, sell it to them first. I actually found myself in an intensely awkward position a couple weeks ago where I threw a story up on Amazon that I'd been sitting on for a long time and finally (after a loving YEAR -- no joke -- of waiting to hear back) Dark Discoveries sent me an email saying they had just gotten to the story and were interested in publishing it. I unpublished the story in a hurry (it had only been live for moments), but I still have no idea if I'm boned in that regard or not ... because they said it could be another chunk of a year before they make their decision. So, yeah, patience. As for Steampunk fans, not sure. You can find threads on Kindle Board & Mobil Reads and even Amazon that mention it. And, of course, if you don't see one, start a thread in those communities yourself. People there are very friendly and helpful. Of course, as Romper pointed out, this is all pretty high-risk, low-reward. Interesting, but unproven -- except Hocking's wretched scratches.
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Mar 29, 2011 18:32
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FingerbangMisfire posted:Sporadic, if you don't mind my asking, have you self-published anything? You are certainly a (much appreciated) wealth of information. No, I thought about it but decided to go in a different direction (trying to put together a screenplay at the moment). I was just heavily into the community back when it was first taking off and tracked cheap/free books so I was able to see how their promotion worked along with finding new authors through the bestsellers list. Boyd Morrison gave me a shout out in his book The Ark when it was published (which was extremely nice of him and cool to see) Myrddin Emrys posted:Ugh, I've been browsing stock photography sites for a while and everytime something catches my eye it's ridiculously expensive, or extremely complicated to license. By extremely expensive I'm talking $900. Or $1200 but only if you use it in 50,000 or less internal newspaper pages, etc. If you don't mind spending a little bit of money, I bet you could get a great cover made for $50-75 from SA-Mart. Romper Billson posted:Speaking of Amanda Hocking, she just got a contract with Macmillan to publish her books (not sure if it's her future books or the ones she's already got out) traditionally for a cool $2 million. Not bad, though I wonder why she'd want to give up the revenue of self-publishing (though I can understand why she would want to focus solely on writing rather than marketing, design, and everything else that a traditional publishing house takes care of) -- at one point she was selling something like 200-300,000 Kindle copies a month, at $1 a pop, which is no small amount of change. She actually posted a blog entry about it. quote:Okay, I've been writing this blog in my head for about a month or so, and I was trying to decide how I would break the news to everyone. But by the time I got to say things, everybody had already heard. Call Me Charlie fucked around with this message at 18:55 on Mar 29, 2011 |
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Mar 29, 2011 18:47
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FingerbangMisfire posted:Seems to me that the cover is really the first advertisement for a self-publisher. Need to catch potential readers' eyes. Yeah, definitely. As someone who might be taking a chance on an unknown writer, the things that matter the most to me are an eye-catching title, a synopsis ("product description") that is enough to outline the plot and identify the genre and main character -- for instance, compare your description, M.E., to that of the new James Patterson book (you have to scroll down), and a low price, in that order. (By the way, that new Patterson book sounds like the original Star Trek's "Space Seed" meets Minority Report/Terminator. What a bizarre-sounding book.) Romper Billson fucked around with this message at 19:51 on Mar 29, 2011 |
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Mar 29, 2011 19:49
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Hocking's reasoning in that blog post sounds kind of odd to me. She thinks that a regular publishing deal will mean more stability than what she has currently? And then cites Patterson, who has made a pile of money, even with terrible books. So I guess she wants protection for her terrible work and thinks the regular publishing route will do that for her? Then theres the editing thing. She's gone through a bunch of editors apparently with her self published work, even though a cursory glance would suggest theres been virtually no editing at all, and a real publisher can edit her better. But she could hire a real editor for her current publishing method. Its not like regular publishers have some sort of secret pool of editors. They just have ones they've hired or hire out to. I think what it really boils down to is the household name thing. Even with a million copies sold or whatever, she doesnt feel like a "real" author because none of her books are in the physical stores. So shes going to go the publishing house way in the hopes that once people see her books on the shelves she'll be as well known as Stephanie Meyer. Can't really hurt at this point I guess. Its not like she can ever be viewed as a total failure.
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Mar 29, 2011 21:38
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There's just something about holding a real book in your hands, with your byline... But, no, the move & the reasoning strike me as a little squirrelly. Good for her (I say that with the most envious voice possible), but she'll almost certainly be losing money in the deal. Her fanbase is all online. I can appreciate her desire to conquer new brick & mortar lands, though.
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Mar 29, 2011 21:53
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Barry Eisler, who turned down a half million offer from St. Martin's Press to self-publish, and Amanda Hocking, who of course accepted a $2 million+ offer from the same publisher, had a discussion about their choices: http://www.twliterary.com/selfpub.html It seems like Amanda Hocking wants to get her name out as a brand in bookstores/Wal-Marts/airports not just to attain a wide print readership, but to gain new readers that will then purchase her already existing self-published novels. She insists that the four book deal (which are new books, not republication of her existing books) will not keep her from self-publishing new books in addition to this four book series. And I'm not going to judge her methods at all, as she's the one who's sold hundreds of thousands of self-published books, landed a movie deal for one of those self-published trilogies, and now has a multi-million dollar contract for four more books. She may not necessarily have written the best books out there, but she did something to click with a wide readership. As for editing on her books, I think what her mistake may be is that she's hiring JUST an editor and not necessarily a copyeditor and line editor. It's the copy editors and line editors that find the nitpickiest plot holes, redundancies, grammatical errors, etc. Hef Deezy fucked around with this message at 22:41 on Mar 29, 2011 |
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Mar 29, 2011 22:34
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Hey I sold two books today with a cover. Compare that to 5 total in like 2 years previous. That said I did a bunch of self-marketing on twitter and stuff today, so it could also be that...
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Mar 29, 2011 23:20
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It all helps, man. But more importantly: congratulations!
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Mar 30, 2011 01:52
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FingerbangMisfire posted:It all helps, man. But more importantly: congratulations! Ha, thanks, that $1.40 that I'll never see was worth it! 
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Mar 30, 2011 02:08
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Yeah, what's the deal with Amazon? You have to make over $10 in royalties before they'll send that to your bank account, right?
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Mar 30, 2011 02:47
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Same reason some stores require you to spend $5 or whatever to use a credit/debit card. They are paying transaction fees and dont feel like eating the cost of constant fees for tiny amounts. Or at least thats the reason I would expect. Could be they're just dicks too.
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Mar 30, 2011 06:15
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FingerbangMisfire posted:Yeah, what's the deal with Amazon? You have to make over $10 in royalties before they'll send that to your bank account, right? I think once your account tops $5 they'll bank transfer it to you and once it tops $10 they'll cut you a paper check. Could be $10/$15 or something, I forget. What's the deal with ISBNs? Do you guys buy an ISBN or not bother, or what?
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Mar 30, 2011 13:45
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FingerbangMisfire posted:Yeah, what's the deal with Amazon? You have to make over $10 in royalties before they'll send that to your bank account, right? Something like that. I think it's $10 for ETF and $20 for cutting you a check. They don't want to be mailing around checks for $0.35, I guess.
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Mar 30, 2011 15:03
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Arnold of Soissons posted:What's the deal with ISBNs? Do you guys buy an ISBN or not bother, or what? ISBN's aren't necessary for Barnes & Noble or Amazon or Smashwords. They're also $125 a pop, which is maddeningly high for a small fry like myself. However, they are required for the Apple Store, Sony store, Kobo and (I'm not sure but I think) Diesel. I expect my shorts, once they pass muster, to be in the Apple & Sony stores by way of Smashwords, which will provide an ISBN for you if you agree to list them as publisher. This wasn't a huge deal for me with the short stories, but I can see why it would turn some self-publishing authors off. It doesn't mean Smashwords OWNS anything of yours, but some people prefer to be the only name on their manuscripts. Myrddin Emrys posted:They don't want to be mailing around checks for $0.35, I guess. Haha, yeah, I can't imagine that they would. Cost of postage and the check itself would be more.
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Mar 30, 2011 18:39
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Arnold of Soissons posted:2- steampunk fans, where are they? They're the demographic I'm going after but I have no idea where to talk to them about my stuff or how to spread the word. Also, how soon should I start doing that? Now, or not until the story is done? A good place to start on Steampunk is sending your book to Jake Von Slat at the Steampunk Workshop. He's mostly dedicated to maker stuff, but he's promoted many authors and steampunk novels. His site doesn't get a ton of comments, but he's kind of the father of the modern movement, so getting his endorsement/recommendation can't hurt. I'm a marketer by profession and a crappy novel writer by hobby. Basic marketing says you should really identify your audience as a first step. Some authors seem take that notion to heart when they even begin to write a book. Regardless of what you think about Amanda Hocking's skill level, she knew her audience early on and relentlessly churned out marketing and more books that catered right to their wants/needs. I'm not saying you should be sell outs and only write books or stories that you think you can sell, or pander to a lucrative audience, because that would suck. However, spending some serious time and effort to figure out exactly who your book audience is can only help you. Get specific. Create your "ideal reader" demographic. Figure out an age range, their interests and hobbies, reading habits, are they dog or cat people. Seriously. Once you have that in hand you can start digging into where those people are on the web. Target a few communities and put yourself out there to them. You are asking someone to spend some cash to buy your book and some time to actually read it. You have to convince them that you already know it would be of interest to them. That was overly wordy! I hope this is helpful.
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Mar 30, 2011 19:25
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Sedgr posted:Its not like regular publishers have some sort of secret pool of editors. They just have ones they've hired or hire out to. True, but a good editor is more than just someone to relentlessly track down missing commas and dangling participles. At some point the relationship demands a fit for personality and vision as well -- to be able to think like the author, or to be able to push them in a certain way that they don't want to go (for marketability, readability, pacing, or other such issues). And in my experience, in-house editors are just better at maintaining personal relationships and easier to work with than freelancers are. That's not to say that a freelancer can't add as much value to a work as an in-houser, it's just that the publishing house serves to weed out the people who generally aren't "people people" in the way that the editor-author relationship really demands in order to work well. It's harder to know until it's too late whether you and your freelancer are a bad fit -- and there's no fallback option that doesn't demand breaking contracts, large sums of money, and potential lawsuits.
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Mar 30, 2011 21:44
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