Is this success?

[Mad Swede]

Now I know that seems like an odd question, but bear with me through this post and maybe you'll understand why I'm asking myself that question.

I got the latest sales figures from my publisher today, the ones that cover the period leading up to the end of 2025. Total sales for all four of my books are now 101 032 copies, both physical and e-book.

Sounds impressive? Well, possibly. That's total sales for four books over nearly eight years and across all the Nordic countries (Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Iceland, the Faroes and Greenland) plus a few sales elsewhere in the world. Obviously (?) sales peak in the run up to Christmas, and also in late spring just before the summer holidays start. The rest of the year things are quieter, sometimes much quieter. The first book didn't start off selling that fast, it took nearly five years together with the publication of the second and third books before things got going. My publisher had a lot of patience and belief in me as an author, patience which paid off when the fourth book was published because that did sell well from the start.

So am I pleased? Yes, but...

Selling lots of books wasn't why I started writing and it isn't really what drives me on in my writing. I write because I have to, I can't not write, for reasons which are very personal and which I'm not going to explain here. The thing about these sorts of sales figures is that suddenly I feel under a form of pressure, I feel I have to produce more books and stories to satisfy my readers. Don't get me wrong, I love writing but there's an additional sort of edge to it now. It's not only that I can't not write, it's now also that I feel I can't stop writing. If that makes any sort of sense?

There's also the interactions I have with readers, both directly when I answer e-mails and talk to them at book signings, and indirectly through interviews and things like that. My writing is so very personal to me that when the readers start asking questions about why I write and why the characters are the way they are I find it hard to answer them. I'm not able to explain it all and I sometimes feel I'm letting my readers down because of this. It's like they're (unintentionally) intruding on something very personal and private and I feel very uncomfortable about it.

I had no idea that I would end up in a situation like this when I started writing, and it's sometimes hard to know how to handle it. My stories have taken on a life of their own, and I sometimes wonder if I'm still in control. I understand now what Sharyn McCrumb meant when she wrote that "writers build castles in the air; the fans move into them; and the publishers collect the rent. It's a nice place to live, but please don't try to live there."

If this is success I'm not sure I would recommend it to other writers...

 

[Finchbearer]

You’ve answered your own question, and identified why quite clearly. Not going to refute that. It’s your experience of being a published author, writing to deadlines, working with other publishing professionals and responding to readers. Or readers responding to you.

You’re possibly posting in the wrong place if you want input from other traditionally published authors. Dark One is the other traditionally published author on here I can think of. MS is mostly writers deep into self-publishing, still learning to write or just enjoying the process.

You’ve chosen to write deeply personal subject matter - that’s on you. However it’s manifested, it was the choice you made, assuming that your writing is the better for it.

 

[pmmg]

Thanks for sharing.

I would hope that as one gained success, they would also likewise grow into the role of expanding into it. But, it does not always remain our love, and many things have a shelf life.

For myself, I have to be ahead of the game. I could never meet a deadline, which is why I have four books written and only one published. I want to complete book 5 solely because I want to know I can deliver it before I make a promise. I hope someday to have 100,000 readers, but I suspect even at that, I would not be successful according to many standards in the US. I'd love to be done and be they wise old sage that answers questions about my work, but...maybe I wouldn't. I am kind of an introvert, and would not enjoy book signings and such. Hopefully, We'll see.

I guess I would say, if it starts to become more of a chore than something that brings you pleasure, change. Maybe even quit. There are other things to do, and life is too short to be in a trap of someone else's expectations.

 

[Finchbearer]

Can I ask, do you write genre or literary?

 

[Mad Swede]

You’ve answered your own question, and identified why quite clearly. Not going to refute that. It’s your experience of being a published author, writing to deadlines, working with other publishing professionals and responding to readers. Or readers responding to you.

You’re possibly posting in the wrong place if you want input from other traditionally published authors. Dark One is the other traditionally published author on here I can think of. MS is mostly writers deep into self-publishing, still learning to write or just enjoying the process.

You’ve chosen to write deeply personal subject matter - that’s on you. However it’s manifested, it was the choice you made, assuming that your writing is the better for it.

No, that is not what I wrote. I write for deeply personal reasons, which isn't the same thing. Inevitably I, like most authors (or so I'm told), find myself putting events and personalities from my life and even bits of myself into the various characters and plots. This leads to a situation where some aspects of my stories become very personal in spite of the fact that I hadn't intended this to be the case. It's my editor who has pointed this out to me, given that she now knows me very well - she sees these things in a way that I don't. It explains why I find some readers questions and comments so hard to reply to, but it doesn't make things any easier.

Can I ask, do you write genre or literary?

I think I write genre fiction, I've never intended to write literary fiction. But some critics don't quite see it that way, which is why I now have a much greater understanding of what Roland Barthes was getting at when he wrote La mort de l'auteur (The Death of the Author).

 

[Finchbearer]

No, that is not what I wrote. I write for deeply personal reasons, which isn't the same thing. Inevitably I, like most authors (or so I'm told), find myself putting events and personalities from my life and even bits of myself into the various characters and plots. This leads to a situation where some aspects of my stories become very personal in spite of the fact that I hadn't intended this to be the case. It's my editor who has pointed this out to me, given that she now knows me very well - she sees these things in a way that I don't. It explains why I find some readers questions and comments so hard to reply to, but it doesn't make things any easier.

I was having this conversation the other day, when I pondered a similar issue. Of how much of ourselves we put into our writing. The general consensus, or the school of thought came to be that we cannot separate ourselves from the writing. It comes from us. It’s imbued into our characters, it filters through scenes we create, it’s on the page. As a reader I actually love this about fiction, that it’s never actually that far from the author. As a writer, it’s quite a scary thought, so I’d say it’s understandable how you feel. Either own it, or retreat.

 

[Mad Swede]

I guess I would say, if it starts to become more of a chore than something that brings you pleasure, change. Maybe even quit. There are other things to do, and life is too short to be in a trap of someone else's expectations.

I wish it was that simple, but it isn't. I can't not write. I'm compelled to write. So it isn't a question of walking away. I guess what I'm finding hard to come to terms with is this sense of compulsion (and, it has to be said, fun) to write relative to this feeling that I can't stop writing.

 

[pmmg]

Stop writing to publish.

 

[Mad Swede]

Stop writing to publish.

I wish it were that simple. I hadn't quite appreciated that I'd develop a sense of loyalty to my readers, by which I mean that the relationship would become two way. They buy my books because they like them and in return they expect - and I feel obliged to write - more books. In some ways it's like being in the army, the loyalty goes both ways. You, the commander, look after your men (and women) and in return they follow you and look out for you.

 

[Penpilot]

This is a bit tangential, but hopefully there's something useful to be gleaned from it.

I grew up playing various sports. In terms of success, failure, and pressure, one of the keys I found for handling things was in repeating the following statement to myself. "Control the things you can control." Everything else, it doesn't get ignored, but it gets focused out. Because, it's going to happen. Nothing you do is going to change that, so why wast the mental energy?

A lot of times, an athlete will get into their own heads too much, and get in their own way and start preforming poorly. Sometimes it's about how they're defining success. They define it in a way that it's next to impossible to achieve, so in their heads, they're setting themselves up for constant failure in some way.

For example, I play a lot of hockey. Some players define success by the number of goals they scored in a game. But nobody scores every game, and in highly competitive environments, few score even in every other game. So if scoring is their definition for success, then they're failing more often than not. It's entirely possible to play a great game and have zero goals and to have had a poor game and had three goals bounce off your butt.

That failure mindset causes them to stop doing the things they did to be successful, and instead, they start to cheat to chase that unreasonable expectations, which can start a downward spiral in performance. To get out of that failure mindset, they have to redefine what success means to them and set reasonable expectations.

And obviously, if they make mistakes, they have to learn from them, do better, and move on.

For me that involves simple honesty, to myself and to others. Honest to myself is understanding myself and setting reasonable expectations for myself. Honesty to others is owning my flaws and either navigate around them or try to overcome them.

When I listen to people answering questions about their craft or whatever subject mater is at hand, it's not necessarily the detailed answer that's the most interesting or satisfying to me. It's the honest ones, and a lot of times, that honest answer contains the statement "I don't know." or "I don't know how to answer that."

Any way my2cents

 

[Zilver]

Not sure how useful anything I say is, because I am not in that situation myself. But it resonates with feelings I have in other aspects of my life, and I wonder if one of these things is what you need to hear:

I wish it were that simple. I hadn't quite appreciated that I'd develop a sense of loyalty to my readers, by which I mean that the relationship would become two way. They buy my books because they like them and in return they expect - and I feel obliged to write - more books. In some ways it's like being in the army, the loyalty goes both ways. You, the commander, look after your men (and women) and in return they follow you and look out for you.

Ugh, fandom. I get that it can feel like that. Please always put that in perspective though. You may feel loyalty, and it may feel like a two-way street, but that's not true. It's a parasocial relationship, in which it's very easy for them to ask - while what they ask of you is an aweful lot. Please remember that you, as a person, have a critical say in this. If you need to stop writing for them - then that is an option for you. Their loyalty is easy, yours is a great sacrifice. So please remember that this is not an equal exchange, and you are the only person who can protect your boundaries. As long as you keep giving, they'll just keep asking.

You've already give them an important part of you, which they enjoyed. That doesn't mean you always have to continue doing that. Their loyalty is not enough reason for you to press yourself beyond limits you are not comfortable with.

And anyway, isn't the cliché that authors are excentric, capricious folk who don't always make sense to the outside world? Live the cliché. Or at least remember that that is always an option for you, if you need it. That idea may just take a bit if the pressure off.

In short, you post makes me feel like a total mom, and I just want to say: please look after yourself. If you don't, no one will.

 

[skip.knox]

I think I understand. I sell almost nothing and am content. I believe I caught a whiff of what you describe when I get (at a book fair) someone wanting to know if this (they point to one of my books) is part of a series. No, it's a standalone. Don't ask me to feed you a series.

Because it is feeding of a kind. People consume books, sometimes voraciously, and no matter how good and complete unto itself a book might be, all the buyers want is: give us more. That's fine. It's human. But it was like that person was not really a person but was Audrey, the insatiable plant from Little Shop of Horrors. I could see how writing books might turn into producing books. I want no part of that.

Really, though, this is not so very far from what other artists face. People fall in love with a comic actor and hate it when the actor takes a run at drama. They want the band to play all the *old* songs. They can't figure out why the painter is not just continuing with the stuff we liked in the first place. We're similar to Audrey but not the same: we don't want more, we want more of what we already know we like. Not everyone is like that, but enough are that artists in every walk have suffered and complained of it.

Oh, you were hoping for solutions? Advice? Hah! Remain unknown, I guess. Get discovered posthumously? I dunno. I've never seen an actor or other artist say they had found a solution, without going all J.D. Salinger (total isolation).

 

[ThinkerX]

In terms of sales, by my standards, you are a smashing success. You have literally sold 95 times the number of books that I have, though in my case, it is eleven books over three and a half years.

As to the rest...when a hobby becomes a job, is it worth it? The pressure to produce outweighing the creative impulse sucks. Something once pleasurable and personal becomes a job or chore.

In my case, I fretted over my most recent book, 'Exiles: Pilgrimage,' quite a bit during the writing process, as it is a continuation of another series, but paced and themed differently. I had visions of it flopping completely. Instead, by my low standards, it is modestly successful...so far.

There are multiple stories that I want to write, but with my age and health, I have to pick which ones to go with. Some are weird, some are flashy, and some are trashy. With 'Exiles: Pilgrimage,' I went for weird.

 

[Karlin]

Mad Swede, yours is a very personal story. I don't know if I have anything useful to say, but:

I have sold some books, though not of the order of magnitude that you have. Honestly- I am not quite sure how many, I should write the publisher and remind them to send me an update. I've seen a fair number of people visiting my suthor page in Facebook, so now I fell- well, I ought to psot some stuff there, to keep the readers/ potential readers happy. Or maybe fed. A mixed feeling.

Pen Pilot mentioned sports. I am not a sports player- but my grandson was, until recently. Basketball. He told me that when your team is losing, it's a lost cause- that's when you see who is a serious player. The serious player plays his best, no matter what.

Besides that, please accept a hug, and my acknowledgment that I don't really understand your situation.

 

[Prince of Spires]

I have sold 576 book split over 6 novels since I started publishing, 5 years ago. So I'm in a very different place. What I have found however, is that the metrics of what succes is move.

When I worked on getting my first novel published, I read a lot about self-publishing. Anything I could find. I came across a lot of succes stories. Publishing, and especially self-publishing, has a very strong survivor bias built in. You only read about the people who launch a book they wrote on a whim which sold a zillion copies. Who join newsletter promotion and sell tons. Who start ads and make millions, that sort of thing.

Anyway, I was realistic enough to realize that wasn't going to happen to me. However, when I started out, I had hoped to at least be able to sell stuff on a regular basis, and while not make enough money to live on, at least be able to sell stuff profitably.

None of that has happened. I managed to sell some books, but out of the past 5 years, I think I only managed to make some money on selling books a handful of months. Maybe 5. As I've kept on writing and publishing, I've had to change my definition of succes a lot. It used to be that I though succes would be selling an ever increasing number of books, or selling enough in a month to afford something fun like going out to dinner. That sort of thing.

Instead, I've had to constantly revise what I think of as succes down. Now for me, succes is selling a book a month. I've got a 50 month streak going, where I've sold at least 1 book. My most recent book managed to actually sell something like 10 copies just to people subscribed to my newsletter, without me paying for ads. That's succes to me. The next step up is to break even with marketing when selling them. After that maybe even make the money I invested in them back.

I think the above goes for all authors, both not succesful and succesful. Each step you take on this journey, you have to look at what succes means to you. About what you hope to get out of it. It's only human to look for a next goalpost. And then it doesn't matter if you sold 10 or 100.000 copies. There's always a next point.

You also have to define your own boundaries. Only you can set those. I can see what you mean with the two-way relationship. It does feel that way sometimes. And that brings pressure. However, only you can determine where you draw the line, and how much of yourself you put into the relationship, and how much you keep back.

There is nothing wrong with giving a generic answer to personal questions about stuff you don't want to talk about. When asked why you write, you can simply leave it at I would go mad if I didn't. Or I have all these people living in my head forcing me to write their stories. You don't have to expose yourself any further than you already have in your writing. Instead you can just let that speak for itself. Of course you want to be truthful to people who contact you with questions. But you can (and should) set boundaries around what you do and don't want to share.

As for feeling the pressure to meet your readers demanding more stories. That's definitely a thing. I remember reading about J.K. Rowling (a succesful author by pretty much any metric you can come up with). She apparently had a talk with another author at a conference, where that other author had been getting lots of questions about when the next book would be out. Her consoling words were, "they just don't understand, do they?" The pressure from people for the next book is a real thing, even if it's not spoken aloud. Acknowledge it and accept that it's there. You're not alone in feeling that. Just don't let it rob you of the pleasure of writing.

Maybe a quote from Neil Gaiman is good to keep in mind here: The first draft of a novel is just you telling yourself a story.

 

[pmmg]

Ugh, fandom.

Fandom? Whats that?

Seems like a faraway dream

 

[ThinkerX]

Fandom? Whats that?

Seems like a faraway dream

Going from the reviews (and the sheer number of freebies during the last Smashwords promo), I seem to have some fans...maybe enough to fill two or three tables at a diner. Then again, I might be delusional.

 

[pmmg]

I'll put in a little effort when book 2 is ready...Just waiting on the artist... I am hoping by book 4, I'll have some fans.

 

[Mad Swede]

Thank you for all the supportive comments. I mean that.

I think what I'm having trouble coming to terms with is the expectations that readers and indeed society seem to have of authors they regard as a success. It isn't something I've seen openly discussed, certainly not here in Sweden. I'd never thought about it, so I didn't ask my publisher and none of us thought things would take off in quite the way they did. My publisher would have been happy if I'd sold 25 000 copies, that would have covered costs and made us all some money - but we've sold four times that.

Part of the problem seems to me to be that I didn't intend to end up here. I wrote because I had to, a lady friend of mine (who knows what happened and how it affected me) read it and suggested sending it to a publisher and it all went from there. Now I'm asking myself what the hell have I done?

At least when I was in the army and in command I knew what I was aiming to do and why, and I could judge how close or not I'd got when things were all over. Yes, there were things I couldn't control and sometimes didn't know, but I was trained to deal with that and I could cope. But this isn't like that, it's just happened.

I mentioned expectations. For many (probably most) readers this means when is the next book out? That depends on my time, and I have to squeeze in writing between work, family and other things I want to do. If I'd sold ten or twenty times as many copies I could live off my writing and just spend my time writing. But I haven't so I'm in the middle ground where eveyone wants the next book and I don't have time to write it as fast as they'd like. Without those readers the books would never have sold and I wouldn't be where I am, so there is a sense that I owe them another book. It's probably also my pride and ego at work, wanting to prove that a dyslexic author can come up with another book at least as good as the last.

There are quite a lot of readers who want to see more of certain things in the stories. That's fine, it shows a curiosity and an engagement with the books and characters. Some complain when you don't do so, but the more worrying ones are those who come up with suggestions as to how I might write the text, That's usually because they want to see more sex between certain characters (I suspect self-insert wishes) and there are times when I wonder why my e-mail inbox doesn't self-combust.

Terry Pratchett once mentioned those readers who like Death and hope for something like that when they get there. I know what he meant, I get a few letters and e-mails like that too and they're hard to deal with. I do get a sense of satisfaction from them, not because I want to provoke that sort of reaction but because it shows that some of the themes in the stories resonate with readers and that I (in terms of my ability as an author) can write a real novel. But sometimes they trigger my PTSD and at the point I just have to lie down.

Don't get me wrong in any of this. I still love writing and I still can't stop writing. And if my publisher likes what I write then the books will continue to come out. But I wish I'd known what I was getting myself into when I started. Maybe I'd have been better prepared.

I'd say to the rest of you that you should think very carefully about what you're aiming to achieve with your writing. If you dream of being a best selling author, be careful what you wish for.

 

[pmmg]

Maybe go on your website and explain to the world why books dont appear as fast as some would like.