fears

[eowebrinia]

hello you guys, there is something i wanted to discuss about.
i really want to publish the novel that i am working on right now, but i am a little scared that no one will read it.
i am afraid that due to the the TV, and gaming world, no one would want to read my book and i am also scared that it wont be good enough and it will really disapoint me.
can someone share his thoughts with me and maybe give me some other perspective?
dont get me wrong, i think that my novel is good, but still...

 

[ThinkerX]

Putting your book out there is an unnerving experience. And yes, zero sales are a strong possibility. You will have to promote it, which means reviews and marketing. For reviews, your best option is the Goodreads Reading Rounds, followed by review pools like Authentic. For marketing, try ordinary posts (not ads) on Facebook Book Groups. Avoid ALL FB 'book promoters' like the plague - they are scammers. After you get a few reviews, try email newsletter promo sites like Reign of Reads ($8), E Reader IQ ($10), or catch one of the discount deals at Crave Books (Try the $7 Bookspry option and ignore Nebula of Books.

 

[Phantasy]

Are you self-publishing or trad?

 

[pmmg]

Sold 18 copies this month and I did not even advertise.

 

[pmmg]

Returning to this...

You are asking the questions we are all asking...Is this worthy?

All I can say is, you need people to read it who can tell you if it looks ready to put out or not. I have read many books with errors in them, and they don't really bother me, but I always feel like I want to tell the author so they can fix them. Books with errors in them, a lot of errors, do read like stuff that came form people who are not really ready to publish. If you have one of those and you publish....you will find out when you get past the friends and family as readers.

Getting readers is a whole nuther task and skill set. My aim is to expand into areas on other forums and get people interested because I am very prolific in filling up forum posts. I am also putting out some ads, when I have the energy to follow and track them, which mostly I don't.

I did find that amazon ads did not help me at all, but...I kind of think its a waste of effort until you have around 25 reviews for your book, so there is some credibility to it--I'd say street cred, but its more like author cred.

It is true that the gaming and TV draws a lot of attention, but if you spend some time on Goodreads, you will see there are a lot of readers out there...and you know what? The whole world is waiting for the next big thing. Dune on screen wasn't it.

Based on what you have written, I would be looking for beta readers.


Or post up a chapter or two here and get some feedback. You may feel nervous about it, but the scrutiny of writers on a forum like this is to get you ready to be in public, where the scrutiny will be more direct and less helpful.

Another place you can get feedback on your story might be Scribophile. They have a karma system, so you have to earn some karma, but its not hard.

And last....See Goldie's rule no 5: Review the crap out of other peoples stuff. That is the fastest way to improve as a writer.

Goldies Rules

 

[Prince of Spires]

The honest and harsh truth is that it's very likely that no one will read your work.

That's not because of movies or gaming or TV. The book market is still growing. Google gives me something like Americans buying something like 1 billion books per year. The book market is alive and kicking.

The problem is discoverability. There are something like 1.4 million books published on Amazon per year, and something like 20 million English language books listed. Getting someone to find your book is hard, and doing so in a way that is actually profitable and sustainable is even harder. There was the statistic a while back from a big publisher that half of its books only sold something like 20 copies or less. That was only physical copies and not also ebooks. But that means that for half the books from a big publisher, the author can't even get all his friends to buy a copy.

Being good only has, unfortunately, limited impact on this. 50 Shades of Grey wasn't very good from a literary perspective, but it was hugely succesful. You need to market the book if you want people to read it. And when you do, you're competing with other authors, many who have more books out there and can thus afford to pay more to get attention.

I'm not saying this to discourage you. It's just the way it is. It's still possible to find readers. Many new authors still do every day. And there are plenty of ways to find readers. It just takes time and effort. So publish and write the next book. At worst, all you can say is that you published a book, which is a thing many people dream of doing, but few actually manage.

 

[Rexenm]

It sounds like you are pensive. Just remember, not all books are read. Just think of the plenty of books that are read. They are all classics. Or bestsellers. Just think of the ton of movies that aren’t read. Or remember any sort of idiom or idiosyncrasy. And you shall be right.

 

[pmmg]

The honest and harsh truth is that it's very likely that no one will read your work.

That's not because of movies or gaming or TV. The book market is still growing. Google gives me something like Americans buying something like 1 billion books per year. The book market is alive and kicking.

The problem is discoverability. There are something like 1.4 million books published on Amazon per year, and something like 20 million English language books listed. Getting someone to find your book is hard, and doing so in a way that is actually profitable and sustainable is even harder. There was the statistic a while back from a big publisher that half of its books only sold something like 20 copies or less. That was only physical copies and not also ebooks. But that means that for half the books from a big publisher, the author can't even get all his friends to buy a copy.

Being good only has, unfortunately, limited impact on this. 50 Shades of Grey wasn't very good from a literary perspective, but it was hugely succesful. You need to market the book if you want people to read it. And when you do, you're competing with other authors, many who have more books out there and can thus afford to pay more to get attention.

I'm not saying this to discourage you. It's just the way it is. It's still possible to find readers. Many new authors still do every day. And there are plenty of ways to find readers. It just takes time and effort. So publish and write the next book. At worst, all you can say is that you published a book, which is a thing many people dream of doing, but few actually manage.

I don't disagree with any of this, but I would add...persistence and a never quit attitude will do more to help you break through than anything else. You got to put energy in, to get energy out. Hopefully, at some point, the energy in, will diminish, and the energy back will grow.

 

[Diana Silver]

Well there's only one certainty: if you don't publish it, no one will even have a chance to read it. So shouldn't your fear only encourage you to publish it, rather than keeping you from publishing?

 

[minta]

Start by finding beta readers! You can never fully predict what critics and readers will think of your book, but finding some honest readers will give you some idea. It’s sort of an existence proof that someone will like it, and it will help get past that fear.