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Writing-GAF: Writing, Publishing, Selling |OT|
- Thread starter AngmarsKing701
- Start date
Crash Station
Member
As many as you want as long as there's at least one. Content-wise, erotica has pretty loose rules when it comes to pretty much everything. My first short has two sex scenes which account for 2/3 of the story while my second one has an almost continuous one with a single exposition break in the middle. The other three are all over the place.
Just do what you think works.
I'm actually writing a erotic stuff. Never thought this was going to happen, but let me see how everything turns out. Will probably try for 3 5000 words. Or 1 5000 word one and two shorter ones.
I don't plan on making a huge amount of money or any at all. But if I an use this to supplement my income...hey, and who knows if people like it. When i legit actually get one of my books out maybe people will go to it despite it probably not being anything erotic in it.
I don't plan on making a huge amount of money or any at all. But if I an use this to supplement my income...hey, and who knows if people like it. When i legit actually get one of my books out maybe people will go to it despite it probably not being anything erotic in it.
Crash Station
Member
Day 4 results: 1 borrow, 1 sale
Total: 5 borrows, 7 sales, 12 total=$24-1 return=$22
Slowing down a bit, but I'm happy nonetheless even if there's going to be more returns in the future.
Interested to see how things go next week when my second short is out. Managing to do the cover is a load off my mind so I don't have to scramble to get stuff done for Monday.
Meanwhile, 2,700 words into the 5th short. Probably going to write for a little bit before going to sleep, but I'm making progress at least. With a weekly release schedule, it's not like I have to rush either.
Total: 5 borrows, 7 sales, 12 total=$24-1 return=$22
Slowing down a bit, but I'm happy nonetheless even if there's going to be more returns in the future.
Interested to see how things go next week when my second short is out. Managing to do the cover is a load off my mind so I don't have to scramble to get stuff done for Monday.
Meanwhile, 2,700 words into the 5th short. Probably going to write for a little bit before going to sleep, but I'm making progress at least. With a weekly release schedule, it's not like I have to rush either.
Plasticine
Member
I really should try my hand at pure smut. My three books already have a bunch of explicit gay, lesbian straight and bisexual smut in them. They're just more focused on even more graphic gore and horror. I think the end result scares off both the horror market and the smut market, resulting in books nobody wants to read.
AngmarsKing701
Member
I do wonder whether this shorts technique would work in a different genre, like fantasy. It's sort of the reading version of YouTube videos (i.e., keep it short because this generation is interested in short, fast entertainment).
I do think there's some potential in serialized sword & sorcery shorts in the vein of Howard or Lieber. Write a couple of likable characters, send them on adventures around a fantasy world. That said, you can get so much good SFF short fiction for free that it would probably be tough to get readers to lay down money on stories unless they're tied to an IP/series that they already love.
Crash Station
Member
Still waiting on an answer from sirap for that. He says there's an intricate way of finding out that he'll write up in here eventually.
I assume the idea of writing Smut is the fact that you send out so much that if someone is interested or enjoys one of your stories they will pick up another one.
Since they can be made weekly or monthly you can have a huge backlog of stuff. Ergo standalone stories that people can read and you will constantly be making money off of.
Since they can be made weekly or monthly you can have a huge backlog of stuff. Ergo standalone stories that people can read and you will constantly be making money off of.
Crash Station
Member
Day 5 results: nothing.
Well, it was fun while it lasted. Guess we'll see what next week brings.
Well, it was fun while it lasted. Guess we'll see what next week brings.
toddhunter
Member
For making a cover, just use https://www.canva.com/design?create&type=kindleCoverSmall. Pick a template, change the text and the background image. It'll do the job.
I'll check it out once I get finished...if I ever get finished.
Oh, thanks for linking that. I followed the earlier canva link and couldn't even work out how to change the layout!
Related:
Couple Sues Self-Published Author Over Image Use
It's just a snippet of an article, the title says it all really.
AngmarsKing701
Member
1st short almost done. Both sexy times are written. Now to wrap it up and put the cliffhanger in there. I'm at 4300 words and I just edited those.
I also put a little tie in to the world I built in Ahvarra, although the connection won't actually be seen until I publish book 2 (hopefully sometime next year, if I can stop writing erotica long enough to finish it lol). Came to me yesterday in a flash of insight. Just a name change, but it's something.
Also started up my Twitter account for my pen name and started doing some tweeting. Again not much, a few follows. Trying to think like a woman (my pen name is female) so following more fashion stuff and less sports stuff than me IRL. Kinda fun.
Still gotta work on a cover dammit. But given we've got a couple weeks I'm definitely in good shape for the 1st short. Ideas for shorts 2 and 3 are already percolated, and like cosmic I may go as far as 5 shorts to actually wrap up the overall arc of this series. Assuming they all fall in this 5K range then I can tie them all together into a decent little 25K novella at some point.
And if this is successful then I've got an idea for another series.
I also put a little tie in to the world I built in Ahvarra, although the connection won't actually be seen until I publish book 2 (hopefully sometime next year, if I can stop writing erotica long enough to finish it lol). Came to me yesterday in a flash of insight. Just a name change, but it's something.
Also started up my Twitter account for my pen name and started doing some tweeting. Again not much, a few follows. Trying to think like a woman (my pen name is female) so following more fashion stuff and less sports stuff than me IRL. Kinda fun.
Still gotta work on a cover dammit. But given we've got a couple weeks I'm definitely in good shape for the 1st short. Ideas for shorts 2 and 3 are already percolated, and like cosmic I may go as far as 5 shorts to actually wrap up the overall arc of this series. Assuming they all fall in this 5K range then I can tie them all together into a decent little 25K novella at some point.
And if this is successful then I've got an idea for another series.
Finally finished the first draft of my new book. When I started out, the aim was to get it done in about 65-70k words. It came in at 102,441. Needs plenty of work, as you'd expect from a first draft, but I'm very pleased with the foundations that have been put down. A big, loopy action extravaganza.
Really need advice guys. Been wanting to embrace this story idea I've had for years now, but it revolves around dual protagonists (twin brothers). This isn't simply a preference but is a necessity for the overall plot of the story. In my education and in every expert advice I am reading, however, I am being told to steer right-the-fuck clear of having more than one protagonist. "You can do it," I'm told, "But it won't sell, and it won't be a success. The general audience absolutely needs only a single protagonist to relate with and follow. Publishers won't touch your novel, since they only touch what they believe the audience will pick up."
Should I just drop the idea? Any thoughts or advice you guys have?
Should I just drop the idea? Any thoughts or advice you guys have?
It'd be a hard sell without coming from an established author, but ensemble casts are a thing.
Conkersbadfurday
Member
Almost all of the Stephen King novels I've read have had more than one protagonist. Game of Thrones is currently the BIG THING in our pop culture, and that has a giant cast of characters.
really, just write the story you want to write. Worry about selling it once it's done.
AngmarsKing701
Member
Congrats! That's a great accomplishment!
Crash Station
Member
Day 6 results: 2 sales.
That brings the total up to 9 sales and 5 borrows. Not too shabby for the first week.
That brings the total up to 9 sales and 5 borrows. Not too shabby for the first week.
fredrancour
Member
I am probably biased by reading things like epic fantasy, but books with enormous casts are definitely a thing, even as debut novels in some cases. Is this lit fic? Mainstream thriller stuff?
I have noticed in reading query shark that there is pressure to have a super-concise sales pitch with a single discrete protagonist and antagonist. I guess that might be indicative of mainstream publishing attitudes because she doesn't do spec fic.
I'm about 95K words into my first book and it's an ensemble piece with five protagonists. If I had the opportunity to start from scratch, I would've scraped at least two characters entirely, five's just overkill for my relatively simple thriller. However, two seems perfectly fine to me, I'd go for it.
Crash Station
Member
Hit the publish button for short 2. Should be up by tomorrow morning. Let's see how this one ends up doing.
Congrats! What a great accomplishment. I've grown to love editing, so, in my opinion, you're about to get to the fun part of writing a book!
I'll join the chorus of others that are saying multiple-POVs is definitely a thing in genre fiction, even for first time authors. Don't know about non-genre works, though.
A friend just posted the results of an experiment she started this year. She pulled all her books from other vendors and put them all in KU. Definitely something to think about if you're just starting out. Some genres are very KU friendly, and it's worth making them exclusive to Amazon.
Crash Station
Member
Day 7: 1 sale.
So that brings the first week with 1 short out to a close, netting me 10 sales and 5 borrows. Not something I can quit my job over, but not too shabby.
Let's see how week 2 pans out with another short added.
Damn, the hell happened from January to February?
Also, after releasing your first 10 shorts on the same day, how far apart was each release?
So that brings the first week with 1 short out to a close, netting me 10 sales and 5 borrows. Not something I can quit my job over, but not too shabby.
Let's see how week 2 pans out with another short added.
Damn, the hell happened from January to February?
Also, after releasing your first 10 shorts on the same day, how far apart was each release?
A number of factors, the biggest is probably the bundle set of Part 1-6 of her BBW Billionaire BDSM Erotic Romance serial.
That, or the MMMF book with alien tentacles. She probably did some promoting too.
Generally, once you've established your pen name you don't want to wait any longer than two weeks before publishing again. That said, the author above published nothing this month, and only experienced a minor drop in sales.
AngmarsKing701
Member
Depends on the genre. My fantasy novel is 120k+ and is $4. Looks like erotica can go for a little higher, as we're all talking about putting up shorts in the 5k range for $3.
H.Protagonist
[-_-]/
Big congrats! 102,441 is monster of a book, but at least it's all drafted now. Good luck with the editing phase!
H.Protagonist
[-_-]/
Hubba-hubba Challenge Update
Guidelines:
- Write 3 erotic shorts (2,000 8,000 words*) by May 9th
(Proofreading/editing 2nd week of May)
- Simultaneous release of everyones first erotic short to be May 18th
- 2nd short to be published May 25th, and 3rd on June 1st
- Bundle of all 3 to be published in June for 1.99-4.99 (if your shorts are <5000k 1.99, if >5000k 4.99)
- Release platform: Amazon
- Pricing (2.99 for 4500+ words, .99 or 1.99 for 2000 - 4500 words) + (KU available)
- Willingness to share sales/profit numbers (if any)
P) so that we can track and compare
Progress Checklist (1 WEEK TO GO): You should be finished with/or well into...
- 2 shorts
- Silly pen name
- Title
- Blurb
- At least 1 cover
- Amazon account/agreement to publish
Resources:
- Formatting: Free Template, Draft2Digital (free formatting), Mark Cokers formatting guide for Smashwords
- Covers: DIY & Paid cover resources
1) Canva - Super cheap and easy to use
2) 4 Incredible Free Sources for Photos to Use in Your Book or Blog - Good info about the process of getting photos + free and paid sites listed
3) Canstockphoto - Free and paid images
4) Fiverr - Recommended by reddit/used by other authors putting out shorts if you don't want to design your own
Other Considerations:
- Twitter Account - You might want to consider starting a twitter account for your pen name now so that you can cultivate a few followers in the weeks leading up to tell about your shorts when they release. Not necessary, of course, but it's free marketing and could benefit your sales. If you do start one, let me know and I'll put a * next to your name. No need to reveal what it is, but this will be a good way to see how much of an impact a little marketing does for this.
Tips from other erotica authors:
1) 2/3 of your short should be sex
2) You need to hook a reader in the first 10% of the short (remember the "Look Inside" feature on Amazon)
3) Titles really need to be eye-catching for the genre
4) Nail your keywords
5) One bestselling author noted not to put your book in the erotica category
They also said to not use taboo, step-family, virgin or anything like that in keywords.
6) Blurbs need to be tight and suggestive (without getting you flagged by Amazon as ADULT), not meandering
A hilarious, but compact blurb example I saw:
Participation List
Me - Medieval
Nappuccino - Friends and Benefits
Gaz_RB - Doctor-Patient Fling
Delio - Superhero
Blargonaut - Cyberpunk Heist Caper
Jintor - Lesbians?
timetokill - Virgins/Daddy Issues
toddhunter - Theme? What theme? Sex!
Nudull - ???
mu cephei - ?????
FlowersisBritish - Historical/Dinosaurs?
Cyan - Tiger/human love
cosmicblizzard - The Strange and Bizarre
Petit Melon - Vampire/Paranormal
besada - Housewives/Occult
Fiction - Heaven and Hell
sirap - Werewolf billionaire stepbrothers kink (serial)
AngmarsKing701 - Fantasy/Monster
SolVanderlyn - ???
Ashes - Thinking Man's Erotica
360 pages - Older Women and Arranged Marriage
Welcome, new participants! Be sure to read the following articles. They cover those choppy waters I mentioned earlier concerning the dreaded ADULT filter and how to avoid that and/or your book being banned.
Selena Kitt - Corporate Censorship: Keeping Your Erotic Books Off Retailer Hit Lists
Selena Kitt - Amazon Targets Dark Erotic Romance and BDSM
Basically: "If you dress up pretty on the outside, you can be as much of a whore on the inside as you like.*
(*with a few exceptions )"
For all: Whether you're doing 1 short or 3, mind the May 18th publishing date!
Joining up is the best way to find out~
^A good warning for everyone as they start working on their covers. Be sure what you're using is legal and won't get you into trouble.
Well done! Sounds like you're making really good progress.
Nice. Thanks, sirap. I'm really loving all these little insights/results you post. Keep 'em coming!
Guidelines:
- Write 3 erotic shorts (2,000 8,000 words*) by May 9th
(Proofreading/editing 2nd week of May)
- Simultaneous release of everyones first erotic short to be May 18th
- 2nd short to be published May 25th, and 3rd on June 1st
- Bundle of all 3 to be published in June for 1.99-4.99 (if your shorts are <5000k 1.99, if >5000k 4.99)
- Release platform: Amazon
- Pricing (2.99 for 4500+ words, .99 or 1.99 for 2000 - 4500 words) + (KU available)
- Willingness to share sales/profit numbers (if any)
P) so that we can track and compareProgress Checklist (1 WEEK TO GO): You should be finished with/or well into...
- 2 shorts
- Silly pen name
- Title
- Blurb
- At least 1 cover
- Amazon account/agreement to publish
Resources:
- Formatting: Free Template, Draft2Digital (free formatting), Mark Cokers formatting guide for Smashwords
- Covers: DIY & Paid cover resources
1) Canva - Super cheap and easy to use
2) 4 Incredible Free Sources for Photos to Use in Your Book or Blog - Good info about the process of getting photos + free and paid sites listed
3) Canstockphoto - Free and paid images
4) Fiverr - Recommended by reddit/used by other authors putting out shorts if you don't want to design your own
Other Considerations:
- Twitter Account - You might want to consider starting a twitter account for your pen name now so that you can cultivate a few followers in the weeks leading up to tell about your shorts when they release. Not necessary, of course, but it's free marketing and could benefit your sales. If you do start one, let me know and I'll put a * next to your name. No need to reveal what it is, but this will be a good way to see how much of an impact a little marketing does for this.
Tips from other erotica authors:
1) 2/3 of your short should be sex
2) You need to hook a reader in the first 10% of the short (remember the "Look Inside" feature on Amazon)
3) Titles really need to be eye-catching for the genre
4) Nail your keywords
5) One bestselling author noted not to put your book in the erotica category
They also said to not use taboo, step-family, virgin or anything like that in keywords.
6) Blurbs need to be tight and suggestive (without getting you flagged by Amazon as ADULT), not meandering
A hilarious, but compact blurb example I saw:
"Julie's life is out of control and empty. As a 21-year-old college drop-out, she wanders the side show, looking for something, anything, to make her feel alive. When she sees six-foot, seven-inch Arnold under the Strong Man canopy, she realizes she may have found just what she's been craving. But can she take his raw power?"
Participation List
Me - Medieval
Nappuccino - Friends and Benefits
Gaz_RB - Doctor-Patient Fling
Delio - Superhero
Blargonaut - Cyberpunk Heist Caper
Jintor - Lesbians?
timetokill - Virgins/Daddy Issues
toddhunter - Theme? What theme? Sex!
Nudull - ???
mu cephei - ?????
FlowersisBritish - Historical/Dinosaurs?
Cyan - Tiger/human love
cosmicblizzard - The Strange and Bizarre
Petit Melon - Vampire/Paranormal
besada - Housewives/Occult
Fiction - Heaven and Hell
sirap - Werewolf billionaire stepbrothers kink (serial)
AngmarsKing701 - Fantasy/Monster
SolVanderlyn - ???
Ashes - Thinking Man's Erotica
360 pages - Older Women and Arranged Marriage
Welcome, new participants! Be sure to read the following articles. They cover those choppy waters I mentioned earlier concerning the dreaded ADULT filter and how to avoid that and/or your book being banned.
Selena Kitt - Corporate Censorship: Keeping Your Erotic Books Off Retailer Hit Lists
Selena Kitt - Amazon Targets Dark Erotic Romance and BDSM
Basically: "If you dress up pretty on the outside, you can be as much of a whore on the inside as you like.*
(*with a few exceptions )"
For all: Whether you're doing 1 short or 3, mind the May 18th publishing date!
Joining up is the best way to find out~
^A good warning for everyone as they start working on their covers. Be sure what you're using is legal and won't get you into trouble.
Well done! Sounds like you're making really good progress.
Nice. Thanks, sirap. I'm really loving all these little insights/results you post. Keep 'em coming!
Crash Station
Member
Bah, second short still under review. Thought it would have been live by now.
On the plus side, i finished my fifth short last night at around 4.6k words (at work, so i cant check). How these other ones do will determine if i go for a 6th one.
On the plus side, i finished my fifth short last night at around 4.6k words (at work, so i cant check). How these other ones do will determine if i go for a 6th one.
cr_blah_blah
Member
You're pumping these out. It's really impressive. I was writing to join the contest last night and, what felt like hours later, I looked down and saw it was 315 words. It was funny, it was sad.
Crash Station
Member
Petit Melon
Member
I released my superhero novella today, whoop whoop. My problem is that when I had no confidence I posted my work on free sites, and while I have a pretty decent following there, it doesn't seem to translate to paid fans. //sigh// At least I have the guts to straight up publish now.
error message: "document not found"
Petit Melon
Member
@_@ Thanks, corrected now.
Crash Station
Member
The fuck? Looks like someone made a Goodreads page for my pen name. At first I thought it just got auto-made due to the Amazon connection, but it has a COMPLETELY different author description than the one on Amazon.
Weird.
Weird.
Conkersbadfurday
Member
I planned on tossing mine up for a buck. It's around the same length. I can't tell if I'm underselling myself or not though.
Figure full on novels I have to self publish will be around $4.00. My thought process there is that they'll be mostly self edited and digital only.
It's release day!
Tide of Shadows and Other Stories officially went on sale today, and the response has been pretty positive. I ended up with 58 pre-orders, and have sold a handful of copies today.
There's an interview with me on Nerds of a Feather--we chat about the collection, writing short fiction as a new writer, cover art, and self-publishing. It was a lot of fun and made me think about the book from a different angle, which was helpful.
If you're interested, you can buy Tide of Shadows and Other Stories on Amazon for $2.99.
This is the approach I took for my release. I obviously don't expect number like your friends' (only a single release, short fiction, not erotica, etc.), but I do feel like KU might be able to compensate and surpass the revenue generated by sales on non-AMZ booksellers. So far I haven't had any borrows, but it's early yet and I get the sense success on KU is largely dependent on smart keywords.
Petit Melon
Member
Is there a reason why everyone is pricing their books so cheap? Like a 100k novel should be $5.99 imo. Hell, everything 75K and up should be $5.99. I feel like anything less sells it short.
Petit Melon
Member
I'm completely broke but I'm buying it as soon as I get paid.
Conkersbadfurday
Member
Well, I just plugged in a random genre fiction book (A Sea of Swords by Salvatore) and looked at the kindle price: $5.59. Since that had a professional editor go through it, I figure I gotta at least chop a dollar off. That was a slightly older book.
Checking a slightly newer fantasy genre book, I see $5.99 for A Wise Man's Fear by Rothfuss. Quite a bit thicker there too. Also has a professional editor.
So yeah. I don't feel to bad figuring $3.99 should suffice for what I"ll end up doing. But maybe I shouldn't go that low. I'm still waiting on a few more rejection letters before I fully consider this route anyways.
Crash Station
Member
Still under review. Bah!
Hope Amazon doesn't have a problem with this.
$2.99 is the standard price for indies with nothing to their name, at least in the standard 70-80k+ range. $3.99 is fine for 100k and up it seems, but I've seen it recommended not to go higher than that until you've established yourself. Hell, there's people putting up 160k epics for .99.
The exception is of course erotica, which you can price at $2.99 with 5k words because people will buy it if you know what you're doing.
Hope Amazon doesn't have a problem with this.
$2.99 is the standard price for indies with nothing to their name, at least in the standard 70-80k+ range. $3.99 is fine for 100k and up it seems, but I've seen it recommended not to go higher than that until you've established yourself. Hell, there's people putting up 160k epics for .99.
The exception is of course erotica, which you can price at $2.99 with 5k words because people will buy it if you know what you're doing.