I’ve written a bunch of books. They were all passion projects. Unfortunately, not everyone shares my passions. The zombie books sold and continue to sell. I might be summering in Rio if I had stuck with one genre. That doesn’t mean I wish I had only catered to one genre and made it more lucrative. The details are a little more refined than that. Let’s make it simple. If I were starting again, here’s what I’d do:
- Pseudonyms only. It makes no difference to the final product but psychologically it’s less stressful on the post-production end.
- One genre and, of course, one author page per pseudonym. That separation helps Amazon algos sell books without muddling the reader pool. Readers are more specific in their wants than many authors. If they want zombie fiction, they don’t want my crime thrillers and vice versa.
- Build out the series into longer strings of books.
- Write shorter books, fewer big bricks.
- Focus more of my energies on the series that sell and earn the time and privilege of my artsy passions later.
- I won’t stretch out a story longer than it takes to tell it. That wouldn’t serve the readers. However, I wouldn’t be against writing more stories in the same universe and tying it all together. (Just did that with Dream’s Dark Flight, a stand alone that fits with the Dimension War Series.)
- Write more of what readers actually read instead of what I want to read. I know the typical advice is to write what you want to read (and it is important to know your genre.) However, I’m a writer. I finally figured out (since working under pseudonyms) that I can write in just about any genre and make it interesting for myself.
There are many other things I’d do differently, of course, but that would be a good start. Now I’ll retcon and reverse engineer that plan. Or build a time machine. The time machine is coming along pretty well.
~ I’m a writer across several genres, darn it. Couldn’t beat the ADD. I just started a podcast in which I go deep on life management issues. The podcast is complementary to my latest book, Do the Thing! It’s about managing stress, pain, time and energy. Find out more on my author page at www.AllThatChazz.com.
Filed under: publishing
C h a z z W r i t e s . c o m 
by shorter books, what word count are you referring to?
I always aim for 50,000 words and often end up at 60,000. Sometimes I end up at 90 – 100,o00 words. I’d prefer to do fewer books where the word count climbs that high. By outlining more aggressively, I can do that.
My last work-in-progress ended up at 27k words and an unedited version of a completed story is sitting at 37k words.
I like the point about writing /more/, but I don’t agree about writing for others. You don’t write because you hate all other ways of making money. You write because you enjoy telling yourself stories. Take away that enjoyment factor and what you have is an unpaid ‘job’, no different to all the other jobs you could be doing to make money. If I want to hate what I do I’ll go out and work at McDonalds. Wait…do they hire 64 year old geriatrics?
Oh, I always write for myself and enjoy it. However, I can find joy in choosing book projects that serve a wider audience.
lol – that’s good coz I like your passionate writing. 😀
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Reblog: On Writing What Will Be Read