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Hello from Denver - self publishing success

COSenior

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PS, a heads-up to those who are requesting the tool. @Held for Ransom doesn't live on this thread...he visits rarely because he's busy writing. You might want to try to PM him instead of hoping he'll see your post.

You might also get some benefit from this spreadsheet, thanks to @lleone.
 
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Unknown

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I looked through some books on Amazon tonight, but I'm having trouble figuring out which categories the books are actually using. Let's take Divergent for example (I know it doesn't work for the strategy). How can I tell which two categories that particular book chose?

I think I see it now. I just had to go down through a couple of categories to find the books that crossed both. I think I see how Amazon organizes the categories now too. So if I wanted to write a science fiction dystopian book I'd just select dystopian.

 
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marklov

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After reading this thread its has given me the courage to go forward with a novel.

Hopefully $200 can stretch for a couple more books until they start selling since that's al I have to my name now......so depressing :(

going to follow the golden advices here from hfr and other threads.

I dont know what I have gotten my self into but I know its worth a try!
 
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LisaK

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I just reached 30,000 words...I hope to be wrapping the first draft up this weekend. I'm going to work with a Fiverr on bookcover I'll see how that goes.
 

seamles

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I PMed for the infamous HFR link tool but haven't heard back from him (hope he's doing well), but was wondering if someone could PM the link tool? Or if HFR comes back, do you mind sending it my way? Sorry to be late to the party!

Thanks again for this truly gold thread!
 

ChickenHawk

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I PMed for the infamous HFR link tool but haven't heard back from him (hope he's doing well), but was wondering if someone could PM the link tool? Or if HFR comes back, do you mind sending it my way? Sorry to be late to the party!

Welcome to the party! @Held for Ransom sometimes turns off his notifications to focus on writing, which is hopefully what he's doing now. I hesitate to speak for him, but I believe that the tool is something he tracks carefully, so he probably wouldn't like any of us to share it on his behalf. Sorry I can't be more help!

Maybe as a start, you could browse the top-seller lists and see which genres look promising. I found when using HFR's tool that having some genres in-mind helped me get the most out of it. Then, when he returns, you'll have a head start. :)

EDIT: One quick note...His tool was awesome, but the way I used it was mostly to confirm what I'd already gleaned from browsing the top-sellers. In short, I found it be most useful at the ending stages of picking my genre rather than at the beginning, so hopefully you won't be out much time.
 
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seamles

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Thanks @ChickenHawk! I've been checking out and have a lot of ideas for what might work but just wanted to test it out against the tried and true method also.

I already have my personal project set with non fiction topics, am looking to get a ghostwriter involved in certain sci/fi/fantasy genres and just want to confirm.

Thanks for all your help too, still working through the threads but you guys are amazing and it's great you guys take the time to help us out! Like I wrote, it would have been awesome to started when you guys did a year ago, instead of dabbling in the failures I had (I know I know they helped me "grow") but to be where you guys are would be awesome. All hail the process! (Sounds like Marvel's hydras..I'm a nerd)
 

ChickenHawk

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Like I wrote, it would have been awesome to started when you guys did a year ago, instead of dabbling in the failures
I can relate! I felt exactly this way when I first read HFR's amazing thread, wishing I had gotten on board sooner. But just think...In a year, you'll be the seasoned veteran with a whole bunch of new insight and potential titles under your belt. I can also relate to the "failure" thing. Just the other day, my husband and I were marveling at my obvious insanity in not giving up after such a looooooong list of failures.

Here's looking forward to following your progress!
 

seamles

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Thanks for the kind words. I love this forum and that I can actually get answers and words of encouragement!

As I wrote elsewhere, my wife is only lukewarm supportive so getting the feedback here has been awesome. I've gotten great feedback from peers but they have no clue for process. It's going to hopefully turn out great! I guess I extend offer to anyone who's helped along the way that if they're even in LA be glad to take them out to dinner!
 
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marklov

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@ChickenHawk and to anyone who can chip in

I am kind of having a bit of difficulty in choosing a genre to write for.

There is the romance genre that I am looking at but from my research it seems that readers prefer novels done by femalse and so I looked at writing with a female pen name but wouldn't that hurt credibility if maybe readers want to connect with the author?

Also looking at Horror as well ( I'll explain below)

The two above genres and technically others really benefit from having organic characters but I enjoy working with romance/horror related characters and environments even my word counts show it I have an extra 300+ quality words per day.

I am not searching for a a one over the other type answer but just opinions on the matter


Thanks!
 

ChickenHawk

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I am kind of having a bit of difficulty in choosing a genre to write for.
There is the romance genre that I am looking at but from my research it seems that readers prefer novels done by females and so I looked at writing with a female pen name but wouldn't that hurt credibility if maybe readers want to connect with the author?

Since I'm a female writing under a female pen name, I might not be exactly the best person to answer this, but I know it's not terribly uncommon for a male to write under a female pen name. I vaguely recall that authors who do this will often post a pix of someone who looks the part, or even of their cat, for example. Also, there are some authors who write as teams, including the famous self-publishing team of Jasinda Wilder, who's really a husband and wife who self-publish together.

If gender is your primary concern about the genre you've got your eye on, definitely don't let that stop you. If you browse through author profiles on Amazon, I bet you find plenty that don't have a pix of an actual person. Or, you could use one of those "can't tell the gender" pen names, which might leave the option open either way.
 

marklov

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Since I'm a female writing under a female pen name, I might not be exactly the best person to answer this, but I know it's not terribly uncommon for a male to write under a female pen name. I vaguely recall that authors who do this will often post a pix of someone who looks the part, or even of their cat, for example. Also, there are some authors who write as teams, including the famous self-publishing team of Jasinda Wilder, who's really a husband and wife who self-publish together.

If gender is your primary concern about the genre you've got your eye on, definitely don't let that stop you. If you browse through author profiles on Amazon, I bet you find plenty that don't have a pix of an actual person. Or, you could use one of those "can't tell the gender" pen names, which might leave the option open either way.



horror/mystery are my target markets then.

I am sure there have been authors who rake it in while remaining anonymous but my primary concern is what if I want to make additional content available to subscribers like podcasts , recordings etc....it gets tricky.

I pretty much have all the info that can get me started and only by banging out a couple books can the others really be answered and those are the ones that I need answers for.

My writing is another obstacle but ill take hfr's advice on that lol
 
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Rawr

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HMWard said that her books didn't take off until she was writing under her name...it felt more authentic or something.

But I write under a female pen, and know other guys who have done the same successfully. In the end right now it's about $ and exposure, and if female pen is the way, then it's the way. Sometimes I do wonder about how to reply to women who email a "chick" but in the end it's not a big deal.

If it's an issue for you, then you already know it and just get to stepping and put that butt in the chair and write.
 

LisaK

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This thread and Chicken Hawks thread are what inspired me to write fiction. I had never even considered it and because of that I was stuck. I didn't believe I was "guru" enough to write a non-fiction book at this point and so stayed in a frozen state. After reading this thread and then Chicken Hawk's thread, well I am proud (and/or scared shitless) to report that I finished my first Novella last night. 35,000 words. It is at my Editor's right now probably getting "red penned" a hundred times. Regardless, I am a little shocked and surprised that I got it done as quickly as I did. The story pretty much flowed. I had purchased the Snowflake software. He has a training video that talks about figuring out the kind of writer you are. Well, I'm the "fly by the seat of your pants" writer for better or worse. There was no way an outline was coming out of me. I have some minor things to address in the book like: does anyone really care what town its based in? I was going to use my locale but I don't know. Anyway, that is up in the air. I named two characters the same name...Tommy and Tom...oops. I'll be changing that and I used the same street name twice. No big deal. It amuses me though because I wonder where these things pop out of in my mind. There is some repetition going on in there. I apparently REALLY want "TOM" to be in the story!! I think I will need to go back and be a little more descriptive on some of my characters but I'm going to wait for some feed back. I read something on a blog or forum...I don't remember but it just said they hated it when authors stretched out a book for word count. I don't want to add unless it is going to improve the story. I dropped my manuscript off at the Editor and felt all insecure and weird. She said all authors feel that way. You think? Agh!

So, there it is. I have to get the book cover done and the detail stuff like table of contents page, all the stuff I hate to do will be next. I'm afraid the book is ...too mild. It has a paranormal theme but is not a horror (at least not this first one) and it isn't exactly a romance, although one is blooming. I planned on writing a trilogy so I wanted to leave some things in the air. I didn't make it a cliff hanger (but I did give some flash on what is to come at the end.) I'm sending it to a few friends to get feed back. I'll let you know how that goes. I feel like I'm in one of those dreams where I'm naked.....
 

Selfy

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When I have a doubt in my head, I go back to this thread and I get pumped up!

Thanks HFM and everyone who contributed to this thread. I'm now on book 2!
 
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seamles

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This thread and Chicken Hawks thread are what inspired me to write fiction. I had never even considered it and because of that I was stuck. I didn't believe I was "guru" enough to write a non-fiction book at this point and so stayed in a frozen state. After reading this thread and then Chicken Hawk's thread, well I am proud (and/or scared shitless) to report that I finished my first Novella last night. 35,000 words. It is at my Editor's right now probably getting "red penned" a hundred times. Regardless, I am a little shocked and surprised that I got it done as quickly as I did. The story pretty much flowed. I had purchased the Snowflake software. He has a training video that talks about figuring out the kind of writer you are. Well, I'm the "fly by the seat of your pants" writer for better or worse. There was no way an outline was coming out of me. I have some minor things to address in the book like: does anyone really care what town its based in? I was going to use my locale but I don't know. Anyway, that is up in the air. I named two characters the same name...Tommy and Tom...oops. I'll be changing that and I used the same street name twice. No big deal. It amuses me though because I wonder where these things pop out of in my mind. There is some repetition going on in there. I apparently REALLY want "TOM" to be in the story!! I think I will need to go back and be a little more descriptive on some of my characters but I'm going to wait for some feed back. I read something on a blog or forum...I don't remember but it just said they hated it when authors stretched out a book for word count. I don't want to add unless it is going to improve the story. I dropped my manuscript off at the Editor and felt all insecure and weird. She said all authors feel that way. You think? Agh!

So, there it is. I have to get the book cover done and the detail stuff like table of contents page, all the stuff I hate to do will be next. I'm afraid the book is ...too mild. It has a paranormal theme but is not a horror (at least not this first one) and it isn't exactly a romance, although one is blooming. I planned on writing a trilogy so I wanted to leave some things in the air. I didn't make it a cliff hanger (but I did give some flash on what is to come at the end.) I'm sending it to a few friends to get feed back. I'll let you know how that goes. I feel like I'm in one of those dreams where I'm naked.....
Sounds like you're on the right track though. Are you using a pen name? Can always experiment and if it doesn't work, burn the pen name.

But like so many others have said, you're already doing what a lot don't! So stay naked and keep running.
 

marklov

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Trying to get my typing speed up... I am pretty much type with 4 fingers with few pinkies and ring finger thrown in and man its fairly slow about 37 wpm and I guess it because i never learned to type properly .
The years of built up bad habits are so hard to break.
I am thinking of giving the dragon naturally speaking dictation software a try as recommended by Cosenior and work on my typing an hr a day
 

Cyberseraph

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Hello everyone,
I did all kind of research about self-publishing and found something very interesting!
Basically there are two fiction authors who will write a book LIVE in 30 days (from nothing to print) and people who sign up can watch the process live. The sign up starts from $1 and will be closing today. The project is called "Fiction Unboxed"

Hope it is ok to post the linke here, I am not affiliated with them:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1027829739/fiction-unboxed-change-the-world-with-a-story

PS: Since reading this thread many things changed. I finally finished my first book and publihed it on Amazon.
However it is non-fiction. I want to learn to write fiction ASAP but not sure where to start. Doing market research now.
 
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AustinGator44

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First off congrats on your success Held For Ransom, very inspirational

Now wow just got done reading the entire post. Thanks a lot Held For Ransom this had been extremely insightful. I recently wrote a book and it is now being copyedited. I wish I had found this thread before since the book is 100,000 words and in the fantasy category could have been using my time much more productively. I guess better late than never though. Anyways thanks for all the advice look forward to applying it and if you get a chance could I get the link to that tool? Thanks.
 

Karla

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So, there it is. I have to get the book cover done and the detail stuff like table of contents page, all the stuff I hate to do will be next. I'm afraid the book is ...too mild. It has a paranormal theme but is not a horror (at least not this first one) and it isn't exactly a romance, although one is blooming. I planned on writing a trilogy so I wanted to leave some things in the air. I didn't make it a cliff hanger (but I did give some flash on what is to come at the end.) I'm sending it to a few friends to get feed back. I'll let you know how that goes. I feel like I'm in one of those dreams where I'm naked.....

LisaK, how is you book going? I am curious ;-)
 

LisaK

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LisaK, how is you book going? I am curious ;-)


Hello- I finished my first book, a Novella and published in June. I had some editing issues and got those fixed but not before I had 3000 downloaded on a free promotion. That garnered me some negative reviews which I totally understood. I did go back and have it re-edited. My friend and I have now figured out a better way to edit the book so I don't think it will be so time consuming next time.

I have sold almost enough to cover my expenses. During the free promotion I was #1 in my genre for a couple of days. I had hoped that would increase sales later but I am not sure that correlated.
I learned some valuable lessons. I am about 120 pages into my next book. I am attempting to be a full novel. As I said, I’m only about 120 pages in so I have a ways to go. I will slow down a little on the next book and make sure I don’t have the editing issues like before.

I’m not a best seller yet but maybe I’m one book closer, whatever that means! Thanks for asking about my progress.
 
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princephoenix

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Congratulations on your progress and what you've learned so far! Its helpful to those of us who are also going along the same path!
 

Berliner030

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I started with Self Publishing in May 2014. I have published 9 eBooks and 6 paperbacks so far (Non Fiction, written by me, $3000/month). Also, I have 6 books more in my backhand (in a niche that I already tested).

I am a good analyst and its easy for me to find lucrative niches, keywords and so on but I don't trust myself to write Fiction.

Then I found this thread here last week. Its so inspiring and amazing what process some people do. So I outsourced the fiction writing (8 short stroys in 2 specific nivhes (but with different plots) with 10k words each book). My plan is to create 2 series. I will see If I can market fiction books successfully (I'm getting all story's at the end of this month). I'm very excited and just want to thank everyone here in this thread.

Let the money rain on us! :D
 

Draven Grey

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I've been self publishing loss-leaders for quite a few years now. I just recently started writing fiction, and will be launching a few flash fiction pieces along with enhanced audio in the next month along with the launch my group, The Silent Still's new website, store, album, and memberships. I plan to move from there into longer form stories and I can see how a research tool like you came up with would be invaluable for validating story ideas. I would love to look at it, if you're still offering to share!
 
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Hucryn077

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Mind: officially BLOWN!!! Thanks to hfr. Chicken. Rawr and everyone else. Its this stuff that has made me decide I need an INSIDERS subscription so ill be joining shortly. Mj....your a legend for opening up a forum like this. Im more than a year late on this post but thank you all. Cheers from a sunny South Africa
 

Polarbeans

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I don't know for sure if this has been asked or not so you have to correct me in that case (i searched the thread but did not find it).

  • I assume you pay taxes, how do you do this (i.e have you registered a company that you publish all your books through?)
  • Do you need different pen names for different genres and if yes; do you market each of that pen name individually or do you add all your readers to the same mailing list?
  • You said that you have experienced readers who bought your whole collection of books, does this mean that all your books are under the same authors page but with different pen names?


Thanks for all this great information, I'm looking into it as of this moment and I just started on a book (using your research methodology).
 

Polarbeans

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Oh and by the way, in my research I found this: Word to page calculator... Now I don't really put an upper ceiling of how many words to write but I kinda think it's a nice tool to get a grasp of how long your story will be in its physical form.
 
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Cantona7

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It took me 4 days but I FINALLY finished this thread! Amazing stuff!

I read MJs book almost a year ago and have been lurking here ever since. I became an INSIDERS earlier this year as well in an effort to take my Fastlane quest more seriously.

After procrastinating for so long I've decided to go the self-publishing route. I've always been a great writer so I know this plays to my strengths.

I notice HfR hasn't been around, but can anyone PM the infamous research tool? Thanks in advance!
 

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