Things I Learned as a Writer in 2013

Because nobody asked, but I'd like to codify it for myself, here are the top five things I learned as a writer in 2013, in no particular order.

1. IT'S A BUSINESS. This point will not be foreign to anyone who has published through Amazon, but it bears repeating. I've never been all that business-minded, and setting up my payments for Amazon was a real trial. Being Australian made it that bit harder, as I had to register with the IRS, and there was no shortage of paperwork to be done. I'm almost glad that my book wasn't a roaring success, because then I'd have to deal with some nightmarish tax issues. As much as I'd like this writing thing to simply be just about the writing, that's not how it is. If you want to make money, you've got to run it like a business.

2. DON'T SWEAT THE FIRST DRAFT. The first draft of Jack Manley was a mess. Scenes were repeated. Characters changed names half-way through. Inconsistencies abounded. It was a genuine train-wreck. But here's the thing: you can fix all of that stuff. It took me a while, and it was not an easy process even for such a short book, but I got there eventually. It's a learning process, and I expect that my next book will not be quite so disjointed, but what it taught me was not to worry so much about what I'm writing on the first pass; just get it on the screen and come back to it later.

3. BOOKS DON'T SELL THEMSELVES. Psst, let me tell you a secret: my book has not sold a ton of copies. More like a few pounds. I haven't done any paid marketing. I focused on Facebook, Twitter and giveaways on Amazon and Goodreads. None of these have pushed my sales to any significant level. I'm considering some paid advertising, but I'm not even certain that this will make a difference. What I do know is that there are hundreds of thousands of ebooks out there, and with that amount of volume it's hard to get noticed. I need to get out and push this thing if I want to sell some books.

4. THIRD-PERSON CINEMATIC. This is what my writing style is called (at least according to noted writer and homophobe Orson Scott Card). If you read Jack Manley you'll notice that at no point does it go into the character's heads, and there are no interjections from the narrator. I tried very hard to keep things visual, to keep the narrative rattling along as fast as possible. Everything is described from the outside, and that's Third Person Cinematic. It's the style I naturally gravitate towards, to the point where I'm having some trouble getting into my protagonist's head in The Lightless Labyrinth.

5. RELEASING THINGS IS AWESOME. Seriously. It gives me a massive charge to know that I have a book out there and available on Amazon. I am a bona-fide self-published writer, which is a pretty damn radical thing to be. So don't expect this thing to slow down: I'll be doing this thing until I die, because it's what I love to do most.

PROGRESS THIS WEEK:

The Lightless Labyrinth - 871 words
Marvel Guidebook - 0 words

Yes, those word-counts are super-low, but this week at least I have some decent excuse. Firstly, I have entered Jack Manley into the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Contest, which could net me a cool $50,000 publishing contract (to be honest, I'll be happy just to make it past the first two rounds). Secondly, I have been formatting said book for Smashwords. It should be available through them within the week. So not much actual writing got done, but plenty of writing-related activity. I call it a win.

OTHER TIME-WASTING ACTIVITIES:

What I've Been Reading
Marvel Comics from 1964

What I've Been Playing
Super Mario Galaxy on the Nintendo Wii (I finally finished it, only to discover that I need to play through the whole thing again as Luigi. Not right now, Shiggsy!)