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    Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Indie Publishing: WMG Writer's Guides, #4
    Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Indie Publishing: WMG Writer's Guides, #4
    Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Indie Publishing: WMG Writer's Guides, #4
    Ebook105 pages1 hour

    Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Indie Publishing: WMG Writer's Guides, #4

    By Dean Wesley Smith

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    About this ebook

    As indie publishing flourishes, many, many myths form around this new booming area of publishing. USA Today bestselling author and major indie blogger Dean Wesley Smith takes a cut at killing some of the myths before they can take root.

    From the myth that indie writers can't get books into bookstores (they can) to the idea that indie publishing must be easy (it is and it isn't), Dean knocks ten myths down one after another and might just save you years of wasted time.

    Author of the acclaimed Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Publishing, this companion WMG Writer's Guide for indie writers and publishers will become a necessity for your reference shelf.

     

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherWMG Publishing
    Release dateMay 12, 2020
    ISBN9781393823292
    Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Indie Publishing: WMG Writer's Guides, #4
    Author

    Dean Wesley Smith

    Considered one of the most prolific writers working in modern fiction, USA TODAY bestselling writer, Dean Wesley Smith published far over a hundred novels in forty years, and hundreds of short stories across many genres. He currently produces novels in four major series, including the time travel Thunder Mountain novels set in the old west, the galaxy-spanning Seeders Universe series, the urban fantasy Ghost of a Chance series, and the superhero series staring Poker Boy. During his career he also wrote a couple dozen Star Trek novels, the only two original Men in Black novels, Spider-Man and X-Men novels, plus novels set in gaming and television worlds.

    Read more from Dean Wesley Smith

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      Book preview

      Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Indie Publishing - Dean Wesley Smith

      INTRODUCTION

      Welcome to the second book in the Killing the Sacred Cows series. The first book was called simply, Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Publishing.

      Both books are about the myths, which I call Sacred Cows, that infest the publishing industry. I’ve been writing about these myths, killing one sacred cow after another, on my web site for years now.

      Finally, last year, some of the readers convinced me I needed to put the Sacred Cows into a book. So I took what I thought were the top ten myths about publishing in general and created the first book.

      But then, as the indie publishing world started to grow and gain traction, it became clear to me that the writers thinking of indie publishing were getting pounded with a lot of myths as well.

      So thus this second book.

      All the chapters in the two books were blog posts on my website and have some wonderful comments and questions attached. So feel free to go follow the discussions and ask questions.

      There is a tab at the top of my website called Killing Sacred Cows that links to all the different chapters in a rougher form.

      Why I Can Write About This Stuff

      I sold my first short story in 1975, and have been pushing and working at writing ever since. I went through many of the general myths from the first book and survived them and finally started making a living in publishing in 1987, the same year I sold my first novel.

      Also that year, Kristine Kathryn Rusch and I started a publishing company called Pulphouse Publishing, which quickly grew to be the fifth largest publisher of science fiction, fantasy, and horror in the nation.

      I was the publisher and sometimes editor on some projects.

      We shut the business down in 1996, but I kept editing at times, first for a magazine, then for Pocket Books in the Star Trek department. Also, during that time and up until around 2008, I sold over one hundred novels under various names to traditional publishers.

      So sitting in the writer desk, the editor desk, and the publisher desk allowed me to see all sides of this business. And working for such a long time writing many, many novels, helped me clear out the last of the myths for myself.

      Then the indie revolution started and I loved it right off.

      I loved the freedom and the fact that I didn’t have to spend so much time dealing with editors and such in New York.

      So in 2009, Kris and I once again started up a publishing company called WMG Publishing Inc. to work on our indie titles and get our backlist out.

      Now, as I write this in 2014, WMG Publishing Inc. has seven employees and three more coming on in the fall. It has over 400 titles in print and is publishing not only Kris’s work and my work, but work by a lot of other writers as well.

      So I know the indie side as well as the traditional side.

      And both Kris and I have been voices in the indie growth on our blogs since it started.

      The Goal of This Book

      Writers hold onto myths like lifelines that are keeping them from drowning in a raging river of information. Sometimes sane people in the normal world will follow a publishing myth that makes no sense at all.

      And they follow the myth, the sacred cow, without thought.

      So this new series is an attempt to help the new world of indie publishing with the growing list of myths that plague it.

      My goal is simply to show other sides of myths, to help writers become grounded in good business decisions.

      Writing fiction is a business. Indie publishing your fiction is a business.

      This indie publishing business can be fantastic fun and very profitable if you can make clear business decisions that are right for you.

      My goal is to not show you the right way, or the only way, or any other such nonsense.

      My goal is to help you push aside the myths that are swirling around publishing and make good decisions for yourself.

      Thanks for reading. I hope this book helps your writing and publishing dreams in some fashion or another.

      Dean Wesley Smith

      June 9th, 2014

      Lincoln City, Oregon

      Sacred Cow #1

      YOU CAN’T GET YOUR BOOKS INTO BOOKSTORES

      Or put more clearly,

      INDIE WRITERS CAN’T GET THEIR BOOKS

      INTO BOOKSTORES

      Fact: Of course indie writers/publishers can. But some things must be done correctly and the bookstore owners or buyers must know your book is there. And it also must be something that fits what they are selling.

      I’ll lay it out below and in even more detail in a lecture that is now available under the lecture tab called How to Get Your Books into Bookstores.

      But let me say this here. Traditional publishers don’t have magic wands that ship their books into bookstores. They simply know how to do it and indie publishers have yet to learn. Or at least some indie publishers. Some of us already know how and are making great money on paper books.

      First Some History

      As with all these publishing myths, to really grasp the myth and get past it, an indie publisher must know where the myth came from and why there used to be a little truth to the myth. Not much, but a little. Myths in publishing are often formed from half-truths of the past. But just as if you don’t need a buggy whip to start your car, you don’t need an agent to sell a book, or a traditional publisher to make a living at fiction writing.

      And traditional publishers can’t magically block you from going into bookstores. They can’t even try, to be honest.

      So where did this myth start? Most of it came from the old days of warehouse publishing and vanity press publishing. Writers (often horrid writers, but not all) would spend thousands and thousands of dollars through a scam vanity press to get a garage full of really ugly books. Then these poor writers would wander the roads and the streets peddling their books to any unsuspecting store who let them in the door.

      Store owners hated these vanity-press people almost as much as they hated a young traditionally published writer with a handful of bookmarks. Sometimes a vanity press book had a local interest and the bookstore owner would take a few. (Young writers with bookmarks who demanded to have a signing were just flat annoying.)

      Also, in those vanity press days, traditional publishers seemed to have a stranglehold on the book distribution network.

      Of course, that wasn’t true either, but it seemed that way.

      In 1987, Kris and I started an indie publisher (called a small press back then) named Pulphouse Publishing. We got our books and magazines into traditional distribution systems just fine. Our magazines were on newsstands. And the company lasted for nine years selling to bookstores. Go figure.

      Why could we do it? Simple,

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