Too much of a good thing?
Val over at Obsidian Bookshelf asked a while ago how often an author has to publish to stay relevant. There are some interesting answers and be sure to check out the thread over there. I remembered this thread when I started feeling overwhelmed by keeping up with author releases.
What stands out to me though is that lately authors seem to be publishing at lightening fast rates. Gone are the lengthy waits of six months to a year for your next author piece. With the instant publishing of electronic publishing (and decreasing quality of cover art, editing, and proofreading), there are dozens of new books every day in every genre. Lately it seems you can’t trip over your front step without falling on an author or aspiring author.
To that, I can only say thank god. As a reader, I love authors. So write, write, write.
Yet the caveat to that is that I’m finding I can’t keep up with even favorite authors, let alone new ones. In the past two months, there have been a total of 32 short stories, novellas, anthologies, novels, and free reads by authors that I consider “auto buys.” And believe me, this is not an extensive list. It’s still in single digits.
This list doesn’t include the some dozen + new releases being touted within the upcoming month and I’m left with fatigue trying to keep up with a list to buy, let alone read, and all those new authors? Yea good luck. All of this and I consider myself a pretty fast reader.
I can see why the novella is the best selling length. Who has time to sit down and a read a novel anymore? I’ve started checking page count and actually had to remind myself that I read for *PLEASURE* and thus, word count doesn’t matter. If it takes me *gulp* a week to finish a book, it’s ok.
And honestly this has nothing to do with reviewing. It’s just the fear of getting so far behind on the never ending crush of new releases that I’ve totally given up on my old release pile.
With new books introduced every single day and authors publishing numerous times a month, how does any reader keep up? How do you even –remember- all the new releases, names, titles, publishers?
I know everyone likes to say there is no competition within writing since it’s about individual choice but come on. There are only so many hours in my day and dollars in my budget I can allocate to reading and if I can’t keep up with my favorite authors, how am I ever going to discover that rare gem?
How do you do it? Because frankly I’ve already forgotten the title of the new JCP I wanted to buy and there’s a new Lethe Press that caught my eye and somewhere I forgot where I put my copy of The Coming Storm…and well.. you get the picture.
And authors – while I adore you (really I do) – why are you publishing so fast and so much? I promise I’ll still read your new releases even if you don’t publish 2 a month. I pinky swear.
Posted in Ramblings
I don’t know, Kassa – it worries me too, speaking from the other side of the fence, if I can. I’m not particularly prolific – and certainly not when I look at what others can produce, but these days I do start to panic if there’s nothing coming up in my release list for a month or so. I know it’s a truism (though it is true!) that all authors are twitchy and not very confident, but I fear that I might well be forgotten about if I don’t get writing and get something out at reasonably regular intervals. Has it got any worse lately, or is that just my take on it? I don’t know!
And it’s not that publishers are shouting at us (or they’re not shouting at me) to tell us to get a move on – perhaps the pressure comes from within? I’m my own worst enemy for pressure and I know it! Maybe it’s the fact that ebooks are very easy to publish and there’s no long lead-in as there is in print books that’s making everyone twitchy? Much like the old days (yes, I am that old!) when computers started and everyone said what a marvellous thing it is as it would give us all more leisure time, as the work would get done more quickly. Ho ho. Well, in actual fact computers have had the effect of making us all work much much harder and for longer – perhaps the bliss and ease of ebooks has the same effect??
Sorry, I’m rambling so I’ll shut up now. But it’s a fascinating question, and I’m longing to hear the views of others …
Axxx
I think you bring up a great point. I think most authors feel like they need to have near constant releases to stay relevant. And that is a completely separate issue from wanting to release so many books. I mean I’ve got nothing against authors at all, no matter how much or how little they publish. Really it’s fine.
But an author publishing every month because they have that many great books is different from an author publishing every month out of fear of being forgotten. I’m not sure -where- that pressure comes from but even as a reader, I can see it.
One of the most interesting responses has been from authors that have said “Thank you. I’m a slow writer so that makes me feel better.” Interesting that slow writers are the ones in fear the most and actually need the reassurance they’re not forgotten.
This here is the one reason I think all the bally-hoo about the rise of digital/self publishing is just a wee bit overblown. There just aren’t enough readers to support that many books out there. I for one am very choosy about what I read. I’m not fast. I will read about 15-20 books in a year. I have a fairly small circle of authors I will always look for plus the occasional cool new thing I hear about, but I have little time or inclination to be trying tons of new authors when I get plenty of material to choose from already. Having material to choose from to buy and read has never been a problem in publishing. It’s always been the number of readers and the time to read, because unfortunately with today’s society, alot of people would rather spend three hours to go see the movie instead of investing the extra time and energy to read the book.
Very excellent points! Thank you for commenting. I’m getting to be more and more that way – where I prefer to just use what time I do have to read known authors and favorites and appreciate the books I can vs keep trying new authors. Perhaps unfortunate for new authors but with the explosion of e-books, it’s somewhat the only choice.
I sympathise with you Kassa because I often feel the same. Once upon a time I used to eagerly await a new release by my autobuy authors, now I know that I don’t have time to read them. I used to read Josh Lanyon’s new releases on the day they were published, and yet he’s got a new one out this week and I only bought it yesterday and it’ll be at least a week before I’ll be able to read it, if not longer. I also find that I become fixated on the length of the book. I like reading longer books, but sometimes gulp over reading one that’s over 300 pages, even though I know I’ll probably love it, because I know it will take me twice as long to read as a novella.
Part of this is because I’m a reviewer, and therefore take on reviewing commitments which means those books get priority over my favourite authors (unless I can snap those up for review before anyone else gets them *g*). I do get a sense of panic though that I’m missing out on new releases, not trying out new authors and shoving some of the older releases further and further down my TBR pile, all because there are just so many books out there to choose from. Some weeks I don’t even look at the new release page of my favourite publishers because my TBR is completely out of control and I don’t want to tempt myself
.
Then again, I can see it from the authors’ point of view – they feel the need to keep visible and one way to do that is to publish shorter pieces more often, rather than a longer book once every 6 months. As long as the quality is consistently high, I don’t begrudge them that.
I can sympathize with all your comments! I don’t begrudge authors any choices really. If they have to or even want to publish every week, that’s not only their choice but good for them. If they can publish good quality books that quickly, then who am I to complain?
And really this is not a complaint post. I know I sound like that but really it’s more of a question of why authors publish so much and if anyone feels overwhelmed like I do. Perhaps it’s just me that feels that way. It’s nice to hear that other readers also sometimes feel they’re bogged down in too many books but it’s also sad to hear that authors feel a lot of pressure. I figured they have to, it only makes sense but I wonder where it comes from.
As far as reviewers, that also plays into my reading. If I have to review a new release… I’m MUCH more likely not to read the book if I don’t have it for review since I prioritize them. I mean I’m 5 books behind Josh Lanyon’s new release list. I can’t keep up and while I enjoyed previous books… I kind of gave up. Same with other authors. I -want- to read them but I just never feel like I have time.
Since I started editing, my TBR pile is hip deep. It’s getting to the point of, “If I didn’t edit it, I probably didn’t read it.”
I’ve noticed that if I review the newest releases I read them much quicker than if I don’t have to review them so I’m the same way.
(Thanks so much for the link and the mention, Kassa!) You raise some really good points here. As a reveiwer, I was nodding in recognition at practically every sentence (yours and in Jenre’s comment).
I often feel like the slowest reviewer on the face of the planet (especially because I’m also writing and trying to publish fiction), and yet I love reviewing and don’t want to give it up.
I’ve lost track of ebooks on my hard drive, and had deadlines pull me away from really outstanding books that I’ve then completely forgotten to get back to. I’ve had to put a notice on my blog that I no longer review to request just so I could keep my free time free to keep up with my auto-buy authors, and even that’s hard.
I try to keep an eye out for talented new authors because they need all the promotional help they can get, but I’m so pressured to keep up that I’ve grown incredibly picky and intolerant about things like beginnings and realism and pacing.
So I’ll click into excerpts and blurbs online and click back out really fast and move on without buying. Soon, I know I’m just going to be scanning titles and cover art as fast as I can while making buying decisions.
What Jen says is totally true for me, too. I check page count all the time and wince at the higher amounts even though I’d rather read a novel than a short story any day and I used to read huge novels (Stephen King, Robert Jordan) and look forward to them.
At the same time, I don’t even waste my time reading short stories anymore (all the sips and nips and naps and whatever) because I know there’s not going to be much of an escapist payoff there. Maybe this is why the novella is so popular. It strikes a balance between being long enough to be involving, yet short enough to manage as we try to keep up with the relentless flow of new publications.
I’ve noticed on the very few times that I can get it together and review something that’s just been released (rather than something older which is what I usually seem to do), my blog traffic shoots upwards because readers are searching for reviews of the very new things. But something released more than a month ago? Already forgotten by the readers.
My husband jokes about how there’s now a ratio of 100 writers to every 1 reader, and this might actually be coming true!
On somebody’s blog somewhere, the theory came up that we reviewers here in the blogosphere are becoming the gatekeepers in the new world of insta-publish and we correspond to the acquisitions editors in the NYC publishing firms before the internet.
The consumers just don’t have the time to read as much as they used to (as Anne and Jim pointed out). They don’t even have the time to review the field and get informed. So they go to us reviewers whom they’re probably keeping up with on their humongous RSS feed readers. So we’re becoming even more important to the careers of writers that epublish than we may have thought.
Not sure where I’m going with all this … except to say that this is a really fascinating topic!
Hi Val, thanks for the comment! You always have such intelligent and insightful comments.
I also think you make some great points. I agree that the naps/nips/short stories tend to be a waste but at the same time some of these can be really great stories by some superior authors. For example Chrissy Munder is an author I enjoy greatly and one who excels in short story format. And I wouldn’t have discovered her if I avoided short stories…
So it’s definitely a double edged sword. It’s a balancing act of only having so much time to read so how to choose?
This is where the page counts come in. I think readers love the novella length since it’s short enough that you can read it quickly and its long enough to be satisfying. While I love longer books and they tend to be my favorites.. but I do the same thing. I check out page count and think “oh I can read this quickly.. ok I’ll read it” vs. the 500 page literary novel that will take much longer.
I think readers aren’t as interested as backlisted titles – though this is something *I* personally believe in. I try to review classics and backlist titles not just new titles, but I agree…. it seems most like the new and shiny best.
I think it’s flattering to call reviewers the gatekeepers and it fits with the theme “any press is good press” because at least someone is talking about the book. I’m not sure how much people rely on reviews to be honest .. but I do think more buzz about a book does always help.
I am horrible for getting distracted by shiney new stuff and avoiding older books that are really very good. Or quickly reading all the short ones before the longer ones because if I have 10 books to read and 4 are 70 pages and 6 are 200 pages, I can trick myself into thinking I’ve whittled down my pile by reading those 4, nearly 50% down. Granted by page total it’s nothing so it’s a mental trick for me.
I don’t know the answer. I buy what interests me and what I can afford and I hope for the best. I think with e-publishing there is not the control that you get with print where publishers would pace their releases. Even if an author had 3 books ready in March, they would realease one in March, one in June and one in October. Whereas with e-publishing they are released when they come out. If it’s three in March, it’s three in March. Plus you get authors with multiple publishers so you get more overlap. You don’t find that so much in print. I’m not complaining though.
I definitely don’t mean to complain because I do appreciate all the new books and the author’s efforts. No matter how many books, new or old, it gives me something to read.
I’ve also done the same trick as you and one day I only read short stories to knock 10-15 books off my TBR….lol. It was just a trick to pretend that I was getting my list down but i still had a ton of other books so not sure how successful.
I just wish there were less releases but at the same time if the books dried up I’d be desolate lol. Feast or famine.
I do feel very pressured to write more and write faster, though I don’t know where the pressure is coming from. I think it’s just from seeing that all the other authors I know are having a release every two months, and I seem to barely manage one a year.
I took a stubborn decision after finishing “Shining in the Sun” that the next book would be as long as it should be and take me as long as it takes. But now that it’s already 80K and only half way through (and has taken me 6 months) I’m getting anxious and twitchy and thinking I should let the second half rest for a bit while I write a quick novella. Or everyone will have forgotten me by the time I get back.
Yet at the same time I’m another one who can’t keep up with reading some of my favourite authors. I almost think I would read more by some of the very prolific authors if they wrote slowly enough for me to keep pace.
I think that kind of attitude is really prevalent. I’m not sure where it started or how its perpetuated but I think the invisible pressure exists and makes authors feel like they have to be constantly producing, producing, producing.
I never forget about authors – assuming it’s not taking 10 years between books – but one year is completely reasonable and understandable. When authors write a GREAT book, readers always immediate clamor for a sequel but I don’t think that’s pressure so much as a compliment.
While I disagree with the pressure , I definitely know it’s there and tough on authors. I feel for you! For my own opinion, I can say just let it take however long it takes. But I’m just a reader so I wish you luck in whatever you do.
Without Evernote, I’d be lost – every time I see a blurb for a book I want to read, but don’t want to buy at that second, I copy it into Evernote so I’ll remember later that I wanted to read it.
But yeah, there are so many new books coming out that I seem to be mostly reading new stuff and not reading all the ever-so-slightly older books I have on my reader.
What’s Evernote? I should remember to take notes of titles and authors that I want to go find later because I definitely forget about 3 seconds after thinking I’d like to get the book.
I’ve almost given up on my old TBR list and anything that I don’t read immediately just doesn’t get read sadly.
Evernote’s a note-taking application you can install on your various computers and/or smartphones (along with a browser plugin). When you want to save something on a webpage, you highlight it, right-click, and select send it to Evernote. It’s free, up to a certain use level, which I have never even gotten close to reaching. I like to think of it as an extension to my brain.
As a reader of ebooks, I force myself to stop buying and Just Read when the backlog of TBRs already purchased gets to a certain point. I have vowed to not let my ebook backlog ever approach the unwieldy mess that is my print book backlog of the purchased and unread.
Just as in a print bookstore, the temptation is to pick up everything e that appeals. Unlike in a print bookstore, the amount I can carry to the cash register imposes no physical sanity check.
So, the budget (pegged to the money saved by having quit smoking) and the size of the TBR backlog determine how many items to buy and how often.
What to buy. A couple from authors I already know and like. A couple from recommendations at blogs and here and there. A couple from my own random shopping around publishers and online bookstores and author blogs, for the fun of discovery. And then maybe another one or two from proven favorites, depending on the budget and the backlog.
I prefer a full length novel, but the good-sized e-novella or even the e-novelette has proven surprisingly satisfying from the hands of several authors. I do resent it if I think I’m buying a novel and it turns out to be a novella, which is why there are some epublishers I won’t buy direct from anymore. I buy collections of short stories and novellas occasionally, but will only buy a stand alone short story when I am collecting a particular author. The published collections can be a time- and cost-effective way to check out new authors.
Regarding how fast a particular author cranks out new work, it’s got to be up to each author to discover what works for them. I don’t blame authors working too fast for the sometimes haphazard editing and proofreading or the sometimes poor quality material. I see the errors more and more in print volumes in every genre. I largely blame Spellcheck (and its cousins) for the haphazard editing. We become dependent on the computer to tell us whether there are misspellings, and we mistakenly trust that the computer understands context and will catch the important stuff — and trust that the programmer was an expert grammarian. Spellcheck won’t catch the misuse of “unphased” instead of “unfazed.” Or “diffuse” instead of “defuse.” Or the many other misused homonyms and other errors that would pass Spellcheck muster but should not pass human editor or proofreader muster. I run across that type of error in at least 25% of the material I read now. These errors are not confined to ebooks or m/m books; they are Everywhere. It’s the modern, sloppy and inexpensive reliance on Spellcheck rather than literate proofreaders, which is everywhere, not just with little epublishers. Ooops, that became a mini rant.
As for poor quality material that sometimes gets written and published… Well, some authors can be astonishingly prolific and keep their creative edge for years and years. Some authors can write no more than a book every year or two or five, and fall into a dull creative rut. Some authors write one good book and nothing else that’s much good ever. And some authors that seem quite unskilled to me have many enthusiastic fans. How swiftly they write looks like just a small part of the picture.
As a reader, hooray if a favorite author gets ahead of me in publishing, because then there is that happy phenomemon of a backlog that I can go to and enjoy. Authors, your fans will not forget you if you’ve written books that spoke to us, so please write just as swiftly and brilliantly as feels right to you. Despite my usual way of shopping described above, sometimes I just go crazy for a particular author and buy and read that author repeatedly for weeks or months (or years, because I really don’t forget the authors I love), if the voice keeps speaking to me.
Oh some fabulous comments as always Cary.
As for buying – that’s really what I’ve gotten into. I try very hard not to out buy what I can read, although it does happen frequently. I’m working hard to keep my pile as reasonable as possible (if that’s close to impossible) but it just seems my “want to read” is bigger than my “can read” for all the above reasons. Perhaps it’s just a case of my reader eyes wanting more than I can possibly consume. Kris gave the best advice in just relaxing and reading what you can and not worrying.
As for editing and quality. I do see some errors in printed books as well as ebooks. However I see many, many more common errors in ebooks than I see in more traditional printed texts. I see frequent mistakes such as flipped names, left out words, misspelled words (not homonyms) and so on that show even the lack of using spellcheck in some ebooks. I also think the cover art is much better in printed work but both of these are entirely new threads because oy there are arguments and reasons both ways.
Whether an author is prolific or only publishes once a decade, assuming its great work, it doesn’t matter. I routinely buy an entire author’s backlist if I like them. In fact I discovered one prolific fiction author quite late in their career and read 18 books over the course of one year to catch up. I loved it and enjoyed most books. It was great knowing I had all of those to catch up on. Unfortunately now there seems a phantom pressure to keep up with the publishing craze, which is just as mistaken as authors feeling like they have to publish as well.
Thank you for commenting, you always make me think.
“With new books introduced every single day and authors publishing numerous times a month, how does any reader keep up? How do you even –remember- all the new releases, names, titles, publishers?”
Bottom line – I don’t. It used to freak me out that I couldn’t keep up with it all – and I still occasionally feel overwhelmed – but now I’m just trying to enjoy the increase in the genre for what it is and go with the flow.
If I’ve forgotten about a new release I was looking forward to and suddenly come across it, it’s like a welcome surprise. I just enjoy the moment and snap it up. LOL.
What I don’t like is the idea that authors feel the need to ‘crank’ out books. I hope this is not a trend. I think the thing for both authors to remember is that a regular online presence that provides updates about WIPs and new releases can go a long way to satisfying that demand. After all, the Book Goddesses didn’t invent the saying ‘quality over quantity’ for no reason. Readers will appreciate a good product over bad any day.
That’s truly the best advice. Don’t freak out, don’t try to stay on top of the releases. Just keep plodding along and read whatever you remember to read. I enjoy the genre’s growth for both good and bad reasons .. well that the growth comes with both.
I also think that some authors push out a lot of books simply because they can. We can say “quality over quantity” but a vast number of readers are willing to accept pitiful quality so there’s no real reason to agonize over a great story when you can make 3x as much writing some cheap porn that will be a bestseller. Thankfully an equally vast number of authors respect their craft and don’t take the easy way out.
My God, everyone has expressed my thoughts already so eloquently
.
As an author, I also seem to feel this pressure to keep visible. Who’s pushing me? It’s over a year since I released a novel and I’m panicking (got my Carina one out in July and a DSP one in Sep *phew*). Yet I’d made a conscious effort to spend more time browsing contentedly – and slowly – through my WIP in this 2nd half of the year because I felt I’d been chasing quantity not quality. What’s with the conflict? Personally I think it’s a side effect of following the digital world around me, not just particular publishers or authors. I read daily about the new releases, the latest news, the exciting Coming-Soons. It always moves faster than I can write or read – and always will.
As a reader – and as a another commenter said – I have to stop trying to keep up, take stock of what I have on my reader, and take time to enjoy that properly.
(and maybe trying to do that as an author, too)
As a reader of reviews – I think this was Val’s point- I *love* it when a reviewer highlights a book that’s been out for a while! So often it’s one I was interested in at the time but never bought it then lost touch. Or *did* buy it but never got around to reading it! It’s not fair that authors’ work should *only* be noticed at release time, but it’s often the case.
What do people think of the reader sites like Goodreads? They often keep up interest in a book over a longer period, or return to a previous classic. I have some issues about the way it allows anyone and everyone to ‘review’, but it can be good for broadening the attention.
I contributed heavily to the flood last year. Six full length novels and four shorts. But bear in mind, that was three years of work paying off all at once.
This year, it looks like six pieces total, most of them novellas and shorts, the novel a re-issue.
I feel that if I don’t release a novel a year, I’m not keeping my name out there. If I don’t have at least one new print title either for MidSouth or for Dragon*Con, I’m probably trying to sell into a saturated market.
As a reader, I don’t even buy books any more. I am still plowing through my TBR stack, supplemented by the local library. (I get a whole hour and a half to read, once a week, while the kids are at Summer Reading. Glorious!)
I don’t keep up… I’ve got a dozen ebooks on my hard drive.. no, more than a dozen, there’s a batch for Elisa’s awards that have to be read ASAP…
As far as writing’s concerned, the whole Linden Bay-Samhain-Cheyenne switchover threw me off my stride, and the past year has been a matter of getting my backlist back in print. One more to go, a new novella for the Sail Away anthology (not a trilogy anymore, the ‘free reads’ will be in there too, and a short piece from Charlie Cochrane) and I’ll be ready to sit down and figure out what I want to write next.
I don’t know how people keep cranking books out; some people write fast. The speed is not necessarily a reflection on the quality, (sometimes a fast-published series is a backlog of previously unsubmitted stories, like Charlie Cochrane’s Cambridge mysteries), but I’d rather see one or two good books a year than a spate of mediocre ones.
I don’t mind falling behind in a series. Sooner or later I’ll have time to sit down and read. The only problem is that with so many new books by new writers, I’m bound to miss some that I would enjoy. Maybe by the time someone comes up with an inexpensive, universal-format, solar-powered, waterproof e-reader, I’ll be ready to take a vacation and just read…