Saturday, August 2, 2014

Romance Anyone?

Why is that we only hear about the million dollar success stories and not about the tens of thousands who fail to make a million bucks by self-publishing? 

5 comments:

Thomas Pluck said...

How do you fail?

sandra seamans said...

By only selling a dozen copies of your story?

Maybe failure is the wrong word. But most writers barely make a living and all we're ever shown is the writers who are making millions. A fair balance in any article would show the down side and not just the big money side.

This was one of my pet peeves with Writer's Digest. They only published articles about writers like Stephen King or first time writers that got $100,000 advances and three book deals.

There has never been a clear picture of the realities that writers actually face when trying to make a living by putting words on a page.

sandra seamans said...

For those who are stopping by now, I've edited that sentence to explain what type of failure I was talking about. We writers aren't always as clear as we think we are :)

Thomas Pluck said...

I very much agree, small deals are kept secret so there can be no bargaining.
When I saw that Hugo nominated books were selling 5-8 copies a week via Bookscan that opened my eyes.
You need to define success for yourself.

sandra seamans said...

Yes, each person has their own idea of success and in this business if success is the million dollar mark you're apt to be a failure.