Good afternoon, Readers!
Image by Ylanite Koppens from Pixabay
In preparation for the most likely outcome of my submission of Soldier, which is to say, silence indicating rejection, I'm struggling a bit with retaining the will to continue submitting and publishing. I have developed a pretty tough skin over the years, but the rejections do wear on me. Couple that with working full time, plus another part time job, plus a monthly video podcast, plus my art stuff, I can feel the burnout starting to take root.
Again.
I feel as if I'm not selling particularly well, and part of that is definitely my fault. I'm not especially good at marketing my work, and so I'm struggling to reach the level of sales I need to reach in order to make this writing lark my full time gig. And I so desperately want to be a full time writer of fiction.
Being so drained, I haven't yet started writing as I promised I would. I feel like I'm in a holding pattern until I pass the indicated deadline from the publisher for my submission and until I get the final edits from my final beta reader for the novel I finished last year.
It's not been conducive to creation, this whole thing called life.
Still, I've not been idle. I've been researching various serial sites where I might publish The Lioness of Shara Mountain. I thought I had settled on a site - Webnovel. Then I read that the contract through them requires first dibs on rights of subsequent related works. The Lioness of Shara Mountain is set in the same world as (albeit a different continent to) The Great Man Series, the first book of which is Soldier... currently on submission. That publishing requirement will not do. So, not Webnovel.
There were a couple of alternatives that my good friend Jen has made me aware of - Vella and Yonder.
Vella is owned and operated by Amazon, and while it does have the structure and monetisation I'm looking for, I really, really, really dislike the way Amazon treats its employees and their authors, so I'm not keen on going with Vella. At all. It's joined Webnovel in my 'Not-Bloody-Likely-Let's-Hope-I-Don't-Get-This-Desperate' list.
Yonder I only just learnt about today, and it looks extremely new. There isn't a lot of information on their site yet about what publishing a serial with them will look like, other than they pay royalties on original content. I've signed up, though, in the hopes that when they're ready, I'll learn more information. For now, they're on my 'Could-Be-Promising' list, though the terms of their contract will dictate whether or not I will seriously consider them.
Currently at the forefront is Wattpad. I used to have a Wattpad account back in the day. I don't know if it's still there. The problem of course, is that it's mad hard to monetise Wattpad stories. They do have an invite-only site where stories can be monetised. But it's invite-only, and so I fear The Lioness will suffer the same problem as all of my other published works - discovery.
Now, I am allowed to ask for payment on Wattpad, which is nice, but also makes my skin crawl. I'm not good at that part. Still, I have both Ko-Fi and PayPal, so I can ask for a tip or a couple of bucks if folks enjoyed the story. And there's always the (very slim) chance that The Lioness gets widely popular there, and is picked up by Wattpad's monetisation site.
For now, though, Wattpad is the surprise leader in my quest to publish The Lioness of Shara Mountain as a serial story.
I'm just sad about the whole discoverability issue, but it's not like I'm not used to it by now.
Listen, the more I think about this latest work, the more I really like it. It's a good story... and perhaps a little too much of my soul for my own good. I really want to give it the best shot possible. So, if any of you know of a serialisation site that might suit, do let me know about it. I'm still researching, and as Beta Reader Three is very busy at present, I have some time.
Thanks so much for your help.
Ciao!
Again.
I feel as if I'm not selling particularly well, and part of that is definitely my fault. I'm not especially good at marketing my work, and so I'm struggling to reach the level of sales I need to reach in order to make this writing lark my full time gig. And I so desperately want to be a full time writer of fiction.
Being so drained, I haven't yet started writing as I promised I would. I feel like I'm in a holding pattern until I pass the indicated deadline from the publisher for my submission and until I get the final edits from my final beta reader for the novel I finished last year.
It's not been conducive to creation, this whole thing called life.
Still, I've not been idle. I've been researching various serial sites where I might publish The Lioness of Shara Mountain. I thought I had settled on a site - Webnovel. Then I read that the contract through them requires first dibs on rights of subsequent related works. The Lioness of Shara Mountain is set in the same world as (albeit a different continent to) The Great Man Series, the first book of which is Soldier... currently on submission. That publishing requirement will not do. So, not Webnovel.
There were a couple of alternatives that my good friend Jen has made me aware of - Vella and Yonder.
Vella is owned and operated by Amazon, and while it does have the structure and monetisation I'm looking for, I really, really, really dislike the way Amazon treats its employees and their authors, so I'm not keen on going with Vella. At all. It's joined Webnovel in my 'Not-Bloody-Likely-Let's-Hope-I-Don't-Get-This-Desperate' list.
Yonder I only just learnt about today, and it looks extremely new. There isn't a lot of information on their site yet about what publishing a serial with them will look like, other than they pay royalties on original content. I've signed up, though, in the hopes that when they're ready, I'll learn more information. For now, they're on my 'Could-Be-Promising' list, though the terms of their contract will dictate whether or not I will seriously consider them.
Currently at the forefront is Wattpad. I used to have a Wattpad account back in the day. I don't know if it's still there. The problem of course, is that it's mad hard to monetise Wattpad stories. They do have an invite-only site where stories can be monetised. But it's invite-only, and so I fear The Lioness will suffer the same problem as all of my other published works - discovery.
Now, I am allowed to ask for payment on Wattpad, which is nice, but also makes my skin crawl. I'm not good at that part. Still, I have both Ko-Fi and PayPal, so I can ask for a tip or a couple of bucks if folks enjoyed the story. And there's always the (very slim) chance that The Lioness gets widely popular there, and is picked up by Wattpad's monetisation site.
For now, though, Wattpad is the surprise leader in my quest to publish The Lioness of Shara Mountain as a serial story.
I'm just sad about the whole discoverability issue, but it's not like I'm not used to it by now.
Listen, the more I think about this latest work, the more I really like it. It's a good story... and perhaps a little too much of my soul for my own good. I really want to give it the best shot possible. So, if any of you know of a serialisation site that might suit, do let me know about it. I'm still researching, and as Beta Reader Three is very busy at present, I have some time.
Thanks so much for your help.
Ciao!
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