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Lessons learned: writing really long fiction

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Re: Lessons learned: writing really long fiction

#51

Post by BerislavLopac »

jonathanstrange wrote: post #3

I'm writing German science fiction novels as a hobby that are around 700-800 norm pages each and learned the hard way that at least in the German publishing market there are virtually no program places for science fiction, very few agencies accept manuscripts in that genre at all, and publishers rarely accept novels larger than 400 norm pages from a first-time writer. I'm currently sitting on 8 manuscripts - two of t…

> learned the hard way that at least in the German publishing market there are virtually no program places for science fiction, very few agencies accept manuscripts in that genre at all, and publishers rarely accept novels larger than 400 norm pages from a first-time writer

Hah, this brings memories. Coming from an even smaller language market (Croatian), I've decided to learn HTML as a way to publish my writings to a wider audience. Skip 25 years and now I'm working as a senior/lead developer, without publishing anything significant in my life... :D

Re: Lessons learned: writing really long fiction

#52

Post by NeedMoreTea »

dalbasal wrote: post #43

I'm slightly surprised that non-sequential series (eg Pratchett's discworld) are not more common. The 3rd book in a sequential series can't become the most read one, but it can in a nonsequential one. It also lessens pressure to make all the books thematically build up to a single literary work with a climactic payoff to all earlier plots. When things do add up, and chekhov's proverbial gun finally goes off in a nons…

Same, as one badly constructed book (or season of a TV series) can ruin the whole lot if they're all sequential.

It's become so much of a trope that it's become a pet hate. I actively avoid buying any that is "first of..." now, no matter how famous you are. The few times I break this rule, I generally regret it. Most trilogies are just a book, heavily padded. So I simply won't buy unless all are written, and well reviewed. Then, do I buy all or none.

There are just a tiny few that deserve it. Archer's Clifton Chronicles, Follett's Century Trilogy, Stross' own Merchant Princes (1-6 anyway, skip the new ones) were all marvellous and fully deserved a series. Yet most are unworthy. Song of Ice and Fire - great idea, so much padding and so little direction. Good book, awful series. I forget where I gave up. Cornwell's The Saxon Stories was mostly great, but I preferred the battle by battle progression of Sharpe without having to achieve perfect continuity or care much what order I read them.

Much prefer the random peeks into a universe approach of Sharpe, Discworld, or Follett with the Kingsbridge series where there's hundreds of years between the books. Or Adam's HHGTTG leaping all over the galaxy with continuity that can leave Marvin in a car park for a millennium. Even Charles Stross reads far better if simply ignoring Laundry Files as series. Lots of unconnected episodes and forget the underlying destination or continuity. It's the only way I can carry on when there's been two books that really didn't work. Well, more one book and one ending that failed hard.

Atrocity Archives and the other Bob books were some of the most entertaining, delightfully observed comedy fiction I've read. Nightmare Stacks didn't really join up, but was a rollicking good tale, and some interesting new characters.

Labyrinth Index on the other hand, was disjointed and unfinishable (The only book from Charles, one of my favourite authors, I can't finish). It should have been a book of Alex, Bob or Cassie. Anyone but Mhari, who might have worked here if given a red shirt to die spectacularly in chapter 2. She's not even anything like the Mhari as created in previous books.

The only way I can react to that is simply ignore as series, tuning out continuity, or stop buying.

Re: Lessons learned: writing really long fiction

#53

Post by arethuza »

dghf wrote: post #32
ilamont wrote: post #15

I really enjoyed reading this. I like Stross' nonfiction work and wasn't aware that he wrote sci-fi, which I will now have to check out. A couple things to add, as a writer and publisher: * There are all kinds of tools to help writers get going. I have twice used NaNoWriMo ( https://www.nanowrimo.org ) to force myself to get fiction and nonfiction ideas from outline to rough draft. I also found the writing program Sc…

> I like Stross' nonfiction work and wasn't aware that he wrote sci-fi I'm the reverse: I only know his sci-fi, and wasn't aware he wrote nonfiction. What would you recommend?

According to the bibliography on wikipedia the only non-fiction I can see is "The Web Architect's Handbook" - from 1996

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Stross_bibliography#No...

Re: Lessons learned: writing really long fiction

#54

Post by sethammons »

gpderetta wrote: post #50
sethammons wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hyperion, probably my favorite sci-fi, was deemed too long as a single book, so it was pretty much cut in half and sold as two books.

Do you have a source? It seems very hard to believe as thee first and second book are very, very different (I find the first book excellent, but the second only sufficient).

Might have been an interview at the end of the audio book.

Re: Lessons learned: writing really long fiction

#55

Post by Qwertystop »

shubb wrote: post #39
jonathanstrange wrote: post #3

I'm writing German science fiction novels as a hobby that are around 700-800 norm pages each and learned the hard way that at least in the German publishing market there are virtually no program places for science fiction, very few agencies accept manuscripts in that genre at all, and publishers rarely accept novels larger than 400 norm pages from a first-time writer. I'm currently sitting on 8 manuscripts - two of t…

'Webnovels' seem to be a growing thing. Bigger in asia than they are here, these are very long stories published in serial on novel publishing platforms like webnovel.com (english language). Sometimes the publishing platforms lock new chapters to paid users only and share out the proceeds spotify style. Sometimes authors use patreon with early access to chapters as a reward. Maybe look into something like this and, i…

There's also a decent number of webnovels (sometimes perhaps too long to be a novel, may or may not be split into distinct books) without a unifying platform, just individual per-book sites - four that come to mind from different authors are Edally Academy, Practical Guide to Evil, Worm, and UNSONG (all different flavors of fantasy/sci-fi). At least the first and third of those are by authors who have also done other things with their own distinct sites. The sites often have links for works by other authors, as well. It might be a bit harder to break in that way than through a platform, but it's still much easier than print publishing.

Re: Lessons learned: writing really long fiction

#56

Post by dhimes »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #34
restalis wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's a market strategy: write off-shots of your long novels as teasers. Make them tasty (as their primary reason is to give the readers a taste for the main piece), make them as close in style as possible to the main work, although you may focus on different aspects in each of them, and lastly - make them convergent (towards something that "happens" to be missing). Let's say shorter stories around some independent…

I'm not a writer, but I don't get why first-time writers - as in, first time they're trying to get their works published, not that they've only now tried to write a book - try to do too much as their first project. I think they should really force themselves to start with short stories first; focus on finishing a story. That avoids a sunk cost, avoids people beating themselves up for what they believe is their life's…

This is what my wife did. She is a physician, not an MFA graduate, so she workshopped and wrote short stories for years, and even continued to do so while she worked on her first novel. By the time she published her novel, she was quite good, and even won last year's (2017) "first novel prize[0]" for "Mikhail and Margarita" (a fictional account of the writing of Bulgokov's "Master and Margarita").

[0]http://centerforfiction.org/awards/the-first-novel-prize/

Re: Lessons learned: writing really long fiction

#57

Post by mindcrime »

jerf wrote: post #46
mindcrime wrote: post #40

I'm actually starting to kinda dislike long series in sci-fi and fantasy, because the time commitment to finish them is just so high. I still have one more book to read in the Wheel of Time series, and after that I'm really reluctant to start another long fantasy series anytime soon. But it seems like every fantasy novel I pick up off the shelf says "Book x of the $FOO series..." Uuuggh. I'd like to plead with fantas…

I don't think it's the authors doing it. It's the publishers. cstross alludes to that in his post as well. It occurs to me that a modern publishing deal for a new author isn't entirely unlike the VC deals we talk about here on HN. Yeah, the publishers might sign you for 2 books in a trilogy, but you just promised to be a unicorn in the process. The startup world is probably more friendly to serial entrepreneurs than…

It's the publishers.

That's a fair point, and I should have phrased it that way in my post. Too late to edit now, but I agree, it's not all on the authors.

Re: Lessons learned: writing really long fiction

#59

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #34
restalis wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's a market strategy: write off-shots of your long novels as teasers. Make them tasty (as their primary reason is to give the readers a taste for the main piece), make them as close in style as possible to the main work, although you may focus on different aspects in each of them, and lastly - make them convergent (towards something that "happens" to be missing). Let's say shorter stories around some independent…

I'm not a writer, but I don't get why first-time writers - as in, first time they're trying to get their works published, not that they've only now tried to write a book - try to do too much as their first project. I think they should really force themselves to start with short stories first; focus on finishing a story. That avoids a sunk cost, avoids people beating themselves up for what they believe is their life's…

Because writers are told publishers want 100k word novels, and they won't touch 25k novellas, and the short story market is very hard to get into, and writing a good short story requires an extra level of talent and discipline beyond writing a novel, and so why not make it a trilogy anyway, because publishers love those? (In reality they don't, but they'll fall over themselves for a good trilogy if a writer is one-in-a-million good.)

Writers are also told it takes two or three failed novels to write a good one.

And on top of that, there are plenty of writers whose primary motivation is vanity. They care more about seeing their name on the spine of a book - as if that proves they're Someone Important. They also think the more words there are, the better they're doing, and don't understand the value of understatement or editing.

Writers who view it as a business - willing to learn the required skillset, realistic about their potential, and with a product plan, a marketing and customer engagement plan, and a realistic assessment of sales outlets and likely income - are not common.

Re: Lessons learned: writing really long fiction

#60

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

montenegrohugo wrote: post #30
sethammons wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It might be of little effect, but I specifically target series. A set of nine will beat out a pair for me. I'm hooked on Brandon Sanderson partly due to the interlinking between his different series.

Exactly. Especially in SF and Fantasy, series present a much more attractive target. You know the author has put in some love & effort into the books, and you know that the effort YOU put into learning the world and your emotional investment into the characters won't be wasted. You might of course still drop it after the 2nd or 3rd (or even during the 1st) book due to various reasons (you didn't like it, found someth…

Paper book retail has complicated shelving and buying rules which make it a winner's game.

A tiny percentage of the most popular writers gets reprints, new editions, and shelf space. For new writers, the process is more like a sales audition.

And it's a very short audition. If a new title doesn't show serious sales momentum within a few weeks, most copies will be returned, and the odds of a follow-up title from that author go down rapidly.

Virtually all of the n-ologies you see in the bigger stores are already best sellers, and the publishers and the store buyers have both said "Give us more of the same" because previous sales were strong enough.

Some markets - like romance, and sometimes fantasy - have more complicated rules. Store buyers typically buy a consignment from a publisher, and authors can sometimes find themselves sneaking into a consignment without being anyone's first choice.

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