8 Things to Learn from Jake Needham about eBooks and Publishing

It's not everyday in Thailand that you get to hear an internationally-acclaimed author talk about his work. The last time I had the opportunity to hear a writer speak was Stephen Leather over a year ago. Author Jake Needham gave a great talk yesterday morning at the Pattaya City Expats Club. I'm not a dues-paying member of this club, just some bum who happens to have a residence in the same province. Thankfully, I was invited to join the audience by the friendly folks at the PCEC. I've been working through Jake's latest thriller: A World of Trouble. People who have spent time in Thailand will recognize some of the familiar personalities and typical foibles of the country, but those who haven't been to the Land of Smiles can also enjoy this great crime novel.

Jake Needham sells around 5,000 eBooks a month and has been writing for years, so when he talks it is wise to listen. One nice thing about being part of the author community is that veteran writers often share tips and tricks of the trade and are extremely helpful to people just starting out. You cannot say this about every community--how many investment bankers are going to give you stock tips without charging an arm and a leg? Anyway, here's 8 good points he brought up on publishing, eBooks, and the future of reading.

1) Print Books are Hard to Discover

Due to the distribution challenges, logistical requirements, and high fixed costs for print books, it can be hard for authors to even get your book in a bookstore in the first place. Joel Friedlander touched on what a pain distributing to bookstores was in a blog post a few weeks back. Once you get your book into a bookstore, it might not even be worthwhile. Unless you're some bigwig author, most bookstores are just going to turn them sideways and stuff them on a shelve in between the Woman's Studies section and the bathroom. Jake mentioned some of his frustrations with this process.

2) Retailers of Print Books are a Commodity Business

One of the "dirty little secrets" of the book business, Jake noted, is that the Barnes & Nobles, Waterstones, and Asiabooks (in Thailand's case) of the world just want to stock shelves with books and move them out the door. They're not really interested in selling specific books or figuring out what customers really want. In a lot of ways it's like going to Walmart or Tesco and buying sugar. Jake asked the audience do you really care what brand of sugar you buy? No, not really. You just want to know that the sugar (or books) are there, because the customer is probably going to buy some no matter what the brand name is. Of course you and I know that a business model involving mass sales without customer feedback or a solid marketing strategy is not well-suited to the information age...just ask Borders.

3) The Publisher's Main Reason for Existence was Product Placement, but That No Longer Applies with eBooks

Once upon a time, the big added value that publishers offered was the infrastructure and capacity to get your book in a bookstore. If you were a top-tier author, they might even do a little promotion for you (ads in magazines, swag, etc.) However, with the rise of eBooks the playing field is becoming much more level. The Amazon algorithm is about as mysterious as the Bermuda Triangle, but one thing for certain is that it doesn't really discriminate whether you are self-published or Big 6-published. Jake said that this reality truly benefits the author and the reader.

4) With eBooks, Readers are the Gatekeepers, Not Publishers

Jake said he was pleased that readers are the ones who decide whether a book will be a success or not. Under the publishing process for the last several hundred years or so, authors had to write to impress the publisher, but not the reader. By allowing a direct connection between author and reader through eBooks, an author can better understand their audience. This of course also has the benefit of improving your writing and sales. If you're the kind of author who enjoys writing so they can hobknob with the blue-hairs on the wine and cheese circuit of Manhattan, this new paradigm of writing for the masses might be a bad thing. However, if you're like the rest of us trying to make a living, this is great.

5) The Accessibility of eBooks Can't Be Beat

Speaking as a reader, Jake noted that he really enjoyed the accessibility of eBooks. As a person who actually has the money to travel (he must not be married to a Thai woman), Jake enjoys carrying around an iPad rather than a suitcase full of books. He even mentioned that he would read on his iPhone in a pinch. Jake prefers the back-lit eReading off tablets (same as me), but other folks in the audience mentioned the e-ink displays were easier on the eyes (same as Jeff Bezos). One gentleman during the Q&A even stated that he needs to read on a MacBook plugged into a 32" monitor due to trouble with his eyesight. Whatever format the reader prefers, the reflowable nature of eBooks allows a good reading experience for people of all different preferences.

6) As an Author, Don't Be Afraid to Outsource

Giving some hope to our new startup, BB eBooks, Jake noted that he outsources his cover design and interior design/eBook formatting. He said that the EPUB and MOBI/KF8 formats were the major standards, but he didn't really know how they were put together. That sounds about right, because you sort of have to be a big nerd with skin problems and some time on your hands to figure out the technical requirements of eBooks. He paid a company to turn his word document into the eBook format, which is the crux of our own business model. He also talked about the need to invest in a cover designer and editor. All in all, he said you could get your book published for about $500. This is in the same ballpark as we advise our clients; however, it really depends on what you want to do and not do.

7) Marketing is Somewhat Mysterious, but Get to Know Your Readers

Like every other author, small press, and big publishing houses, the bulletproof way to market your eBook is a bit of mystery. Jake knows this and every author who isn't full of himself knows this. eBooks and social media are just so new and dynamic that it's difficult to say. However, Jake did provide some tidbits on marketing. He says that word of mouth works best for him and he is constantly connecting with his readers, which lets people know he is a good guy. No one wants to buy a book from a jackass. Lindsay Buroker has some great tips on how not to be a schmuck when you market your eBook.

8) eBook Piracy is not a Big Concern

Perusin' the Thai Rath

During the Q&A, I asked Jake about his approach to the problem of eBook piracy. He said because his eBooks are priced reasonably and fairly (about $4.99), he isn't really worried about it. This is extremely good news for a high-profile author to be saying this, since Digital Rights Management (DRM) is holding back the entire eBook industry. Jake said he had never heard about one of his eBooks being pirated. I checked some of the torrent sites that are known to have pirated eBooks (no, I won't share the links), and lo and behold none of Jake's books were there. Hopefully, Jake will take this message to other authors who equate eBook piracy with the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse.

A big thank-you is in order to Jake Needham for making time to give a talk on a Sunday morning (over a three-day weekend in Thailand no less). Show some love by picking up a copy of A World of Trouble.

8 Things to Learn from Jake Needham about eBooks and Publishing

Interview with Stephen Knight - Author of The Gathering Dead series

Born in south Texas but raised in various cities across the United States, Stephen Knight has been writing commercial fiction for years. He is the son of a famous radio personality and a former local television producer. Trying his luck at self-publishing, he put The Gathering Dead on Amazon earlier this year. It is a novel about a Special Forces Team warding off the zombie apocalypse in New York City, and it has been a tremendous success, currently at #1,933 in Kindle. The follow-up novella, Left with the Dead, was just released, and it is a continuation piece that focuses on First Sergeant Gartrell's struggle to escape NYC. It is also highly ranked at #2,442 in Kindle. In other words, Knight is kicking ass in the brave new world of self-publishing, so it is a real treat for me to be able to interview him, because I hope some of his success rubs off on me (and you too)!

Thank you, Stephen Knight, for joining us:

1) There are many zombie novels floating around out there. Some are great and some are really lousy. What has been your secret to make your books stand out so well in a crowded market?

I wish I knew? To be honest, I’ve not read a great deal of zombie fiction—only the rather excellent World War Z and the more pedestrian but still notable The Rising. So I really didn’t have a lot of background research in the sub-genre. But, I’ve always been able to craft some fairly credible action sequences, and I leveraged that quite a bit with The Gathering Dead. I also concentrated on Army Special Forces tactics, techniques, and procedures, things most folks aren’t normally exposed to. I was never man enough to be a Green Beret, but I know guys who are, and I was able to harvest their experiences to ensure I was presenting at least a passing nod to reality. I think that might be the big selling point there—I take a group of extremely highly-trained individuals, and put them in a set of circumstances that are so overwhelming that even their backs are pressed against the wall despite their skills and experience. The rest of the zombie fiction out there seems to deal with John Q. Public who finds a gun and hits the road trying to flee the dead. McDaniels and his crew kind of break away from the usual circumstances.

But this is all guesswork on my part. I can say it’s true that the zombie sub-genre is red-hot; I have another offering called City of the Damned which is about black ops against vampires in Los Angeles, and that one doesn’t sell half as much as The Gathering Dead. So there’s definitely an appetite for zombie fiction, especially if it’s of the apocalyptic variety.

2) I read at 1001 Secrets of Successful Writers that you try for 2,500 - 3,000 words a day by maintaining a self-disciplined approach. That's pretty difficult, what with the kids, the day job, the collections agency guy banging down our door. Do you have any writing tips for aspiring authors looking to achieve that kind of productivity? Do you develop extensive outlines or do you just start from scratch? Do you wait until you finish the work before going back to edit, or do you look over your work-in-progress daily to patch things up?

Word count is essential. If you don’t write, if you don’t fall into the practice of writing, if you don’t develop a robust work ethic when it comes to writing, then failure is just waiting to be your best friend. You can’t sell a book unless you finish it, and taking a year or two or ten to finish a novel is just too long. In my world, writing is a business, not a pleasure, so I decided to just get on with it and get it done. I was able to finish the first draft of The Gathering Dead in two months, and Left With The Dead in three weeks. That’s about 126,000 words in three months, and I didn’t find it to be a killer pace, even with the usual stuff going on that happens in life. I did sacrifice a lot of television and nights out with the guys, though.

My gig for writing a story is to find some good music to pace myself with. Movie soundtracks are the best, and I find the works of Jerry Goldsmith give me the most creative fuel. (Even though I’m not using to for inspiration at the moment, I can’t get strands of his score for Chinatown out of my head at the moment.) I just pop in the ear buds and start pounding out the text. I used to outline extensively, but I don’t do that anymore; it’s odd in that as disciplined as I try to be, I’ve essentially tossed out the whole project planning phase. Instead, I decide what the turning points of the story will be and write toward those, exploring things along the way. I never used to write like that, but now it’s what works for me. And I try to keep moving forward, though at times I will have to go back and reread some of the text to catch the vibe again. But editing the product while it’s in progress? Not for me, though editing is a definite weakness on my side. I can churn out the prose, but I’m not so great at ferreting out all the busted text. So I have to hire that out, and that can cost thousands of dollars. I’m in the financial echelon where I can do that, but most writers aren’t, so developing a critical eye and becoming more than just a passing acquaintance with proper grammar and mechanics are essential.

And as you know, even my efforts—as costly as they have been—have not been 100% effective. So now I have to slam on the brakes and really, really look over a book before I publish it, even after it’s come back from an editor. I find this maddening, boring, and tedious, but it’s got to be done. At the end of the day, I’m the only one on the blame line if people can’t get through my product because it’s not as close to perfect as it can be.

3) Why did you choose New York City as the setting for The Gathering Dead and Left with the Dead? A lot of zombie novels go all over the place, but these two stories are entirely set in Manhattan. Did something about the Big Apple inspire you?

I live in suburban Connecticut now and work in Manhattan, so it wasn’t a great stretch for me. I’d already written about vampires staking a claim to Los Angeles, so I wasn’t inclined to drop zombies there, and everyone knows New York. So as a backdrop it was an easy reach. If I needed to verify something, I could just take the subway to a location, snap some pictures, and voila! My research is done. The next book in the series is much more epic in scale and takes place in several different locations in the U.S., with some cutaways in Europe and Asia. But tactically, one reason for choosing the Big Apple is that it’s a very contained, vertical environment; there’s not a lot of real estate to use, and the residents are literally living right on top of each other. So for a zombie epidemic, where the virus that animates the dead is transmitted by a bite or gouge, a restricted environment makes it easier for that epidemic to spiral out of control. Los Angeles is hundreds of square miles in size; Manhattan isn’t even 25 square miles. In my mind, that makes for one hell of a breeding ground for this kind of plague.

4) Let's talk shop. When I picked up the Gathering Dead on Amazon's Kindle, it was $0.99, but I see that you now are charging the magical $2.99 price to get the 70% royalty from Amazon. Which price point has been more profitable for you?  I think the self-publishing community is way ahead of the curve on ebook sales, as some of the big publishing houses are charging over $10 for a bunch of 1s and 0s and wondering why piracy is so rampant. Do you have any thoughts you would like to share on the eternal pricing strategy debate?


99¢ is a fantastic intro price. At that price point, The Gathering Dead made it to #343 overall, and #5 on the Amazon Horror List. I sold thousands of copies a month; it seems that most folks are lucky to sell 50 copies of product in a month, so I busted that barrier right out of the starting gate (though I do know of folks who have one novel up that sells more than 10,000 units per month—ah, to be that fortunate). But even before I switched from 99¢ to $2.99, my rankings were starting to erode; suddenly, books that had been languishing in the middle of the lists skyrocketed, and products like mine began withdrawing from the top spots. I think the highest position I had on the Horror List after the price change was #11; now, somewhere in the 20s or 30s is more normal, with dips into the 50s. But I’m only moving a thousand or so fewer units per month, so financially, it’s been fantastically rewarding. If I can get really, really lucky and launch a few more books that perform the same way, then hey, this writing thing might actually work out!

As far as pricing strategies go, I think it ultimately depends upon the product and what the audience will bear. Stephen King can command a $9.99+ price and sell thousands of units per month; Stephen Knight can’t, and I’ve never had any doubt that would be the case. So $2.99 is the best place for me to be right now, but as I say that, my next release will be $3.99. It’s a very large international thriller that I cowrote with another author, and I think it has the chance to appeal to a wider audience. As of this moment, I don’t plan on releasing it at 99¢, it’ll go straight to $3.99. 130,000 words is a lot, and that’s where the book (White Tiger) stands right now. So that price seems adequate, and it’s still more than five dollars less than what a so-called “traditionally published” ebook would cost.

Of course, if it tanks, I’m not frightened to play with pricing. That’s the good thing about this, I don’t have a remarkable amount of overhead to pay off, so I can undercut the competition on price.

A quick aside about piracy: I found The Gathering Dead on dozens of download sites, even when it was at the 99¢ price point. Obviously that’s money out of my pocket, and it’s frustrating to discover a book is being pirated. I used to patrol the internet looking for them and getting those sites to pull the links to the product, but every time I got one shut down, two more would pop up. And some of those who prefer to obtain their goods in an illegal fashion got back at me through some severely negative reviews, which sucked. There are always folks out there looking for a free lunch, and if you go up against them, they’ll boot you in the crotch, figuratively speaking. So while piracy is absolutely wrong, fighting it is probably not in the best interest of a single author. Ignore it as much as you can and move on to the next project.

5) Your next novel in the Gathering Dead series promises to focus on events both in the United States and world-wide as the zombie horde continues its rampage. Can you give us a taste?

Well, McDaniels returns, as do Gartrell and Regina Safire. Earl and Zoe head off in a separate direction once the Escanaba makes port in Boston, but I don’t forget about them. McDaniels and Gartrell don’t bury the hatchet, but they manage to work together again on their next assignment as the country goes to Hell. The U.S. military takes off the gloves on the dead, but by the time it gets its act together, there are millions of stenches in the nation, so it becomes a very difficult war to fight. And the occurrence of zeds retaining some “intelligence” continues, and those corpses that have the ability to hunt in something more than just a shambling mass become much more important to the story. And I decided to parachute some characters from City of the Damned into the fray, which was suggested to me by the current doyen of self-publishing, some little-known hack named Konrath. The working title for the book is The Rising Horde, and it looks like it’s going to spec out at about 130,000 words. I think I’ll be able to release it in the October/November 2011 timeframe.

Hopefully, it will be a worthy sequel, and will enjoy the same success as the first book and the novella. If not? Well, I’ve got more stories to tell, so I’ll just dry my tears and move on.

We thank Stephen for his time and sharing with us this valuable insight. Don't forget to visit his website to learn more about him:

http://knightslanding.wordpress.com

Interview with Stephen Knight - Author of The Gathering Dead series

Christopher Moore in Bangkok Post

Christopher Moore has a good interview in the Bangkok Post today. In a world of grandstanding politicians and buffoonish reality TV stars, it's quite refreshing to see someone so humble. This excerpt is hilarious:

I think anyone who writes a book has a little bit of a romantic, idealistic side to them, because frankly it's not a way to live a life or make money. There has to be some kind of idealisation that drives you to do something that would make most people would feel sorry for you.

Moore also discusses how even though it's much easier to write and distribute a novel nowadays, it's actually harder to be a writer due to the difficulty of starting out. This echoes Stephen Leather's thoughts on the subject. The logic being that since it's so easy for any rube to write a manuscript, it can be difficult to get noticed in the crowd. Guess I'll just have to try harder!

Christopher Moore in Bangkok Post

Dealing With Rejection as a New Writer

Everyone knows the axiom that it's better to try and fail than to not try at all. However, Nathan Bransford recently had a post about how to deal with rejection letters. Granted, I've never submitted a novel to an agent or publisher, but I was really surprised at the comments from other writers. They said when they got rejected they would do everything from gorge themselves on ice cream to getting in a drunken stupor. It's like their cat got AIDS or something.

Perhaps it's because I was a junior officer in the US submarine force that I'm accustomed to having heaps of scorn and ridicule given to me, but sometimes you have to roll with the punches. This first month in this new found activity, I've been trying to shop around some short stories and flash fiction pieces. I have received two acceptance emails (here and here) and three rejections. One of the editors was even kind enough to tell me why he thought my story was lousy. This is actually tremendously beneficial for me, because it's more helpful to get negative feedback than no feedback at all.

It might be my day job as a personal assistant creeping into my life, but I'm a total ass-kisser when I get these letters (yeah, yeah, there's not a lot of men in my profession). Here's how I have responded:

Dear xxx,

Thank you kindly for your consideration, and I look forward to seeing the future works of fiction you publish on [xxx].

Sincerely,

Paul Salvette
http://paulsalvette.com  <---Never hurts to include the URL in your sig!

In my mind, it's the only way to be professional. I'm new at writing, but I know that being a likable and decent person always pays off in long run.

Dean Wesley Smith has a helpful and detailed post for new writers, and he advises to never stop learning and to keep at it. Besides, the worst that could happen is I end up getting zinged in Slushpile Hell.

Dealing With Rejection as a New Writer

5 Things I Learned from Stephen Leather

Two Great Authors in Thailand: Stephen Leather talking and the Back of Christopher Moore's Head

Today, I managed to cajole the bosswoman into going to Wordplay which was being billed as "Bangkok's First Literary Festival" at the Neilson Hays Library on Surawong road in Bagnkok. The misses had to drop off a hefty stack of 100 and 20 baht bills from our shops at the local Kasikorn bank, so I narrowly missed Christopher Moore's talk, but I bet it was good. At 2:15pm, I had the choice of listening to author Stephen Leather talking about eBooks or to David Thompson, a chef who caused some serious controversy last year when he made a comment about the decline of Thai food. Seeing how my sophisticated culinary skills consist of eating whatever is put in front of me, I opted for Stephen Leather's talk.

The acoustics in the room were pretty lousy, but the talk was very interesting. Stephen Leather has been writing and published for quite some time, and he had some big, recent successes selling eBooks on Amazon. Here's 5 bits of wisdom I was able to pick up from him:

1. Getting Published 25 Years Ago Was Terrible - Maybe things were easy when the Gutenberg Press first came around, but getting something published back in the 1980s sounded like a huge pain in the ass. Stephen Leather said that you had to spend days slaving over some crappy word processing system, and the big publishing houses expected the manuscript to be perfect and on gleaming white paper. These manuscripts would be submitted to a publisher and typically sit in a slush pile at the publishing house until some poor unpaid intern brought it to the attention of an editor. He noted that after the proliferation of computers and word processing software, more people were able to write books which brings us to #2.
2. Getting Published Today is Terrible - Now that technology has made it easier to go about the task of actually writing something, obviously more people are doing it. Most of the publishing houses, not keeping in step with technology, have stopped accepting unsolicited manuscripts and only get them from agents. However, Stephen Leather did not have very nice things to say about agents in general at this talk or at his guest post at Joe Konrath's last week when he called American literary agents "horrible, self-centered, arrogant shits". Therefore, getting through the gatekeeper system towards being published is a challenge.
3. eBooks are Great, but You Need to Write Well - Stephen Leather devoted a lot of his talk to discussing how eBooks are marketed and sold to consumers, and also how he had some success with self-publishing his own work. He said that with this new technology in place, it was a great time to break down the barriers between readers and writers, but he wasn't trying to preach some gospel from "The Secret" or anything. He said that since anyone could publish, it is important that you write well to distinguish yourself. During the Q&A, I asked him how to not "Write Shit" as he advised in his blog post recently. He said that there was no secret really, but you had to be clever, have a good plot, good character development, and work hard to put a novel together. He mentioned that his novels take 6-8 months to complete. He also recommended all of Joe Konrath's blog if you are getting started or his book:The Newbie's Guide to Publishing (Everything A Writer Needs To Know).
4. Time Spent Marketing eBooks - Stephen Leather said when he was writing for the publisher, it was about 95% writing and 5% self-promoting.  With his eBooks, he said it was about 50% writing and 50% self-promoting. This makes sense, as 25 years ago there were no blogs, facebook, twitter, Kindle boards, and other signs of the modern age. However, I personally think these forms of outreach will be better in the long run, as it allows you to get direct feedback and kiss ass to the customers actually buying the product rather than some dickhead critic.
5. My 6-Year Old Stepson Will be Well-Behaved if Given an iPad - Unlike everyone else, I made the faux pas of bringing in my kid to this talk. The nice lady running the event told me about the children's workshop at the fair, which I assume was code for get your kid the hell out of here. Luckily, I had my iPad with me and I let him play Grand Theft Auto. I'm probably not winning stepfather-of-the-year award, but there was hardly a peep from him during Mr. Leather's talk except his fingers sliding across the screen. A good tip for other dads I learned at the talk!

Many thanks to Stephen Leather for giving this talk on an extremely hot day in Bangkok. The streets were practically vacant in the city today because it was so damn toasty, and it was nice to get inside some A/C and hear words from someone who has been in the business a while. I think I'll send him a thank-you email, because everyone likes those.

If you're interested, be sure to check out Bangkok Noir, which has Stephen Leather and lot of other interesting writers who focus on Thailand.

5 Things I Learned from Stephen Leather