I read a ton about writing. I take in quite a bit when it comes to the best and most viable options for turning my fledgling series into a full blown powerhouse. But not every option is right for me and it shouldn’t be for you either.
Author goals range from a desire to craft a novel from start to finish all the way to becoming the next JK Rowling. Yours should be just that – YOURS.
Writing for Bucks
Yeah, I’m leading with this one. Some people still believe this is possible, to launch a single book and watch the money train back into their driveway. Done and done.
Not likely.
Beginning the process this way dooms you from Chapter One. I know there are many people out there telling you differently. I’ve read their blogs, listened to their podcasts.
These are the guys that discuss niche writing. Finding a small but heavily searched topic PRIOR to developing a story in order to tune into a specific audience FIRST. If you can locate a topic that sings to you and you have a story in mind, I’d be all about this method of writing.
But what about those people out there churning out product in areas they care nothing about? It shows in the writing. It does. Doing this turns the act of writing from a creative endeavor to a business plan. Full blown.
Having a business plan is a great thing but when it becomes the central tenet of your process you may as well build the cubicle walls in your house and start looking around for who stole your red stapler.
True Author Goals
By true, I mean those that are in tune with who you are as a person. Rather than looking outward – money, popularity, fame – my feeling is author goals should – and work best when they do – come from within.
I love reading about authors finding their story and what inspired them. I never want to read about someone who found a profitable market and planted a flag as their “origin story.” LAME.
Be it romance or post-apocalyptic, the author’s connection to the subject pours through the writing. It can’t be helped. But those that work from the dollar sign back to the creative aren’t committed to the reader. They’re committed to the end result, that monthly check from Amazon.
My Author Goals
I’d love to be a bestseller, I’d love to have rabid fans who NEED the next installment of Greystone today not tomorrow.
But I start with a simple author goal and one that guides me in my process.
What story do I want to tell? What story do I want to read?
When it came to Greystone, it was my love of myth combined with the detective elements that brought me to the keyboard. A novel I wrote in 2014 – that needs a massive amount of editing – dealt with henchmen teaming up to start a consulting business. It was the humor of the main character – and the challenge of a first person narrative – that kept me working on the piece month after month.
A series I am currently developing and revising for next year centers around my love of The X-Files (a series frequently mentioned on this blog). Another comes from a simple question I asked myself about the legal thriller genre and how I would approach one having ZERO knowledge of courtroom policy and procedure. But learning was part of the challenge and my unique spin on it part of the fun and that’s how the series was born.
All from my curiosity. Not looking at searches on Amazon or trolling the bestseller list.
But what about the $$$?
Yes, there is a need for profit, a sense of accomplishment when you can sell a gajillion copies of the latest diet crave book or yet another self-help book or the next “Writer’s Guide to the Question Mark” book. I’m sure one or two of the authors behind them are absolutely IN LOVE with the question mark or how to fit quinoa in every fudging meal for the rest of your life. (NEVER!)
I doubt every author on the subject is though. I bet a dozen or two have a great sci-fi military novel lodged in their brain but are afraid of the middling sales compared to a less crowded, more profitable niche.
Being afraid, worrying about selling the book before it’s hatched mentality is an epic fail and one that should never trip you up. Tell YOUR story, the one that keeps you up at night. The one that forces you into the freezing basement in the middle of winter wearing a hat and gloves to churn out pages.
That’s where the fun is in writing and the fun behind it makes the best author goal.
Thanks for reading.
