My IRWA buddies are all excited about the national conference next week, but I'm having a hard time motivating myself to even make a list of what to take with me. I'll be meeting with my agent and doing two booksignings and the Sourcebooks dinner. Other than that, my schedule is wide open, and I'm sure nobody gives a damn what I wear. My agent told me that my editor promised to have Cat Star #10 read before nationals. I haven't heard a peep from her yet, and the way things are going, I'll probably get an "I really hate this book" email right before I get on the plane to Atlanta.
Speaking of Cat Star #10, Budley just brought in the mail. I received a package of bookmarks from Sourcebooks to take with me to Atlanta. According to the bookmark, my next book, Rebel, is to be released in July 2014. This is how I find out the title and release date of my next book. On a freakin' bookmark.
Re the Rebel title new: lazy & disrespectful not to tell you. Too strong wording? Whatever, I'm sure you will market yourself better than anyone else will.
ReplyDeleteI mean title news.
ReplyDeleteHang in there, Partner. Consider Atlanta a vacation and just enjoy the atmosphere of being with so many writers. Relax and simply have fun! You might even try getting out of the hotel and checking out Atlanta a little bit...
ReplyDeleteTake good care of yourself, okay? Sending peaceful and happy energy your way, baby!
No, Mary G, your wording isn't too strong. But you can add "typical" to the list.
ReplyDeleteI'm trying, Nan. Doing better today. Yesterday was a total downer!
Chin up!! You're not a REBEL without a cause.
ReplyDeleteGood idea, Susan! And you're right, Donna! I do have a cause!
ReplyDeleteI'm amazed that Sourcebooks manages to keep any authors if this is the way they treat them. I don't know what your "original" release date was for Rebel but seems like July is quite a bit later than your norm...
ReplyDeleteI've noticed that a lot of published authors have started taking the self-pub route. More power to you!(Though that AMZ return policy we talked about yesterday sucks!)
I'm with Susan, though-I'm gonna read it no matter what it's called.
I'm still chuckling over the Roadkill title, Susan! Good one!
ReplyDeleteI believe Rebel/Rascal should've been published in February 2014, but that's only going from the due date for the manuscript, which was March 1, 2013. It takes roughly ten months from that deadline to the actual publication date. When a book fails to pass the launch committee, (in this case because they didn't think Rascal was a macho enough title) the pub date gets pushed back to the next round of releases. I'm surprised the change to Rebel (they'd decided on Renegade, which I didn't believe was appropriate) didn't push it back even further. And you're right, Lisa. SB doesn't have a tremendous amount of author loyalty.
I'm sure people are reading and returning ebooks other than those that are self-pubbed. I just don't see those statistics on my Cat Star books. ;)
Well Cheryl, I guess you'll have to think of a different birthday gift for me this coming year and for that I declare a POX on Sourcebooks!
ReplyDeleteLMAO at the Roadkill comment from Susan but it's true...old fans will stick and new fans are a crap shoot at best.
I think you do a fine job of promoting your books and we who love to read your stuff will keep it real and pimp where we can.
From what I experience as a reader, the market for new books and new authors...self-published or not is overwhelmingly intense and borders on too much of a good thing. Periodically I shut down and simply revert to my TBR mountain or I stick to new purchases from a very large number of favorite authors I've acquired over the years.
I think the timing is fortunate that you started building your fan base a few years ago. It's understandable why authors go the self-pub route...they get to keep a fairer share of the profits BUT at the same time, because the ease of publishing is way easier than it ever was, competition has increased. Readers are left with wading through the good, the bad and the ugly or falling back to their favorites.
Just thoughts for what they're worth;) A disclaimer, as always, I'm one reader with one opinion but here's the shit that's real: we all have the same number of hours in a day...some of us with more discretionary reading time than others...meaning that even when we addicts over-buy books, we still have limits on how many we can consume.
You make a number of good points, Nancy. I used to read all of the Sourcebooks author's books. No way I could keep up with them now, and those are books you can pick up at the store. I don't know how anyone sifts through all the books available online. My guess is that they go by author, word of mouth recommendations, and price.
ReplyDeleteThe main stumbling block for my self-pubs thus far is that they're in a different genre than my traditionally published works. However, that will change after Rebel's release. I have an idea for a new sci-fi series that will probably be self published unless my agent comes up with some really good offers. ;)