The Future of Writing

As someone who is working toward publication, the current state of the industry is pretty sobering. Publishers are taking a bath, and the major booksellers are closing stores and laying off employees. I’ve yet to see data on this, but I’m certain publishers are buying less books, if not in general, than specifically from first-time authors.

Against this economic backdrop, you have the push toward the electronic mediums. I’m not going to debate the pros/cons of digital vs paper here, and I don’t think traditional books are going away. But given what is happening to the newspapers, it seems fairly clear that paper is a dying medium. Costs, environmental concerns, and plain old convenience will continue to hoist the digital banners. Blogs, podcasts, eBooks are, if not the future, certainly part of it.

Given all this, what’s an unaccomplished writer to do? How do we fit in?

1. Don’t worry about what you can’t control. The only thing you can do is write. Keep at it, and know the markets will be there when you’re ready, but…
2. Don’t count on traditional publishers to be waiting, checkbook open when you finish your opus. Tales abound of professional, full-time writers who can no longer live off writing alone. What’s to say that you, a relative unknown, will be?
3. Take your career into your own hands. Get your name out there. More, get your work out there. Podcast your novel. Or release it via your blog. One of the growing trends is the publisher pursuing the writer, who already has buzz and a built-in audience. It’s safer for them, and its something I think we’ll continue to see more of.
1. As a corollary to this, once you have an audience, you can direct-market to them, cutting out the publishing middle man altogether. You’ll reduce your target audience, sure, but you’ll make drastically more money per story.

There’s a lot of uncertainty these days, specifically in the publishing world. You can let these bigger issues paralyze you, or you can figure out how to take advantage of the Internet and make your own destiny.