The thing about being a blogging author is that you have three audiences with very different desires. How do you speak to all of them without alienating any of them?
Being a blogging author is like being a fish in an aquarium. You are on display. You can’t hide in the plastic treasure chest all the time. There are other fish that want to know how you survive and thrive in your medium. There’s the interested audience that wants to see a fish in its natural habitat. And then you have the people in the business of supplying pet shops.
Writers want to know about the process of the art and craft and business, how you navigate books and contracts and business issues without losing your creative mind or your shorts.
Readers want to know that you have sweated appropriately in the creation process to deserve the money they’ll plunk down to buy that book. That you are giving fair value. The recent discussion about authors taking enough time to make their books as good as they can be is a prime example. Nobody wants to hear you slapped your story together with shoddy construction tactics and shoved it out, ready or not.
Editors want to know that you can produce that well-constructed, fabulous work of art fast and meet their production schedule so they can supply book sellers.
So what do you do? Besides blow bubbles and swim slowly around.
I try to remember that I have three audiences. I know that I can say something that one group might understand and another group might take the wrong way. For instance, the last paragraph of my last blog post might be construed to imply that I don’t take craft seriously. When in fact it’s a reminder to me to keep craft in perspective in the creative process. Writing is art and craft. It takes both. To be published, you have to add business to the mix and balance all three.
So, publishing is just like blogging as an author. Balance the different demands of art, craft and business. And really, they all intersect. Writer, reader, or those involved in publishing and selling books, we are all interested in books.
At least, that’s my theory. I think it beats hiding in the plastic trunk or blowing bubbles.
Charli,
I totally got what you meant in the last paragraph of your previous blog – and it’s valuable advice. I think your background is somewhat similar to mine (yours was journalism, I believe?) and sometimes those of us who are (or were) in technical fields lose sight of the emotional vibe of our work in pursuit of a perfectionist ideal that doesn’t exist. So yeah, I understand completely. 🙂
Carolynn, not only did I learn writing in journalism, I moved on to technical writing. *g* So yeah, getting over the pursuit of technical perfection is a hurdle. I mean, I looked at deleting one word in my last round of revisions and I spent ten minutes asking technical questions about the composition and construction of the gun’s bullets to make sure it remained accurate. Which has what to do with the story? *eye roll*
I think I’d rather stay in the plastic trunk and blow bubbles most of the time. LOL
I think most authors would. But writing (whether a book or a blog) is a balancing act and it’s not always easy to stay on track.
I find blogging a lot harder to do than writing a book. It doesn’t flow as easily…mostly because I’m often talking about myself in my blog. 🙂
NJ, it is tough to balance. Although you can always cheat by posting a snippet. *g* That way you’re writing AND blogging!
I don’t know. That trunk sounds pretty good to me sometimes. *ggg* 😉
I do wish I could come up with a better balance on my blog though. It’s frustrating.
Jordan, I think inevitably the balance will tip in one direction or another. Some very successful blogs just focus in one direction. I do think whatever we do, though, we have to bear in mind members of all 3 groups read our blogs.
Charli!
I wish I gave more thought to my blog, but I usually open it up when I’m tired and grumpy, and there you have it. 🙂
D., you post lots of nice pictures, though. *g*
“So what do you do? Besides blow bubbles and swim slowly around.”
Do comic impressions of the dimwits who come by only to hammer on the glass and scare the crap out of you. They get mortally offended and go away. 🙂
Authors often objectify themselves on their blogs and then run out of stuff to write because family life and/or the writing life is generally not that exciting or news worthy. Same thing with the authors who blog mainly about their books — I have yet to read an author who can sustain a blog that drones on and on about one or two books a year (okay, there’s one exception to that, but the author in question is having a passionate and enduring love affair with theirself, which is kind of fun to watch, actually.)
Mixing it up is really the only way to keep an interesting blog, I think. Don’t objectify or focus on any one thing; instead offer a variety.
Why we blog has a lot to do with how well we blog. We’ve all seen blogs that are only advertising dressed up like a personal journal. They’re phony and boring. Likewise the blogs that pimp the industry, the writer orgs, and are always happy, happy, happy. I’m sorry, I’m not buying it — this is not a happy industry.
I guess the why for me is the loneliness of being a writer. Being shy and writing in total isolation for so many years gave me a gigantic mental inventory of things I’ve always wanted to talk about with other writers but had to pack away. For twenty years I was writing and reading books daily, but didn’t know anyone else who did that and was too timid and afraid to go in search of my people. 🙂 When I started blogging, I think I just went back into my cerebral warehouse and started grabbing boxes.
It’s not as safe or as fun as it used to be in the old days, but blogging is still a huge, wonderful thing for me. I especially love being able to do things like come over your blog and post these long, annoying comments. Jordan’s blog won’t let me write more than two paragraphs. 🙂
Lynn, feel free to commandeer my comments. And by the way, if the kneebreakers threaten you for Twilight Fall not hitting higher on the list, mention that Some People went to 4 different stores in the first week of release and couldn’t find the book. (Walmart did promise it was en route after I eyed their unopened book boxes in a zealous manner.)
I agree that blogging is not the free and easy atmosphere it was when I started this one in 2004, let alone when I had my fiction-only blog in 2002. Sigh.
But like you, I’ve been very isolated or only had local writer groups that wanted to write for art and they didn’t know what to do with somebody who wanted to do it AS A JOB. So I blather online. It beats talking to myself.
“And by the way, if the kneebreakers threaten you for Twilight Fall not hitting higher on the list, mention that Some People went to 4 different stores in the first week of release and couldn’t find the book.”
I’m sorry about that; I’ve been getting the same complaint from a lot of people. I guess the first print run was on the short side, and the July 4th holiday may have factored in with the shipping. Here I didn’t find the book in any of the five stores in my area (the first level of new release hell) and was told by our big B&N that they were expecting their shipments by 7/7. But online sales have been brisk, so I’m hoping that will convince the publisher to get it out there fairly soon.
Yikes. I’m so sorry to hear mine wasn’t an isolated experience! The holiday probably did mess up the timing, but here’s hoping the print run for Robin’s book is bigger.