Paying It Forward Without Breaking the Bandwidth

 

THE LONG NIGHT OF THE RADIANT STAR - Jak and Stella's midwinter holiday wedding - is out now!

      

This week of U.S. Thanksgiving, at the SFF Seven, we're talking about Paying it forward. We're asking:

Did anyone give you truly sound advice?

Did you have a mentor and if so how do you pay it forward without getting buried by requests?

I've been truly blessed in having numerous mentors and lovely, gracious people willing to give me advice. The one I'll single out today is SFWA Past-President, Nebula-Award winner, and wonderful author of science fiction, sf mysteries, fantasy, and near future thrillers, Catherine Asaro. When I was shopping my first fantasy romance novel, sometime around 2008/2009, Catherine did me the huge favor of reading the book for me. I kept getting enthusiasm from agents and editors, and full manuscript requests, but they all came back with "no," saying they didn't know what to with the book or how to market it. I'd run out of ideas for how to revise the book so it would sell.

Catherine read it and said - the first person to say this to me - that the only "problem" was that I was writing cross-genre. She told me the story was good and that I was a good writer (things I desperately needed to hear), but that if I kept writing this fantasy + romance cross-genre, it would be like wading through hip-deep snow to succeed with it. She also told me she thought it was worth doing. 

She was right on both counts.

As for paying it forward... I do that as much as I can. I volunteer to mentor through SFWA and other fundraisers. I offer advice in various arenas where I think people genuinely want to hear it. (Few things are more frustrating to me than putting energy into offering advice to people who don't listen.) I have my podcast, First Cup of Coffee with Jeffe Kennedy, where I talk about writing and publishing (and other random thoughts). All of these venues allow me to control how much bandwidth I devote to mentoring others. In truth, I started my Author Coaching side business entirely so I'd have a way to charge money for my time and energy, when the bandwidth wasn't enough. 

That said, if you catch me in person at a con, I'm always happy to chat over an adult beverage. Offerings of chocolate are also acceptable!

Author Coaches - How to Spot the Phonies

This week's topic at the SFF Seven is whatever is on our minds. Now that The Promised Queen has been out for nearly a week, I'm once again reminded of the many, many scavengers that begin circling the sparkling and hopeful fresh meat that is a new release. 

So, as a general warning, remember that there are a LOT of people out there looking to make money off of authors. From paid reviews to advertising to various "services," they are targeting authors by searching for new releases in particular, and attempting to capitalize on the mounds of money they hope you're making - or your desperation if you are not.

More specifically, my current MOST LOATHED scavenger critter out there right now is the Author Coach.

And yeah... I'm fully aware of that irony, as I do offer author coaching myself. I justify this in my own mind in that I'm simply asking to be paid for the kind of thing I was already doing for free. I love mentoring! But I also have to watch how I distribute my time. Writing books is my number one commitment. By charging for the advice I used to give for free, that puts a value on my time and reminds me where my priorities should remain.

Which segues nicely into what I see happening in some of these other "business" offerings.

These people offer to teach you how to write a novel - in whatever time frame sounds sexiest at the moment - and they tell you they can teach you how to make it into a bestseller, via amazing story tricks or marketing know-how, etc.

They have snazzy, clickable titles that promise ways to get your book in front of everyone, to write a breakout novel, to write a bestseller, to write your first novel, to make a viral book video, to get reader email addresses, and so forth. Yes, these are all things many of us would like to be able to do. That's the hook.

The question is: can they actually teach that?

BECAUSE - and this is the bit I always come around to - if they know so much about how to do the thing, why aren't they actually DOING it?

In the case of one famous agent who's built a considerable career selling books and workshops on writing a bestselling novel, I have always wanted to ask why, if he can teach this, aren't all of his clients bestsellers? I mean, wouldn't he want that? 

If an author is a bestselling rolling in royalties, why on earth would they be spending their time teaching anyone how to make viral Tik Tok videos? If a writer is making easy money writing books, why are they spending money on Instagram ads extolling their author coach services? Writers like Nora Roberts aren't spamming your IG feed with ads to teach you her secrets. Because she's making her money from actually writing.

In this era where anyone can add "Bestselling Author" to their credits either by a) lying, b) fudging the exact list, or c) buying their way onto a list, then it's become meaningless. And if being a Bestselling Author is their sole credential for teaching you anything, I'd take a hard second look at what they've actually done.

Frankly, the slicker the business site looks? The faster I'd run away. 

 I'm not saying there aren't good and helpful people out there - I like to think I'm one of them - but look very carefully at what these folks are promising vs. what they're actually doing. 

Authors Mentoring Authors

I love these #shelfie pics - ones readers send me of my book spotted in the wild. This one is from a Kroger grocery store in Anchorage, Alaska. Pretty awesome company it's keeping, huh?

Our topic at the SFF Seven this week is Mentoring: my mentors, ways I've mentored others, how to do it right, how to do it wrong, and whether it's possible to lone-wolf this writing journey.

A lot of writing is done alone, it's true, by its very nature. And I suppose it's possible to "lone-wolf" it, though... why would you want to?

First of all, one of the best perks of being an author is getting to be friends with the authors whose books you love. I highly recommend everyone take advantage of that!

Also, a lot of the industry is stacked against authors. The people who want to make money off of us have their best interests at heart, not ours. (Often these things coincide. Sometimes they don't - and we need to be able to know the difference.) That kind of thing (like paying authors as little as they can get away with) operates best in secrecy. Only by banding together and sharing our insider knowledge can we counteract those attempts to keep us ignorant.

I've had some great mentors all along - teachers, editors, agents, sister writers, business-minded friends - and I'm deeply grateful for each and every one of them. I've done my best to pay that out as well by doing formal mentoring, as with SFWA's mentoring program, and informally by giving advice to friends, and friends of friends, as needed.

How to do it right? My approach is be generous and listen. There is no one-size-fits all solution. Everyone wants different things from their writing. I try to help writers refine their own goals and dreams - and then give feedback on best practices to get there.

How to do it wrong? Just the reverse! Every time I hear some author giving advice like "All you have to do is write a good book" I end up grinding my teeth. If that's all there was to it, we'd all be JK Rowling, right?

This is an apropos topic because I'm moving into a new phase of offering Author Coaching. The information will be going up on my website soon - like, this week! - so keep an eye out for that.

Happy writing, everyone!