There are so many indie-published novels with mediocre ratings on Goodreads and Amazon and such, and I always find myself thinking, āwho reads these?ā
Since I donāt have as much time as Iād like to read fiction, I generally end up reading just the big hits and then continue reading sequels on them.
Which ones are your favorites so far? š¤
One great sci-fi author who publishes that way and might get lost in the noise is Greg Egan. He's probably in my top 5 living sci-fi authors, but everything is, like, $4.99 Kindle releases.
That is the nature of all creative arts: The big boys take it all (bands, authors, artists, actors).
Nobody has the time to wade through mountains of shit just to find a raw gem - even more so in today's age where anyone and everyone can be a creator.
So everyone just sticks to what has labelled to be good by many people already.
Wait until you find out big boys were once small, too.
Oh wait!
I'm writing my first novel right now and when it's done I'll have to figure out how/where to encourage people to read it. I wonder if there's a V4V indie book store similar to what Wavlake is doing for V4V music...hmm
Seems like a kindle-like experience could translate well. Sats for an ebook
Yes! Could #Nostr have its own eBook format? #asknostr nostr:npub1l2vyh47mk2p0qlsku7hg0vn29faehy9hy34ygaclpn66ukqp3afqutajft
With a automatic zap per page, similar as podcasting. Don't like the book? Stop reading. Nice thing with zaps is you can verify if you already paid for a page.
I recently finished an 8 book series in the niche "litrpg" that was published a chapter at a time on royalroad.com . It's not always the finest literature but some can be quite entertaining.
It's an interesting direct to consumer model. They must monetize with ads, but why not zap ā” your favorite reads?
I've taken to audiobooks far more than reading as I can still work while listening. I may not get as much of the content as if I was reading but it is far more than not. But I generally am listening to non-fiction, like your book.
Me too! Prefer the acoustic experience more than the linear written one these days
I want to return all the good times listening you by doing a suggestion: The Devil to Pay in The Backlands, by GuimarĆ£es Rosa.
Some hit just the right niche at just the right time that I can accept a mediocre book š¤
Iām the same. I have my list of authors of fiction that I stick to. Occasionally a new one will make the list, but rarely.
Non-fiction is an entirely different case.
In Amazon, you sell the digital version of your book for a penny, during a limited period of time. Then you became best seller and can write that in your book. It is all a scam. Your book can be garbage and show as a best seller.
I disagree that "indie-published" is more likely to be mediocre. I am constantly astonished at the poor quality of "traditionally" published books.
But, I understand limiting what one reads to known quantities!
Agreed. Its a walled garden. Easier to maintain since reading is time expensive but just like music, itās becoming more decentralized for people to self publish.
I recently met a woman that was a writer and I could only buy her book on kindle. I surprised her by reading it to surprise her but the real surprise was how amazing unheard this book was.
I donāt think indie published books are more likely to be mediocre. Instead, itās just that there are *a lot* of them, and books in general. And so when there is a flood of like 3.6 out of 5 rated books, I just wonder who the audience is that goes and reads them.
If an author writes a book but nobody reads it but it still gets 3.6 out of 5 did a tree even fall?
Same. I did finally decide to read the foundation series by asimov a year ago. Oh and contact by sagan. I get most of my science fiction from Isaac ā¦ something š on YouTube. āSFIAā
Actually lemme find you a link
Some books only apeal to a small crowd. I'm guessing there are some genuine 5 star reviews on those books.
There are tons of indie publishers publishing phenomenal fiction, especially in the translated world. Other Press, New Directions, Charco Press, Dorothy Press, Zerogram, and NYRB for a larger āindieā.
Incorporate some thrift store fantasy books into the rotation too! Also Iām not sure you should analyze creative writing just write what you like, right?
Iām not big into marketing my work so Iām not 100% on all the details but this is what Iāve noticed: there are a lot of genre junkies out there who read just about anything within the scope of their preferences even if itās mediocre. You see this a lot in the āsplatterpunkā and erotica genre. Splatterpunk is basically for gore hounds who wanna read books with nasty kills. A lot of these get circulated and recommended via TikTok. The āsimilar authorsā section on Audible and Amazon keep those genre junkies occupied (and authors fed) despite the mainstream algo not always pushing the darker content like erotica and horror. I wanna get more of those people here on Nostr! Iāve had inconsistent experiences trying to follow anything horror related on mainstream social medias because of censorship. I literally wasnāt allowed to follow #horror on Instagram and, I shit you not, it showed me a suicide hotline number. How condescending can meta get?!
Iām deep into Robin Hobbās Realm of the Ederlings series. SO good.
Baffling to me is that thereās a whole industry of āwritersā who are just businesses that hire ghost writers and publish under a pseudonym on Amazon publishing.
I met a guy whose pseudonym is known for vampire romance novels. He doesnāt write them, of course. He has a whole team. He says teenage girls read them. Crazy!
Tastes are different.
After having to read the first Harry Potter I never understood how that took off. Never touched another book of the series.
On the other hand I love the Dark Tower series, which didn't get that much attention.
Oh yes, good evening #nostr
Geez you have time to read fiction? I did that as a youth reading all the great European classics like The Idiot, Les Mis and Madame Bovaryā¦to establish a solid understanding of human nature from those classicsānow I mostly read book about ideas and concepts i.e. Broken Money (thank you for writing that!) The last fiction book I read was Infinite Jest which exposes the mind of a drug addict with lazer precision over 1100 pages šš¤£š
Novels by Daniel Suarez are quite good, a modern day Michael Crichton using cutting edge tech facts to weave great stories.
You might enjoy Drew Hayes as an author. He has multiple series happening. I am enjoying NPCs which is a D&D based series. The other is Villainsā Code which is a fun spin on the superhero genre.
I often wonder who makes all the YouTube videos about every random car repair scenario.
Like who, actually, does it.
Someone. Obviously.
let's not forget that very often in history, those indie authors became classics only after their death. There are many examples of completely unsuccessful writers or painters that one would categorize like the ones you mentioned. They died unsuccessful, poor and unrecognized. 50 years later their works are considered the epitome of expression.
I'd say that in art, any unknown indie artist - whether it's music, painting, sculptures or writing - might just be just as good or better than mainstream colleagues. It's not like sports where this is an objective competition possible. Often the commercially successful artists just happened to be at the right place, at the right time, born in the right place and captured the eye of the right supporter. I known I heard some amazing street musicians that would put most most mainstream singers to shame and have seen amazing paintings in local artist galleries that you'll only see when you visit these towns.
