High brow, low brow, and the e-publishing revolution

In the past couple of weeks, I've received notice, via email or social media, of five new self-published novels.

 

Here's the latest.

 

Image found here.

 

Last year, I receive notice of exactly one.

 

Self-publishing used to be an admission of defeat, used to open an author up to charges of vanity.

 

Not anymore. Decisively.

 

What it is, is a gold rush. And like a gold rush, very few prospectors are going to strike it rich. But it will be fun trying, and maybe we'll discover a few things that will be worth keeping, like sourdough.

 

The gold strike is real, by the way. There are signs the e-revolution is driving up sales of fiction. So it's all good, right?

 

Maybe not. Genre fiction, especially in the YA market (fiction aimed at teens) is leading the way, at the expense, some would say, of real literature.

 

An online discussion in the New York Times produced these comments:

 

Let me get this straight. Adults are reading books at aimed at teenage-level readers, on top of the brain candy that are romance and mystery novels.

 

Some might say, well, at least they're reading. Some might also say, well, my husband's addicted to Snickers bars, but at least he's eating.

 

Is it any wonder that this country is in the toilet?

 

Then there's this one:

 

I fail to see why [previous commenters] don't understand why it's troubling to see so many adults reading so many mystery novels and romances but especially so many teen novels. A nation of adults constantly looking for entertainment and escape is a troubled nation. Our reading habits reflect who we are, and Americans are in dire need of some self-reflection. Literature provides that opportunity.

 

University English departments resolved this debate between "junk" and "real" literature in the 1990's.  For the purposes of university-level study, there's no difference (See also this book... BTW, priced at $15 as an e-book).

 

But away from the ivory tower, there's a marketplace where some serious rubber is hitting some serious road.

 

The lit market has always been tenuous. Always small, and clubby, has been the group of people who have valued books encouraging self-reflection. Or at least that made the author feel good about his or her erudition. It was really, really hard to get into this club, but those who were in had a wonderful time being passionate about their craft.

 

And the people in the club could feel good about themselves because they were writing stuff that was worthwhile.

 

Well, it's about time that the club disband and reform as something else.

 

There's something exhilirating about everyone in the world deciding to be an author. I know that doesn't square with Flannery O'Connor's view, but it's exhilirating none the less. 

Time was, we wouldn't have been able to manage a deluge of new fiction. If we were publishing all this stuff and putting it in a bookstore, the aisles would be stacked with whatever. 

 

 

But thanks to data aggregation and social media, we can categorize and differentiate. We can decide what's good and what's not. The best-- however that's decided-- can be recognized, and yet everyone can be in the game.

 

Don't decry the e-publishing revolution. Join it. Join it to get rich, join it to have an adventure, join it to do a service for our country. Just join it.

So here we go. I herewith announce a new category for Breakfast with Pandora blog posts: Sourdough with Pandora: the e-book revolution.

 

Comments

[Bob Mustin]

We forget that many of the ones we now consider literary greats self-published, or were published via one-horse pub ventures:

G.B. Shaw
Percy B. Shelley
Walt Whitman
Thomas Hardy
Ernest Hemingway
Robert Bly

as well as others:
John Grisham
Zane Grey
Pat Conroy

But the caveat is that if you haven't taken the time to develop your writerly chops, it's all for naught.

[Lyn Fairchild Hawks]

Amen to what Bob said.

I like how this article recommending these YA reads neatly acknowledges our human need to find our identity...and how YA satisfies that for all ages.

http://www.npr.org/2011/08/09/137456199/hooray-for-ya-teen-novels-for-readers-of-all-ages&sc=nl&cc=es-20110814

Lyn

[DF]

Bob, I agree that writerly chops are important-- as is a good editor. Unfortunately that's a guarantee of nothing. The Kardashians are writing novels, I hear. I think their stuff will sell, but I'm not sure of the quality of the writing.

We need to acknowledge that best sellers are not always well written, and well-written books don't always sell. You probably have a better chance of being recognized as good if you write well, but you also have to market, market, market.

Lyn, thanks for that link. As you know, I've been championing the stories of teens for years, seeing in the journey to adulthood a immensely important, compelling, and exciting source for great stories. Looking forward to seeing your well-written YA work in print.

[Bob Mustin]

I think the test isn't whether your books fly off the shelves in the first three months, or even a year; rather it's are they selling well 10 years later, 20 years later. There's no real way to market that, but if you write well, and you speak to your time well in what you write, I think your work will more nearly withstand the vagaries of time.