Writing thoughts: Discuss amongst yourself.

[pen37]

Partially due to the shrinking economy, a lot of the larger (and not so large) publishing houses are tightening their budget and dumping whole lines of genre fiction. The most recent of these was Five Star, where a number of friends and aquaintances have their work placed. They just dumped their entire line of mass market sciene fiction and fantasy

Comments

[twasadark]

Some great thoughts here. My understanding is that sci fi/fantasy books are a drop in the bucket of book sales, so that's probably why they're being cut. The World Sci Fi Convention used to be the place to go for sci fi lit, but the fans have become so intolerant that they no longer welcome young people. Consequently, the con has no energy and no base for future fans. It's kind of sad, really.

Anyhow, ComicCon is amazing, although totally expensive. I'm shooting to attend Dragon Con next year - we'll have to meet up if we both go!

Are you a member of Broad Universe? They are a great organization that promotes women sci fi and fantasy writers. They often have tables at cons and will allow you to sell your books from their table for free. Here's their url: http://broaduniverse.org/

[pen37]

Thank you! I haven't heard of them. I'll have to get in touch with them.

I think a secondary problem with the market is the mentality that 'genre dosen't sell' so a lot of books that used to be marketed as science ficiton and fantasy now go under a different imprint. Harry Potter and Twilight are YA, One of the fastest growing markets for romance are paranormal romance.

And when a book like twilight succedes, the bean counters tend to say that it's because it *wasn't* marketed as genre fiction.

Personally, I tend to read (and write) small press because #1, you don't see the same old same old. #2 the books tend to be shorter. My first novel was packaged in the same volume with another author's novella. Mine was 50,000 words, his was 39,000. The total for the whole collection was $14.00. My second book will be 50,000 words, it will be packaged by itself, and it will retail about $8.00.

I feel like people need shorter reads. Not everyone wants to invest in a 150K novel that's just the start of a 12 part epic fantasy.

[pen37]

Part of the problem is that the people making the decisions are the bean counters. Most publishers have been trying for years to take advantage of the internet, but they can't figure out how to make money doing so.

Until something viable comes out that causes them to sit up and take notice, most will continue down the same old path.

[pen37]

*nods*

And Amazon has done a lot. Then there have been the podio books. In fact, the internet has made it a lot easier for smaller press and self-publishers to find a market.