Tag Archive - Genre

The Secret to a Successful Book Publishing Career

Yes, I know there is more than one “secret.” But what is the most important aspect to garnering success as an author? Growing your audience or readership. And readers can’t glomp onto your books if they can’t find them online.

I’ve addressed this discoverability issue head on in my blog posts, my free Amazon success email course (click on the widget on the right), and in my Targeting Genre for Big Sales course.

This is a very personal issue for me because, once I got published, I thought my novels would jettison to the top of the best-seller lists. From all the great reviews and comments from agents and publishers and readers, I was confident I would see sales of millions of copies of my novels. Silly me.

I didn’t know then what I know now. Continue Reading…

Getting to the Heart of Why You Write What You Write

Understanding why you write what you write, and what brings joy to your writing, is key because if you are going to write for life—if writing novels is a career goal for you—then you want to make sure you are writing in a genre that you enjoy and that fulfils your need to be creative.

You motivation plays a big part in your success and happiness.

Sure, you could chose to write something you dislike, and you might not care. Maybe what you write isn’t at all important to you and doesn’t affect how you feel about writing. Some writers only write to make a living and they view it as any other job.

There is nothing wrong with that. But other writers find it difficult to spend hours, weeks, even years of their life writing material that doesn’t interest them. And it often shows in what and how they write.

I firmly believe we should be able to find joy and fulfillment in everything we do in life. And when it comes to writing fiction, I don’t believe any writer should be miserable or hate writing, because they’ve chosen to write something because it sells and can make them a living. Continue Reading…

The Key to a Successful Novel Lies in Genre

If you asked me what is the most important thing an author needs to know to ensure they will have the best chance of success with their novel, I could sum it up in one word: genre.

You have to know what genre you are writing in. And, on top of that, you have to do your homework to be completely “fluent” in that genre. That means learning to identify the markers for that genre.

Readers have specific expectations that they bring to a genre. So that means you, the author, must identify your niche genre, write to those expectations, and be sure that all marketing materials, including cover design, perfectly reflect that genre.

That might seem like a no-brainer, but, sadly, I see a lot of writers clueless about the genre they are writing in and haven’t done their homework.

Let me give you an example.

Here are the elements of Southern Gothic stories:

  • Voodoo and spirituality
  • An air of mystery, and/or the supernatural
  • Grotesque history, especially focusing on the South’s history of slavery
  • Social anxieties represented in racial tension
  • Deeply flawed, disturbing or eccentric characters
  • isolation and marginalization
  • violence and crime
  • sense of place
  • freakishness and the grotesque
  • destitution and decay
  • oppression and discriminat

Some Southern Gothic authors include Flannery O’Connor, Harper Lee, Truman Capote, Tennessee Williams, Carson McCullers. You have to know not just the markers of a genre but the great authors who’ve mastered the genre. Then you need to study those authors. Continue Reading…

Page 1 of 3123»