To Go Indie or Not To Go Indie

The world of publishing is in an upheaval.

Amazon, the “book” web site we all used to peruse for our books is doing all they can to command the publishing world.

They say they believe books are to be affordable. They claim to care about both the reader and the writer. But not much at all for the publisher.

So there’s been price wars between the Big 5 and Amazon. With Barnes & Noble somewhere in the middle.

Word is traditional publishers are trying to preserve literary excellence. And trying to uphold the hardback.

Of which they’ve been trying to do since 1939 when the paperback started taking over publishing.

So it’s price v quality again. The aristocracy – the hardback v. commoner – the paperback.

Publishers are being swallowed up like minnows by big fish Hachette, Harper Collins, Simon & Schuster and Penguin Random House and Macmillan.

While they are trying to hold onto the old way of doing things — or so it seems — Amazon continues to innovate.

Recently, they came up with Kindle Unlimited. For $9 a month, you can borrow all kinds of books. But the Big 5 have been excluded from this feature.

The Reason We Write

My friend, Lori, posted this quote on my Facebook page last week:

“We write to taste life twice.” ~Anais Nin, author

I think she posted the quote for two reasons:

I love quotes. Love, love, love them.
I am a writer who often wrestles with the why of writing. You know what I mean: Why do we willingly do all of this? The writing. The rewriting. The deadlines.
I think my friend read that quote and thought, “Beth will ‘get’ this.”

And I did.

But I did more than read the quote and think, “Good one.” I pondered the quote for a day or two … until it became this blog post.

Breaking Down the Basics of Tension

All right. You’ve read my post before on tension but I’m not sure I can stress it enough.

Tension is key!!

TENSION! TENSION! TENSION!

I’ve been doing some reading lately, amid deadline fever, and found the tension to be on this low side.

The stories were good. Well written. Great characters. But at some point, I found myself skipping pages because I just couldn’t wonder around inside their heads my more.

Here’s the deal. This is just the truth. Tension talks.

The more your characters dialog, the more likely they are to say things that make one another mad, or reveal a secret, perhaps say something embarrassing or something controversial and an argument starts.

Dialog is the gas pedal for tension.