Selling Out: The Choice to Write What Sells

I posted a blog post a while back talking about the craziness that is the E.L. James and 50 Shades phenomenon. Since then I have written, not as much as would have liked, but still have been writing. I came to the realization that I want people to read my writing and I want to make money. Well… after some research, I came to the realization that erotica and romance sell like hotcakes as well as selling for more per word than any other type of writing. I have no previous expertise in writing either, so I figured I’d give erotica a shot, how hard could it be?

I did some research, watched some videos and read blogs. My next step was to read some erotica so I bought a few popular shorts and sat down with my kindle. Most of what I read was hot, but at the same time the writing distracted me. There was nothing there that I couldn't do. I was going to have to draw off of some personal experience  if I was going to make it hot and enjoyable for people to read. I sat down last week and started writing.

The result was an almost 4k word short that will end up leading to a series of 5 or 6 stories. I think I did a good job, not amazing but I think a valiant first effort. I have confidence that as time goes it will be easier. I also sold copies of it quicker than I ever did with my other work and. I’m excited to say the least. Not ready to throw my pen name into the world, not that proud of myself.

What does it all mean? Don’t limit yourself by writing only one thing or only what you know. Trying something new, try something fun, you might just surprise yourself.

Getting back into the swing of things

I miss it. It’s been a while since I’ve written anything, let alone a blog post. The only thing I have actually written in the last month in a half or so was about 1k words of a short I’m working on. Hopefully I can finish this week *fingers crossed*. Other than that, most of my time is spent on school or other writing related activities. I have been working with a writer to edit, develop cover art and publish her erotic shorts the past few weeks. So good so far. We managed to get two done in a week that were already written and she is hard at work writing the third and should be done in a few more days. It’s actually quite fun to help someone else get their books ready for sale and then see copies start to move on Amazon. It makes me really want to get back to writing. Midterms this week and I’m in the midst of writing a couple of magazine articles for a class, so yeah, it could be a few days or maybe a week before that happens, but I sure do miss it.

I really look forward to writing soon, but I’m also a little worried. Right now, I’m about halfway done with a novel that was supposed to be the first book in a planned five book series and I feel no connection to the main character right now. I think my plan will be to get a couple of shorts done, maybe 5-10k words each and then give the novel a fresh shot and see how I feel about it. I think most of my fear is that in order to get back to where I was in the story, I will need to read the whole thing and I feel like it might be utter shit. Then what? I guess only time will tell. 

Back to writing magazine articles (for school, one about food (boo) and one about publishing (yay!)).