To Agent or not to Agent

Just when you think you know what’s going to happen in the publishing industry, everything turns upside down again. I spent the summer recuperating from a back injury, and when I came back to the world of the Internet I found something rather stunning had happened. My genre (erotica and erotic romance) had exploded. Apparently, the flood of erotica in the market went crazy after the success of Fifty Shades of Grey. And what truly amused me was that writers who previously shunned the idea of writing “that stuff” were now invading the erotica genre like panhandlers looking for sparkly stuff in the early days of the California gold rush.

Of course, there’s no recreating the organic success of something like Fifty Shades of Grey. It’s like trying to recreate Harry Potter, Twilight or The Hunger Games. Yes, wizard, vampire and post-apocalyptic fiction can and has ridden the coat tails of such bestsellers. But you can’t recreate the first, because the original had an x-factor that the later copycats couldn’t capture. It’s like cloning – you can get a facsimile, but it’s never going to be the same.

That said, apparently my name has been bandied about this summer, after the popularity of the James’ series, because I’ve had not one, not two, but… well actually it’s now more than three, agents approach me in the past month or so with the promise of, “You could be the next EL James!” First of all, you’re assuming I want to be the next EL James. You’re also assuming I want to be traditionally published. Two pretty big assumptions.

I’m not sure I want to do either. Do I really want to open that door? Most of the agents have approached with the caveat: “I know you’re doing well on your own…” so at least they know the score. I’ve got 100 titles out there with my name on them and I’m pretty close to a million ebooks sold (if I haven’t passed it officially already… I still have to run the numbers) in the past two years. "Pretty well" is a bit of an understatement, I think.

I always said, “I’m glad I write erotica, because no agent is ever going to approach me with a ‘too good to turn down’ offer from traditional publishing.” I was so sure of this fact, especially given that everyone from Amazon to Apple to Paypal wanted to get rid of the stuff.

Then Fifty Shades of Grey became a runaway bestselling series.

Derp.

Now I’ve got a decision to make. To agent, or not to agent? I know all the arguments for and against. I think we all do. But self-published erotica and erotic romance authors are heading toward traditional publishers in droves. Sara Fawkes recently signed with Amanda Hocking’s agent and he got her a book deal with St. Martin's. Maya Banks just signed a 7-figure deal with Penguin for a three book series.

Publishers are now banking on erotic romance.

Whhhhaaat!? Really!? Have I entered the Twilight Zone?

I’m leery, I admit. I’ve heard so many horror stories about traditional publishing from authors who have jumped ship to self-publish. But there are authors (like EL James or Amanda Hocking) who have decided to go the other way, from self-publishing to traditional, and they’ve had good success.

The fact is, I have a three-book series based on Under Mr. Nolan’s Bed waiting in the wings. It was a huge seller for me in the days before Amazon decided to ban "certain types" of fiction, and although its ranks have never recovered there, it’s also the book that spurred people to run over to Barnes and Noble to buy it and clock in record sales (over $100,000 in a month!) last year. It’s also my “most requested” book in terms of a sequel. It's different while still tapping into the erotic romance genre, it's controversial, it's already got an enormous following of readers who want to read a sequel and it's hot--in short, it has huge potential.

Now I have to decide… do I want to self-publish it? Or give it to an agent?

What would you do?

 
Selena Kitt  
Erotic Fiction You Won't Forget
www.selenakitt.com

The difference between censorship and censorship

The Edinburgh International Book Festival is running at the moment and has thrown up some interesting articles. Patrick Ness put out this brilliant polemic on censorship and in particular how social media can cause problems of self-censorship for writers worried about their words being taken out of context and misunderstood. In the latter article China Miéville made the point it's only really censorship when the police show up.

This is a familiar argument and a problem with how censorship is defined. Selena Kitt brought it up here after the problems with paypal and online retailers banning some of eXcessica’s books. The articles around the time generated some debate with other people making the point that it wasn’t true censorship—no government body was actively banning the books; the booksellers were simply refusing to stock the books, which they had every right to do. I argued back then that the semantics of whether or not it was technically censorship were moot if they resulted in the same outcome. It might not be censorship in the pedantic sense, but the end result is still a writer being unable to get their work out for readers to read. There isn’t really a word to fit this ‘soft’ form of censorship, so we tend to use censorship even though it’s not strictly accurate.

This ‘soft’ censorship is especially appropriate to social media and I think Ness has it spot on. A writer either has to censor themselves and avoid trigger topics completely, or risk something being interpreted the wrong way and then have a baying online mob (most of whom probably didn’t even read the original work in the first place) stomp all over their reputation and career.

Ness raised the example of Salman Rushdie. Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses was not banned or censored by Western governments to my knowledge, but after seeing what happened to Rushdie, only an incredibly brave or reckless writer would attempt to tackle the same topics now. Again, this isn’t censorship in the pedantic sense, but the end result is the same—certain work will not be available for the public to read. It’s a kind of censorship by the mob.

And irony of ironies, this is the week when the Save the Pearls and Weird Tales controversy erupted on the internet, a situation that exemplifies Ness’s argument (although I don’t think he’d thank me for drawing the line from A to B).

I don’t want to talk about Victoria Foyt's book too much. I’ll be charitable and assume Foyt was aiming for an anti-racist message, but rather than hit the target, managed to spin around 180° and fire the arrow right through her foot. As a result plenty of people found it racist and were offended by it. They were also offended that Weird Tales (a fiction magazine with a long history) planned to run an extract. Further exacerbating the situation, Weird Tales had recently undergone some kind of editorial coup, with the popular Ann VanderMeer turfed out by the new owners.

This is where being one of those staunch Free Speech Warriors sucks. I fear and loathe all forms of censorship, which by extension means I also fear and loathe Political Correctness, as it’s another form of censorship, albeit by people with more honourable intentions. The moment you start to think certain things should be banned, for the “good”, is the moment you start opening the door to allow other people to ban other things, for their “good”, which might be vastly different and far more narrow-minded than your own “good”. That door should be kept shut and firmly locked. Unfortunately that sometimes means ending up on the side of the river you’d rather not be. As the famous quote goes: “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”

Of course, freedom of speech does not mean freedom from criticism. If someone writes something bone-headed and stupid, someone else has the right to call them out for writing something bone-headed and stupid. There is, however, a fine line between honest and deserved criticism, and hounding a writer off the internet and leaving a smouldering crater where a magazine once stood.

I fear the chilling effects Ness talked about in his polemic. Culture is poorly served if writers are grinding their work down to tasteless gruel for fear of the PC police lurking at their shoulder. Free speech should mean exactly that, not “You can write what you like, but if you write things we don’t like it’s back to rounding up trolleys at Tesco for you.” Our culture shouldn’t be ruled by fear.

Given a choice between a world where people have the freedom to write what they want and occasionally fuck it up completely, and a world where people don't write because they're scared of an online lynch mob coming after them if they do fuck it up, I'll take the former. If that means the existence of the occasional disagreeable—even bigoted—book, it’s a price worth paying.

During the rather lively discussion beneath The Guardian article someone made the point freedom to be published is not the same as the right to be published. Ultimately that decision lies with the publisher or magazine. They’re not obligated to provide a platform to writers whose work they find disagreeable, same as readers are not obligated to support businesses they find disagreeable.

I agree with that, but this is not what happened in this case. Rightly or wrongly, Weird Tales had already taken the decision to publish an extract of Foyt’s work. Then—rightly or wrongly—a pitchfork-wielding mob turned up at the gates and forced the publisher into a U-turn. In doing so they denied other readers the chance to make up their own minds on whether or not to support the magazine’s decision. That choice was taken away.

This is censorship by the mob.

No matter the provocation, we should aspire to be better than this.

M.E. Hydra

Big Head-Small Paycheck

I've been skirting my responsibilities as a blogger. Mainly because I'm not sure if it is a good use of my time. I received my Q1 sales spreadsheet and I am only making about $150 a month even though I have five novels on the market. It's mainly Cinderella Club selling. Apparently I did not sell a single Cinderella Thyme during the month of March.

So I think- maybe I should be doing more to promote? But that just gets me into more time spent on a dream. The books are available. People will eventually find them if they are good. It's that simple. Writing takes a long time. I can't whip something up and get it out there like the full time authors seem to be able to do. And as you all know, I'm not a people person. I'd rather make the art and let someone else sell it.

I'm almost done with the art stuff then I can spend the better part of the summer finishing my trilogy. After that I will reassess. It is phenomenal when I think about all the people who have read or bought and plan to read my stuff. I don't exist in the real world as a writer. Lunch conversation with my family turned into who's read Fifty Shades of Grey? I cannot believe how that book has sunk its teeth into American pop culture. But even so the next line is not I write erotica too. I'm Mia Natasha.

It feels so strange. But good strange because I wouldn't do it if people knew. It's like when I make art, there needs to be some element of wow-ie. The same as when you make an entrance into a room looking stunning. If people are looking over my shoulder, I'm out. Out for good.

Erotica Sustainability

There are plenty of midlist authors out there who have faded into oblivion. Not many authors can look forward to a career life-span of someone like Stephen King or James Patterson, or even Anne Rice. Some say epublishing is going to change all of that. Now books won’t ever go “out of print.” They’re all going to be on the virtual shelves forever, competing for the attention of the reader.

In an epublishing world, this seems to be true. Many midlist authors are finding a new audience for work that was previously out of print, making money off books that were unavailable for years. Most genres, especially those with big reader-return and high book-read counts like romance, mystery/thriller and horror, will sustain this kind of boom.

But what about erotica?

The good news is that erotica readers (and erotic romance readers) are as voracious as the readers in the genres I’ve already mentioned. The bad news is, as any of us who write in the genre can tell you, we are often the subject of round-about corporate censorship, something most other writers don’t usually have to deal with. I’ve been writing in the erotica genre since 2006, and I can tell you that things have changed exponentially since then, and I imagine they are going to continue to change as the ebook market shifts.

When I first started writing erotica, there was a lot of erotic romance in the market—where the story or book followed one relationship to a happy conclusion, with lots of sex sprinkled in along the way. But there wasn’t that much true “erotica,” where the emphasis was on sexual exploration that didn’t necessarily focus on one couple and didn’t always end happily. The largest romance ebook publisher at the time, Ellora’s Cave, had just started their “exotica” line, focused solely on erotica, and they were the first.

Fast forward to 2011 and the Amazon erotica bestseller lists have changed considerably. No longer dominated by the erotic romance market, it now looks like a shelf in the back room of your local video store, with titles like Virgin Cumsluts in Space Suits Get It On With Daddy. What happened? Nothing except the sale of more Kindles. Kindle readers discovered erotica and their demand for more created a huge supply of it from self-published authors. Nothing wrong with a little free-market capitalism!

Readers are buying and consuming these stories like popcorn, faster than writers can keep up, and authors are making a living writing erotica. It’s a win-win situation! There’s just one wrench in the works—Amazon doesn’t like erotica. How do I know this? First of all, they make it very difficult to find. The “erotica” category is hidden within “fiction” and there are absolutely no sub-genres, so readers can’t hone their search. Secondly, Amazon bans certain “taboo topics” it doesn’t like. Things like incest and bestiality. Sometimes topics like rape for titillation. They remove titles at their discretion, without warning or recourse. And lastly, Amazon “filters” adult titles based on their covers. If the cover is too risqué, Amazon will mark it “ADULT” and that title will no longer be searchable in their main store.

So how can an erotica writer make a sustainable career in a world where the subject matter they write about is often the subject of controversy and corporate censorship?

All erotica writers walk a fine line when it comes to this genre. We need to make it sexy and appealing, without stepping over the line into "porn." Unfortunately, too many writers recently have ignored that line altogether, moving into more extreme territory when it comes to titles, covers and blurbs. I understand that it isn’t easy, as a newcomer in the genre, to get yourself noticed when there are so many new voices calling out in the wilderness of erotica. A lot of writers have heard that you can make a ton of money “writing sex.” And many of them think it’s a gravy train and have jumped on board with both feet.

But it seems to me that the more mercenary folks tend to push the boundaries. They want to get noticed as fast as possible, to make as much as possible. They want a shortcut. They want the big bucks, the gold-rush. I think these newcomers truly believe that without the risqué title and description, no one will buy the book. The belief is that titling books with porn-keywords garners more sales. Maybe that's really true, maybe it isn't. But, unfortunately, it’s pretty much guaranteed that they also garner a lot more negative attention.

The kind of attention Amazon and other distributors don’t like.

The question is—is that a risk you’re willing to take? If you’re in it for the short-term, maybe it is. But if you’re looking to build a long-term sustainable career in erotica, I’d advise against it.

We’ve already had one distributor axe Indies altogether after these kinds of extreme titles flooded their bookstore. We’ve had another draw up restrictive guidelines about what they will or will not accept. The larger venues like Amazon and Barnes and Noble haven’t taken these steps. Yet. But how long do you think they’re going to let it go on without doing something about it? Indefinitely? Based on their past behavior of corporate censorship, I just don’t think so.

Let’s assume for the moment that it’s true—titles with porn-keywords do garner more sales. But at what cost? In the short-term, you have money in the bank. In the long-term, what have you gained? A fan base? I’m afraid not. If you are not putting out quality, professional product, you aren't creating a fan base. Your readers are drive-bys. Drive-thru fast-food eaters. They may get addicted to burgers, but if they can't find you easily in the top 100, any old burger will do.

My readers seek me out. My readers are loyal. They don't want just any old meal—they want a Selena Kitt feast. And I sold 500,000 books in 2011 without one porn keyword (that I can think of...) in my titles. If you consider me an "exception," then I can tell you that Excessica made over a million dollars last year, and we have the word "fuck" in just one of our titles. I would argue that you can garner sales without titling with porn-keywords. And you don't have to go all sunsets and vanilla. We've got "excess" in our name, for pete's sake. We're known for pushing the boundaries. But for the sake of all our authors, we walk the line, because all of us want to have a sustainable career in this genre.

So what else does this strategy of putting porn-keywords in your titles and description get an erotica author? Negative attention in the media perhaps? A lambasting on some snarky podcast show or review site? The loss of distributors and vendors? Not such a pretty picture. So a writer makes a few more sales than they would have—all impulse buys. Most of them won’t actively seek that author out again. And what was the risk in the meantime?

And please don’t think I'm talking about censoring content in erotica. What I'm talking about are covers and descriptions and titles. Inside the book, pretty much anything goes (as long as it's—please and thank you—proofread and spellchecked!) in terms of creating a quality and professional product. For me (and I think for most readers) titles run toward the extreme when they start adding porn-keywords like cumslut and cornhole and gangbang. The same rule applies to book descriptions and blurbs. Erotica authors are already self-policing their covers, because we all know Amazon will mark your book “ADULT” if you cross the nudity line.

Of course, there's a fine line there too. "Hotwife" in a title might not catch attention. Or "Cuckold." But they're borderline. And I think we're all adults. We write erotica. We know what might be deemed offensive. The trick is walking the line. Having porn-keywords in their titles and descriptions seems to be what books have in common when they become the target of the kind of corporate censorship we’ve seen at Amazon, Smashwords, ARE and Bookstrand.

The truth is, only you know if what you are selling is a quality, professional product, since self-publishing has no gatekeepers. Except, of course, the market. But that market is tricky. Everyone keeps saying, "People want this, and it sells, and I'm just writing to the market." That may be true, but you have to factor in the distributors. Even if the market will bear the current influx of extreme titles, the vendors aren’t going to let the market be truly “free” in the case of erotica.
If there was a longer, say, five-year stretch of evidence that Cumsluts Doing Daddy in Outer Space With Werewolves Parts I-XII were great long-term investments for you, as a writer, I'd say so. That isn't the case. I’m encouraging erotica authors to look at their current investments and decide whether or not they're going to pay the dividends you want. If not, you might want to consider changing your investment strategy.

The problems at ARE and Bookstrand were directly related to the influx of extreme titles, blurbs and covers that flooded the virtual shelves. Most of them were written by authors thinking with short-term views and goals, many of whom were trying to compete with one another for spots on the Amazon erotica Top 100, so they attempted to one-up each other with more and more ludicrous and extreme titles. It was a gamble, and in the case of two distributors, it didn't pay off. It's still paying off well at Amazon and BN and Smashwords. For how long? Maybe forever. Maybe not. I'm betting on "not."

I could be wrong, but there's no way to tell the future, either way. If you want to think in a mercenary way about your work, then it makes sense to hedge your bets.. If you're going to post extreme titles or covers or blurbs, I suggest making sure you've got a backup in case that content gets slammed. And having been around for six years, I've been through enough censoring cycles to know it's going to happen, it's just a matter of who and when. And the main identifying factor will be your titles, covers, and descriptions, because no one has time to read that much erotica!

So it stands to reason that the more extreme your titles, blurbs and covers, the bigger target you paint on your forehead. Is that really part of your long-term business plan? Unfortunately, the “free-market” doesn’t necessarily apply in this genre. The distributors will only allow things to go so far before yanking the chain. They’ve proven this over and over. So even if the readers want it, a long-term career in erotica doesn’t involve writing short stories with porn-keywords in the title and description. Only you, as a self-published erotica writer, can decide if the long-term risk is worth it for short-term gain.

I’m going to be brutally honest with you. Writing twelve 3,000-word short stories a week about vampire werewolf daddy cumslut gangbangs and charging $2.99 for them isn't going to make you rich, or famous, or give you any sustainability in this genre.

Even if you have 100+ stories in your catalog, as the market becomes more saturated with writers who want to jump on the bandwagon and as ebooks tip the scale toward a majority of readers, even the drive-by readers are going to disappear. The glow of the “new Kindle” will fade, and the idea that you can read “naughty fiction” on it and no one will know will become passé.

Eventually practically everyone will have an ereader and the people who always read erotica will still be reading it—and those readers will turn their tastes toward known quantities. The erotica writers who delivered quality, professional product, again and again, will be the ones still standing.

Ultimately, it's up to you. You decide, you make the choice. Are your goals short-term or long-term?

What kind of erotica writer are you?

And what kind of erotica writer do you want to be?

 
Selena Kitt  
Erotic Fiction You Won't Forget
www.selenakitt.com

No one ever said it would be easy...

“Lies, damned lies, and statistics” as a great man once said.

This survey by the Taleist website has been doing the rounds of the media recently. It’s interesting to see the headlines it’s generated.

“Half of self-published authors earn less than $500”. That’s pretty good considering half of those writers (and others like them) were probably earning $0 a decade or so ago.

“Self-Publishing: under 10% of authors earn living”. And they were before…

It’s a Writer versus writer thing. People in media tend to be Writers. They have a strong vested interest in stamping on the fingers of those ‘orrible grubby hobbyist writer-types currently clambering over the ramparts and threatening to eat their lunch. And so we get “Half of self-published writers earn less than $500” instead of “Half of self-published writers earn enough extra lolly for holidays in the south of France”, or “10% of self-published writers earn enough to give their boss the finger and live the dream, baby!”

Last year I did better than the median, but I still fall more into the ‘free-holiday-somewhere’ category rather than the ‘give-the-boss-the-finger’ category. I have a day job and I write part-time in the evenings. I expect this arrangement to continue for the foreseeable future. There is nothing new with this. Look at the bio’s of your favourite authors and you’ll see many of them continued with their day jobs even after their first couple of books were published.

You become a full-time writer when you earn enough to become a full-time writer. That’s the way it’s always been.

It’s heartening to read that one in ten self-published writers managed to pass that threshold. Congratulations. Well done. I wonder what percentage of writers submitting manuscripts to publishing houses ever reach that goal. I suspect it’s much smaller.

And for the rest of us floundering around in the long tail, it’s not actually that bad. A book is like a little mini-me you cobble together from grey matter and bits of your soul. It runs out into the world like a demented little busker, eager to entertain the masses and be showered with their pennies. Then it collects those coins in its hat and brings them all back to you. And it does this year after year after year. It takes a lot of time and effort to create that mini-me, but once created it will continue to collect those pennies on its own, leaving you free to make more and more, until you have a whole army of mini-me’s out there working for you. At that point we’re talking about a lot more than pennies.

It’s not surprising that 95% considered themselves successful. They finished a book and put it out there for the world to read, an achievement in itself. They earned some money for that achievement and will likely continue to do so in the future. Most importantly, their work is out there and ready to be discovered rather than mouldering away on a slush pile or in a desk drawer somewhere.

Statistics. Make of them whatever you want…

M.E. Hydra

Top Ten Myths About Erotica Writers

TOP TEN MYTHS ABOUT EROTICA WRITERS

1. We're sex experts.

I can't tell you how many emails I've received over the years asking for sexual advice from readers who were sure, since I write about sex, I must have the answers they're looking for. While I, personally, do happen to have a degree in psychology, I'm not a sexual therapist and don't profess to be one. I've made my best attempts to answer questions, always with the caveat that I am not an expert. Writing about FBI agents doesn't make thriller writers qualified to guard the president and writing about sex doesn't make me qualified to tell you how to do it.  

2. We’re nymphomaniacs.

I'm sure a few of us are, but for the most part, no. I'm not having sex on every surface in my house twice a day. I'm a sex writer, and not a sex blogger, for a reason. I write about the sex lives of imaginary people, not my own. While the two may cross on occasion, that line is blurry and indefinable. The reader doesn't know which part is mine and which part belongs to the character. Don't get me wrong--I like sex. I wouldn't be writing about it if I didn't! But I'm not a nymphomaniac or a sex addict by any stretch of the imagination.

3. We're all gorgeous.

 Right. Sure we are. And all those pictures erotic authors put on their Facebook profiles are really them. We're all busty, nineteen-year-old nubile beach bunnies who love sex and writing about it in our books, just for you. And if you believe that, I've got some unicorns for sale... The fact is, I've been to gatherings of erotic writers and we're all pretty normal people. You'd never spot one of us in Target and think, "I bet she writes erotica!"  

4. We're immoral.

This is so not true. Most of us have very solid values and beliefs. Morality is a touchy subject, but the fact is that erotica writers do have morals and we're usually very clear about what they are. I wouldn't commit adultery, for example. I happen to take my marriage vows very seriously. They're sacred to me. But I also think that marriage can take place between a man and a woman, or a woman and a woman, or a man and a man, that the only thing that makes it a marriage is that sacred commitment. I think most erotica writers are probably more liberal in our moral beliefs than non-erotica writers, but for the most part we're not immoral or even non-religious. I know many Christian erotica writers, believe it or not. And many more who are spiritual and believe in a higher power.  

5. We're ashamed of what we write - that's why we use pseudonyms.

We usually use pseudonyms to protect ourselves from judgment, yes, but not because we're ashamed of what we write, but because other people are. I know some erotica writers who use their real names, and good for them! Most of those don't have children, or have children who are grown. There is a stigma in our culture about sex, unfortunately, but the labels pasted on an erotica author's forehead say far more about those applying them than they do about the writer. I'm not ashamed of anything I write, but I do go out of my way to protect my family and my children from any possible fallout from religious or anti-porn zealots. I also know that because there is a myth that erotica writers are gorgeous, immoral nymphomaniacs, many people believe we want to have sex with them, and some have even sought me out to tell me so. Writing under a pseudonym doesn't insulate me completely, but it provides another layer of protection from that sort of thing.  

6. We only write erotica for the money/attention/titillation ________ (fill-in-the-blank).

This may actually be true, for some erotica writers. But for those of us who have done it a long time, who have a bit of longevity in the genre, I don't think we set out to make a million dollars, or gain fame and fortune. Like authors in any other genre, we had a story to tell, and we told it. It just happened to involve human sexuality instead of vampires or CIA Agents. (Okay, I admit, sometimes those things mix... sometimes in the same story!)  

7. We only write erotica to pay the bills so we can write our more "meaningful" books on the side.

 I don't. I think I put a great deal of "meaningful" into my erotic work, and I hope that most erotica writers do the same. I think the good ones really do. Do I have another pen name for mainstream work? Yes. Do I consider it better or superior to the writing I do as Selena Kitt? No, I really don't.  

8. We condone doing everything we write.

This is a big one. I don't condone incest, underage sex, unsafe sex, rape, nonconsent, public sex, threesomes, group sex, eating uncooked beef or fish, driving at unsafe speeds, or any of the other things I may write about. This is the stuff of fiction. It's a fantasy. So if my characters don't put on condoms, please don't send me hate mail about how I must want everyone to get herpes. If my characters are exploring sex with a sibling, and you think that's sick, remind yourself that these two people are not only not really related--they're not real! I'm not saying you should go have sex with your brother. I'm just saying that reading about a sister and brother having taboo sex can be a hot fantasy. It can also open the door to an exploration of their feelings and the issues that come up if something like that did happen. As a writer, I admit, I like edgier topics. Not everyone does. But just because Stephen King likes to write about evil clowns doesn't mean he would condone the Shrine Circus having a "kid killing" act in their show. Let's keep it real. Or, in this case, not real, but fiction!  

9. We're ruining marriages and relationship with our "mommy-porn."

I heard a great quote from Dr. Phil the other day. He was talking about the EL James Fifty Shades of Grey phenomenon and someone basically asked him this question--was this mommy-porn ruining marriages? His response? If reading a book ruined your marriage, it was already over. In my experience, most of my readers write to thank me for revitalizing their sex lives. Husbands write about their wives' new reading habits. Wives usually say, "My husband doesn't know what hit him after I read one of your books!" As far as I'm concerned, I'm having a more positive effect than a negative one.  

10. We don’t care if young children see our books, we just want the money.

This is really not true. I have called for, time and again, clear and consistent boundaries from the companies who carry my books. I'm fine with an "erotica" section that is adults only. I have kids, too, and I don't want them seeing or reading things they shouldn't before they're ready. As a parent, I know that I'm ultimately responsible for that, and I can guarantee you that my children won't ever stumble across a "Selena Kitt" book by accident. But I can't police every parent's child, only my own. For now I have to rely on parents to keep their children safe, and maybe that's the way it should be. But it doesn't mean I'm not horrified at the thought of an underage person reading my work, because I am. I don't want it to happen, and I wish parents were more responsible about keeping tabs on their kids, and that businesses were more receptive to giving parents controls that allow them to do so.

Selena Kitt
Erotic Fiction You Won't Forget
www.selenakitt.com

Erotica Gravy Train

My brother-in-law says he wants to write an erotic book.

What he really means is: I want to get rich. 

Everyone is talking about erotica lately. The words "mommy-porn" are on everyone's lips, from Dr. Phil to Dr. Oz to the ladies of The View. E.L. James' "Shades" series has pushed erotica and erotic romance into the mainstream spotlight. Suddenly my "smut writing" isn't such a shameful secret the family doesn't want to talk about--oh no, not anymore--now it's a lucrative career choice!

Everyone wants to ride that erotica gravy train, bay-bee!

My brother-in-law took a look at my current success in the genre and decided that he, too, could write about inserting tab A into slot B and make a million dollars.

And he's not the only one.

I get a lot of letters asking me what amounts to: "How do I get rich writing erotica?"

It's a hard question to answer, because I didn't set out to make a million dollars writing about sex. I didn't even set out to make a million dollars as a writer. All I wanted to do was find a larger audience for my year's worth of work at Literotica.

Maybe I'm a cynic, but I have a kind of "if you build it, they will come" philosophy when it comes to this business. There is no magic wand, no secret formula for success. You have to be passionate about and love what you do, whatever it is, whether that's being a writer or being a chef or working in advertising. No one ever gets rich inserting Tab A into Slot B--or writing about it, for that matter.

If it were that simple, we'd all be doing it, right?

Writing about sex may sound simple, but it isn't. Writing itself probably looks easy-peasy from the outside. You sit at a laptop and peck away on the keyboard until you have enough words on the screen. Taa daa, you're a writer! Ask the thousands of people who fail to finish Nanowrimo every year how easy it is to write a novel, to commit to writing every single day, or even just five days a week.

I happen to love writing. I also love sex. And I have a very vivid imagination. That has served to give me a modicum of success in the erotica and erotic romance genre. I'm no E.L. James, but I'm making a very good living writing about similar topics (although I tend to push things to far edgier places!) and the market for it seems to be widening.

So if you are a writer who is looking to get on the erotica gravy-train and want to know if you can make a living doing it, my answer would be a hesitant and conditional "yes"--if you're looking for short-term gain and not long-term stability.

Right now, erotica sells, and it sells well. There are many well-known authors out there who have opted to write erotica under a pen name who are doing quite well pumping out several 2-3K shorts a week, selling them for $2.99, and in a very minimal amount of time, making enough money to quit their day jobs.

But the question is, what is erotica's future? We have to remember that self-publishing is in its infancy, and while erotica and erotic romance has absolutely and unquestionably driven the sales of Kindles and Nooks everywhere, there is no telling how stable this genre is going to be in the future. We only have to look at how often this genre has been attacked, from Amazon pulling books from their shelves, Apple removing the genre from their bestseller lists, to Paypal refusing to pay for it, to see that job-stability is an issue for erotica writers.

My feeling is that this "gold-rush" - both in self-publishing and in erotica writing - is going to end, at least as we know it. Like those who never finished Nanowrimo, there will be writers who wanted to jump on the erotica gravy train who put out a few stories, made a few sales, and gave it up because they didn't make a million in their first few months. Or, like my brother-in-law, they'll talk a lot about wanting to write it so they can get rich too...but they never will.

And yes, there will be writers who make money at it, who take advantage of the "gold-rush" and pay off their student loans, their credit card debt, maybe even their mortgages. And good for them!

But in the end, the glut of work being rushed onto Amazon's virtual shelves on a daily basis will end up settling to the bottom. Big publishing has known for a long time that the bell-curve doesn't apply to books--which is why they invest all their money into those books at the top they think will sell best. They know that most books, whether they're self-or-traditionally published, only get minimally read.

The shine is going to wear off the Kindles and the Nooks. Readers are already getting more discerning about what they're willing to download. I've seen threads on forums where readers have asked, "How do I avoid downloading ANY self-published work ever again?" because they've been burned by the unedited, poorly written stuff that people are putting out there.

The fact is that this erotica "gold-rush" thing is going to end. This genre isn't a magic bullet. And trust me when I say I'm not looking to discourage the competition. As a publisher at eXcessica, I've done more to help writers succeed in this genre, I think, than most. What I'm trying to discourage is the "get-rich-quick" mentality that breeds poorly written and edited stories and books--and the heartache and disillusionment that comes with it, when authors realize they're not making the money they wanted to.

The reality is that writing isn't easy, whether you're writing erotic or thrillers or children's books. Writers work hard (and erotica writers may even work harder... every pun intended!) and, as in any profession, the best ones make it look easy. I always know someone is following their calling when, watching them do what they love to do and are clearly very good at, I find myself wanting to do it too. So it's always a compliment to me when someone says, "Wow, you make that look easy, I want to do what you do!" But I also feel a little like Simon Cowell on American Idol - I want to keep it real. I want to encourage those who are good at it, while redirecting others toward a path that may be more suited to their talents. So the whole, "How can I get rich doing what you do?" question also rankles me because it doesn't put the focus on the writing, where it should be, but rather on the money. 

When it comes down to it, erotica is like any other genre. Writing about sex might seem titillating, but in the end, those books and stories that stand the test of time will be those written by authors who loved what they were writing about, and who conveyed that to their readers.The writing that will abide will have been written by authors who didn't worry about bottom-lines and time-investment ratios, but rather let the story lead and the characters tell their tale.

As for whether my writing will be among those?

Only time will tell!


 
Selena Kitt  
Erotic Fiction You Won't Forget
www.selenakitt.com