Confessions…Quickie Edition

I read the book 20 Books to 100K. The premise for this (and the similarly named Facebook group) is that if you write twenty books, you’ll have enough algorithm recognition from Amazon that you’ll make, well, 100 thousand dollars. I’m not sure if that means per year or overall, but I like the idea either way.

Another premise put forth by the author Michelle Kulp is to write “Quick Reads” and put out a book of 100-pages or less per month every month. Her focus, and the focus of the other books that push the same idea seems to be based on list-based non-fiction I.e. instructional books like 23 Ways to Organize Your Life. I disregarded the non-fiction angle and ran with applying this to my current work, a sexy vampire novel. I  had also just started writing a superhero novel based on my own graphic novel that would be perfect for the fast reads category.

What an inspiration! “But won’t you sacrifice quality for quantity?” you might ask. “Great hypothetical question!” I would reply. That’s an obvious thought for anyone, but imagine this- consider making a dozen tiny meals versus the planning and execution of a single  banquet. The answer is, that both are unique and require their own difficulties, but to be able to focus on smaller portions frees the mind from the daunting task of planning, writing, editing and releasing an entire 300ish page novel. You have a faster turnaround from idea to release, and one might imagine there is a market of readers not looking to invest the time and money in reading long books. 

“But readers love trilogies and they love to sink their teeth into a, or curl up with, a thick book!” Sure. That’s true. But in this short attention span world, I can see readers who like to finish a book in a single sitting and move onto the next. At less than 100 pages, the quick read isn’t quite a short story and it’s not as big as a novella. “It’s just right,” said a little girl, settling down in a bed that’s not hers.

I was psyched as I browsed books (and sales numbers) in Amazon’s short reads category. I emailed their customer service and asked to have my graphic novel put in that category, thinking that it would be possible to promote my book at a lower price point and achieve the coveted “Best Seller” status, even for a week. The reply to my request was, “You don’t decide to be in this category. We decide to put you in the category.” Shit! And this from a company that lets obvious erotica that is not super heroic be placed in the “super hero” category by publishers seeking an easier best seller title.

Sigh.

That isn’t going to stop me. I’ll still release my short novel and start on the next one to see what happens. Hopefully I’ll be invited into the short reads category, but at least I’ll be able to get to the goal of 20 books more quickly.

I wonder what I’ll do with my 100k…