But wait… what does that even MEAN?
Well, in case you aren’t sure, I’ll elaborate:
Basically, the prevailing wisdom among the indie author world for how to “be successful” as an indie author (which, in most circles, means you are earning a full-time living from your books) for many years now has been the following:
- Choose a “lane”: aka, find something that is marketable, or actually has a readership wanting to read it, preferably a VERY LARGE readership, that you will also enjoy writing. (Of course, for some indie authors, enjoying writing the thing is not a requirement, only that their chosen genre is selling lots… though I have no idea how those people do it, because at that point, just get a regular day job, ya know? But I guess it works for some people!)
- Write a book a month in that lane.
- Rapid release (aka publish a book a month–or more) into Kindle Unlimited.
- Rinse and repeat until you feel like retiring, die or burn out.
As you might imagine if you know me at all, none of this has ever sounded very appealing to me.
I made up my mind very early on that I was never going to attempt to write a book a month (that would lead to me burning out almost instantly), and therefore was not going to rapid release, and I most certainly did not want to put all my eggs in one basket by only having my books available on Amazon. For me, that was just a disaster waiting to happen, and while it does work for many authors, I’ve also seen almost as many authors have their careers completely wiped out in an instant because of some misunderstanding with an Amazon bot that got their account shut down.
All those years of blood, sweat, and tears, just POOF. Gone.
And even if they are able to get their account reinstated, it is only after a LOT of stress, sleepless nights, and begging and pleading with Amazon reps to try and rectify things.
(Side note: This is something to also keep in mind if you are exclusively a Kindle Unlimited reader. If you love the authors who write the books you love… it’s probably a good idea to start looking into other, more reliable ways you can better support them, for their own good (and yours) long-term. This is how Amazon treats its authors. Oh, the horror stories I could tell you… and most authors would be happy to not be 100% reliant on Amazon… if only more readers were not 100% reliant on Amazon…)
But I digress.
That’s not what I’m here to talk about.
I’m here to talk about that elusive “Author Lane”.
As you also might imagine from that tirade I just went off on above… I was never one to “stay in a lane”.
That was another thing I tossed right out the window. Because to me, staying in one lane sounded BORING AS HELL.
And I didn’t want to be BORED as an author… that was the opposite of what I wanted to be. So I charged on ahead doing my own thing for a full decade, writing whatever-the-hell I wanted whenever-the-hell I wanted. (*cough* Becca Syme says that makes me an Island author archetype *cough*)
And it was glorious. And I still found readers. And I mostly found other authors to join up with, too, and we helped each other out with cross promotions and craft and marketing advice and such, and most importantly… I was having a BLAST.
But then, over the years, something happened.
The readers who loved my funny space opera series Starship Ass wanted more Starship Ass.
The readers who love my scifi western genre mash-up The Legacy of Lucky Logan series just want me to keep on writing more of The Legacy of Lucky Logan.
The readers who found my short stories in anthologies wanted me to expand those short stories into novels or series of their own.
And that makes me kind of sad, because while I absolutely LOVE that readers are wanting more of all of these stories and characters (that’s the whole point of being an author, right!?)… I have limited ideas for all of those worlds and characters. At least at the moment.
Of course I’m not ruling out the possibility that someday in the future I will return to any or all of those story worlds… it’s just that currently, I don’t have any further ideas for them that are really pulling at me.
And in order to start a novel, and especially a series, it has to REALLY be eating away at me. That’s how I know it’s ready. If it’s not ready yet, I’ll have vague notions floating around in the back of my head, but I won’t be thinking about it 24/7.
When a story or character gets urgent enough that I’m thinking about them 24/7, to the point I forget things in real life or do stupid stuff like put the cereal in the fridge (this has actually happened) because I’m lost in brainstorming… THAT’s how I know the thing is ready to be written.
And for all my already written worlds… I don’t have that happening for any of them, at least not yet. And that may not happen for them for many more years yet.
That is what makes me sad… and it makes me extra sad for the readers who love those series and characters. Because I know EXACTLY how they feel.
I’m a reader, too, after all. And a consumer of entertainment media. I cannot even name all the times I’ve loved a novel, book series, tv show, movie, movie series, videogame, or videogame series SO. VERY. MUCH. except for that it ENDS. It ends WAY TOO SOON, and I want more SO BADLY… but that “more” never comes. And it drives me batty.
And I mourn. A lot. And often write fanfiction, because at least *I* can continue that world and characters on, damnit!!!!
Except these days I don’t have much time for fanfiction. 🙁 So I have to go read other people’s fanfic, instead. Lol.
But the point is… honestly, I kinda hate doing that to my own readers. So I started thinking at the end of 2022, after attending 20BooksVegas and hearing one author after another talking about “finding their lane” (I mean that theme came up over and over and over again, it was almost like the universe was trying to tell me something)… what if… what if I could minimize how often I did that to my own readers???
And so began… THE QUEST FOR MY AUTHOR LANE.
The quest really officially began after watching Becca Syme’s talk on author archetypes. When she very briefly covered The Island (uh, it me)… what really struck me was when she said “writing the same thing for the same people for a long time” can lead to success, even if you don’t bother caring about “what’s selling” or “what’s hot”. It sort of hit me like running face-first into a brick wall. (Ouch.) And then that notion lodged in my brain and I couldn’t shake it loose. I just kept turning that thought over and over in my mind, as it paired perfectly well with what I’d already been lamenting: not being able to give my readers more of what they wanted.
At first I was pretty depressed about it. I still didn’t want to have to limit myself to just one genre or just one series or whatnot. But then I realized… that’s what pen names are for!
Most of the authors at 20BooksVegas talked about finding their lane, sure… but then they also had multiple other pen names. So really… they actually had SEVERAL lanes, all of which they adored writing in. And writing in those singular lanes long-term ended up really paying off for them.
I’ve never really been one for pen names, either, tbh. (Are you noticing a pattern here?)
But now, after a decade in the indie author space and having been published for 8 years, everything is a lot more clear. I know myself, my voice, my writing process and my readers infinitely better now than I did when I first started writing original fiction again in 2012, and way, way better than I did even in 2015 when I first self-published.
So that leads us to now… when not-secret pen names are no big deal, and I’ll use them for my off-roading adventures into genres or series I have limited ideas for, which I will still do whenever-the-hell I feel like it. 😉
And when, after 3 months of hard contemplation, soul-searching, and market research, I’ve realized that there IS, in fact, a main author lane for me! *squee*
Despite my initial terror that I was destined to genre-hop forever and ever, never establishing a true foothold anywhere or finding any one group of authors to really belong with because of my damnable Island tendencies and proficiency for wanting to explore EVERYTHING…
I rather accidentally stumbled upon this lane. But once I found it, it gripped me hard. However, I didn’t want to prematurely announce it, given that I’d THOUGHT I’d found a lane just a few weeks previously that ended up not standing the test of… well, a few weeks. LOL.
But THIS one… I’ve tested it a few times now, done lots of market research like I said, and it STILL feels good. It still excites me. I’m already building a world and characters and guess what??? They are making me put cereal in the fridge and almost gas up our hybrid car with diesel! O_o
Lolol. All good signs, though. (If not necessarily that great for our car…)
And it’s the best of the best, because this genre allows infinite ideas. It is an infinite playground. I will literally be able to do ANYTHING I WANT within the confines of this genre and my budding story world.
And it’s ironic, too, because it’s bringing me full circle. Back to my “roots” as an author. Back to the genre I wrote at first, at the beginning. Back to the genre I grew up on… which makes complete sense, really.
Funny it took me an entire DECADE to figure this out. Such is life though, I suppose.
I have other books to finish first, of course, before I can launch off into this new adventure.
The Legacy of Lucky Logan has 2.25 more books to go, and I love that series so very much. There are plenty of spin-offs and continuations in the pipeline for that one, eventually, but my dears need a rest for a bit at the conclusion of this main story. Hahah. Though I may end up loosely connecting the LL series with the big new one! We’ll see…
And there’s my epic romantic fantasy trilogy. That one HAS to be finished and published before the covers I already had made and paid for get old fashioned and out-of-date!! O_o (Which, we’re already butting up against that time, I think, eek.)
In the meantime, I’ll be plotting and building the new series world in the background, so by the time I’m ready to take off with it I can hit the ground running. I wouldn’t be surprised if a prequel story or two for that is launched in-between the conclusion of the Lucky Logan series and the romantic fantasy series though, honestly.
But then… it will be time to hit that brand new highway full speed ahead!!! ^_^ WOOT!
And that highway is called…
GALACTIC EMPIRE SCIENCE FICTION
Basically. Or at least, that’s what Amazon calls it. But you already know my feelings on Amazon.
So here are some series that are similar in tone/feel/subject matter/worlds/crews to what I’ll be doing:
Aeon 14 by M. D. Cooper
The Colossus Collection by Nicole Grotepas
Starhawke Rising by Audrey Sharpe
Star Kingdom by Lindsay Buroker
Renegade Star by JN Chaney
And there you have it. A satisfying conclusion to what was a rather difficult and frustrating quest. Whew.
I am absolutely ecstatic about this discovery though and I have sooooooooooooo many plans and can’t WAIT to get started… but all of that is for another day…
PS: Don’t forget to join my newsletter if you want to stay abreast of all this craziness…
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