[This series started last week.  If you haven’t already done so, you might want to read Part One.]

Have I convinced you book reading America is in trouble?  There’s another chapter in this story.  No, it doesn’t have anything to do with traditional publishers and their writers trying to kill indies.  For the most part, readers can ignore that problem (unless they’re also authors).  Moreover, I’ve dealt with that enough in this blog as have many other people (Joe Konrath, in particular).

No, in this second part, I claim what few avid readers are left are spoiled.  That’s not necessarily a bad thing.  Authors and publishers should spoil their readers (something traditional publishing fails miserably at).  Authors produce the raw product—think of bananas—and readers eat it up.  We’d have no market for the raw product if they didn’t do that.  (Traditional publishing adds a new wrinkle.  Like a certain banana company responsible for even the overthrow of governments, traditional publishing represents the middle people who exploit their workers, the writers, and exploit their consumers, the reading public.)

I want to spoil my readers with entertaining, meaningful stories, though.  Genre fiction writers are like the bards of old, providing entertaining stories at reasonable cost (indie writers, at least).  Maybe all writers fit into that role.  We should value every reader we have.  A satisfied reader will come back to buy my bananas.  A satisfied reader will tell other readers I sell good bananas.  Such a reader won’t like everything in my books (I don’t even like everything in my books, but I need to release my bananas or they’ll spoil).  Such a reader should complain to me about what s/he doesn’t like—I listen.  I might change my way of growing bananas.  But maybe not.

That kind of spoiling is justified.  It’s a personal interaction between reader and writer, even if neither has ever met the other, because it’s an interaction on the written page, an ancient interaction with a long and impressive history that goes back to the oral tradition with those bards of old.  But 21^st century publishing has seen a different kind of spoiling.  It might be more hurtful for traditional publishing even, but I think it hurts all authors and creative people in general.  It’s akin to taking bananas at the supermarket and walking away without paying—the middle people are hurt, from that banana company to its distributors and grocers, and that hurt trickles down to the banana producers (one place where trickle-down economics is valid).  It’s the phenomenon of not valuing the product and the work done to produce it.

Writers have always worked their butts off without making much.  Even a biggie like Patterson or Preston makes his money from sheer quantity sold.  Again, it’s a bit like the supermarkets making money off produce like bananas.  What they make per banana is a pittance, but everyone in the supply chain does well if many bananas are sold.  Same for books.  But when there’s a glut in the banana business, they become so cheap that no one does well, no matter how many are sold.  Same for books.  Traditional publishing has tried to control the glut.  Indies don’t, so they increase it.  Readers enjoy the benefits (why shouldn’t they?), but that situation will stop if the banana producers decide to go do something else.

Readers are spoiled by low prices.  It’s insane that you can buy an ebook for the price of a Happy Meal, but that’s the current situation.  Many readers won’t even pay $0.99 (my Kindle Countdown Deals prove that)—they want a novel for free, when that novel is something a writer has slaved over for months at least.  We’re forced to give away our bananas.  Who can make a living working for free?

Again, I don’t see any solution for these problems.  We’re stuck in a deadly business cycle where the very producers of the goods won’t be able to go on producing them because the value of the goods isn’t recognized by the consumers or middle people.  The producers of the goods will suffer; they’ll stop producing.  Spoiled eaters of bananas will no longer be spoiled by cheap bananas.

Yes, readers should be coddled by the authors they read.  But it’s a two-way street.  Readers should coddle the authors they like in the sense that they reward them for spinning a good yarn, telling others about the authors, and deciding to forego a few McDonald’s meals for an ebook.  It probably won’t happen.  Too many consumers want something for nothing until that something becomes nothing.  Writing a book isn’t easy in spite of all the writers and books out there.  Readers should reward that work.  Right now reading a book is the cheapest entertainment you can get if you choose wisely.  Don’t abuse that privilege.

I’m not the best or worst writer, but I value my work.  I’ve spent my own time and my own money creating a crop of nourishing bananas.  I respect that you don’t want bananas in your diet, but I certainly won’t give them away for free.  No author should have to do that.  Spoil your authors and they will spoil you.  That’s the only relationship between readers and writers that’s fair.

[Waiting for new sci-fi?  More than Human: The Mensa Contagion is now available on Amazon, Smashwords, and other online retailers.  Kindle Countdown Deals: The Collector will go on sale for $0.99, reduced from $2.99.  The sale will run from August 28 through September 1.]

In elibris libertas….

 

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