My unrealistic goal would be writing something that completely revolutionizes the market and the genre so much so that works that come after it can only hope to have a fraction of its creative genius and glory.
Ha, you know it probably should have been... but since this was inspired by my unrealistic author expectation video and I wanted it to not be too repetitive, I left it off :)
@@AlexaDonne whenever I see people on these message boards comment with "movie deal", I always think "The Shining". It's been about forty years, Stephen King still does not like what Kubrick did to his film. And who can blame him? Kubrick, totally misunderstood the source material.
@@DrVVVinK Yeah, that's what I do too. I would be scared (honoured, but scared) to have anyone wanna make a film off of my book. I'd be bound to get disappointed with it. XD
I had a friend who had the goal of publishing a book before she turned 21. Now, at 35, she is finally achieving that goal. Writing is indeed a marathon.
@@skywa7183 She didn't want to self-publish. She wanted to go trad. When you go trad. you basically have to undergo a series of trials and have a lot of luck on your side. It's not something you can control, really. Don't put that kind of pressure on yourself. Just live your life and publish whenever it happens. You will be happier.
@@hiplessboy God willing I will go trad cuz self pub isn't that great, I've heard. But thanks! I know it's not easy, but a girl can dream right. My dreams are too wild but whatever😂. Why is it that your friend took long? I thought a maximum of 6 years would be enough with any amount of obstacles on the way
@@skywa7183 So, trad publishing takes time. It might take you 3 completed manuscripts before you write something at a publishable quality, and that might take a decade. And then to query for an agent, might take you a year. Then revisions with that agent might take a year. Then you go on sub with the agent and that might be a year. That MS might die. Then you write another book and do it all over again. And then if it gets bought, it'll be a year or 2 before the book reaches shelves. In my friend's case she signed with a bad agent who then ghosted her. So that was 2 wasted years. Then she had to find another agent which took a year. I guess this is why I say people should throw out any kind of timeline to publishing they have set for themselves.
Yay! I do mean for them to be hopeful for sure. Like it's totally ok to hope for things but it's best to go easy on yourself, re: setting goals. Just want everyone to be a little bit happier :)
Alexa Donne I love the positive aspect you bring to it. You manage to be no-nonsense and realistic without being soul crushing and it’s absolutely wonderful!
Absolutely. Otherwise we'd be drinking our sorrows thinking 'why don't I get a 7 figure advance for my book that will undoubtedly become a New York Times bestseller!' Grounded goals are satisfying because they're achievable. We've been setting little realistic goals for our social media and we just today we passed both 50 subs and 100 Twitter followers!
Okay, This has nothing to do w the video, but I wanted to say that I started reading the stars we steal and I love how my culture (Scandinavian) is represented!! It almost never is in books unless I read a book by a Swedish author. It makes me really happy 😊
Alexa Donne I think you nailed it! I did read the part about ABBA. I laughed. I did love the thing you did with the “Valg” Season. I did also love the part where Leo joked about Swedes not being like Russians which is so true. Sweden has always been a little cowardly. (After the Vikings 😂)
I'm 16 and have been writing for a couple of years without really knowing what I'm doing. Alexa's videos and other people on TH-cam have really helped me figure out how publishing and stuff works.
Hahaha no! Honestly some authors can do it and I'm in awe. But I see many baby writers barrel into their query experience/agent relationship expecting this to happen quickly/easily and end up disappointed... once you've debuted is a great time to look at it and see what you can do.
@@AlexaDonne I wrote the Adult and sent it to my agent without warning her that it wasn't MG and she reported back that she had been VERY confused for the first few pages lol.
I was thinking what if you just use different pen names for each. Then you can definitely write all the genres you want in any Romeo you want. I was thinking of maybe doing this. Obviously only my agent would know all the pen names but I just watched a video where the agents talk about their clients having different pen names.
Sofiya Pasternack did your agent suggest a pen name to separate the MG from Adult... sorry I had commented something similar before reading the comments.
@@TheReadingPuppet She didn't suggest it, but I kinda decided to use "Sofiya Pasternack" as my MG named, and "S.R. Pasternack" as my Adult name. idk what to do about YA though.
Would love to hear a video from you that is a step-by-step recipe to writing a book that wins particular awards. It would be 100 percent ironic, of course. But it would be hilarious and illuminating too. Because satire, like a court jester, is sometimes painfully revealing.
How interesting that publishing is soooo different in different countries, because in mine it is a realistic goal to be published by a specific publishing house or even a specific imprint. You just have to fit their series and standards. There are not so many publishers, though. Thank you for the video!
I mean, to each his own? And on a majority of the points, I wouldn't say so? Self published work rarely if ever is permitted to List (and, indeed, the overwhelming majority doesn't sell gangbusters), nor compete in major awards? It's a rare author, period, who makes a million dollars on their work. And then the last two points have nothing to do with self-pub at all, as they are trad pub specific. Per the first two, of course volume is the game in self publishing--but they are very different ballgames by their very nature? But those who wish to trad pub do so for specific reasons that are right for them and their books, and that's not a knock on self-pub--but neither should the strengths of self-pub be a knock on trad? They're different. I speak to those who have already aimed toward trad pub, to better help them navigate those waters. ymmv.
@@AlexaDonne I have to agree with Quartknee K. And yes, I understand, to each his own, and I understand your channel is targeted to authors who wish to pursue traditional publishing-but this video, from the perspective of a self-published author-really does come off like an advertisement, or at the very least, a validation for our choice. I sincerely believe each author needs to choose his or her own path-trade or self-publishing. But I have to disagree with some of your points. First, I know a number of Indi authors who have made the NYT Bestseller list. As for self-published income, for someone who can write, and who is willing to put in the work, it is a realistic goal to make a livable income self-publishing. I make over 225K a year, and I know a number of dedicated Indi friends who do well over 100K a year-and many who make far more than me. There is no guarantee, it’s not a sure thing, but it is goal worthy. And I agree, we each have our own goals. Technically speaking, I am hybrid, as my audiobooks (31 if we count the ones sold yet not yet released) are all trade published, by two different audio publishers. I find your videos interesting-and I really did like that comic sans hack, that darn thing worked, and I have shared it with friends. So, thank you. But some of your trade specific videos, I will confess, they make me grateful for the road I chose. Write on!
@@bobbiholmes Not to argue but I'm from the YA world and I cannot think of a single indie published book other than Handbook For Mortals that has listed in the past decade (and that was a scam that was delisted promptly). In YA, you're not going to list unless you are traditionally published. And then of course the list is a hot mess in and of itself. Regardless, it's not a reasonable goal to set one's self as it's so far outside of an author's control. I really wasn't making a point of income? it wasn't "don't set a goal to support yourself with writing" but "don't set a goal of getting a 750K advance." That's all. Authors have very little control over advances. I mean... this video was super duper trad pub specific and not meant to speak to self-publishing at all so shrug emoji.
@@AlexaDonne I totally understand your video was not speaking to self-publishing, but to those interested in trade. But understand that to a curious Indi-lurker..when we watch it...well, as the OP said, it sort of comes off as a great advertisement for self-publishing. Edit: And I mentioned income in response to the advance. Because basically, for many trade authors, that is all the income they make.
Since starting to work full time and training as a teacher, I've been trying to reevaluate my relationship with writing. I still love it, want to tell more stories and I hope one day to get published. But I realised my focus had shifted entirely on that end goal and not on actually writing a story that I love. Watching you and the Brandon Sanderson lectures have really been helpful to adjust my mindset. Thank you for the honesty and realism of your videos! It really helps, even with not as newbie writers haha :)
Oof that scares me. I'll noodle on it? A few of them I've already achieved (getting a Big 5 deal was definitely one) but I have so many that just feel unrealistic and scary to confess!
These are great to keep in mind--no reason to set yourself up for disappointment! I just put up a video this morning talking about some of the same things. All goals should be realistic, measurable, (a lot of the time) have a deadline associated with it, and be something you can accomplish without relying on others!
For me personally, it's unrealistic to write a novel. I get so overwhelmed when I try to start writing a book because when I start a project I want to look at the whole thing and it's hard for me to break it down into smaller parts. However, this flaw has made me really good at writing short stories, including series of connected short stories. So I've actually been looking into short story publishing. But my point being, I had to let go of novel writing as a goal because it was really stressing me out, but I have found a way of writing that does really work for me.
@@GeeBee135 If you need advice on short stories, I'd suggest to check out Hanna Lee Kidder. She writes short stories and poems, rather than long novels. And she makes writing advice videos too. :)
Great! You do you! My whole life I was dreaming about writing a mystery, but my reading taste, life experience and a job (medical writer) makes me more of a self-help book writer (or at least I'm trying to explain it to myself. How did you do it Camxi?)
At 06:16 I get what you're saying, but just a note: #PublishingPaidMe was about highlighting the disparities between what non-Black authors have historically been paid and what Black authors have been paid. It wasn't a "there's not enough money" statement so much as a "the money that there is is disproportionately distributed because of racism." Yes, we did see that most people weren't getting 7 figures; we also saw that at least one white author got 6 figures for a debut, while award-winning Black authors made a lot less for books that were not debuts. That was the purpose of the hashtag.
My sad broken author goal was independently publishing by a specific date. My unofficial Zelda cookbook kickstarted last August, and I had hoped to be shipping cookbooks by that Christmas- instead... I'm shipping them now, in June of the following year. Looking back, my goal should have been 'Do your best, work hard' as I've done that- but missing the timeline I had set for myself was very disappointing- even if a lot of the setbacks were unavoidable. Wonderful video Alexa! Thank you!
this is super informative and makes the world of publishing seem a lot less daunting. also, this is totally unrelated but i wanted to say that your eyeshadow looks absolutely stunning. it's such a beautiful colour on you
My only goal right now is to finish the damn outline, and maybe eventually actually publish. :p And personally I don't care what advance I get, as long as it leads to a published book. Also, I didn't even realize having a dream agent was a thing. Like, people really have favorite famous agents? This is all new to me.
My goals are a bit odd. I only write fantasy and sci-fi. My personal goal is to write 5 or 6 books a this year but my publishing goal is one a year for the first few years. Unless my publisher decides later on to publish more than one a year. The reason my writing goal is different from my publishing goal is because realistically as a writer not every book we write gets published. Branden Sanderson wrote 13 novels before getting his first novel published. He has written several that just did not make the cut. Even though now he is a nyt best seller he still occasionally has books that never get published. Steven king has written dozens of books that never got published. If authors as good as they are sometimes have books that do not make the cut I am certain that I will have some that just do not make the cut. I would love to be a best seller but I acknowledge that is not the average.
I am halfway through this video. I would agree that sales goals should be sales dreams. That being said, I have a sales goal. When (if) I publish my first book, I will have a sales goal of 10 sales to people I've never had lunch with. Realistic, hopefully. I'll probably faint if I manage to get 11 sales. But I have self-confidence issues. Lol
My WIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIG, Alexa! lol To be FAIR in my recent video, I said they were dreams of mine, so you're not technically talking about me, but MY WIGGGGGG! (This is specifically in regards to wanting to win an award lol)
Haha but dreams are ok! But once you make them a goal I feel like the universe does what it can to screw you over haha. (even with dreams though I have so many that have been totally crushed by publishing RIP)
@@AlexaDonne Oh yeah I 100% agree with you. It's nice to have goals as long as they're realistic. The longer I'm in the publishing sphere, though, I do feel my dreams getting further and further away lol.
I think an important part of setting goals is to be honest about what really matters to you. If making money from writing is absolutely the most important thing, then there are strategies for doing that (e.g. churn out hyper-steamy romance novellas with trending keywords at a rate of one per month and self-publish them to Amazon Kindle). But usually people have a particular type of story they want to tell, and that may not be compatible with goals of making lots of money, winning awards, or getting a particular agent/publisher.
These "goals" were mainly targeted at the publishing aspect of writing, but I did want to pop in and say how much your advice and videos have helped me in trying to be more self-aware of my writing and how to improve. I'm 15, but a wee babe in the woods, but writing is what keeps me afloat. My dream is to be published one day and to share my work. Though what to do with my current work is another question for another time (I guess it just sinks to the bottom of my Google Docs. Ah, well). Thank you for all that you've done and I've enjoyed reading your book. I'm curious as to what your thoughts are on young writers such as myself, and if you have any advice. Sending all the good vibes!
I'll be honest and say I would love to write in both ya and adult, but mostly because my books cradle that crossover. Which means I am making an effort to sub to agents that represent YA and Adult as much as I can. So even if I start of writing YA I could also be able to write adult in the future (I love both age ranges!) Also, a big one- getting your book made into a movie/tv show! A lovely dream but unlikely to happen. I used to run a writers group, and a guy there said he only wanted to write his book because he wanted it to be a tv show, which, to me, isnt the purest reason to write, because it seems like ur heart isnt in it and ull most likely be disappointed in the long run.
Wow, I'm actually impressed that I had never had any of these as goals (There is a dream or two, but I will definitely not be heartbroken if it doesn't happen).
I love the difference between dreams versus goals. So true. Some of it really is luck and timing so putting the big expectation on yourself for big sales, awards, best-sellers are all just going to undermine your creativity. Great video. Thanks.
Just to toss this out there, even if you don’t set these unrealistic goals for yourself, aren’t you still going to feel the disappointment anyway? Similar to a comedian setting a goal to make 6 figures solely from their comedian career one day, even if they didn’t set the goal, they still won’t feel like a credible comedian until they “make it” on stage so….idk I think aiming high is fine. When you write your book just keep the customer in mind: make it high concept, make it a series, make it original, etc. just make your book as commercial as possible so that you have the best shot of success. Don’t write another one-off random romance or thriller that no one’s going to read because it’s already been done before
have an addition; getting a film and/or series adaptation for your debut ( or later novels ). definitely possible to dream about that and fantasy how you would adapt it into a different medium. but a goal? maybe not the best. dreams not goals.
The world of Writing and Publishing is so much like the world of relationships. You can't set a goal to get someone to like you back, date you, or marry you. You can only dream and let those things happen or not happen naturally.
Great video. My top 2 favorite unrealistic writer goals that I’ve seen lately: 1) Get an HBO show, when you are early stage as a writer and haven’t published or even built an audience 2) Create an epic manga, without art skills or the ability to pay an artist long-term And my own unrealistic writer goal has been: Figure out qualities of a specific genre without spending time intentionally reading only in that genre. My own reading habits have always been based on recommendations and not publishing categories, and I’ve read stories for stories, not genre. Now that I’m narrowing my reading to genres I want to publish in, I’m learning faster.
Alexa, thank you for the dreams vs goals. Clarifying the how and why really gave me foundational strength. Trying to write three stories at a time is exhausting.
I'm so glad you mentioned the publishing 2-3 books a year when you are first starting out. I've often wondered if that was a requirement for a debut author. Thank you for clarifying that. Also -- I'm with you on the shirt comment! Yes, it really should be! :-D
my only goal is to have my name on my own published book and to give this book to my wife :D Maybe I am not dreaming big :D Thank you Alexa, I really like listening to your videos to connect with my inner writer. You are amazing!
Great advice as usual Alexa✨ I’m a teen High Fantasy writer and I’d love to see a video on pitching a book series, or tips on how to get a book deal for one.
I didn't know that being published by a Big 5 publisher WAS a goal of mine until I thought about it! Way better not to pin validation as a traditionally published author on that, holy crap...
Awesome video, I think this advice applies to all who work in the arts. Many visual artists will try many different styles when they first start, aim to be sold by Christie’s and hung on the walls of Momo. When the truth is if you can make a living from your art you have succeeded in a way most do not.
It's easy to dream about these things, but in the end, you have to make your goal be what you can control. Improve your writing is the best goal you can have.
Well, you could publish YA with a traditional editor and then self-publish an adult romance within the same year, right? We can add that to the list of things you mentioned at the end to kind of achieve these goals-that-should-be-dreams 😅
If you plan on doing this you have to make sure your agent pays attention to non-competes in the contract. Not all publishers are flexible, re: authors also self publishing so you agent needs to be sure to negotiate those contract terms.
lol, 2-3 books a year!? XD Crazy! I'm not done with my first book yet, and it's been 1 year and 4 months since I started it. :D Yeah... I don't think I'll become rich, I'm just happy if my book gets published and bought by some. XD If I get more than that, yay! :D I don't have a favourite agent (I mean, I didn't even know about them a year ago). I do have a specific publisher though. But I'm not too hopeful. But I wish! Someday! :D I'm not gonna set any of this as goals, but I'm gonna hope and trust to luck! :D
I have a favorite author who writes historical ya fiction, and I was looking for more books by her, and I see that she's writing animal fiction where it's in the POV of kittens and puppies😔OOF. I know that she could have written another great series and I would have read it. I'm a writer, and I agree that u must stay in the same genre. Working on this standalone and I hv high hopes... but they might be too high... thankyou for the video!!
My goal is to have at least 1 book published by the time im 35 (im 26 now), hope its not unrealistic xD its ok if it doesnt happen tho, I will keep going!
Love your videos!! I did have an odd sort-of-sort-of-not question, though, which would be if it would be weird to have a goal of getting a low advance? Out of all the research I’ve done, getting a high advance is risky because if you want to make revenue off the book, you have to earn out your advance, and high advances means that it’ll be harder to earn it out. So if someone were to have a goal of a low advance, wouldn’t it be a good thing?
It depends? Honestly what you really need is to straddle the line between being properly paid and paid enough that the marketing team is driven to push your book. If your advance is too low, you're more likely to be ignored by marketing so you might not earn out anyway. A 10K advance is still too high if you only sell 500 copies. It's like a dance...
I wrote a book that is a retelling of the fairy tail The Wonderful Birch set in the future and in a different galaxy and from a different charicter's POV. The problem is The Wonderful Birch is a Russian version of Cinderella. I know retellings of Cinderella have been done to death but most of the stuff I used in my retelling is specific to The Wonderful Birch. I'm wondering what I should pitch it as. I think that if I didn't pitch it as a retelling no one would notice that it was but at the same time I don't want to pretend that I came up with the storry on my own. What should I do?
Lol, I don’t even know what category my WIP is in - it’s YA at the start then has this strange transition into a more Adult book, and it wasn’t even deliberate.🤦🏾♀️🤦🏾♀️
@@ramonarobot No it's totally ok! It's actually one reason that indie publishing can be MUCH better for genres like romance, and for prolific authors. They can be way more successful and make more money in indie than trad, depending :)
"The 7th unrealistic goal is being published..." I knew it "...by a specific publisher". Oh? I thought getting an agent and being published were unrealistic dreams. I can't imagine how anyone could think this list is realistic
My "goal" that I've had to realign is just... any goal haha. I'm not great at meeting the goals I set for myself so I've decided to chill on the deadlines no one expects of me but me, and just write the damn book
Publishing 2-3 books per year by yourself is past unrealistic it’s something you shouldn’t want in the first place 😂 you can’t physically output something that’s actually valuable that fast
My goal is to make enough money from my debut to go live and write on the moon, where I'll take interviews via satellite and eat cheese until my beard becomes a scarf.
If you really wanted him to do your book cover, it's not hard, but it's probably expensive. I doubt he has an exclusive contract with the publishers he's worked for. He seems like a freelancer. Likely, however, depending on the complexity of your cover, it would be about $1000. If you had a 3 book series, he might give you a discount and make it $2500. This is all speculation on my part, of course. But I have friends who illustrate covers, and that is kind of ballpark for book covers. If you wanted spot illustrations for the inside, that would be more. Best thing to do is go to his website and email him with a pitch, ask for a quote. And depending on who your publisher is - sometimes they'd be the ones who covered that cost! Unless they have an in-house designer, in which case that would have to be negotiated. Sometimes, if you really wanted a particular illustrator, you could go halvsies with your publisher and pay them out of your advance. Good luck!
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My unrealistic goal would be writing something that completely revolutionizes the market and the genre so much so that works that come after it can only hope to have a fraction of its creative genius and glory.
True of JRR Tolkien, but also true of Stephenie Meyer and Suzanne Collins
I thought “turning your book into a movie” would be here.
Ha, you know it probably should have been... but since this was inspired by my unrealistic author expectation video and I wanted it to not be too repetitive, I left it off :)
@@AlexaDonne whenever I see people on these message boards comment with "movie deal", I always think "The Shining". It's been about forty years, Stephen King still does not like what Kubrick did to his film. And who can blame him? Kubrick, totally misunderstood the source material.
@@DrVVVinK Yeah, that's what I do too. I would be scared (honoured, but scared) to have anyone wanna make a film off of my book. I'd be bound to get disappointed with it. XD
You could turn a book into a movie if you find it yourself but selling a book to a film studio is a dream.
I had a friend who had the goal of publishing a book before she turned 21. Now, at 35, she is finally achieving that goal. Writing is indeed a marathon.
Oh no that's me I'm 20😭 and wanna publish before 21. Why did she take so long?
@@skywa7183 She didn't want to self-publish. She wanted to go trad. When you go trad. you basically have to undergo a series of trials and have a lot of luck on your side. It's not something you can control, really. Don't put that kind of pressure on yourself. Just live your life and publish whenever it happens. You will be happier.
@@hiplessboy God willing I will go trad cuz self pub isn't that great, I've heard. But thanks! I know it's not easy, but a girl can dream right. My dreams are too wild but whatever😂. Why is it that your friend took long? I thought a maximum of 6 years would be enough with any amount of obstacles on the way
@@skywa7183 So, trad publishing takes time. It might take you 3 completed manuscripts before you write something at a publishable quality, and that might take a decade. And then to query for an agent, might take you a year. Then revisions with that agent might take a year. Then you go on sub with the agent and that might be a year. That MS might die. Then you write another book and do it all over again. And then if it gets bought, it'll be a year or 2 before the book reaches shelves. In my friend's case she signed with a bad agent who then ghosted her. So that was 2 wasted years. Then she had to find another agent which took a year. I guess this is why I say people should throw out any kind of timeline to publishing they have set for themselves.
I love these kinds of video so much, they help me so much when my perspective gets out of focus and they weirdly encourage me? Idk lol
Yay! I do mean for them to be hopeful for sure. Like it's totally ok to hope for things but it's best to go easy on yourself, re: setting goals. Just want everyone to be a little bit happier :)
Alexa Donne I love the positive aspect you bring to it. You manage to be no-nonsense and realistic without being soul crushing and it’s absolutely wonderful!
Absolutely. Otherwise we'd be drinking our sorrows thinking 'why don't I get a 7 figure advance for my book that will undoubtedly become a New York Times bestseller!' Grounded goals are satisfying because they're achievable. We've been setting little realistic goals for our social media and we just today we passed both 50 subs and 100 Twitter followers!
These types of videos encourage me too. I watch them before I sit to write. It's like a daily dose of motivation
My writing goal is to have one person outside of my family and friends to read my book on their own free will.
mood
Okay, This has nothing to do w the video, but I wanted to say that I started reading the stars we steal and I love how my culture (Scandinavian) is represented!! It almost never is in books unless I read a book by a Swedish author. It makes me really happy 😊
Oh yay! I worried I had bungled it b/c I'm not in-culture. Just an ardent admirer. (Did you get to the one page section all about ABBA yet? lol)
That's fun too know Alexa added that in her book :)
I'm from Sweden and I'm writing a fantasy series that I include a lot of Swedish foods 😊
Alexa Donne I think you nailed it! I did read the part about ABBA. I laughed. I did love the thing you did with the “Valg” Season. I did also love the part where Leo joked about Swedes not being like Russians which is so true. Sweden has always been a little cowardly. (After the Vikings 😂)
Hi Alexa, I'm not sure if you'll see this comment but i appreciate your videos, they inspired me to start writing recently (I'm 15), so thank you :)
I'm 16 and have been writing for a couple of years without really knowing what I'm doing. Alexa's videos and other people on TH-cam have really helped me figure out how publishing and stuff works.
@Elizabeth Bennet Don't worry most writers are older when they write their famous books!
**looks at my published MGs**
**turns to my finished Adult**
**peeks at my YA WIP**
Narrator: "Sofiya had made a mistake."
Hahaha no! Honestly some authors can do it and I'm in awe. But I see many baby writers barrel into their query experience/agent relationship expecting this to happen quickly/easily and end up disappointed... once you've debuted is a great time to look at it and see what you can do.
@@AlexaDonne I wrote the Adult and sent it to my agent without warning her that it wasn't MG and she reported back that she had been VERY confused for the first few pages lol.
I was thinking what if you just use different pen names for each. Then you can definitely write all the genres you want in any Romeo you want. I was thinking of maybe doing this. Obviously only my agent would know all the pen names but I just watched a video where the agents talk about their clients having different pen names.
Sofiya Pasternack did your agent suggest a pen name to separate the MG from Adult... sorry I had commented something similar before reading the comments.
@@TheReadingPuppet She didn't suggest it, but I kinda decided to use "Sofiya Pasternack" as my MG named, and "S.R. Pasternack" as my Adult name. idk what to do about YA though.
Would love to hear a video from you that is a step-by-step recipe to writing a book that wins particular awards. It would be 100 percent ironic, of course. But it would be hilarious and illuminating too. Because satire, like a court jester, is sometimes painfully revealing.
How interesting that publishing is soooo different in different countries, because in mine it is a realistic goal to be published by a specific publishing house or even a specific imprint. You just have to fit their series and standards. There are not so many publishers, though.
Thank you for the video!
I am loving digging in and reflecting about if I have appropriate goals and dreams. ❤
“Make you feel like garbage” BRING IT ON ;)
This is one of the best commercials for self-publishing I've ever seen.
Why? It's not saying anything about that.
I mean, to each his own? And on a majority of the points, I wouldn't say so? Self published work rarely if ever is permitted to List (and, indeed, the overwhelming majority doesn't sell gangbusters), nor compete in major awards? It's a rare author, period, who makes a million dollars on their work. And then the last two points have nothing to do with self-pub at all, as they are trad pub specific. Per the first two, of course volume is the game in self publishing--but they are very different ballgames by their very nature? But those who wish to trad pub do so for specific reasons that are right for them and their books, and that's not a knock on self-pub--but neither should the strengths of self-pub be a knock on trad? They're different. I speak to those who have already aimed toward trad pub, to better help them navigate those waters. ymmv.
@@AlexaDonne I have to agree with Quartknee K. And yes, I understand, to each his own, and I understand your channel is targeted to authors who wish to pursue traditional publishing-but this video, from the perspective of a self-published author-really does come off like an advertisement, or at the very least, a validation for our choice.
I sincerely believe each author needs to choose his or her own path-trade or self-publishing. But I have to disagree with some of your points. First, I know a number of Indi authors who have made the NYT Bestseller list.
As for self-published income, for someone who can write, and who is willing to put in the work, it is a realistic goal to make a livable income self-publishing. I make over 225K a year, and I know a number of dedicated Indi friends who do well over 100K a year-and many who make far more than me. There is no guarantee, it’s not a sure thing, but it is goal worthy.
And I agree, we each have our own goals. Technically speaking, I am hybrid, as my audiobooks (31 if we count the ones sold yet not yet released) are all trade published, by two different audio publishers.
I find your videos interesting-and I really did like that comic sans hack, that darn thing worked, and I have shared it with friends. So, thank you. But some of your trade specific videos, I will confess, they make me grateful for the road I chose.
Write on!
@@bobbiholmes Not to argue but I'm from the YA world and I cannot think of a single indie published book other than Handbook For Mortals that has listed in the past decade (and that was a scam that was delisted promptly). In YA, you're not going to list unless you are traditionally published. And then of course the list is a hot mess in and of itself. Regardless, it's not a reasonable goal to set one's self as it's so far outside of an author's control.
I really wasn't making a point of income? it wasn't "don't set a goal to support yourself with writing" but "don't set a goal of getting a 750K advance." That's all. Authors have very little control over advances.
I mean... this video was super duper trad pub specific and not meant to speak to self-publishing at all so shrug emoji.
@@AlexaDonne I totally understand your video was not speaking to self-publishing, but to those interested in trade. But understand that to a curious Indi-lurker..when we watch it...well, as the OP said, it sort of comes off as a great advertisement for self-publishing.
Edit: And I mentioned income in response to the advance. Because basically, for many trade authors, that is all the income they make.
Since starting to work full time and training as a teacher, I've been trying to reevaluate my relationship with writing. I still love it, want to tell more stories and I hope one day to get published. But I realised my focus had shifted entirely on that end goal and not on actually writing a story that I love. Watching you and the Brandon Sanderson lectures have really been helpful to adjust my mindset. Thank you for the honesty and realism of your videos! It really helps, even with not as newbie writers haha :)
Have you made a video about what YOUR publishing dreams are? I’d love to see that! I’m going to follow in Lindsay’s footsteps and post one next week!
Oof that scares me. I'll noodle on it? A few of them I've already achieved (getting a Big 5 deal was definitely one) but I have so many that just feel unrealistic and scary to confess!
The perfectly matched eyeshadow, once again. You just look SO good, and I love listening to you.
indeed! she definitely nails make up
These are great to keep in mind--no reason to set yourself up for disappointment! I just put up a video this morning talking about some of the same things. All goals should be realistic, measurable, (a lot of the time) have a deadline associated with it, and be something you can accomplish without relying on others!
For me personally, it's unrealistic to write a novel. I get so overwhelmed when I try to start writing a book because when I start a project I want to look at the whole thing and it's hard for me to break it down into smaller parts. However, this flaw has made me really good at writing short stories, including series of connected short stories. So I've actually been looking into short story publishing. But my point being, I had to let go of novel writing as a goal because it was really stressing me out, but I have found a way of writing that does really work for me.
@@GeeBee135 If you need advice on short stories, I'd suggest to check out Hanna Lee Kidder. She writes short stories and poems, rather than long novels. And she makes writing advice videos too. :)
Great! You do you! My whole life I was dreaming about writing a mystery, but my reading taste, life experience and a job (medical writer) makes me more of a self-help book writer (or at least I'm trying to explain it to myself. How did you do it Camxi?)
At 06:16 I get what you're saying, but just a note: #PublishingPaidMe was about highlighting the disparities between what non-Black authors have historically been paid and what Black authors have been paid. It wasn't a "there's not enough money" statement so much as a "the money that there is is disproportionately distributed because of racism." Yes, we did see that most people weren't getting 7 figures; we also saw that at least one white author got 6 figures for a debut, while award-winning Black authors made a lot less for books that were not debuts. That was the purpose of the hashtag.
My sad broken author goal was independently publishing by a specific date. My unofficial Zelda cookbook kickstarted last August, and I had hoped to be shipping cookbooks by that Christmas- instead... I'm shipping them now, in June of the following year. Looking back, my goal should have been 'Do your best, work hard' as I've done that- but missing the timeline I had set for myself was very disappointing- even if a lot of the setbacks were unavoidable.
Wonderful video Alexa! Thank you!
The pause between ‘being published-‘ ..... ‘by a specific publisher’ gave me a heart attack
this is super informative and makes the world of publishing seem a lot less daunting. also, this is totally unrelated but i wanted to say that your eyeshadow looks absolutely stunning. it's such a beautiful colour on you
My only goal right now is to finish the damn outline, and maybe eventually actually publish. :p And personally I don't care what advance I get, as long as it leads to a published book.
Also, I didn't even realize having a dream agent was a thing. Like, people really have favorite famous agents? This is all new to me.
My goals are a bit odd. I only write fantasy and sci-fi. My personal goal is to write 5 or 6 books a this year but my publishing goal is one a year for the first few years. Unless my publisher decides later on to publish more than one a year. The reason my writing goal is different from my publishing goal is because realistically as a writer not every book we write gets published. Branden Sanderson wrote 13 novels before getting his first novel published. He has written several that just did not make the cut. Even though now he is a nyt best seller he still occasionally has books that never get published. Steven king has written dozens of books that never got published. If authors as good as they are sometimes have books that do not make the cut I am certain that I will have some that just do not make the cut. I would love to be a best seller but I acknowledge that is not the average.
I am halfway through this video. I would agree that sales goals should be sales dreams. That being said, I have a sales goal. When (if) I publish my first book, I will have a sales goal of 10 sales to people I've never had lunch with. Realistic, hopefully. I'll probably faint if I manage to get 11 sales. But I have self-confidence issues. Lol
My WIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIG, Alexa! lol To be FAIR in my recent video, I said they were dreams of mine, so you're not technically talking about me, but MY WIGGGGGG! (This is specifically in regards to wanting to win an award lol)
Haha but dreams are ok! But once you make them a goal I feel like the universe does what it can to screw you over haha. (even with dreams though I have so many that have been totally crushed by publishing RIP)
@@AlexaDonne Oh yeah I 100% agree with you. It's nice to have goals as long as they're realistic. The longer I'm in the publishing sphere, though, I do feel my dreams getting further and further away lol.
Pink looks gorgeous on you, both the blouse and the make up! ❤️ ^__^
I think an important part of setting goals is to be honest about what really matters to you. If making money from writing is absolutely the most important thing, then there are strategies for doing that (e.g. churn out hyper-steamy romance novellas with trending keywords at a rate of one per month and self-publish them to Amazon Kindle). But usually people have a particular type of story they want to tell, and that may not be compatible with goals of making lots of money, winning awards, or getting a particular agent/publisher.
These "goals" were mainly targeted at the publishing aspect of writing, but I did want to pop in and say how much your advice and videos have helped me in trying to be more self-aware of my writing and how to improve. I'm 15, but a wee babe in the woods, but writing is what keeps me afloat. My dream is to be published one day and to share my work. Though what to do with my current work is another question for another time (I guess it just sinks to the bottom of my Google Docs. Ah, well). Thank you for all that you've done and I've enjoyed reading your book. I'm curious as to what your thoughts are on young writers such as myself, and if you have any advice. Sending all the good vibes!
Good luck with your writing, everyone!
I'll be honest and say I would love to write in both ya and adult, but mostly because my books cradle that crossover.
Which means I am making an effort to sub to agents that represent YA and Adult as much as I can. So even if I start of writing YA I could also be able to write adult in the future (I love both age ranges!)
Also, a big one- getting your book made into a movie/tv show! A lovely dream but unlikely to happen. I used to run a writers group, and a guy there said he only wanted to write his book because he wanted it to be a tv show, which, to me, isnt the purest reason to write, because it seems like ur heart isnt in it and ull most likely be disappointed in the long run.
Wow, I'm actually impressed that I had never had any of these as goals (There is a dream or two, but I will definitely not be heartbroken if it doesn't happen).
I just want to make enough money to pay my bills and not be stuck in a call center the rest of my life 😑.
Writing is not a good career choice for making money lol
Ikr I'm a receptionist. 😑
Be a really good writer and create a story that a wide variety of people will love. Simple as that and also incredibly difficult.
I really love your videos! You're very informative and your manner of speech is fun and interesting.
I love the difference between dreams versus goals. So true. Some of it really is luck and timing so putting the big expectation on yourself for big sales, awards, best-sellers are all just going to undermine your creativity. Great video. Thanks.
LOVE the publilshing real talk, keep it coming. You have a fantastic attitude when presenting it, very entertaining and grounding.
Just to toss this out there, even if you don’t set these unrealistic goals for yourself, aren’t you still going to feel the disappointment anyway? Similar to a comedian setting a goal to make 6 figures solely from their comedian career one day, even if they didn’t set the goal, they still won’t feel like a credible comedian until they “make it” on stage so….idk I think aiming high is fine. When you write your book just keep the customer in mind: make it high concept, make it a series, make it original, etc. just make your book as commercial as possible so that you have the best shot of success. Don’t write another one-off random romance or thriller that no one’s going to read because it’s already been done before
have an addition; getting a film and/or series adaptation for your debut ( or later novels ). definitely possible to dream about that and fantasy how you would adapt it into a different medium. but a goal? maybe not the best. dreams not goals.
The world of Writing and Publishing is so much like the world of relationships. You can't set a goal to get someone to like you back, date you, or marry you. You can only dream and let those things happen or not happen naturally.
Great video. My top 2 favorite unrealistic writer goals that I’ve seen lately:
1) Get an HBO show, when you are early stage as a writer and haven’t published or even built an audience
2) Create an epic manga, without art skills or the ability to pay an artist long-term
And my own unrealistic writer goal has been: Figure out qualities of a specific genre without spending time intentionally reading only in that genre. My own reading habits have always been based on recommendations and not publishing categories, and I’ve read stories for stories, not genre. Now that I’m narrowing my reading to genres I want to publish in, I’m learning faster.
Alexa, thank you for the dreams vs goals. Clarifying the how and why really gave me foundational strength. Trying to write three stories at a time is exhausting.
someone needs to stop me from binge watching your videos every day smh
I'm so glad you mentioned the publishing 2-3 books a year when you are first starting out. I've often wondered if that was a requirement for a debut author. Thank you for clarifying that. Also -- I'm with you on the shirt comment! Yes, it really should be! :-D
my only goal is to have my name on my own published book and to give this book to my wife :D Maybe I am not dreaming big :D
Thank you Alexa, I really like listening to your videos to connect with my inner writer. You are amazing!
Nora Roberts loves to give me unrealistic expectations for writing like three books a year
lol, 2 to 3 books a year. That's funny. I'm struggling with just one XD
Great advice as usual Alexa✨ I’m a teen High Fantasy writer and I’d love to see a video on pitching a book series, or tips on how to get a book deal for one.
I didn't know that being published by a Big 5 publisher WAS a goal of mine until I thought about it! Way better not to pin validation as a traditionally published author on that, holy crap...
I just want to traditionally publish a book and for a handful of people to connect with it. Even that sounds like a "dream not goal" scenario.
Awesome video, I think this advice applies to all who work in the arts. Many visual artists will try many different styles when they first start, aim to be sold by Christie’s and hung on the walls of Momo. When the truth is if you can make a living from your art you have succeeded in a way most do not.
It's easy to dream about these things, but in the end, you have to make your goal be what you can control. Improve your writing is the best goal you can have.
I have a dream to one day get a book or book series made into a TV show or movie, probably never going to happen but it's a dream
It's a good dream! Same :)
“And make you feel like trash”
Alexa: *nods fiercely*
Well, you could publish YA with a traditional editor and then self-publish an adult romance within the same year, right? We can add that to the list of things you mentioned at the end to kind of achieve these goals-that-should-be-dreams 😅
If you plan on doing this you have to make sure your agent pays attention to non-competes in the contract. Not all publishers are flexible, re: authors also self publishing so you agent needs to be sure to negotiate those contract terms.
I am so torn, there are 500 likes on the video, so I don't want to ruin it but I want to like the video!!
I have won awards for short stories, but I think it is rather difficult for one’s novel to become an award recipient.
This is a great video of things to be aware of, thank you! I will try to keep these things in mind as I move forward with writing my book.
Yay another video!!
What kind of numbers are realistic for ‘modest’ success?
I have no illusions about being anything approaching a best-seller, but I was curious...
I wish you one day have a millions of dollars! Your books are fantastic 💕🥰
Honestly, I’m starting to feel like just getting published is an unrealistic goal, let alone multiple books in a year or anything else.
My dream goal is definitely the dream agent and dream agency... 🙂
lol, 2-3 books a year!? XD Crazy! I'm not done with my first book yet, and it's been 1 year and 4 months since I started it. :D Yeah...
I don't think I'll become rich, I'm just happy if my book gets published and bought by some. XD If I get more than that, yay! :D I don't have a favourite agent (I mean, I didn't even know about them a year ago). I do have a specific publisher though. But I'm not too hopeful. But I wish! Someday! :D
I'm not gonna set any of this as goals, but I'm gonna hope and trust to luck! :D
I love this videos! So much insight, tough love & a lot of hope! Thank you Alexa for all of the information you share!
I have a favorite author who writes historical ya fiction, and I was looking for more books by her, and I see that she's writing animal fiction where it's in the POV of kittens and puppies😔OOF. I know that she could have written another great series and I would have read it. I'm a writer, and I agree that u must stay in the same genre. Working on this standalone and I hv high hopes... but they might be too high... thankyou for the video!!
My goal is to have at least 1 book published by the time im 35 (im 26 now), hope its not unrealistic xD its ok if it doesnt happen tho, I will keep going!
Love your videos!! I did have an odd sort-of-sort-of-not question, though, which would be if it would be weird to have a goal of getting a low advance? Out of all the research I’ve done, getting a high advance is risky because if you want to make revenue off the book, you have to earn out your advance, and high advances means that it’ll be harder to earn it out. So if someone were to have a goal of a low advance, wouldn’t it be a good thing?
It depends? Honestly what you really need is to straddle the line between being properly paid and paid enough that the marketing team is driven to push your book. If your advance is too low, you're more likely to be ignored by marketing so you might not earn out anyway. A 10K advance is still too high if you only sell 500 copies. It's like a dance...
My unrealistic goal is that I'm actually going to finish writing anything at all.
Great advice and reminders.
I wrote a book that is a retelling of the fairy tail The Wonderful Birch set in the future and in a different galaxy and from a different charicter's POV. The problem is The Wonderful Birch is a Russian version of Cinderella. I know retellings of Cinderella have been done to death but most of the stuff I used in my retelling is specific to The Wonderful Birch. I'm wondering what I should pitch it as. I think that if I didn't pitch it as a retelling no one would notice that it was but at the same time I don't want to pretend that I came up with the storry on my own. What should I do?
Lol, I don’t even know what category my WIP is in - it’s YA at the start then has this strange transition into a more Adult book, and it wasn’t even deliberate.🤦🏾♀️🤦🏾♀️
Alexa is talking directly to meeeeee 😫🤣
Quite a number of romance novelists release books within a trilogy/duet/series around one month apart eg Penelope Sky
I believe that author is self-published, no? I am only able to speak to traditional publishing.
Alexa Donne oh ok, sorry
@@ramonarobot No it's totally ok! It's actually one reason that indie publishing can be MUCH better for genres like romance, and for prolific authors. They can be way more successful and make more money in indie than trad, depending :)
I just want to do well enough to support myself. Is that to much to ask for?
"The 7th unrealistic goal is being published..."
I knew it
"...by a specific publisher".
Oh?
I thought getting an agent and being published were unrealistic dreams. I can't imagine how anyone could think this list is realistic
You really should put „Dreams, Not Goals“ on a shirt 😂
The awards are also really political as well, the best book is not guaranteed to get the award
Watching this as I upload a "Publishing Wildest Dreams" tag lol
My "goal" that I've had to realign is just... any goal haha. I'm not great at meeting the goals I set for myself so I've decided to chill on the deadlines no one expects of me but me, and just write the damn book
"Having dreams is important. But a dream without action is just a wish."
------Brad Turnbull
I heard the huge advances for debut is for a tax write off so the publishers don't care if it sells
Number 8: blockbuster movie or TV series
Publishing 2-3 books per year by yourself is past unrealistic it’s something you shouldn’t want in the first place 😂 you can’t physically output something that’s actually valuable that fast
I love youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu
This is wonderful.
But I can't stop looking at your sparkly eyes. Please tell me what you're wearing.
I used Colourpop's Bye Bye Birdie palette!
Hi. Would you recommend any book editors?
This encourages me somehow HA LMAO
My goal is to make enough money from my debut to go live and write on the moon, where I'll take interviews via satellite and eat cheese until my beard becomes a scarf.
I suppose getting Rich Deas as my cover designer is a dream and not a goal?
If you really wanted him to do your book cover, it's not hard, but it's probably expensive. I doubt he has an exclusive contract with the publishers he's worked for. He seems like a freelancer. Likely, however, depending on the complexity of your cover, it would be about $1000. If you had a 3 book series, he might give you a discount and make it $2500. This is all speculation on my part, of course. But I have friends who illustrate covers, and that is kind of ballpark for book covers. If you wanted spot illustrations for the inside, that would be more. Best thing to do is go to his website and email him with a pitch, ask for a quote. And depending on who your publisher is - sometimes they'd be the ones who covered that cost! Unless they have an in-house designer, in which case that would have to be negotiated. Sometimes, if you really wanted a particular illustrator, you could go halvsies with your publisher and pay them out of your advance. Good luck!
What is a typical advance?
Leona Cade was first.
Detective Back lolllll
If I sell 10 copies of a book I'll be happy.
Oh, TOR, will you ever notice me? *Flutters eyelashes*
(🍷•w•) 🍗
Lets have some actual and realistic advices shall we
(Haha im depressed)
😊
Anyone else realizing nearly all their goals are dreams? 😂
What? I can’t publish 20 books a year? Yeah right... 😒 hahahaha
Money makes you lazy, poverty makes you hungry.
To be creative, stay hungry
Hungy makes you weak.
That in turn hurts your brain and motivation which doesn't do your creativity any good.