Oh! And I just got to sit down and read 'wisteria.' It was great! The visuals were really vivid and I liked how Mila figured out what she really needed /before/ choosing to kiss Eleanor. Good work! ^^
The maybe-novel I'll be working on come January is a thriller that capitalizes on the gaming for lives type genre. It's full of deadly challenges, a group of people forced to compete in order to live through them, consequences, some sort of anonymous "game master", a bunch of in-fighting and trust issues, etc. The only things I can come up with are Gremoryland meets Among Us...but none of those count as a book LOL. I still have a lot of fleshing out to do, but I know the genre I'm in is very lucrative so I'll find something! Thanks for the tips! I don't think I'll do trad pub, but this will definitely help with the marketing aspect of self-publishing.
This video is incredibly helpful! I think as a reader I struggle with comp titles because I feel like some of them tell me nothing about the end result and it's gotten to the point I'd rather just read a summary of what I can expect going into the book. I'd honestly like to see less comp titles of "book A meets book B" and more "inspired by" or "perfect for fans of X author" because I think that gives me a better sense of what to expect. Perhaps it's also because there are a lot of comp titles that are "Mulan meets X" and I do never know if people are referring to the orginal ballad, the Disney animated movie, or the 2020 live action remake lol!
I'm so glad you found it helpful! I 100% agree with you on the Mulan comp - I've been seeing less of it these days, and thank goodness for that. It would be used so thinly, and often the book would not even be Mulan-esque at all. I love the idea of seeing more "inspired by" type comps! I'm not 100% sure how receptive agents would be to those at the querying stage, but I do think that it would be a lot better for setting up reader expectations. thank you for watching!
thanks for this! I hope to finish a novel someday, but I am not tapped in at all to the publishing/marketing/book review scene. I'd barely heard of the term comp titles! I started looking at goodreads once you brought it up here... didn't find much, but I don't even know yet if I'll publish at all, so I'm not going to stress out just yet XD Good to know what to keep an eye out for, though!
This is so helpful. I think comp titles are going to kill me, because all the most informative comps I can find are outside my genre/age, the comps I have in my genre are sort of... bleh.
thank you, I'm glad you found it helpful! it's really tricky to find comps that sing, but you can always try to balance it by using comps outside of your genre/age category as well as ones that might fit less well but are within those parameters, if that makes sense!
Thanks for sharing your own comps, that helps a lot to understand the way into it. How do you define if a book did well if you are not comparing with the big names that are runaway bestsellers? Especially if you write in a less popular genre overall it can be hard to gauge what is successful. Some books are divisive where they could be popular but are notorious for being poorly written even if the overall story is strong, so it feels like a bit of a minefield at times. Maybe step one is finish the damn book. 😅
thank you for watching! generally speaking, looking at the # of Goodreads reviews or amazon reviews is a solid way to gauge whether a book 'did well.' anything that had a brief stint on bestseller lists (nyt, indie) could also be helpful! I think one of the nice things about comps is they don't necessarily reflect the quality of the writing, just the themes/tropes/genre/vibes. haha, definitely a good way to start. ty again!
It just feels like as long as there's one superficial aspect in common, they'll throw it in the comp title. "I'm writing an R-rated, grim dark barbarian fantasy. My MC has a magic sword and he fights orcs " "Harry Potter meets Lord of the Rings! Publish it!"
yes, I definitely feel like marketing departments tend to kind of throw things into the wind in that way at times. it's a bummer, but a reality of the industry I guess!
Thank you for this. Comp titles are so hard. I can do them for my critique partner but struggle with my own stories😅
You're welcome!! They're tough to navigate :-( maybe your CP can return the favor?
@@lynndjung Hopefully!
Oh! And I just got to sit down and read 'wisteria.' It was great! The visuals were really vivid and I liked how Mila figured out what she really needed /before/ choosing to kiss Eleanor. Good work! ^^
thank you so much for reading WISTERIA and for your kinds words !!
The maybe-novel I'll be working on come January is a thriller that capitalizes on the gaming for lives type genre. It's full of deadly challenges, a group of people forced to compete in order to live through them, consequences, some sort of anonymous "game master", a bunch of in-fighting and trust issues, etc. The only things I can come up with are Gremoryland meets Among Us...but none of those count as a book LOL. I still have a lot of fleshing out to do, but I know the genre I'm in is very lucrative so I'll find something! Thanks for the tips! I don't think I'll do trad pub, but this will definitely help with the marketing aspect of self-publishing.
After watching this, I'm never going to NOT keep reading. Thanks for another video!!!
thank YOU Kelley, for supporting!!
This video is incredibly helpful! I think as a reader I struggle with comp titles because I feel like some of them tell me nothing about the end result and it's gotten to the point I'd rather just read a summary of what I can expect going into the book. I'd honestly like to see less comp titles of "book A meets book B" and more "inspired by" or "perfect for fans of X author" because I think that gives me a better sense of what to expect. Perhaps it's also because there are a lot of comp titles that are "Mulan meets X" and I do never know if people are referring to the orginal ballad, the Disney animated movie, or the 2020 live action remake lol!
I'm so glad you found it helpful! I 100% agree with you on the Mulan comp - I've been seeing less of it these days, and thank goodness for that. It would be used so thinly, and often the book would not even be Mulan-esque at all.
I love the idea of seeing more "inspired by" type comps! I'm not 100% sure how receptive agents would be to those at the querying stage, but I do think that it would be a lot better for setting up reader expectations. thank you for watching!
thanks for this! I hope to finish a novel someday, but I am not tapped in at all to the publishing/marketing/book review scene. I'd barely heard of the term comp titles! I started looking at goodreads once you brought it up here... didn't find much, but I don't even know yet if I'll publish at all, so I'm not going to stress out just yet XD Good to know what to keep an eye out for, though!
writing and publishing are such different worlds - I'm glad this video was able to give you some insight!
I hadn’t even heard of comp titles before this video, so it’s definitely a good resource! Also love the turtleneck
I'm surprised by how many people weren't familiar with the concept - thank you!! and yes, I love my turtlenecks, haha
This is so helpful. I think comp titles are going to kill me, because all the most informative comps I can find are outside my genre/age, the comps I have in my genre are sort of... bleh.
thank you, I'm glad you found it helpful! it's really tricky to find comps that sing, but you can always try to balance it by using comps outside of your genre/age category as well as ones that might fit less well but are within those parameters, if that makes sense!
Thanks for sharing your own comps, that helps a lot to understand the way into it.
How do you define if a book did well if you are not comparing with the big names that are runaway bestsellers? Especially if you write in a less popular genre overall it can be hard to gauge what is successful. Some books are divisive where they could be popular but are notorious for being poorly written even if the overall story is strong, so it feels like a bit of a minefield at times.
Maybe step one is finish the damn book. 😅
thank you for watching!
generally speaking, looking at the # of Goodreads reviews or amazon reviews is a solid way to gauge whether a book 'did well.' anything that had a brief stint on bestseller lists (nyt, indie) could also be helpful! I think one of the nice things about comps is they don't necessarily reflect the quality of the writing, just the themes/tropes/genre/vibes.
haha, definitely a good way to start. ty again!
It just feels like as long as there's one superficial aspect in common, they'll throw it in the comp title.
"I'm writing an R-rated, grim dark barbarian fantasy. My MC has a magic sword and he fights orcs "
"Harry Potter meets Lord of the Rings! Publish it!"
yes, I definitely feel like marketing departments tend to kind of throw things into the wind in that way at times. it's a bummer, but a reality of the industry I guess!
@@lynndjung 100% correct
Your voice rocks.
Just sayin'...