My agent told me that marketing for your own work requires the gift of foresight.296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUyR8s7shA1
Anticipating reception is almost as important as writing the work itself. Sometimes it's easy if you're working within conventions. Outside of it, you need to fall on old lessons learned. I mean, one of the first things you hear in English Comp is the proper way to ask yourself motive: "Who the heck are you writing this for?" 296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5gIzZhj7So
Know your audience--You know the maxim. 296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡD9oCcE8ABc
But what if you're coming at this from the back end? Fffffuuu... The work is finished and you've been told it's good (and you know it's good), but now you've got to figure out why the book 'works' in the first place before it goes off to an editor and your agent or your dashboard--wherever.296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZIzGXLUwD1
Self-actualization and self-awareness are hard enough to come by. Now, try analyzing a piece of your own fiction while remaining entirely impartial. What an unreasonable ask... but an ask nevertheless, and an important one to answer if you're to proceed with eyes open.296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXHOaRa9yg6
Now, the downside with coming at this whole thing backwards is that you're going to discover pitfalls, flaws, plot-holes, and problematic truths about your own unconscious biases/opinions. This could generate more work, or merely provide insight into your own style. It could also prove something isn't ready to leave the cutting room floor.296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1O0o4XK9JE
At the end of the day, if you're not comfortable with the exposure of these things, you may feel obligated to change or cut those parts of the text. Everyone's different. Some people can answer to their little fuck-ups (--can even laugh with the haters), but for some, it's enough to keep them up at night, bumping depressing thoughts together fast enough to generate sparks. (So, for those with weaker constitutions towards la critique, I would not recommend your first sojourn into publishing be upon the back of a poetry collection. Fair warning, luv.)296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0kJsNfnKFS
But say you don't find any bad news. Say, whatever you do find about your work that may be construed as problematic is not without its merit or use... Then, you've got the basis for your marketing down, haven't you? You have the plot, but then you have the soul. You have the meat they come for, and the potatoes they stay for. You've figured out what makes your story tick, and you know how you would tear it apart if you were your own worst critic. And now you can fight fire with... er... more fire--anyway, before my metaphors start burning down--296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkyDOY0CUAP
Many people--perhaps because of debilitating Imposter Syndrome or overly inflated ego--are not keen on confronting their own ideas about something--even things as innocent as who-gets-hooked-up-with-who by the end of the book--nor are they prepared to defend those ideas.296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaHFNYAzhfO
Ultimately, isn't any work we make an expression of an idea that interests us enough to sit down for hours and hours--days on end--furtively (often futilely) mining and chipping away at the rock and hardened clay of our stories, trying to reveal a glorious Adam beneath? 296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzzM0VqQT8m
Asking someone to distill their vague, often soft-edged, ideas down into ten strong words would defeat the purpose of creating a book about it in the first place, wouldn't it?296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡahNQ41HDBe
Oh, but we are talking about conventional genre fiction here... It is a medium that at once forgives the writer for not taking themselves or their text too seriously, while begging the reader otherwise--or visa versa, depending on the intent.296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjCq1BoOHYK
So. Marketing. Audiences. Platform. The raison d'être within a piece's beating heart...296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYgS2qfMTRb
Why do we create and sell these particular stories? Are we expressing ourselves? Sharing ideas? Trying to impact the youth? Staving off boredom? Profiting off the repressed? Empowering the oppressed? Validating the depressed? Codifying the suppressed?296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQE0ebwyoqr
I don't fucking know. Shouldn't it be different for everyone?296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2JcPVyYzVo
I write about things I want to read, and sometimes the things I want to read aren't too embarrassing to take to market, as such:296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKJHt8MBTj4
"I liked x, so I made a thing like it. So if you like x, you might like this thing I made."296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLqspSbIbnK
Marketing is as simple, and as painfully obvious, as that.296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhBX95P4KsI
No foresight required.296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjiV2itIXqV
Cheers.296Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9u2T1lkAuY
