August 2021 – Writing Across Genres

My father had a small business which I thought imprisoned him, so when I was growing up I swore I would never “do retail.”

Boy, was I wrong. As an author, I wound up owning my own small business and it’s as vulnerable to competition and the vagaries of the marketplace as any physical store. Sometimes it’s just as exhausting.

From the beginning of my book publishing career in 1990, I was deeply involved in pushing my work, contacting venues for readings, investing in posters and postcards, writing my own press releases when I thought my publisher hadn’t done a good job, and constantly faxing or mailing strangers around the country about my latest book.

Then came the Internet and everything shifted to email. Add a website that needs constant updating; Twitter and Facebook, Goodreads and Instagram; keeping a presence on various listservs; blogging and blog tours; producing book trailers; updating ebooks in various ways; and the constant reaching out to strangers in the hope of enlarging my platform and increasing sales. It never ends.

And neither does the advice offered by consultants. I’m deluged by offers to help me increase my sales and drive more people to my web site. They come 24/7 and when they tout success stories, I sometimes feels as if I’m trapped on a low-performing TV show while everyone else on the schedule is getting great Nielson ratings.

Going independent for a few books after I published with big and small houses momentarily made me feel more in control, but that control morphed into an albatross. My 25th was brought out by a superb university press, Terrace Books, and I was relieved to not be in charge, just consulted. Ditto with nos. 26 & 27, mysteries published by Daniel and Daniel.

Way too often, the burden of business has made writing itself harder to do, and sometimes it’s even felt pointless because it initiates a whole new business push. So this isn’t a blog that promises you magic solutions to your publishing problems. This blog says: If you’re going to be an author, prepare to work your butt off at things that might not come naturally to you and might never feel comfortable, whether you’re indie published or traditionally published.

One author friend who’s been a perpetual NYT best seller confided to me that despite all the success she’s had, “I still feel like a pickle salesman, down on the Lower East Side in 1900.”

Lev Raphael is the author of 27 books in genres from memoir to mystery. He coaches and mentors writers, as well as editing manuscripts, at writewithoutborders.com.

In my academic mystery series, I exiled professors to basement offices well before The Chair became a series starring Sandra Oh. I’ve seen much worse behavior and it’s inspired my fictional English department since the 90s. The New York Times Book Review has noted that “The Borgias would not be bored at the State University of Michigan, that snake pit of academic politics.”

Of course they wouldn’t. Academia has the egomania of professional sports; the hypocrisy of politics; the cruelty of big business; and the inhumanity of organized crime.

But fans sometimes ask me if academia is really that bad. Are professors that selfish, backbiting, and ungenerous? Yes, they can be. Academic culture from school to school has quirks and even idiocies that make great material for satire (and crime). Sometimes the behavior is egregious, sometimes it’s just ridiculous. Either way, it’s great fodder for fiction.

Here’s a case in point. At one private college where I read from one of my most successful books, I wasn’t brought in by English or Creative Writing faculty, but by a different department.

I love readings. I have a theater background, years of experience on radio, and I’ve done hundreds of readings on three continents. I’ve also taught workshops for writers on how to do readings; they require practice, art, and planning.

Only four people turned up for this particular campus reading, and the disappointed coordinator explained why. Whenever she brought in a speaker who writing students would naturally be interested in, English and Creative Writing professors consistently failed to do anything to promote the reading. They wouldn’t be co-sponsors, didn’t encourage their students to show up, and basically boycotted the event. Why? Territoriality. Apparently they felt that they’re the only ones who should be inviting authors to campus.

It made me laugh, because it seemed so typical of academic pettiness. But it also made me sad because the writing students might have learned something and enjoyed themselves.

I never obsess about numbers when I do a reading: 4 or 400, the audience deserves my best, and that’s what I gave them at this college. Too bad the small-minded English Department and its writing professors don’t do the same, don’t really care enough about their own students to point them towards opportunities right there on their own little campus. It makes you wonder how else they may be giving students less than they deserve as they jealously defend what think is their turf and nobody else’s.

Lev Raphael’s latest academic mystery is Department of Death. He mentors and coaches writers as well as edits manuscripts in all genres at writewithoutborders.com.