One thing that writers get asked about a lot is where they get their ideas, and I’ve already blogged about that (spoiler: from everywhere!), but one thing that happens if you’re a person who tends to generate a ton of ideas (it’s me. Hi. I’m the problem. It’s me.) is that it can be hard to decide which idea to focus upon at any given time. The standard advice, which I can’t argue with, is that if you can write several books a year (my average is 3), then you should focus on one series before moving on to the next. That is fundamentally solid advice and should probably be followed.
But I can’t do it. I did write the first four Broken Stars books all at once, but other ideas have called to me, and in order to show up for the idea, it means that I needed to start the work of putting it out there. Which … I write fast, comparatively, so I can juggle several ideas at a time, even if I can only work on one book at a time. What I needed to do was get these other ideas out of my system. Also, a big consideration, I didn’t want to get five books and five years into a publishing career and have to find a whole new audience when I switched from cishet sci-fi romance to m/m fantasy. I really wasn’t sure whatever audience I had would follow me in that switch. So, I would build both audiences at the same time.
Once again, this is something no one who actually knows what they’re talking about regarding making a living doing this would tell you to do. It is spectacularly bad advice for most people. However, for me, it was the only way I could preserve my love of the work and not get bored. So, I decided to go ahead and work on several different series at once. Other writers do this. Not many, but there are people, like Andrew Rowe, who are successful working on multiple series. Seanan McGuire comes to mind as well if we’re looking for examples of successful Trad authors. Those examples aren’t flipping back and forth between sf and fantasy the way I am, but I digress.
So, 2 years later, I decided that I was doing this on purpose. And beyond fears of my audience not following me, I found that my queer fiction was doing much better than my cishet fiction anyway. Perhaps it has something to do with own voices authenticity. Or maybe I’m just better at that, for whatever reason.
So, as I write this, I have three series going concurrently.
The Broken Stars series, the cishet SF Romance. Book 5 is done and I’m getting ready to publish that in March. This will be the last book in the series, although there will be a short story/novella released digitally that will serve as a denouement and wrap up some dangling threads.
The Ascension Apocalypse series. Secondary World Romantic Urban Fantasy. The first book in this series, Blade of Shadows, Wings of Light is my best-selling book by far. It is not even close. This will be five books long, and I’m working on Book 2 right now.
The Circle and the Shadow. This is an epic sword and sorcery series, of which Curse of the Onyx Heart was the first volume. I have big plans for this series, and I have it outlined at 8 books. The 2nd book will be finished, I hope, by the end of this year and will be out next spring. This is also the series that I’m keeping PG-13, though I might publish spicy outtakes from it on Bookfunnel.
I have three other series planned, both sci fi and fantasy. When I sat down and made a list of the books it would take to finish all of these, as well as some stand-alones I wanted to write, it came to 30 books. Because I am me, I made a plan for finishing them and at my current pace it will take me roughly twelve years. I should live at least that long, so, yay?
So no, I am not following the best advice for how to grow an Indie Publishing career. But I’m doing it the way I want to do it. My life is set up in a way that this doesn’t have to support me, though it would be very nice if it were at least paying for itself, but I’m happy with the quality of work I am doing and am inspired by all of my different series.
Here’s the thing. Everybody must do things the way it makes the most sense for them. My scattershot ADHD strategy is very on brand, I’ve got to say. But I’m still writing and publishing the work that I love, and the fact that I get to spend most of my time is a gift for which I am grateful.
So, if you’ve read my books and liked them, thank you. If you’ve given me a chance and I wasn’t your thing, that’s great too. I do have a lot of great work planned for the future. Most of it will be queer, but there are also major cishet characters because I believe in diversity. I hope you will take the ride with me.