7 myths about authors

Why “7 myths about authors”? It all goes back to when I worked at a newspaper: I learned pretty quickly that most readers had no clue about what went in to putting out what was known as the “daily miracle.” It wasn’t a miracle at all. It was part of a process that required teamwork, determination, creativity, attention to detail, research, and the ability to meet deadline.

But all readers cared about was the end result. And if there was something they didn’t like about it, they’d let you know. It’s much the same with books.

At the newspaper, whenever I got a fair criticism, I took it to heart and made it a point to do better next time. When I got an unfair criticism, I did the same thing — but in the back of my head, a snarky little voice would silently utter the following words: “You try it then!”

The truth is, it’s not just newspapers that are mysteries to the people who buy them. Most of us don’t have a clue how much thought, preparation, skill, and hard work goes into what anyone else does for a living.

These days, I write books, and it’s the same way. Most readers don’t know what goes into being an author, the frustrations we face and the time it takes. You’ll hear things like, “I always wanted to write a book.” But they never did, either because they didn’t want to take the time necessary to make it happen or because they didn’t know how to go about it.

That’s OK. And it’s OK that readers don’t know much about what happens on our end, either. But that’s why I thought I’d write this piece: to give them an idea about what it takes, and to put to rest some misconceptions about us and what we do.

We’re all celebrities

Quick: How many authors can you name off the top of your head? Stephen King, J.K. Rowling, James Patterson, maybe a few classic writers like Mark Twain and Charles Dickens...

Most people haven’t even heard of many authors on the New York Times bestseller list — unless they were celebrities or political figures already: people who got signed to publishing contracts not because of their writing ability (many of them have co-writers or ghostwriters), but because they already had marketable names. You’ve probably heard of even fewer authors signed by the so-called Big Five publishing houses.

Yet for some reason, the odd notion persists that authors are somehow celebrities just because they’re authors. The opposite is true. No one’s heard of most of us, and many of us are introverts who’d much rather be sitting in front of our computers than gladhanding and getting photographed. Most of those who are celebrities already were, and for many of them, publishing a book is more is more about vanity and branding than actually writing.

You’ll find our books at Barnes & Noble

According to Berrett-Koehler Publishers, a book as “far less than a 1% chance” of being stocked in an average bookstore. There are so many books fighting for such limited shelf space — especially with brick-and-mortar bookstores dwindling in number — that it’s a heavy lift to get your book a place, and most bookstores won’t carry self-published books at all.

I once had two books at my local Barnes & Noble at the same time, and saw another one of my titles on the shelf at B&N in Los Angeles, 200 miles down the road. I was stoked. But what did that mean in the end, other than a bit of excitement and pride?

To find out, read on.

We all have publishing contracts

There was a time when finding a publisher was the only way to get your work out there, and the only way to get a publisher was to find an agent willing to represent you. But that’s not true anymore.

The vast majority of authors these days don’t have agents and haven’t been signed by publishing houses. Instead, they put out their own books through companies like Kobo, Lulu, Ingram Spark, and the most widely used platform: Amazon’s self-publishing arm, KDP (formerly CreateSpace).

I’ve had half a dozen books traditionally published, and I’ve been pleased with the results, aesthetically. The company I signed a contract with was able to format several of my books with color photos and glossy pages — something I couldn’t have afforded to do myself. They also hooked me up with some media interviews. Pretty cool. But, again, read on.

We’re all wealthy

It all comes down to this: Most of us don’t. We have day jobs that pay the rent, and if you crunched the numbers in terms of hours, we probably make less than minimum wage on our books, especially when you factor in expenses like advertising, editing, cover design, and so forth. Traditional publishers do some of that for you, but you still have to do a lot of your own marketing, and even then, you may not wind up with much in your pocket.

Those books I had traditionally published and the ones that appeared at Barnes & Noble? They didn’t make me anywhere near enough money to live on. And even if you factor in the other 25 books I’ve published myself, I make far more money doing contract writing and editing than I do from all my books combined.

And if you think that’s surprising, consider this: Most authors don’t go into the business with a background as a professional writer and editor. I had about 25 years of work as a journalist under my belt before I published my first book. That’s how hard it is to make money as an author.

A 2018 Authors Guild survey of more than 5,000 professional writers in the United States found that their median income was $6,080 in 2017, with just $3,100 being from book income alone — less than one-quarter the federal poverty level for a single-person household.

We don’t need reviews

Reviews help any product gain visibility on Amazon, but for some reason, readers seem more reluctant to review books than other products, which has always mystified me.

Stephen King’s The Stand had 20,000 reviews as of July 4, 2021, which sounds like a lot (and it is for an author) until you notice that the third generation of Amazon’s Echo Dot smart speaker had more than 41 times as many:  862,000. A set of queen-size Mellanni bedsheets had nearly 234,000, and a hair-straightener from HIS had almost 71,000.

Most people put more time and effort into reading a book than they do into listening to a speaker, straightening their hair, or lying down to sleep. So you’d think they’d be willing to spend a little more energy writing a review for a book they’ve read than they would for those other products. Not so.

Maybe they think we don’t need the help, but if so, I’d refer them to the misconception directly above this one.

Plus, we like to be appreciated — probably more than a hair-straightener does.

We’re either superheroes or slackers

Two misconceptions exist about an author’s workload, and they’re both equally wrong.

On the one hand, I’ve been approached by people who are almost awestruck at the fact that I’ve written a book (I’ve written more than 30). “I could never do that!” they say, marveling at the immense amount of work that must have gone into it. And yes, writing a book is a lot of work. But so is building a house, repairing a car, putting out a newspaper... pretty much any job that requires an honest day’s effort.

On the other hand, there’s this idea floating around that authors are a bunch of flighty layabouts who spend most of their time wringing their hands over writer’s block and crumpling up unsatisfactory half-written pages and tossing them into overflowing trash bins.

That’s not true, either. There’s really no such thing as writer’s block. Any author who claims to suffer from it either isn’t getting up and walking around enough, has grown bored with their own story, is being distracted by something else, or actually has been writing so much they’ve gotten burned out.

Authors are neither miracle workers nor slackers. We’re people who do a job and want to make some money, make a difference, and be appreciated for what we do.

We’re all the same

Many readers seem to be under the impression that — unless a writer’s a celebrity — the only things that differentiate one author from another are the genre they write in, and personal preference (“whether I like their stuff or not”). Of course, you have to read their books to form a preference.

In the days when virtually all authors went through publishing houses, those publishers served as gatekeepers. Yes, they made mistakes, and often big ones: J.K. Rowling’s submissions were rejected repeatedly, as just one among many examples. The process was highly subjective — and frustrating for those who didn’t make the cut. But at least the reader could (usually) count on a certain level of quality.

These days, when anyone who wants to publish their own books can do so, quality is all over the board, ranging from high eloquence to incoherent rubbish. All authors are not the same, but because we’re all on the same playing field, there’s very little to differentiate us unless we have a name, and unless you actually open one of our books.

With more than 1.7 million books self-published in the U.S. in 2018, who has time for that? You don’t even have time to judge a book by its cover anymore.

What it all boils down to is authors are people who do a job that they believe in. We want to be paid, and we want to be appreciated. That shouldn’t be too hard to understand. In that way, we are all the same — not just authors, but human beings: That’s all most of us really ever want.

Stephen H. Provost has written more than 30 books and published more than 25 on his own imprints, Dragon Crown Books and Century Cities Publishing. All are available at Amazon.