[Tatterdemalion]

Funny, Maark. I'm about 40% (or whatever 90k ends up being) done book 2 as well and in limbo while 1 gets figured out. Similar sitch.

[Maark Abbott]

Tatterdemalion, on 02 December 2017 - 06:54 PM, said:

Funny, Maark. I'm about 40% (or whatever 90k ends up being) done book 2 as well and in limbo while 1 gets figured out. Similar sitch.

Per that ridiculous conversation on the GDFRAW group where industry workers claim we've each written two books as opposed to one, we should form an autonomous collective. Still can't believe how analacritous that whole post was. "If it's over 140k, it's two books." Hoe, Malazan is regularly over 300k words. It's one normal length book.

[Maark Abbott]

Just uploading the manuscript now.

[Aptorian]

Maark Abbott, on 04 December 2017 - 08:59 AM, said:

Tatterdemalion, on 02 December 2017 - 06:54 PM, said:

Funny, Maark. I'm about 40% (or whatever 90k ends up being) done book 2 as well and in limbo while 1 gets figured out. Similar sitch.

Per that ridiculous conversation on the GDFRAW group where industry workers claim we've each written two books as opposed to one, we should form an autonomous collective. Still can't believe how analacritous that whole post was. "If it's over 140k, it's two books." Hoe, Malazan is regularly over 300k words. It's one normal length book.

If you look at this from a professional perspective, writing over 100,000 words for your first book is a bad thing. A majority of readers are not interesting in reading a brick of pages. Even for a fantasy book, starting out heavy is dangerous. You either have to start out light or you need to wow the agent/editor.

A massive script is more often than not a sign of a poorly edited and bloated project.

[Maark Abbott]

Alternative Goose, on 07 January 2018 - 02:17 PM, said:

Maark Abbott, on 04 December 2017 - 08:59 AM, said:

Tatterdemalion, on 02 December 2017 - 06:54 PM, said:

Funny, Maark. I'm about 40% (or whatever 90k ends up being) done book 2 as well and in limbo while 1 gets figured out. Similar sitch.

Per that ridiculous conversation on the GDFRAW group where industry workers claim we've each written two books as opposed to one, we should form an autonomous collective. Still can't believe how analacritous that whole post was. "If it's over 140k, it's two books." Hoe, Malazan is regularly over 300k words. It's one normal length book.

If you look at this from a professional perspective, writing over 100,000 words for your first book is a bad thing. A majority of readers are not interesting in reading a brick of pages. Even for a fantasy book, starting out heavy is dangerous. You either have to start out light or you need to wow the agent/editor.

A massive script is more often than not a sign of a poorly edited and bloated project.

A professional perspective, then, directly clashes with what I want as a reader and what my creative side demands. I suppose that by this logic we must consider Gardens a bloated and poorly edited project?

The demand for excessively short books frankly astonishes me, and is a large part of why I decided to go it solo. If it's expected that people rein in their artistic vision merely to get published, the trad route simply isn't worth it.

At any rate, it's 203.5k words. Splitting it into two books would have been a very cynical move given that there's no midway point where it could realistically cut off.

[Puck]

While I do appreciate novellas, every time I read one that's not just magic realism or something like that, it becomes glaringly obvious how little space there is for that well loved fantasy genre discipline: worldbuilding. And every time I look at reviews for these books, one of the biggest complaints ends up being not enough or too vague worldbuilding. It's kind of a pattern by now. While admittedly the genre does suffer from unneccessary bloat, some books just need to be thicker in order to be the best they can be.

[Binder of Demons]

Maark Abbott, on 07 January 2018 - 03:26 PM, said:

Alternative Goose, on 07 January 2018 - 02:17 PM, said:

A massive script is more often than not a sign of a poorly edited and bloated project.

A professional perspective, then, directly clashes with what I want as a reader and what my creative side demands. I suppose that by this logic we must consider Gardens a bloated and poorly edited project?

Not to be pedantic (ok, just to be pedantic), it should be pointed out that Erikson did complete Gardens in some form back in 1991-92 and it got rejected by publishers. It was picked up some years later (1999) after he had already published several other works as Steve Lundin. So the GOTM analogy doesn't quite work.

But I think the Goose was just pointing out that it is often the case that larger manuscripts aren't all that tightly edited. There are clearly exceptions, but less common for first time novelists.

I see it often enough in filmmaking too especially amongst novice filmmakers. They are so invested in what they have shot, that it can be hard to make serious cuts, and so the film runs too long. That's why Im glad to see that you've had someone else help with the editing.

Still, even getting to this point is a fantastic achievement. Kudos to you. I look forward to seeing the completed project.

[Maark Abbott]

Amazon US

Binder of Demons, on 08 January 2018 - 12:27 AM, said:

Maark Abbott, on 07 January 2018 - 03:26 PM, said:

Alternative Goose, on 07 January 2018 - 02:17 PM, said:

A massive script is more often than not a sign of a poorly edited and bloated project.

A professional perspective, then, directly clashes with what I want as a reader and what my creative side demands. I suppose that by this logic we must consider Gardens a bloated and poorly edited project?

Not to be pedantic (ok, just to be pedantic), it should be pointed out that Erikson did complete Gardens in some form back in 1991-92 and it got rejected by publishers. It was picked up some years later (1999) after he had already published several other works as Steve Lundin. So the GOTM analogy doesn't quite work.

But I think the Goose was just pointing out that it is often the case that larger manuscripts aren't all that tightly edited. There are clearly exceptions, but less common for first time novelists.

I see it often enough in filmmaking too especially amongst novice filmmakers. They are so invested in what they have shot, that it can be hard to make serious cuts, and so the film runs too long. That's why Im glad to see that you've had someone else help with the editing.

Still, even getting to this point is a fantastic achievement. Kudos to you. I look forward to seeing the completed project.

Thanks! I've added a link to it below.

Regarding novel length - I'm a firm believer that people should write the sort of thing they'd want to read themselves. That was my mindset when I was writing Incarnate. The proofreader feeback was very positive, but we'll have to see what the general consensus is I suppose.

https://www.amazon.c...ds=maark+abbott

[Tiste Simeon]

That is a dope front cover.

[Aptorian]

Bought a copy via Kindle. I'll take a look at Incarnate when I'm done with the Delirium Brief.

An observation. When browsing through the store on my kindle and searching for Incarnate, your book doesn't show up before the second page, because there are quite a few other books with a similar name. Might be worth doing some SEO rethinking for later titles if you want to maximize visibility. Don't know how Amazon's information retrieval works though, might be randomized. You'd think their algorithms would push a new release to the front though.

This post has been edited by Alternative Goose: 08 January 2018 - 12:40 PM

[Gorefest]

I assume anything backed by a publisher will be top. Amazon is in the business of money making, not pushing exciting new authors.

[Morgoth]

I'll make sure to write a review if I like it

[Whisperzzzzzzz]

Any chance of a print edition, maybe via Amazon's self-pub stuff? I don't e-read.

[Abyss]

Luddite.

[Whisperzzzzzzz]

Abyss, on 08 January 2018 - 08:58 PM, said:

Luddite.

Luddit, thank you vry much.

[worry]

The price is 11 cents too high.

[Maark Abbott]

Alternative Goose, on 08 January 2018 - 12:39 PM, said:

Bought a copy via Kindle. I'll take a look at Incarnate when I'm done with the Delirium Brief.

An observation. When browsing through the store on my kindle and searching for Incarnate, your book doesn't show up before the second page, because there are quite a few other books with a similar name. Might be worth doing some SEO rethinking for later titles if you want to maximize visibility. Don't know how Amazon's information retrieval works though, might be randomized. You'd think their algorithms would push a new release to the front though.

Could be. Thanks for taking a punt on it - Let me know what you reckon.

Gorefest, on 08 January 2018 - 01:06 PM, said:

I assume anything backed by a publisher will be top. Amazon is in the business of money making, not pushing exciting new authors.

You'd think so, but what publishers think readers want doesn't seem to correlate with what readers actually want (at least, this reader).

Morgoth, on 08 January 2018 - 01:48 PM, said:

I'll make sure to write a review if I like it

Thanks!

Whisperzzzzzzz, on 08 January 2018 - 08:55 PM, said:

Any chance of a print edition, maybe via Amazon's self-pub stuff? I don't e-read.

I need to look into this because a few other people have asked the same. I'll have a gander at Amazon print editions later on maybe - I imagine there's an outlay implied with these and realistically I can't do that if there's an upfront just now. Any royalties from this one are going towards print editions, mind.

worry, on 08 January 2018 - 10:01 PM, said:

The price is 11 cents too high.

I cry

[Maark Abbott]

Something of an aside, but apparently I now rank in the pantheon of 'urban and supernatural'? Granted, it's at the rank of peon just now, but I didn't quite expect to fall into that category.

[Macros]

Amazon says I can't buy it?
Not currently available in my country, (using amazon.co.uk) strange, isn't Mark English??

[Macros]

Spoiler

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