When it comes to fiction, authors seem to fall into two camps: those who have multiple favorite genres and want to explore all of them and those who couldn’t imagine wanting to pen stories outside of their chosen niches.
One of the things we noticed when looking at many of the successful independent authors in the fantasy/science fiction arena was that they all wrote in series (many had multiple books out in multiples series), and most of them stuck to one genre. In the cases where they wrote in multiple genres, they tended to be related (i.e. fantasy and science fiction).
As we’ve discussed before, there’s a lot of power in a series. If people like the first book, subsequent books often become auto-buys. Also, the series itself is out there where it can be discovered for a long time (every time you publish and promote a new book, there’s a chance that fresh readers will chance upon it, and that’ll rekindle interest in the earlier books). With self-publishing, you can change prices on a whim, and this can help tremendously when you have a series; you can offer the first book for free or 99 cents to get people into the adventure, and then use normal pricing for subsequent books.
So, what happens if you like to write stand-alone books? And, more, what if those stand-alone books are in different genres? Western, science fiction, romance, thriller, historical non-fiction on the importance of basket weaving in Sub-Saharan Africa…
If you have multiple unrelated books out, you may have already discovered that one sells better than the others, and people just don’t go on to try the others you’ve written. If so, you’re not alone. I’ve seen indie authors rock it with one book, maybe even reaching the Top 100 in the Kindle Store, only to see mediocre sales on subsequent books if they’re not related to the first. And, if the books are in different genres, getting readers to cross over seems to be even more of a stretch.
What are your options, then, if you like to genre hop?
I’ve thought about this because I’d like to try my hand at space opera some day, and there might be an urban fantasy series in there somewhere. Even in the SF/F area, though, you’ve got folks who will only read epic fantasy or only urban fantasy, and getting them to try your other books can be a challenge. Here are a few suggestions:
- Make use of the “afterword” area in your books to cross-promote — You can include previews of one or more of your other works at the end of your most popular ebooks, so why not post a few pages of something with a similar style? Even if you’re writing in different genres, you’ll probably have some distinctive you traits that appear in all of your work, and that’s likely part of what drew people into your first book. If you can get the reader to try one of your unrelated stories, maybe they’ll get into it even if it’s not in a genre they typically buy. (It occurs to me, as I write this, that I should probably do more cross-promotion of my own unrelated ebooks!)
- Include your social media sites, blog, newsletter signup details, etc. — It’s always good to encourage people to follow you online and sign up for your newsletter (even if they read your thriller and aren’t interested in the historical romance you’ve got out now, your next book may be more up their alley, so it’s worth keeping in touch with them).
- Think about whether a series makes sense in one or more of your chosen genres — Even if you’re a genre-hopper, you can still utilize the power of the series. If you’re at all inclined to write that sort of fiction, you might want to leave things open for the possibility of sequels. Even with only two linked books, you can start seeing some of the benefits of writing in a series.
- Work on branding yourself instead of specific books — When you’re writing in one main series, it makes sense to try to turn the series into the brand, i.e. the Harry Potter books. But when you’re jumping genres, you’re going to have a lot of work on your hands if you try to and create a brand for every world you create. I’ve seen authors do three or four different pen names because they’re writing in three or four different genres, but I don’t think this is necessary unless there’s a possibility that some of your books will offend readers of the other books (i.e. if you write both children’s books and steamy romances). Ultimately, you end up with a ridiculous amount of work if you’re maintaining online presences for all of these entities. Instead of building one career, you’re trying to build three. Also, you lose out on those readers who will follow you across genres. Instead, I suggest finding the common thread (you) that runs through all of your books and turning that into your distinctive brand, replete with a little tagline that applies to all of your books. Amy Smith, the queen of wry humor, explosive adventures, and geeky heroines (okay that could be my tagline…). If those qualities are typically in all of Amy’s books, then it’d make a lot of sense to offer that promise as part of her “brand.”
All right, that’s enough from me. I do think writing in multiple genres can make it tougher to succeed, at least from a financial standpoint, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible. In the end, you have to go with what you enjoy writing if you want to have a chance of turning this into a career.
Do you have any thoughts on what else authors can do when they’re trying to succeed across multiple genres?
I use pennames.
I often point out that I’m a one book author twice over. Both are fantasy, and in other parts of the same world, but one book is decidedly for adults and the other is a youngish YA. I have some crossover from the YA to the adult but not a lot from adult to YA, and not a big amount total.
I think this will change when I have more books out of each series (July for another adult novel). Increased sales within the target audience, obviously, but hopefully more crossover.
I think once you’ve established a core audience, you’ll be fine in related areas like scifi and fantasy, superhero and maybe action thriller.
I have two writer friends who started out using multiple pen names and both abandoned it for exactly the reasons you mentioned. If you ever want to switch to traditional publishing and get an agent it can help if you have a solid brand and fanbase established online, and your ability to do that is split if you’re doing everything x 2. You don’t get the same search engine traffic either when your content and links to your content are spread across multiple sites.
I guess you could not bother with creating an online persona for your alternate ego, but it’s more competitive all the time in the Kindle store and it really seems to take more than simply publishing books and buying a couple of ads these days.
I use “pen names” but in actuality both are my real name. L.A.Christensen for SF&F, Laura Christensen for literary translation and historical fiction, but I make no secret about my real name on my SF&F blog even with the disguised-gender name.
I just haven’t seen any of my SF&F audience take a remote interest in my literary translation and history-buff side, so I thought I would do them a favor and “organize my interests” a little.
I am going to link my websites together, though, so that they feel like one website or they are both easily accessible. (I would link my main one here to show you what I mean, but it’s still a work in progress.) It’s mainly having two separate blogs or RSS feeds so that people take what they want and aren’t forced to browse what they don’t.
I’m not sure if this is the right answer, but I’m going to try out this compromise and see how it works.
As for your possible space opera one day? I would totally read that. 😀
I’ve sold 8000 copies of my cyberpunk novel, but that has not resulted in any crossover sales to my YA novels, which have only sold 200 or so.
I’ve concluded that genre diversification strategy was a mistake. My advice for all writers is to write in a series until you attain some level of success. Then you can branch out.
I haven’t had many people (relatively speaking) pick up my middle-grade ebook either. Granted, it’s a short-story collection instead of a novel, but I think when you’re writing for different age groups, that’s even more of a hurdle than simply writing in different genres. It’s a foregone conclusion that most adults who enjoy action-packed thrillers aren’t going to be drawn to 12-year-old animal (or in my case, goblin) heroes. 😛
I do have quite a bit of crossover between my high fantasy novels and my Earth-based steampunk novellas, even though I plugged the first one of those as YA since the heroine is 18. I think the older range of YA may have a better chance, as a lot of adults read it these days.
I would agree with the write in a series thing, but the poor sods like me… I spent 10 years writing to get traditionally published and almost getting there when agented. So naturally, I’ve got a number of first books in a series but not sequels.
I think adult to YA works more than vice versa. For me anyway.
I like the idea of using the afterword. You could steal a line from Amazon and go with a “you may also like..”
If you liked Emperor’s Edge, you may also like my urban fantasy novel Mayor’s Mac-10.
I have yet to publish my first book, but I am doing a series, because as a reader I prefer reading series novels. One book with a good set of characters just isn’t enough! If I hop genres, I would likely go with series, trilogy etc there as well.
Great article Lindsay, got me thinking!
as a reader…
I like it when authors write cross genre. I will read anything (favorite is fantasy but will read sci-fi, epic, space opera, urban, steam punk, ya, mysteries, horror, romance ( though not typically contemporary romance- too unrealistic- ironic I know), historical fiction. I seek out books with well developed characters and a resolved ending- preferably happy. I do like at least a smidge of romance. when authors write cross genre I can rx favorites to people who wouldn’t typically read fantasy. don’t like pen names- makes it harder to follow favorites. I could see the use though if you write erotica and Christian romance though!
Food for thought. I write children’s books under my real name. Never really thought about it creating extra work. Must think on this…
Lindsay, you’ve got the kind of voice that is going to pull a big chunk of your readers into whatever genre you venture into.
There are others out there doing it. Look at Meg Cabot – she writes kids’ books, YA romance and paranormals, adult chicklit… SF/F crossovers like CJ Cherryh, David Weber, Lois Bujold, etc., etc., etc.
I think Dean Wesley Smith had the best advice about pen names – use them to keep your readers straight about what they’re getting into if you’re grossing major genre boundaries, the way Laura Christensen said she is doing.
So you might have one pen name for science fiction/fantasy/horror, one for thriller/mystery, one for romance/paranormal.
Just make sure you let us know what they are. 🙂
This sounds like the classic short term vs. long term dilemma.
Do you go for a larger readership at the beginning by sticking to one genre?
Or do you build multiple readerships (in different genres)? Your overall audience will likely be much larger in ten years, but the early years may be lean.
I write YA fantasy and chicklit so I have two completely different names, for organizational purposes. I can’t imagine it cutting into my sales because the chicklit readers are voracious and don’t generally cross over to fantasy. I might be missing out a few sales but eventually I’m going to link the two names and minimize that.
I’m worried about angering people by having it all under one name and some poor chicklit reader picking up the fantasy and hating it!
Cross-promoting via the afterword section is a great idea. I suspect that if you can get several authors who are in the same genre to cross-promote one another, you all stand to multiply the effect. I also love the idea of branding the author and not the series. The power of the internet is that the divide between author and reader is greatly collapsed, and we can interact as humans. It makes literature into a living art, where we can connect in the present while still building a literary legacy for the future.
Thanks for another great post!
-aniko
Pingback: A few links of note: Sweat Records, Jim Aparo, G. Willow Wilson and more | Alex Segura
That’s actually a question I’ve been asking myselfon a regular basis. I read and write in different genres and I don’t really want to commit to one. Come on, urban fantasy is so much fan, but who doesn’t like a good funny contemporary romance? An those werewolves just can’t live without a mate, just look at those puppy eyes!
Decisions are HAAAAARD (yes, a very mature approach :P)
Echoing Laura Christensen, I plan on using my ‘real’ name for various genres and age groups, just different versions of my name. I have one website that will host all versions of myself, so that I will get the benefit of search engines having just one site for which to tally the hits (and therefore, my ranking), to second Mary A’s thoughts. All of my series will have their descriptions and age appropriateness displayed, for every potential reader will know what each is about, but housed at the same site. This will cut back on website efforts and costs as well. You could split up your newsletter, if you send out plenty of those in various genres, but as I do not send out much more than publication information, I have a single newsletter. So if a reader who likes my adult science fiction is in a discussion with someone who asks what YA author may appeal to their child, then s/he may remember that I publish YA as well, and pass it along (“You know, there is this author who I like who recently sent out…”). Every fan, even if they do not read every genre in which you write, can be an emissary, if they know what you are doing.
Not everyone is a single category genre reader! I cannot count the number of genres that I read—if it is a great story, it is a great story, period. So finding a great writer in one genre who writes in another…well, I will easily cross a ‘boundary’ to try another great story. So let potential readers find your other work easily.
Having a single website is good for ‘tangential searching’. When I read an opinion that I really like by someone who I know is an author (or RPG designer), I try to find their website. If the opinion is written under their real name and their website is under a pen name, then that breaks that action chain. I have signed up for newsletters because of finding interesting opinions, searching for author’s website, and then finding interesting ideas presented at the website (including authors at this website).
As an ‘indie’ producer, you should be thinking long term (great advise that Kristine Kathryn Rusch and her husband Dean Wesley Smith will pound into you until you understand). If you write both young adult and adult fiction, and you think VERY long term, then you’ll realize that those YA readers may remember your name when they become old enough to read your adult fiction, so why make your real name a secret? And plenty of adults read YA, because they appreciate the ‘rating’ built into the genre, so those may cross over to your other work even sooner. I found out early that ‘Paul French’ was really Isaac Asimov’s pen name when writing his YA books. So when I finished the Lucky Starr series, I was ready—and eager—to read his adult fiction.
Stick with a genre as a writer or expand? Well, that is two issues. The first is, can you keep the freshness in writing the same genre, and that is fresh for the readers as well as for you to want to continue doing it? The second is, can you NOT write stories in another genre? I have to write in various genres because I have story ideas that belong in other genres. When the lightning strikes, I put in down, flesh it out, let it ferment, stir the pot, and write some more—my apologies for mixing all the metaphors in the same stew. Then I go back to the book on the front burner. It keep things fresh to write differently every couple of weeks, and seems to give time for the refilling of the writing well for the first book to spend a couple of days on different one.
My three cents.
Pingback: Writing Blog Treasures 6~23 | Gene Lempp ~ Writer
I’m in the midst of a genre jump.
My first novel, written long ago, is literary fiction. My current works are dystopian soft sci-fi- ish. I haave no expectation that current readers (of which there are few), will follow me over to my next work, when published.