The continent can be fictional too. On an “earth-like” planet that you never actually call earth. 
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True, very true.
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This depends on the person, but in general, self-publishing doesn’t mean you’re not good enough for traditional publishing. There’s a stigma around self-publishing where many think this way: “Oh, you self-published? That just means you couldn’t get a publisher.” But in reality, many go the self-publishing route without ever having to try traditional publishing, without the desire to traditionally publish. This is because the majority who self-publish only do so because they want full control. They’d rather choose the cover design, choose where to distribute their books, choose how much editing goes into it, choose all the different things you don’t get to choose with trad-publishing. And not only that, but they’d rather get the majority of the royalty percentage and pay everything out of their own pocket than get published for free and barely get anything from royalties.
Self-publishing isn’t actually a last resort. It’s a choice based on what you want most out of publishing in general.
But like I said, it depends on the person because some people may choose self-publishing as a last resort just because they can’t get traditionally published their way. This basically happened to Rachel Hollis with her fiction books. She had publishers who wanted to buy it, but told her that if they do, she would need to add sex to them because otherwise, it wouldn’t sell (this was around Fifty Shades era) and she wasn’t going to do that because 1) there was no point to the sex. And 2) her book was supposed to be innocent. So, she gave up trying to traditionally publish and went self-publishing, and eventually found her audience. But she later became a hybrid author where her non-fictional works were traditionally published.
Not to mention, you can self-publish and get those same books traditionally published if they become successful enough. This has happened to many authors like A. K. Mulford and Ruby Dixion who actually self-published and put money into their books. And then there’s authors who self-published online (through Wattpad, their blogs, etc.) like Andy Weir, Anna Todd, E. L. James, and so many others who eventually got picked up by publishers. Andy was posting the Martian one chapter at a time on his website, then posted it to Amazon Kindle, and it gained the attention of publishers. He even got a movie deal from it that starred Matt Damon. Anna’s book was a Harry Styles fan fiction on Wattpad, and E. L’s book was a Twilight fan fiction on FF(.net).
It’s kinda crazy what self-publishing can do. Though, of course, only a select few can get those big dreams, but it doesn’t mean it can’t happen to you.
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I still think that all of this is a massive losing game. Like you said, success only happens to a select few. Most of us on here, if not all of us, aren’t going anywhere. For me it’s because my work is just not good enough and it will never be. It’s based on luck I guess. When you write what you’re passionate about and it happens to line up with what readers and publishers want then you have a shot. But if you’re like me and all you ever manage to write is dog sh*t then you’re spinning you’re wheels and going nowhere and there’s no hope for you. And then you have to continue living knowing that you wasted so many years on something absolutely worthless and that you will never get that time back, and you will always feel like you’re not good enough and that you’re too inadequate to produce anything that’s of any value. That’s how this game goes for most of us. Writing can’t be taught, it’s about luck and talent really, and for most of us it just isn’t worth trying anymore. It’s better to either give up or keep writing just to keep it to yourself because despite everything you still love your story even if everyone else tells you that it’s bad.
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I am sorry, but you seem very negative about the whole thing or is that you just facing the bitter reality that has been glaring you in the face this whole time. Mixture of both maybe?
Sorry if that came off as hella rude.
Your comment just seems a little defeating in a sense.
I mean it does make sense in a way when you see the bigger picture.
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So are you saying that I should put Twilight through Gizoogle and then submit it to a publisher instead? Because from what you are saying, the only way to win this game is by cheating.
that’d be plagiarism so no but my point is there is no way to win the game not even by cheating you either have it or you don’t and most of us don’t have “it…” it’s all hopeless honestly and it’s not really worth trying anymore. It’s better to just write what you want to write and keep it to yourself
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That is a loser mentality. You will regret that once you grow older and greyer.
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Hehe. Maybe you should have been a comedian, because that is the funniest thing I have heard since someone argued against writing anything at all!
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Don’t give up! Remember, Colleen Hoover’s a millionaire. Success is very often a matter of luck as well as talent. In the meantime, just do the things that will eventually pay off – read and write as much as you can, submit short stories, poems or essays to magazines to try to get your work in front of readers, upload to Wattpad, Amazon, Kindle Vella or wherever you think best, etc. etc. Maybe start a blog to attract people to the same subjects as your books. There’s no point in keeping your work to yourself if you can earn a few pennies every month from Kindle Unlimited and whatnot. There’s lots of advice online about how to get your work in front of people, and you really only need a small but devoted niche audience to become successful. Others have done it. You can do this with a lot of patience and a little optimism! ( ˆ◡ˆ)۶ ٩(˘◡˘ )
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I didn’t argue against writing just pointed out that it’s an uphill battle and for some of us there isn’t a chance of making it so it’s better to just write for the hell of it.
I have ASD and it’s impossible for me to write something people want to read because I’m constantly writing for an audience that I don’t understand. So for me I don’t think there’s a chance. Sometimes it’s better to just recognize the harsh reality and to just stop trying. Some people can write what they want and be successful but I can write what I want but it’s never going to be good enough to share. There just isn’t an audience for it and I’m not good enough to do it well. So it’s just a waste of time. I put so much work and love into something that will never be good enough for anyone and hell if that doesn’t want to make someone unalive themselves then I don’t know what will. Understanding that you can’t create what you want because it isn’t good enough is a harsh truth and perhaps the most difficult experience ever. It makes you feel like you’re not good enough to exist. And if you have ASD you already feel like that anyway so having to experience it with your creative work too is just too much. The writing works is hateful and closed off. It’s just not possible to be successful unless you can write a certain way. It’s incredibly exclusive and there isn’t much hope for most of us. So no you can’t write what you want. It’s better to either sell out or quit
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I have ASD and you can’t stop me from writing what I want.
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Thing is, no one’s work is perfect. Writing is subjective so for every person that loves it, there’s going to be someone who hates it. There is no such thing as the “greatest story ever” because it doesn’t exist. Books that are subjectively crappy to the majority do get published, and books that are subjectively amazing to the majority don’t. But the crappy books usually get published because 1) the publishers subjectively liked it enough to publish it or 2) the writer has a massive following to ensure great sales. This happens a lot to celebrities, YouTubers, and writers on Wattpad or other online writing websites. Heck, Christine Riccio, a big BookTuber (over 400K subscribers), had her very first book published easily.
She documented the process of drafting it to getting it published and it took, essentially, three years. Writing it. Editing it. Publishing it with Wednesday Books. She described it as her very first book she ever tried to write; she’s written screenplays before and other things, but never a novel. Personally, the book was subpar at best. I gave it 3 stars just because the idea was good and there were some decent scenes. But there was a lot of grammar mistakes, pacing issues, and scenes that could’ve been cut. It was sloppy work, especially when it comes from a publishing company. And, because of her massive following and probably connections her agent has, when the book first came out, it hit the New York Times bestseller list.
A part of it is luck, most of which came from her popularity.
But to the majority of us who are hidden from the rest of the world, yes. It is luck. It’s always luck. And it’s not just about writing, but about anything. Getting your dream job, your dream car, your dream house, your dream significant other, your dream college, your dream anything is based on luck. Most people don’t have that, but most who do get that dream work hard for it. I once saw this TikTok video of a guy describing how he bought and created his own cafe/bookstore duo for 300K, most of which was paid in cash. He had no knowledge on coffee or how to run a business either. But he said he became a photographer and did as many gigs as possible and saved everything he made. He couldn’t get a realtor to sell him anything, and instead, found an empty shop and asked the owner if he could lease it to him directly, and pay it in cash. After everything was said and done, he renovated the hell out of it and built his cafe.
I’ve also heard of people saying you can start a bookstore with just 5K, which to me, sounds crazy because I’ve done the math—the cheapest you can go is probably 80K. But this lady, also on TikTok, described how she got her dream bookstore: she started small with used books and she put in a lot of hours as not only the owner but an employee. Over time, her sales were decent enough to expand and now she’s selling both new and used books.
The majority of successful people out there get rejected constantly before they make it big. Walt Disney was told he wasn’t creative enough, and he went bankrupt making Snow White and everyone thought it wasn’t going to do well. Marilyn Monroe was told she wasn’t pretty enough to be a model and actress, and that she’d be best being a secretary. Steve Jobs was fired from his own company. While Emily Dickenson was alive, only a few of her poems were published out of hundreds to thousands. Stephen King kept getting rejected by publishers and threw his manuscript in the trash until his wife told him to continue submitting them.
Point is, luck may play a part for most of the time, but it’s also just showing up, putting in the work, and not giving up that gets you to where you want to be.
Every creative person feels that way. Even people who are successful. Even people who have been in the business for years. People who have been trying to get their foot in the door.
During Taylor Swift’s Miss Americana documentary, there was a scene where she didn’t win an award, and she bawled her eyes out, saying that her music wasn’t good enough, and how her next album has to be better. And in Selena Gomez’s Mind and Me documentary, she hated how she looked, how she preformed, and thought of herself in a kid’s body. She didn’t feel like what she was doing was good enough, either. Feeling like you’re not good enough is insecurity talking, and no matter how successful you may be, it will gnaw at you and eventually destroy you.
As someone who isn’t successful in writing, I do have moments where my work isn’t good enough and that I’ll never be good enough. But then I remind myself that every writer eventually feels this way about their work, and that it’s normal. I remind myself that the majority of writers, even ones who are published, are still learning and practicing their writing skills. It’s a never ending game because perfection in this field is non-existent. Perfection in any field, in any shape, way, or form, is non-existent. And I’ve seen what perfectionism does to people, specifically in writing. They give up. And if you give up just because you can’t be perfect at it means that this industry, that doing anything really, is not for you and you need to re-evaluate yourself and lean away from perfectionism.
Writing can be taught, actually. You can learn grammar and punctuation. You can learn about pacing, character agency, the craft of storytelling, showing vs. telling, and more. There’s a lot of blogs out there, a lot of YouTube videos from authors who teach you about it. Learning about it, practicing it, doing whatever you can to improve is how you can get better. I know because I’ve done it. I started writing at the age of twelve, and at the time, I thought I was an amazing writer, though I once heard my dad say that I seriously needed an editor. But it wasn’t until I found Wattpad by age fifteen where many reviewed my work and told me, in a basic sense, that it sucked. I cried and wanted to give up, but decided not to because it’s been a dream of mine to get published. So, after that moment of weakness, I grew thick skin and put in as much effort as I could to improve. I implemented people’s advice, I looked up how to improve, I practiced whatever I could and learned from my mistakes. For most of my teenage life, everyone who has ever read my writing laughed at me and said it sucked and how it didn’t make sense. It wasn’t until I was eighteen where I saw the differences, where I was improving.
I wrote a short story for my family and they read it. They cried while reading it (because it was emotional) and it was the first time I had ever been told by them that I was an amazing writer. Around the same time, through Wattpad, I was also getting a lot more positive feedback as well. Of course, a lot of the feedback was still nitpicks of my work which helped me even more, but still, a good portion of the consensus was how my work was really great.
And that’s pretty much at the stage I’m at now as I near my twenty-sixth birthday and trying to improve my writing for over ten years. I still have a lot more kinks to work out, but there is a clear difference in my work that I wouldn’t have had if it weren’t for being taught how to write from people over the internet.
But honestly, I wouldn’t be where I am today if I had given up when I was fifteen. And even though I’m not published, one of my stories on Wattpad has over 45K views with over 1K votes. I’ve been on the Talent Scouts reading list (which helped that story gain traction). And I’ve made people cry (strangers) from my writing. Showing emotion, to me, is a sign that I did well.
There’s also this thing called the Dunning-Kruger Effect.
It’s what I think happened to me where, when you start, you feel like you’re better than everyone else, better than you think you actually are. Then as you continue improving, getting the hang of it all, you find out it’s a lot harder than you realize and that you’re not that good anyway. Many have said that if you think you suck at writing, it probably shows that you actually aren’t but you’re just insecure about it. I’ve met a lot of talented writers who are absolutely amazing at writing but they thought their writing was a piece of garbage. 
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I never said that you can’t write what you want. I said that you can’t write what you want and expect to be successful.
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Eh. I write what I want to write.
One of my passion projects is my trad. published ones. It’s barely making sales, BUT that is a publisher being awful and not marketing me thing rather than it just not being successful.
My passion projects are now also paid on Wattpad 
have yet to see how well it’s taking off. But I’m not in the millions of views but hey, it’s still technically successful.
One of my passion projects is also doing well on Radish.
I write what I want to write and never deviate from that. Success is what you make it. When I started writing, even before I started my writing degree, my aim was to be a best seller millionaire. My naive brain switched. Then my success was getting a published book. I have that; best seller or not, I consider myself successful.
How did I get it? Working hard but also writing what I wanted to write. Readers – and publishers – know when your heart is NOT in it. Never write just for success. That’d be (general) your downfall.
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What’s even more fun with this is that I grew up with the more conservative streak of black in the deep south as a white woman–all well spit 60s but before this modern era (born in 1980). Mixed congregations, as a child. Giving voice–I mean directly copying opinions, word-for-word into a fictional character would lead to some very hurtful accusations of misrepresentation because I’ve been surrounded by counter-culture Christians. I can also parrot what everyone expects, because I sat in classes with that, too.
The amount of hell I’d catch for being open and honest about those cultural issues–without me even having an opinion of my own–would get me called a racist, or at least questioned of I’m one.
In fact, it did, when I cautioned against ignoring those we are counter-culture. The person in question left here, and I’m sure my existence was a part of that.
It’s hands-down why inclusivity is hard to do, and why my ethnic characters in fantasies don’t cookie-cutter tie into with what happens here and now. I don’t have the patience to pretend that orcs have a damn thing to do with anything going on in the real world.
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(More piggybacking off your general points than anything else.)
I’ve been a write-for-fun from the start because it is a humiliating market to be in. Books require a heavier investment than a lot of other mediums for the one who makes the. And the one who receives them.
The thing is that if I was staying in my actual lane, I’d explain it through music, first. Which is funny because I was explaining why Nickelback and AC/DC deserve the same criticism, yet AC/DC wins, hands down.
It’s really simple: AC/DC is–when measuring the fluidity of talent (actually being able to sing complex music) is a much worse band than Nickelback. AC/DC is basically like making Twinkle Twinkle Little Star into classic rock. Same 5 notes, in an endless pattern, no novelty to it whatsoever. But like a commercial jingle, it’s extremely catchy, simple to repeat, highly inclusive in audience interaction.
Nickelback, on the other end, doesn’t have that jingle quality as consistently. They also have the musicality to compete with bands like Queen. Capable of harmony, very lyrical. But they aren’t one or the other: too repetitive to be Queen, not enough effort out into vocals to be Queen, and not enough simple sellability to withstand people noticing that they don’t have enough diversity to keep you listening to a whole album.
Here’s the thing. Since I’m a voice major, I’ll sing Nickelback songs, any day. But I bet you I can recite the lyrics to more AC/DC songs. There’s that much of a difference in automatically recognizing the work.
So, looking back into writing: there’s bad writers who make it. They have little actual talent in their field, but they’ve managed to grasp a hold of something simple and embody it. Their whole freaking lifetime of work is a Jingle. They aren’t your Queen, your Prince, or your Michael Jackson, but they sure as heck are AC/DC. They certainly as heck had something that clicked. Even when the MC has the spiritual embodiment of the lead singer’s awful voice.
What doesn’t help a lot of us who can’t be that shining star, also can’t be the other end, where “improving our craft” would ruin it, as well.
Also, it’s funny that I can get this wrapped around a band that actually “made it”.
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I love writing genre fiction on Wattpad. So I write what I love. Wish people read it, but if they don’t, so be it. I don’t think I queried for a while and I don’t intend to in the next year or ever. I have zero interest in self-pub.
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Exactly!
If you want to be published one day, you should never use that as a reason to only write toward the trends, toward what is successful today because generally, publishing doesn’t work this way. What’s trending today won’t be trending in a few months, in a year. The market constantly changes.
Very few people can write to market. Most don’t. They try to pick a few trendy tropes to keep up, but even then, stories that get published are their own things, their own creative worlds and characters, all being different from one another. Some may not make it to the top, others become the new hot book.
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I think you also find out without even trying if you can write for market or popular fiction. Those select few that can, I am pretty sure they write what they want, it just happen to resonate with what other people want to read. ‘Misery’ is a great story, but it’s misleading in terms of ‘and then he switched to Regency and it was all it took to be super successful’. Meh. A writer can switch to anything and their mafia, dark romance, smut, teen pregnancy, whatever trope they want will be just as unpopular as their military sci-fi. Because it’s them who is the common denominator, not the trope. If they weren’t destined to be successful , or don’t have the chops, they won’t be.
‘Misery’ for writers is what ‘Cinderella’ is for girls. Misses the point. Cinderella didn’t become a princess because she was average and magic happened to her. That’s not the point. The point is that she was a princess all along, Prince recognized her when she put a clean dress on and washed off grime off her face. Her sisters can bathe all they want, they are never going to succeed. But they still can have good time at the ball if the6ydon’t set their sights too high.
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