N. J. Lindquist
Instead of being completely dependent on editors, agents, and publishers, which also creates competition among writers for the few available spots, why not work together so that each person’s skills are improved and everyone gets their work into a form in which its audience can be found?
Following up on a few points raised in previous posts:
Do I have an idea of what a new publishing model for Canadian authors who are Christian should look like?
A vague one that involves the following three things:
1. Authors working together in some sort of co-op.
If we have to do most of the work and the selling anyway, why not eliminate the majority of middlemen? I’m convinced the only ones actually making money in traditional publishing are the printers and the truck drivers.
In the old model, writers are forced to rely on other people to get their work into print. Cap in hand, we beg for just a moment of agents’, editors’ or publishers’ time, and we latch onto any word of praise that falls from their lips as if it were gold. I’ve watched groups of writers approach editors the same way the fish in my son’s aquarium gather to get their share of the allotted food. Feeding frenzy is the word for it. And anyone who gets selected is immediately transported into a state of euphoria. Is that really the best way to use your God-given gifts?
Instead of being completely dependent on editors, agents, and publishers, which also creates competition among writers for the few available spots, why not work together so that each person’s skills are improved and everyone gets their work into a form in which its audience can be found?
Or at the very least, create partnerships with agents and editors whereby the goal is to get funding for projects from a variety of sources, and to create new kinds of materials as well as traditional books?
2. State of the art use of the Internet, speaking, and joint promotion.
Part of what is needed is for us to lose the attitude of dependency on publishers, agents, editors, etc. to “make” us into writers, and to recognize that writing is as much a craft and a business as it is an art and a ministry.
I, for one, am tired of the old model that’s at least as much about who you know and how well you can sell yourself, as it is about your ability to write and the need for your message. I’m also tired of a model that encourages writers to settle for the lowest common denominator — i.e., what booksellers want — rather than finding the best ways to share what God has placed in their hearts.
3. Work written and first published in Canada, selling throughout the rest of the world.
We really need to lose the ideas that it’s wrong to want to be the best, and that it’s absurd for us to think we could lead the way. There is nothing wrong with wanting to do what we are doing as well as it can be done. And it’s past time to recognize that we have all the tools to lead if we would only trust ourselves to do it.
By working together, I’m convinced that Canadians could lead the way in creating a new model for writers who are Christian.
Why not give it a try?
1 Comment
December 15, 2009 at 12:30 am
This is a great blog. I’ve always been a supporter of this kind of thinking. I’m hoping that this sparks a revival of this style of thinking along the same lines.