My agent told me that marketing for your own work requires the gift of foresight.273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRU22vg0W7W
Anticipating reception is almost as important as writing the work itself. Sometimes it's easy if you're working within conventions. Outside of it, you need to fall on old lessons learned. I mean, one of the first things you hear in English Comp is the proper way to ask yourself motive: "Who the heck are you writing this for?" 273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLIC17366Wj
Know your audience--You know the maxim. 273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEN1qd0qPDn
But what if you're coming at this from the back end? Fffffuuu... The work is finished and you've been told it's good (and you know it's good), but now you've got to figure out why the book 'works' in the first place before it goes off to an editor and your agent or your dashboard--wherever.273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpLOaGJHqez
Self-actualization and self-awareness are hard enough to come by. Now, try analyzing a piece of your own fiction while remaining entirely impartial. What an unreasonable ask... but an ask nevertheless, and an important one to answer if you're to proceed with eyes open.273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbVhLabRcGf
Now, the downside with coming at this whole thing backwards is that you're going to discover pitfalls, flaws, plot-holes, and problematic truths about your own unconscious biases/opinions. This could generate more work, or merely provide insight into your own style. It could also prove something isn't ready to leave the cutting room floor.273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVJqFx70vP5
At the end of the day, if you're not comfortable with the exposure of these things, you may feel obligated to change or cut those parts of the text. Everyone's different. Some people can answer to their little fuck-ups (--can even laugh with the haters), but for some, it's enough to keep them up at night, bumping depressing thoughts together fast enough to generate sparks. (So, for those with weaker constitutions towards la critique, I would not recommend your first sojourn into publishing be upon the back of a poetry collection. Fair warning, luv.)273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiSFXy8F86R
But say you don't find any bad news. Say, whatever you do find about your work that may be construed as problematic is not without its merit or use... Then, you've got the basis for your marketing down, haven't you? You have the plot, but then you have the soul. You have the meat they come for, and the potatoes they stay for. You've figured out what makes your story tick, and you know how you would tear it apart if you were your own worst critic. And now you can fight fire with... er... more fire--anyway, before my metaphors start burning down--273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQgnhyJs1vD
Many people--perhaps because of debilitating Imposter Syndrome or overly inflated ego--are not keen on confronting their own ideas about something--even things as innocent as who-gets-hooked-up-with-who by the end of the book--nor are they prepared to defend those ideas.273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEVPt3UzdhW
Ultimately, isn't any work we make an expression of an idea that interests us enough to sit down for hours and hours--days on end--furtively (often futilely) mining and chipping away at the rock and hardened clay of our stories, trying to reveal a glorious Adam beneath? 273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrBSXHHqXor
Asking someone to distill their vague, often soft-edged, ideas down into ten strong words would defeat the purpose of creating a book about it in the first place, wouldn't it?273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8CT8XgsCkD
Oh, but we are talking about conventional genre fiction here... It is a medium that at once forgives the writer for not taking themselves or their text too seriously, while begging the reader otherwise--or visa versa, depending on the intent.273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAy5Zr1gUBu
So. Marketing. Audiences. Platform. The raison d'être within a piece's beating heart...273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlceTWc0fAf
Why do we create and sell these particular stories? Are we expressing ourselves? Sharing ideas? Trying to impact the youth? Staving off boredom? Profiting off the repressed? Empowering the oppressed? Validating the depressed? Codifying the suppressed?273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGvp6sqJ76q
I don't fucking know. Shouldn't it be different for everyone?273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡftblFkMHcQ
I write about things I want to read, and sometimes the things I want to read aren't too embarrassing to take to market, as such:273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPppWzhirxB
"I liked x, so I made a thing like it. So if you like x, you might like this thing I made."273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4dLATiIeyu
Marketing is as simple, and as painfully obvious, as that.273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIAG9CFocB4
No foresight required.273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDQQSZcOMYX
Cheers.273Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTx8STD7bhr
