Stark Reflections on Writing and Publishing

EP 365 - An Interview That's A Hug with Gail Carriger

Jun 14, 2024

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Mark interviews Gail Carriger about her writing life, her journey through publishing, analytics, the careful curation of her author brand, being a hybrid author and so much more.

Prior to the interview, Mark shares comments from recent episodes, a personal update, and a word from this episode's sponsor.

Learn more about this self-publishing/WIDE-publishing focused cruise.

In the interview Mark and Gail talk about:- How honored Mark is to learn that Gail listens to the Stark Reflections Podcast

Gail's branding phrase of "Gail Carriger writes books that are hugs" and the various experiments she's done with that over the years
Always being a person who wrote, or had a passion for writing
Reading The Lord of the Rings as a child and deciding to craft her OWN ending for the story
Growing up in a "commune" environment with a bunch of poets
Gail's career as an academic when her first traditionally published book (Soulless) came out and took off
The challenge/dare to herself of wanting to write a genre-blending/cross-genre tale of something that she would enjoy as a reader
Negotiations taking a long time because Gail dug in her heels on specific contract clauses
Her agent investigating a back-door deal with another publisher who offered her 3X the deal the first was looking at and was willing to adjust the right of first refusal clause
The vision that the publishers had that Soulless was the beginning of a series (despite Gail believing, when she first wrote it, that it was a stand-alone)
Having a two-book contract and then writing a cliffhanger at the end of the 2nd book in order to grease the wheels of a contract for other books
Gail's love-affair with spreadsheets and the fact she reads all 56 pages of her royalty reports
One of the main reasons she became an indie author was her ability to have direct access to data about her sales and her readers
Gail's cautionary note to authors that with a "right of first refusal" a publisher is allowed to take their time with that offer, which can significantly delay an author's forward-movement plans
The possible "rights grab" that a publisher might do even if it's not something within their regular publishing plans
How growing up Gen-X and being a non-native to computers and the internet has resulted in an abundance of caution about digital, computers, the world wide web, how she is presented on the internet, etc.
Gail's recommendation to test the waters in self-publishing with short stories first
Nerding out with Mark about the "old days" of self-publishing and podcasting
Being a social scientist by training and loving analytics and spreadsheets
Pinging her rabid fan base and testing things all the time
Gail's A/B testing on whether it's better to put a newsletter signup link at the front of a book or the end of the book, or both
Ensuring that her author brand is not diluted with author business stuff that she's known for from other authors and industry insiders
Talking to her readers constantly to continue to stay in the loop on insights
The importance, when communicating to your readers to use the same language that they're used to
Learning that her readers tend to not have a distinction between libraries and bookstores - that many of them see them under the same umbrella of a place they go to see what books are on display
Confirming the reports that "word of mouth" is, by a landslide, the way that most readers find out about new books and new authors to read
The value of a recommendation from another author in a newsletter or on social media
The challenges of book blurbs
A podcast that Gail recommends: Reading Glasses - and that authors should subscribe and listen to it in order to understand the language that readers use
The deliberate curation and creation of the Gail Carriger persona, including her love of wearing retro outfits
The side benefit of being able to be a fan at conventions, etc when "out of uniform" and how she's rarely recognized when not sporting that specific "look"
A little bit about Gail's book THE HEROINE'S JOURNEY
The next book for writers that Gail is working on called GOING HYBRID, structured to help established and existing traditionally published authors to learn the indie publishing landscape
And more . . .

After the interview Mark reflects on several different topics that came up in the conversation, including contract clauses, being incognito, and Gails's suggesting for testing the self-publishing waters.

Links of Interest:

Gail Carriger writes books that are hugs, mostly comedies of manners mixed with steampunk, urban fantasy, and sci-fi (plus cozy queer joy as G. L. Carriger). These include the Parasol Protectorate, Custard Protocol, Tinkered Stars, and San Andreas Shifter series for adults, and the Finishing School and Tinkered Starsong series for young adults. Also nonfiction: The Heroine’s Journey. She is published in many languages, has over a million books in print, over a dozen New York Times and USA Today bestsellers, and starred reviews in Publishers Weekly, Booklist, Kirkus, and Romantic Times.

The introductory, end, and bumper music for this podcast (“Laser Groove”) was composed and produced by Kevin MacLeod of www.incompetech.com and is Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0