Despite the publishing industry turning like a super-tanker, some authors are beginning to take the Music Artist route and experiment with selling stories direct to readers. It’s probably been going on for a while, under the radar somewhere (well, apart from the high publicity Stephen King experiment), but a few cases have highlighted it recently.
First of all Hal Duncan asked for donations for a story, promising to send it to everyone who donated, and put it online if payments reached a certain amount. Well, donations have exceeded $100 so it is online. Hal has some interesting thoughts on what’s happening and what might happen.
Next, Gareth Powell is offering his story What Would Nicolas Cage Have Done? to anyone who donates, leaving the price up to the buyer in Radiohead In Rainbows style. The story has previously appeared in the Future Bristol anthology from Swimming Kangaroo Books.
And then Cory Doctorow’s next project With A Little Help is a short story collection that’s going to try a whole raft of different self-publishing ideas, including special limited editions.
None of this feels like self-publishing in the, old, derogatory sense, more like how musicians have been dealing with the change in access to music.
My outstanding question for all of this is whether an unknown author can make it using these techniques, rather than one with a following?
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