Not in the very distant past, could an author only compete for readers by using established publishing houses. Those houses were very selective in the manuscripts they chose to print. Unless you have a well-recognized name, or are just plain lucky, most authors submitting their work rarely stand a chance. Enter vanity publishing, where authors pay to have their work printed, usually only in large numbers. If you are good at hustling, maybe you may manage to eke out a living from writing. Print-on-demand is now the predominant method for printing books. But who reads hard copy, right?
Amazon opened a whole new world to wannabe authors — eBooks — lots of eBooks. eBooks spun from the classics, well-known authors, and authors by the tens of thousands. It may be surprising for you to believe, but eBooks originated in the 1930s. It wasn’t until 1998, however, that eBook readers began to be mass-produced. At about the same time, libraries began providing eBooks to the public through their websites. Amazon didn’t come out with the Kindle reader for almost another ten years. However, others noticed the potential of Amazon’s foray into eBooks and jumped onboard.
Audiobooks have further distanced independent authors from potential readers. Originating with vinyl records in the 1930s, their evolution continued through cassette tapes, CDs, and eventually digital downloads as technology advanced. The popularity of audiobooks surged with mobile devices and multimedia systems, and digital audiobook sales have grown steadily since 2014. However, producing a decent audiobook remains costly, making it inaccessible for many authors.
More recently, a new competitor has taken form — flash fiction. Now, writing a story, often with 1,000 words or fewer, has drawn even more writers to the table. A lot less daunting than producing longer pieces of work, flash writing is filling a niche demanded by many of today’s readers.
We spend less time reading than we did five, ten, or twenty years ago, with social media now taking up much of that time. We want information quickly and instantly.
Are novelists too late to the party as authors? Has reading become a lost art? Only time will tell.