This morning I had a message from someone who has been writing womag type stories for years and is thinking of putting them into a collection to sell on Amazon. One of her reasons is she feels AI stories are taking over, and she'll find it even harder to get them published, so may as well try herself. As I've produced lots of such books myself, she wondered if I had any tips. Well yes. The first is, don't expect high sales. Secondly, it's not for everyone – and most definitely not something you 'should' do unless you actually want to. Thirdly, here's how I did it.
This post isn't just for her – it's for all of us wondering whether AI will make our human creativity worthless, and what we can do with our existing stories and any we may write in the future. What do you think? Are their still readers for short stories written by humans, and if so, how do we reach them?
Please note – I only know of one womag market using AI to 'create' stories. As far as I know, the other publishers have not decided to take this route, and still do value human creativity, and those who use it to produce content for them.
3 comments:
A bit of good news: only a bit, but hey. I am still on the case of how to work out if stories have been reprinted. If you search for BOWW, there are outlets which sell them (2? maybe) If you click on one of those, it generates several covers. The other, however, gives you a preview... Don't hold your breath, not all of them give the contents page, but some of them do. Which is how I know Maisie has a story in this month's. 🙂
Nothing to report on the writing front other than awaiting an answer from Crowvus submissions (end July, memoir) and a couple for WM which I put a lot of effort into. Au revoir et merci, Patsy.
Putting together an e- collection of stories is a good idea, but you need to have an awful lot of IT knowledge and expertise- and even then, there's no guarantee of high sales. I tend to sub to mine stories online fiction projects. There's no fee but at least it's online somewhere and you never know, people may read them! I have no news to report.
What a comprehensive guide, Patsy, together with all the pros and cons, that anyone thinking of publishing on Amazon may not have been aware of.
If A1 is being used to generate stories to cut costs then showing support for your favourite magazines, (ie those still accepting stories written by humans) may help them to keep going, and, if you can, buy them regularly or take out a subscription for yourself (offers often available) or as a present for someone else.
Dee
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