Book Talk: To Do as Dickens Did—Thoughts on Web Serialization (Part I) by Jaye Viner

When I first made it known that I intended to serialize my beloved, but Lit Agent rejected, Battery Park Trilogy the first responder wanted to know what my story had to do with serial killers. Um nothing, please don’t go around telling people I’m starting up a serial killer. But as I thought about it I realized ‘serial’ isn’t a common word anymore except when it involves violent crimes. Some explanation is necessary.

Introduction


Fiction serialization refers to scheduled installments of a story. If you do a Google search you’ll find lots of chatter about this old guy to my left who is upheld as our most famous serialization success story. That’s right – Charles Dickens got his start having chapters published in magazines. It was totally in vogue back then and everyone did it including Henry James with A Portrait of a Lady. But history remembers Dickens. It was a way for writers to get their work into people’s hands without readers having to invest their hard-earned cash on a very expensive book.

Nowadays serialization is coming back into vogue but for a different reason than expense.
In our warp-speed modern society, running around with mobile computers glued to our hands, we don’t have a lot of time to commit to a novel that isn’t being made into an epic teen film franchise or an author who hasn’t won an award. But it’s easy enough to read a chapter during the morning commute, during lunch, during an awkward family outing with that grandparent who thinks you’re out of touch. An average serialized fiction post runs a couple thousand words and several serialization sites list estimated reading time along with word count. Twenty minutes allows enough time to engage a reader if they love the story but isn’t too much that if they hate the story they feel they’ve wasted their time.

Ebook trend
Web fiction sites have been around as long as there has been a web. Before the Kindle boom, web

communities gravitated towards a theme—Sci-Fi, Fantasy—those marginalized geek genres that now dominates pop culture, a wonderful trend which has given us the gift of the Big Bang Theory, hurrah! Then came fan fiction. Then came Amazon.

Amazon’s bourgeoning KDP-Kindle self-publishing platform allows for any form of fiction to be thrown up in its Kindle store for sale. The trend towards short fiction began here as marketers noticed people buying short stories and short story collections for e-books from both established and independent authors. From here stories shortened into serialized chapters. Capitalizing on this, Amazon has even created a Kindle Serial program taking on authors who are willing to publish a novel as they write it while working with an Amazon editor.

I debated whether to go through Amazon and charge money or go through web fiction communities, putting my hard work up for free. These communities have grown out of the Amazon model into a form of fiction as conversation where authors throw story fragments up on sites as they write—arguably the purest idea of serialization—and network for fellow writer and reader feedback. Next time we’ll look at the give and take of monetization with a focus on the Amazon model. In the meantime I’ll talk a bit about some of the sites I discovered.

When I began researching web serial sites it quickly became clear which were the old mainstays and those which had cropped up in the last few years riding the bubble of YA and e-book/mobile platform availability. The old ones look like a text file. The new ones are bright and colorful with big buttons. Of course there are some in the middle who are not only a little old school but also have a strong forum community and a stable review system. Most blog posts and writers who have come before me mention http://webfictionguide.com/ as one of the best places to get involved in web serialization or at least a place to find answers. If you’re a writer I would also highly recommend plugging into this group on Google+ . The wealth of information these members have, as well as their experience, and willingness to share gave me a huge boost when I began to make the big decisions on when, where, and how to serialize.

Wattpad Pros and Cons
Perhaps you’ve heard of Wattpad. Recently profiled in the NYTimes, this social media site is being watched as a touchstone of the next evolution of publishing. Right now it’s free and dominated by teens, but the Internet gossips whisper how long something so big can stay so free. Wattpad’s easy platform and the visibility it lends to writers has the publishing industry watching closely to see if the e-book generation may yet gravitate towards something even less permanent than Kindle or Nook. I’ve been on it for three weeks, along with Figment.com, Textnovel.com, and Fictionpress.com. These three I haven’t really engaged with mostly because they haven’t engaged with me. I’m not talking fellow writers/readers, I’m talking format—ease of seeing work, ease of uploading, and adding chapters.



What I like about Wattpad marks me as a twenty-something, one of those who came of age in the dawn of Facebook. I like it best because the format makes sense to my computer brain. Through forums and clubs I have found adults willing to interact about adult themes and adult choices and possibly to become fans of my serialization, which is rated R according to Wattpad regulations to keep teens away from adult themes and swearing just as R-rated movies do.

Most recently I was informed R-rated stories are blocked from the Wattpad search engines and therefore have much more limited visibility than other stories. Granted, I heard this from a frustrated adult writer, not from Wattpad itself. Time will tell if my story as one geared for an adult audience will be doomed by its rating.

Are you considering a serial? Have you tried and failed? Share your thoughts and tune in next week for more on the money side of the serial trend and what is best for you.

Stay tuned for part II! (Now posted!)

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About Jaye:

Born in Kobe Japan, Jaye was destined for a life of wandering both physically and mentally. She can only remain home two to three months at a time before wanderlust takes over. It has yet to be discovered how fully this need has influenced her writing. Author of two Kindle novellas, she is currently serializing a thriller involving a nurse who fights back against moralizing terrorists who but celebrities on trial. Find the serial and more information on her blog at www.writecasltesinthesky.blogspot.com or on Twitter @JayeViner