The Great Unsubscribe, Week 4

Author Myths I’m Leaving Behind in 2024

Several years ago, I went into a day spa to get a massage. As a total newbie, I really didn’t know what I was looking for; I just knew that I had a painful knot in my right shoulder from the chronic tension and stress I was experiencing—and I needed it gone. 

I perused the options on the menu, looking for the right massage that would help relieve my pain.

The deep tissue massage sounded exactly right. I envisioned that the next hour would be a relaxing treat and that I would emerge swinging my arms with joyful, pain-free abandon.

Oh, how naive.

Instead, I spent the next hour struggling to breathe through the pain, convinced the masseuse was trying to dig through my body and carve out my soul with her bare fingers, squeaking out frightened requests for her to go “maybe a bit softer, please?” 

“You wanted the deep tissue massage?” she asked. I nodded shyly. 

“This is the deep tissue massage.” 

Clearly, I had picked wrong.

I limped out of there, in more pain than ever and resentful that I actually had to pay for that experience.

And then the next day, something totally unexpected happened. I felt AMAZING. I was sore, yes, but the stiffness in my neck and shoulders was undoubtedly better. I could actually lift my right arm up without the pinching that had been agonizing me for weeks.

This whole process of unsubscribing has felt a bit like that. I expected it to be a fun, relaxing cleanse—and at first it kinda was. And then, as I got deeper and realized the things about myself that I needed to change—the deeply ingrained mindsets and habits I’ve been holding onto—it got less fun. At times, it’s been downright painful.

But it’s been worth it. It’s forced me to rethink the way I’m doing some things and the assumptions that I’ve been making about my work and life. And although the series is technically ending, I know that this process will continue into 2024 as I work out how to live and write more authentically. I’m feeling lighter and freer to pursue the writing that is important to me, more ready to be bold and vulnerable.

Which brings me to today’s unsubscribes. The final area I’ve been contemplating are the beliefs that I and many others have taken for granted within publishing—beliefs that are really just myths about how to be successful as a writer, author, and creator. 

Without realizing it, these are myths that I’ve subconsciously endorsed and co-signed for years. But it’s time for that to stop—and I invite you to join me.

Warning: These ones might hurt a bit.

Myth: You have to cultivate a large social media presence to be a successful author.

If you’ve been reading this newsletter for a while, you already know how I feel about this one, but in the past few months I’ve only gotten more disillusioned with this myth. 

First, let’s look at the facts. I’ve spent too much time looking up authors who hit the bestseller lists and who’ve gotten great book deals, and I know that plenty of them are people with “small” to no social media followings. 

Examples from the November Hot Sheet Top 50 Hidden Gems

• Sunita Kumar Nair, author of CBK: Carolyn Bessette Kennedy: A Life in Fashion: 2700+ followers on Instagram

• Jordan Moore, author of Interesting Facts for Curious Minds and not the football player. I can’t find him (or her?) on social media at all.

• Dan Abnett, author of The End and the Death: 21k on TikTok—which is more than most people have, but still considered “small” by publishers.

• Andrea Beaty, author of Lila Greer, Teacher of the Year: 4600+ on Instagram

• Claude Davis, author of The Lost Book of Herbal Remedies, who describes himself on his Amazon author page as “an old-fashioned guy by any standard,” and perhaps unsurprisingly cannot be found on social media.

Examples from this week’s Publishers Weekly bestseller lists:

• James McBride, author of The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store: 6300+ followers on Instagram and 7800+ on Facebook.

• Jeff Kinney, creator of the blockbuster Diary of a Wimpy Kid series, who shockingly only has 20k followers on Instagram.

• David Grann, author of Killers of the Flower Moon and The Wager, who has 2300+ followers on Instagram and 3600 fans on Facebook.

Of course, you’re going to find more people on the bestseller lists who have large social media followings. Yes, it is easier to get signed (especially in certain genres, like prescriptive nonfiction) if you have gajillions of followers on social media. 

But hear me loud and clear: It is not a requirement. 

In fact, lately I’ve come to think that investing so much time and energy into growing a platform primarily on social media is incredibly risky. 

These platforms, especially Instagram, are designed to make money—and they’ve found a new revenue stream in aspiring influencers who are willing to keep paying for “visibility.” To increase the chances that our audience sees our posts and reels, we now have to pay $14.99/month to be Meta Verified and then give our posts a “boost” on top of that. Call me suspicious, but Meta has created a profitable cycle where we keep shelling out more and more money to acquire more eyeballs that may or may not be looking at us. Aspiring authors are literally spending thousands of dollars a year to hit this totally subjective number of followers that no one in the publishing industry can agree on anyway.

But here’s the thing that publishers do agree on: Social media is not a reliable way of selling books! 

So why do we keep doing it? 

Not to mention the fact that we could lose all of our hard work—and money—if Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg decide it suits their whim to kick us off their platforms.

I’m tired of putting my time, energy, and money eggs into this basket full of holes. 

You can build an audience in much more reliable and safe ways like starting a Substack or other newsletter, writing articles for national and local publications, and speaking at conferences and events. These methods take more time than posting on social media, but they are far more effective and create long-lasting value for your readers.

That’s what I’m focusing on in 2024. I’m not getting off social media entirely (though I’ve thought about it!), but I’m only using it when I feel like it. And I’m not paying for it anymore. Instead, I’m putting far more of my time and energy into creating long-lasting value for all of you—and for myself.

Myth: You have to offer readers practical value in order to build an audience.

It’s true that prescriptive nonfiction is an easier sell, especially because it’s hard to write great memoirs. And because prescriptive nonfiction is, in many ways, simpler. The structure is usually more straightforward. It has a clearer value proposition for potential readers. It’s easier to describe to someone else.

Because of this, agents, editors, and industry-insiders often tell authors to shift their memoir into a prescription for others. For some memoirists, this shift makes sense. but many others then feel pressured to either 1) shoehorn their memoir into a prescriptive package, like Cinderella’s stepsisters trying to squeeze their feet into a shoe that just isn’t working, or 2) build a platform around something prescriptive and then pull a switcheroo by publishing a memoir for people who are there for the teaching.

Neither of these scenarios works out well for anyone. Readers see right through it and feel betrayed, and authors feel stifled in their creativity, putting out a bastardized version of the story they really want to tell.

So what to do? 

Agents, editors, and industry-insiders aren’t wrong. I think aspiring authors will continue to have a better chance of traditional publishing if they try prescriptive nonfiction first. But that doesn’t mean memoirists should give up their dreams if that’s what they really want. 

If you’re hearing from agents/publishers/others that you should make your book prescriptive and that kills you a little bit inside, then you have a few other options:

1. Self-publish your memoir

2. Write the memoir and then save it to release as your second book

3. Publish excerpts/pieces of the memoir in national publications to build a name for yourself around your (hopefully) amazing story. In other words, keep trying.

If, on the other hand, writing prescriptive nonfiction does sound like fun and something you’d like to try, then do that. It’ll be easier, and you’ll learn how to write a book and publish it.

I took my own advice here and focused on creating a prescriptive book first with my friend and coauthor Liz Morrow: Hungry Authors. But in 2024, I’m hoping to do far more personal writing. Teaching people how to write great nonfiction is always going to be a passion of mine, but I can no longer ignore some of the personal stories I want to tell. Hopefully, you’ll enjoy reading them here (and maybe in a book someday?) as well.

Myth: Traditional publishing is better than self-publishing.

My bias has definitely been toward traditional publishing throughout my career, but I’m trying to shift that. I’ve started paying more attention to self-published bestseller lists and buying more self-published books. 

My own biggest hesitation about self-publishing has always been the quality, both the quality of the content and the quality of the physical manufacturing of the book. But many of the self-published books I’ve seen recently have been incredibly beautiful and well made—because the author chose to invest there. It’s convinced me that high-quality self-publishing is possible, and it may also be more lucrative for many authors. 

Including myself. In fact, my next book will be a smaller one I’ve been wanting to write for a couple years now—and it’ll be self-published.

Myth: Great memoirs/stories are about interesting things that happen to people.

Nope. Not that interesting things that happen don’t make for great memoirs, because often they do. But more often, great memoirs are made when the author does interesting things.

Author Rachel Bertsche knows this. In her first book, MWF Seeks BFF, she went on 52 different “friend dates” to see if she could find a new best friend after moving to a new city. In her second book, Jennifer, Gwyneth, & Me, she modeled her life after her favorite celebrities (Jennifer Aniston and Gwyneth Paltrow), but on a budget, to see if living like the stars and following their advice would really improve her life.

Cheryl Strayed hiked the PCT. Liz Gilbert traveled to Italy, India, and Indonesia. Tara Westover fibbed her way into BYU. 

You get the picture. Don’t just let life happen to you. In 2024, resolve to look for opportunities to do something interesting with what happens to you!

I’m doing this, too. I don’t want to share yet, but in 2024 I’m doing an experiment that I hope will become a book one day. I’ve been letting something in my life happen to me—and I’ve finally decided to do something about it. Stay tuned for results. 🙂

I’d love to know how you feel about these author myths, and what you’re giving up or taking on for 2024!

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Join us to Map Your Book in February 2024!

We haven’t officially announced this yet, but I wanted to give you a sneak peek at our new Map Your Book cohort course, taking place live this February!

In four 90-minute meetings + 2 live Q&As, Liz & I are going to teach you everything we know about book mapping: how to…

• Formulate your big idea

• Pick the right genre 

• Articulate the transformation

• Structure your book

• Plan out each and every chapter

Book mapping is the secret sauce that makes books work. Plus, it’s a lot of fun. The end result could be a CSI-style bulletin board of post-its and index cards, or a straightforward outline if that’s more your style.

Either way, you’ll have a plan to start writing your book. 

We’ve also got a TON of sample book maps (for several different nonfiction genres) we’ve been creating, to show you how this works and what it looks like.

If this sounds like fun, learn more here and use THIS DISCOUNT LINK to get 25% off!

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What’s Bringing Me Joy

I’m looking forward to taking a break from client work in the next couple weeks, spending time with my parents who are arriving TODAY, and celebrating my favorite holiday with friends and family - and most importantly, our sweet foster babe.

Wishing you a very Merry Christmas.

Ariel