Beauty and Marketability
What Kind of Writing Do You Want to Give the World?
With regret I must inform you that this post is not about a recently discovered, long-lost Jane Austen or Yasunari Kawabata manuscript. I apologize if the title was misleading.
A Song of Beer and Puppies
I’d like to share Ross McCammon’s Two Beers and a Puppy test. Many thanks to my sister-in-law, Jacque, for bringing this to my attention last week.
McCammon, in his book Works Well With Others, posits that you can sort all the people you know into four categories based on two criteria:
Would you have two beers with them?
Would you let them babysit your puppy?
The people in your life are either No-Nos (these folks don’t deserve bandwidth in your heart or mind); Yes-Nos (fun friends, but not dependable); No-Yeses (the people you can count on, but who aren’t much fun); and Yes-Yeses (people who are both reliable and enjoyable to be around).
Most people are probably Yes-Nos or No-Yeses. The friend who is always up for a zany adventure but can’t hold down a job? That’s a Yes-No. The friend who declines 70 percent of your requests to socialize but will drop everything to come help when your car breaks down? A No-Yes. There’s plenty of room for both of these in your life. Most of your casual friends are likely one or the other. But you treasure the Yes-Yeses. These are the people you love to spend time with and can trust to help you out in a tight spot. You want to cultivate close friendships with Yes-Yeses. You want to be a Yes-Yes.
Writing falls into categories like this, too. Well, kind of.
Sorry. Do not let writing babysit your puppy. That is a terrible idea. You did not hear it here.
The Good and the Salable
Writing, too, can sort into four categories based on two criteria:
Does it have intrinsic, inherent value—ie, is it good?
Does the market have an appetite for it—ie, can it sell?
First let’s look at the No-Nos: The books that do not appeal aesthetically and are not marketable.
What makes a book inherently bad? Maybe the writing is full of errors, or maybe the plot is full of holes. The message doesn’t resonate, the story isn’t relatable, the characters are flat, it’s full of tropes, predictable, illogical. It’s probably got several of the above problems if it’s got one. That list can go on for a long time. These books have no qualities in themselves that redeem them.
There’s also no audience for them. Don’t assume this is because they’re bad in the ways described above; that’s not always true. There are markets, for some subjects, niches, and genres, that are so hungry they don’t care how bad or unoriginal the writing or plotting is. If you find that market and give them what they want? They’ll buy your book no matter how badly written. The marketability factor is not inherent, as the quality of the book is, but extrinsic. A No-No doesn’t have anything readers are looking for. Even if it fits a niche that will support poor writing, the market doesn’t want it. The market, for instance, may already be saturated with similar offerings.
These are the bad books nobody asked for. Publishers usually recognize these and won’t sign them. The vast majority end up never seeing the light of day, and if they do it’s through vanity- or self-publishing. I’m not going to name names because it would be unkind to do so. It’s not hard to find these books. They’re everywhere. This is not the book you want to write. Don’t be a No-No if you can possibly help it.
Then there are the Yes-Yeses. These are the opposite, the books that are intrinsically good—aesthetically pleasing, meaningful, well-written—and that have the right elements to be financially successful. A beautiful example of a Yes-Yes is One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez.
I don’t think you’ll find many people who would argue that this book isn’t a masterpiece of the written word, even in translation. It’s also around a 50-million-unit seller, one of the bestselling books of all time. This is the type of writing we all want to do. Critically acclaimed, universally adored, and wildly successful. Nobody would kick that Nobel Prize out of bed. This is also proof that books can and do sell based on their intrinsic value. Beauty absolutely can drive marketability. It’s just that it doesn’t always.
Two Roads Diverge
So you know you don’t want to write a No-No and you do want to write a Yes-Yes. But what about the other two groups? Most of the books out there fall into these next categories. They’re either amazing reads but not successful, or successful but awful.
Take Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James. A 15-million-unit seller with a half-billion-grossing movie behind it. Two sequels, two spin-offs. There was an enormous, underserved market salivating for erotic Twilight fanfic and E.L. James answered the call. But, whew.
This. Book. Is. Bad.
The writing is poor. The story makes no sense. The characters’ behavior is illogical. Even the depiction of BDSM relationships is so poorly done that the fetish community came out of the shadows with dire warnings about health and safety. This is the quintessential No-Yes.
No-Yeses are not only the wildly viral, terribly written publishing phenomena—Fifty Shades is an extreme case. No-Yes can also be pulpy romance; extended-universe tie-ins to lucrative movie and game franchises; and long-running episodic SF/F series. They’re not always terrible but nothing about them is unique or original, either. You can make a very nice living cranking these out year over year. Not by publishing a single million-seller, but by cultivating a moderate audience who wants your work, and then making it available frequently and consistently.
Finally, you have the Yes-Nos. The books that are beautifully written but just don’t make it. Maybe they get picked up by a publisher on their obvious merits (or maybe not). Maybe the publisher puts some muscle into marketing (and maybe they don’t). Maybe a similar book came out around the same time and ate up the available market. An example of a Yes-No is one of my favorite books, The Brief History of the Dead by Kevin Brockmeier.
Lovely prose, based on a compelling idea, with two intricately interwoven storylines that come together in a satisfying way. Major publisher. Positive critical reviews. Award-winning. Have you ever heard of it? I talked about this book recently on social and even most of my readerly friends weren’t familiar. This book had a brief moment in the sun, a pan flash, and then disappeared into an obscurity that it did not deserve. Sadly, a Yes-No.
There are many more Yes-Nos coming through trad publishers than there are No-Yeses. In fact, the Yes-No is most books coming through the major trad houses.
When publishers see writing with intrinsic value, they know the book has a small but real chance of becoming the next big thing. Their model is to throw as many of these as they can at the wall and see which ones stick. They only need a few bestsellers a year to make their money (though they’ll always be glad to make more revenue). You may think that if a major house signs you then your book will be famous, profitable, and remembered for a long time. That is not necessarily the case.
Your Writing Success Story
Give some thought to the goals you have for your writing. Most people strive to be a Yes-Yes and to avoid No-No territory, but you don’t actively choose either of those outcomes. There’s no sure way, no formula you can follow, to become the next Gabriel García Márquez. And no one wakes up in the morning thinking, “today’s the day, I can’t wait to write a terrible and unsuccessful book!” But you may be able to steer yourself toward Yes-No or No-Yes.
If you had to pick one:
Would you choose recognition—catering to a hungry market and enjoying the rewards of their patronage?
Or would you choose aesthetic appeal—beautiful writing, a thrilling plot, memorable characters?
I’d love to create something incredible and successful. That’s the dream. But I’d be thrilled to settle for either one. A decent book that sells well and reaches a lot of people? That’s a huge win. A book that doesn’t sell well but receives critical acclaim and touches a few lives? Also a huge win. In writing—as in all things—make sure you define what success looks like for you before you decide how you want to tackle achieving it.
Are you wondering about the applications of this weird Punnett Square for narrative nonfiction and business writing? It’s on my list of topics to tackle in the near future, so stay tuned!
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This is great. I would prefer to write a yes/no book but will strive for yes/yes versus the lucrative no/yes. The perfect thing to read before re-evaluating my plotline!