Oh, The Changes I've Seen - Janet Lane Walters #MFRWauthor #BooksWeLoveLTD #writing #Publishing #Novels #Shortstories

  

Oh, The Changes I’ve Seen

 

When I was first published in 1968, publishing was a thriving business. The thriving remains the same but the changes astound me. I didn’t realize how many there were until I began to look at this. Now I was seriously writing long before I was published. I spent several years studying the short story before I put down much more than ideas. I’d been a reader all my life and writing seemed to be the next extension. I’ve seen many changes in the publishing of fiction. I no longer write short stories, though I do some novellas. Most of my writing is in genre fiction. So settle back and let’s look at some of the changes I’ve seen.

The Writing

Not only has my writing changed but so has that of other writers. When I began this adventure, I realized I was a minimalist. But more on that later. Here are some of the things I’ve noticed.

 

Books became shorter. When I first began with a novel most books ran at least 80,000 to 120,000 words. For a time that prevailed and those lengthy descriptions of people, places and things went on for paragraphs and sometimes pages. Now we try to make a few words do the work of many.

The passive voice wasn’t frowned on. When I look at my first short stories and saw the amount a passive voice, I wanted to go back and rewrite them. Now the active voice is the way to go and we’re not telling stories, we’re showing them.

Now the next big change I’ve noticed is with dialogue tags. “said she,” used to be the way dialogue was tagged. Asked John. Rather that she said or Jon asked. Then there was this tag. “said she while she walked across the room to close the window and cut the draft.” We now shorten these kind of phrases and clauses a lot.

 

Content

 In the past 50 years, the content of stories has changed, especially in the romance field where most of my books are set.

In 1972 when my first romance novel sold, there were romances out there but the content has changed with time. Romance was often entwined with a mystery or an inspirational message. Books we might have considered romances today were more in the main stream manner. Nurse-doctor romances were there and that’s where I began. Being a nurse gave me an insight into the medical world. There were many differences from the romances written today.

The internal conflict was more important than the romance. Body parts were avoided, except for lips and mouth. Romance seemed to focus from the neck up. Anything else was taboo. One of my published romances out in 1983 had all mention to breasts removed. But times were changing. Sex was perhaps hinted at but the couple seldom reached the bedroom door. The proposal and the kiss came near the end of the book. There was usually a triangle with either the nasty sexy female opponent or the heroine having to choose between two men who were either both great guys or ones not so great. Macho men came a bit later.

There are probably other trophes out there but most of the romances were sweet.

 

Publishers

When I published my first short story, there were many magazines for short stories. I’m sure I sent the first one I wrote to about twenty  or more magazines before someone bought the rights to publish. Then magazines began to disappear. Some were large magazines like The Saturday Evening Post and others were smaller. I even sold two stories to magazines that ended publication before the stories saw print. I was able to keep the money they paid. I used to buy The Writer’s Handbook every year for the listing on publishers. 1983 is the last one I remember buying, probably because I went back to work as a nurse for a few years.

What I’m going to give you a summary of the markets for each kind of story and then the publishers for that year.

 

Short Story Markets 1983

Science Fiction and Fantasy 13 magazines

Detective and Mystery 10 magazines

Romance and Confession 9 magazines

Fiction there were 6 pages of listings

Children 34 magazines

YA there were three pages of listings

Book Publishers

Hardcover Publishers there were 10 pages of listings

Paperback Publishers 2 pages of listings

Romance Publishers 14 Publishers

 

There were also self published manuscripts that were mostly chap books of poetry.

And there were always Vanity publishers

 

Changes Continue

From the 1980s through the 1990s publishers consolidated and merged leaving fewer places for an author to sell books to a publisher without an agent. These mergers are still happening.

Then came electronic publishing. I was early in publishing this way and the number of small publishers expanded and contracted daily. During those years, I sold well though at first the books arrived on floppy discs. Those were exciting and some unpleasant days. Being part of something new was fun. Having friends who were or were not published making snide and hurtful remarks wasn’t fun but I endured. I endured so well that many of my fellow romance authors who were the most vocal against me are now published electronically.

An ereader arrived and that boosted sales. Then Kindle and other devices that were slimmer and lighter came and selling ebooks became the thing.

Lately, audio books have taken off. Self-publishing is popular. Reading books on one’s phone is now a trend. Who knows what will come next and I hope I’m around to see the next great leap.