You’re still not getting it, Kent. I’m not passing judgment on any book or genre. I’m talking about people’s perceptions. Specifically, the perceptions of the people you would most likely want to take on as customers.

The perception that “Macs are better than PCs” is undaunted by the fact that Microsoft still owns 90 percent of the market. Ingrained opinions about a product or manufacturer can take decades and billions in advertising to correct.

Or the company gives up and abandons or orphans or remainders the product. It happens all the time. Cultural snobbery in particular is an implacable foe.

As you rightly observe, as far as the writer, readers, and publishers of what you call “trash” are concerned, it’s not broke, so why fix it? And I agree with them. They’ve got a profitable business model and would be crazy to reinvent the wheel.

I don’t have a high opinion of the “gateway drug” argument. I don’t have a high opinion of the “gateway culture” argument either. Its essentially condescending nature (”allow me to elevate your reading choices for you”) will never win over customers.

I honestly don’t think a Jack Weyland or Anita Stansfield novel is “better” or “worse” on the cosmic scale than what the “literary” world has to offer on average. But good luck convincing their fans or detractors of the opposite proposition.

There is a fundamental fallacy being propagated here–that the market for literary Mormon fiction is substantially bigger than the one all these small Mormon publishers are already crowding into.

In marketing terms, anybody entering a market like Mormon lit faces the same 80/20 rule. And while the “long tail” is real, in a niche market this small, the “tail” segments become microscopic. Because everybody reads authors and genres (even those who claim they don’t).

The “leftover” genres not being targeted by (what pass for) the “major publishers” in this market are not being targeted because they’re not worth targeting. Tastes down the tail are too eclectic to be grouped and exploited in any kind of cost-effective manner.

The standard measure of marketing effectiveness–the cost of acquiring each new customer–is way too high.

There is no “there” there, at least not a big, money-making “there” sitting there like a placer mine. A capital-attracting ROI from publishing Mormon literature whose only unique or common selling point is that it is finely wrought remains illusionary.

Disney discovered this with Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away. After spending a hundred times what other anime importers do prepping the films for U.S. release, they failed to expand the existing market beyond its natural growth rate.

That’s why I believe the best strategy would be to grow those Mormon micro-niches in ways that can find purchase in already-defined marketing channels and genres, and among a possible demographic of 300 million rather than one of 3 million.

When anime importers started licensing titles, they concentrated almost solely on SF/F. By doing so, these tiny, bootstrap operations could advertise in precisely defined markets, and leverage shared venues such as clubs and SF/F conventions. They could sell “the same only different.”

They could attract customers with calculable expectations about what they would be getting. Mormon publishers (and authors) should likewise concentrate on profitable genres that can be easily defined, easily expanded, and pushed into non-Mormon markets.

One other business model that might prove viable is a literary agency that concentrates on discovering Mormon artists with a non-Mormon reach and shops them to national publishers.

There are two huge issues.

First, the larger number of temples has really hurt bookstores. It used to be that people would travel to a temple, and as a part of that, visit local bookstores. In Texas, the new temples reduced the area that Dallas had in its district to 16 stakes. A very large, independent bookstore moved into space of 1/4 the size and the Deseret Books outlet closed.

Second, there is a real perception that the material outside of what Deseret Book has really isn’t worth exploring.

The problem with the LDS market right now is that it suffers from “too much” (both too much stuff and too much bad stuff) so that people retreat to a gatekeeper.

What most authors are really looking for is a way to by-pass the gatekeeper or to get it to accept them. Otherwise, what we will have in LDS books is a “book of the month” from Deseret and everything on the outside getting left out completely.

so-called POD publishers (Lulu, iUniverse, Publish America and similar companies)

You’re perfectly correct in calling out Publish America. Scumbags. iUniverse is, I think, on the fence. However, I do think Lulu’s perfectly reasonable if you’re on a tight budget and you have no real skills, because they don’t pressure you into getting any service you don’t want and they don’t threaten you and they give you a fair shot at the marketplace for a nominal fee and you can pretty much point and click it into being.

On the other hand, I chose to go a different route because I didn’t want Lulu’s ISBN on my book as if I couldn’t go the distance to do it properly, so obviously I agree with the sentiment. What I don’t like about Lulu at all is that it’s disingenuous enough to tell you (as you’re purchasing one ISBN from them) that you are you’re own publisher and let you set up your little “store” or “publishing company” when…no, you aren’t. Lulu’s the publisher.

Perhaps a few dozen active participants in non-Mormon forums who bring up Mormon works in ways that stay on topic for that community could make a substantial difference.

There is, right now, three active discussions going on about the Twilight series over on Dear Author in which Mormonism is one of the topics and quite a few LDS “come out” as members:

Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer

On the Question of Whether Stephenie Meyer is a Racist

Stephenie Meyer Books Encouraging Abstinence?.

Dear Author is, IMO, where the net-casting should start, particularly since its readership is heavily invested (emotionally and financially) in furthering digital content.

If Stephenie Meyers is good for nothing else, it’s conceivable she could be the one to crack this open. Certainly, no other LDS authors who write for the mainstream have done it.

Even if we had a dozen books each year that were of interest to these communities, would we actually be increasing the market for Mormon literature and fiction?

Yes. By a dozen books a year. That’s better than what’s out there now.

After all, I don’t think this increase would be reading the works simply because they are Mormon, would they?

It’s been done. It keeps being done. It’s always going to keep being done and the Mormonism of it is always going to get skirted.

*You don’t write smut (good or bad) with non-LDS characters and then cover up the fact that you’re LDS.

*You don’t write clean (good or bad) and trumpet the fact that it’s clean because you’re LDS.

*You don’t write Mormon mythology and cloak it in fantasy and then kind of dodge the fact that it’s LDS mythology. It’s alllllll been done and it works, but it still keeps the worlds of LDS fiction and mainstream fiction written by LDS worlds apart. And it doesn’t cast a wider net for Mormon fiction.

The gap needs to be bridged. You write LDS characters in a gentile world and present their world as if there is nothing remarkable about it and this is just the way they live their lives. You create a pocket of fiction where being LDS in a mainstream genre book is as unremarkable as breathing and the reader just accepts this as part of the world you’ve built. You write what’s interesting with LDS characters for the mainstream market of whatever genre you want in mind, and you are neither apologetic or defiant about it. You just are.

The electric kool-aid acid test for this is when non-LDS start writing LDS characters going around doing normal-people things instead of making us all out to be nutjobs.

I still think that there is a role for the kind of “trash” you are talking about. PEOPLE READ IT!

Not enough people. That’s the point.

It can therefore be a gateway to better works.

Not according to the people who aren’t reading it because they think it’s trash. What needs to happen is a massive PR campaign. How one would do that, I don’t know. It’d have to be viral, getting the word spread through wards and stakes across the country through a book or a series of books. I’ll tell you, though, it’d have to be something remarkable. I can’t write that book; I have neither the talent nor skill to do it; I don’t write literary anything. Nor do I have the willingness to keep it clean it enough for one member to whisper to another in Sunday school as they pass the book along, “You have got to read this book.”

I’d hold up Napoleon Dynamite as a film-counterpart example, but again, no overt LDSism was presented, so it fails my personal test of how this would manifest.

I’ve been thinking about LDS Wholesaler some more and I think my pessimism comes from the fact that this is not something I can do on my own–and I do almost everything as a solo effort because I don’t play well with others and I run with scissors. I don’t have the passion or resources for it. LDS Wholesaler would need a team of people dedicated to the same goal (who also have money) and so I am un-optimistic on that basis.

On my own, I can write and publish a book that breaks all sorts of rules, hire out what I can’t do, market it myself (although admittedly, those skills are not amongst the strongest in my repertoire), and let my six-year business plan gather steam. This is doable, with clearcut goals and a simple plan of execution.

Kent, I really think if this LDS Wholesaler is something you want to pursue, you as the head cheerleader might need to make up a plan and recruit participants who have the same agenda you do. I might be willing to chip in for that (depending on how well my ADD is behaving), but it’d have to be a sound plan with set data. I don’t know, so I’m asking: Do you know any others who are on this bandwagon with you or who could be persuaded to climb aboard?

In any case, I think you and I have similar (if not exact) goals in mind yet completely different approaches to achieving those goals. It’s kind of like we might meet in the middle if we both achieve what we set out to achieve and thereby cut the workload in half. You know, burning the candle at both ends.

If I understand you correctly, you want to write off the entire LDS market as it now exists, and either create a new one, or work through the US national market.

I agree that the LDS market is broken and needs revolutionary fixing — perhaps along the lines of writing off the entire LDS market as it now exists and replacing it with a new one.

I think working through a national market might be a plan of attack to fix the current LDS market. As objectionable material gets published (mine), other LDS might be persuaded to actually write good work in response and get it through LDS channels.

Again, Kent, you seem stubbornly determined to miss the point.

Well, I thought you knew I was stubborn from all those years ago at SR!! [GRIN]

If you think these bad opinions of Mormon literature are “true but irrelevant” or “unsupportable” or “subjective,” you might as well throw in the towel already. Frankly, I’m naturally inclined to rise to the defense of even bad genre Mormon literature. But stamping one’s feet and insisting that the potential customer is wrong (even when the customer is) won’t change anything.

I don’t think I said the above. In fact, it sounds like we think the same thing. I probably miscommunicated. I don’t think that the perceptions are irrelevant. I think that the fact that there are bad books is irrelevant to what should be done in the market.

Of course we have to pay attention to perceptions, at least among those that have perceptions.

But we also need to point out to those saying this that just because there are bad books in the market doesn’t mean that better or good books can’t exist.

Of course, the painful question for Microsoft, Detroit (and Mormon literature) is how they allowed things to get to this point.

The painful question, yes. (And an interesting question, for those not in pain). BUT, the more important question is the one in the post. What should be done (or what should the LDSBA do for its part) at this point.

In any case, what Orson F. Whitney said doesn’t matter when the people whose interest, support and talent are most necessary to make true his prediction do not believe it.

Eugene, I think we are saying very similar things and disagreeing about details, except in perhaps one area.

If I understand you correctly, you want to write off the entire LDS market as it now exists, and either create a new one, or work through the US national market.

I agree that the LDS market is broken and needs revolutionary fixing — perhaps along the lines of writing off the entire LDS market as it now exists and replacing it with a new one.

I will admit that I’m not quite willing to work entirely through the US national market. I see too many substantial downsides to that strategy, not the least of which is that Mormon material would be reduced or diluted substantially as a result.

The hard reality here is that the correlation of Stephenie Meyer’s success (and that of Glen Larson and Battlestar Galactica) to her book not being sold primarily into the Mormon market as a “Mormon” book is 100 percent (ditto Card and Wolverton and many others).

Correlation is not equal to cause. Nor is it absolutely predictive. AND, most importantly, success in the national market isn’t the only success. While you may not like their work, its hard to argue that Gerald Lund, Rachel Ann Nunes, Chris Heimerdinger and the like are not successful.

The hard fact that I’m working with is that any culture, for it to be vibrant and growing, needs cultural institutions the roles that exist and should exist in the LDS market — publishers, distributors, retailers, etc.

Without these institutions and the work they produce or should produce, we are poorer culturally.

So, no, I’m not willing to give up and “stop trying to fix” the LDS market at this point.

I cross over from genre romance and drew a bit of attention from that quarter to Eugene’s book….

What I’m doing is NOT kosher in any way, shape, or form for either “Mormon fiction” or genre romance, mixing believing LDS, erotica, and conservative politics. On the other hand, I had a story to tell and now I have people (not LDS, surprise!surprise!) wanting to read my story and they know it has religious themes.

This is great. You are right, this is the kind of thing that needs to be done more often. It requires that authors and publishers actually invest time in getting to know the community around books that are NOT Mormon. Perhaps a few dozen active participants in non-Mormon forums who bring up Mormon works in ways that stay on topic for that community could make a substantial difference.

However, I’m not sure that this can work without some body of work that will interest them. Even if we had a dozen books each year that were of interest to these communities, would we actually be increasing the market for Mormon literature and fiction? After all, I don’t think this increase would be reading the works simply because they are Mormon, would they?

No, the “trash” mentioned therein wasn’t in reference to popular fiction; it was in the unrelenting cloying sweetness’n’light of LDS writers who don’t feel a need to confront conflict.

Well, let me be clear then. I still think that there is a role for the kind of “trash” you are talking about. PEOPLE READ IT! It can therefore be a gateway to better works. It can also support the institutions in the LDS market, allowing those institutions to grow and survive. It can also simply be the kind of entertainment that a segment of the market wants.

Personally, I don’t read these works, I don’t want to publish them, and I’d rather have more good literature in the LDS market.

But, I think it is better that “trash” exists than if it doesn’t exist.

Re: Self-publishing

I hope I didn’t come across in the wrong way when I addressed your self-publishing plan. I don’t mean to discourage anyone wanting to get their book published. I DO want to suggest that they need to realize what they are up against.

You are right, as your comment implies, that at least with self-publishing the book actually is published. Many times that is the most important thing.

I just to persuade those that are trying it to learn enough about the market so that they have a shot at some success. Unfortunately, most of the so-called POD publishers (Lulu, iUniverse, Publish America and similar companies) are almost guaranteed paths to failure, especially if you are writing for LDS Church members.

Lightning Source is one of a few exceptions to this idea.

If you think these bad opinions of Mormon literature are “true but irrelevant” or “unsupportable” or “subjective,” you might as well throw in the towel already. Frankly, I’m naturally inclined to rise to the defense of even bad genre Mormon literature. But stamping one’s feet and insisting that the potential customer is wrong (even when the customer is) won’t change anything.

This is the problem David Halberstam describes in The Reckoning, about the decline and fall of the U.S. auto industry a quarter century ago. One of the lasting legacies from that period is that the typical U.S. consumer still believes a German or Japanese-made car is superior to every competing Detroit model. Even when that is factually not true.

Microsoft recently proved the point by test-marketing a rebranded version of Windows Vista and collecting favorable reactions from test marketing groups who had previously indicated a deep dislike for Vista. Lance Ulanoff notes here how Apple has brilliantly branded the Mac as something other than a PC when that is exactly what it is under the hood.

Do you think that argument will change the minds of many Mac users? Of course, the painful question for Microsoft, Detroit (and Mormon literature) is how they allowed things to get to this point. In any case, what Orson F. Whitney said doesn’t matter when the people whose interest, support and talent are most necessary to make true his prediction do not believe it.

The hard reality here is that the correlation of Stephenie Meyer’s success (and that of Glen Larson and Battlestar Galactica) to her book not being sold primarily into the Mormon market as a “Mormon” book is 100 percent (ditto Card and Wolverton and many others). You’re right that the LDS market is broken. Perhaps we should stop trying to fix it.

They are far less forgiving of that than LDS would be of the sexual content and perhaps that is as it should be, I don’t know.

I meant, secular readers seem to be far MORE forgiving of religious themes than LDS of sexual ones.

I bought my ISBNs. I got my PCN and the cataloging information done for the copyright page. I have a fairly good eye for interior design and I don’t think my cover sucks. I hired an editor so I don’t get tripped up by my puppy-like enthusiasm. I’m going digital as well as print (Lightning Source).

All that aside…

I have nowhere else to place it. I’ve never read anything like it (although I’m not arrogant enough to think it hasn’t been written). I’d rather it be considered a market “failure” and sell a couple hundred copies (if that) than live through another 10 years of rejection letters (the first 10 years was hard enough). I don’t write novels just to put them under my bed and store them on a CD in my file cabinet in my basement, never to be heard from again. I write to be read.

Even if the strategy of creating sub-genres is a successful strategy, I’m not sure how this is applied to Mormon works. If we start a Mormon Chic Lit sub-genre, do we really get gentile readers? I can’t see it.

“Mormon fiction” that’s not exclusive. I cross over from genre romance and drew a bit of attention from that quarter to Eugene’s book (though I don’t know if that translated to sales or hits on his site) from that flap over his shockingly inappropriate Vampyra, Mistress of the Dark. His isn’t so Mormon-centric that context can’t be gleaned from an intelligent readership who’s up for something completely off the wall for them.

What I’m doing is NOT kosher in any way, shape, or form for either “Mormon fiction” or genre romance, mixing believing LDS, erotica, and conservative politics. On the other hand, I had a story to tell and now I have people (not LDS, surprise!surprise!) wanting to read my story and they know it has religious themes. They are far less forgiving of that than LDS would be of the sexual content and perhaps that is as it should be, I don’t know.

I have no delusions that I’ll make any difference whatsoever to anybody but maybe, just maybe, my outrageousness can carve a path for some who come behind me with work that’s far less outrageous but still too much for DB or any other LDS publisher out there.

Ultimately what I’d like to see is work that puts the LDS lexicon out there in the mainstream so that people can pick up a book at B&N published by, say, Random House, that has LDS characters acting like…everybody else, being decent people, solving murders, having crises of faith, or or or or or… You get my point. “LDS/Mormon” becomes as ubiquitous and uneventful as “Catholic.” Oh, like Julia Spencer-Fleming’s episcopalian priest Clare Fergusson. I’d like to see “Mormon” unpacked and its baggage nullified in the general public’s consciousness and I think fiction is a conduit to that.

[sigh] Didn’t I just get through saying I wasn’t up for a revolution right now?

Breakthroughs can be quite difficult to accomplish, especially in a market that is as resistant to change as the LDS market.

Someone said over on that Times & Seasons thread something to that effect (in a frustrated tone), but I’ll be darned if I can find it right now.

There is a role for trash (aka popular fiction), and always will be.

No, the “trash” mentioned therein wasn’t in reference to popular fiction; it was in the unrelenting cloying sweetness’n'light of LDS writers who don’t feel a need to confront conflict. The person who said it also said:

Conflict, complexity, tough choices, drama, obstacles are all part of our lives, and these are things we are told we should overcome. (You can’t overcome something that’s not there. It’s expected that we’ll have challenges.) We need to stop whitewashing our books, music, and movies, and start producing some honest, genuine, sincere creative works for entertainment, education, and even enlightenment.

In this instance, “trash”=”whitewashing.” I don’t think it’s fair to call all popular fiction “trash” in any case.

And, FWIW, it flies in the face of Orson F. Whitney’s prediction that “we will yet have Shakespeares of our own.”

This, too, was addressed in the same Times & Seasons thread:

Mormons tend to shove conflict under the rug, or at least wait until the “proper” moment arrives for talking about it (testimony meeting). The arts are institutions of mortality. They are granted to us to ease our suffering by making us confront suffering. When Mormons are REALLY willing to face our own mortality without requiring a happy ending, then we will write the next Tale of Two Cities, compose the next La Boheme, and paint the next Raft of the Medusa.

Shakespeare? Have you READ that guy’s stuff? Shocking, is what it is. Beasts with two backs and black rams tupping white ewes. Please. He should be banned. [big evil grin]