Christmas lights are up!

A happy holiday season to everyone out there!  Here in Budapest, the Christmas lights went on yesterday throughout the city, bathing the streets in a bit of holiday cheer.  Here's a picture from my balcony looking down Vaci street:

We should be getting even more in the spirit this week as the first significant snowfall of the year is expected to start falling tomorrow!

Photo of the Night: Budapest Atmosphere

For the past month or so I've been living in an apartment here in Budapest on the famous Vaci street, which is the backbone of a pedestrianized zone running parallel to the Danube.  It is right in the center of town, and an ideal location to live.  I love walking around the area at night, when the neighborhood is thick with Bohemian atmosphere.  The street lamps, the cobblestones, the stylish old buildings.

Last night I took this photo, which sums up the feeling of the place pretty well, I think.  Over the last few weeks, crews have been putting up lots of Christmas lights.  They haven't been turned on yet, but I'm looking forward to seeing it when they do!

What I Learned from Fishbone

Back the 1980s when I was in my teens and early 20’s, many of us who lived in Southern California had musical tastes that seemed to be wildly divergent from people in the rest of the country.  While Michael Jackson and Madonna were topping the charts nationwide, California was home to a more raucous musical scene, full of the livelier sounds of punk, ska and reggae.

We followed local bands like X, The Untouchables, Sublime and Agent Orange.  We liked The Dead Kennedy’s and The Vandals.  From the UK we listened to UB40 and the English Beat.  Another local band that was very popular among my crowd at the time was the punk-ska group Fishbone.

Last summer when I was living up in Mammoth Lakes, California, Agent Orange and Fishbone played a free show along with two other acts.  Seeing Agent Orange was like a trip down memory lane, but I had to leave early and missed Fishbone entirely, much to my dismay.

So I was quite happy when I was standing at the urinal at the Akvarium Club in Budapest on Friday night and saw the upcoming schedule posted on the wall in front of me.  Fishbone, coming Sunday!  I couldn’t miss them twice.

Even better, I found out that a guy I know in town was screening the Fishbone documentary, Everyday Sunshine, in the attic of a small pub nearby before the show.

So last night about 20 of us gathered under the eaves in the attic and watched the documentary together.  It told the story of Norwood Fisher, the pragmatic founder and bass player, and his struggles to keep it all together over more than 30 years of drama and upheaval.  It showed Angelo Moore, the charismatic and artistically sensitive lead singer yearning for self-expression.  It talked of Kendall Jones, the lead guitarist who spun out of control and ran off to join his father’s cult after his mother passed away.

The thing that is most striking about this film, and about the lives of these musicians, is that the dream they share is so potent, and yet in some ways seemingly just out of reach.  They had an enormous influence on many bands that came after them, like No Doubt and The Red Hot Chili Peppers.  These bands went on to stardom and great commercial success.

And Fishbone?  They have struggled to survive.  Angelo had to move back in with his mother when he was evicted from his home.  The rest have a hard time making ends meet and most of the original members ended up quitting the band along the way.  A great live act with a few hits locally, they never managed to have a big hit nationwide.  Some say their songs are just too hard to categorize.  They do their own thing and can’t have it any other way.

What is inspiring about their story is that Angelo and Norwood just refuse to give up, and they seem like such good guys that you can’t help but want the best for them.  They love making music, as though it was the reason they were put on this earth.  And maybe it was.  I’m sure that they couldn’t imagine doing anything else.  Even after they were dropped by their music label and most of the original members had peeled off, Norwood and Angelo keep on plugging away, putting out new music and touring.

Watching the movie, I found myself a little bit concerned about what might happen to these guys if and when they just can’t do it anymore.  How will they survive?  But then, the beauty of it is that they are surviving, and somehow you know that they’ll persevere.  Angelo’s mother may not completely understand him, but you can see how deeply she loves him.  Norwood may be living in a tiny apartment, but he’s right by the beach in Venice and embracing his life.  He’s learned to surf and to snowboard and seems to make the most of every day.  Perhaps most importantly, they have each other, even if that has been difficult at times as well.

All of this begs the question of what really constitutes success in the end.  Michael Jackson was also an African-American performer from Los Angeles, and roughly the same age as these guys.  He ended up becoming one of the wealthiest and most famous performers of all time.  That constitutes success in our society, but was he happy?  Arguably not. 

Michael Jackson had wealth and he had fame, but his was a tormented soul, and that torment ultimately led to his demise.  Angelo and Norwood have struggled along the way, but they wake up every day and keep going.  They play the music that sustains them and find beauty in the everyday world.

In many ways I find that my own story has much in common with these guys.  I started pursuing a career as a fiction writer more than 25 years ago.  In that time I’ve written more novels, screenplays and non-fiction books than I can even keep track of.  I’ve lived on a dream just as potent as theirs, but had only small successes so far.

It was only two years ago that I started to make a living from my fiction, but even then it wasn’t enough to survive in my home state.  I’ve had to come halfway around the world to Budapest just to find an interesting place to live where I can actually afford the rent.

Part of the reason that my career hasn’t taken off so far is that my novels are hard to categorize.  I do my own thing and can’t have it any other way.  I’ve picked up some fans along the way, but I’m still looking toward the future.  Mostly, I write because I simply can’t see myself doing anything else.

The lesson I take from Angelo and Norwood is that even if your dreams are not fully realized, it is a fool’s errand to base success on the standards of others.  I would argue that success is having people in your life that love and care about you.  It is doing what you are inspired to do.  And it is enjoying this short time that we have on the planet as much as we possibly can.

By those measures, I would indeed consider my life so far a success.  I have good friends and family who care for me.  I write what I am inspired to write.  I’ve lived and enjoyed my life as much as possible, including last night at the Fishbone show here in Budapest.  Not only did they bring the house down, but they seemed to be having a great time doing it even after all these years.

So to the guys in Fishbone, great to see you keep on keeping on, living the dream by your rules and making the most of whatever that brings.  I’ll try to set the same example.  After all, success by one’s own standards is the only true success.

Budapest at Night

I'm settling back in here in Budapest as the autumn slowly turns toward winter.  I'm enjoying the hot wine, sitting in cafes to write, and generally just being back in this city that I've come to know as a home away from home.  The other night I went out wandering with my camera to take some photos, so I'll post them here. 

Budapest at night

Fall leaves under light.

Tram in motion

Heading home?

Chain Bridge

Tram tracks

What writer wouldn't like spending time in a city as atmospheric as this one?

I guess this means summer is over

I arrived back in Budapest a few weeks ago to spend a few more months or so here working on some writing.  Last weekend it was nice and warm and I was out and about in shorts and t-shirts every day.  This week that all changed.  Suddenly it is cold, and dark, with the first flakes of snow falling on the city this morning.

Not only that but we rolled back daylight savings yesterday, so it's now just a bit after 5 O'Clock and already dark out!  Here's a shot of the view from my room a few minutes ago:

And here is looking in the opposite direction:

It's a scenic spot, in the heart of the city on the trendy Vaci Utca pedestrian street.  It's a great location, with lots of cafes nearby to write in and the city library only a ten-minute walk away.  Now it's time to get into the spirit of jackets and hats, and perhaps a cup or two of mulled wine to get through these chilly autumn nights.

One of those in-between times

I've been a bit lazy about updating my blog since I finished my last novel, Natalia.  After focusing so hard for so long on one project, I'm now in one of those in-between times, with one project finished and the next yet to fully gel.  In fact, I've actually found myself working on three projects at one time, not sure which I most want to devote my energies to.

One problem that I've never had is coming up with ideas for books I want to write.  I suppose the opposite is true.  I have a long list of things that I want to write and have to find a way to prioritize them.  Currently, the things I've got going include:

1) A memoir that I've been working on off and on for the last ten years.  This one is full of funny stories about the life of an itinerant writer, traipsing around the world on a shoestring.

2) I've begun plotting out the next two Natalia novels and want to write the first few chapters of each.  So far sales on the first one are virtually non-existent.  I'm very happy with the way the book came out and want to write the next two, but it seems that perhaps the "indie" route isn't working this time.  Perhaps if I can present this as a series I might be able to find an agent and go the traditional route.  I figure it can't hurt to try.

3) I've always thought that Sweet Ophelia, currently titled Tinseltown Fairytale, would make a great movie.  I'd previously written a screenplay version, but after seven months of revisions to the novel, I feel like it is time to revise the screenplay to match, and maybe start sending that one out again.

So there you have it.  Plenty to keep me busy as I settle in again to Budapest, where I've just rented a room in an apartment in the center of the city.  With the temperatures falling and plenty of rain, this is definite writing weather.  Hopefully I can take advantage!

Is this party over?

I made the decision to put my books up for sale on Amazon and other e-book retailers in the summer of 2010.  Things were just beginning to take off in this space at that time, with a growing enthusiasm among "Indie" writers for the e-book publishing revolution.  Self-published stars like Amanda Hocking and John Locke were on their way to the million mark in downloads and others like Joe Konrath were trumpeting their own success stories and others.

My first book, No Cure for the Broken Hearted, went up for sale in late November of that year.  To my surprise, it did remarkably well, climbing to #9 on the overall bestseller list at Amazon UK.  The price was a low .49 pence, but I was selling upwards of 300 copies per day across all platforms, ultimately selling 45,000 or so copies and garnering some great reviews.

I had high hopes for my second book, Sweet Ophelia (currently Tinseltown Fairytale).  It also ended up getting mostly good reviews but sold only about a third as many copies.  My latest book, Natalia, came out one month ago.  So far it has sold about eight copies, six of which were to family and friends.

So what happened?  It would be easy to say that people just don't like the sound of my latest book, but I know that there is more to it than that.  I follow the "Indie" writer's forum (Writer's Cafe) over at Kindle Boards, and by the way many of the writers over there are wringing their hands about their sales "going off a cliff," it is clear that something bigger is going on.

I have to say, I never really did trust the system much even when my first book took off.  I always figured that what Amazon gave, Amazon could somehow take away.  Not that it is necessarily Amazon's fault.  The jury is still out on that, but there seemed to be plenty of variables stacked against the long-term potential of this publishing paradigm.  Not that I didn't hope for the best, but always with caution.

Back in 2010 I saw two possible culprits for a crash.  The first was piracy.  Quite a few writers on the boards have the opinion that piracy is actually good for independent writers, since it gets more people reading our books, who might illegally download one but then buy the next, or spread the word about a particular writer.  I never bought into this theory.  To me, piracy is stealing, pure and simple, but I don't think it is having any large scale impact at this point in any case.

Another issue was the huge surge of self-pubbed books going up online all the time.  I've read somewhere that 50,000 new self-published books go up on Amazon every month.  Some are well-written but many are just junk, put up by people hoping for a quick and easy buck.  The bottom line is that this just makes it harder and harder to stand out in this massive sea of material.

A third thing that hurts sales overall is the proliferation of free books.  Authors like myself found that in order to stand out, sometimes it pays to give away a book for free for some period of time.  Free books count towards overall sales rank, so when you go off free you have a lot more visibility than you did before.  The first time I did this, with Sweet Ophelia, I gave away about 50,000 copies in a week and then had $3500 in sales the next week.  Not bad.  But as more and more writers give away more and more free books, I think some readers become inclined not to pay for books at all.  Great for them but bad for us writers.

The last thing, and this one is the hardest to quantify, is the tweaking that Amazon does with their algorithms.  This, I suspect, is what the sales crash for independent writers is mostly caused by at the moment.  Book sales on Amazon are driven to a large degree by the "Also Bought" listings you see on every page.  If enough people buy a certain book and then another, those two books will show up on listings on each others pages.  In this way, they drive each others sales.  The more books a writer sells, the more listings they show up on and sales can grow exponentially.

Amazon has algorithms, or equations, that they use to calculate which books show up where and what a book's ranking is on the bestseller lists.  From time to time they tweak these algorithms to favor one variable or another.  Free books, for example, used to count for a lot on the bestseller lists (after they'd reverted to paid books).  Now those free books don't count for much and the corresponding sales boosts after a free run have dissipated dramatically.

Honestly I don't think that anyone outside of Amazon knows what the reasons are for the huge sales slump amongst independent writers.  All I know for sure is that I did a free run with Tinseltown Fairytale earlier this month that led to three paid sales.  Other than that I only sold one other book in the last two weeks.  That means I've earned $8 in fifteen days.  Not quite the way to make a living.

So it leaves me wondering, is this self-published e-book party really over?  I'd always expected that this day might come, but I'd hoped I could run with my earlier success a little bit longer before it crashed.  I'm not giving up completely yet.  I'm working on a memoir now and have plans for some sequels to Natalia, though with nobody buying the first one it is a little hard to motivate to write the next.

Perhaps when Christmas comes along, all of the new Kindle owners will go on book buying sprees and boost all of our Indie writer's boats.  It isn't like people suddenly stopped reading, in any case.  They are reading now more than ever, according to statistics.  Apparently they just don't seem to be buying independent authors at the moment, for whatever reason.  I'm willing to give it some more time, in any case, but it does seem that there are dark clouds gathering at the moment...