Status Update: Calling All Would-Be Writers

Well, I'm online again, never mind from where, waiting to receive payment for the last batch of hack writing and start the next...The first part of today's status update is an invitation to would-be writers.

I'm certainly willing to work with established book writers on book contracts with big-name publishers, but the type of writers I'm addressing here is the type who hire hack writers via sites like Guru, Upwork, Freelancer, Hirewriter, Iwriter, et al. (See "Hello, Guru Clients" for an explanation of what I was doing on Guru up into the last month, and why I'm no longer available there now.)
I have a little down time because of the coronavirus panic. So do you. If you were planning to use that down time to take advantage of Amazon's e-book system, and you're now thinking about hiring help, I am one of the people you used to meet through writing sites: professional writers' assistants. As the primary author of a dozen e-books that have been published under other people's names, I may be available through those writing sites or others in the near future--if, when, and as they process my correct U.S. tax identity as a business, not an individual--but, meanwhile, I'm still available to work directly with you.

You can trust me with an advance payment as much as you could trust any of those writing sites--most definitely more than you could trust Freelancer. As a business I've been around longer than most of them have. I have a reputation to maintain, just as they have. I have a banker who's willing to hold your payments for a reasonable amount of time while you review our collaborative work and suggest changes. I have an Amazon Associate account that those of you who don't have one can use to help market our work. I have a book blog and its associated tribe of regular readers.

I also have some advantages over several of those writing sites. As a native U.S. citizen I can guarantee acceptable English. I can preserve your ethnic, regional, or foreign "voice" while making sure your e-book is easy for U.S. readers to understand. I don't charge any additional agents' fees. And I'm familiar with the "short e-book, free or cheap, as a trailer to market a full-length book" format. (A sample manuscript for a short e-book--the one I wrote last winter, for a Guru client who slept through his chance to pay for it through Guru--will appear here as a series in the next few weeks, unless the client pays me for it, pronto.) And I'm an individual human, so if your project is problematic or just not for me, I'll tell you so and refund your money before doing the work.

Project descriptions that motivate me to bid on project listings at writing sites include:

* any "Tags," "Labels," or topics on which I write at this site, Live Journal, or Twitter. (Retweets on Twitter count as topics of interest.)

* scientific/technical--if I understand the topic well enough to handle it that way. Generally I can write scientifically about "life sciences" and copy-edit scientifically about physics, chemistry, and mechanical sciences.

* generally theistic/spiritual, or specifically Christian content--if the topic lends itself to that market. (I'm not wild about faith-filtered treatments of scientific topics.)

* family-friendly, middle school, young adult, sweet/wholesome, or literary (for fiction). I'm not terribly interested in "adult fiction" unless it's very well done. If you think your manuscript is the millennial counterpart to Tropic of Cancer and The Color Purple, I'll read it, but I do not generally care to read detailed descriptions of rape and murder. Even profanity tends to attract nasty stuff to computers and activate spam filters and other technical problems, so if you've written a war memoir full of the way soldiers talk, think, and carry on in a war zone or the kind of romance that helps you rise to your spouse's expectations, I'll proofread it offline, thanks. Generally I'm hoping to work on books that I'm going to be able to display to grandparents who shop with their grandchildren.

* However, men's interests--in the sense of work, health, sports, crafts, hobbies, music, philosophy, religion, politics, fathering, memoirs, personal life--are fine as long as they're not going to embarrass grandfathers. I'm not going to try to write as a man; I enjoy writing with men.

* quirky niche-market projects--I don't demand a blockbuster if you don't, and I'm perfectly willing to help you make a family, school, or company project read like a real book

* I can copy-edit content with which I don't agree. Some writers even like working with someone who's willing to check and challenge their facts, and I don't mind reviewing the case for the opposition.

* I can write content that leaves room for different points of view as long as it's not in direct opposition to my own point of view on moral grounds. (Obviously, sympathetic fictional characters can make personal choices that don't agree with mine or yours or one another's. An evangelical atheist who's conflicted and obnoxious but basically a good person is not a problem.)

* A question people used to ask on Fiverr was "Can you do a British accent?" Actually I have a sort of Middle Atlantic accent. Having learned to speak BBC and tried to imitate Joan Aiken's fiction and C.S. Lewis's nonfiction in youth, I can sound hard to place...but if you want a really authentic British (or Canadian or Australian or Indian) writing voice, please hire one. There are masses of underemployed writers in cyberspace. Since I really am trying to promote an Asian-American Book Club, I wrote a poem about hack writing globally that did not win a prize but did win some e-friends...In the past I wrote "guaranteed native U.S. English" short articles about India, Singapore, and the Philippines for sites in those countries. Over the years I've watched some writers from those countries build their skills. There are people in those countries who write English as fluently, in their own voices, as people in the U.S. or U.K. do now. I can't guarantee you Alfian Bin Sa'at or Daniel Yeo, but I can recommend some competent Asian writers who are looking for paid jobs. Or you can read their short free posts for yourself on writing sites like Beermoney or Seoclerks.

Here's the fee schedule I was using on writing sites:

For $5-30: I will write a blog post or short printable article to your specifications with "search engine optimization" and relevant stock photos.

For $50: I will copy-edit your 10,000 to 20,000-word e-book as you have written it. People for whom I've copy-edited include Andrei Codrescu, Joe Collins, and Mason Weaver.

Also for $50: I will write a 1500 to 2000-word review of your commercially published, printed book, which will appear on this web site and/or on "literary review" sites on or near the date of publication if you send the review copy in time, and a short review on Goodreads.

For $100: I will write the first draft of your e-book from your outline. (The more material, links, drafts, or instructions you can add to the outline, the more likely you are to be pleased with this draft. However, I will look up references online and provide citations, complete with working Amazon links if you want them.) The draft will be publishable as it stands, though I recommend you revise it to preserve your voice. E-books can include tables of contents, indices, quotes, stock graphics, your original graphics, footnotes, endnotes, live web links, and some special visual effects. Graphics and special effects may, however, need to be redone when e-books are transferred to Amazon or other formats. This offer applies to drafts written from source material in English.

For $200: I will write the first draft of your e-book in English from your draft, outline, and/or source material in French or Spanish only. If your material is in another language, please consider hiring someone from a country where that language is spoken.

For $500: I will write  all five sections of your 75,000-word e-book series and/or full-length book.

For $2500: I will co-write your full-length book, print it, bind it, distribute a limited first edition, and pray fervently that a commercial publisher snaps up reprint rights and puts it into stores everywhere. (This should not be a problem, if it's an excellent book. It did not hurt, e.g., Duck Commander.)