Emery 🏳️‍⚧️

Anyway, work smarter not harder, y'all. Surround yourself with readers who *want* your books, not readers who are willing to put up with them if you dance when they demand.

If you have to make all your books free & one click for your audience to "buy" them, you have the wrong audience!

The same person who hounded me every week or so FOR YEARS asking when they could buy my book at B&N refused to even call their local store to have it ordered in.

Like, I know some people won't put in any effort to get my books. The point is I don't want to waste time listening to them complain.

Me: the best readers will buy direct. Yeah, you'll make sales elsewhere, but the people who will value and support you the most are willing to go direct.

Annoying rando: well *I* wouldn't buy books this way.

Me: thank you for proving my point!!

This reply is a level of missing the point that's rare even on Bsky

I mean, if *you* don't read paper books, then it's definitely worth just buying an author's ebooks direct (most of us sell both print & ebook direct), but frankly, many many people still read print books. Ebooks make up maybe 10% of my total sales, online and in-person, from all retailers.

I feel like you missed 90% of the joke ngl

The reason I started *studying* Japanese was because I wanted to chat with my grandfather in Japanese because he no longer had anyone in his life who could speak it, but then Covid hit and he died before I could see him again, so the reason I kept studying was really just the anime and porn.

I gotta be real with y'all, I learned Japanese so I could multitask while watching anime and read porn on the internet. I am not equipped to translate things for people. When I try to say "turn right" in Japanese, my brain always defaults to French first (don't ask me why).

LMFAO no, it's totally reasonable. I used to do that all the time when I still did traditional. Even now, if I like a sketch I do in a sketch book, I scan and trace it to color digitally

*whispers* scan and print a copy to color so you don't damage the original

It's Sex Worker Rights day.

Twitch only exists because of the success of its NSFW counterparts.

If we had listened to SWs over a decade ago as they were being silenced and deplatformed, we could have stopped the wave of ID Laws for "adult" spaces now.

Support Sex Workers. Listen to them!!

A graphic with a large yellow banner in the middle announcing "Live on Kickstarter! We've Always Been Here: A queer historical zine." The bottom text is in a rainbow gradient with little rainbows framing the box. Above this is a mockup of the book's cover alongside some page mockups, and the bottom half features three other illustration previews.

🎉 Live on Kickstarter! 🎉

We've Always Been Here: A multicultural art book celebrating queerness throughout history, with illustrations from over 50 incredible artists! 🌈

Get the book and limited edition merch here: www.kickstarter.com/projects/tap...

#ZineSky #Zines #LGBTQ #LGBTQArt #QueerArt

Literally this tho 😭

Meanwhile, a reader who shows up to your table and buys literally every title you have on hand and signs up for your newsletter all in one go--they'll be back!

They'll return with friends! They'll drop $5 on bonus content monthly if you let them. A solid foundation of readers like that goes SO far.

Don't get me wrong, your most loyal reader could be anywhere, and someone who downloads your free ebook on a whim one day might be a die hard the next.

But realistically, most people who download 500 books for $1.99 aren't reading all of them. They DEFINITELY won't like all of them.

That human component of hand-selling means readers who are:
1. More likely to actually read the book
2. More likely to recommend it to others
3. Willing to pay more
4. Willing to go out of their way to find every book you put out in the future or offer support in other tangible ways

I don't think most authors realize this, but one reader who's willing to go out of their way to order direct is worth 10 readers who are only willing to grab your book at 90% off through one click on Amazon or in some massive Itch bundle.

I just think it's funny how *deeply important* it is to some people to believe that some artists are just inherently lesser than them for things that don't matter. Like, we're all just making stuff up. We don't have to assume some of us are superior in our made up stuff haha

You know, I also think people have this idea that "loving the process" makes you immune to AI, but I know many "process lovers" who use AI "just for brainstorming ideas".

Meanwhile, I find this repulsive because the brainstorming is the best part. I love thinking! I'd rather think than write/hj

Aw yay! I'm glad it helped!! 💙

Also, to be clear, *I* am not insecure about not being a real artist. I don't care if you think I'm a fake artist. I'm still gonna draw things and you can't stop me hahaha

I just know that there are probably people like me out there who hear these sentiments & think they should give up. Don't!!!

Lineart drawing of my character Tao as an adult and next to him the same drawing just sized down. Showing that sized down it just looks like a small adult and not like a child.

Kids are not sized down adults

I got a tutorial up on my patreon
patreon.com/Amalas

There is also a one time purchase for people who don’t want to subscribe to my patreon but are interested in this tutorial

I was about to be like "I don't think this is unforgiveable" but then you described it in the least appealing way possible 😭

💀

But I've also done videography, photography, music, poetry, sewing, sculpting, painting, etc. I just like making things!

The medium is kind of irrelvant to me. I just picked the ones I was most capable of reaching my goals in so my hardwork would go further. That doesn't make me a grifter!!!

I don't *dislike* writing or drawing. It's not like knitting for me, which I gave up on because I hated it and sucked.

But my love isn't for "writing" or "drawing". It's for *creation*. I love letting my imagination wander & then turning that into something real. I chose writing bc I'm good at it.

Anyway, I find it so oversimplified and honestly condescending when people act like the difference between an artist & a hack is loving the process.

I spent 10 years working on my craft as an illustrator and 20 as an author. Do those years not count because I had a different motive than you?

But I just *really* like having that thing at the end. I like having a book I can talk to friends about. I like having an illustration I can share online.

I like having physical proof of what my mind created in a way my brain won't forget bc it's *real*. I like seeing how uniquely mine it is.

I've never had the "I'll die if I don't draw" urge. I learned as an adult that people with ADHD often get as much dopamine from imagining a thing as they do actually accomplishing it.

I don't need to write the book to be satisfied. I get more joy daydreaming about it than putting it on paper.

But also, I started writing because I wanted a story that didn't exist. I wanted to hold it in my hands. It wasn't about "the art of creation" or whatever else.

I was 8. The thing I wanted didn't exist so I made it. I did the same with drawing at 20. I wanted to see something drawn so I drew it.