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Photo by Jarda Brych
Seth Harwood graduated from the famed Iowa Writers’ Workshop in 2002. He quickly published a dozen short stories after that, one of which was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. With a resume like that, you would think that agents and publishers would be beating down the door of this young, up-and-coming writer. You would think that Harwood could write his own ticket, right?
Wrong.
For whatever reason, Harwood found little success in the publishing world. In fact, it wasn’t until Harwood discovered podcasting and began serializing his stories on the Internet for free that he received any attention at all. By then, however, he was quickly becoming an Internet sensation with a worldwide audience completely hooked on his free Jack Palms Crime Podcast Series.
Finally, publishers were interested. And Harwood’s fascinating path from podcasting to traditional publishing began.
In March 2008, a small press called Breakneck Books published Harwood’s first book Jack Wakes Up, which thanks to Seth’s online fans, became the number-one selling Crime/Mystery book at Amazon.com.
Today an updated edition of Jack Wakes Up by Seth Harwood is being re-released nationally by Three Rivers Press (a division of Random House) and will soon be featured in The New York Times Book Review.
Jake Wakes Up is available today at SethHarwood.com. Seth Harwood invites Examiner readers to download the first few chapters of Jack Wakes Up for free.
I met up with Seth Harwood at The Mystery Bookstore in Westwood recently and had a few question for him.
Q. Jack Wakes Up hits bookstores on May 5th. For those who have never experienced a Jack Palms story on podcast, what can they expect?
A. Jack Wakes Up has been called "an action movie between two covers" and "a fast, smooth ride on a highway not found on any map." It's a crime novel set in San Francisco with Jack Palms, a one-time action movie star who's now just a normal guy looking to make a buck, more or less. When he gets involved with some old friends from L.A., and their idea of a big score is helping some Czech tourists carry out a big drug deal with a fast-talking Colombian, the action and trouble get turned up to eleven.
Ultimately, though, Jack's biggest problem is he's actually starting to enjoy himself.
Q. You did everything "right" in terms of "becoming a writer". You went to the right school. You published short fiction in the right literary journals. You were even nominated for the right literary prize. Why do you think it took traditional publishers so long to recognize your talent and ability to attract an audience? What advice do you have for aspiring writers out there who are trying to make it in this tough business?
A. Part of it was that I was writing short stories. Yes, everyone told me that short story collections never sold, but I would look around at the marketplace and think: if these writers are publishing story collections, why can't I? Well, it took me a while to give up on that. Then I had my crime novel and I worked to show it to agents. That took a lot of time and eventually didn't yield anything. So I wanted to get the book out to readers myself, to let readers decide.
The fact is, the system is kind of broken. As it is now, agents are basically the gatekeepers to publishing for new writers. And that doesn't work because they're a) overworked, b) inundated with submissions and c) basically looking for what'll be the fastest sale. So they don't necessarily have a writer's long-term plan in mind and, for many debut authors, that's what's needed.
My best advice is to find a way to get your work in front of readers. It's a numbers game: if you can get thousands of readers/listeners to find your fiction, you're going to wind up with a lot more people who like it than if you can get it to 12 or 20 agents. First, you'll get better percentages with readers and second, you're "putting a LOT more quarters into the machine!"
The fact is, don't worry about making money up front. If you want to charge $3 or $15 for your book online, just give it away instead. A few hundred bucks profit is nothing compared to the power and inspiration of finding readers who like your book.
Q. As you know, a lot of the classic novelists, Dickens, Dostoevski, the Bronte sisters, for instance, serialized their novels – that’s just the way things were done back then. What’s interesting to me is that, as a reader, I can easily spot where the end of each serialization would likely have occurred. With this in mind, does the process of serialization affect your writing style or the pacing or structure of your work? Did you, or do you, write your fiction with the podcast in mind?
A. Not so much, really. At least, not until my fourth book, Young Junius. That's the first one I actually wrote in a serialization model. With the others, the first three JACK PALMS books, I wrote the whole novel first and then started to put it out as a podcast. I'd break the end of an episode at either a good chapter break, around 4,500 words, or where the best cliffhanger happened to fall. Still, that affected the serialization more than the writing.
One thing that this process did affect though, was that I'd start to look at the books sometimes a bit like seasons of a good, extended-narrative TV show, like the Sopranos or Dexter. It just felt like a natural parallel there. By the end of each book, some plot threads would be wrapped up, but not all. Just like with a TV season. I think this also freed me up to write better endings.
Q. I’d say you’re probably considered a fiction podcasting pioneer for successfully podcasting your work to a dedicated worldwide audience. But, now that traditional print publishers are taking on your work, will that change anything in your process or the way you work?
A. I'm not sure that it will. Three Rivers Press (a division of Random House) is my publisher now and they're perfectly content for me to keep giving away my work as free podcasts. They know it works and that I'm building an audience by doing that. They'd be crazy to ask me to stop. Also, working with a bigger publisher gives me more recognition from the media and so hopefully that can help me grow my brand. They also give me more funding to stay at home and work on my writing, podcasting, etc. Those things are great!
Q. On your website, you said your work is heavily influenced by movies and television. What are your biggest influences?
A. Sure. Basically I've always loved action movies, fight movies, comic books, video games, all that. I started writing crime fiction when I allowed those parts of my personality to come into my fiction. Two things happened then: 1) I started having a lot more fun and 2) my writing got better as a result of it!
I love shows like The Sopranos, Dexter, The Wire. Movies like Pulp Fiction, Scarface, True Romance, and old Hong Kong Cinema. Early Jackie Chan movies. All of it! You'll definitely see the influence of games like Grand Theft Auto on my work as well.
Q. Like many of the writers I've interviewed, you have an interesting list of jobs that allowed you to pay the bills and make time for writing, including a commodities floor trading clerk, bartender, copy-editor for Avon Products, rare book cataloguer, librarian, English teacher, and freelance journalist. What’s next for Seth Harwood and Jack Palms?
A. I'm teaching English and creative writing here at Stanford and City College of San Francisco. I'd say the future holds more part-time teaching for me and plenty of mornings spent writing more Jack Palms adventures. And I don't think I'd have it any other way! If I'm writing and paying the bills, I'm a happy man.
Scott Sigler and I are also starting to teach a course called Author Boot Camp (http://authorbootcamp.com) where we show other writers how to do what we've done by serializing our books as free podcasts and using social networking to build a big audience. So far that's been a great deal of fun!
Q. Do you think more big publishers will finally begin to utilize technology like podcasting to enhance their marketing and promote their writers?
A. Ultimately, I think they will. Steering my own writing career is a lot easier to do than to steer a publishing company. It's the old "hard to turn an ocean liner" metaphor, and it's true. I can make more changes and try new strategies much easier myself than a big publisher can. But they're looking to get into much more online fan-promotion. They're using blogs now and many other things, but they're still afraid to give the actual writing away for free, in most cases. It's a little crazy: why insist on spending money to buy advertising instead of giving away some of what you already have for free? That's the way I look at it.
(Watch as Seth Harwood shares the secret to his podcasting success in this video.)
Q. How do you feel about other publishing technologies, like eBooks and wireless readers like Amazon's Kindle2?
A. I love 'em. I love them all! Fact is, it's going to be readers who decide how they want to consume books and what devices they're going to buy. My best strategy as an author is to just do my best to get my book(s) onto as many of them as I possibly can. Whatever way a reader wants Jack Wakes Up, it's my job to make sure they can get it!
Jack Wakes Up (Three Rivers Press; Updated Edition, May 5, 2009, 304 pages)
For more info about Seth Hardwood: go to www.SethHarwood.com.
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