ePublishing and the New Golden Age of Pulp Fiction

In Woody Allen’s Academy Award nominated movie, Midnight in Paris, a nostalgic writer is whisked back to the 1920s to what he considers to be the high water mark of literature. There he is captivated by a young woman who doesn’t share his enthusiasm for her own time period and is pining to go back to an even earlier epoch. The message, greatness is often difficult to see when it surrounds you and only becomes clear when viewed in hindsight.

Decades from now people are going to look back at the recent explosion in eBooks and ePublishing as the start of a new “Golden Age” of fiction. This will be one that rivals the period of the 1930’s -1950’s when authors like Raymond Chandler, Rex Stout, Mickey Spillane and Dashiell Hammett created the definition of modern detective mysteries. Where Isaac Asimov, Robert A. Heinlein, Ray Bradbury, Arthur C. Clarke, among many others laid the foundation for science fiction that has come since.

The same people today who tut-tut the quality and coarseness of some of the material currently available on the internet -- particularly the cheap or free eBooks -- would likely have had the same reaction to the pulp magazines like True Detective and Astounding Science Fiction. They would have shaken their heads at the fledgling “Graphic Novels” publishers DC and Marvel Comics. That, however, wouldn’t have stopped them from reading The Saturday Evening Post or checking the rack at the local drug store to see what new cheap paperback Bantam Books and Dell Publishing had to offer this week.

With ePublishing and eBooks, a new generation of fiction giants is just starting to emerge but, like the forest and tree dilemma, we may all be so close our vision is obscured. Now, with Kindle and other eReaders, someone with a different idea doesn’t have to send their work through the New York City Publishing industry’s homogenization process. Their book doesn’t have to be derivative or fit into a “niche” so the marketing department will know what cookie cutter approach to use to promote it.

Aspiring authors no longer need to genuflect to the NYC based publishing College of Cardinals or go hat in hand looking for an agent. While the big houses may not like it one bit, the world is discovering a new religion. It’s one that doesn’t require clear cutting forests to get paper to print $30 books. It’s one where the latest books can be downloaded magically from a “cloud” instead of delivered by a diesel fume belching truck. It’s one where a thousand novels can miraculously fit in the palm of a small child’s hand.

Today writers can break new ground and not have to be content to follow the herd. There are no limits and no guardrails. Since the costs to produce an eBook are negligible, authors can take risks. If a title craters, so what? Dust yourself off and try something new and see what happens.

Are there going to be some truly dreadful eBooks ePublished? You bet. Will it be tough sometimes to separate the wheat from the chaff? You bet, but the marketplace will take care of that. Is fiction going to be better because of all of these new voices and fresh ideas? Absolutely.

Every day new writers are climbing into the arena armed with interesting and original things to say. Because they are motivated by a desire to be heard and not necessarily to get rich, you can get a good eBook for less than the price of a cup of twelve hour old gas station coffee. You can get an award winning novel or the occasional older Bestseller for less than a Starbuck’s White Chocolate Mocha Grande. If you’re willing to pay an arm and a leg for a current bestseller from a major publisher, they are available as well. All can be delivered to you instantly anywhere you can find a Wi-Fi connection.

Who will create the next hot niche? Will it come from the lumbering dinosaurs in New York who lately seem only interested in sure things and are no longer willing to take chances on new authors? Or, will it be a .99 cent Kindle that captures the imagination and catches fire? Will it be a combination of the two? Will the next Jim Butcher and his marvelous “Dresden Files” series, be discovered in the publishing backwater and jump to the top of the New York Times Bestsellers list? Will eBooks become the minor leagues where a new author can learn his or her craft before making the leap to the big show and a fat contract with one of the Big Six publishing houses?

It is too early to say how this will all play out. But, was there ever a better time to be alive and be a writer? With this much creativity and passion crackling in the air, how can this be anything but the dawn of the next Golden Age of Pulp Fiction.