Greetings,
I’m glad you’re here and want to learn about serialized fiction. I wrote episodes for Amazon on the Kindle Vella platform for sixteen months. After watching online videos, YouTubers convinced me readers were hungry for the format. So what the heck went wrong? First, let me share what Amazon did.
Amazon’s Yacht
Amazon created a platform for writers to publish their stories without spending a fortune to self-publish. Kindle Vella was a website for readers, and they sold virtual tokens to unlock the story episodes. The cost was a range between six-cents to fifty-cents, depending on the length of the individual episode.
The Kindle Vella department believed they could convince people to purchase reads from their serialized platform. Then readers could indulge in vella-books and discover new writers. For their effort, writers were paid generous royalties and bonuses. On the surface, it sounded like a win/win for everyone.
Why I hopped aboard
After browsing the vellas, I realized hundreds of writers had joined. Some of them created the type of content I wrote. With a little marketing, their readers would likely read my stories. After all, people can read faster than the authors can type a new webnovel.
My computer held edited but unpublished stories. I decided to test the water and set sail with Amazon. How could a big ship like “Zon” sink?
In the beginning, I published shorter pieces, knowing that readers were allowed to enjoy the first three episodes free. Those vellas were made up of award-winning short stories from conferences. The result was incredible. People were asking me what else I had. And Amazon was paying me bonuses for putting my fiction on their platform. It was the easiest money I ever made from writing.
I kept publishing until I had over 200 episodes on the platform. In all, I had 7 vellas and almost 10,000 reads, over 7,500 likes, lots of comments, crowns (awards given by readers), and a few great reviews. This whirlwind happened in a span of 8 months, then it slowed down.
Our Ship Sprang a Leak
Despite publishing in various genres, most of my success came from posting The Cave Witch. It was a 97-episode-long paranormal thriller. I rewrote parts to make it suitable for a serialized platform, but I preferred it as a novel. People who bought my young adult, coming-of-age book, Run Girl Run, objected to Kindle Vella. They asked me to let them know when The Cave Witch went into print. They wanted to read it — just not online.
Other authors hit those obstacles, too. Our readers didn’t like the token experience. If they bought a book, they wanted to turn those pages or download it into an ebook reader.
Some authors disappointed the readers. Serial fiction pacing was faster than most novels. Readers didn’t expect cliffhangers at the end of a book. Some people were put off when writers concluded their story at a crucial moment and made them wait for the next season. While this technique may work on television, readers will stop following the story if they feel cheated.
Greed got the best of some writers. They robbed Wikipedia of public content and tried to pass it off as their own to create vellas. They went to Wattpad and stole other author’s stories. Imagine the shock of seeing your own story on someone else’s account. These instances weren’t isolated. Thievery was rampant. Amazon missed the plagiarism. They might’ve been checking our work, but with hundreds of stories popping up every week, it was the writers who spotted the problem.
Amazon trained writers to expect huge bonuses then cut their pay. Writers stopped writing and marketing when they lost the income. Complaints about overspending on ads flooded private Facebook groups. The ROI (return on investment) dropped, and writers were discouraged. Many of them left the platform in anticipation of Kindle Vella going under.
The Best Parts About Jumping Ship
Though I packed my stories before Amazon screamed SOS, I took my memories, too. I met some incredible people on the Kindle Vella platform.
Readers gave me positive feedback, which boosted my confidence.
I read some good tales while I was there.
Reflecting on the Vella Experience
The United States doesn’t embrace serialized fiction as well as other countries. I’m an avid reader and if someone offers me an online read, or a printed book, I will prefer the book. I’m not saying no one likes serialized work, but I don’t believe it’s the majority.
Romance fared better than other genres. If you write romance, you have a better shot at success on a serialized site.
A writer can market until the Coast Guard comes, but the ship will still sink if too many readers don’t embrace the platform. Plenty of writers were spending big bucks on Facebook ads to get more reads. Unfortunately, most of them either broke even or lost money.
I loved connecting with the audience in the comment section of the vellas. It was fun to see what they thought about the episode.
While on Kindle Vella, I learned to pace my books better and to create question loops in the reader’s mind. It kept them reading. I may do a post about this in the future.
I appreciated the support Amazon gave me when I joined. Overall, they paid me well, though I disagreed with some of their policies.
The Future of Serialized Fiction
Did my experience convince me that serialized fiction was a waste of time? Not at all. Not if you have a strategy to convince readers to join the site. Amazon couldn’t figure it out. They depended on writers to bring their following to Kindle Vella. Not enough readers liked the platform.
If you want to try reading or publishing serialized fiction, you can go to Wattpad or Ream. Those are the ones I know about. Some people are also self-publishing their work here on Substack.
Always do what’s right for you.
My Plans
I grabbed a lifeboat and sailed away from Kindle Vella. Now, I’d like to publish my stories elsewhere. The Cave Witch will go into print in 2025. More to come about that. I have two other novels I might self-publish or let a publisher do the job. I’m still thinking about it.
A Word of Encouragement
Writers, though Kindle Vella will shut down in February 2025, don’t be afraid to explore new avenues in storytelling. Think of it as a new journey. I learned a lot from my serialized fiction experiment.
I invite you to share your experience with serialized fiction or ask me questions I haven’t answered in this post. Drop a comment. I’d love to hear from you.
Serialised works used to be the backbone of great literature. Dickens, Tolstoy, Dosoevsky, Melville, Flaubert, Dumas. Even Stephen king and Tom Wolfe.
It's especially fun when you've got this big book that can feel so intimidating. "I've got to read all that?" but in a series, it's the opposite, it's like 'yeah, I still have so much more to read!"
It's like the meme about long movies. a three hour movie? - Nah.
or
10 one hour episodes, 6 season series? Yeah! binge all night and day!
But I agree, the token system is terrible.
and Whatpadd and Dreame, I don't know it might work for Romance readers and writers, but that's about it.
I'll be posting my series here, so we'll see how it goes.