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Living the Dream

This is a guest post from @ZeroToSold (thanks Carolyn!). It originally appeared in this month’s Duolit Newsletter. Speaking of which, you really should sign up! It’s a great way to keep abreast of the latest self-publishing news, notes and tips. It’s super-easy to subscribe and we’ll never spam you — ever!

Photo: Navicore | Flickr

I look at people funny when they tell me “I’ve always dreamed of publishing a novel.”

I mean, they do know it is 2010, right?

Publishing a novel is a straight-forward, attainable and as simple as driving a car.

Is there work involved?  Yes.  Do you need to know a few rules and abide by them?  Um, of course.

Did that stop you when you were sixteen from getting your license and begging for your parent’s keys?  No.

The case is the same with your novel.

I shocks me how many people have a book (or two… or three) sitting in a drawer (or an abandoned ‘archived’ computer folder).

Yes, I totally get it that getting an agent or publisher was a one in a million occurrence and that self-publishing was looked down upon.  That basically if you dared self-pub, you ruined any shot of every getting that novel released.

Um, ya, then actual business people took over the publishing industry (which is not ALL a good thing, but for us unpublished authors, it was awesome).  They wanted to well, sell books.  It started on the non-fiction side.  They embraced people that put their own books out and established a sales base.

Then indie film hit.  Reinvigorating the movie industry.

And good old MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter brought wide range, yet personal reference marketing to every author’s fingertips.

Game on!

Traditionally published authors such as JA Konrath embraced this new media and realized they could actually make MORE money by self-publishing than traditional.

So yes, I do look at people funny when they talk about dreaming of a day when their book could be out.

#Um #Thisisawkward #Itcouldbetoday

Great sentiment, Carolyn, and so true! Connect with Carolyn via Twitter as a woman dating after 40 (@craftycmc), a book marketing guru (@ZeroToSold) or thriller author (@CristynWest).

Simon Cheshire: Self-Publishing Interview Series

Welcome to the first interview in our series of talks with self-published authors and those involved in the self-publishing process. We hope that sharing the opinions and perspectives of others will benefit us all, not only by better understanding the self-publishing process itself, but also by becoming better acquainted with folks going through the same trials and tribulations as the rest of us.

Today we’re talking with Simon Cheshire, the bestselling children’s author of the Saxby Smart series, who has just self-published one of his backlist titles, Jeremy Brown: Spy. Simon’s unique perspective, having traversed both the traditional publishing and self-publishing worldsmade him a great fit for the series, and we’re so pleased to have him lead things off.  Now, without further ado, on to the interview! (more…)

Taking a Piece of the Power Away from Publishers

Just a quick drive-by post to share an interesting article I read on The Huffington Post this morning entitled “Publishing: Taking the Power Back” by Judith D. Shwartz. Judith wrote a memior that piqued the interest of several publishers, but none that could get the book past their marketing department. What was she to do? From the article:

You see, it was comforting to believe that there was this distinct entity called “a good book” that a writer aspired to and that an editor would recognize and embrace. But I could no longer believe that. From keeping up on publishing news I saw that while money was being invested and decisions were being made, no one really knew what people wanted to read or what books would sell. [...] So the question for me became: why should I allow my literary fate to be determined by what seemed an increasingly dysfunctional system?

Instead of giving up, she took the process into her own hands, publishing the book on a printing machine in her own independent bookstore. And how did readers respond?

Readers have responded powerfully to the book. Every once in a while I slip and find myself apologizing about its being independently published, but it turns out readers are not as hung up on those publishing brands as I thought. The same with writers (though every once in a while I sense that someone sees self-publishing as a disease they might catch–but this could be my own projection.)

It’s great to see success stories like this — mainstream publishing just isn’t for every author or every book and self-publishing can help gets the books into readers’ hands that would have otherwise never seen the light of day. A great morning read, indeed!