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| 2009 Cover |
My Road to DIY Publication
I often talk to Independent authors with newly-launched books. They all have the same questions, and I’m always glad to offer up my experience to help them on their way. I’ve been DIY publishing e-books and paperbacks since 2009 and I can tell you that this business changes every few months. I did well for a short time, a mere 10 weeks, but now I struggle like most other authors.
I’ve decided to put what I’ve learned into a short series of blog posts for my Kentuckiana Authors Association friends. I’ll try to keep these short, feel free to comment, by all means ask questions. I’ll put in links as I go. I might rearrange the links on my website to make it easier to find stuff.
I think it was in 2007 that I joined a local writer’s group called the Bard’s Corner. I learned how to outline, which made a big difference in my writing, but my work schedule kept me too busy to attend regularly. It was my first exposure to writing groups and peer review; it changed my paradigm on writing forever by opening my eyes to a larger world.
Once I learned to outline, I was able to finish my first novel “Let’s Do Lunch.” At that point (2008) I joined a couple of websites for writers so I could learn more. “Forward Motion” was the best of the writer’s websites – I don’t know if it is still around, I hope so, because it offered the first ever open peer review that I’d ever experienced. I got feedback by people who had skill-sets superior to mine and I learned a whole lot in a short period of time. I edited the manuscript using every bit of feedback that I could get.
2009 I entered Amazon’s Breakout Novel Award – I uploaded the manuscript during a horrendous ice storm via dial up because we had no electricity here at the house, but the phone still worked. My novel made two of three cuts, and garnered some feedback that has me rolling my eyes to this day. It was during that contest that I learned of a website run by Harper-Collins called Authonomy. I spent the next 4 years on that site, learning a lot, but none of my books ever got any traction on the contest to the Editor’s Desk.
I spent 2009 and most of 2010 watching the phenomena of the Amazon Kindle shake up the publishing industry and allow authors to upload their books to the new e-book format and get some readers, and get paid. I uploaded my e-books to Barnes & Noble’s Nook Press platform, Kobo Writing Life and Smashwords as well.
Those were heady days indeed.
My brief appearance on the Amazon best sellers list was 10 glorious weeks on the romantic suspense chart in the UK where Let’s Do Lunch hit #3 for a few hours and settled to #8 for several days. It then slid off the Top ten list into the top 25, then the Top 100 and then down into the mulch layer with about 50 million other e-books.
After that the sales trickled in, a handful a quarter but not enough to pay for the endless hours I spent marketing my e-books. I was obsessed, always a bad sign, and getting nowhere but discouraged. When ’50 Shades of Gray’ came out, my sales evaporated completely and I’ve struggled just to stay somewhat in the game ever since.
I hope this series of blogs will serve to open a dialog with my fellow writers.
Warning: This blog contains subject matter that other's might find offensive as well as blog posts that have snarky language. Feel free to roll you eyes and click away from posts that offend you. The opinions expressed here were only valid on the day of posting, after that I've probably forgotten what I posted. I think the eye-roll emoji is either ::-( or 88-(, I no doubt deserve it.
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