Be Famous

On Self-Publishing

Self-publishing, the red-headed step child of the publishing industry. It is what writers do if they aren't good enough to "really" get published. To be honest there was, and still is, some truth in that statement. I've read my share of vanity press and/or self-published gruel. By the same token, I've also pulled more than my share of crap off the Barnes and Noble bookshelves.

Messy imagery aside, let's lay down a couple of facts. Fact one: A good writer, coupled with a good editor, will often produce a good book. Fact two: Not all good books are picked up by traditional publishers. I doubt anyone with even a passing knowledge of the publishing industry would debate either of those statements, and those statements beget (I've always wanted to use that word.) the question that fuels the self-publishing industry. Does a writer want to spend their life writing words

that no one will see?

Before I became a game publisher I had hundreds of articles published in magazines from Playboy to Alaskan Air (are they still around?). It was great, it paid the bills. That part of my life passed as I developed my publishing company. Now I write fiction. Good fiction (sorry, I know we should all be modest and stuff), better than most of the published material that I read. If an editor doesn't see it that way, that's cool, if several don't see it that way, that's fine too, but I refuse to throw it in a drawer. I'll publish it myself. Yep, maybe only 500 people buy it, but that is 496 more than the four editors that rejected it. And if ten of those readers tell me they really enjoyed it, I guess I've done some good.

It's a decision that only you can make. Write a novel, write several novels, and spend a lifetime striving to get them traditionally published, or publish them yourself. Get them out there, let someone read them. Be famous. Like Madonna.

I had to tie in the picture somehow.