5 Fantastic Benefits of Self Publishing
Benefit #3 (No Waiting. No Rejection.)
For those of you just tuning in, this is the second installment of this illustrious blog series entitled
5 Fantastic Benefits of Self Publishing
written out of a sense of duty and actual love for first time authors, according to many years of experience as an author, book editor, and publisher. I’m a bit crusty but quite well-meaning, and I want to save you time and tears. So here I go again . . .
Benefit #3: No Waiting. No Rejection.
The Cinderella story of a little book by an unknown author that gets discovered by a publisher and becomes an overnight bestseller is mostly just that – a fairytale. Yes, it happens. Like, when the stars align in the shape of an Appalachian rabbit’s left knuckle. Seriously, it just hasn’t been happening lately.
In the current publishing climate, with major houses paying gigantic advances to celebrity authors – the Cash Cow Club – not much is left to spend on developing new talent. Let’s be honest: a publisher isn’t going to spend its tall stack of shiny dimes marketing a book written by someone nobody’s heard of, no matter how brilliant it is. Even for your book to be considered, you’ll need to have amassed no less than a national following in your field of expertise, as well as an extremely well-planned marketing strategy which you intend to implement at your own expense!
Such is the putrid truth nowadays in every genre from children’s books to alternative health to historical novels. First time authors are being turned away en masse, with nary a glance at their wares. And since nonfiction books can be particularly time-sensitive, trend-focused as they so often are (and therefore, to borrow a phrase from Hart Crane, “as liable to melt as snow”) authors frequently while away their precious window of publishing opportunity enduring increasingly frustrating rounds of disappointment, usually at the end of a very long wait for an agent or editor to respond to their proposal. It’s not that I despise agents and acquisitions editors; it’s just that I’ve seen the piles on their desks, and I’ve seen the pile on the floor that they affectionately refer to as “the slush.” It isn’t impossible to get a major publishing house interested in a book by a first-time author, but it’s getting more difficult all the time.
Self publishing (and again, I prefer the term “independent publishing,” which is blissfully free of the negative connotations which have attached themselves to the “self” term) removes the wait – as well as the accompanying weight from your shoulders. Publishing on your own means giving up the frustration of rejection and getting on with the business of getting your book into the hands of readers.
Why wait? And why bother wading through a mountain of rejections?
Stay tuned.
Next blog I’ll tell you all about Fantastic Benefit #4. Yet another doozy.
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A graduate of the University of Iowa Writer’s Workshop, Ceci Miller is also the author of two published children’s picture books, and former contributing editor for Darshan, an international magazine. A student of yoga and meditation since 1976, Ceci leads seminars that explore language as a vehicle for personal transformation. Based on her book Sacred Visitations, and the popular book she co-authored with John Lee, Writing from the Body, Ceci’s work (both with CeciBooks authors and in public programs) blends writing, intuitive guidance, and contemplative practices that connect right brain creativity with your true intention.
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