Self-Publishing

The stigma seems to be gone. Of self-publishing, that is. I'll just start with that. For years, I’ll admit that it was an obstacle for me. . . .

My first novel, or a draft very much in the spirit of what has become The Crafter’s Son, was finished years ago. In 2008 I was passing out .pdfs like a salesman passing out business cards at a convention. My family and close friends had all at least checked it out. Some had read it to completion. And the feedback was mostly very supportive and positive. Even "non-Fantasy-types" seemed to like it.

All good, right? Well, yes, but . . . the literary agents and publishers I contacted weren't interested. And then, life happened. I got divorced and my free time, and secondary priorities, became tied up with other focuses and different activities.

But in 2019 my kids had somehow gotten older. They were now all teenagers, and were all achieving the kind of emotional maturity and balance a parent hopes for. So I decided to give it another go. I did my research. I identified the most high-powered literary agent I could find (who represents some of the top talent in the Fantasy genre right now). And I submitted my query per his requirements. I waited the appropriate amount of time. And then, once the window had passed, as he'd said in his query instructions, I was to consider him not interested. This was August of 2019.

While I was waiting for what would prove to be "rejection number seven" I started listening to podcasts about self-publishing. Eventually, I stumbled onto Mark Dawson. And so it was that, when the rejection came, I bit the bullet and shelled out the $500 for Mark's course.

I will qualify my next paragraph quite clearly: this is not a paid endorsement. Nor does Mark have a clue who I am, nor does he have anything to do with what I'm about to say. But . . . if you have a dream of self-publishing, and you can scrape together $500 by clipping coupons or skipping your morning Dunks, you can hardly do better than to pay for Mark's course. It gave me everything I needed to get off the ground and publish my novel. From cover design, to print layouts, to advertising on Facebook, to finding an editor . . . it was all there.

There was even a "tech library" with guided walk-throughs to painstakingly show you precisely what to click on and where to open a Kindle Direct Publishing account, to create a Facebook Ad, and even to write the "blurb" to sell your writing. Truly . . . the best $500 I can recall ever spending. It has invariably paid for itself many times over in the time, energy and effort it has saved me. And it also served as a checklist for everything I did to work through the process of selling my book on Amazon (spoiler: that's the first step!).

So, if you have been wrestling with the idea of self-publishing, I urge you to check out Mark’s podcast and see for yourself what he is all about.

Good luck, and good writing!