Don’t tell me to “just self-publish”
Seriously, don’t. Especially if we’re strangers, but even if we’re friends. If I want to revisit self-pub in future, I will let all and sundry know, and seek fresh advice appropriately.
(Shout-out to my critique group who are predominantly self-pub oriented and have never done this. And also the vast, VAST majority of self pubbers I know who have likewise never done this. It is appreciated, for reals. Disclaimer: the post below is all a matter of opinion, reflecting on no one but me, and my various experiences of changing tracks from intending to self-pub, to attempting the trade route.)
The source of this complaint: Not a day goes by in the various writing-related FB groups where some poor soul naively asks for advice on the trade publishing process (usually querying), or worse, wants to bemoan the difficulties they’re encountering in the hopes of commiseration. And inevitably, such posts attract the attention of at least one self pub evangelical, galloping forth on a metaphorical white horse with cries of Just self publish!
Inb4 people telling me it’s only advice, it’s a well-meaning comment, get over it, take it for what it is. All the NOPE for that one. If you’re a writer, you should be among the first people to recognise how dire “well-meaning” advice can be, and sometimes even hurtful.
Humor me for a moment. Imagine if the above thread was, instead, about a self-pub author struggling to get sales or struggling with marketing (another common topic of discussion) when suddenly, a trade-oriented author appeared over the horizon with the cry of Just query agents! Can you imagine how frustrating, hurtful, and irritating that would be? Same deal for the querying author above.
It’s in the exact same category as mothers asking for breast-feeding advice, and being told to bottlefeed. Or parents asking for sleep advice, and being told to leave their kids to cry. Or adults asking for relationship advice, and being told to simply leave. And a thousand other examples.
As a general rule, people don’t ask for advice because they are totally unaware of their other options. They ask for advice because they’ve chosen a path and are trying to make it work. (This is so utterly and patently obvious that I can’t believe it needs explaining, and yet it’s the most reoccuring, facepalm conversation of adulthood, in various forms.)
It’s condescending to assume that if someone’s choices don’t align with yours, they haven’t considered their options enough. But that’s exactly what that advice implies. (And yes, this can apply to SO many other topics… but we’ll stick with writing for now.)
If someone is trying to query, chances are they’ve done a fair amount of research to even get to that point, because you don’t usually stumble onto querying by chance. That means they probably have reasons specific to them for wanting to try trade publishing, and *to them* the charge of just self-pub is often akin to someone saying just give up.
This is not a reflection of self-publishing as a whole. This is not a statement that self-pub is simply a failure of the “traditional” route. It is simply an acknowledgment that these decisions are hugely personal and dependent on circumstance, book, author, etc. There are hundreds of different reasons why someone might choose one path over another, without any of those reasons being a condemnation of other options.
Here’s one other thing about advice threads: a lot people are really asking for encouragement, and simply saying “do something else” is… pretty much the exact opposite of encouraging.
I should add that this goes both ways, that trade authors should not be commenting on the choices of self-pub authors. However, I do feel compelled to add that I don’t think I have ever seen anyone say, in an online writing community, “just query agents” as advice. Partly this is because there is no guarantee of results that way so it doesn’t make sense–whereas in self pub, you can guarantee hitting the publish button, and guarantee self-marketing–and partly, I think, because trade-oriented authors are vastly outnumbered these days. So the outlier fringe who are evangelical about it tend to be already published (moving in different circles) or an even smaller subset of an already small (comparatively) group.
But I think there is another reason as well; many trade-oriented authors are not confident in their decision. There are so many steps and hoops to conquer, and you can get stuck at every stage; much of publishing process involves acclimating to continuous failure and disappointment.
Speaking for myself, I could never in good faith recommend that someone attempt the trade publishing route. I would encourage anyone to write, and will share what little I know if they ask or seem interested, but it seems a peculiar form of cruelty to urge an unsuspecting soul into the querying trenches unless I am dead certain they’re a sucker for punishment.
In fact, I wonder if that shouldn’t be the community attitude full stop. Should you write? Definitely! Should you try and publish (either self OR trade)? Only if you’re a sucker for misery.
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The rest of this post is an overview on why I don’t want to pursue self-publishing at this time. It’s not something I really talk about much, and I didn’t want to skew the conversation above or complicate it by throwing in my own narrative, so I’ve included it as a separate section here.
Self publishing was my first choice. (And this is my number one reason why the advice to JUST SELF PUBLISH drives me up the wall; been there, done that, seen the goods, rejected the sale.)
My overriding goal is to be a career writer because I don’t have any other skills and would prefer work that fits around caring for my youngest, who has special needs. Yes, I know that might be out of my control, and yes I might not achieve that. But that’s why it’s a goal, not a guarantee. I’m explaining this to give context to what I’ve written below.
I write weird fantasy with (hopefully) a literary edge. There’s not a huge market for this in trade, but there’s even less in self pub. Yes, there are exceptions, but counting on being an exception is not a good business move. In general, the more literary a book is, the more you’ll struggle to market it in the self-pub world. Other categories of books that are also hard: picture books and middle grade fiction, for example, are tough sells in self pub. It is very, very difficult for indie authors to match trade presses re picture books on a cost for quality basis.
Counter-intuitively, trade presses are often better at pushing unusual books, because they have the reach and marketing to make it work. A good example of the kind of book I mean is Ada Palmer’s “Too Like the Lightning” for which she did the research and eventually came to the same conclusion: if her highly unusual scifi novel was to have any chance at all, she needed the Big 5 with their money and their expert marketing departments to get it off the ground. The belief that self-pub is inherently better for unusual fiction does not hold up well on closer examination, imo.
But please, whatever type of fiction you write… if you self pub, DO take it seriously. Research. Invest. Work hard. Listen to advice. Listen to feedback. If someone says your covers suck, don’t get defensive. If someone says your book needs editing, don’t get defensive. Generally, the self pub community want you to succeed and their advice is mean to be honest.
Anyways, where were we. Okay. This is not to say a writer of niche fiction or kidlit shouldn’t try the self pub route. If it’s what you want, go for it. But I personally am already apathetic to the idea of self-marketing; doing it uphill in the rain doesn’t make that more appealing. I don’t think I’d make the money back, to be honest. And I’d need it to.
Which brings me to cost. I can’t afford to self-publish. Assuming I wrote all four of my literary fantasy tetralogy and then published together for a rapid release schedule, the cost of editors and covers *alone* would be punishing (at least £4k).
I can’t use cheap photo manip covers because there are no human characters in those novels, nor would that be appropriate for the market I’m trying to target (have a look at the cover of Etched City, you’ll see what I mean); I also strongly believe self pub books benefit from an editor, and that it’s a bad idea to skimp in that regard. But those do cost money. As before, the goal is sustainable career, even if not wealthy. I need publishing to be affordable, I need to have a hope of making the money back.
Even if I went “cheap” on self pub I still can’t afford the few hundred outlay. Not even for one book. We have zero savings and a shitton of debt. Self pub is akin to starting a small business and since I can’t invest the minimum amount to create a good product, I shouldn’t do it.
I could, of course, write in a different genre for self pub. This was the most common advice given to me in self pub communities; write in a genre that definitely sells. Target your demographic appropriately. Self pub gives you the freedom to write outside of prescriptive trade press guidelines, but only true if you don’t care about selling copies. If you do, you’re just as constrained by what does sell. (Hint: Romance outsells everything else by an enormous, mind-blowing margin. I can’t write romance to save my life.)
If I’m going to be confined no matter what I do, then I might as well write what sells to a trade market, because querying costs nothing, so it’s a safer business decision. And then eventually do a transition (if/when I get a following of my own) into writing what interests me a bit more, and/or is a bit weirder.
It’s a fair point, of course, that trade publishing doesn’t guarantee success. But I have less to lose by attempting this route, at this time. And I potentially have a lot more to gain.
There are probably a thousand other issues that could be raised for discussion in conversation, such as artistic control and so forth, but we’d be here all day and I think I’ve given a general idea for why this option wasn’t going to work for me in the end.
Anyways. I feel better now. My apologies to the various followers I might lose because I’ve given into grumpiness today.
