Self Publishing: License to Ill

Self publishing is, as Karen L. Oberst points out, “either freedom or a license for mediocrity.”

Usually it’s the latter.

Oberst and I both agree that “Self publishing is the wave of the future. As publishers merge, and grow closer to one huge publishing house, it becomes harder and harder for new authors to get anything published. You may need to self-publish if you have a controversial title, a niche title, a quality title that is not likely to make a lot of money, or are just plain unknown.”  And I, after all, am hardly in a position to criticize self publishing as an option because in choosing to work directly with a boutique publisher I essentially did the same thing.  I’ve been, to the extent that I’ve enjoyed success with my writing–and for those of you who’ve helped, and are continuing to help that happen, thank you–a beneficiary of the same leveled playing field that I’m now describing as a license for mediocrity.

So what gives?

For every serious writer, who takes themselves seriously as a writer, there are ten thousand hacks clogging up the market and making us look bad.  People who’ve essentially vomited whatever onto the page, often in a completely incomprehensible fashion, and then opened a Twitter account and spent the next six months telling you that their book is “the best thing ever written” and “un-putdownable” and “a gripping page turner” and you need to buy it now.  Because there’s this myth, out there, that all you need to achieve literary success is access to a computer.

One of the major impetuses for the so-called self publishing revolution in the first place was that the gatekeepers of traditional publishing were no longer doing their job.  Instead of sorting the wheat from the chaff, they grew ever more inward-looking.  Traditional publishing, over time, became less and less about scouring for new talent and more about making a quick and obvious buck.  Which, when you’re a talented writer and people keep coming back to you with nonsensical rejections like “Asians don’t sell,” is obviously going to make you think twice about the process.

But the problem is that there is still a need for gatekeeping–just not the kind of gatekeeping that, these days, mostly anyone is doing.  It matters whether your writing is any good.  It matters whether you’re committed enough to your craft to, say, proofread your own work or whether you have sufficient artistic integrity to do anything more than copy Twilight.  That you can go out and publish anything doesn’t mean that you should.

One of the things I talk a lot about in my forthcoming writing guide, I Look Like This Because I’m A Writer, is paying attention to your audience–and recognizing that they are an audience, not a collection of coin-operated robots.  Selling your book involves a lot more than vomiting onto the page and then commanding people to read it.  You have to create something that they’ll actually want to read.  And that means, whether your work has any obvious commercial appeal or no, taking yourself seriously enough to actually produce your best work.

Stephen King observed, and I’m paraphrasing, here, that you’re either writing for an audience or for yourself.  Which I think is generally correct, and something really important to think about; the problem is that too many aspiring writers take “I’m writing for myself” as license to produce drivel.  Which, you’re perfectly entitled to produce drivel; what you’re not entitled to do is then rush out and publish it and expect miracles to occur.  Personally, I think all of the great writers are to some extent writing for themselves–if not wholly and completely–in the sense that they feel compelled to write.  I know I certainly do.  And of course, I sell my work and of course, I hope you’ll buy it.  Both because, let’s get real here, I have bills to pay but more importantly because I want to share something I love.  But the fact is, I’d still be writing, and still be writing the exact same things, if I were trapped on a desert island.  Because the stories I’m telling are, although fiction, really personal to me and are to some extent born of the experiences in my life.  They’re a part of who I am.

I think you can learn a lot about the patience and dedication required of the publishing process, however you choose to publish, by being a parent.  My son is now two and just beginning to master the art of complete sentences.  He gets frustrated a lot, because of the communication barrier; so I’ve been working with him on teaching him new words.  His especial favorite thing is drawing, and being a child of the 90′s myself I one day started drawing on him to cheer him up.  Over the past few weeks, we’ve been working–at his insistence–on learning all of the body parts and his reward is that every time he correctly names a body part I draw a star on it.

Usually, this ends up in smudges of marker everywhere (thank God for Crayola’s washable markers line) and even pools of brightly colored water all over the kitchen floor (and everywhere else) as he splashes in the puddle the cat has made by flipping over his water dish in disgust at the entire situation and then tracking the results through the house.  But he’s happy, and that’s what counts.

Now, as far as how this applies to the self publishing process, what you can take away is:

Nothing’s instantaneous.  Expecting yourself to become an accomplished writer overnight is like expecting your toddler to master language in one afternoon.  Success comes from a combination of patience, diligent (and repeated) effort, and realistic expectations.
Creation is messy.  You learn more, and you have more fun, when you’re willing to get a little ink on your feet.
Balance is essential.  As a parent, the balance is between respecting your child as an autonomous individual and helping him to actually interact with the world around him.  But in either case, you should be doing whatever you’re doing for his benefit.  Likewise, as a writer, the balance is between telling your story and making your story fit for public consumption.  Things like grammar and correct punctuation aren’t restrictive to your creative process, any more than teaching your child not to hit other children is restricting his development as a human being.  Rather, it’s doing the opposite; it’s giving someone (or something) you love the tools they need to succeed in the broader world.

Perhaps the hardest thing about self publishing is that you have to be your own gatekeeper; no one will tell you, get this edited.  No one will assign you a proofreader.  No one will write your ad copy for you, or give you step by step directions on how to market yourself.  Which is why, at least theoretically, you’re getting a larger slice of the royalty pie: you’re earning it.  But there really is no such thing as a free lunch.  If you’re not ready, willing and able to be self directing–up to and including embracing the notion of self criticism–then self publishing probably isn’t for you.