A Goodreads user
asked
Carissa Broadbent:
Carissa, I ADORED The Serpent and the Wings of Night! As an aspiring romantic fantasy novelist myself (currently in the purgatory of my first round of agent queries - joy!), I'm wondering why you decided to self-publish vs. going a more traditional route? You CERTAINLY have the talent for it! Your book is easily the best thing I've read on Kindle Unlimited all year.
Carissa Broadbent
Thank you so much, I'm so glad you loved it and so appreciate your kind words!!
There were so many different factors that went into that decision... I've always been interested in entrepreneurship, so indie publishing really attracted me on that front. I love being able to have full control over my output, books, packaging, marketing, and career. My day job was in marketing and I went to school for graphic design, so I also felt like I had the skillset to leverage in an indie career (plus, those things are fun to me, so I wanted to be able to play with them!).
The financials of indie publishing are also very different than trad, and they've been very kind to me. Because I take home all of my royalties (after the retailer cut OFC!), I make a comfortable full-time living from my books, and I feel like it would have been a lot harder to do that as a mid-list author if I was trad.
If the right trad deal came along, I would definitely be open to being hybrid. I think that in today's landscape, there is more opportunity than ever for authors to explore different business models and ways of shaping their careers. Overall, I really love being indie!
Good luck on your authoring journey! No matter which route you go, it's a wild and fun ride!!
There were so many different factors that went into that decision... I've always been interested in entrepreneurship, so indie publishing really attracted me on that front. I love being able to have full control over my output, books, packaging, marketing, and career. My day job was in marketing and I went to school for graphic design, so I also felt like I had the skillset to leverage in an indie career (plus, those things are fun to me, so I wanted to be able to play with them!).
The financials of indie publishing are also very different than trad, and they've been very kind to me. Because I take home all of my royalties (after the retailer cut OFC!), I make a comfortable full-time living from my books, and I feel like it would have been a lot harder to do that as a mid-list author if I was trad.
If the right trad deal came along, I would definitely be open to being hybrid. I think that in today's landscape, there is more opportunity than ever for authors to explore different business models and ways of shaping their careers. Overall, I really love being indie!
Good luck on your authoring journey! No matter which route you go, it's a wild and fun ride!!
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