An Indie Author’s Bumpy Road to Self-Publishing

It’s been almost one week since my book birthday, and what a whirlwind it has been! Thank you to everyone who bought CURSED VINES and visited my virtual book launch party. Your support will not be forgotten!

Now that my debut novel is officially for sale, I feel the need to do what designers call a “post-mortem.” (I am a designer by day and writer by night.) It’s a morbid term for a review of a completed project in order to implement positive team changes for the next project. Learn, grow, repeat.

I’m taking a moment to reflect on the long journey leading up to this life-changing day. I’m now officially a published author and a lifelong dream of mine has been realized. It’s been a surreal week, with the mixed emotions of a new indie author and the stress of a first-time publisher.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m ecstatic to finally show my work, a novel a decade in the making, but it hasn’t been easy.

Great Expectations

As most writers, my dream started with hopes to land a great agent, sign a contract from one of the Big Five publishers, cash my fat advance check, and attend all the marketing events planned for me. It was a lofty dream most writers never achieve. Notice how that dream didn’t include publishing on my own.

After a bunch of rejections from agents, I decided to go the small publishing route and signed a contract with what I thought was a great little publisher. I won’t name names, but this publisher kept running into financial issues. So when my 18-month contract ran up and I still didn’t have a published book to show for it, I knew it was my turn to step to the plate.

I always dreamed of being a publisher. I even started a fake publishing company when I first became a web designer. It was named Owl Cave Publishing, a tribute to David Lynch’s television show Twin Peaks. It never published anything. I don’t think I even tried.

So I read up on all the best self-publishing blogs such as JaneFriedman.com, TheCreativePenn.com, and SelfPublishingAdvice.org, and planned my own book launch. It took much longer than I expected to get everything done, especially with a full-time job and toddlers, so I missed a few deadlines. I also made up a few along the way.

Determined to get it right, I vowed to not become another unpolished self-published author. CURSED VINES had already been edited dozens of times by this point—read and reviewed by beta readers, edited by professional book editors and proofreaders, and critiqued a thousand times over. Still, it needed one last revision. It had been two years since I last read it, after all.

Ready, set, go!

By the time I set up the files to be printed, I read the book so many times, I didn’t want to read another line. That’s when I knew the manuscript was finally finished. Wabi-sabi.

Then it was time to market it. Truthfully, this process should have started much sooner, but that’s another post.

I have years of experience with marketing and web design, as well as graphic design and public relations. I have a degree in journalism and almost 20 years of experience as a designer. Technically, I could do it all on my own. I just needed to make time for it and ask some experienced writers and publishers for their advice and guidance. Their insight helped immensely. I could not have done it all in a vacuum.

It took many months, hours, mistakes to be able to hold a printed copy of CURSED VINES in my hands, but it was definitely worth it. I learned a lot about publishing and marketing a book, and I plan to tweak my process the next time around with all my new knowledge. (Yes, there will be a next time!)

I don’t claim to know everything, and my newbie advice may not work for everyone, but I hope you will continue with me as I blog about my experiences with writing and self-publishing. Do you have your own story to tell? Maybe we can learn a thing or two together!