Looking Back on my Foray into Self-Publishing

It’s been a few years since I took the plunge into self-publishing my first two short story collections. Three years, to be more precise, although it seems like most time has passed. The COVID years tend to make time a little freaky when I look back.

Self-publishing my stories wasn’t an easy decision. I’ve been writing fiction for a long time and had stories published in a wide variety of print, online, and electronic publications. But I was tired of the “submit my story and wait to hear back from an editor if I’m lucky” routine. I felt that it was time to take the next step.

I researched traditional and self-publishing, read a lot of personal opinion pieces from writers on both sides of the fence, and finally decided to do it myself.

Why? Several reasons.

One reason was the wait time. Waiting for an agent to make a decision. Waiting for a publisher to make a decision. Then waiting to sign a contract, waiting for feedback, waiting for edits, waiting for proofs, and waiting to get paid. Ugh.

Plus, there are a lot of hoops to jump through just to get started. I’d have to get the attention of an agent, so that means the possibility of spending several years engaging agents and finding one who likes my work enough to represent me. Then they have to get a publisher on board, which could take another couple of years. If ever.

In the meantime, my stories would languish, unknown and unread. I found that depressing.

Of course, there are obstacles and downsides to self-publishing. There’s a lot of work I had to do that, if I had gone the traditional route, would have been handled by the publisher. All the editing and re-editing. All the formatting. Getting the ISBNs.

I’ll admit that I enjoyed working on the covers. It was a lot of work and it took me quite a while to figure out what to do – hire someone or do it myself – but I’m glad I created my own covers. And yes, I went the cheap route and used images with Creative Commons licenses. A little manipulation, a bit of tweaking, getting input on fonts from a friend who is a graphic artist, and viola! Two covers I think work quite well.

Then there’s the marketing. With traditional publishing, the work is done for the writer. Sure, there’s still a bit of self-promotion, but the publisher would handle the heavy lifting. They get the books in the stores and shops, buy ads, produce displays, and develop all that great marketing.

Doing it myself was tough. There was a lot of trial and error, trying to get noticed on social media, networking and making connections. Eventually – like many, many months later – I started to get sales. And as long as I stayed engaged on the social media platforms, I continued to get sales. When I dropped off for a while, sales dropped. No surprise there, but it goes to show that for a self-published writer, one has to stay on top of the marketing 24/7.

Overall, I think self-publishing was the right decision for me. I mean, I could potentially make more money going traditional, but that’s only if my book gets picked up. My choice resulted in my books being purchased, read, and reviewed (mostly positive, too!).

I have two more short story collections in progress at the moment. Like my previous collections, one will be traditional fiction and the other will be a mix of speculative science fiction and horror. I also have a novel that it slowly coming together. All will be self-published, of course.

If you’ve self-published or gone the traditional route, what was your experience?

RB