This falls under the philosophic musing heading. There are many claims that self publishing is becoming more popular. I think many people who feel a need for self expression have finally found a reasonably inexpensive way of doing it. The traditional publishing scenario where an author submits books to a publisher and spends years being rejected continues but now there is an alternative. Previously in most cases if you didn’t have an agent, you couldn’t get a publisher to even look at your manuscript with self publishing it is more dependent on your tenacity to get it published. Self publishing can be done for nothing on Amazon. Their publisher CreateSpace will allow you to put your book into published format and sell it on Amazon. If you want a proof to insure what you did online is what you really wanted to do, it costs $10.00. When you are satisfied, it goes up on Amazon and you are published. Now some people believe that until someone buys your work you really aren’t an author. I think perhaps a better definition might be you aren’t an author until someone actually reads your book. Regardless of how you define authorship getting your book printed really is the first step. Now you have to market your book.
Marketing a book submitted to a publisher is generally the publisher’s problem not the authors. For the self publisher, marketing can be daunting. If you hope to sell to someone besides your relatives you will need to make a commitment to as much or often more time than it took to get the book written in the first place. Perhaps when I am successful in marketing mine I will be better able to blog on the process. There are other blogs that can help in the process.
Bottom line is if you have something to say and want to get it in print their no excuses anymore. You can do it and do it without spending a fortune. If you have a few bucks and want more help, Lulu and iUniverse are two of the publishing services I have found that seem well reviewed. I have no personal experience with them so do your own due diligence. Be aware that there are many online outfits that will suck your bank account dry while promising to make you a best selling author. Do your research; I am sure that there are other inexpensive methods of getting publishing that I haven’t found yet. Remember no excuses, if you want to do it you can.
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