are you an indie author?

A reader emails to ask:

“Sorry quick question. Are you an Indie writer? I assumed you were no idea why just did. A friend was pretty sure you are not. So I just had to ask, sorry if it is offensive question.”

Nah, it’s not an offensive question. It’s just the truth!

All my ebooks and all of my paperback books are self-published. As of right now, 8 of my 17 audiobook titles are self-published, and 9 are through the publishers Podium and Tantor. If all goes well the numbers of both self-published and traditionally published audio titles will rise before 2019 is over. I admit that I am very hard on publishers (much more on that below), but I’ve had nothing but good experiences with Podium and Tantor, and the money always arrives on time, which is something of a rare condition among publishers.

I’m not embarrassed to be self-published. I own it proudly. I spent most of the 2000s trying to get traditionally published, and while I had two books traditionally published (DEMONSOULED and what would become THE TOWER OF ENDLESS WORLDS) I got mostly nowhere and made very little money. In fact, I made more from tech blogging and Google Adsense in 2010 than I did from everything I had traditionally published in the entirely of 2000 to 2010. By contrast, in the eight years I’ve been self-publishing, I’ve sold 1.32 million copies of my ebooks.

Bit of a difference between traditional publishing and self-publishing, yeah?

I will concede that indie publishing is not for every writer. However, I am quite convinced that traditional publishing isn’t good for any writer. Sure, traditional publishers will talk about all the good they do for writers, marketing support and editing and cover design and so forth. However, the nasty truth is that 1.) it’s nearly impossible for a new writer to become traditionally published unless they have connections or are somehow trendy, or 2.) and even then, new writers don’t get all that stuff that trad publishers promise. The big sellers like Stephen King and James Patterson and Nora Roberts and their peers get the marketing support and all that because their books is where the money is. What new writers or mid-level writers are likely to get is an editor who either mauls their manuscript or ignores them entirely, and royalty payments that either never show up or somehow go missing. There are many, many, many documented cases of publishers stealing from writers, and that doesn’t even get into agents. (Check out my last Interesting Links post for links to a few of the most recent examples.)

However, many writers still want to be traditionally published. This will sound mean, but I think that desire for traditional publishing comes from insecurity, a need for validation. If you look at the Twitter or Facebook pages of many traditional writers, many of them talk frequently about how MY agent or MY editor or MY publisher just LOVES my book. I get that attitude – I used to think that way until my growing disgust with publishers in general almost led me to quit writing novels at the end of 2010. Then in 2011, I discovered the Kindle, and I realized a writer no longer needed to waste time attempting to impress the obsolete gatekeepers – it was now possible to reach the readers directly.

So, it is my strong and firm opinion that self-publishing is now better than traditional publishing in every aspect. I’m sure there are people who disagree with me, but I’m even more sure that I’m right. 🙂

-JM