The Publishing Possibilities are Endless

It does come with a price.  There is always some sort of work to be done, and you can not simply fit back and enjoy the money.  There is someone who needs your writing skills or your experience when it comes to publishing.  It is your book and while rules need to be followed, it is your personal style that makes a book a success.

*It wasn’t until I learned the art of acceptance that I found I could write again.  It wasn’t until I learned I knew zero things about self-publishing that I went out and began to improve on my knowledge of the industry I was going into.  It wasn’t until I sat down and faced the cold hard facts that I slipping as a writer of a blog that my blog turned around.  It wasn’t until I could look with pride at my own writing, and learn to be able to communicate what I wanted and needed that I learned the possibilities are endless when it comes to publishing.*

You need to follow these rules before you can go to play around with the rest of the work of becoming a creative writer and publisher.

Your book must be edited by an editor, and then it must be edited again by someone else.  As much as it is great to have one second set of eyes, there is no doubt that an editor has “blind spots” as well.  For example: one of my editors prefers to “plough through” everything in one large go, and usually doesn’t look back at older works, and generally doesn’t worry about them at all.  My other editor could care less about the newer works assuming instead that the older ones can drag me down as a writer.  They are both right, and I need both of them to have success.  This is more true with a self-published book, if you want to earn some money after the fees come due.

Your book must look professional, and the first few might need a professional touch.  This means going over the interior and the cover.  It also means that you will need to see rule one to keep your cover and interior looking good.  This also means you will play mediator to some adults who often don’t work together and build a book from there.  Generally even a self-published book is created by more than one or two people.  You have to make sure everyone is on the same page.  This means telling people that “no, they can’t do that.”

Your book is your own, until it hits distribution.  After this point it is never your own and you will have to accept that your “baby” is independent and it can get nasty with reviews or unhappy readers.  You have to write another book to have a “baby” back in your life after this book is published.

After these rules, the publishing choices and possibilities are endless.  You can choose to go the traditional route and find a literary agent and go from there.  You could try to get a book published with one of the vanity presses and then sell it through the online stores such as Amazon or Barnes and Noble or if you live in Canada, Chapters-Indigo. You can go completely with the self-publishing route and go with Lighting Source, or have some help and use CreateSpace (its parent company is Amazon.)  You could even choose a small local printer.  It is all your own choice.

A writer’s life goes beyond rules and gets into how you can be a creative person but still use your business skills to network online and still make money with your writing.  You publishing a book isn’t just a one day thing, it’s a form of growth as a writer.  The fact you have one or more books published is a important step, but it is the ability to understand that after publishing one book….

You can publish another.  In this case, knowledge is a key to creating the network, and the money and the life of a writer you want to be.  The heart of the matter is that you will have to think of the endgame- a published book before you have the chance to see how much publishing has to offer.

In my experience, the publishing possibilities of a book are endless, and this helps me become a better person and a writer.