No shade, no tea, just honest thoughts about where my publication journey with an indie small press has led me. Had I known then what I know now, I wouldn’t have pursued this route. At the very least, I hope my knowledge may be helpful to other fledgling writers out there trying to decide what to do with their books in the brutal industry that is publishing.
Indie presses are similar to traditional publishers in the sense that they won’t charge you for editing, cover design, marketing, etc. (*but more on that later). However, because indie publishers run on much smaller budgets, they often don’t have the money or reach that Big 5 publishers do, which means that, de facto, an indie-published author still has to shoulder a lot of the marketing on their own.
Before I begin, I want to lay down some factors that led me down this route:
- I was unemployed at the time that I was seeking publication. This is a big one. Traditional publishing is, quite frankly, a very classist institution. Querying agents takes months if not years. Getting a book deal takes further months if not years. At the time that I was seeking publication for my first novel, I did not have a fantastic day job or family obligations to occupy me in case publishing didn’t work out; I had no income whatsoever. I tried querying agents, but got all rejections, and then I just wasn’t in a position to continue to put myself through months and years of waiting. I was in a position in which I kind of needed an answer right away.
- My first book was very personal. I would say this was a mistake, in retrospect, but honestly, I know I don’t often control what stories I write. But this made it harder for me to take rejections from agents, and it also made me afraid of getting an agent but not a book deal. I wanted this book to be published.
- My book was written in a genre in which indie publishing had established more of a foothold. If, for example, I had written a YA that I couldn’t get an agent for, I probably would’ve just shelved it and moved onto the next thing. But because indie publishing has had a large presence in the realm of queer lit, it was an option I was more willing to entertain.
- It was my first book, and I was inexperienced.
All of these factors combined created pressure for me to seek indie publishing as the route for my book. And although I wish I had made different decisions, I do realize that some of the factors above were beyond my control, so I try not to blame myself too much.
But this is what I know now that I wish I’d known back then:
- If you can’t snag an agent’s attention, you’re not going to be able to snag readers’ attention. In other words, if you have trouble getting an agent, you’re probably also going to have problems marketing your book when it’s published by a small press.
- For some small presses, the marketing they do is almost nonexistent, which means you’re in almost the exact same position as if you had self-published anyway.
- Marketing is difficult. Marketing sucks. Shouldering the marketing burden means you have to be prepared for a LOT of rejection. It’s like going through the querying process all over again, except almost worse, because marketing never ends.
- I understand why I felt pressure to publish ASAP; however, ultimately, rushing the process led to some major mistakes that have overall made it harder for me to advertise my book after the fact.
Also, my expectations for my relationship with my publisher were, in fact, not borne out in reality. This is another thing I don’t blame myself for (because really, I couldn’t have known, and all the testimonials I had heard from authors there were positive), but had I known these facts, I wouldn’t have settled for that publisher so easily.
- Delays. I experienced numerous delays in the publication process. I don’t even know why (I had real-life obligations at the time that kept me busy enough that I wasn’t constantly trying to chase them down). This actually ties into the rushing point above–if my publisher hadn’t delayed my book, I would not have ended up rushing, making mistakes, and essentially not having any time to get advance reviews.
- Cover art mistakes. The biggest issue with the fact that I was rushing was that there was a cover art SNAFU. The details are too long to get into here, but suffice it to say, several months after release, I do think that the cover art doesn’t clearly reflect the genre and may be a reason why there is tepid reader interest in my book. I made some mistakes, but I also felt at the time that my publisher wasn’t willing to work with me, especially because the artist seemed to not actually even know what my book was about at all which caused a lot of confusion and miscommunication.
- Marketing changes. When I initially signed on with my publisher, they paid for each book to have a blog tour with the biggest review blogs in the genre. Later on, however, they switched to something else that requires more “opt-in” participation from review blogs, and they asked authors to pay an extra fee for a blog tour. In fact, I only saw a grand total of *one* review blog feature my book during release week. I was not happy about this change, honestly, because I did not sign up for a traditional/indie publisher just to have to invest money in *standard* release marketing.
So this is, as concisely and succinctly as I can make it, a summary of how my publication process has gone and the major cons I wish I knew before I took this route.
As a show of good faith (and because I do genuinely like my editor), I was willing to have the same publisher publish my second book (and, until recently, the last queer romance I planned to write). However–although now isn’t a great time for me to explore other options due to Real Life Problems getting in the way–I’m starting to at least think about exploring other publishers in the genre, especially since I’ve been waiting 2+ months and I have not received any answer from my editor yet about my second novel.
For sure, though, after my second novel, I will not be seeking indie publication again.
Rain Symphony 