WARNING! PLEASE READ ABOUT THIRD PARTY ADS: Authorlink encourages writers to thoroughly investigate third-party ads on this or any other site offering free and easy publishing help. We subscribe to the highest standards of the traditional publishing industry, and do not necessarily endorse any advertiser on our site. Also, Google, as a third party vendor, uses cookies to serve ads on our site enabling display of ads based on user visits to our site and to others on the Internet. Users may opt out of the use of the DART cookie by visiting the Google ad and content network privacy policy. Authorlink guidelines, #7 includes more on our own policies
Lisa Lenard-Cook is a regular
columnist for Authorlink. She is an award-winning published author and writing
instructor. Read more about Lisa.
"Over the past year, a growing number of my former students and colleagues have chosen the independent publishing route."
—Lenard-Cook
November, as many of you know, is NaNoWriMo month (National Novel Writing Month), during which hundreds of thousands of steadfast writers complete a novel. But what happens after NaNoWriMo?
Very few, if any, of the drafts completed during NaNoWriMo are ready for primetime—yet. Most should be put away for a month or more, then taken out for revision and/or rewriting (see my August 2005 column, or my book, The Mind of Your Story, for more thoughts on this). And then what? This question leads me to the heart of this month’s column: the state of the art, or rather, of the publishing business.
Over the past year, a growing number of my former students and colleagues have chosen the independent publishing route. Some have made this decision after being shut out by traditional agents—as in getting no response to their queries, even when those queries were beautifully composed and the authors have strong credentials. Some have researched traditional publishing options versus CreateSpace, Lulu, or AmazonDirect, done the math, then chosen to skip the rejection and go straight to the marketplace.
"I want us all to think, really think, about what we, the writers, want." —Lenard-Cook
There are already a million and one blogs out there discussing the pros and cons of traditional versus independent publishing. That’s not what I want to explore here. Instead, I want us all to think, really think, about what we, the writers, want. Forget, for a moment, about the marketing you have to do if you go the independent route. Forget about the theoretical cachet of being published by a traditional house. Instead, consider this: If your book could be published to your specs, what would those specs be?
"What’s your vision of a more perfect publishing model?" —Lenard-Cook
Be creative—this is an imaginary world, of our own making. Join the conversation here http://www.facebook.com/authorlink, and remember, it’s not a conversation if I’m the only one typing. For this year’s holiday season, let’s create a new publishing model. I’ll start the list with my #1 priority: Respect the author. And you? What’s your vision of a more perfect publishing model?
PEN-short-listed author Lisa Lenard-Cook’s most recent book is The Mind of Your Story: Discover What Drives Your Fiction (Writer’s Digest), which originated in her columns for Authorlink. With Lynn C. Miller, she’s co-founder of ABQ Writers Co-op (abqwriterscoop.com), a creative community for New Mexico writers, and co-editor of the literary magazine Bosque. She’s on the faculty of the Santa Barbara Writer’s Conference and the Board of Narrative Art Center in Santa Fe. Website: lisalenardcook.com
