Self Published and Loving It.

I am a self-published author.

It feels very good to say that. The road I took to get there was long, arduous and in the end, gratifying.
Originally I had no intention of self-publishing. To me that meant a living room full of boxes of books, that I paid for, sitting there with the hope of selling them to someone, somewhere. A big financial investment along with a lot of leg work; I was not interested.
I worked for several years to write a novel, Justice Rules, and when it finally got to the stage that I thought it was ready I took it out into the world. I then waited, with great expectations, for my door to be kicked in and the world to come running to me. To my surprise, nothing happened.
I started down the traditional publication path. I searched for many months to find an agent, who in turn would find a publisher who in turn would publish my work. Finally, I found an agent who was willing to represent me and thought that this was the step I needed to take to find success. To my great disappointment, the relationship ended shortly after when she got married and retired from the business. Not to be deterred, I set out in search once again, and again, I was successful in finding an agent, the person who would take me over the hump and I would get to see my work in print on a book store shelf. Well, she got divorced and left the business to pursue other interests. (What is it with agents and matrimony?) About this time a good friend sent me an article he read about a site called Smashwords.com. Smashwords.com had just signed an agreement with Apple to supply content for the iPad. My eyes opened.
The iPad and the Kindle are the two top selling products in the world. After researching the site it occurred to me that I could, in fact, self publish. There was no cost involved, the book would be available through Amazon.com as well as the Apple bookstore. There was nothing standing in my way. I suddenly realized that I had been waiting for someone else to tell me that it was okay for people to read my book. I was allowing my success to be determined by other people who functioned in an institution that was changing faster than they could comprehend. A Springsteen lyric came to mind.
“My soul checked out missing
As I sat there listening
To the hours and minutes ticking away.
I was sitting around waiting for my life to begin
While it was all just ticking away.”
I made the decision to take control of my own success or failure and go for it. I signed up with Smashwords.com, published the novel and started my journey.
To date, I have had over 40 tremendous reviews from a wide range of people. Many customer reviews on Amazon as well as several professional reviews on web sites, blog sites and from other authors. I was a finalist in the Pacific Northwest Writers Association 2010 Literary Contest. I was listed on the Top 25 Self Published Novels of 2010 at a very popular blog site, http://www.gelatisscoop.blogspot.com. It is incredibly gratifying to have people read your work, recommend it to their friends, and write nice things about it. I would have been denied that experience had I allowed the old world publishing guru’s to dictate to me what I can and cannot do.
Take control, that is my advice for the day. You control your own destiny and you can succeed with hard work and perseverance.


http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003K16TCY