The Pride of Vanity

Today is, indeed, the official Writing Wednesday, even though I talked about writing yesterday (sort of). But I can't pretend yesterday didn't happen either; lots of good things happened that I want to keep as having happened. So I'd like to build off of one theme and expand it a little: self-publishing.

For the duration of this post (and, really, until things change) I'd like to remember that I am not a high-and-mighty published author; I am not even an author with an agent; and I am someone with a self-published title (see sidebar -- and feel free to check out the book, too). But you can ask my fiancee (always-becoming.blogspot.com): I don't consider myself an author, still only a writer. I am not one who has "made it" and is trying to keep others away, or feeling some twisted kind of need to "keep the waters pure," or something like that. But I do have serious misgivings about self-publishing.
I look at the recent issue of Writer's Digest, and a little quiver goes down my spine, and it's not because the toilet seat is cold (even though it usually is). Instead it is because they have a slew of articles devoted to self-publishing. Amidst those articles I see an ad: an elderly man of seemingly moderate affluence, certainly wise and bespectacled, not professorly but simply kind of cool, is gazing at me with a caption that reads: "Feel the pride of a published author." The ad is for a self-publisher.

My problem, to get to the point, is that the goal has been shifted; I don't want to be merely "published": I want to be published with the knowledge that a team of people who do such things for a living have deemed what I have to say to be of some worth. Now, I concede that Snooki is "writing" a "book," and I can guarantee that there is little in there that will last more than a generation; but that's her problem (or probably not -- a spotlight is a spotlight is a spotlight). But I'm not here to judge motivations. I am here to caution and hopefully alter slightly the course of motivations.

There are a wide array of self-publishers out there, ranging from outlets a monkey could use to outlets only a monkey with money could use (I went just the monkey route). I've read a book by someone who went to a self-publisher that only a monkey with money could use. I didn't read his first draft to see what their "editorial board" might have done with it; but the book was clearly not professionally published. Don't get me wrong, the story was amazing and the ending was one of the best I'd ever read; the guy can write a story. And he's managing to sell himself well. But it lacked polish. And I think it hurt it, just a little.

So I'm not saying to ignore self-publishers; just recognize that they are not the same as professional publishers. You get what you pay for, they say; and that extends even beyond monetary terms to the blood, sweat, and tears of clawing your way into the professional publishing market. But if the cost to you is only the cost of printing, i.e. you pay nothing? There's a very good chance that you get nothing. Unless you are just that incredibly skilled. In which case you need to do yourself a favor, build a little patience, and do it the hard (better) way. Which is why my novel will never see the inside of a self-publishing mechanism, even if it never sees the inside of a professional-publishing mechanism. If I write an entire series of novels, they will all be flung at the doors of The Big Six, and maybe at the windows of small literary houses; never will they be chucked into the basement of Lulu.

Unless you just want to see your book in "print." But the true pride of a published author comes from far more than having a bound copy of written text. And you won't understand until you do it.

See you Friday.