Nothing but Delays

It looks like I'm going back to self-publishing my work again.  That's not because I was rejected by the publisher I had hoped would take me.  It is because she had a limited number of slots open for 2012 and I didn't make that list because I had to revise my book.  So I either wait another year and hope I make it or I move on.

I'm moving on because:

• I hate waiting.
• I feel like time is short and I can't waste another year hoping for something that might not happen.
• Some other publisher may want it.

I gave her the right of first refusal but she won't even get to it this year so it is time to pack up and move on.  If she ever gets back to me and says, yes she'll take the book then I'll can stop self-publishing.

Meanwhile, I can see how far I can move the book forward into the arms and ebook readers of the general public.

This is the worst possible outcome too, from my perspective, because it is a non-answer.  A rejection I could handle (sort of) but being in limbo is like taking a final exam and then never receiving a grade.  It is also bad news because I'm lousy at promoting my own work.

It would be one thing if everyone reading this blog would go out and get a copy of the book.  But that's not likely to happen.  I need to find people who enjoy reading fantasy novels and I need to provide both paper and electronic formats simultaneously.  So that when I spend the word, people can go to Amazon or Barnes and Noble and order a copy.

I wish there was a clearinghouse for paper books that did what Smashwords does for electronic books.  But there isn't.  The best I can do is purchase a service from Lulu.com to help infiltrate bookstores or go with CreateSpace (an Amazon company) so at least the book will be in Amazon's listings.

Worse still, because I'll be self-published, some places will not review me.  In fact, the only reason for providing a paper copy of the book is that far too many folks will not even consider reading the electronic version.

If my frustration and loathing for this whole process is coming through then I'm glad; you'll have a sense of what it is like for me.  I have half a mind to forget about promoting the work and just write my novels for my own enjoyment.  Obviously no one cares if I write them or not so why should I try to move mountains?  But then why write them at all?

And I know why I am writing them:  so I can share them and entertain others.  But that task just got a lot harder.  In fact everything I'm doing got a lot harder.  Now I have to find time to do the production work for Book 1 while finishing Book 2.  I'll probably need to remake my whole web site for the both books and the series this time.  And I can't announce or promote all the new work until all the versions of the books are ready to go.  And all this just delays Book 3.

Delays, delays, delays.  That's all I'm dealing with.  Have I mentioned how much I hate waiting...?