Why be an Indie author?

1. To have your work read, and read by as many readers as possible. Self-publishing is the best way to achieve this.

2. You can publish a book that looks professional and compares well with a traditionally published book. So do it!

3. You can update, correct and add to your books very quickly.

4. You earn more of the money. 40% -70% is a lot more than trad publishers offer.

5. You can privately, and definitely behind closed doors, cock a snook at the agents and trad publishers who 'loved' your book but couldn't sell it, especially when it is selling nicely in both e-book and print forms.

Gloat privately, but just sometimes it does feel good to see that 5 star review and know some kind reader admires your writing skills and story telling ability.

The New World of the 21stC Novelist.

Now isn't that a grand title? Alas, being a 21stC novelist means hours spent doing P.R.
It goes like this.

I am still a bemused technophobe so when Simon at Readersintheknow.com drops me an email telling me about a gadget I have to have and it's a Read Excerpt widget I have visions of a little robot that crawls around books finding extracts for me. I haven't signed up yet, need the money, but this is the sort of gadget I need for readers on my website. Then I am struck by an awful thought! Is that what it is?

I could waste hours of writing time finding out. But I won't. I am waiting for some clever reader or writer to tell me. I still prefer real word of mouth for information.

Just when I thought I had recovered some writing time by not doing that bit of research into my inbox comes an email from Indiesunlimited.com. I like Indiesunlimited for its useful articles and list of resources for Indies. It is real source of information for me. This time I have to sign up for BookLikes. Apparently it is different from Goodreads, is set up like a blog, and users of Tumblr will love it. More time is wasted as I look up Tumblr, and try to work out how to use a dashboard page that functions as a timeline.

But back to Booklikes, it seems I must trot round the site liking and following other peoples’ blogs. There’s also a discussion section, but having had some nasty experiences at Goodreads, I will probably avoid those unless I know some people from my kiwi reading groups are chatting there.

It has a section for authors and authors can giveaway e-books as well as print copies. This makes it better than Goodreads. You can also list your book release dates under Events.

I shall cogitate but probably join up as the more one's books are out there, being visible, the better the chance of a sale. But all this PR research eats into my writing.

This is the new world for this 21stC novelist.