#selfpub

[ariaste]

🚨WRITER BEWARE🚨

I've just gotten an email from a new "self-publishing platform" called Written (written.app), which is making suspiciously extravagant promises about the benefits they offer to authors. After further research, this is just "upload your book with us and we'll make it an NFT :)"

There is a "thesis" that you can read right on their website if you're interested in looking for yourself at the business model of their grift, but if you'd like to save yourself the trouble, I've pulled out some of the highlights of the receipts over on Bluesky. TLDR: I would not touch this platform with a ten-foot-pole. This is not a book-selling platform, this is a Coincidentally Book-Themed NFT Platform.

[leechjuice]

after months of planning, drafting and executing, it's about time i let the cat out of the bag. right?

i'm self-publishing my debut novel, IN THE END, YOU KILL US BOTH, on October 19th, 2024.

IN THE END is an adult literary horror and queer coming-of-age about the first three months following a nineteen-year-old arsonist's release from an out-of-state mental health facility and the dark, spiralling path she takes after falling in with a suspected cannibal.

this book is an ode to the indigestible ways we process trauma, grief and our own desires. it is my heart project, through and through, and i can't wait to share leo & elowen with all of you.

pre-orders now available 🪳🏚️🩸🔪

[copperbadge]

I'm finally getting around to editing my fanfic for actual publishing. Any warnings for Kindle Direct Publishing?

Aside from, you know, "It's Amazon and they'll fuck you out of every penny they can on principle," I can't really speak to it -- I've never used Kindle Direct. My only real experience with pub/sales through Amazon is the fact that when I allowed them to sell my books via Lulu, they artificially inflated my prices because they take such a massive cut of your profits. I have a little more discussion of how that works at this post (look for the paragraph just after "wait, what?").

Now, that said, Amazon is a much, much larger platform for your work than Lulu and unless you are marketing from a platform where you already have a readership (like my blog) then Amazon will probably get more eyeballs on your work. Especially if you are marketing primarily to people who aren't familiar with you, they'd much rather buy from somewhere known, like Kindle, than from a random website they've never encountered like Lulu.

You might peruse @thebibliosphere for more useful information than I can give -- Joy has a lot more experience with Amazon's various fuckeries and has spoken to them pretty extensively. I don't know what the tag is offhand but Joy's tumblr is fun reading anyway, so if you browse around you will also get entertained :D

Readers, if you have info to share, please feel free! Remember to comment or reblog, as I don't repost asks sent in response to other asks.

[corvidarcana]

BLOOD OF THE GODS, COMING SUMMER 2026

Captain Jonah Morgan was damn tired of taking in strays. The logic was simple: a larger crew meant solving more problems, and solving more problems meant caring about more people. The more people he cared for, the more he’d someday watch die.

Today was QuestPit over on bluesky, so hey, why not post some of my pitch materials on here, too!

[apples-and-cinnamon]

Sweet & Wild is my debut novel and it’s coming out July 29th!

💛MM Fantasy Romance

☀️A Sunshine MC

🍯A Cozy Adjacent Setting

🍃Forest Magic

🌳Spirits in the Woods

🐝Witches

🌻Healing and Growth

Universal Link: books2read.com/u/bzNng9

Itch: applesncinnamon.itch.io/sweet-wild

Cover art by the wonderful northyme.com

[montgomerygills]

Writing Progress

Smashed out 10,000 words on my sequel to Queen of Spindeln today. Going well! Finally getting to the bit where the main character steps into the narrative.

[thefortunatemisfortunesseries]

3,000 words into book 2..

[misterpuca]

Reflections - Digital Download Zine

A zine made with a collage of 35mm photos I’ve taken and exploring the idea of records and self. Each purchase will go towards my medical bills. Shop

[ollydee]

EVEN IF YOU CAN'T, which I totally get--

Please please reblog and share. Every lil bit helps.

XXOOX

-Olly

[seldnei]

Psst! Wanna buy my book? Check out the links at lauraeprice.com/books! Paperbacks available through Barnes and Noble, ebooks from just about everywhere else!

[liliewriter]

alternative places to self-pub?

this is the longest way i could ever ask this question, but;

i am considering self-pub for one of my original works, but im not really looking to earn money for it and definitely wont pub it as an ebook through am*z*n. i think i'll go the epub route only as a "last resort" because the process seems a bit time-consuming, and i'll need more free time than i currently have to learn about it. basically i need alternatives to this.

i was thinking ao3, bc as far as i understand they do allow original works so long as i tag appropriately, BUT i realize it might be hard to reach my target audience if i post it there (esp since it seems most of original works on ao3 are sci-fi/fantasy). i'd post on tumblr, but i think i'd get overwhelmed by having so many separate posts for the work (compared to e.g. ao3, where it's all in one singular post).

does anyone have any tips for places where i can post my original work online? or experiences with posting original work on ao3? additionally; posting original work that is not fantasy or sci-fi?

[copperbadge]

I was at the library yesterday, which is now my go-to for distractionless work; I uploaded Dinner At The Palace with a few last edits so it's ready to go in print and epub, wrote all the sales copy, and updated my website with "coming soon" announcements. Wordpress really is just the worst; I can code what I want in about a third of the time it takes to tell Wordpress what I want and even then it fucks it up. It's like working with Word if it were designed by a toddler who hates me, personally. I'm building a new site on another platform, which is not much better but does allow me to copy, paste, or delete a block of text by selecting said text, something Wordpress's feeble grasp on structure is still grappling with. As we have daily proof. *gestures at Tumblr*

Anyway, I've been thinking about overhauling the older novels, standardizing them into the style guide I've developed. So I dug out all the upload files for Nameless, my first novel, and cracked them open just to see what kind of work it would take.

The document file for Nameless is so old that Windows wasn't sure how to open it. I mean it was just a .doc file and Windows likes to give you options when it's not a .docx, but I was still amused that I had to tell it how to get into the Ancient Tome. This was also before ebooks were as big as they are now, especially in indy publishing; these days you can just upload a word document and Lulu will convert it, but back in 2009 I had to create an HTML file of my novel to get it converted to ePub. Wild.

The bad news is that my early documents for my first few novels are a brutal mess, but the good news is that because I was less sophisticated in terms of how to typeset, they're also very simple and easy to upgrade, and even back then I was saving the covers as psd files, so it's all editable. I'd rather finish Royals/Ramblers than work over all my old manuscripts, but they're a nice break when I'm tired of other work.

Now I just have to determine if I have the emotional stability to re-read Nameless. It was a very personal novel to me, but it was also published almost 15 years ago, and I'm a little concerned about being able to read my deathless 2009 prose without wincing. I tell myself we all learn and grow, and Christopher and Lucas aren't real and won't suffer if I wrote them poorly, but I'm still bracing myself for all that.

[cmoroneybooks]

Amazon KDP will now allow authors list their book under 3 catergories!

It used to be that Amazon would let authors select 2 catergories themselves and that authors could email Amazon requesting to be added to further catergories but in May 2023 they limited it to a maximum of 2 catergories removing the ability to ask to be added to more. They have now increased the maximum to 3 and authors can select these themselves.

Its all in their quarterly KDP newsletter if anyone wants to read it!

[summer-r-storm]

Mein erstes Buch hat endlich seinen Veröffentlichungstag und es fühlt sich immer noch surreal an. Ein Traum wird wahr, aber es ist nur der erste Schritt auf einer langen Reise.

[thefortunatemisfortunesseries]

The edits are done. Now I gotta hand this shit to a professional. ✌🏻

[ollydee]

FUCKING ISBNS COST HUNDREDS OF DOLLARS PLS REBLOG DONATE HELP

Thank you <3