This week our blog is written by Crime Cymru’s David Penny, with advice on the benefits of self-publishing ……

THE BEST OF DAYS

A couple of things prompted me to put these few thoughts down. Several years ago, I was walking back through Islington after the Triskele LitFest, marvelling at all the 20-somethings crowding the streets and, as someone my age often does, experiencing a little envy at the exciting lives that lie ahead of them. The other was my wife asking me “Do you ever wonder where you would be now if you hadn’t given up writing at the age of twenty-nine?”

These two things combined to make me realise that now, today, we live in the best of times to be a writer. And the thing that makes it the best time is self-publishing. I still see people willing to do almost anything to land a traditional deal, without even being aware of the alternative. I see them try for year, and years, and years. There are times I believe they are misguided.

What makes me say that is the question my wife posed. If in 1979 I had continued writing after my fourth novel in five years had been published by Robert Hale, after being publishing in Galaxy magazine in the US and Vertex in the UK, just where would I be now?

Almost certainly forty years into a career as a so-so middling writer who had to also hold down a job to support his family, and who had recently lost his trad publisher because they were no longer supporting the mid-list. I would have 40-50 books published, all barely paying royalties after their advance, and I would be a minor name — but someone known in the business.

When I started writing there was no option but the trad press. Oh, sure, vanity presses existed even then, but the ire directed at them was a thousand times worse than what is now steered towards self-publishing.

There were no computers. All my work was created on a manual typewriter, and if I made a mistake out came the Tipex. If I wanted a copy of the manuscript, I used carbon paper and flimsy paper stock and hit the keys a little harder. And then, when I was finished, I bundled the book into a large envelope and posted it to my agent. With luck, I would hear back within three to six months, and maybe land a publishing deal after another six. Then I would see my book in print a year after that.

And if there was a fire in the house — like my wife and I had three months after moving into out first home — you might be in trouble. There was no cloud computing backup. If there was a fire my manuscripts went up in smoke. Fortunately, in that instance, my writing didn’t. (But my first ever good guitar bought for my eighteenth succumbed to the flames).

There was no social media, so if I wanted people to know who I was I had to attend conventions.

It wasn’t a bad world, and I guess I experienced some degree of success, but compare it to the opportunities available to people today.

If you want to write a book now there are a glut of resources to get you started. Not just ALLi but a hundred great websites like those of Joanna Penn, Jane Friedman, Mark Dawson and others. Most of these cover almost every aspect of how to do the job of self-publishing your own work.

The gates are crumbling around the gatekeepers. There is nothing to stop anyone publishing their work at minimal or no cost. I hear talk of the tsunami of content (the real quote is a little more explicit) and yes, it’s true that anyone, even their cat or dog, can publish a book. These days books are being created by entities that are not even cat, dog or human. But whoever creates it, if the book is bad it’s going to sink without trace. Like cream, the good stuff rises to the top. It’s always been the same, except now there is more good about. The world is bigger, brighter, more connected than it has ever been, and those ready and willing to embrace it hold the future in their hands.

I have no nostalgia for the seventies — that part of it I can still remember. Point me to the future. I just wish someone could give me back the years I wasted.

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David Penny is the author of the Thomas Berrington Historical Mysteries set in the chaotic final years of Moorish al-Andalus in Spain, and Unit-13 a WWII Spy Thriller Series. He started writing again after a lapse of almost 40 years. After being traditionally published in his 20’s with four science fiction novels, he chose to publish independently on his return to writing. David’s work is available in eBook, print and audio, as well as a translation into Spanish and German.