In 2019, my husband’s career took us across the country, and in the midst of searching for a new job, I found myself with time on my hands and a renewed interest in trying to write a book. As a former English teacher, I have always loved young adult fiction, and for several years, I’d been bouncing around an idea for a sci-fi story set in a futuristic boarding school where android students learn alongside humans. About a year later, after many fun (and not-so-fun) days of writing, editing, and preparing for publication, After Intelligence: The Hidden Sequence found its way into the world.
A lot of people tell me that they could never write a novel - that is not true! I firmly believe that anyone who wants to write and self-publish a book definitely can, but as with any big endeavor, it takes a lot of perseverance, optimism, and research. Though I can’t help with the first two, perhaps I can save you a little time on the research side and share four things I’ve learned during my own self-publishing journey.
Use Scrivener
This is my top piece of advice. Use Scrivener. Do not start your document in Google Docs or Word, as I did. Once you get past several chapters, the document will become incredibly unwieldy. Editing will become a nightmare, and rearranging sections will get you tangled in knots.
Scrivener is a magical application that keeps chapters organized, streamlines the editing process, and offers multiple options for exporting to e-book and manuscript formats. I honestly don’t know if I would have completed my book without this. Learn more and check out the free trial here.
Get Your Own ISBNs
An ISBN (International Standard Book Number) is a unique identifier for published works. Some publishing platforms, like Kindle Direct Publishing, offer free ISBNs to use within their platform. However, if you want to publish through multiple platforms (see next section), you will want to have your own ISBNs. You can buy ISBNs from Bowker, the official ISBN agency in the U.S.
Publish on Multiple Platforms
Self-publishing is wonderfully accessible right now thanks to print-on-demand and e-book services. If you’re starting out, you may consider publishing only through one platform, but for the widest reach, I suggest getting your book on as many platforms as possible, including those listed below.
Kindle Direct Publishing through Amazon
You can publish e-books and paperbacks through KDP for free. They have some additional promotion opportunities, but keep in mind that those options require you to publish exclusively through KDP.
You can publish e-books on Kobo for free. Kobo is more popular with international markets, and the platform also has some marketing and promotion opportunities.
You can publish e-books, paperbacks, and hardcovers on B&N Press for free. However, if you also go with a distributor like Ingram (see below), then you will likely not be able to publish your paperback and hardcover in both places. I only publish an e-book directly through B&N Press.
You can publish e-books on Apple Books for free.
You can publish e-books on Google Play for free.
If you want your books to be available for purchase by bookstores and libraries, you’ll need to go through a distributor like IngramSpark. For a fee, they’ll publish paperbacks, hardcovers, and e-books. I found that the e-book publication led to some duplicate entries on sites like Kobo and Amazon, and I prefer to publish directly through the other platforms. For that reason, I only publish my paperback and hardcover through IngramSpark now.
If you don’t want to deal with multiple platforms, aggregator sites like Smashwords are another option, but I appreciate the control and data access I get from publishing directly to retailers. While I’m still learning how to successfully market my book across different platforms, at least I know it’s available wherever a reader wants to find it.
Reach Out for Reviews
Before I published my novel, I didn’t realize that professional reviews are necessary for getting books into libraries and bookstores. Unfortunately, when I started looking for review opportunities, I found that many of them require submission several months before publication. However, all was not lost! I was still able to obtain a Kirkus and Publishers Weekly review, which not only helped in marketing my book but also provided some welcome encouragement as I started drafting my sequel.
If you self-publish, the only way to get a Kirkus review is to go through their indie site and pay for a review. The fee guarantees you a review, and depending on the content, you can choose whether or not to make it public. In other words, if the review is unfavorable, no one else has to see it.
Publishers Weekly and Booklife Reviews
If you self-publish, the only way to submit for a Publishers Weekly review is through their BookLife site. Unlike Kirkus, submitting for Publishers Weekly is free, but a review is not guaranteed, as they review a small percentage of the books they receive. A BookLife review, which you can pay for, is guaranteed. I recommend submitting for Publishers Weekly first and seeing what happens. Also, be patient; in my case, the process took almost six months.
These are only two of many review options. I suggest submitting your book widely and looking for genre-specific opportunities in addition to industry-wide reviews.
In Conclusion
If you find the self-publishing process to be daunting, don’t despair! Writing the book is definitely the hardest part of the journey. I’ve done my best to enjoy the research, accept that I have a lot to learn, and welcome the inevitable mistakes along the way. If you want to learn more about my work, visit www.tandemental.com, find me on social media @Tandemental, or email nicole@tandemental.com. Now it’s back to editing book #2 for me!
