John Edgar Wideman, author of Brothers and Keepers, not to mention a National Book Award finalist, winner of two PEN/Faulkner awards, and the recipient of a MacArthur genius grant, has decided to self-publish (albeit with Lulu, “the largest self-publisher in the business”) his new book, Briefs: Stories for the Palm of the Mind.
Learn more about Wideman’s reasons for self-publishing here. Also, if you haven’t already, be sure to read our own Steve Almond‘s “Presto Book-O (Why I Went Ahead and Self-Published).”
4 responses
This is interesting, but I always wonder how much this really factors into the debate on self-publishing. It is like when Radiohead releases their album online. That’s interesting, but these people have secure positions and prior publications and secure reputations… they can afford to do it.
What self-publishing does to the career of a mid-level author or a beginning author is probably quite different.
Agreed. I posted the link because I enjoyed some of Wideman’s thoughts on the subject; but you are most certainly correct that it’s easier for someone of his reputation to go this route than it is for someone nobody has ever heard of. That being said, ain’t that true of most things.
Well, to start with, firms like Lulu are not “self publishers” but rather specialty printers and distributors. This is an important distinction because the author assumes the publishing process and organizes the production of a book and either does or hires done all of the functions of a traditional publisher. That’s a lot of work and lot of responsibility, but it’s not “rocket science” and many of us are doing it, despite all the prejudices and propaganda against it.
I’m proud to say that my book, “The Shenandoah Spy” is used in at least one course on self-publishing as a positive example of what can be done and that it has gotten over a dozen favorable reviews. Brass Cannon Books may eventually publish other authors, but for now, it’s just me and I’m a co-owner. But we have world-wide distribution for a book that no one in traditional publishing would even read. The response was “Historical fiction doesn’t sell.”
Many authors go this way because they find it impossible to get their work read by a traditional publisher. Submissions can only be made through a certain class of agents and those agents are disinterested in finding new authors (despite all their advertising to the contrary) and chase the market, trying to imitate the best sellers of previous years. The time to market, as one gets older, also becomes a major consideration. Why wait for months or even years for a reply when you can simply put the work out there to its intended audience? That Mr. Wideman has chosen to go this route is simply evidence that even someone with a publisher cannot get that publisher to put all of their work into the traditional system. In fact, those who enjoy mainstream success are strongly discouraged from innovating or wandering off the reservation. If you are a successful author of, say, legal thrillers, then your boyhood memoir is not welcome and you will have to fight to get it published. You may have to threaten to do it yourself. Fortunately, technology makes that much, much easier to do now.
As a self-published author of 11 books, with a 12th in progress, I chose to self-publish because I write in a genre which most agents and publishers WILL NOT publish, even if their lives depended on it, and even if most of the blockbuster movies being made these days are in that genre. And you know what? I don’t miss being left out one bit. I decided one day that life is too short, and I wan’t getting any younger. Historical fiction doesn’t sell? Impossible, when we have stories like “Sharpe’s Challenge” and “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” being published every day and doing quite well. I use Lulu myself as my printer and the quality of the books being produced are on a par with those of the big houses. So when you read about this or that publishing house struggling with sales, it’s because it chose to cut off its own nose to spite its face. I write mostly science fantasy and historical fiction wrapped up with vampire romance and adventure. My nonfiction book, “A BOOK OF FIVE RINGS: A Practical Guide to Strategy by Miyamoto Musashi” is a popular seller for Kindle, and all I had to do was publish these books myself. Otherwise they would not have seen the light of day.
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