Article on self-publishing

I received a request from Shahrukh Husain to write an article about my experience of self-publishing (which has not been great!) The article is now up on Narratives Online:

http://www.narrativesonline.com/index.php/user/showInterviewSession/3


Scroll down to:
Ms. Watkins on Self Publishing

You may have to log in to read it.

~Shelagh

Thanks for this Shelagh. I didn't have to log in but had to click your name part way down that first page in order to get to whole article which was at this page http://www.narrativesonline.com/index.php/user/showInterviewSession/3.

So now I am curious about a couple of things (your article has stimulated a quest for more information - well done!).
1) Did you ever find an agent, and if so, how did you finally swing it?
2) Do you have access to the library grant system in the UK, so that if your book is in the libraries you receive grant money for that?

Cheers!
Pam

Shelagh,
I read the review but haven't seen article. I'll keep trying.

Shelagh,
I was especially interested in learning more about you as a person. You decide what you want and make it happen.

A great article Shelagh, but I have come to expect no less from you. Very informative, and entertaining as well. I really appreciate your journey to the library.

Thanks everyone. No, Pam, I didn't find an agent at the time and decided not to pursue it any further. I don't know anything about library grants but J.K. Rowling received a grant from the Scottish Arts Council to write the second book in the Potter series.

Everyone thinks that she was an overnight success but sales from the first book did not provide a living wage and she applied for and was granted £8,000:

Quote :

She was told that the plot, like her sentence construction, was too complex and too long. "That unnerved me because I knew it was going to be the shortest book of the series!" Refusing to compromise, she at last found a publisher, Bloomsbury, and, armed with an £8,000 grant from the Scottish Arts Council, ploughed into book two, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

That's quite a sum of money now and was worth even more in 1997!

You can read the rest of the article here:

http://www.accio-quote.org/articles/2000/1200-readersdigest-boquet.htm

Ah it's always good to see that the famous don't forget their roots. I know she worked hard.
Isn't it neat to consider that an editor or someone things that the plot is too complicated...and yet the kids absolutely devour the books...

That's an interesting comment, Pam.

A funny thing about the sort of parameter shifting we are seeing today is that you get new crops of people with very different roots. It's not impossible for an author to come out of self-publishing to get a contract with The Bigs. Several have done it, including a couple of guys I know. It's only a matter of time before the next Steven King or Elmore Leonard or whatever hits the charts that way... then you've got people who are "rootless" in the old-timey, agent oriented game plan.

To compare to the world of film, Quentin Tarrantino came out of working in video rental stores. He didn't owe much to the older models (like starting in the studio mail room). Now there have been a few people get films made coming out of the internet learning system.

It's like they say, "Everybody has to be from somewhere." But we're looking at a future where much of the grass has different roots.

I think you are very right Lin. It seems there are new opportunites opening up all the time in every field. You just have to be able to grab the moment and have the right people be aware. It takes a lot of luck and hard work, but it's out there.

I would agree, the old paradigm is slowly breaking down... it's just that no one knows what the new paradigm will be. But I think it will be much more diverse and dissipated across several different platforms and media types.

That's my thought.

I'd use the analogy of playing soccer in most of the world vs playing football in the US.

There is college ball, then there's the NFL. And that's it.

Whereas with soccer there is are bewildering strata or leagues, amateur, semi-pro, company teams, country teams, professional leagues, world cup, olympic cup....pretty much anybody can play who wants to and the level at which somebody can make some money at it is fairly low.

Nice analogy... so we need to be the ubiquitous ball that is used by all leagues, not the star player who gets injured only after half a season.