What Next?

At this point we were somewhere around April 2022. I had one book pretty much edited (First) and another with the draft about 67k words complete. On the latter I didn’t like the way the story had turned and knew I needed to do some major rewriting. It languished for the time being while I’d been concentrating on editing First since late January.

What next? With a book ready to go, should I self-publish as I’d done in the past? Independent publishing? Or try to find an agent and get a deal with one of the big publishers?

When it comes to having the desire to do all the things necessary to market my book, I’m like a lot of authors: I don’t want to. I’d rather spend my time writing and let someone else take care of the things I’m not good at.

I know there are some things that are a bit easier these days if I go down the self-publishing route, compared to 10 years ago when I did it myself. Some companies sell packages that include cover art, copy editing, proofreading, formatting, and blasting my book to all the regular sales channels. That’s kind of cool, actually, but still puts the onus on me to publicize and do all the things that keep me from writing more. At the time, I kept that option in my back pocket.

I thought I had a good book with a relatable story that could sell very well. I knew it was a long shot but I decided to take the time to search for an agent. Having someone do all the back-end work for all the things I mentioned earlier really is appealing. If ever I was going to make the attempt, this was the time.

So in the spring of 2022 I set out on a journey that lasted almost two months. To get started, I had some research and work to do. We’ll pick up there next time.