Have you ever asked the question – if I self-publish, does that mean I’m stuck self-publishing forever?
A lot of writers think they’re stuck defining themselves as one or the other, either a “self-published writer” or a “commercially-published writer.” I hope you haven’t fallen into that trap!
In fact, you don’t have to pigeonhole yourself that way, as I hope I’ve proved with the release of my first book from a commercial publishing company, Yossi & the Monkeys (Kar-Ben, 2017).
So what’s it like having a book commercially published after so much self-publishing experience?
It’s weird, that’s all I can say. It’s all about sitting back, relaxing, and WAITING, because this thing took – well, forever.
But still – I thought it would be fun to break it into steps, like in my last post, so you can see what was involved along the way. So here we go… with Step 1.
Step 1. Contest submission.
It all started back in 2014 with a Jewish kids’ story contest at Barbara Krasner’s website. I entered, didn’t win, didn’t even come close. But a real editor was reading!
Trouble was, my story came in at around 10,000 words (what was I thinking???). It had 10 chapters, it was an EPIC. Oops… wayyyyy too long! Here’s Chapter One.
2. Contest rejection
Well, needless to say, this 10,000-word behemoth was rejected – with just about the nicest rejection note I have ever, ever seen:
She liked it! She really did! Considering I hadn’t paid anything to enter this contest, it was a delight to receive a positive reply like this.
Only trouble was… how to get the story down THAT small? 10,000 words to 850 words???
