A note to my publisher of ten years (who is me, I am my publisher)

Fairy Tale Fail celebrated its 10th year in publication, which means it’s also my 10th year as an indie author, aka a self-publisher.

I almost didn’t write this post, because hello, this blog has documented the entirety of my 10-year indie author career. You and I, reader, were in this together from the beginning! I self-published my second book because of several reasons: 1) someone encouraged me to do so, 2) I discovered an easy way to do it, and 3) I’m not very patient.

Number 3 has been the “reason” for so many things I’ve tried. I get bursts of energy that may last days at a time, and suddenly I start so many things. And that’s why self-publishing has been a great match for me, because I will get energized and try new things, and when I lose that steam, I can delegate things to someone else. Working this way means I get to set my own goals, and targets, and adjust them based on what I want to learn. Many of my publishing partnership contracts were for 5 years. To be honest I’ve only felt the same kind of energy from a publisher in the first year of a new book’s life, and never after that. But I also understand why it works that way, when you’re in charge of many titles and are accountable to other people.

I’m glad I somehow found my way to a method of creating and publishing that I find kinder, more collaborative, more flexible. Ten years later, I still love what I do, and I don’t resent my publisher (who is me). I’ve seen some cool successes but there’s more to do, and I can aim higher. It’s not all cute rainbows, though, because believe me there’s tremendous resistance at every stage here, and you can be doing this for 10 years and still get treated like you’re new and know nothing. But I’ve found enough people who have inspired me and given me hope. And maybe the new thing I learned is that what we made together? Is fine. Is great. Is wonderful. Is what we will keep doing.

And the plans for other things, new things, we’ll do that as soon as everything is ok, everyone is ok. As my own publisher I get to adjust the target, and I’m not looking at books published or sold. I’ll be fine just seeing people be ok.

Thank you for being part of this. I hope you too are ok!

Tags: fairy tale fail, publishing

Mina V. Esguerra