Elise Carlson

A Fantasy Author's Adventures in Fiction & Life

Tag: Indie authors

September 6, 2026 / / 0 Comments

For many indie authors, the biggest stumbling block is marketing the book, so people know it exists. Paid advertising can easily waste money. The platform that works for one author doesn’t work for another. Bookfunnel does involve a group temporarily promoting a landing page for multiple author’s books, but other author’s books may sell and yours may not. The best solution I’ve found for one landing page for multiple authors books, collectively promoted by indie authors, in which a sale for one author is a sale for every author, is Itchio Bundles. This post will explore how and when to set a bundle up well; choosing a focus/ theme, genre, pricing, timing and duration, and factors I believe made successful bundles so much so.

Intro to Itch & Bundles

If you don’t know it, Itch was an online indie game store. Since early 2025, its become popular with indie authors too. (Yes, the book store Collective Shout attacked via its payment processors Stripe and Paypal in 2025, which I blogged here.) Itch has taken off because instead of Indie authors finding time to write books around day jobs that often pay our bills, to let people know said books exist solo; bundles mean we do it together.

Any author with an Itchio account can create a bundle. Any book with an Itch sales link can be added to the bundle. Creating the bundle creates a landing page with all individual books sales links linked to it on Itch. Books can be individually purchased this way. But the main point is the bundle description, and single click button to buy the whole bundle/ every book.

Organisers (certainly me) tend to create a promo graphic for a bundle, usually featuring covers of all its books. This is shared with participating authors, often in the same email as the Itch link to the landing page, which must be approved by all participants before the bundle goes live.

Choosing A Bundle To Participate In/
Setting One Up

Sign Up Forms

I use Tally Forms to create sign up forms for authors. Here’s an example, including how I describe bundle requirements/ eligibility of books, all book info questions (to inform the bundle description and marketing graphic), plus questions for multi genre, and identity specific bundles. It also gives you a good example of how to communicate sign up requirements, key dates and other things its good to communicate to authors at the sign up stage.

You can get bundles approved, share graphics and and do any necessary follow up by email, but it helps to also have the option to organise on discord. My own Writers & Authors Discord has an Itchio channel for bundle organisation, as does IndieBookSpotlight‘s. (You can ask for an invite for mine via this Bsky post.)

Choosing a Focus; Identity/ Genre/ Theme

Generally speaking; marginalised rep themed bundles sell best. The highest selling bundle I’ve been in was specifically Aromantic. The most successful one I’ve organised was Trans People Take on The World. Specific identities can sell well. Though my ADHD bundle struggled, while my Autistic one did well.

General queer bundles can sell alright during Pride, though there tends to be multiple, so its competitive. I’ve seen precious few BIPOC bundles, but the world needs more BIPOC books, so my prediction is they would be well received.

Note for Cis-Het Authors

I’m sometimes asked by cishet authors if their book with a, for eg. nonbinary love interest or side character can go in a nonbinary bundle. Yes, representation MATTERS. I encourage it. But as a nonbinary author, I don’t merely want to highlight a book that acknowledges nonbinary people exist. I want books that place one or more nonbinary characters on centre stage, as a main character. Queer themed bundles tend to (but don’t always) take that approach.

Choosing a Focus; Theme & Genre

Themes are trickier and I prefer to combine them with genre. For example, I did Friendship-Centred SFF, my best selling bundle so far in 2026. Romance books have many subgenres, making them easy to identify. But books that focus on a group of friends tackling a plot problem? Or a friendship group forming? On a new platonic relationship developing? There are no genres for that. And some people WANT to read it. So bundling books like that worked.

If you’re interested in themes, I suggest being no broader with genre than SFF (SciFi/ Fantasy/ Speculative Fiction). Many readers do read multiple genres. But the chances of many readers reading the exact combination of genres within a single bundle that authors chose, and wanting every book in the bundle?

Also, just because 10-15 authors have a book that features x doesn’t necessarily mean 10-15 or more readers wish to buy it. Author and reader interests won’t always align, so be careful in selecting a bundle you think will have reader appeal. Especially if your spoons to promote and participate are limited, and you need to choose bundles sparingly.

Friendship Centred SFF Book Bundle 37 Books Feb 1st-15th Background photo: four friends standing with arms around each other. Photo by Helena Lones, ItchioCovers: The Unidentified Champagne Charlie and the Amazing Gladys Walking the Knife's Edge Bonkpocalypse Bad Grains A Spark in Space The Damsel AN UNCOMMON CURSE Courage Is the Price Puppetry Duckett & Dyer, Dicks For Hire The Old Goat and the Alien Spirits of the Relentless Without Wings Clipped Sing In Me, Holy One, and Through Me The Lucky Machine The Lost Star Chart Werecockroach Rescue from the Orc Fortress Riyati Ripple Wherever the Stars Call The Crows Woodspell Common Accord Awakenings River of Crows A Study on Magic and Crystals Once Upon A Wave of Witches Fortitude Waters Dust & Lightning The Re-Emergence

Dates: When To Run A Successful Bundle

Whether its queer identity, or May 4th for SciFi; dates matter. The benefit of identity bundles is timing them to match awareness days/ weeks/ months. A May 4th SciFi bundle will get more eyes on it that a random month of the year SciFi. (I suspect this is true for all genres; romance bundles being best in February, horror/ dark fantasy in Oct, etc.)

Setting A Price

Head’s up: if you have a theme few readers are interested in, or a bundle with a poetic/ vague bundle title, price doesn’t matter, because your bundle won’t sell.
I prefer to charge around $1 per book. So I like to cap the bundle at around 20-30 participants, as I feel like once a bundle is priced over $30; sales tend to drop off, as potential readers are priced out.

Yes, some bundles have had a cheap price and loads of participants and sold really well. But we’re talking 60-100+ participants for $10-15 here. Thirty people promoting a bundle at $10 may earn very little. Ask me how I know 😉

Duration

People tend to be paid fortnightly. If a bundle only runs for a week and they get paid the week after; they may not be able to afford it, having not budgeted for that $30 USD. Related: For the Trans People Take On the World Bundle, I’m fairly confident a chunk of purchasers got paid on the Wed/ Thur of the second week. We got a second spike in sales then that didn’t correlate at all to our promo. I’m sure it correlated with a pay day.

A 3-4 week bundle may get less and less posts and reposts as it’s second, let alone 3rd and 4th weeks come around. Participants get tired of posting. Their followers lose interest in interacting with the posts. And bundle fatigue is real, especially if there have been bundle multiple bundles that month/ the one before, etc. (Late June/ July is a bad time for this, after lots of Pride Bundles.)

Bundle Description

I know imposter syndrome is real and author’s get shy talking about their work. But people need to KNOW why they should part with their $. Why do they want this particular bundle? Is it for people who believe a disabled person can be the author of their own story, not their caretaker? Is it for people who enjoy reading about found families in SFF? Is every author disabled/ queer/ BIPOC? Are they all Canadian? (National or even Asia-Pacific bundles may not sell so well because the country(s) have smaller populations and the bundles get less social media reposts, but I still think they’re worthwhile. And I’d love more Aussie readers!)

Mini Blurbs

If there are 15, especially 40 books in the bundle, how many of them does the potential purchaser actually want to read? This is why some of us now include mini blurbs of each book, displayed under its title, in the bundle description.

These may be 100-200 word mini blurbs. Enough to tell people there are multiple books they want in the bundle and its worth buying. But not long enough that it reads as 30 slabs of text and anyone feeling tired nopes out on browsing book descriptions.

Mutual Aid or Marketing?
Character Focus or Author?

I think bundle names, descriptions, promo graphics and people’s individual marketing posts need to consider whether mutual aid, authors or characters are the marketing focus. Is the overall tone; support queer/ disabled creators? Is it: white people shut up and listen to BIPOC! (No, BIPOC, I’m not accusing you of being rude or aggressive. I’m saying I, white person who talks too much, am happy to shut up and listen to you. Colonialism and racism do too much about you without you, just as ableism, queerphobia and transphobia do too much without listening to disabled or queer people. Hence we need your voices and my Diverse Books list page needs BIPOC bundles on it!)

Is the focus of a marginalised author bundle on the characters marginalised identities? Or on the author’s marginalisation? Is it about financially supporting the authors? Or is it about listening to a range of voices? Or is it all of the above?

I encourage bundle organisers to have clear answers to those questions, and to name your bundle, write its description, design its promo graphic and lead by example in how you describe these things in your own promo posts. Because if any one of the above is the goal, but different authors highlight different ones; your message across social media gets diluted. And the goal of the bundle is less clear to readers, and to anyone boosting or reading your posts.

Important Bundle Set Up Logistics For Organisers

Participants
You need to know who your participants are, and to have them all added to the bundle before your press ‘create bundle.’ Once the bundle is created, even in draft mode; you cannot add more participants. (You can remove/ prune people whose contribution to the bundle is 15% or less of it, if they go m.i.a. and don’t approve the bundle in time.)

Bundle Approval
Give People Time To Approve
Bundles cannot go live until every participant has approved their book’s inclusion. Your participants may live around the world, in many different time zones. Some time zones (eg. in Australia and the US) may have little overlap of waking hours, where neither party is at work. So giving people 24 hours to approve a bundle is cutting it very fine.

I suggest sending bundles out for approval a minimum of 4-5 days before they go live. That gives time around sleep, work and other commitments for people to check their emails. I prefer to send the approval email out 2-1 weeks before the bundle goes live. (But not 3, because that’s so far ahead that I’d suggest also emailing people to tell them when the bundle has started and that its time to promote it on their socials/ newsletter now.)

Approval Follow Up
Often at least one person won’t receive the email. Some people may overlook it because their inbox is crowded and life is busy. Other’s will notice it when they don’t have time and forget to approve. Or they aren’t on discord, so your sharing the approval link on discord AND by email may not reach and get everyone approving the bundle. And the world is on fire and you’re not organising a bundle in optimal conditions.

Some people check Bsky more often, or find our DMs far more accessible than our horribly overstimulating, info overload inboxes (I certainly do, being AuDHD.) So if people don’t respond after 3-4 days to discord or email links, I send a DM if I can find them on Bsky, or a follow up email. I do this as a reminder, before the official deadline to approve has passed, because then people are less likely to feel stressed or be anxious about missing deadlines or holding people up.

Itchio’s advice on physically setting up bundles.

Successful Bundles;
Timing, Explicit Name & Wow Factor

The most successful bundle I participated in excelled in I think, on two main points. It was probably the first time anywhere that I’ve seen books gathered because the author and or main character was on the aromantic spectrum. It was February 2025, Itch bundles were new, and a marginalised, little known identity being spotlighted like that was something people leapt upon.

But also; it was called Aro Books For Pride. It had clear entry requirements; the author and or main character had to be queer, and its name told readers exactly what they were getting. It was also hosted during Aromantic Pride week. So it had all the magic ingredients: people wanted it, it was clearly named for them to recognise, and promoted at a time people were looking for it.

Power of A Name

A Successful Bundle (that wasn’t queer)

As noted above, my most successful bundle in 2026 was Friendship-Centred. I’ve noticed bundles that are just titled and marketed by genre can struggle to gain interest. But with a theme that isn’t given discoverability by its own genre, like a group of friends tackling a plot problem, a friendship group forming or a new platonic relationship developing; this bundle did ok. It was purchased 31 times, and we all made around $35 USD, which is 3x as much as I’ve earnt from some -yes including genre-only- bundles.

I emphasise ‘that wasn’t queer,’ because yes, bundles featuring marginalised authors and or characters generally seem to get more interest and reposts on social media than those that don’t. There’s community goodwill to support marginalised creators (which as the latter I very much appreciate). But I mention the above bundle to assure discouraged cis-het authors that choosing your theme, genre/ overall focus well, and naming your bundle clearly, can still make for a successful bundle when the theme or authors aren’t necessarily queer.

Well Named Succesful Queer Bundles

The most successful book bundle I’ve seen EVER was Queer Lights in the Darkness. It had 38 participants, some of whom have are influential/ have a good connections, which makes a big difference (and alas is something most of us do not have). But it did some things that can be adapted to any bundle. At a dark time for queer people (this was a 2025 bundle), and America generally, this bundle title offered hope. And it put queer people at the centre of that hope.

The most successful bundle I’ve hosted (as an ‘unknown’ author), was also a queer bundle, also during a queer identity’s month. Again; I think the name helped a lot. I called it Trans People Take on the World. The year the UK Supreme Court defined ‘woman’ in a way that excluded trans women, a year of trans people taking a lot of crap in the US and UK alike, I wanted a set of books where trans people were front and centre, and we’re getting shit done! I didn’t care whether that was ‘merely’ pursuing a relationship and a wholesome life in a world of enshitification, or a trans princess seizing her throne from her usurping cis male uncle!

Like Queer Lights in the Darkness, I wanted my bundle’s theme to be empowerment. I chose a title that highlighted that. There had to be a trans main character because I think we deserve to be centre stage. The authors had to be trans because I wanted to spotlight trans authors, and because fuck JK Rowling.

Purpose

Now we’ve hit on something deeper. What is the purpose of the bundle? Is it merely some indie authors chucking their books and marketing them together, hoping to make a few bucks? Or is it to spotlight main characters and works by authors we see far too little of, from the traditional publishing industry? Is it to spotlight a massively undervalued relationship in our society; platonic friendship? Or is it to highlight themes that make as FEEL?

Is the theme hope? Is it rebellion or resistance? Does it aim to inspire or empower? Is it morally grey aces saying “fuck the rules, we’re going to do whatever works for us!”? (Yes, there was a Morally Grey Aces Bundle.) Or is it creating a bundle centring something people love, that makes people smile, like cats, or something? (Sorry, I’m unaware of a bundle about that.)

I don’t know about anyone else, but at the end of the day; I read and view fiction because I want to FEEL. To be inspired, surprised, to experience wonder. Joy. To be moved to tears. I want to ‘experience’ life in fantastical worlds. To live a thousand lives. So I think having a clear idea what feelings and ‘experiences’ your bundle aims to capture/ inspire/ provide, will help with choosing an explicit/ evocative bundle name, genres and how to sell that bundle.

Green, purple, pink and peach magic shield backdrop behind text: For blog updates (SFF, neurodivergent/ queer/ chronic illness life, writer and authoring), see my author newsletter.


Related Reading
Itch, Censorship, My Banned Book and Collective Shout

Marketing & Time Management

Becoming an Indie Author Part 1: Publishing

Becoming an Indie Author Part 2: Book Launching

June 17, 2025 / / 0 Comments

Abandoning Amazon as a reader is easy (if you don’t have a Kindle), when there are so many alternative stores, subscription services, and Goodreads alternatives, several of which I’ll describe and link here. Abandoning it as an author was, until 2025, largely unthinkable. Even authors resentful of Amazon’s market dominance or lack of ethics felt we had to publish on Amazon to have any hope of selling books, let alone a career as an author, especially an indie author. But with Amazon in 2025 adding to its disregard for its staff and contempt for the environment; abandoning DEI (which almost had me bailing), and two big changes with gen ai, my decision to pull my books from them was made. And it became time to consider what being an author who doesn’t sell books on Amazon looks like.

Brick & Mortar/ Local Alternatives

As an Aussie, when I lived in Frankston, I bought books from Robinson’s Bookstore. In inner Melbourne, I discovered Collins Bookstore, and then my new favourite indie store in the inner suburbs, Readings. Anywhere I went, I also borrowed from the local library. Anything niche I wanted that wasn’t at a local store could be ordered online from Book Depository. Yes, the giant who offered free shipping world wide, the rival Amazon bought, then closed permanently.

Bookshop.org

The brick and mortar alternative I like best for UK and US readers, if you don’t have one nearby is Bookshop.org, because they share their profits with indie stores. Its a good paperback alternative to Amazon and, as of 2025, Bookshop.org sell ebooks too.

Note for Authors: distributing your paperbacks via Ingram Spark directly, or using Ingram via Draft to Digital (which I prefer, as I find the D2D dashboard and customer service more accessible), will automatically make your paperbacks available on Bookshop.org. (For more on self publishing and book distributors, see this blog).

Online Store Alternatives

Before I link big multinational stores, I’ve found my Ruarnon Trilogy ebooks (courtesy of StreeLib) in national stores in western Europe, and one (so far) in South East Asia (all linked here.) So if you’re wanting to buy local, unsure of your choices and outside America, western Europe, UK, Canada or Australia, check in with the internet/ friends/ family about bookstores owned by your country.

Itchio

Itch.io was most popular with gamers, but in 2025 is growing in popularity among readers and indie authors. They sell ebooks DRM-free, and offer authors a better profit than many alternatives (buying direct from the author is best for authors, but comes with an international taxation headache that puts off or delays quite a few us with selling direct).

Note for Readers: Itchio doesn’t have a storefront for different countries. There’s one online storefront and the author chooses a currency for the minimum price, which can be free and you can tip above it. If needed, the price is converted into the purchaser’s currency.

Note for Authors: you need to create an account and upload your books directly to sell on Itch. Setting prices in UK/ US or Euro currencies means unfavourable exchange rates for readers in the rest of the world. For example, a US $4.50 ebook cost me around $8.30 Aud. The standard Australian dollar indie book price is $6. So you might want to take exchange rates into account when setting your minimum price.

Kobo

For Australia, New Zealand, the US, Canada, much of Europe, the UK, South Africa, India, Japan, and some of the Asia-Pacific (specific countries listed here), we can buy ebooks via the Canadian company Kobo. Kobo is part owned by Rakuten, based in Japan, where they don’t call it ‘DEI’, but they say ‘we respect human rights of all and uphold individual dignity,’ and commit to ‘contribute to a sustainable future.’ (Kobo became home of my digital library in 2024, and I plan to purchase a Kobo now in 2025. [2026: I did and am very happy with it].)

Not only does Kobo sell ebooks, it also has an ebook and or audio subscription service. And distributes indie books to libraries via Overdrive/ Libby.

2026 Update: Storygraph is now partnered with Kobo, meaning readers can sync their books between Storygraph and their Kobo ereader, for a total Amazon and Goodreads replacement.

Author note: if you upload your books directly to Kobo, you can access more in-store promos than on D2D. Your Kobo dashboard will track for you which ones you didn’t get into, which you’ve done, and your upcoming promos. It will also let you fill in a form to be notified of Overdrive promos.
NB: you’ll likely need to speak to Kobo’s chatbot to ask them to add the Kobo promo tab to your dashboard.

Barnes & Noble

I assume Barnes and Noble is (if anything now even more) popular in America. I couldn’t find much about them and DEI, though they still have their Black Lives Matter statement up, which I take as a good sign.

Apple

All of the aforementioned countries for Kobo, plus more of South America, Eastern Europe, Asia and the Pacific (specific countries listed here) have access to Apple, whose commitment to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion remains firm. BUT in 2025 their CEO personally gifted Trump with 1 million $, and was happy to negotiate favourably for Trump to evade his short lived 2025 tariff madness. Adding two and two, I suspect Apple happily defend DEI because their customers, whom they make money from, like DEI. Were that not the case, I suspect they’d throw it too, under a bus, to curry more favourable business deals with the Trump Regime.

Booktopia

It would be un-Australian of me not to also mention Booktopia, Australia’s largest online store (yes trading again as of 2025 after voluntary administration in 2024). And they own another Aussie bookstore, which seems to be more online than brick and mortar these days; Angus and Robertson.

Note for Authors: I distribute my ebooks (and for B&N and Booktopia my paperbacks) to all of the above stores except –Itchio– via Draft to Digital (who also distribute to Everand, listed below).

Subscription Service Alternatives

For Americans, there’s Barnes & Noble’s Nook.

For Americans, Canadians, Aussies, Brits, Kiwis and everyone who has access to Kobo, there’s Kobo Plus.

There’s also 24 Symbols, which is multi lingual.

And Everand.

Note for Authors: I distribute my books to 24 Symbols and a range of local online stores throughout Europe, Latin America and elsewhere via StreetLib.

Library Apps

My favourite place to read and make my own book available for free is my local library. Any author who doesn’t have their books in Kindle Unlimited can make their ebooks (as well as paperbacks) available to local libraries, and yes, some services or government grants will pay us per borrow, or reimburse us beyond the libraries’ initial ebook purchase (Canadian and American authors, see Indie Author Project. Australian authors, see Lending Rights Schemes). You may want to borrow ebooks directly through your local library, or check if your local lets you borrow via the two popular apps below.

Libby

The readers of Bsky made me away of Libby, an international library app.

Hoopla

Your local library may also or alternately let you borrow through Hoopla.

Note for Authors: if your books are available for library purchase via Overdrive (to whom DraftToDigital distribute), readers can borrow them via Libby. DraftToDigital also distribute directly to Hoopla.

TBR & Review Alternatives

StoryGraph

StoryGraph is independently owned and was founded by Nadia Odunayo, with a focus on readers. This article by Distractify explores the benefit of that. Yes, you can export your Goodreads data to Storygraph, so you have the same TBR, book stats etc. They also offer a short questionnaire about your reading preferences, to inform their recommendations, and a free (which I use) and a paid tier. Book Riot’s (2021) Review has more information. Or you can create an account on Storygraph’s sign up page. (And or check out my epic YA Fantasy books.)

Note For Authors: the reason I’ve linked to my books instead of my Storygraph author profile (above) is because Storygraph doesn’t yet have an author profile option, to which authors can link our books. Apparently its in their roadmap for future developments.

BookBub

Bookbub is another option for following authors, getting notified of new releases, tracking your reading, reviewing books, etc. If you add a book to your wishlist or follow an author, they notify you when that book is on sale, not just on Amazon, but also on Apple, Barnes & Noble and Kobo. You can sign up for their daily email of books on sale by genre, and again sale links are for multiple stores. I’m on there mainly to review books (which I’m quite behind on), and my profile is here.

Note for Authors: you can pay for your books to be advertised in Bookbub’s emails. They also offer a coveted feature deal, which is far from cheap, but from all reports gives you a sales spike the day it goes out by email. Author sign up.

Fabel

I’m hearing mixed reviews of Fabel. It’s a paid service, but I’m including it because it emphasises book clubs and interactive reading, both of which seem less of an option on StoryGraph and Bookbub. I haven’t used Fabel.

Abandoning Amazon as an Author

Why do Indie Authors Publish On Amazon?

As an Aussie who grew up in a city when indie bookstores thrive; I never had any interest in Amazon as a reader. It didn’t exist here till 2018, its foreign owned, bad for the environment and treats its staff in exploitative conditions that would NEVER be tolerated in my country. But when I was doing my homework on self publishing in 2021, before releasing Manipulator’s War in 2022; every indie author I spoke to believed you HAD to be on Amazon.

It dominates the American market and has a firm grip on the world market. It was the best way for indie authors publishing in obscurity like myself to become ‘discoverable.’ It was the site all my indie author friends most valued reviews on, so that’s where I reluctantly purchased and began reviewing books. Then I learned if you spend less than $50 a year annually on Amazon; you can’t write reviews there. (Is it just me, or is everything about that site about keeping you on it, to make more money off you?)

I never liked it. I didn’t want to have my books there. But even Wide for the Win, authors dedicated to and supporting each other with publishing wide (beyond Amazon as well as on it). seemed to believe you had to start on Amazon. the you could gradually build your readership on non-Amazon stores. So I reluctantly published on Amazon from 2022 to 2025.

My Tipping Points for Leaving

As I said in the introduction, I was tempted to pull my books when they abandoned DEI back in January. But with Meta updating their hate speech policy to exclude many forms of hate speech and abandoning fact checking around the same time, January had me busy connecting with travel friends and family on alternative platforms, before deleting my Facebook and Insta accounts.

I then dedicated myself to redesigning Manipulator’s War’s cover with art from my retired cover artist, and overcoming major paperback formatting issues for Ruarnon Trilogy, to release paperbacks via Draft to Digital and on Amazon. Within weeks of all three paperbacks being live on stores in May, I became aware of more Amazon bombshells.

Gen Ai Book Summaries- Author Copyright Violation?

I saw a post about how Amazon are introducing ai summaries of Kindle books. And those summaries include plot and character development. The book blurbs authors submit do not have all of that information. It could only be obtained by feeding an author’s book into generative ai. Which no author gave Amazon consent to do.

Multiple authors began emailing Amazon about this, and I learned of it via this post by Skyla Cameron, summarising her email chain conversation with Amazon. After over a month of emails were exchanged; they failed to disclose whether they were storing and using the book data we did not consent to be fed to gen ai, to train their gen ai.

Skyla and I both concluded from the Amazon customer service person saying, ‘I cannot say’ that Amazon are indeed training their gen ai on authors book files (which we upload for the purpose of selling them), without author consent. I was ready to pull my books then.

Ai to ‘Narrate’ Audible Books

Within days I saw another social media post about Amazon’s plans to make 100 ai ‘narrators’ available to narrate audio books. Stealing from authors on one hand and trying to put voice actors out of a job with the next? Decision to pull my books made!

Then Amazon announced they were cutting author royalties by 10% as of the first of June, and I laughed at them for confirming I’d made the right choice so swiftly.

I Don’t Want To Share Profits With Zon

The other thing the May gen ai revelations brought home to me was something that didn’t sit well with me in April. I participated in a big indie author books sale then (the Naratess Sale), and I sold three books on Amazon. That meant I made them $3 and me $3. I resented that. It’s the tinniest of profits, absolutely nothing to a billionaire. But I couldn’t be happy about those three book sales (there are months where I sell no books at all), because I resented Bezos getting anything.

And that realisation made me not want to promote my books, to avoid Amazon profiting from them. At which point it was obvious the decision I would be happiest with is removing my books from Amazon, then promoting bookstores I like, who treat authors (and in the latter’s case; book stores as well as customers) well, like Itchio and Bookshop.org. So those are the kind of stores my Ruarnon Trilogy books page now promotes. Meanwhile, I’ve been tracking down local stores in other countries too, and listing them on this stores by country page.

So Where Are My Books?

Thanks to Draft to Digital, when I pulled my books off Kindle, they were already on Barnes & Noble, Apple, Kobo, Booktopia and a few lesser known stores. Thanks to Kobo’s partnerships with nationally owned stores, they’re also on local country online stores, like bucher.de in Germany, Bol in Netherlands etc. I uploaded Ruarnon Trilogy epub files/ ebooks to Itchio, and DriveThru Fiction directly, to give myself more reach and readers more options. And my paperbacks and ebooks are available to libraries via Libby/ Overdirve, via Kobo as well. (All of my these links are on my books page.)

Update: later in 2025, I set up a direct store on Payhip, which, now integrated with Bookvault to print and ship paperbacks, allows me to sell my epic fantasy ebooks and paperbacks directly to readers. I got to design my own page, had full autonomy over book blurbs, pricing etc. And when I sell books, I only have to pay payment processing fees, not 30% of the price of the book to a store. So buying direct, as you’d anticipate, cuts out the middle man and gives the author more reimbursement for the blood, sweat and tears we put into our books (or extract from you when you read, depending on your genre choices 😉 )

Why Draft to Digital, and Itchio, and DriveThru Fiction and possibly also direct sales? For one of the same reasons I’ve never been exclusive to Amazon; I hate putting all my eggs in one basket. Twitter has shown how volatile that can be.(Yes, I had my largest social media following there before moving to Blue Sky).

[2026 Update: for more details on store distribution and going directly through stores, to avoid D2D’s 2026 low earning authors tax (yeah, I’m not buying the ‘this was our only way to ‘filter out’ gen ai line), see the Distributor section of this post.)

2026 Addition: What About Audiobooks?

I haven’t released any audiobooks (yet). But my friend Holliday has. And in this post she explains her experience of Audible, which is why she hates Audible and doesn’t recommend it to anyone. Then she introduces some alternatives.

What Does Being on Author not on Amazon Look Like?

I’d already refused back in January to utilise the two most popular ways for authors to make readers aware our books exist: paying Bezos to advertise them on Amazon, or Zuck to advertise them on Facebook. I’d also tried Bookbub ads in 2024, and found my graphic design skills (for my trilogy at least) were NOT cut out for getting Bookbub link clinks, let alone sales. And those are the three most likely paid ads to successfully advertise your book and build your readership…

Itchio Bundles

Having participated in an Itchio Bundle for Pride Month, which gathered 23+ books by 23 authors with aromantic main characters, I see the power of Itch book bundles to put underrepresented characters into the hands of readers who crave them. With every author promoting the same bundle on their social media; our reach is greater. And with book bundle profits split evenly between participating authors; we all earn something.

2025 -? Itch Bundles of Underrepresented Characters

I’m already planning a Nonbinary Books Bundle, for Nonbinary Awareness Week, July 14th to 20th (Ruarnon of Ruarnon Trilogy being nonbinary.) I’ll also do an Asexual Spectrum Bundle for Asexual Awareness Week, and ADHD Rep Bundle for ADHD Awareness Month in October. (Yes, Ruarnon ticks both of these identities as well, while the second main character of Ruarnon Trilogy, Linh, is aro-ace and her best friend Troy is diagnosed ADHD, but not the only ADHDer.)

Whether these bundles will be a thing year in year out I’m not sure. [2026 update: they seem to be slowing but still help get books out and earn me more then selling books individually.] But for this year at least, they’re a good way to meet and connect with more indie authors who share my marginalised identities. And a good way for us to help each other put our books into the hands of more readers, and give more people insight into what life with any one of those identities and more can be like. (They’re also an effective way to collectively market the first book in everyone’s series full stop).

I’ll definitely do an Autistic Book Bundle (or join someone else’s) during Autism Awareness Month (April) next year, with Rarkin, MC of my new Sythe Series being autistic. And perhaps consider broader themes and bundles, like Queer Normative SFF, or SFF Full Of Hope, both of which Ruarnon Trilogy very much ticks. (Technically Sythe Series does too, though its somewhat darker). [I went with Friendship Centred SFF in early 2026.]

In Person Author Events

Having got long covid a mere six months after releasing my debut novel, and not successfully balanced my work life with ongoing chronic illness (fibromyalgia) until this year, I’m FINALLY ready to contemplate attending in person events. If I time them right, I should have the energy to participate and enjoy them physically and socially.

With the complete Ruarnon Trilogy in paperback, and book one of Sythe Series likely to be out in August/ September 2025, I’m hoping to attend some local Sunday markets with my books. To start casual, local and small scale. I’ve applied for a booth at Australia Book Fair (the first ever) in Melbourne in 2026, and hope to attend Supa Nova in 2026 as well. Being a sociable person with a background in retail, and currently a teacher, I think I’ll enjoy meeting people at in person author events.

Online Book Promotion?

Ok, maybe I’ll set aside some time to write some more post-length blurbs for book 1 of Ruarnon Trilogy, make a few more graphics and start posting them at least once a month. Or fortnightly? Like many authors, I don’t like self promotion. And perhaps its my autism that insists that social media should be social, and is reluctant to post about my book with a link to it, like a straight up ad. But I definitely need to do more than my super sporadic and rare posts of previous years.

There’s author chats and daily writer prompts where I’ll also talk about my characters, world building etc (more details on both in my Bsky Newby Guide). And there are questions I’d like to ask other writers in my posts, and discuss, which would also involve me sharing more about my book.

I could consult paid promotion indie author advice of gurus like David Gaughran (who have ideas about marketing beyond Amazon) recommend.

Yes, this post hasn’t just been me sharing links I hope will help readers and authors alike, or aiming to be informative. Its also me setting goals and trying to keep myself accountable. If you’re a fellow indie author trying to do the same, I’d love to hear your ideas/ plans on book marketing in these crazy times. You can find me on Blue Sky, Mastodon or send me an email via my contact page and check out my Writer/ Author Discord on there too. Best of luck!

While you’re here, if anyone likes portal, epic, YA fantasy led by queer and neurodiverse characters… maybe take a look at my Ruarnon Trilogy?

Green, purple, pink and peach magic shield backdrop behind text: For blog updates (SFF, neurodivergent/ queer/ chronic illness life, writer and authoring), see my author newsletter.

Further Reading

Becoming an Indie Author 1; Editing, Covers & Book Distributors

Becoming an Indie Author 2; Book Launch

Author Website Tips

Author Newsletters

Indie Author Marketing and Time Management

Wide for the Win
An online author group dedicated to publishing and promoting books outside Amazon. (Originated on Facebook and is now thankfully on a different platform; Circle. Don’t worry, not the Tom Hank’s personality cult that duped Emma’s Watson’s character Circle.)

More Author Platform & Marketing Resources (on my Writer Resources Page)

January 15, 2025 / / 0 Comments

Congratulations, you’re an indie author with your first book out! What next? Most likely your first book is #1 of a series, and you need to write, edit and publish #2. Gurus say we should also be writing and somehow promoting a newsletter. We may elect (as I do) to write a blog, or run a podcast or a Youtube channel). And almost everyone seems to think social media presence is important. And if all that doesn’t sound like a full time job, there’s the non-writing job we do (full or part time) to pay bills and put a roof over our heads.

So how do you find the time and energy to do it all? Especially if, like me, you’re chronically ill, and or neurodiverse? In this post I’ll unpack time management factors to consider, outline my own attempts at breaking down and making marketing manageable, and conclude with resource links to help with actual marketing at the end.

The ‘Small Amount of Time Daily’ Model

There are those people who say: just do a little each day, like writing 500 words. Its not much time or work in that day. And over not too many weeks/ months you’ll have a novel/ established newsletter/ paid advertising campaign!

A big factor here seems to be that when’s life’s busy, its easy to say, ‘I won’t do it today because x,’ and ‘not tomorrow because y’. There’s a risk of not setting aside time to write/ market books and therefore not starting (as I well know, having not spent 9 months of 2023 marketing due to life and earning a living).

If you’re looking for a way to jam marketing into a daily/ weekly schedule under strain, that ‘short amount of time a day’ model may appeal. But personally, I have one main objection.

Some of Us Cannot Spare a Small Amount of Time

Some of us have a disability. Maybe marketing is ‘just’ an extra 20 mins in my day and that’s not much. But my back hurts and gravity is trying to pull me into the ground. My Fibro is DONE with today. It needs that 20 mins (and the next three hours), and same time the next day/ week/ month to recover from the rest of the day. I don’t control what I do on day’s I’m at my day job. My body makes that call and woe is me if I ignore and defy early warnings of increasing fatigue, and or signs my chronic pain is about to flare.

Maybe it takes you time and effort to get your brain out of work/ parenting/ other mode, to tune into something book/ marketing related (especially if you have ADHD). By the time you’ve spent ten minutes (or for ADHD three hours to days/ weeks/ months) trying to engage your brain on The Thing, you want/ need a solid block of time on that task. The first hour ‘on The Thing’ is passed and you weren’t able to properly engage with, or even start The Thing yet.

Need Solid Blocks Of Time?

I NEVER bother sitting down to write if I don’t have at least 1-2 hours. Otherwise I don’t remember who’s in the scene, where the scene is or what just happened, let alone what I’m writing now, or setting up to happen next. Marketing is similar. I want AT LEAST an hour to draft that newsletter/ blog/ design that ad graphic/ series of upcoming book teasers.

The ONLY ‘book marketing’ thing I do in less than an hour is run late to a social media author chat (you’ll find those listed on my Bsky writer chat list). And while technically talking about your characters and plots online could ultimately result in someone reading one of your books, its mostly an activity I do for fun, and connection with fellow writers.

Do What Works For You

So before considering when in the day/ week/ month to schedule your marketing, I’d first consider your ability to focus, your stamina and what length of time blocks you need for marketing (or writing) to be focused AND productive. IF a little each or most days of the week works for you, of course go for it! If it doesn’t? Ideally, I’m finding ‘how often’ boils down to ‘often enough to remember what I’m trying to achieve and how,’ and often enough ‘to feel like I’m making progress.’

When Did I Do All The THINGS?

Blog?

My blog could mean one afternoon a month editing the next blog, and penciling in ideas for the next few month’s blogs. Enough time to check I’ll have a blog ready to roll out at the same time this month, and enough ideas/ of a draft to have edited and published one next month. Ideally, some ideas and or drafts beyond that.

With that system in place, I’ve published one blog most months for nearly four years. This despite the time blindness and management barriers my undiagnosed, unmedicated ADHD posed for most of that period.

Newsletter?

I spend probably one or two afternoons very second month drafting and editing newsletter content and inserting images. Usually, that’s now within a week of sending out a newsletter. Initially though, I always began the next letter before sending out this one, to have content ideas already ticking in advance.
Again, in this case that helped me have a newsletter ready to go every two months for the last three years (quarterly initially, which wasn’t frequent enough to engage people).

Write the Next Book?

Writing/ editing the next book for me is more challenging than both of the above. As a distracted ADHDer, and autistic person who desires exploring story and character logic ALL THE WAY down the deepest rabbit hole, I love writing complex stories produced by whole days writing and editing. In my energetic twenties, Saturdays were rest from the new, challenging career of teaching, Sunday morning’s were reading to enhance my focus, and afternoons for writing. (Of course there were days my ADHD wouldn’t focus at all and I’d stare at a blank page or not even turn on my computer.)

When I was lucky enough to work only three hours a morning part time for a year (in 2018), I would come home from teaching literacy, read for an hour or two, then write for six to eight hours (going for an hour long run in the middle). Those days were brilliant for my undiagnosed, unmedicated ADHD. The teaching burnt off the restlessness I started every day bursting with. Reading when I got home calmed and focused my highly distractible brain. And I still had HOURS to focus and write. Than an hour to run off the resltessness and re-calm and re-focus my hyper, ADHD brain mid-write block.

Getting Marketing Goals Into a State to Determine WHEN To Do Them

First: pick ONE aspect of marketing to focus on. A social media account, a newsletter, a blog, seeking author interviews, getting your book up on all the platforms (details in Step 9 of this post) , or ONE type of paid ad campaign. As an who began social media with Facebook, Instagram AND Pinterest simultaneously, then mastered Twitter, I assure you its more effective to learn ONE platform/ aspect of marketing well first. THEN transfer your learning to a second a few months later. Otherwise its too easy to do multiple things with lack of clarity/ understanding, and thus ineffectively.

Once you’ve got your One focus, getting started is great, but the challenge (as everyone with ADHD knows), is sustaining your work. I find marketing hardest. Aside from individual blog posts/ podcasts/ youtube videos, its hard to break ‘book marketing’ into small, yet related, continuous tasks. Bookbub ads (the first paid option I experimented with) seemed big, and daunting and I put it off for probably over a year before trialling them.

Example: Breaking Learning Bookbub Ads Into Sessions

Once you’ve picked your One Thing, consider how to break it into smaller parts, likely to fit the time you have daily/ weekly/ monthly for them. When I took a break from teaching early in 2023, that involved three week’s full time testing Bookbub ads for my first trilogy (massive fail. I spent money and lots of hours, but my designs were WAY too far off the mark to be potentially worth it). Here’s how, if I only had a few hours daily, as opposed to whole days, I’d break down learning Bookbub ads.

1: Research

Read David Gaughran’s Bookbub ads book and browse sample Bookbub ads (like Top 10 Bookbub Ads of 2024), and take notes in the first few 1-2 hours slots, for a week (or two).

2: Design Ads

Spend the next few 1-2 hour slots designing my first ad images.

3: Compare My Ads to Successful Designs & Revise

Spend the next few hour slots (over around two weeks) examining each individual aspect of design. I’d break these down into; font & font size, background, text & background contrast, how cluttered the image looks etc. Then I’d compare design elements of my ads to my notes on effective design from Step 1 and tweak accordingly.

4: Test & Compare Results of My Own Ads

Run a test ad, then spend slots over the next week comparing and contrasting the amount of clicks it got to previous ads. Then analyse which design elements/ or whether the target author likely influenced clicks positively or negatively. Repeat step 3 with ad test conclusions in mind.

Repeat As Needed

By this point in my process a loop between step 3-4 involving redesign, reflection and re-evaluation could spread over as many sessions and weeks as needed to nail design. Or to conclude that would waste too much time and money (it did with my first book).

Photo Credit: Aron Visuals

When Might You Do All The THINGS?

When you’ve had a go at breaking things into manageable parts, and in so doing developed a clearer idea of what exactly you want to achieve in which time; you can consider WHEN to do All The Things. In deciding that, these considerations helped me, and may help you plan your marketing schedule/ routine.

1: Choose Your Focus

Realistically choose which authorly things you want to focus on in coming months. If you don’t have a website; DO THAT NOW. If you do, will you start a newsletter/ blog/ youtube presence? Build a particular social media platform/ your writer-author network? Or are you ready to consider promoting your book(s) on Amazon/ to a Wide audience? Or do you want to start local and look at public author events, or getting your paperbacks into a local bookshop?

If you’re unsure which of these Things to tackle next, or in what order to tackle Things plural, I go into detail, link resources and sequence The Things I’d aim to do before and soon after launching a book in this post.

  1. How often a day/ week/ month do you need to work on marketing to stay in touch with your goals and keep making progress? (Note: ‘progress’ can include identifying ways that do NOT work and your reflections on why. I still call on-the-job-learning ‘progress’, as knowledge puts you in a better position to achieve in future.)

2: Block Out Other Comittments

What days/ times aren’t an option for you because of your day job? Because humans need sleep and or your kids need parents to raise them? What other comittments require how much of your time?

In blocking out non-writing time, please don’t forget to block out time to rest, recover, chill, smell roses, eat chocolate etc! In other words, don’t work yourself to death. Modern life is BUSY and we need BREAKS.

3: Identify Your Authorly Time Slots

Having blocked out time for life and wellbeing purposes, what time do you have left and how often, across a week (or even month)?

For my teaching career, all work days are a no for anything authorly (except social media, which is more social for me). Teaching takes a lot out of me physically, emotionally and cognitively, so if I taught that day, the evening is for rest.

If like me, your disability, ADHD distraction, autistic overload (or other) determines when and how much you can get done, use a good day to record Thing you’re working on, parts you’ve broken it into and sequence them. Then, each time your body and mind co-operate and allow you to make progress, make a quick ‘where to next’ note. With that note, after however long it next takes for the stars to align for you to tackle The Thing again, you’ll know where you’re at.
(I’m so glad I wrote a May 2024 Author To Do List, because I spent May moving out, June moving in and life happened for 6 months, so its now my Jan-Feb 2025 To Do List.)

4: Choose a Thing ( big picture focus) for The Year

What’s your big focus for the next few months, or even the year?

With my website established (tips on that in this blog), Newsletter established (Newsletter tips here) and blog established, they all get a couple of hours a month.

Last year I intended to focus on trialing paid ads, but didn’t get to begin FB ads after my Bookbub ones bombed because moving house and setting up (a chronic illness, autistic and ADHD friendly) house took up the rest of the year.

For 2025, my big overall focus seems to be how to promote my books wide (ie. beyond Amazon). My First Thing may be setting up direct ebook sales on my website. Ideally, I’ll do paperback ones after that (which I know will be more complicated).

My Big Thing 2 may be exploring in-house promotions. I’d like to check that for Kobo via D2D and see if I can access Apple in-house promotions that way. I also want to experiment with Smashwords Sales (when they FINALLY merge my Smashwords and D2D accounts, which will put all 3 Ruarnon Trilogy books on ONE trilogy page. They’re currently spliced across two different series pages, for the SAME series).

Green, purple, pink and peach magic shield backdrop behind text: For blog updates (SFF, neurodivergent/ queer/ chronic illness life, writer and authoring), see my author newsletter.

Further Reading (Above Links & More Resources)

Becoming an Indie Author 1; Editing, Covers & Book Distributors

Becoming an Indie Author 2; Book Launch

Author Website Tips

Author Newsletters

Wide for the Win
An online author group dedicated to publishing and promoting books outside Amazon. (Originated on Facebook and is now thankfully on a different platform; Circle. Don’t worry, not the Tom Hank’s personality cult that duped Emma’s Watson’s character’s Circle 😉

More Author Platform & Marketing Resources (on my Writer Resources Page)

Publishing Paths, a Multi-Author Interview

March 7, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Like many writers, I liked the sound of working with a literary agent, receiving editorial feedback and signing with a (big) traditional publisher, who would help with marketing. The dream was write full time and earn a living from it. But with the pandemic, the publishing industry catching fire, supply chain issues, the great resignation hitting editors etc, let’s just say 2020-2021 was a particularly bad time to be querying.

What about small presses? Many querying authors only query literary agents, so the competition would be less extreme. I wouldn’t have to pay out of pocket for cover art or editing and they may still offer marketing advice. But querying was such a passive, SLOW experience for me, and as an active person whose ADHD has two speeds (FAST and sleeping) querying was a terrible match for me. And so I began my indie authoring journey. I’m two books in, with book 3 of my trilogy on preorder. I haven’t had time (or the health) to promote or sell many books yet… though I still love being indie.

But I’m just one person. We all bring different life experiences, skill sets, brains (mine being neurodiverse), temperaments, personalities, needs, expectations and goals to the process. How can you be sure which publishing path is right for you (or for a particular project)? I pursue that by interviewing 5 authors on different publishing paths about why they chose that path, how it meets their needs, why it’s working for them and what turned them off alternatives.

Which publishing path are you on?

Head and shoulders shot of Adam in a red shirt, smiling, seated on a couch with a house plant in the background. Adam had short brown hair, a short beard, blue eyes and is caucasian.
Waist up shot of Maggie wearing a purple, blue and pink scarf wrapped around the lower half of her face, black glasses and her light brown hair half out, half tied back.
Black and white portrait of Megaera in a coloured, checked shirt, short hair combed to the right, wearing dark lipstick, with pale skin contrasting with the black background.

Adam J
Currently pursuing traditional publishing; I have queried once, in 2021 (unsuccessfully), and plan to query another book this year.

Maggie Stone
Pursuing traditional publishing. I only sent a few queries for my first book before pulling back to retool, then switched genres and landed an agent with my second book.

Megaera Lorenz
I’m publishing traditionally with a small press, CamCat Books. I sold my debut novel to them without an agent about a year ago. 

Headshot of Mara wearing a big toothy smile, natural pink/red lipstick, long brown hair flowing over shoulders and a green, embroidered top.
Head and shoulder shot of Joyce (caucasian) wearing a blue brimmed hat, glasses, blonde hair tied back and a bright blue shirt.

Mara Lynn Johnstone

I’m going the indie route for the foreseeable future.

Joyce Reynolds Ward
I am a hybrid writer. While I’m not actively on submission at the moment, I have published around thirty short stories in various anthologies and magazines. My novels, however, are strictly self-published. I had one minor flirtation with small press publication and…it did not go well. I was fortunate enough to get reversion letters for both books before the publisher crashed and burned.

What Appeals Most About Your Publishing Path?

Querying Agents

Adam J: I like the notion of having a team to work with (an agent, editor, cover designer, publicist) with experience in the publishing industry, who can guide me and my books forward. Also, there is a certain repute in having your book chosen by the various gatekeepers of publishing. While I realize that’s mostly bunk — the true judges of any book are its readers — there’s still that little voice in my mind that says I want my book to be good enough to make it through those gatekeepers.

MS: Echoing everything Adam said. I’m not equipped to do this myself, either in skill or in financial resources. Being in a team, a network, gives me the drive to keep going instead of growing anxious over the small details.

Small Press 

ML: love the collaborative, personalized nature of working with an indie press. The CamCat team has been very supportive. They’ve worked with me closely or at least gotten my input on just about every aspect of the publication and production process, including developmental and line editing, finalizing the cover design, creating a marketing plan specific to my book, and even selecting an audiobook narrator.

Indie Author

MLJ: I like being able to take my books from idea to finished product at my own pace, without having to wait years for other people to decide they’re worthwhile. And I also like having the final say over my own covers. 

JRW–Short stories can gain a lot of visibility for any novelist, depending on the market. Novels are where I really turn myself loose to write what intrigues me.

What do you find most challenging about it?

Querying

Adam J: As much as I’d like to say it’s always the quality of the book that makes it worthy of traditional publication, a major element is luck, whether that’s with timing, finding the right person, or hitting the right trend (and sometimes, sadly, luck supersedes quality). There is also a massive time investment often with very little return, and it can be quite a mental struggle to overcome the sheer volume of rejection.

MS: Again, Adam’s beaten me to what I would say. Having a good book isn’t good enough. You have to have a good book that fits what a publisher is looking for now – not that you have to write to a publisher’s specifications, but if they’ve recently acquired (e.g.) two workplace romcoms, they might not be looking for another one right now. Rejection is bad. You can help mitigate it with the right support group, but it’s still going to hurt.

Indie Author

MLJ: Definitely getting the word out. Building an audience is slow when you don’t have a publisher’s advertising budget. 

JRW–Market churn for both the short stories and self-published novels. I tend to say that marketing changes every quarter–that is definitely true for self-publishing, and sadly these days it seems like the magazine market is much the same way.

Which Skills or Life Experiences Help You On Your Chosen Path?

Querying Agents

Adam J: I’ve worked both as a professor at a large institution and as a government consultant, so I’m used to things moving far slower than they really need to (oh, bureaucracy) and I’m also used to rejection, as in consulting you don’t win every contract you bid on. I suppose these impart upon me a certain measure of patience and a thicker skin, both necessary survival traits for the world of traditional publishing.

MS: Also a government person and used to things moving slowly. But I also had a previous life as a musician, so balancing love of creative arts with the (unpleasant) practical aspects of that life (rejection and whatnot). Also, dealing with mental health issues for decades means I’ve built a library of coping mechanisms for when rejections come.

Small Press

ML: I have a lot of professional experience writing educational copy for a general audience, which is an advantage when putting together succinct, snappy pitch materials (such as query letters, blurbs, synopses, and elevator pitches). I’m good at boiling complicated concepts down to their essentials.

Indie Author

MLJ: I’m good at organizing and planning, all that meticulous stuff that’s stereotypically not always part of the artist brain. I’m very glad that I can keep track of everything that needs doing! And my secondary interest after writing has always been visual art, so I’m working on levelling up my skills to where I can reliably make my own spectacular book covers. I’m getting there.

JRW: A couple of years working as a complex securities litigation paralegal as well as ten years of special education case management has helped with the organizational piece.

Why did you prioritise this path?

Querying Agents

Adam J: Admittedly, when I started writing, it was the only way I knew existed. I’ve learned much since — including that marketing kidlit through indie publishing is one of the hardest paths to take (kids don’t buy books online). As I write middle grade, I’m sticking with traditional publishing for now.

MS: This path, if successful, would be most compatible with my skills. I’m not a marketing expert/business manager. Obviously, even with traditional publishing, there’s housekeeping stuff I’d have to take care of, but traditional publishing puts me in a network with shared resources, and has a wider distribution network than I’d be able to establish on my own.

Small Press

ML: I prioritised traditional publishing as opposed to self-publishing because I knew it would help me a lot to have the support of a team that understands how the industry works. I’m a good writer, and I enjoy certain parts of the marketing process, but I have very little business acumen and almost no budget for things like advertising, hiring a professional editor and cover designer, and so on.

Indie Author

MLJ: My original plan was to get an agent, and seek fame and fortune in traditional publishing. But after fifteen years of querying, with multiple novels and many near-acceptances, I finally decided that I was better off self-publishing the many books I’d written in that time.
The current state of the publishing industry made it an easy choice: I’d been active on Twitter at the height of publishing activity there, and I saw firsthand how many editors got laid off from the big publishing houses during the pandemic, how many agents had to leave the industry due to burnout or unsustainability, and how many trad pub authors weren’t getting any more support from their publishers than the average indie writer got from their friends. Self-publishing is a far more viable option than when I first started querying.

JRW: While my short stories have found homes, my books generally received rejections along the lines of “love your voice, love your work…can’t sell it.”

If you haven’t already said, why did you choose against
alternative publishing paths?

Adam J: I’d love to make writing my full-time job, but I know I still have a lot to learn. I also know that the best way to make money (as any kind of author) is with a back catalogue to build a following on. If I go for indie publishing now, and fail, my chances of making it into traditional publication are even less, and I don’t have many books to market. But if I go for traditional publishing first, and fail, I’ll have a back catalogue of books that I think are publishable to turn around and market as an indie author.
I’ve set myself a milestone: if I write ten publisher-ready books and still can’t get a publishing deal, then I’ll turn to indie publishing.

ML: Mostly due to the reasons I mentioned above. However, I was always open to alternatives if the traditional path didn’t work out. I had a three-part plan: try querying agents first, then go directly to small presses that accept unagented material, then do self-pub if the other options didn’t work out. I’d been querying agents for about six months when I saw that CamCat was having a pitching event on Twitter, and I decided on the spur of the moment to toss my pitch into the ring. They liked it, I sent them a query, and a couple months later I had signed with them. I couldn’t be happier with how it worked out.

MLJ: I found that the support I’d been hoping to get from an agent and a publishing house wasn’t likely to live up to the hype, while I could get similar support from a network of writer friends. Better, in some ways! 

If you haven’t already said, what do you see as the main advantages of querying agents, querying small presses, self-publishing or a mix?

Querying Agents

Adam J: There used to be more that traditional publishing could offer over indie publishing, but it’s fairly balanced now. One of the nice things about traditional publishing is that your primary investment is time — even if you don’t get a large advance, you still do not have to pay people to edit your book, design your cover, or (sometimes) run a marketing campaign.
And there are still connections to bookstores, school visits for kidlit, or major conferences that traditional publishers can get, which indie publishers may find more difficult. However, with indie publishing, you have full control, and everything can happen much faster: when you are ready to publish your book, it gets published.

MS: A benefit of having an agent is that I no longer have to focus on a sub list. She reaches out to editors, checking in with me on the way to see if I have input, and handles all that. It takes a load off of me so I can focus on writing, and leaves open the possibility of landing a contract that will be more financially beneficial to me.
Small press, while it means me still handling my own subs, has a faster turnaround time. There are also smaller advances (or sometimes no advances), but the contracts are often one-book, meaning you can easily change your mind after your first book if the experience doesn’t work for you anymore. Indie gives you complete control, if that’s what you’re looking for.

Small Press

ML: The main advantage of working with an agent is that they help authors navigate the complexities of the publishing process and also give them opportunities to get their work in front of publishers and editors who wouldn’t otherwise look at it.

Querying small publishers directly cuts out the middleman and spares authors the agony of finding an agent (not just any agent, but the right agent), which really is a brutal slog. For books that don’t necessarily fit the mould of whatever mysterious marketing trends agents are currently looking for, this can also be a good alternative.

Self-pub gives authors the most control over every aspect of the process, from book design and editing to income from sales.

Indie Author

MLJ: Agents can (hopefully) get you a contract with a big publisher, who will (theoretically) spend a lot of money on making your books famous. Small presses are more likely to accept your manuscript than the big publishers. Self-publishing gives you all the control you could ever want over your own work: you can publish a book any time you want, with no gatekeeping in the way. Doing a mix of both can get you the best of both worlds.

JRW: mixing both provides me with more visibility and flexibility.

Again, if you haven’t already said, what do you think are the cons of querying agents, small presses, self-publishing or a mix of both?

Querying Agents

Adam J: The downside to traditional publishing, aside from there being so much luck involved, is the timescales. Querying will take months, then subbing may take months after that, then your book must be slotted into a publishing schedule, and maybe your book comes out two years after you actually decided it was ready to publish.
I exaggerate a little, and certainly smaller presses who accept unagented submissions can move faster, but the timescales are still quite long.
For indie publishing, the biggest downside is the huge investment in both time and capital required. That’s not to say you can’t get lucky and become a runaway success, but if you truly want to make money, you need to put money in, for a good editor, cover designer, marketing campaign, and anything else you feel would give you and your books a boost in such a crowded market.

MS: I accidentally put a couple of cons in the last question, but really Adam hit a lot of what I’d say. I’ll add for agents that if after you sign with an agent, you decide you want to write something that’s outside of what they represent, you could find yourself looking for supplementary representation, or possibly looking for a new agent, which takes time you could spend writing.
Smaller presses can also sometimes be a total unknown, or collapse after years of success if the wrong person leaves.
Indie can be a huge gamble, particularly if you don’t have a good support network to guide you away from bad decisions that are marketed as easy solutions.

Indie Author

MLJ: Agents have more writers clamoring for their attention than they could ever take on, and your odds of getting an acceptance are low, even if you do everything right.
Small presses have a smaller reach and smaller budget than the big publishers; sometimes all they’re saving you is the hassle of putting the book together into a final product yourself.
Self-publishing comes with no one to tell you no – for good or ill. If you publish a book full of errors with a terrible cover, because you didn’t get enough feedback from others (or didn’t listen to it), that’s all on you.
Going the hybrid route can be both time-consuming and tricky to orchestrate, with far more balls in the air. Best of luck, everybody! Make your choices with eyes open. 

Small Press

ML: ​​Querying agents is a slow, agonizing process that requires a lot of time and mental/emotional energy. Even if you do get a yes from an agent, they might not be the right fit for you or your book. I’ve known several authors who went through multiple agents before finding a good match. As gatekeepers in the publishing industry, agents are also going to filter out books that they don’t think they can sell easily in favour of whatever they see as marketable and on-trend. This means a lot of interesting and innovative books will never make it out into the world if querying authors decide to shelve them instead of trying alternative paths. 

Working with small presses directly can have pitfalls for authors who don’t have access to legal knowledge or resources. Without an agent, you’re more likely to end up signing an unfair contract. (I strongly recommend using the Authors Guild’s contract review service if you go this route.)
And of course, small presses have more limited resources than the larger publishing houses that agents tend to work with. That translates to smaller advances and less of a marketing/production/distribution budget for your books. However, not all small/indie presses are created equal in this regard! Some of them offer an impressive amount of support for their authors in all those areas.

Self-pub requires a ton of time and business smarts that not all authors necessarily have (looking significantly at myself, here). If you want professional editing, cover design, advertising, etc., you’ll need a significant budget, too. Some of the horror stories about Amazon pulling the plug on KDP authors and holding their earnings hostage for inexplicable reasons also give me pause, although I know KDP isn’t the only player in town when it comes to self-publishing.

Indie Author

JRW: The effort required to stay current with recent publishing trends in both magazines and self-publishing is not very different, and striving to gain visibility without spending my life on social media is sometimes a challenge.

Has ‘marketability’ of your writing influenced your publishing path?

Adam: You can get: ‘amazing book, wonderful, but too different and we don’t know what to do with it.’
If you don’t fit the definition its very hard to market. If you have runaway success they all want it because there’s a market for it.

JRW: I have run into this with indie competitions. ‘Excellent writing, different take on this concept, we’re cutting it in the first round.’
These are the competitions dealing with reviewers. They don’t seem to be interested in stuff that’s all that different from trad pub.

Do you identify as marginalised and has that influenced your publishing path?
Does the level of innovation in your writing influence your path?

MLJ: I write my characters inclusive to resonate with everyone as much as I can. I don’t have to care if an agent resonates with it.

JRW Gay couples, lesbian couples, bi couples, throuples, I write them all.

Adam: The fun of writing fantasy is you get to just play and be as representative as you feel like. This is the yellow civilisation, this is the green civilisation —we don’t have to do this anymore. My first book had a female lead and people said ‘you can’t do that.’ -doesn’t apply now.

Have Publishing Industry changes impacted your choice of publishing path?

MLJ: I self published because I gave up on that long list of agents. Everything I’m hearing about the industry now is not what I was told it would be previously. So I’ll self publish while all that is going on and wait till things change.

Adam: I started querying in 2020, first book, so I don’t know any different.

JRW: I started in the 90’s. You could directly query a lot more publishers. I did nonfiction for local journals, just before electronic submissions kicked in. Still the same thing, ‘love your voice/ work/ can’t sell it.’ Jamie Ford sat me down at a workshop and said, “You’re 90% there. You should be trad publishing.” I was going to query, but it was 2020 and we know what happened next.

ML: I came into this right before Twitter fell apart, summer 2022. Started to establish myself in Twitter #WritingCommunity, was finding all these agents and writers, then it crashed and burned. I slid in right before that happened, finding my publisher through a Twitter contest.
A friend was doing one pitch contest on Discord -DVPit- but it was impossible to keep up with and it sounded terrible.

JRW: That’s the element of luck. I was all set to do a big break through reading. A few day’s before the ceiling of the bookstore fell. There is such an element of luck.

Did any Other factors influence you?

JRW: I went to an editor panel with several friends, small press, self pub, all in between, all middle aged ladies at a convention in 2012. We walked out at the end going, “New York does not want us” in 2012.

Were there any surprises on your publishing path? Good? Bad? Did they affirm your choice, or did you stick to your guns despite them?

MLJ: I was a little surprised how hard it was to get an agent since everyone was saying I was doing everything right. I was surprised how little support publishers were giving.
The promise was you would have more people on your side who would make you more successful. Then a big book got 4k for a year to get by and I thought really? That’s not the dream I was promised! So maybe its not that different to go it myself.

JRW: If you can crank out two books a year, in the 90’s, it was a nice living. A friend’s joke was, “Oh that’s Conan the Hot tub. That’s Conan (elsewhere).”
A friend of mine was part of a group of later, middle-aged women midlist writers who reliably turned out 2-3 books a year and hit their deadlines. In about 2008 they decided to form an indie co-op that became the Book View Cafe in order to promote their work. Shortly after Kindle, Smashwords, and then Draft2Digital kicked in. That was when self publishing really took off.

MLJ: All those new indie options made it professional and easy at the same time. Before all the authors had to be on Tik Tok or whatever. Nowadays even the trad authors are pressured to self-promote just like the indies, so the publishers can save some money.

MS: Now if your book is indie its no longer true its dead to trad. If its not identical to 90% of what’s out there -women’s/ romantic comedy- they won’t take it. Most people don’t have the money to make a self pub book popular enough to be taken on by trad publishers.

JRW: Some are spending 9k to make 10k. That’s the deep dark secret of 20BooksTo50k.

MLJ: Amazon does prioritise books that sell better to show up more in ‘you may also like.’

Adam: Its never been easy. Entrepreneurship has always been hard. Some paths will cost money and be better than others but there are paths.

Querying: what is or would be your limit of queries sent before you shelve a book? Is that a factor for you? Or is how many books you shelve a factor?

Adam: ‘10 books. If I have 10 books that haven’t made it, I have 10 books to publish.

MLJ: I didn’t have a limit because 15 years ago I thought that was the way to go. So I didn’t consider change till I heard how the industry was changing.

MS: I don’t have a set number for sub. When I’m done I’m done.

MLJ: I never had a set limit for querying, since the plan was to keep going until I got there. I sent out hundreds of queries, for multiple novels. It was only in the pandemic era when the publishing industry started visibly changing that I decided to switch gears and throw all my efforts into the indie side of things.

What advice would you give on choosing a publishing path for a particular book/ series?

MLJ: I’d tell my earlier self to seek out more writer friends earlier, and do more networking. I didn’t have writer friends. I didn’t know there was a writer club in town until I’d published my first book. The friends I have now across the internet would have been so helpful earlier on. Yes you’re good at writing. But getting someone else’s feedback is always helpful. There will always be people who know stuff you didn’t realise you needed to ask and who have suggestions you wouldn’t have thought of.

Adam: Read more. Read 50 books a year. I did it last year, MG books. If you don’t read you will not know what works and what doesn’t work. I’ve seen a marked improvement in my writing since reading those books. Like a lot of people I thought I’d read them all. I read all the genres.

MS: One piece of advice that always make me cringe a little bit is read widely in your genre. It gets pushed so hard the genres collapse in on themselves. You can tell when you’re reading a romance book by someone who only reads romance books and they always sound alike. I would say its equally important to read outside your genre and to be aware of your genres conventions.

JRW: Ask yourself what you really want–and decide which path is most likely to provide that option

ML: I would say to start by checking out resources like this that break down the different paths so you know what the different options really entail before you get started: https://janefriedman.com/key-book-publishing-path/.
And be cautious about some of the advice that’s out there in the various writing communities online, which can be misleading. For instance, one thing I come across a lot is this notion that getting an agent or going self-pub are the only viable options. Hardly anyone is talking about the route I went, selling directly to a small press.

Head and shoulders shot of Adam in a red shirt, smiling, seated on a couch with a house plant in the background. Adam had short brown hair, a short beard, blue eyes and is caucasian.

Adam’s website

Mastodon

Bluesky

Waist up shot of Maggie wearing a purple, blue and pink scarf wrapped around the lower half of her face, black glasses and her light brown hair half out, half tied back.

Maggie’s Website

Instagram

Bluesky

Black and white portrait of Megaera in a coloured, checked shirt, short hair combed to the right, wearing dark lipstick, with pale skin contrasting with the black background.

Megaera’s website

Instagram

Bluesky

Goodreads

Mara’s website

BlueSky

Tumblr

Head and shoulder shot of Joyce (caucasian) wearing a blue brimmed hat, glasses, blonde hair tied back and a bright blue shirt.

Joyce’s Website

Twitter: JoyceReynoldsW#1

Blue Sky

Green, purple, pink and peach magic shield backdrop behind text: For blog updates (SFF, neurodivergent/ queer/ chronic illness life, writer and authoring), see my author newsletter.

Related Reading

Querying Your First Novel

Why I Chose to Self Publish

Becoming an Indie Author Part 1
and Part 2 (Book Launch).

Signing With an Indie Publisher (a multi author interview)

Indie Authors on Indie Authoring

Where Fantasy Worlds Come From

July 6, 2023 / / 0 Comments

Where do you get your ideas? is a question writers are often asked. But the question that interests me more is ‘where do the ideas for an entire fantasy world come from’? Having already blogged about the cultures and characters in my YA Fantasy Trilogy, I took the question to three fellow SFF authors: Joyce Reynolds-Ward, Mindi Briar and J.F.R. Coates.

How did you develop your magic system(s)?

J.F.R Coates

I love magic. A well-done magic system can add a huge amount of depth and interest to a world, and it’s no a surprise I’ve found a way to include magic in every story I’ve written so far.

I believe there are several important factors to consider when coming up with a magic system. How widespread is this magic system? Who can use it? What is the source of magic? And how is it used?

With my sci-fi series, I took a different approach. I worked hard to make something separate to the Force in Star Wars, so I linked the magic to the subspace dimension that also controls the setting’s FTL travel. Only a select few can utilise this magic, and it allows for the manipulation of inorganic matter. There is even one character who can sense the ripples of distant events through this dimension, giving him a limited ability to see into the future. Knowledge of this magic is strictly controlled by the religious fascist antagonists, so exploration of these newly-developed powers is just one of the many ways the main protagonist can break away from his old life.

Joyce Reynolds-Ward

In the Goddess’s Honour world, magic is tied to tangible things. It’s present in the land to various degrees, and the leaders of various nations must be able to channel and control that land’s magical strength in order to lead. Some nations require that the prospective leaders be able to weave a Tapestry or create some other sort of artefact that is reflective of the combination of their strength and the land’s.

In Becoming Solo, each chapter has an epigraph from assorted guides to that world’s particular form of witchcraft. Since Solo is, essentially, 4H Style Revue with magic, I needed a magic system that could be incorporated into clothing –and a reason for why it was so important for the woman winning assorted Crowns–Style, in this case to win those crowns, as well as what it meant to the magic system.

Mindi Briar

The “magic” in the Halcyon universe derives from the existence of alien dragons, who are able to teleport and read minds. I hate long travel scenes and wanted a way for my characters to travel between planets instantaneously. The dragons became intense pacifists who won’t teleport anyone they perceive as distressed, which means that pilots often have to take calming drugs. That prompted a bunch of questions about what it would mean for humanity to be in a symbiotic relationship with aliens.

In Adrift in Starlight, the dragons are revealed to be hiding the existence of other alien races from humans to protect the aliens. Later in the series, as the trust between humans and dragons breaks down, humans begin working on ways to steal the dragons’ power for themselves using genetic modification. This results in a group of humans who have dragon-like powers —the excuse I needed to give my characters “magic” but keep it plausible in the realm of science fiction.

What informs secular culture in your world?

J.F.R. Coates

This largely depends on what genre I’m writing, as that can play a big part into my vision for the world. My fantasy setting of Farenar tends to be one that I would like to live in – there is still conflict there, with wars between the gods and different interpretations of magic providing plenty to keep interesting, but I don’t tend to include a lot of the bigotry present in our world.

My sci-fi series, on the other hand, was a look towards the future of this world. I considered what might happen a few hundred years into the future if a few certain key events played out – largely revolving around the rise of the Catholic Church returning to a place of utmost power, like it had wielded in the Medieval Ages. This resulted in a pretty grim fascist empire controlling two of the three star systems humanity had reached. This also gave me a chance to explore the third system through the story, with all the issues and problems they face.

Mindi Briar

Quite honestly, I’m writing a world I would want to live in. I got into solarpunk back in 2015, and that’s been a huge inspiration for the planet Halcyon. I came at it with the mindset of, “If I got dropped on a new planet to build a society from the ground up, how would I structure it?” So I made it a socialist utopia where everyone works together for the common good, with the dragons as telepathic enforcers to keep everyone honest. It took a lot of drafts to fully flesh out my ideas, and half of it doesn’t even hit the page until book 3 in the series.

The other planets in the Halcyon universe are the late-stage capitalism foil to Halcyon’s socialism. There’s environmental damage, prison slavery, wealthy people taking too many resources…the Imperial government is kind of my take on where society could go if nothing ever changes.

How did you decide who would occupy positions of power?

J.F.R Coates

Characters in positions of power come in various forms in my stories – I definitely have a few with noble goals and intentions, but probably an equal number who abuse that power. Some even sway from one side to the other. The type of character they are can depend a lot on what my intentions for that power structure are. It is no coincidence that those in power in the fascist empire of the Reborn setting are older white men.

Monarchy and hereditary rule isn’t always portrayed as evil in my worlds, but it does lean that way more often than not. I like to display it as a flawed system, even when the characters in power have the best of intentions. This is certainly shown through the Destiny of Dragons fantasy series, where two of the main characters get their opportunity to rule, with varying levels of success.

Joyce Reynolds-Ward

Positions of power are tied to both leadership roles and the favour of the Seven Crowned Gods in the Goddess’s Honour world.

In Becoming Solo, leadership roles are earned by proof of magical strength and becoming a Solo-qualified magician, either by Academy graduation or else winning Fair Crowns. Otherwise, the witch either loses their power or must join a family spell matrix, where their power joins with others to produce magical goods. Solo magicians get to take credit for their creation. Family spell matrix participants are not identified in the products that the family creates for the use of those who are magical and non-magical.

Mindi Briar

In early drafts, Halcyon was ruled by a queen. It was my fantasy-world default, because who doesn’t love a good royalty story? However, the deeper I dove into worldbuilding, the more obvious it became that a monarchy was fundamentally incompatible with the idea of a socialist community. It had to become a democracy. But I still left the dragons in charge because their control of human culture had interesting implications that I wanted to explore.

In contrast, all the other planets in the Halcyon Universe are controlled by an emperor—one man with absolute power. This is portrayed as problematic in a number of ways that are, again, based on my frustrations with real-world systems of government.

What inspired religions?

J.F.R Coates

Religion takes a massive role in both of my settings. In the Reborn series, the entire conflict revolves around the position of the Catholic Church as the primary antagonist. I took a deliberate look at the church in the modern day and extrapolated out what I believed to be a logical conclusion, should the church be guided by the will of corrupt and power-hungry minds. These are people who do not care about the heart of the religion (which I intentionally did not criticise throughout the story), but are instead guided only by their own ambition. This is a religion that has been weaponised into something truly monstrous. Looking at how the world has developed since I first started writing the series, sometimes I wonder if I did not go far enough.

By contrast, the Farenar setting portrays religion much more positively. If anything, the religion spawned the world in my mind – it all started with the gods. They live, breathe, and walk through the world and are a big part of the many conflicts. Most of them seek to better the world, but some of their number seek instead to rule it.

Mindi Briar

Writing a made-up religion based on the dragons turned out to be an interesting way to deconstruct my personal IRL beliefs. Writing characters who were discovering big, life-changing truths about the universe was a way for me to dive deep into what I thought those truths were for myself. (And that’s the short version of how writing magical sci-fi helped me leave a cult…lol.) Anyway, I wouldn’t say the Halcyon Universe’s religion is an exact representation of my spiritual beliefs, but there are scenes, settings, and situations very heavily based on my religious past, with something of a rose-tinted filter over them.

What other sources of inspiration does your world draw on?

J.F.R Coates

So many of my inspirations come from the great authors who wrote rich and vivid worlds before me. I may not take directly from their work, but their writing has always inspired me to improve me own. My favourite authors will always include Neil Gaiman, Robin Hobb, and Philip Pullman. Our stories may be very different, but they are certainly my inspirations.

Other inspirations can come from strange places. One WiP series has been inspired by my childhood in Somerset, my fascination with an island in the Bristol Channel, and local myths.

The Reborn series was spawned because a friend told me to “turn him [main character] into a stoat.” So I did. And I wrote four books to explain why.

Mindi Briar

Reading fantasy and sci-fi inspires me all the time! I love to read books with lush, creative, wild descriptions that transport me somewhere new. It kickstarts my own imagination and forces me to think about different aspects of my own worldbuilding. A fantasy about road construction? Yeah, hmm, who builds the roads in my world? Or I’ll pick up a book that’s created a totally unique social culture and it’ll force me to think about how my world’s culture would be different.

J.F.R. kneeling beside an emu to pet it, wearing grey tshirt, jeans and sunnies over his short brown hair.
J.F.R. Coates

website
Reborn Book Cover: one fox person lifts another off rocky ground by the hand, storm cloud cloud background.
(The book with the Catholic Church as antagonist)
Mindi in a bright pink top and green, floral, elbow length cardigan belted at the waist and purple framed glasses. Smiling whimsically to one side, her long blonde hair half tied back.
Mindi Briar

website

Adrift in Starlight Cover: title displayed over purpled planet background, blonde (white) woman character hanging from top of cover reaching to hold mixed race, dense dark curled woman character hanging in the sky.
(The book with dragons)
Blonde Joyce smiling in black brimmed hat and glasses.
Joyce Renalds-Ward

Joyce’s website

Becoming Solo Book Cover: woman with gold face paint in red and gold robes holding ball of light between her outstretched hands.
Pledges of Honour Cover: title above a stone, silver sword with a brown and a purple stone tied to its hilt lying on grass, right.
Green, purple, pink and peach magic shield backdrop behind text: For blog updates (SFF, neurodivergent/ queer/ chronic illness life, writer and authoring), see my author newsletter.

Related Reading

Manipulator’s War Origins -the inspiration for the character’s, themes and world building in my YA Fantasy Trilogy.

Fantasy Author Features:  
Mara Lynn Johnstone (SFF)

Nikky Lee (YA, Fantasy)

Nikky’s Interview Of Me

Becoming an Indie Author (Part 2: Book Launch)

July 8, 2022 / / 0 Comments

Having covered the steps of the editing process, book covers, getting set up on stores or choosing distributors in this blog, it’s time to talk indie book launch tips. On to self-publishing step 8!

8. Book Launch

Set Up Pre-orders

You may want to set up pre-orders (especially for a book 2 or later, in which case do so before you publish book 1, so book 2’s preorder is in book 1’s back matter when its first published). You’ll also need a pre-order if this is your first book, as you can’t set up author profiles or put your book on review sites to start gathering reviews until you have a purchase link.

This can take the pressure off leading up to launch today, because setting up the pre-order means having the blurb, keywords, categories, meta data and price set on retailers well in advance. (Uploading all this stuff for stores is unpacked in step 12 below). Having a pre-order also means you can share a purchase link when you do your cover reveal on social media and in your newsletter, and other social media posts leading up to launch day.

Book Links For Pre-orders. Bookstoread will create a link to a page displaying icons linked to your book’s page on each retailer your ebook and paperback are available at. If you also want to provide links for people to add your book to their digital TBR, I suggest creating a book page on your website. Then readers can have the choice to buy and or TBR your book, and a chance to sign up to your newsletter, or to follow you on Goodreads/ Bookbub etc.

Note: I’ve had issues with adding some book links, while others have disappeared after I added them to BooksToRead. So if you use it; monitor it! Check all your links are still there and still working.

Grow Your Newsletter

Consider newsletter swaps with writers in the same genre, writing for the same audience age. Building your list means more people to tell when your book drops. Your reader magnet can get its own landing page on BookFunnel, where you can join group promos (this is a monthly/ annual subscription service). I suggest choosing the promos with the most participants in your genre. This maximises your chances of the download page with all participating author’s reader magnets getting you the most amount of sign ups. (2026 update: this has got pricier and fellow indies still using it tell me they’re getting less sign ups for their money.)

Story Origin (another monthly/ annual subscription) is another good site for swaps directly with other authors. In a swap, each author displays the reader magnet’s cover, a short blurb and link in their newsletter, instead of linking a group landing page image, from which they have to choose to click your book, not everyone else in the group promo’s. The only downside her is last I used them (2023?), they had few authors in my genre with under 500 subscribers. That meant few people with similar size lists likely to swap with me.

Crave Books Giveaways is a one off (or very occasional, likely with different book 1’s) option. But it gained me more subscribers by adding my ebook to a 9 fantasy ebooks giveaway (to which Cravebooks added paperback copies of the Stormlight Archives) in Dec 2024, than I’d gained from Bookfunnel in a year. If you only pay for one thing to grow your newsletter; choose this one!

Also: Keep Subscribers Engaged. Here’s some content ideas from Bookfunnel to help with that.

Multi-Author Promotions

The easiest and free way to do this is to have your books on Itchio and join a (temporary) Itchio Book Bundle, the latter via Discord or Bsky Social.

Resources: Designing Your Own Virtual Book Tour Basics.

Reviews and Blog Tours

Reviews don’t just show potential readers what they may enjoy about your book, getting enough of them makes you eligible to be featured on Bookbub. But don’t pay for reviews. That can get you in hot water.

The alternative I’m finding works well is blog tours. This isn’t paying for reviews, its paying for a tour organiser to make your book accessible to reviewers and or book bloggers, and for your book (and sometimes you as an author) to be featured on blogs and or social media.

Which tours are worth the cost? I’d say the ones that get reviews, though reviews may not be guaranteed. Rachel’s Resources has been recommended to me by indies who were happy with reviews they received. Itsy Bitsy has landed me between 19-30 reviews on Goodreads and Bookbub for my first two books and I was very happy with Colleen (the organiser, who runs a tight ship).

You can put your book on Netgalley (I haven’t tried that), Book Sirens (I got one reader & review), or Booksprout (dito). But honestly, I suspect posting on your social media -for free!- is better value. Especially if you set up a direct store on something like Payhip, which lets you hide the ARC copy page from public view. Then you can send ARC reviewers found on social media a link to that page for them to download your book, without using a paid service.

Promotion Sites & Paid Newsletters

Check out platforms which host giveaways, or promote books. Group giveaways are a good way to grow your newsletter or Bookbub following, depending which of the two readers are required to do to enter the giveaway. Sites like BookSweeps or Prolific Works may help.

First: ensure that your cover is genre-appropriate and looks good at thumbnail size, the size it will most commonly display at online, where you’ll get most of your sales. Again: I suggest asking people publishing in a similar genre what they’ve had success with. Or reading this post of paid newsletters Nicholas Erik has had good experiences promoting a range of genres in.

Advertising

To put it bluntly, paid advertising offers many ways to set your money on fire. Step one to avoid that seems to be take a course, and or research articles or read books, before spending money you don’t intend to lose on paid ads. Even then, paid advertising on any one platform another indie author swears buy may yield you little. In other words; think of advertising as a gamble that may or may not pay off.

Measuring Sales
Book Report is handy for this. I’ve heard it can report sales data faster than DraftToDigital does. It will report for up to 10 stores, so may be worth paying for if your book is available in quite a few stores. (2026 Update: due to reasons discussed in the distributor section of Part 1 of this blog, I’m about to downsize to just Kobo, Itchio and my direct store, so I won’t bother with it.)

Press Kit
This is a means of making your key site and book links easily accessible to bloggers, the press etc. Though I find most bloggers want links pasted directly into their form, and you have to keep updating your Press Kit page, should you have one. So consider whether you intend toctively seek interviews, and whether its worth creating and annually (at least!) updating this page.
For an example press kit, see mine.

Marketing Resources

Wide for the Win is a great starting point for publishing wide (beyond only evil Amazon).

Free Courses: Starting From Zero, with David Gaughran.

Google Air, free Google add workshops (you have to register using your Google account.)

Wondering about sales trends? K-lytics is a handy (free) blog to follow, though their paid services are expensive.

9. Set up Author Profiles/ your Book on; Goodreads, Bookbub, Storygraph etc)

To seek reviews, you need an author profile and your book’s information up on review sites. Your book needs to be on sale or available for pre-order to do this. For Goodreads, you have to add your book to Goodreads first, then you can claim your author profile. This is worth doing early on, as reviews can be uploaded to Goodreads BEFORE launch day.
Tip: get your betas to add their reviews when they finish reading your late draft.

On other sites, you simply need to sign up, add a purchase link for your book, a profile photo, fill in your bio etc. I suggest using the same profile photo and short bio for all of these sites, your website, social media etc., so people you ‘meet’ on any digital space recognise you on others.

If you seek ARC reviewers, I suggest giving them your Goodreads, Bookbub, Storygraph (and any other) profile links, and encouraging reviews on all three+. Remember: Bookbub reviews may one day help you become eligible for a coveted Bookbub feature.

I have author profiles set up on Goodreads, Bookbub and Storygraph —which recently affiliated with Canadian-Japanese store Kobo. (The Goodreads link above is to instructions to set up your author page while the Bookbub and Storygraph links take you to the sign-up pages for those platforms).

10. Update your Socials

Now is a good time to put a book banner on your website’s header and a cover, blurb and pre-order or purchase link front and centre on your website’s home page. It’s also a good time to place a book banner as your social media cover image, and to do and pin a post about your upcoming release (this may be your cover reveal).


11. Street Teams/ Social Media Boosting

2026 Updated: is this even a thing for indie authors? Or newbies?

A ‘street team’ for a traditionally published author may be a large group of people excited about the upcoming book, formally organised on a Discord server, or other digital space. It probably has an application form to join and hundreds of applicants. It will definitely be an organised group effort to ‘generate hype’ about the upcoming book, via its members doing social media posts about the book, ARC readers posting their reviews etc.

As an indie author you may struggle to get ARC reviews. Let alone people happy to organic post your cover reveal, or do social media posts to hype your books. I’ve never bothered with a ‘Street Team.’ I just do my cover reveal, pitch my upcoming release in some Bsky Pitch Parties for more eyes on posts, then do a launch day post. I rely on the generosity of whichever of my followers see them to repost.

Blog Visibility

I’ve heard that blogging is more useful for promoting non-fiction books, and may have little impact with fiction. But my first interview was met with a detailed reply from someone I didn’t know on social media, who read and enjoyed the interview. Blog reach may be small, but a few indies I are interviewing each other about writing, life and their books. Again, ideally the people you interview and are interviewed by, write similar books and have a similar audience to you, the goal being getting your name and book’s existence out there and helping them do the same. Should you find interviews!
Nightbeats can be a good place to look.

12. Format Your E-book
(+paperback if applicable)

Paperback

Perhaps ironically, I found formatting paperback (in Word) easy. You choose your paper size (I chose 5.5 by 8.5 for my YA Fantasy, a common size), set your margins (do this early because when I changed them last, Word re-inserted page numbers into the front matter). I followed Chloe Alice Balkin’s youtube tutorial, using ‘layout,’ ‘page breaks’, ‘next page’ to add page-number-free front matter, created styles in Word for front matter, back matter, titles, chapter headings, chapter header art, dingus and for body text.

Then I saved the Word doc as a pdf and the book was uploaded.

If you do have issues with formatting styles in Word not styling;
-Remove formatting from the offending section.
-Copy the whole book into a new Word doc.
-Then format again. This should work!

Ebook Formatting (in Word)

This I found fiddlier. If you format a paperback yourself in Word, mistakes can insert random blank pages throughout the book, or splice content across pages.

Don’t

-Hit ‘enter’ for page breaks (your book may format without page breaks, and for multiple pov books this will present to readers as head-hopping.)

-Let Word generate a Table Of Contents for you (there are many ways this can go wrong).

-Leave any images without a style (my chapter header images were displayed on separate pages to chapter headings when I converted to epub because of this).

Do

–Use a tool to do the formatting for you. Reedsy’s tool is popular. Draft2Digital will format your book for you (though check it, as it couldn’t handle the chapter header art in mine). If you’re a Mac user willing to pay a one off fee, Vellum is very popular (no, I’m not an affiliate for them or anyone else linked in this post).

–OR Use a Style Guide. Smashwords Style Guide is good, but wordy.

Formatting In Word
-Use styles for EVERYTHING (headings, copyright page, all images, body text etc).

-If you’re wide, upload your interior file everywhere at the same time. Some may pick up issues other’s don’t. So cross-checking issues each distributor and or store spots, then making final tweaks, can spare you additional formatting edits.

–get proofs for every format on every store/ distributor to ensure they turn out ok. (Kobo converted my Word doc to epub without mishap, but Draft to Digital had one issue throughout, while the Smashwords epub conversion was so bad that I converted the epub myself (using Convertio).

Front Matter Tips

-Keep it short so readers can get to the book and the online look inside feature shows the opening pages.

-Look at the copyright notices of other indie books to help you phrase yours. Consider including an assertion that you do not consent to your book being used to train LLMs and asserting whether or not gen ai has been used to create your book. Also consider mentioning which spelling conventions your book uses (I assert that mine are Aussie/ UK to dodge reviews from Americans criticising my ‘spelling mistakes.’

-Mention other or upcoming titles on your ‘also by author ____’ page.
-Consider a map and or personis dramatis for epic fantasy or similar, so readers can see where things are happening and check who is who as they read. (I kept both as front matter when a reviewer said they didn’t notice the dramatis personae until the end, when it was at the end.)

Back Matter Tips

-Link to your website, newsletter sign up and if you like, your social media/ Goodreads/ Bookbub.
-You may like to politely ask for reviews, but only link to the store that copy of the book is being uploaded to. (Apple do not like when you upload competitor’s links to their copy of your book.) Better yet; link Goodreads/ Bookbub/ Storygraph and or the book’s page of your website for stores, so you can upload the same ebook file to every store/ distributor.
-Write a book 2 blurb and include in the ebook a pre-order link to book 2.

Formatting Error Checklist

Is your front matter free of page numbers?
Does your epub have random blank pages anywhere?
Are your front and back matter spaced as you wish?
Are your chapter headings (and images) spaced appropriately and consistently?
Does your back matter only contain links to that store/ your books/ Goodreads/ Bookbub/ Storygraph pages?
Does your paperback file only contain black and white or greyscale text, styles and images? (Unless you’re printing a special colour edition.)

13 Uploading your Book

Meta Data

If you’re going wide, I suggest creating a file that has all the meta data you’ll need to copy and paste everywhere you upload your book (your name, book name, genre, categories, tags/ search terms, blurb, contributors, ISBN, BISACS etc).

Choosing Categories.

Have a look at which sub-genre/ fiction headings match your book using Book Industry Study Group’s BISAC List.

Choosing Key Words
Use ‘incognito’ mode on your browser, then or your browser/ Goodreads or a store; type your genre and audience age, and see which search terms your browser suggests (popularly searched ones) and which are relevant to your book. Different stores/ distributors may allow a different number of these, so its good to build a list.

Pricing

To determine a price in any currency, this article outlines factors you may like to consider.
My best advice:
-Get on the Kobo store of each region of the world it sells to (Important NB: a reasonable $US price converts into what Brits consider to be a too-expensive UK price, so don’t just let retailers convert international pricing from US dollars, check which pricing appears reasonable by currency and national store).
-Search books of your genre and audience age and note pricing.
-Get an idea of cheap prices, moderate prices and outrageously expensive prices (you will see the latter, especially for traditionally published ebooks).
-Observe whether you think a book is indie or traditionally published and how prices vary because of that.
-Check how many pages a books has to get an idea of a reasonable price for a 70k vs. a 100k+ book.
-Choose a price taking the above and your personal publishing/ marketing goals and factors in the article linked above into account.

2026 Update: Standard indie prices for 2022 were $4.99 US for ebook novels and $14.99 for paperback. Rising print costs (an ongoing issue) tends to mean you price your books at whatever price lets you earn a dollar or 2 in profit. Meanwhile throughout 2026, I’ve seen multiple indie author conversations around increasing our prices -after all; everything else has gone up!

I now have my 100k-ish books at $6.99, and my 160k chonker at $7.99. I’m considering bringing the latter up to $8.99.

–Check the profit margin in every currency. Does it leave you room to put the book on sale without losing money? In the UK, print books are so cheap that you may struggle to discount your book there and still break even. But if you aim to make the smallest of profits on every sale (as opposed to freebies), you’ll need to check regular vs. sale price profit margins carefully.

Sale Pricing

If you’re discounting your pre-orders or book, don’t just change the pricing in your author dashboard. Sale prices are entered separately, via ‘Promotions’ on D2D and Itchio, ‘Marketing’ on Payhip, etc. Remember to discount on all stores/ distributors!

Uploading

To Distributors. Before you upload your book to any distributor, be clear about which distributor you want to send your books to which retailer (or other distributor), so you don’t double up.

Upload To Libraries. If you’re American or Canadian, you can upload your books to the Indie Author Project to get your book into libraries in both countries. And yes, you’ll earn royalties -see the FAQ page.
Fellow Australian authors, we can register our books at the National Library of Australia Legal Deposit. We can register to be compensated for having our books in libraries via Australia Lending Rights Schemes, if you register your book within 5 years of its publication date.

Local Brick and Mortar Stores. Some indie stores may be willing to take your books on consignment (meaning for a set length of time, after which they’ll pay you or give you back unsold books.) When you find such stores, this is a free, and much easier option than tabling at book fairs (I’ll be blogging about this soon).

To help you prepare to approach book shops, here’s some comprehensive (UK sourced) advice on Getting Your Book into a High End Store.

14. Cover Reveal

Post your cover on your social media, share it in your newsletter and share it on any promo sites you’ve joined which feature cover reveals, such as LGBTQ+ Reads (who reveal your first 3 covers for free -if you have queer pov characters).

You may wish your cover reveal to be the first of a series of social media promo posts counting down to launch day. That could include teasers, character introductions, ARC review snippets etc, containing your pre-order purchase link.

15. Release Day

Put purchase links on your site and author profiles (if the book wasn’t on pre-order). Post your launch day post on social media (a selfie with an author copy goes down well. Interact with everyone who replies. I hope it goes well for you!

(And if you’d like to join an Author Discord to discuss any of the above, let me know by replying to my posts about it on Blue Sky on Mastodon, or via my contact page.)

Acknowledgements

I learnt A LOT of the above from conversations with and between the following indie authors:

Headshot of silver haired cheryl, with the covers of Keepers, Dragon Gift and her Middle Grade Fantasy trilogy.
Cheryl Burman, Historical and SFF author.
Website
Blue Sky Social 
Lily, poet & kidlit author
Website
Bsky
Dreena Collins
(Jane Harvey)
Website
Bsky

Rebecca Jonesee, Romance
Goodreads

Chris Vandyke, SFF Author Website

K. W. Kenny, YA Fantasy Website
Bsky

Jay Veloso Batista, Fantasy Author.
Website

Leia Talon, Fantasy author.
Website

Chloe Alice Balkin, Speculative Romance
Website

Blue edged, pink, orange and yellow rainbow scroll with text: Get blogs in your inbox & updates from Elise every second month. Join my Fiction Frolics. Select this image to learn more.

Further Reading

Just in case your head isn’t exploding with information already, there are more resources on many of the above topics on my Writers Resources Page. I’ll also point you towards a Self Publishing pro, David Gaughram.
If your head is exploding, I suggest bookmarking this post so you can revisit a few of its steps at a time.

Whichever of the above steps you’re at –Good Luck!

Becoming an Indie Author (Part 1/2)

May 1, 2022 / / 0 Comments

You’ve written a book, you’re considering self publishing and wonder what it involves. In short: a lot! This post is a concise summary from editing, through navigating cover art, stores and distributors, ISBNs and author platform, with many links to tools and information to help you along the way. It contains almost everything I’ve learned from indie author discussions in a Self Publishing Twitter group (circa 2021-22) by Cheryl Burman, and what I’ve learned while self publishing my first book, with a 2026, post DraftToDigital update.

I’m Writing/ Have Drafted My Book, What Now?

1. Craft Knowledge

If this is your First book, and or you haven’t already researched how to develop your characters and plot, or read up on story structure, now is a good time! Make notes to help get your head around character development, story structure and how they intertwine. Then use your notes to write character and plot focused outlines or revision/ structural edit lists to address potential character/ plot holes in your draft.

Resources to Help: KM Weiland’s Blog Series’: Developing Character Arcs, Story Structure and Scene Structure. My own Character Development Checklist.

2. Start Building Your Author Platform: Social Media

Yes, I’m talking about social media before you’ve even edited your manuscript, let alone have a book seeking a publishing path. Why? Because it takes time to grow a following. And the writing and editing stages are great opportunities to get to know fellow writers, build friendships and learn from each other. This is also the time to begin describing interesting features of your book and start generating interest in your story!

Post about the contents and the experience (or process) of writing your book. Talk to other writers on a social media platform of your choice’s Writing Community (my favourite being Blue Sky.) Connect with people you share interests with on social media (local interests, hobbies, themes that inspired and tie in to your story etc).

To begin with —pick ONE social media you feel is a natural (or least uncomfortable) fit for you. Get comfortable calling yourself a writer there, and publicly interacting as one. (FYI: there’s no such thing as an aspiring writer. If you write —you ARE a writer!).

Experiment, and learn the ropes of your first platform. Then start on a second platform. (Unless you’re bursting with restless energy *waves* and would rather choose the chaotic path of tackling multiple things at once over the easier one (*waves again*).

[2026 Update: in the end I settled on Bsky as my main social media, Mastodon as a back up, and Discord as a good place to talk indie authoring with fellow writers, to join Itchio book bundles, etc.]

Resources: Social Media for Writers, Blue Sky Newby Guide, Diverse Bsky Guide.


3. Critical Readers

Aim to get a few beta readers if you can, to comment on how they find your characters, plot, pacing, story tension etc.

If all they say is, ‘this is great,’ I’d be asking, do my betas have the experience and ability to critically evaluate my story?
And the willingness and time to honestly comment on things they find problematic (or less than ideal) as a reader?
The communication skills to spell out how any particular aspect of my writing confused, bored or otherwise put them off?
Or do my betas think I only want encouragement (or a positivity pass), as opposed to constructive feedback to help me grow as a writer and to ensure my story is clear and engaging to unfamiliar readers?

If you suspect any of the above is an issue with one of your beta readers, I’d get another/ an extra beta reader. For my first few books, I wasn’t satisfied readers would be satisfied with my book until I’d had that rigorous critical reader who pulls me up on every potential crease, tear or hole in the reading experience —and I’ve repaired and ironed those things accordingly.

Having attempted that for Manipulator’s War, I’ve now got reviews complimenting things (pacing and characters) the reviews may have complained about, if not for my critical readers.

Resources to Help: Finding Critical Readers, Mentors & Editors.
Checklists to aid Critical Reader feedback: Chapter one, Act 1, Act 2, Act 3.
Self Editing advice: Scene & Line Edit Tips.

4. Editing

Consider your goals for this book/ series and your budget. If you can’t afford an editor, get a second round of critical readers to comment on your post-beta-edited draft. Then, if you’re happy with it —get other, sharp eyed people to proofread it.

If you can afford an editor, consider which type(s) of editing you can afford: developmental (structural), stylistic (line editing), copy editing (word level technical & factual edits) and proofreading.

Manuscript Critiques/ Reports can be pricy, but are a cheaper alternative to (prohibitively expensive for most people) developmental edits. Bear in mind, some freelance copy editors charge by the hour instead of by the word. So if you tend to write fairly clean 100k books for example (like me), paying by the hour is more affordable and better value for money.

Resources: Different Levels of Editing and Critical Reader Services by editor Amelia Wiens (who did my manuscript critique) and 5 Things Authors Need to Know Before Hiring an Editor.

5. Decide on Cover Art

In choosing an artist or creating your own cover, research current covers in your genre and audience age. You want a cover design that clearly says to the reader “this book is (insert your genre)”. You also want a design that appeals to readers of that genre in ways they’re used to seeing. Pay attention to current trends in your genre, by researching new releases and studying their covers. For example, dark covers are a thing with YA Fantasy at the movement, and if characters are on epic fantasy covers — they’ve got weapons. So my cover for Manipulator’s War is dark and features weapons.

Reference Images
These are increasingly difficult to source from human photography/ human produced art, as opposed to gen ai slop, online. A couple of sites with great (photographic) visual references to choose character poses for your artist to refer to are Adorkastock, which has some great genre specific poses for characters, and True Ref.

Gen AI
DO NOT use gen ai to accelerate climate change to plagiarise you a cover. And DO NOT use gen ai ‘art’ or ‘videos’ to promote your books. Telling me you don’t care whether I have a planet to live on is reason to block and boycott you, not read your book, even if you actually wrote that, which your gen ai cover makes many people doubt.

Get a Human Cover Artist

There are 400+ of them, verified as NOT using gen ai in their work by a team of artists, on Hire a Human Artist.

Creating Your Own Cover

Remember that you need copyright permission for the art and fonts you use.
These fonts are public domain and free on Google. You can also purchase fonts from Creative Market.

Dafont has a wide range of fonts, but be sure to check the permissions listed for each, as some are for private use only, whereas some are permitted freely for commercial use. Yet others require you to license them from the font creator.

You’ll find free public domain images on Pixaby and a range of art galleries, including; Smithsonian Open Acess and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The National Gallery of Art, and likely more if you type ‘art galleries public domain’ as a search term into your browser.

Blurbs

Traditionally published authors will have honed their pitches near to perfection. Their blurbs will have had a LOT of critical feedback, editing by a literary agent, and possibly by an editor before a back cover exists to place those blurbs on. So for your blurbs to compete at online retailers —hone your pitch craft!

Post ask for feedback on your social media, or join an author discord (like my Writers and Authors) and ask for it there. You’ll find my best advice for writing an engaging blurb in this post.

Cover Artist

Manipulator's War Cover Left: portrait of young Heir Ruarnon, their hair braided back, eyes outlined with kohl, wearing fitted bronze armour, a bronze disc kilt, holding a helmet in their left hand and leaning on a spear with their right, which pierces the ‘A’ in the title. Right: Red glyphs outline a stone archway, through which fire arrows rain down on torch-lit battlements atop a castle, at night time. Bottom text: Elise Carlson, Ruarnon Trilogy Book 1
Cover by GlintofMischief.

If hiring a cover artist, check the contract to see if you own the art, and if you need to pay the artist fees for using the art in your merchandise, on your website and in any promotional graphics you make. If you’re unsure which of multiple pieces of concept art to use for the final cover, try posting a poll on social media and or consulting your newsletter subscribers. In considering cover artists, you may also like to ask how they work, and how much your cover design can change within the negotiated price.

For example, my cover artist GlintofMischief and I built a set of Pinterest pins as well as discussing my cover (in 2022, before Pinterest was overrun by gen ai), and I reviewed multiple concept sketches before we chose (and modified) the published cover. I also chose my fonts, and designed the glyphs on the Ruarnon Trilogy Covers.

I suggest seeking a cover artist by asking fellow indie authors, though alas the phrase ‘cover art’ on Bsky tends to attract bots/ gen ai/ scammers. Try wording it creatively to thwart bots if you post publicly, or just ask on Discord, where admins like myself work hard to boot bots the moment they enter a server.

6. Choose Your Distributer(s)

2026 Edit: Do You Sell On Amazon?

I know. Not too long ago the idea of being an indie author and not having your books on Amazon was ‘unthinkable.’ And KU gets you page reads without doing anything to market your books, and most of us struggle to find time and energy to market. If Amazon’s terrible treatment of workers (in 2024 unsafe conditions, while 53% of workers experienced low-wage induced food insecurity, and yes toilet access issues in 2018) doesn’t put you off… there’s a 2026 plan to build America’s largest fossil fueled power plant -and climate change accelerator- to power their gen ai slop centre in Texas. You couldn’t find a less ethical store for trying!

Itchio Shared Marketing, Instead of KU

So I suggest adding your books to Itchio. Then you can join Itchio book bundles, and its you and 15-40+ authors marketing for together for 1-4 weeks. And when that bundle sells; all of you profit. So you’re boosting fellow indies, still getting some sales/ your book to new readers each month, and NOT giving Bezos a dime.

(Discord servers like my Writers and Authors and Bsky Social are the best place to find and enter those bundles.)

Itchio also let authors decide how much profit we keep, and how much Itchio get. I have mine set to 10% of sales for them, 90% for me (so I’m earning 20% more than is possible on Zon.)

Kobo Promos, Instead of KU

You could go direct with Canadian Amazon competitor Kobo, ask them to add the promo tab to your dashboard, then apply to have your books entered in in-house promos with a few clicks. You aren’t guaranteed to get into every promo and unlike bundles, which are virtually guaranteed to get SOME sales, you aren’t guaranteed sales. But you aren’t also guaranteed KU reads. Its still minimum effort to make your books more discoverable, and Bezos can’t profit from Kobo promos. I encourage you to think about it!

You’ll earn 70% on your sales, less below certain price points (same as Amazon), as listed on Kobo’s author royalties FAQ page.

Library Sales

Again, you could sell your books to libraries and share profits with Bezos. Or you could use Kobo Direct to distribute to Overdrive. And you could sign up to the Kobo Overdrive Promo mailing list to enter promos on the bottom of this Kobo Writing page.

If you’re in the US or Canada, you can also submit your book to the Indie Author Project, which may see it reviewed and selected by editorial boards for libraries in your state/ province.

Draft To Digital 2026 Update

The original version of this blog talked about Kindle Unlimited, or using Draft to Digital to also distribute your ebooks to other ebook stores, for a 10% fee, for having one dashboard to upload to and manage sales on many stores. D2D use Ingram Spark’s global print distribution, which I prefer to the Ingram Spark (direct) dashboard.

BUT… in 2026 D2D have introduced a $20 sign up fee. (Fair enough, UK company Bookvault, who print and distribute my paperbacks for direct sales have that too.) But they also decided that if you don’t earn $100 gross profits through your wide distribution annually, they’ll charge you an annual fee of $12 US. The problem with that fee is it applies to around 70% of (the many) indie authors I know, and it includes me too. (My Bsky thread asking people about this.)

And if you’re thinking, oh, but I could earn $100 gross profit from D2D stores! note that I don’t because D2D is around 5-10% of my author income.

So for many indie authors, D2D is no longer a way to distribute to Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Apple, Bookshop.org, Hoopla or Smashwords. Unfortunately, Smashwords is now fully merged with D2D, so you cannot go direct with Smashwords. There’s also no option to go direct with Bookshop.org or Hoopla.

Draft To Digital Alternatives

Going Direct

You can go direct with Kobo, Apple and Barnes and Noble. Though you need to give Apple a physical address -not a P.O Box. And Barnes & Noble only pay in US dollars (not great for those of us not in the US.) And for every store you go direct with, that’s another store to update front and back matter or covers with, and another store you’ll have to set up every discount sale you run on. That was the advantage of D2D; ONE dashboard to update your books and run most of your sales. (Itchio and direct sales are my only stores I can’t do that for on D2D.)

Your Own Direct Store

Why give other stores 30% profit from every ebook sale when you can claim around 90% -deductions from that being payment processor and other fees, as opposed to a store claiming a cut? Setting up my direct sales on Payhip in 2025 was fairly straight forward. As was setting up paperback printing on Bookvault and linking Bookvault to Payhip, so I can sell both ebooks and paperbacks on Payhip. Payhip emails my ebooks, and Bookvault prints my paperbacks in Australia/ US/ UK/ Canada, and arranges postage.

Yes, your own store won’t have existing customers, like other ebook stores. So link it your social media bio. Link your direct store, and then an-all stores link to every social media post about your book. Make it easy for anyone your marketing efforts reach to buy from you directly. I’m noticing people on Bsky Social are increasingly willing to do so; if you persuade them to want your book.

Other Distributors

XinXii (European, just to be confusing) seems to be the only free to play alternative to D2D. Aside from a handful of European countries (Norway being the biggest), Paypal is the only payment option for XinXii. 20 Euros in earnings is the payment threshold to get paid at. They claim 30% of your net price, and 60% for books priced under 3 euros.

Worth noting; XinXii is ebook only, not paperbacks.

Ingram Spark
As mentioned above, I found their dashboard a PAIN. But their have a good global distribution network for paperbacks, for which you will need to supply your own ISBN.
Bonus: in February 2026 they waived their paperback book set up fees.

Resource: Why Ingram Spark expanded distribution for print books is preferable to Amazon’s, including ISBN advice, by Eric V. Van Der Hope.

Non Options/ Pay to Play
Publishdrive is $100 a year (and I hear their reporting on sales is SLOW.)
StreetLib is $99 a year. (StreetLib used to have a free tier, but that seems to have been partially hidden on their website, then removed entirely for new authors when D2D introduced their annual fee.)

Both the above are annual prices, period, whereas D2D is $12 annually if you don’t earn $100 gross annually. So I don’t recommend Publishdrive or StreetLib for new indie authors.

Imprints: do you Need or Want One?

Some stores will display a publisher name. Discrimination against indie authors is reducing over time. Perhaps people realise that there are far more stories available than literary agents to represent them, or that just because a publisher can’t make enough $ for a book to be worth their time, doesn’t mean it isn’t a great book for a smaller and thus not so profitable audience.

You could list your own legal name as who published your book. Or you can create a press imprint.. Mine is Faraway Fiction Press. I’ve registered it as a business name with the relevant Australian body for tax purposes and it has its own website (to reserve and link the .com domain name to my books).

Resource: For info on the benefits of having your own press, see this post by David Wogan.

ISBNs: Do you Need or Want them?

Many retailers offer a free ISBN, which can only be used for your book at that retailer. If you’re going direct to multiple retailers, this means a lot of ISBN numbers on your copyright page. Buying your own and having a single ebook, a single print and if you do audio, a single audio book ISBN per book may be simpler. (Yes, each format requires a different ISBN.)

The good news is ISBNs are free if you’re in Canada, or New Zealand. And you can buy around 10 for $80 Australian (unfortunately they’re FAR more expensive in the US.) Bowker is who to buy them from if you’re in Australia or the US. Nielsen is for the UK.

National Book Deposits & Library
Re-imbursements

Adding this section in 2026, as over 5 years I’ve self published 5 books and… only deposited one of them at my (Aussie) National library, which is a requirement in Australia. So I suggest checking if your country/ state also has that requirement. (Here’s the Aussie link for that.)

It’s also worth checking, if you do distribute to libraries, if your country has a government grant to compensate authors for our books being read in libraries. (Here’s the Aussie Lending Rights link.)

7. Extend your Author Platform

Website

I suggest setting this up after social media because imposter syndrome is real. Hopefully, having been on social media and presented as a writer for at least a few months (I was on social media over a year before I took this step), you will find it more natural to write an author bio and present yourself professionally as an author on your site. Blogs are optional and of course take more time, but they bring a lot more traffic to your site than an author name and book title no-one has heard of -if you choose topics and titles well.

If you decide to have a blog, I recommend drafting posts ahead of time. (I teach full time, so I write most blogs in the summer holidays, then edit and publish them once a month).

Resources: Author Website Set Up Tips, Unpublished Authors and Websites by Jane Friedman, 100 Unpublished Author Blog Ideas by Mixtus Media.

NewsLetter

Once your site and social media presence are established, its a good time to think about your newsletter. If you only have time for a blog OR a newsletter, here’s a post by Jane Friedman weighing pros and cons of having only either. If you start a newsletter, you’ll need a reader magnet. A 10-20k short story, maybe the origin or background story of a central character or a subplot you had to edit out of your novel can work nicely for this.

To build your subscriber base, Bookfunnel group promos were a good option (to me in I think 2023), but in 2026 I’m hearing the prices have increased and the number of sign ups people are getting is dropping. Story Origin is a good option for swapping newsletters directly with other authors, when you’ve hit 500+ subscribers. (They have some smaller lists, but not many.)

Resources: Not sure what to say in your newsletter or where to promote it and how? I’ve blogged ideas in Author Newsletters: the Basics. See also Unpublished Author Newsletters by @LombardEmma.
In 2026, I use Email Octopus for my newsletters, who allow you to have 2,500 subscribers on their free plan (other competitors once listed here having since dipped to as low as 250 subscribers on a free plan.)

Part 2

I suspect that’s more than enough information to get you started, and possibly enough to make your head spin, so I’ll end this blog here. Part 2 is packed with ideas and resources for your book launch and initial marketing plan, author profiles, formatting and uploading your book and tips right up to launch day.

Acknowledgements

I learnt A LOT of the above from conversations with and between the following indie authors:

Headshot of silver haired cheryl, with the covers of Keepers, Dragon Gift and her Middle Grade Fantasy trilogy.
Cheryl Burman, Historical and SFF author.
Website
Blue Sky Social 
Lily, poet & kidlit author
Website
Bsky
Dreena Collins
(Jane Harvey)
Website
Bsky

Rebecca Jonesee, Romance
Goodreads

Chris Vandyke, SFF Author Website

K. W. Kenny, YA Fantasy Website
Bsky

Jay Veloso Batista, Fantasy Author.
Website

Leia Talon, Fantasy author.
Website

Chloe Alice Balkin, Speculative Romance
Website

Green, purple, pink and peach magic shield backdrop behind text: For blog updates (SFF, neurodivergent/ queer/ chronic illness life, writer and authoring), see my author newsletter.

Further Reading

Just in case your head isn’t exploding with information already, there are more resources on many of the above topics on my Writers Resources Page. I’ll also point you towards a Self Publishing pro, David Gaughram.
If your head is exploding, I suggest bookmarking this post so you can revisit a few of its steps at a time.

Whichever of the above steps you’re at –Good Luck!

Indie Authors on Indie Authoring

October 4, 2021 / / 0 Comments

I’m sure many of us have been curious about indie authoring at some point. About self publishing’s advantages and disadvantages, and its greatest challenges (broadly speaking: its marketing ?). When it comes to things like writing styles, we often talk about doing what works for you as a writer. So what may work (or not work) for you as an indie author? I talked to four indie authors to find out; Cheryl Burman, Lily Lawson, Dreena Collins and Paula Peckham.

What is it about self publishing that appeals to you the most?

The sense of control over your own destiny and relief of getting away from dependence on other people after three years in the querying trenches. I’m too old to wait for agents. Cheryl

You can usually make more money per sale and it’s quicker. Paula

I’m impatient, so when it’s ready and it’s edited I want it out. Dreena

That I am in control.
Lily

What do you feel you’re missing out on by not publishing traditionally?

Kudos and respectability. Some people won’t be very good and some will be exceptional. Some people who don’t understand publishing will think you vanity published. It’s getting people to overcome that old fashioned view of publishing and to understand. Dreena

Trad. authors get a lot of support around the launch of their book (if they’re lucky), but after those few months you’re as much on your own as if you self publish. It gives you a kick start, however, which is good.
Cheryl

What were your goals and expectations when you set out to self publish?

Dreena’s Goals

I set myself a target to write a story a week. But not about being published. After I published a first collection I realised I could publish more. I jumped straight in without knowing the ropes. I didn’t know what my publishing goals were.Dreena

How Lily Published

I had zero goals and expectations. I’ve written for a long time. I’ve had things published in anthologies no-one’s heard of. Uni put an anthology together and I decided ‘what the heck, I’ll send them some poems and a short story ’ and they published all of them. I started to talking to people about publishing and it took me well over a year to put a book together. When people say they love my stuff or give me a review I still go what?
I’ve been published in more anthologies through Uni, but I don’t necessarily believe in myself as a writer of fiction. I ended up on Twitter because I got hassled into it. I have a website and a newsletter because I got hassled into it. My whole author platform exists because I was hassled into it. I am very grateful and I feel very lucky to have people around who care enough to hassle me. Lily

Cheryl’s Publishing Path

I started writing my book secretly. I bundled it all up and sent it to Curtis Brown. They didn’t immediately offer me a contract so I thought I’d just shove it up on Amazon and let the money roll in. I’ve learnt a lot in the last few years. It takes time to learn what’s going on in the industry and how it all works. Cheryl

Paula’s Goals

Because of the sales goal number given to me by the publisher [a small press publishing one of Paula’s books], in her eyes, a successful book will sell 500 copies. I thought I could do that easy. That was not easy, I discovered with my first one to self publish. I’m realising that has to be done differently or there’s no way I’ll sell 500 copies. I’m using my experience  with a publisher to learn the process I’ll have to do myself. The whole launch thing is necessary. There’s so many books coming out in a day. Paula

How have these changed over time and what changed them?

I think we’ve all just become more realistic. Get something out there, keep on learning and be thrilled when people say they love it. Cheryl [Everyone agreed].

Which aspects of indie authoring have you found most challenging?

Covers

My very first cover I after replaced after only a year. I learnt very quickly that it wasn’t right. Dreena

Covers are the bane of my life, but we have the wonderful  Rue. Cheryl

They saved us. Lily

My main concern was coming up with a book cover. How to arrange the different parts, how big to make the words and pictures, which fonts to use? I have looked at books in the store to try to learn – what makes this look professional? How does it compare to the ones I’ve seen that look amateurish? I was in a panic about having to do that myself. Paula

Technology

[But there was something else pretty big Paula raised that everyone agreed with.] 

There’s so much technological stuff. You have to know formatting for Amazon, how to make a video for Tik Tok. Everything has this whole learning curve behind it, and the writing portion is only this much [Paula held her finger close to her thumb] of it. The other day I had 4 tabs open on my computer. One was an excel spreadsheet to keep track of expenses. But I read an email where someone said Tik Tok is the best place to sell books now. So now I need to know how to edit videos. I was googling ‘best free program to make videos’. It was so complicated. Here’s a layer for your audio, here’s one for  your video, I need to learn what all that means. I can’t even learn one new skill before the next comes up. I need to focus on my goal for the day, write it down, get that one thing done,  and learn it before moving to  the next one. Paula

I found things like doing my website challenging as well. David [Cheryl’s husband] is great moral and practical support but I’ve forced myself to get to grips with it all. For me it’s: what are the most important things? If you spend hours doing a video for Tik Tok, how many books is that going to sell? Everybody says the best way to sell books is to get more out there. I think it’s taking what you can personally cope with,, setting priorities 1, 2 and 3 and after that I don’t care. Cheryl
[Everyone laughed and agreed].

Confidence

I find it difficult with confidence. If someone said write about my book I’m like do I really have to do that? Lily

I kind of role play it. It’s like it’s Dreena the writer doing this bit now. With a pen name I have to put on a persona and it really helps. Dreena

Followers to Fans

I enjoy making the images, videos and all that. The danger is you can focus on that instead of the writing. I’m not trained in a techie way and I don’t even know the terminology for what I do. The difficulty for me is getting likes on Instagram where I have 12k followers but how can I turn that into book sales? Dreena

Having thousands of followers doesn’t translate into sales. Lily

A lot of people who follow you are writers. But breaking into being followed by a reading community is really hard. Dreena

They tend to go for traditionally published, big names. Cheryl

Be Your Own Fans

This could be a mindshift in ourselves. In my local writing group, we started a book club. Every few months Stacy will put up 7 or 8 books on a Facebook poll, and we’ll vote on which to read next. We buy the book, read it on our own time, and then meet as a group to discuss (via Zoom).  Often, she can get the author to join us and we talk about the book and writing in general. I told her, “Stacy, stop listing all the big names for Christian writing. It’s a small pond, it’s not hard to get big. Start listing us. We’ve written books. Let’s read our own.” It’s being confident enough to say, ‘I’m an author. I’m published. Let’s read my book.” Paula

Networking

I had a good opportunity to build contacts with the local literary community by helping with a local  a festival. It takes an awful lot of time to build these contacts and feel comfortable. I met a famous author through this, but I still  can’t bring myself to ask them to review my book… You’ve got to build these relationships so that when you do go to a library to flog your book, they don’t just say “thank you” and put it on a shelf, they actually do think of you to give a talk or something. Cheryl

[When an organisation Paula works with wanted a volunteer to take on a role similar to Cheryl’s]. I’ll do it because it gives me the opportunity to meet people who are farther down the path than me. What behind the scenes things can I learn? ACFW does all these contests. They need people to organise the entries. I’m like “Yes, I’ll help do that.” So now I’m working everyday with people on the national board of ACFW. I don’t understand why people don’t get out there everyday and make those connections. It means that you have a claim. Paula

Some people find it horribly painful and some people don’t have the time as they work [I, Elise, silently raised my hand]. My children remind me constantly that I’m supposed to be retired. The marketing is a challenge. Cheryl

What’s worked well for you in overcoming these challenges?

I was freaked the first time I did Zoom. There’s always a part of me that goes “I’ll just run away”. It’s fine now I’m used to it. To begin with it was like, “So scared.” Lily

Practical things like having a persona in writing I found an easy way to overcome insecurities. Dreena

Moving outside your comfort zone does help. All my life I had a job I didn’t know how to do when I started it and I learnt as I went. I had a fantastic mother who told me I could do anything. When the local radio says, ‘Can you come live on air’ you’ve gotta push yourself out there and think: what’s the worst that can happen? Cheryl

Take on one thing at a time. My day with 4 tabs open? I never finished any of them. Just pick something. Learn it. Then you can move on. Paula

Critical for me has been actually engaging in the Writing Community in Twitter and meeting friends like yourselves. It has helped me so much and taught me so much. The kids laugh at me but they’ve stopped now. I think because of covid and having to learn this technology, that has helped so much as well. For me personally, one thing that’s worked really well has been building community with other writers. I also buy your books. Cheryl

My shelf is growing with books by people I know. I think that’s cool. Paula

The first time you pick up a book by someone you actually know, it’s brilliant. The fact my critique partner has published her book means almost as much to me as publishing my book. Lily

Have you found anything easy?

The blog tour I’ve just been on has been a useful tool. I’m paying this woman, she’s giving me a service and she does all the connecting with the people who read my book. I found it really helpful and it did work. Of 20 people who signed up there’s 1 who didn’t read it yet. They did what they said they would do and all I had to do was pay for it. It’s an example of not really expensive and I only had to give away 18 ebooks. The fact someone else was the pivot made it easier for me than having to call lots of bloggers. Dreena

The writing is the easy part. And it’s not all that easy. Paula

Nothing’s easy. Cheryl

Getting people to read my book and pick it to bits was quite easy for me. I just put a message on my FB book page and asked if anyone would read it for me and 6 people were like “I’ll do it.” Some read it more than once. That’s because I already had a community of people I’d known for over a year. Lily

What do you consider to be one of the most important lessons you’ve learned as an Indie?

Author Platforms

Build your platform first. If you don’t have a platform when you are ready to launch your book, there’s nobody to tell. That website where you post your newsletter or short stories you’ve written has to be there ready to use when you publish. The hard thing about doing it before you have a finished book in your hands is that you don’t feel real yet. It just feels like you’re playing. Paula

Having somewhere people can come to, to find more about you is important because it builds into the whole marketing is the key point and you have to start that way before you launch your book. Cheryl

Authenticity

Be yourself. Trying to do things the way everybody tells you to, you end up feeling like a bit of a fake. I try to do things my way, instead of going “what does an author do here”, because that isn’t me. Lily

You have to be comfortable. You have to be you. Authentic. Cheryl

Yeah. I know they’ve been doing this longer than me, but the change they’re suggesting doesn’t feel right. I’m not always going to do it that way. Paula

Formatting

The interior of the book presentation, layout and all of the tricks I really rushed in the first book. I’ve spent longer and longer with each one. I went back and reformatted everything because people are paying money. So I think the design and formatting of the interior needs to be spot on. Dreena

I looked at books and the fonts and where to put your name. Then hard copy proofs. It’s always important to see how the book will actually  look. It’s the same also with the editing, grammar, punctuation, chapter headings. I tend to be a bit of a perfectionist with those things. Kobo messed up the formatting of Keepers the first time. It didn’t show the scene breaks. The only clue was no indentation in the first para. Somebody gave me a review saying I had head hopped within scenes. Horror! I put proper scene breaks in with a symbol now, not just a double space. Cheryl

Poems can be a right pain with formatting. Lily

What advice would you give to writers beginning Indie Authoring?

Writing Community

Be part of the WritingCommunity on Twitter [this blog is from 2021, before Twitter and it’s #WritingCommunity imploded] and find your people whether that’s on platforms, or geographically. Learn as much as you can from reading, webinars, asking questions. Don’t be scared to ask people for help. If you think its a stupid question, chances are there’s somebody going, “Oh I wanted to know that.”
Know your limits, what you can do and can’t do and be willing to get someone to do what you can’t do for you. I did do my cover for My Father’s Daughter, but now Rue’s re-done it, it’s a better job. It doesn’t always cost you money. Some people are willing to share things with you and help you for zero pence. Sometimes it’s you teaching people and they’re teaching you. Go your own speed and your own way. You learn at your own speed. Lily

If you want people to reach for you, then reach for other people as well. Lily

I’m in another group and there are some people who are very conspicuous by their absences. Some people have more chutzpah than others. Cheryl

Other

Find a critique group. Paula

Subscribe to Jane Friedman’s newsletter and take advantage of all the topics there. And be willing to engage with other people. Cheryl

Get a good product. Be patient and learn from others. Cheryl

I know I said take your time with formatting and all that, but at the same time don’t wait too long and doubt yourself. Don’t think it’s not a great time. The time is now. Some of that hesitation will be from a lack of confidence, but people will support you and guide you and you’ll learn from that. I would say don’t hesitate. Dreena

I think you have to be ready. Lily

But it’s good fun. I think we all do it with very little expectation of being fabulously rich, because for me anyway, it’s just what I do. I treat it almost as a job these days. It’s what I like to do. Cheryl

Tell us a bit about you, your books and where we can buy them.

Cheryl Burman

Headshot of Cheryl with her book covers: Keepers, Dragon Gift and Guardians of the Forest.

I came late to writing, inspired largely by where I live, in the beautiful Forest of Dean in the UK. Over the past few years I’ve published a children’s fantasy trilogy, a slim collection of short stories (several of them prize winning/commended) and a women’s fiction novel which is being met with positive reviews. In between getting on with two current projects, I’m much involved in my local writing scene including working with students in local schools to encourage their creative spark.

You can see all my books (including the dog’s best selling book) on my website.

To keep up with what’s going on, including in my local writing world, join my mailing list for my monthly newsletter.

You can follow Cheryl on: Blue Sky

Paula Peckham

Paula's book on a side table with coffee.

A fifth-generation Texan, Paula Peckham graduated from the University of Texas in Arlington and taught math at Burleson High School for 19 years. She divides her time between her home in Burleson and her casita in Rio Bravo, Mexico. Her debut novel, Protected, was an ACFW Genesis semi-finalist in 2020 and will be published March 2022 with Elk Lake Publishing, Inc. She also writes short stories and poems and is a member of ACFW and Unleashing the Next Chapter.
For more about Paula and her books, visit her website.

Lily Lawson

Lily Lawson is a poet and writer who has self-published two poetry collections; My Father’s Daughter and A Taste of What’s to Come. She has had poetry, short stories and creative non-fiction published in anthologies.

For more about Lily, visit her website.

You can follow Lily on: Blue Sky Social

Headshot of Lily with her covers: My Father's Daughter and A Taste of What's to Come.

Dreena Collins

Black and white headshot of dark haired, dark eyed, white Dreena wearing black glasses and a black top.
Winged person hovering beside a flock of birds and 4 of Dreena's book covers.

Dreena Collins was born in Jersey, where she lives with two males and a dog.  
She has also been listed and placed in a number of writing competitions, including the Mslexia annual awards, and the Bridport Prize. She writes earnest short fiction under her birth name, and feel-good light reads as Jane Harvey. Jane’s debut novel – The Landlord of Hummingbird House – is out now. 
Her hobbies include eating spicy food, unintentionally waking at 4.30 am, and falling over.

For more about Dreena and her books, visit her website.

Green, purple, pink and peach magic shield backdrop behind text: For blog updates (SFF, neurodivergent/ queer/ chronic illness life, writer and authoring), see my author newsletter.

Related Reading

Becoming an Indie Author advice part 1

Becoming an Indie Author 2: Book Launch

Signing with an Indie Publisher

Author Newsletters: the Basics

Author Website Set Up Tips

Social Media for Writers

Stay in touch via My Newsletter

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