Well, I’m finally ready to publish Choose Yr Future. It’s taken about six years but I’m happy with it – with the storyline, the characters, the style. I don’t think there is anything else I can do with it. I have sent things off to publishers when the writing is still in too raw a state before and it didn’t get me anywhere but I’m fairly certain that this is a lot more polished.

In fact, I had started to prepare it to be self-published via Amazon like I did with Shattered Reflections. However, there are a number of things that are making me pause and think about other avenues.

The first – and probably the most important – reason for not self-publishing is the fact that I proved to be really bad at marketing last time so I didn’t sell many books. I’m quite a shy person, at least in terms of putting myself forward for things. Not a good thing when you are trying to promote yourself. I don’t really have the time either. Not to do it properly. And I don’t want to sacrifice the spare time I do have after work to marketing. That’s when I write normally. It helps me relax. Marketing is the opposite of relaxing and not something I want to do when I’ve already been at work all day. Of course, the dream would be not to have to work but that would come after successfully marketing my book, not before.

Then there is the fact that a lot of self-published books are genre fiction. Not that there is anything wrong with that but while Choose Yr Future is a dystopia, it doesn’t really fit completely in that genre and it is more literary than popular fiction. On top of this, I am broke so I can’t afford a cover designer or an editor. The more and more I think about it, the more I think that traditional publishing is a better idea.

So I’m once again considering more traditional routes. I’ve been pouring over The Writers’ and Artists’ Handbook trying to decide whether I need an agent or am going to go with a publishing house who take unsolicited manuscripts. And then there are all the Indie publishers who have sprung up over the last few years. Of course, a lot can be dismissed immediately as not quite the right thing but it is a time consuming nonetheless.

Maybe I’m a snob (not maybe, not really) but I must admit I’d like the kudos of being published by a recognised publisher, to be able to say someone thought this worthy of publication. Other than me, of course.

We’ll see what happens. The whole process takes a long time so I may run out of patience and find myself back at Amazon. Of course, there are a lot more places for self publishing now as well and I’d welcome any advice from anyone who has done it recently.