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Blogs by Joel Arnold
Going Indie with my novel Northwoods Deep 3/4/2011 6:57:08 AM
When I originally decided to make a few collections of my short stories available for the ebook market, I figured why not? Most of the stories had already been published in venues like Weird Tales, Gothic.net and ChiZine, so I wondered if this was a good opportunity to not only make them available for a few more people, but also squeeze a little more money out of them. Also, my collection of sci-fi horror, Bedtime Stories for the Apocalypse, had come out in print through the wonderful Sam’s Dot Publishing – but they had only asked for the print rights, so I thought I might as well get that out in electronic form, too.
My wife Melissa, who is also a graphic designer, deisgned my covers, I uploaded them to Amazon and Smashwords, and hoped to perhaps make enough per month to pay for a tank of gas. A couple months later I was making enough for four tanks of gas. Meanwhile, I had my horror novel Northwoods Deep gathering dust on my computer. I had written it years earlier – had even gotten an agent for it, but that didn’t end up going anywhere. So -
I decided I should jump in to this indie publishing thing with both feet, damn the torpedoes! Again, my wife designed what I feel is a cool cover, and we made it available for the ebook market. It has become my second best-selling work out there (behind Bedtime Stories for the Apocalypse) and while I’m certainly not making a living off of the sales, it keeps selling a few more copies each month than the month before.
If I was to give anyone considering this indie thing some advice, it would be – have patience. Although more and more indie authors’ books are skyrocketing up the charts, those are still more the exception than the rule. Marketing is certainly important, but even more important is to keep writing. And while it’s tempting to get your work out into the market as fast as possible, take the time to make sure it’s at its absolute best. While quantity may catch more eyes, quality is what is going to increase your sales over the long haul. And if you have both quantity and quality – then look out!
