Things That Bang

The Writer's Dilemma - Print Or Online Publishing?

I am now half way through the second half of my novel and part of me has already decided that my baby will not be accepted in the print world and its best I show my baby to the online world where I am most comfortable. It matters little to me that I could finally say that I am a 'published print' writer when someone asks me the uncomfortable question - so what do you do? Or have my relatives tell their relatives and friends that they have a writer in the family as if by that connotation they too would become famous. Getting tons of money due to my writing would be good as would a villa somewhere in Brussels, but those are pipe dreams. Not all of us can reach the heights of Salman Rushdie, Stephen King, Steven Erickson and though the list of successful writers is never ending, the list of those who slip by into oblivion precedes the lucky ones who reach the skies and have hordes rushing to book stores to read their work. I don't envy these giants. Fact is, I wish them success since reading is a dying activity and publishing houses don't make as much money as they used to. People don't read any more. Somehow people are now suffering from mass ADD. Everything is quick fix- be it entertainment, food and even sex. Leisure activities like putting your legs up to read and letting the day roll by is indulged by few. And for this reason alone I am grateful to J.K Rowling. She got many youngsters hooked to reading. She's been a life saver for most of us writers. Publishing houses are known to be picky when it comes to accepting new authors and even if a book does get published what an average author makes barely covers a month's rent. Not everyone gets the 6 or even 5 digit advances. It is a well known fact that most authors cannot live by weaving stories. A day job is a necessity if one doesn't want to suffer for art's sake or sell their kidney. In the online world, however, it is easier. There are no letters of rejection and there are sites available which publish works of all types of genres and their readership is into hundreds if not thousands as is the case with ASSTR. Even Amazon has woken up to the potential of online publishing. There are also sites like Smashwords where the writer can either give his book away for free or set the price of his book which can be then downloaded. Smashwords now powers the Sony Publisher Portal, increasing their reach many-fold. Further enhancing the appeal of electronic publishing, Tina Brown's Daily Beast has launched a new imprint in collaboration with Perseus Publishing, Beast Books, that will roll into print writers from the Daily Beast on a faster timeline (months) than that typically promised by traditional publishing houses. Published authors like Cory Doctorow are open enough to give away their books, while still achieving success with print publishing. Of course there are many writers who aren't inclined to follow this new path and would rather see some concrete proof of their toil and then then there are lazy nut jobs like me who like living in the online world and find readers even in hard to reach places like Multan or Rwanda. I've had readers mailing me from all over the world and I get both hate and fan mail. This is the high I've been living on for past five years without needing a print publisher to give me my fix and if one happens to be a regular on social networking sites, word reaches out even faster. Do I need the money? Yes, of course, I do but the likelihood of getting there via print media seems pretty dim, and as I meet more online gods of the written word, the less I am inclined to want to be creating just another book lying in some dusty corner of a second hand bookstore. I have better chances of reaching out to thousands via the online world. Would I still write a cover letter and send my manuscript to the big publishing houses or let the world have it for free? I guess I will know once I finish my novel. Until then its a whole lot of dreaming and hogwash.