Support For Indie Authors is Growing.

Since making the momentous decision to become an indie author, I've become more aware of the number of writers who are choosing to take this road to publication. It's not that we've never been offered a publishing contract - many of us have - it's that we simply don't want it!
Traditional publishing is on the reject pile, and the old stigma once associated with self-publishing is fast disappearing as professionally written and produced books are beginning to equal the number of traditionally published ones.
And what is more exciting, is that respected organisations, such as the RWA (Romance Writers of Australia), the ARRA (Australian Romance Readers Association) and Dark Side DownUnder, are now actively supporting indie authors. Why? Because they realise readers don't care how an author is published, as long as the story grips their imagination! And if it does, than they keep coming back for more and eventually develop into a loyal fan following.

Lately, I've been impressed by the number of indie author interviews and book reviews on both these well known sites, and as far as I'm concerned, they're now my source for finding some great reads. I tend to trust the veracity of reader reviews from organisations such as the AWA and the ARRA more so than the ones on Amazon. Why? Because they tend to weed out the trolls.
Only recently I've seen one such nasty troll attack a fellow author's work, out of - what I consider - pure spite; a sick-minded individual who enjoyed tearing down another writer in order to enhance their own twisted identity. And, unfortunately, there's a lot of them out there.

What do readers look for?

1. A great cover -  That old adage, "Never judge a book by its cover" was never more wrong, for it's precisely that which initially attracts a reader.

2. A great story - If an author is in love with their story, chances are, so will their readers. Better still, if it's part of a series.

3. Well written - A professionally written - and edited - book will attract and maintain a loyal fan base. Some readers may overlook bad writing, poor grammar, endless typos and a plethora of adverbs, but the majority won't.

So, to all the indie authors out there I say, keep writing and entertaining us with great books.
As for me, I'll be joining the ranks very soon - now that all the final proofs have been completed.
My debut book, Bloodgifted, Book 1 of The Dantonville Legacy, is due for release at the end of July on Amazon.

Trials of a Newbie Author

Writing a book is comparatively easy compared to all the work that comes after. If someone had told me that three years ago, I would have said they were nuts! But, it's all true.
You've got a great story; it's down on paper - or on the hard drive - and you can't wait to inflict share it with the rest of the world. Now, comes the editing part and the - seemingly - endless string of corrections. I'm convinced I have dyslexic fingers! Then again, from a total of 119,000 words, having only 87 typos isn't too bad, I suppose.
Since I turned down the services of a traditional publisher in favour of indie publishing, I went to CreateSpace to format my manuscript into a paperback, and do the kindle conversion for me. I know the facility is there for me to do it all myself, but my knowing my techno-skills - or lack of - I thought it safest - less hair pulling and screaming all round - to let the professionals do it instead.
CS only allows 50 free corrections, and since I've got slightly more than that (I hang my head in shame) and it'll take approximately 4 weeks (and extra bucks, but it's still less than if I was to send them a spanking, brand new manuscript ) for these to go through.

The editing, correcting, re-structuring and polishing my manuscript took longer than actually writing it in the first place. And that's good, as it means my debut novel, Bloodgifted, will not be released until it's ready, and can proudly take its place alongside the best of traditionally published books - although these days it's sometimes hard to tell. The lines between traditionally published and indie published books is blurring. I've seen just as many badly written and edited books with the former as with the latter.

So, how far have I come? Hopefully, in the next two months, Bloodgifted, Book 1 in The Dantonville Legacy, will be released, and the next in the series, Bloodpledge, will be out in 2014.

I'd love to hear from other newbie writers. What has been your writing experience? And if you had the choice, which would you rather choose - traditional or indie?