Writer Beware

I have loved to write ever since I was able to write. When my mother passed away, I found in her desk files two ‘books’ I wrote for her, years before I even learned cursive. One has construction paper cutouts glued to the cover creating the image of a flower in red, blue, green and yellow. The content, a single page on lined paper with the title Mother reads:

Mother is the dearest of all the friends I know. She works for me. She plays with me. That’s why I love her so. Joy Ann

That sentiment remains true today. The second book is titled My Family and is three pages long, each one illustrated with drawings of family members, trees, clouds, bicycles, our house and our dog. The content reads:

This is my Mother. I like her. This is my father. I like him. This is my brother. He is getting bigger. His name is Bobby. This is my brother. His name is Billy. This is me. My name is Joy Ann. This is my dog. He is good.

One can see here a very young girl’s reach to become a published author, stretching the manuscript from one page to three, creating a unique cover design, adding illustrations and writing for a clearly defined audience. Since these initial works, I went on to become an English major, teach Freshman Composition, design a K-12 Language Arts Curriculum for three school districts, and the proud author and co-author of two books, and am seeking representation for a third, a memoir.

My experience with publishing has seen many changes since those early manuscripts. With my first adult book about living with chronic illness, my co-author and I were lucky to find a competent professional agent who steered us to the right publisher for both the first edition in 2005 and a second in 2012. The process was transparent and rewarding, our book remains in print, and You Don’t LOOK Sick! was recently named one of the best 11 books for living with chronic illness and pain by Upjourney. I still get notes and emails from readers thanking us for helping them manage their illness. I self-published my second book, a novel, and while I hired a competent editor and the novel won many awards, CeeGee’s Gift did not reach the audience I hoped it would. I would not go that route again unless I was writing for a well-defined audience, one I had direct access to, on a very specific topic, for example a business sector or an educational theme.

Over time, the process of getting a book into a publishing house has become long and grueling with query letters sitting in slush piles until some rookie agent gets to them—or never does. Self-publishing diminishes the need for the valuable professional collaboration between agents, editors and publishers. Any author with any project can pay up front to have their work edited, formatted and published. But in spite of this investment the book may not be widely distributed, get into bookstores, receive meaningful reviews or achieve sales that exceed those upfront costs. Most of all, these books may not be good writing.

Today, self-publishing has gone even further away from tradition, and the model is truly jarring. It seems as if the authors are now the market, not the books nor the readers. Since I began to follow authors’ groups on Facebook, I have been contacted by publishers, editors, designers, reviewers, marketers, and book club promoters, all raving about what a great a writer I am and how much they want to represent me. The model is not to share in royalties from sales after publication, but for me to pay them up front for their services. The determination and relentlessness of these marketers have been rattling, and verifying their legitimacy has occupied time I could have spent writing, researching and improving my query letter, synopsis and comparable memoirs so I can find an actual agent.

On a positive note, I still receive notes from readers and reviews for my published work. An Amazon review of CeeGee’s Gift was posted by a mother who planned to share the book with her daughters but found out all three had all already read it. I was recently contacted by a college professor who is using our 13-year-old book, You Don’t LOOK Sick, as a textbook in her classes with disabled students. And today I received a royalty check from the agency that represented that first book. Sadly that agent has retired. I would love her advice today and the trust we shared. But at my heart, I am a writer, as I have always been. And being a writer has always been both challenging and satisfying. I will do the work and find a home, a safe home, for my memoir and the book after that. And hopefully the one after that.

Most of all, I will keep writing.