Why I Self-Published My First Book (and may do so again...)

Footfalls echo in the memory, down the passage which we did not take, towards the door we never opened… T.S. Elliot

Set in Spain, North Africa, and New York City, my first novel was a fast-paced, exotic, and yes, intellectual thriller entwining adventure, science, history, and religion.  Prudently researched and structured in the manner of Willa Cather’s The Professor’s House, it’s based on the fanciful premise that Saint Papias’ scrolls, long lost first-hand accounts of the prophet from Nazareth, may have been found. A brilliant and ambitious Fordham grad student is the protagonist, employed for the summer by a seedy NYU prof to find the scrolls. Akin to a twenty-something Indiana Jones, she doggedly pursues them across Andalucía and Morocco, along the way falling for an Apache Adonis and discovering the New Testament’s serendipitous origins. Encountering a disparate cast of extraordinary personalities, she dodges a gauntlet of murderous rivals, and at story's end, recovers more than the scrolls.

At first shared with a host of critical readers and reviewed by literature profs, book clubs, and devotees of the genre, the manuscript was declared a thoughtful, clever, and spellbinding page-turner. With optimism brimming, I sought representation but found the task tedious and distasteful: searching for a match in a choppy sea of publishers and agents, crafting stilted query letters and synopses, deflecting patronizing doubts that an old man could still write, waiting months or forever for haughty responses, then disturbed when learning of far-off release dates and exasperated to learn that merit plays third horn to marketability. Agents offered their services, presenting contracts as opaque as mortgage docs, but I declined, as much for lack of confidence in their skills and the growing allure of self-publishing. Surely it offers more, I reasoned: soup-to-nuts control, full editorial authority, choice of title, cover, and release date, equitable royalties, and most comforting, the freedom to utilize social sites as much or little as deemed necessary.

Armed with a foggy strategy, deficient planning, and inept counsel, the unsuspecting little novel was fed into Mr. B’s magic machine and hence promptly published, a handsome paperback that earned five-star praise, glowing reviews by a score of critics, and a national book prize; but in the absence of cogent guidance, proper networks, and shrewd retailing, online sales were outnumbered by those at book signings, lectures, and personal appearances. Later, as an old friend of failure, I swapped disillusion for toil, chose my favorite of several incomplete novels, and when the second manuscript was ripe, welcomed the counsel of an experienced professional and her talented crew to consider novel alternatives.

So today, with Gaelic faith in good fortune and aware of the fast-forward evolution of publication, I consider my fork in the road. Perhaps wiser and with the en garde confidence experience brings, I must consider Mr. Berra’s advice and once again decide whether to embrace or eschew the self-publishing mode.