I'm Losing Faith in the Quality an Indie Publishing "House" Will Provide...

[@vb_scottwrites]

In the same vein of not making any proclamations as a writer, as a reader I'm finding better quality self-published novels than I could have expected based on the continued narrative from a certain segment of the industry that wants to see self-pubs fail. It really sucks when anything happens to "validate" that false narrative. In fact, you can see where a lot of trad published works are lacking in quality compared to self-pub, like there's been a shift, and now the gatekeepers are coming for the other side as trad scrambles to deal with their general creative and quality bankruptcy. So we reach another point where the self-pub writers can't win, and the readers can still miss out on truly amazing work because someone(s) in the background are doing everything they can to keep that voice out of the market for any number of dubious reasons (unless they pay up, of course)

[@The_Open_Book]

@@vb_scottwrites I think general self pub quality has gone up a lot lately too! I guess my big conflict is with the marketing of the publishing "structures"? If there's more eyes on it, it should be better? I am consistently impressed with solo self pub authors, it's the process promoting gurus that rub me so wrong heh Maybe this is all because I *want* to trust and assume indie pub houses care more than traditional ones.. but with the capitalism beast in everyone's side hustle, perhaps I need to stick to trustworthy recommendations only

[@Nickel_The_Wise]

well, now that I looked up what adverbs are again, I'ma have to go thru all 118 pages (or 59 actual pages) of my primary work to adjust some stuff. Writing is a passion, a hobby, and a practice to me, but all self-oriented. Unpublished, hardly any posted work to speak of so far, and positively riddled with fear, but as far as what I've heard of mob mentality and industrialized popularity of *_anything_* these days, there's a perspective I've got: you've gotta be hungry to be a great cook. It's that case of struggle and adversity being part and parcel to the whole element of great praise in the first place; you can't start out great and just be the standard for yourself without any precedent, that's a bridge too far with a car trying to drive across it. There's less of a hardline process of accountability before success sometimes, you're not seeing things, says I. Look, this is a market I've got no basis of comparison for because I _really_ gotta start reading again but, to truncate this diatribe down to how I feel personally, I'll say that I'd rather be a writer people enjoy reading first, and not so much a published rockstar success story. You're also right on it being a case of the customer/fans, but we've gotta watch what we say these days... I don't like that.

[@The_Open_Book]

@@Nickel_The_Wise I wanted to keep focused on my irk as a reader at what if been sold but the part of the discussion I left out for ease of connection was that I peer edit for people too, not at professional rates, but I guess it's also a bit of a caring concern that writers will be taken advantage of if what's being put out IS toted as professional. Editing ain't cheap ':) You're right though, I should give that particular author/house another chance. They were newer at the time. I would just be quite disgruntled if I was a writer taken under their wing and been allowed to publish such. With the illusion of "more eyes= better work" gone maybe I'll have an easier time finding worthy reads, not listen to the hype 🤔 Which is too bad, I DO want to get excited for people's work with/for them too. My heart is too fragile for potential disappointment tho lol

[@The_Open_Book]

@@Nickel_The_Wise oh and congrats on the progress you've made on you writing since the last comment! Don't worry about adverbs! Trust me, you're far too well written already to have crossed that line as egregiously as what I'm referencing lol 👍

[@Nickel_The_Wise]

@@The_Open_Book It's just kind of deflating when something as fun as writing with creativity can have this mercantile element to its success, it's why _Barton Fink_ is one of my favorite movies. You've probably seen it, and if not, I suggest it whole-heartedly. I don't pay my editor because it's my own crippling self-doubt, plus Spellcheck is included.

[@Nickel_The_Wise]

@@The_Open_Book it is THIS close, but I realized I accidentally did something twice, if you look at it a certain way, so I tore the whole thing down and started again. I'm the same way with Elden Ring too, I've barely owned that game and I think I've restarted from Liurna six times.