A few weeks ago I entered a short essay contest at Backword Books. The Grand Prize was a copy of all eight works on the site. Second prize was a single book to each of eight second-place winners, and the contest rules asked each entrant to include mention of which individual book they might like to receive with their entry.

The book I chose, and the book I won with this entry, was Waiting for Spring by R. J. Keller.

How did I choose which book I was interested in winning? Well, a combination of factors. I read all the summaries, so content was probably the most important filter. Then there was subject matter: I like Maine, and I thought it would be interesting to read something by someone from Maine. Third, the cover interested me, because I like snow and cold. The more snow in my world the better, and if you want to drop -50° F on top of the white stuff, I’m down with that. So barren trees tends in a field of white tends to draw me in.   Read more

The following post is my entry into the Backword Books Contest, which ends today. And yes, I almost forgot.

As I noted in a previous post, until very recently self-publishing was tainted with the implication of failure. It was tacit admission of inability in a world where ability is deemed equal parts talent, determination, networking, pedigree, bombast, salesmanship, sensationalism and hype.

For writers unable to find traditional publishing outlets — for whatever reason — there have always been self-publishing options, including subsidy and vanity publishers. Whatever you think about those options, the important point here is that technology has always been available to pursue one’s own publishing objectives, provided one had the money to do so.

So if the technology has always been there, what’s changed? Why is self-publishing no longer inherently considered a sign of failure? The internet is the answer, but not for the reason you think.   Read more