January 2023 – A Swift Start

I hope 2023 has been treating you all well so far. In this post, I will share my January in summary, my reasons for choosing to self publish, and some reviews for indie books

On the Publishing Front

January presented me with my last opportunity to delve into rewrites before sending my manuscript to a proofreader. The proofreader is only booked for late March but my freelance work is picking up next month so I wanted to finish early. Any free time I have in February will be spent on my cover illustration, maps and other design elements. I’m also looking into producing an audiobook which feels a bit unreal. Hiring a narrator and a studio is a big investment and I won’t necessarily reap a profit anytime soon. Still, it’s very important to me that I make this book accessible to as many people as possible. My brother has autism, and my best friend has ADHD. Both are better able to enjoy books that are read to them. I also love the idea of employing a human narrator to bring her creativity to my novel. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Why Self-publishing?

From the beginning, I’ve described myself as an “aspiring indie author”. Though I’d like my novel to be of comparable quality to a traditionally published title, I did not write it in the hopes that I could query it.

I have worked as a freelance illustrator for over a decade. This was made possible by my family who supported me at home when I was gaining experience and earning little. Such assistance is not something everyone has and I’m grateful for it. I’ve learned to be patient and to trust the process of building a creative career. I’ve also learned my limits, and I now know when to delegate certain tasks to other professionals. For me, art and writing have always been inseparable. When the right story came along, I felt I could transfer the experiences I had gained as a freelancer to self-publishing.

I knew if I wanted to market my book, I’d have to face the thing I’ve been running from for years: social media. Joining Twitter hasn’t been all bad; it’s given me a realistic idea of the sales trajectory I can expect, and has introduced me to many great indie authors.

Indie Reviews

Disclaimer: like everyone else, I am biased. I have a soft spot for certain tropes and genres. Every time I list my favourite books, it bothers me that other fantastic titles don’t get exposure. Everything I read, I review on Goodreads so you can look me up there (Coe Lansdell) if you’d like to see more. In no particular order, here are my top 3 books and series of 2022:

The Drift by Casie Aufenthie I was lucky enough to snag the audiobook version of this. It’s a well-paced, dystopian sci-fi with distinctive characters. The Drift has a very cinematic feel to it, and the world-building is excellent. I’m now fully invested in this series.

The Curse of the Cyren Queen series by Helen Scheuerer

In 2021, I trawled the Internet for titles that featured concepts similar to those in my WIP (which had already been outlined and drafted at the time). I wanted to make sure I was working with an original concept. Like my WIP, this series follows an inhuman protagonist. Beings from Greek mythology are renamed (cyrens instead of sirens). The protagonist is artistic as one of mine is. But the similarities end there and I have written in a different genre. I quickly got past the comp title research and was hooked by the story. The first book has a Hunger Games-style tournament. The books that follow, take us on an epic quest. Scheuerer has a profound way of showing (rather than explaining) character development over the course of a series.

Stalin’s Door by John St Clair

I enjoy political thrillers and historical fiction so I was very excited when I won a paperback copy of this book in a giveaway. The author very kindly sent it all the way to South Africa, import duties and all. I am just over halfway through this title and I’m already very impressed by it. The writing is precise and professional, and the culture and historical period appears to have been very well researched. So far, I like the way the menacing undercurrent is gradually building.

Another book I’ve not yet read but I’m looking forward to is Haven by Ceril N Domace, a fantasy featuring human-to-fae transformations and a middle-aged dad as a protagonist. What is not to like? I’ve peeked at the first two chapters and it’s sitting near the top of my TBR pile.

I’ll be back at the end of February with more specific news about my own novel.