Tag Archives: self-publishing

Filling the void in indie publishing? Is that possible?

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I won’t pretend to sum up the weird state of small publishing here. If you’re been following the world of indie and small publishing, you know that 2025 has seen some small imprints go out of business – in some cases leaving authors unpaid – and others purport to try to fill that void.

I’m not sure that Constellate Creatives’ publishing arm, Constellate Publishing, the enterprise I’m affiliated with, will fill that void. For one thing, we can’t be all things to all people.

But as we started Constellate’s venture into editing – developmental editing and copy editing — and publishing and marketing a few months ago, it became obvious that somebody needed to be around to step in and catch a few worthy projects. Or maybe juggle chainsaws.

It’s making for a 2026 I’m really excited about. Constellate Publishing will publish my novel SEVEN ANGELS but there’s a diverse lineup of books on tap for the first two quarters of 2026, including a book of mindful self-help, a book of poetry, my novel and two by Jill Blocker, a reissue of her WHAT WAS BEAUTIFUL AND GOOD and her new novel, HAPPILY AFTER EVER. The latter is what’s increasingly termed a “new adult” book and will appeal to readers post-YA in their reading interests.

I’m proud to have noticed that every book besides mine is written by a woman and even mine has a cast of woman as protagonists.

And note the slide I’ve posted above: Constellate Creatives is offering editing, publishing and marketing services, or some combination of those, and at socially-responsible fees based on the regional wage in each writer’s local economy.

Some of us love to edit copy and help with developing your work. Others (raises hand) love marketing. Yes, I’m weird like that. We can’t promise that PR about your book will land on large market-share sites like KTLA, where our news release announcing our slate for the first half of 2026, was picked up. But we’ll be pitching your work and you won’t have to deal with the dreaded marketing.

There’s a button somewhere on the CC site that will lead you to a free consultation. We might be able to answer some questions for you.

https://constellatecreatives.com/

Am I telling you to self-publish your novel? Well …

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Okay, this post comes with SO MANY caveats.

It’s very, very early in this process.

A few random sales can prompt big movement among the lower reaches of Amazon’s sales chart. Believe me, I’ve seen this with our four true crime books, which were published by History Press.

And ultimately this won’t put a lot of money in my pocket or, if you follow this path, yours. We didn’t become writers to make money, did we?

But today I checked the sites selling my novel THAT OCTOBER – Bookshop, Barnes & Noble, Powell’s Books and Amazon among them – and was surprised to see that on Amazon, the book was marked with a “#1 New Release in Teen & Young Adult Law & Crime stories” label.

On the mobile Amazon, this:

A red banner. As opposed to a Bruce Banner.

So I don’t know any more today than I did yesterday about how my book is doing or will do, before or after its June 1 publication date. (That’s five days away as I write this.)

But it looks like it hasn’t hurt to self-publish the book, in paperback, through Ingram Spark.

I can’t tell you what to do. Your scenario is not like mine. I’m a guy who doesn’t have years to take the traditional publishing route. I hadn’t really thought about self-publishing until last fall, when my friend and editor Jill Blocker, who had self-published one language edition of her great book WHAT WAS BEAUTIFUL AND GOOD, suggested I might want to consider it. Jill did all the heavy lifting and my friend and artist Sara McKinley created an incredible cover that has sold at least as many copies of the book as the promise of what’s between the covers.

So should you self-publish? Maybe. There’s no doubt there’s much more prestige in being published by an indie or small press, not to mention a big publishing house, compared to self-publishing. Some people will always look on self-published books as “vanity” books. That doesn’t bother me at all.

I hope you like THAT OCTOBER. I don’t expect to make much, if any, money off it. I encourage you to buy it (the ebook version is coming) or borrow it from your local library. Libraries do a lot of society’s heavy lifting, and I would be thrilled if you read it or any of my books through a library,

But I will say I’m not, not encouraging you to self-publish. This is working so far for me.

If there’s any questions I can answer, look me up on BlueSky or on my Facebook page, which is called, in a blindingly brilliant move, Keith Roysdon author.