Re: Fantasy fans...

Just returned from seeing "Little Women" on Broadway's national tour.
Fantastic show. I bottom replied, because, well, there is just too
many I want to reply to.

First of all, thank you to many who understand I am not trying to
promote self-publishing as the answer to publishing. I am not, however,
I do think there are right times to use it to your advantage. Okay, 99%
of us, probably don't see an advantage to it and that's okay.

I still think anyone with dreams of making it commercially and write
well enough to do so, should stand their ground and fight, fight, fight
and one day I hope that your ship comes in and you become a
best-selling author.

For those who have been trying for longer than they remember, I only
offered an option, it may or may not suit you. I personally do not see
anything wrong with taking initiative and saying, here I am, this is
what I write, love it or hate it, I have arrived and I will go this
road alone if I have to.

Are there risks involved? Absolutely, but is life worth living without
taking chances now and then?

I have taken some time to search the web for many of the posters here,
and I am pleased to see how successful many of you are. Kudos to you
all for living your dreams, and many more happy returns.

To those aspiring authors, never give up, never let anyone tell you not
to pursue your dream, no matter the road you take.

We can all improve, we can all reach higher than we have reached
before. I truly believe anything is possible if you believe in it
enough.

Now, back to PublishAmerica. Oh boy, yes, I know of the horror stories,
I know of the reputation they have been given by some horrified authors
that believe they were mislead, and although you may say I am defending
them here, I am only defending what is true from my experience with
them.

They promised me they would publish a manuscript, this particular
manuscript was written a little over twenty years ago while expecting
the arrival of my first son. I knew this particular novel would not be
published, not that it is terribly bad, but because it needed something
more, something I was not willing to do for this one particular
manuscript. They promised me it would not ost me anything to do it.
Hey, the price is right. They promised me nothing more than what they
delivered. I researched them, I read the bad things said about them, I
read some great things about them, I read conflicting stories about
them, but for what I wanted for this particular manuscript, they were
perfect.

Once again, let me remind you of something, profit, best seller lists,
becoming famous and having a movie made about this particular novel was
of no interest to me. This novel represented one of the best moments
of my life, the anxious anticipation of my first child. I could not
possibly see myself editing and changing the story for an editor to
publish it, how can someone edit a memory? How could I as a father,
edit words that came from my heart, as I sat up at night writing a
story for my unborn child? How could I possibly alter what I thought at
that moment twenty years ago?

This particular manuscript was lost for the better part of twenty
years. I had read it to my children and somewhere around thirteen or
fourteen years ago I lost it. Gone, vanished. This story was not the
best I have ever written, it was not going to ever be published or win
an award. This particular story represented something far more valuable
to me than money, awards, or a commercial publishing contract with a
fat advance. This manuscript represented a part of me that was
non-negotiable. It was my imagination about a man trying to save his
wife and his unborn child in a strange and magical land called
Asintania. Fast forward to 2005. Five years separated from my
ex-wife, I move in with my current fiance, and while unpacking boxes I
have hauled for years I come across a box of old momentos. A box I had
not opened for a long, long time. My Fiance is there going through
stuff with me, when she holds up a 5 1/4" floppy disk with the words,
novel back-up written on it. I stare at it and say, "OH MY GOD!"

The next day I track down a used computer store that just so happens to
have quite a few old PC's with 5 1/4" floppies. I ask them to see what
is on the disk for me, and if possible, save it to a 3 1/2" floppy.
They do, and don't even charge me for it. There is only one file on
the disk, it simply reads novel.txt

I rush home, put the floppy into my PC and open the file, lo and behold
it is my missing novel, that very dear and special novel I had written
twenty years ago.

Long story short, My Son cried when I handed him a copy of my book,
with a special dedication to him and his siblings on it. It was
perhaps the greatest achievement in my life, it did not have to be a
best-seller, it did not have to make a million, it was simply the
greatest thing I have ever written. No, I can not say anything bad
about PublishAmerica.

.

Relevant Pages

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  • Re: Fantasy fans...
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