"... where INDEPENDENT artists shine!"

The Stigma, Part II

A few months ago, I wrote a blog about the stigma of self-publishing. I questioned whether audiences perceived self-published work as not being of the same quality as something published from a major publishing house. I don’t necessarily think so. However, I do have to make a few admissions. Yes, this blog is written with a little anger and frustration but also with some hope. Also, I have to admit that I have found some things seriously lacking in many self-published works.

I sometimes write book reviews, so I get all kinds of books. I have gotten a few that have no business being in print either in cyberspace or in traditional book form. I have also gotten books that should be much more well known than they are. The thing that gets me is that I can say the same for many books published from major houses. Some are good and some were huge mistakes. My question is why would the self-published books be perceived as not as worthy as books printed the “traditional” route?

I don’t think it’s a question of quality. The one thing I’ve noticed in nearly every book I’ve read in the past few years is that none of them are free of grammatical errors, not the self-published ones and not the ones backed by Penguin, Random House and others. There seems to be an overall decline in respect for the written word everywhere, not just the self-publishing sector. Why do we forgive these mistakes when they are made by the publishing houses that have their own professional editors whose sole job is to catch these mistakes but castigate a self publisher who may not be able to afford a professional editor?

I will admit that I cannot afford an outside editor so I have to take it upon myself to edit my own works, but I can find most if not all my unintentional grammar mistakes after a few read throughs. Things such as run ons and fragments still drive me up the wall and more so than when I find them in books that have the advantage of passing through multiple hands to ensure these mistakes are not made. Writing is my life and it pains me to see so much mediocre work out there.

I usually try to refrain from tooting my own horn, but now I simply must. I know I’m a good writer and I have the determination to work at it until something sticks. I get tired of all the encouraging words that come my way when I need sales. Don’t get me wrong. I appreciate good luck and keep it up, but I can’t use that to buy groceries. It frustrates me that I can’t get reviews because for some reason people are opposed to e-books. If you can’t afford to give them a freebie in physical book form, you don’t matter. Apparently if you already have money to distribute your work, you must already be good. The rest of us aren’t worthy of attention or sales.

I am grateful for social networks such as MySpace, Facebook and other social media, but I find that they too revert back to the old way of doing things once they have made the national news. I understand that I network with a lot of people who do the same thing I do, but I thought the point of opening up new avenues of distribution was to allow a more diverse representation through, not to let the old guard take that over, too.

I don’t consider myself in competition with anyone. Maybe I’m the only one who thinks that way, but I feel there is room for everyone willing to make her place. So I am confused and disturbed when people don’t want to give a chance to someone who is willing to give away her craft for FREE when she can or even give her a chance to help them distribute their own for FREE! If a website only gets 20 hits a day but I can post my links, work or whatever for free, I’m going to do it. If you have to pay to be on a website that gets a million hits a day, you still have to compete with everyone else who pays to be on that site. Besides, the twenty people on the other site may begin to spread the word.

As I wrote before, I am a little frustrated with things right now. I understand people need to weed out their books, music, films or whatever to get what they want. However, there is a lot of trash out there that people think is good because someone paid the right people.

http://www.amazon.com/People-My-Head-Inda-Lauryn/dp/1449963196/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1262622444&sr=1-2

http://www.amazon.com/Time-Inda-Lauryn/dp/1449960561/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1262622583&sr=1-1

http://conceding2kismet.weebly.com

http://conceding2kismet.blogspot.com

http://conceding2kismet.wordpress.com

http://blackswanthinktank.ning.com

http://indalauryn.vox.com