Change of Plans?

It's honestly been a hard month. Full of stand-stills and unexpected pitfalls.

I'm disappointed that most things I'm trying to achieve in my life right now just aren't going according to plan.  But that's fate for you.  Try as you might, the universe can off-set you at a whim.

I'm also sad to announce that just three months after my campaign, Kindle Scout has thrown in the towel and will no longer be accepting submissions.  I had planned on continuing to submit my work to them in the future, but now that is no longer possible, unless by some miracle they reopen submissions.  But right now, I'm assuming they are just shutting down the program for good.

But!  All is not lost.  I'm reconsidering my plans for The Un-Life of William Moore.

I am wanting to get it out as soon as possible.  My plan had been to self publish.  However, I am strongly considering changing my mind and giving my novel a chance to be traditionally published.

Normally the traditional submitting process can be extremely grueling and even take years to get a response, whether good or bad.  I was not willing to wait any longer for The Un-Life to reach it's readers so I thought self-publishing would be good enough, but there is a possibility to speed traditional publishing up, at least a little bit.

I am a member of a branch of the Missouri Writers Guild.  There is an upcoming conference in June where agents will be there to hear pitches.  From what I'm told, there's a good chance for many authors that attend to walk away with agents and/or publishing offers.  If I play my cards right and present a good pitch, it's possible The Un-Life can be traditionally published.  It will probably still take some time if it's selected, but it will probably also be a more refined product than what my lone self and some freelance editors might achieve on our own, not to mention the marketing backup.

June seems forever away, but that gives me a couple months to continue to make some final tweaks to the story and get the chance to have a much better footing in the publishing world than I might have gotten on my own.

And, if I don't get an offer in a reasonable amount of time, or if the offer I get demands the wrong changes to the story, then I will resume my efforts to self-publish.  But this is a chance that I kind of don't want to miss.  As much as I love marketing myself, it does get hard to do so, especially in the rock-and-a-hard-place period I'm going through now personally.  Traditional publishing could help me and the story flourish.

Let's see what we can do!


-Dana Lockhart

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