The moments between

Pressing publish and the book being published

Last night I pressed publish on my first self published poetry collection!

It is a project I have been working on almost all year long and that final push of the button to release the book was both terrifying and thrilling.

It represented me letting go of my control of where these poems go and how they will be read. It represented me deciding that these 100 poems are the ones I want to represent the last 5 years of writing. At the start of the process I collected all my poems in one massive document, which was over 300 poems long. Whittling them down, whilst improving and tweaking was a huge feat. The draft manuscript I sent to test readers/quote providers was more than 100 poems long, but in the end I killed more of my darlings and the collection hangs together better now.

Photo by charlesdeluvio on Unsplash

The collection also spans a 5 year period of huge amounts of change. Not only did I become a poet in this period, we had a pandemic, I moved jobs, I spent more time doing things I love than I had done in the previous 5, 10, 15, 20 years. I made and lost friends. I became older and for the first time, actually felt it. I learned about much more than poetry by becoming a poet.

As I pressed publish I reflected on all of this time and mainly felt proud that I had done it.

Which self publishing route should I take?

I have written before about the internalised debate I have held with myself about publishing vs self publishing. And ultimately the reality for me is that I just want my poems to exist. And that is entirely within my control.

But the question of how I would make this happen took up a lot of time. I had heard of Ingram Spark from my debut collections’ publisher and I did explore this, but I couldn’t read all the detail of the T&Cs and I worried that if bookstores ordered my book and they didn’t sell I would need to pay the pulping costs. Even though I am not sure this understanding correct, and it was a remote issue anyway, I knew I didn't want any accidental financial loss. I also didn’t have enough time to read all the detail of the T&Cs to work out if my worry was valid or not. I also found their software hard and clunky to use.

I looked at sending to local / online printers to send me a physical copy. But then the logistics of distribution weighed on me. Taking books to the post office around a busy working day would not work, and as I am not on the performance circuit so often right now, I just imagined a pile of books in my house. How to set up an online shop was not something I had time to do.

I am also wanting the book to stand the test of time so a one off batch was ruled out.

I have met enough small publishers at this point to know how profoundly opposed a number of poets are to the idea of using Amazon. Killing publishing and bookshops.

And here’s the thing, it also takes a huge amount of work to end up with a big enough publisher to end up in a bookshop on any significant scale. I am a poet with a day job and lots happening in my life that means that taking the time to submit to publishers is a big ask on my time. And I did submit part of my collection for consideration by some poetry publishers and even managed to get long listed. That process takes between three and six months to hear back. I did it a few times over 2023 and early 2024. As we reached the summer of 2024 I wasn’t ready to wait that long again. And possibly again.

Photo by James Yarema on Unsplash

Reader, I chose Amazon KDP

Plus my own investment in my own ISBN, so I still have the option to publish it in a small local publisher batch if I choose to later on. I chose Amazon because, software wise, it is super easy to use. I chose Amazon because I didn’t see any risk of having to pay to pulp my own work. I chose Amazon because I do not have the time to manage all my own distribution. I chose Amazon because millions of other writers do too. I chose Amazon because, I want my work to exist.

The title

I will reveal this really soon, but the book had several working titles, including the one I sent to my test/quote giving readers. Almost as soon as I sent them the title of the draft manuscript I wanted to change it. I then had two strong contenders and one stuck in my head as feeling right for longer. It needed less explaining than the other one. It also let people make their own interpretations of it. Which is something I love in other book titles.

Photo by Abigail Boone on Unsplash

The cover

I wrote about this in a recent post, about how much I was enjoying the design process. Well, when I received the proof it wasn’t showing up in the way I imagined. Not at all. I had all the dimensions wrong. I also kicked myself a bit at this stage of not collaborating with a proper book cover designer who would have picked this up. However, I was moving what my final collection would be so much I am sure it would have cost a fortune and driven the artist crackers with all my tweaking.

I also don’t want to delay pressing publish this side of Christmas after all the work I put in to the actual collection so I have had to take a more stripped back approach.

The work of promotion

I am in this for the long haul. I am not putting all my eggs in one basket in assuming I need all my sales to happen in pre-order season. I don’t want to exhaust myself selling it all in one go.

I want to be able sell this book any time I perform live. I

want to remind people it exists for years to come, without being sickening sales pushy poet.

But, I will be proud in my promotion.

I will also have fun with it. Over on my instagram account (@thelisaohare) I have already used Charli XCX and Barry from Eastenders to tell the world I am nearly there with my book.

‘I went my own way and I made it! - Charli XCX 360

‘I’m gonna do it anyway! I’m gonna do it anyway!’ Barry from Eastenders doing karaoke.

Stayed tuned!

The next letter will most likely be the one where I reveal the book itself , but if you have any questions about the process so far, or words of advice if you have trodden this path before please do let me know in the comments.