Week 1 - Sunday
Sunday spoiled completely by the knowledge that I have to work again next
week. Spurred by this dreary fact I set to work today trying to get the
self-publishing thing sorted out once and for all. Then I can become rich
and retire to a heavily defended island somewhere and try to get the
genetically-engineered army of supermen thing sorted out once and for all.
Except that won't happen and if I ever manage to publish the book I will be
reduced to flogging it out of the back of a van at flea markets. Attempting
to self-publish is the single most stupid and self-destructive thing I have
ever done in my life, and that's saying something. The crucial mistake is
that I told people I was going to do it, and when they said 'How cool'
casually said 'Oh, it's pretty easy, I don't know why more people don't do
it', and I announced it on my website, so if I back out now all the village
children will dance round me and chant 'All talk and no do, eats chalk and
smells of poo.'
If I could give one piece of advice to a young person just starting out in
the world, it would be, never tell people you are going to do anything. No.
No. Not even that. It would be, never ever bother your arse trying to
do anything ever. It just isn't worth it. The world was carved up long
before you were born, and the only way to get any of the crumbs off the
table is to grovel to the people who are already made and make nice to
people you really want to bayonet in the belly.
I will spare you the long list of my grievances in this matter. In a
nutshell, the basic problem with self-publishing is that printers and
distributors are even more evil than publishers and agents. I do not say
this lightly. If a publisher is a pimp, a printer is a wholesale sex-slaver.
If agents are all child molesters, book distributors machine-gun school
playgrounds. Hammerhead sharks get creeped out by the dead eyes of
distributors.
The printers. I can't find anyone to take my money. I can't get anyone to
even return my mails. Big ones, small ones, they are uniformly rude lazy
bastards who hate the sight of books. But that doesn't matter, I'll find one
eventually if I have to go to China. But that's irrelevant, because as
things stand now, if I did get it printed I couldn't get it in the shops,
because I can't get anyone to store and deliver it. Now there are
distributors who advertise as specialising in small independent publishers,
but in their terms that's anyone with a turn-over of a million quid a
year, no less.
So I can't get a distributor with my five thousand privately printed copies.
It turns out what I need is a 'Fulfilment Service'. They'll represent, I
don't know, several dozen smaller publishers, and they'll band together and
then maybe that way they'll be worthy of the attention of the distributors,
who may deign to handle their books.
Only, it turns out I can't just write to the Fulfilment People and say 'Oy,
how much to deliver my book.' They have to vet it. They ask to see projected
sales figures. They have to decide if the title will fit their
profile.
You understand? I'm having to pitch my book to warehouse-owners. No,
not even that, people who are tenuously allowed to use a corner of a
warehouse. I'm getting rejection letters from the people I'm trying to hire
to load the thing onto a fucking lorry.
I'm going to end up... I'm going to end up dealing with some bloke who has a
fucking shady meat locker on a wharf somewhere... I'm going to end up down
the docks trying to pitch 'The Roy Orbison In Clingfilm Novel' to some
fucking gangster... fog drifting in off the river, the mournful hoot of
tugboats, from the next room intermittent screams and the sound of a grown
man crying...
'There should be more tits in this book, sunshine. Wrapping Roy Orbison is
creepy. He should wrap some naked birds, naa'da mean?'
'Anything. You. Fucking. Say. Sir.'
'And this German bloke, too polite, he should stab some fuckers in the head,
naa'da mean, I like that, me. I remember one time...' Horrendous anecdote.
'Oh what a lovely story sir, may I use that?'
'If you want your tongue cutting out... One other thing, put more K
words in. I like the letter K me, it makes me happy.'
' ...'
'All wight, my son, welcome to the family. We'll dump yer books in the
corner there, next to the kidnap victims... that's right...'
'I hate to put you to any trouble, but... worried about these decomposing
bodies dripping on them... if you could throw a tarpaulin over them...
Waterstone's... ridiculously fussy about the condition of books... like to
avoid bloodstains... and the cocaine everywhere...'
'Don't you worry about that sunshine, our sales team are second to none...
fucking Waterstone will be begging and pleading to take your book... Every
shop will be devoted exclusively to selling your book...'
Ha! Yes! That would be the plus side. They would roam the country breaking
people's arms unless they stock it... Not just bookshops, fishmongers,
haberdashers... St. Paul's cathedral... 'This isn't a bookshop...' 'It is
now, you ___.'