Yuffie's Writing How-To's

SELF-PUBLISHING & How to PUBLISH YOUR FANFICTION

Two topics in one today, just because they're related.

I just found out about this exciting new endeavor from Amazon called Kindle Worlds. You can now publish and sell fanfiction on Amazon.com. Yes, folks, you heard right. Publishable fanfiction that isn't masked as an original story. True fanfiction can now be published!

But there's a caveat: only a limited number of worlds have a license for fanfiction to be written and sold on Kindle Worlds. So no, you cannot publish your Harry Potter/Avengers crossover fanfiction. But there are still quite a few other worlds/stories that have given the license for it. I'm sure the list will grow and change in the future.

Here's the current list: https://kindleworlds.amazon.com/

While I don't write fanfiction myself, I thought it was interesting that this was a thing, since before it was illegal to sell and profit on fiction using a copyrighted world and characters. Just thought I'd share this with you fanfiction writers out there, in case you have something in one of the licensed worlds and want to publish it.

It's self-publishing, of course, so no queries, agents, or publishing houses to get through. That being said, if you want to self-publish, you better do some SERIOUS research on it. Don't just slap your first draft on amazon and call it day. You won't get anywhere like that and will likely get shit reviews. Workshop your writing through places like Scribophile, hire an editor to polish your draft, figure out proper formatting, get a professionally-done cover if you don't have the photoshopping skills yourself, research the market, advertise, advertise, advertise, read every blog you can about the self-publication process and mistakes to avoid, because there are a lot.

Because it's so easy to self-publish, with absolutely no supervision by professionals in publishing companies and editors who know what they're doing, there's so much drivel self-published. I'm sure you've seen some of the books with atrocious covers of a random stock image with text slapped on in Word, the book itself has the worst writing known to man with typos galore and ... they're just bad.

But there are some really great self-published gems. The Martian began self-published, and that is my favorite book ever. Holy crap, guys go read The Martian. Not the movie; READ IT.

Yeah, so self-publishing is not as simple and easy as you think. If you want to break into self-publishing and be successful, it takes an incredible amount of time researching and marketing, so make sure you're willing to put in the time. Unless you're fine with your mother being the only person to buy your book. 

I won't go into any more detail than that because you guys know how to use Google. And if you don't, it's time to learn. There are so many great resources out there. The market and world of self-publishing is always changing, so make sure you look at recent articles, written in the past year or so.