In response to Joe Konrath’s The Myth of the Bestseller— Hallelujah! There is something insane about the expectation as a writer to make millions to be successful. The above link takes you to a first hand experience of what self-publishing and e-books can do to transform a writer.

As hesitant as I am to switch to e-books, there is something magical about this blog post. This author has published his writing and successfully sold his e-books online. Now you must be thinking, that’s success? I thought success for a writer was getting in the New York Times Bestseller’s List. How do you do that self-publishing in digital form? Well, it’s easy.

Being on that list is overrated. If you look at the books on those lists, you’ll find a majority of them have sacrificed more than they needed to get their book published. According to Konrath and many writers (including myself) success doesn’t come from millions of books sold. It comes from one. Stephen King once said if you get paid for your writing, you’re a success. The truth is that if you get satisfaction from your writing that should be all that matters.

Don’t set your sights on a career that is littered with rejection, despair, and loss of money. Maybe, the future of writers is in taking the publishing into our own hands or smaller groups of people looking out for the creators of the works. We deserve some credit after years of being underpaid. We need to be recognized for the work we do, instead of being swept under the rug if we don’t make millions in the first year. What if paying for the groceries is enough? Selling a few books a day may be all the success you need to fulfill your dream.

Join the revolution! Self-sufficient, confident writers who take the action into their own hands. They make their books happen because they have the dream that no one else supported. Now we don’t have to create a pile of rejection letters. We can publish our books on our own letting the fate of the readers decide our paycheck rather than a corporation that doesn’t know us.

Although this revolution is just beginning, don’t rule it out. Someday, self-published e-books may become the standard. Give it a try if you’re ready and the big business publishers just don’t see the same vision you do.

Yes, ideally we all think we should be able to sell millions of books, but that isn’t the most important aspect of writing. What’s most important is being true to yourself as a writer to affect someone else with your words. To me, if I can make one reader learn about him/herself or more about life, then I’m a success. I want to entertain. If I can pay the bills, even better!

One of the shortcomings of traditional publishing as we all know is dealing with the big wigs, the publishers,editors, even agents taking parts of the profit. One of the solutions to that is e-books. The cost of making the books is terrible. As much as I love print books, they cost money to make. That money comes out of the profit of selling the books. If my book fails all of those book costs come out of my future. If I don’t make millions for the people that invest thousands into me, my career is sunk.

The glory of self-publishing is that the writer takes the majority of the profits in royalties. The money isn’t divided 15 ways to nothing by the time it gets back to the creator. The allure of this is so tempting that writers all over the world are jumping on the self-pubbed, e-book bandwagon. AND IT WORKS! It’s not something one or two writers are making money from now.

This is the future of writing. It may just be the beginning, but think of a world where writers get to choose how their book turns out. Give it a shot because when no one else has the faith in your book to make millions, you do. You can publish it and make as much money as you are willing to market it. That control/freedom has never been felt before by writers. With the internet at your fingertips you can reach the readers of the globe in an instant, and reap the benefit in a much more personal way.