Once upon a time, in a land not too distant and a past not so remote, there existed a magical kingdom called Published Author, filled with worldwide acclaim, movie rights, and streets paved with gold. Although thousands of writers besieged the fortress, insurmountable, impenetrable walls hundreds of feet high protected this Elysium from the great unwashed masses. “We must keep the enclave exclusive,” they said. “We must keep the blood lines pure.”
Seven formidable gatehouses guarded by seven immense giants provided the only access to this coveted realm. From their ivory towers, the elite few leveled their edicts and published their decrees, dictating what the public would and would not consume, which authors they would allow to peddle their wares. Only the Worthy entered therein.
To gain admittance, a writer must battle through the surging horde of their peers to the portcullis, somehow convince a deaf and blind giant to raise its particular grill, then finesse their way through a gauntlet of grueling torments which required excruciatingly long waits and impossibly short exposure, all the while braving the slings and arrows of assistant editors and editorial assistants flung at them from murder holes unseen. Few writers made it across the draw bridge. Only a fraction of those emerged from the death traps and into the rarified air.
Then came the cataclysm, brought by the Amazonian destroyer of publishing reality. It shook the kingdom to its very foundations. It knocked the giants to their knees, bruised their egos, and shattered their confidence. Some received mortal wounds and will never recover. The rest struggle to regain their footing as the ground continues to roil beneath their feet.
It rent great gaps in the walls of the citadel, and as the brick and mortar began to crumble, the ravening hordes rushed into the space it created and overran the city. However, as often happens in the case of mighty battles and victorious but enraged armies, in their wake, pillage, rapine, and famine replaced the exclusive realm’s peace and plenty.
Now, instead of the order enforced by the established hierarchy of agents, marketing directors, editors, and publishers, the city teems with humanity, the bold and brilliant obscured by the impossible mass of the foul and fetid. Among the jarring cacophony, discernment of single voice is rare. The marketplace has shifted but remains survival of the fittest.
Unfortunately, that maxim too often means the best cover, the best marketing, the best appeal to the salacious, with little to no attention given to the quality of story or text within. In such an environment, to the indie author, their goals feel as far out of reach as ever, and the brutality of the new reality even more daunting than the previous status quo. The Writing Horde has discovered the illusion concealed by those massive walls. Published Author does not guarantee Commercial Success.
One easily feels the despair of the giants at the gate and the publishers in their towers that the end of their world has come. It has, in large measure, but, in its place, a new model will emerge and bring order to the chaos, howsoever less exclusively. The ascension of indie authors into that higher plane of existence now rests, in large measure, in their own hands, but equally in the hands of the reader.
Next week: The New Gatekeepers
Editor-in-chief Penny Freeman currently works with author J. M. Salyards on his dystopian urban fantasy Shadow of the Last Men, slated for release in the summer of 2013; also, with author R. A. Smith on his next installment of The Grenshall Manor Chronicles, Primal Storm.
Her latest release, Mechanized Masterpieces: a Steampunk Anthology, hit the shelves in April, 2013, to excellent reviews.