I'm actually doing it. Calling myself a publisher. How daring! How arrogant, even. Me, a publisher? Publishers are those elusive people who breath life into your manuscript and make it sing into the world, bright and shining. They hold the key to bringing you validation as a writer. I am not one of those people. Or am I?
The more I read the more I understand that the literary world is not owned by Random House. Publishers are people. And in this day of computers and the Internet, it is possible to publish a book yourself. Not easy... but possible.
I filed my domain name, calling my press, what else... Medusa's Muse. I'm setting up shop in my bedroom with my computer and several books on publishing, plus spending hours on the Internet researching and reading about other small presses. And I've been pondering what kind of publisher I want to be. What kind of books do I want to bring to life?
I am now seeking a book to publish, deciding not to publish my own. I write fiction and I can't publish fiction right now. As a fledgling, start up, one woman press, I have to find books that can pay for themselves. I know I won't get rich doing this, but I have to be able to pay the printing bill, so for the time being, I'm staying away from fiction. Someday I hope Medusa will be stable enough to support fiction.
My muse is extremely happy, so much so she's returned to being female. "It was fun being a boy," she says. "But we have a bigger challenge now." She gathers up her snakes from the corners of my room and they slither back into her glittering hair, contained. For now. She likes it when I listen to her.
Okay, maybe this time she was right.
