What do you do when the novel you've written is rejected by every publisher in the land? The official answer of course is to keep trying; the literary world is filled with stories of blockbusters being turned down by major publishing houses. John Grisham, Ursula Le Guin and JK Rowling, amongst others, have endured the long walk to the doormat to collect their politely written, but still very firm "Thanks but no thanks" letters. Rejection is a part of the job for the budding author, a rite of passage all must go through. Self-publishing is another route, and one that has been enjoyed by a number of well known and literary authors. Lord Byron, Walt Whitman, Virginia Woolf and G.P. Taylor are among the great and the good that chose to go it alone.
An increasing number of authors are bypassing the publishing houses, and indeed the printers, by publishing their work online. The realm of online fiction is not just limited to the new writer. Stephen King, the master of horror, debuted his novella Riding the Bullet online, and sold over 500,000 copies.
Payment is varied. Some writers use the web to gain a steady fan base, sometimes offering whole novels online on a "shareware" basis. If the reader likes the novel, they can donate a fee to the author direct. Sci-fi author John Scalzi did this with his first story Agent to the Stars. Thanks to Scalzi's blog, and his very open attitude to his earnings, we know that this little experiment has netted him around $30,000 to date, not to mention kick-starting his successful print career in the US.
Internet fans tend to be very generous. Chicago based journalist and artist Charlie "Spike" Trotman found this out first hand when she launched an appeal to get her web-based graphic novel (or webcomic) Templar, Arizona into print. Setting a target of raising $3000 to fund the first print run, and resigning herself to the thought of it never happening, she was amazed when fans contributed the whole sum in just thirteen days.
The advantage of the website versus the print novel is the social aspect. Readers can engage with the author on a one to one basis, offer suggestions and support via email and comments on the website. Even that fictional figurehead of teen insecurity Holden Caulfield from Catcher in the Rye spoke of wanting the call up the author of a great novel and have a chat - now he could, at least on the author's own messageboard.
Amateur writers can also be launched into the spotlight using the web as their marketing tool. US based Lulu is a self-publishing company that exploits Print On Demand technology as a cheap and accessible method of users getting their work into print. They encourage users to upload their writing, be it a cookery book, novel or just a collection of doodlings, and online shoppers can order it to be printed and sent to their home. Lulu even run their own literature prize, the snappily titled Blooker Prize, where blogs and personal websites can win the chance to be put into print. Lulu also now offer the option of putting work into a downloadable e-book, which can be produced and obtained at minimal expense.
Most of the writing on the web however comes from those who just have a love of writing. The explosion of fan fiction sites, where fans create their own stories using characters of their favourite book, TV or film series, has now led to the more confident writers setting out on their own, and writing their own novels online. The Google-owned blog site Blogger actively encourages this, and community project National Novel Writing Month even sets users the challenge of writing a 50,000 word novel in the month of November. Project director Chris Baty's philosophy is that “The key [to writing a novel in 30 days] is to lower your expectations from "best-seller" to "would not make someone vomit,"”. Thousands of people have been inspired to take part, amassing 982,564,701 words so far. Donations to the website have also paid for a school library to be built in Southeast Asia. As a creative writing project, this scheme is unique, getting those who would not even consider themselves a writer to compose a 175 page novel. Admittedly, some of the results are not of the best quality, and real literature enthusiasts would have a hard time to separate the rare wheat from the vast amounts of chaff.
Getting your own novel on the web couldn't be easier. Sign up with Blogger, and cut and paste your masterpiece on to your own site so the world can see. Letting people know it is there is trickier, and blog listings such as Brit Blog are invaluable here, flying the flag for smaller websites. Specialist literature websites can be helpful also, with sites like Metaxu Cafe giving advice, support and advertising for the budding author.
E-publishing is about to take off in a big way, mostly forced by reader demand. The question is whether it will overtake traditional forms of publishing. If the type of fiction you read was available free, would you still wait for the print version? Many people of course like the feel and comfort of the printed form. LibraryThing.com's founder Tim Spalding is one of them: “I don't see the perfect ebook arriving any time soon, and all the book lovers and libraries hauling their collections to the dumpster. A thousand interesting, transformative things are happening to books and to libraries, but death-by-ebook seems very far off”.
The most attractive aspect of the online novel revolution is that thousands of people are now using the power of the web to create their own stories, and to find their own niche audience. That has to be an exciting prospect, even if it does mean having to wade through a few more Da Vinci Code clones.
