I'm a whore

Okay, before anyone gets all up my grill for the title of this post, I'd like you to know that the word "whore" appears in the Christian bible 59 times!

Okay. I just made that up. I really have no idea how many times the word appears, but I know it does. A lot.

So anyway, about that "I'm a whore" thing.

Most of you know I wrote a novel, called The Devil You Don't Know. It's pretty good, I've been told. It took me three years to write and revise it. Three complete revisions, actually. It's been professionally edited. Not once, but twice.

It has garnered attention from some of the top literary agents in New York, two of whom told me I was among the best debut writers they had stumbled across. The managing editor of Writer's Digest Magazine critiqued the manuscript and pronounced it one the best he'd read. I've had requests from agents, but no offers.

I don't say these things to brag. These are facts.

I am almost done with my second novel, which I believe is exponentially better than the first. It's certainly more commercially viable.

And therein lies the problem with TDYDK.

It's a pseudo-Christian/mainstream thriller. It doesn't preach (much). It has very adult themes, including rape, pornography, alcoholism and promiscuity. See, what I wanted to do was rewrite the Bible the way Stephen King rewrote Stoker's Dracula.

I wondered what would happen if the Bible IS true. And what would happen if things predicted in the Bible started to happen today? In this secular world. To real people, not cardboard cutouts from poorly written Christian novels.

You know, it sounded like one hell of an idea back in college, when I thought of it after a long night of booze and dope.

And it turned out to be a damned good story. One person who read it said it reminded them of a weird cross between Stephen King and Saint Paul. I took it as a compliment.

Sadly there is no market for such a hybrid in today's fiction market, I have been told. I wish I had a dollar for every agent and/or person in the business who has told me privately that they loved it, but just knew in their heart that they couldn't sell it because of its "Christian stuff."

To which I say: Bullshit.

Has anyone ever read King's The Stand? That book has more religious imagery in it than mine does. Really. I mean, if you sub the name God for Mother Abigail and the name Satan for Randall Flagg, you have The Book of Revelations. Classic Good versus Evil.

I don't recall that causing any sales problems for Mr. King. Do you?

All of which brings me to my point (and yes, I can hear your sigh of relief out there!).

You see, I'm sitting on TDYDK. It's gathering electronic dust on my computer -- still edited, sleek and ready to be read and enjoyed.

So. Do I leave it there and call it a practice book?

Do I start another round of queries (I've sent 29 so far; most were unanswered)?

Or do I find a way to publish the damned thing myself?

For some reason self-publishing (or e-publishing, or Indie publishing. Are they all the same? Hell, I don't even know) scares me to death. For several reasons.

1. It looks like a lot of work.

2. It requires me to do all the PR work. I don't HAVE that many friends and I hate to pimp myself on Twitter and Facebook (although I will if I have to. See the title of this post).

3. I don't want to screw up any chance I have to traditionally publish the new book, or any future books.

Because as much as I love writing fiction, I also want to make money at it. There. I said it. I am a literary whore. I don't do this for the hell of it. I do it because I believe I have something to say, and because I want people to read what I write. And pay for it.

I write this with no apologies. I mean, you CAN be an artist and make money at it. Just ask JK Rowling. Or Stephen King. Or Amanda Hocking. Or (cringe) Dan Brown.

I'm not saying I'm in their league (well, except for .... oh never mind). You get my point.

So I'm writing this to get your opinions. I know they will be all over the place. I know that some have tested the self-pub waters and found them to their liking. Others, I suspect, have the same fears I have.

So if you were me, what would you do?

My head hurts

Oh. Hi there. Been a while, huh? Sorry. I've been busy here in the writing dungeon, slaving away at the new book. (That's NOT me at left. I wear a blue tie when I write.)

And the new book is going well. Thank you for asking. ;)

I've also been cruising the Internet lately, where I've been reading all of the doom and gloom reports about the state of publishing today.

I mean right now. Today. This hour. I say that because it seems to be changing that rapidly. Today, agent Rachelle Gardner wrote a blog post saying she's rethinking her previous aversion to self-publishing, partly because it's so difficult to get pubbed the traditional route these days. Publishing houses are paring staff and cutting mid-list authors right and left. It's never been harder, she says, for debut novelists to get published the traditional way.

It's not pretty, especially for someone sitting on one finished manuscript and hard at work on the next. Since most of you reading this have either already written a novel or are writing one now, I don't have to tell you how much work it is, right?

For the record, I have not considered self-publishing. Yet. I honestly believe agents like Nathan Bransford when they say that self-publishing still has that stigma attached to it that might make it even harder to get published the traditional way, i.e., with an agent and publisher. You know, where you actually make money.

Now money is not, nor has it ever been, a major factor in my fiction writing. I am still romantic and naive enough to want my work read by people who might enjoy it. Who might get something intangible from it. To be moved to tears, or laughter. To be entertained.

I've sent out less than twenty queries on The Devil You Don't Know, and have received nothing back as of yet (five are still outstanding, including three I sent just last week). In other words, I'm still early in the process and I'm nowhere near giving up on TDYDK.

But that's not to say I don't worry about the state of the industry. As I've written here before, I left the newspaper industry as it was crashing down around my ears. I then stepped -- quite innocently, I might add -- into the fiction writing industry, only to start hearing rumors of its inevitable and unavoidable demise.

Geez. Is it me or what?

Anyway, my blog friend Annie at http://theinkphantom.blogspot.com/ blogged about this today. She's torn, as I am, about what to do in these chaotic and rather frightening times. Her post is informative and forward-looking, unlike my thrown-together drivel. Please cruise over and read it. It's worth it.

Also, Annie offers some quality help for writers at her blog. She knows her stuff and she's always willing to help out. So if you're reading this, please go over and follow her blog. You won't regret it.

Thank you and carry on.