by Mikhaeyla Kopievsky
Last week I finished the final round of line edits for Divided Elements (Book 1): Resistance. With only the proofreading to go and the cover artwork all but finalised, I found myself at my own creative denouement point. In terms of story structure, the denouement is the part of the book where all the plot threads come together and outstanding matters or conflicts are resolved. In terms of creating a book, I like to think of the denouement as the point at which the substantive work has been completed (writing and editing) and the support work begins its process of finalisation.
As an indie author going down the self-publishing route, the denouement stage is BIG. Self-publishing authors need to be consummate multi-taskers and jacks of all trades. Kind of like parents are…
Some of the key roles you need to assume when self-publishing:
- Business Manager: Yep, if you want this lucky gig called writing to be sustainable you have to think of the triple bottom line – Financial (bringing in the dollars), Social (maintaining your own creative sanity and the relationships with the people you love), and Ecological (supporting and giving back to the creative network around you). PS I love the concept of a creative ecology – might have to explore that further in a future blog post…
- Marketing Guru: Writing (and polishing) a great book is only half the battle – people need to know about it before they can read it and see how great it is. Getting your story out in front of the crowd and into the hands of the adoring masses is HARD. Luckily in this age of the internet, there are some great resources around to help with this. My favourites:
- https://kindlepreneur.com/
- http://www.thebookdesigner.com/
- https://davidgaughran.wordpress.com/ (I was lucky enough to buy David’s books when I first started out – they are ESSENTIAL reading for any indie author!!)
- http://www.creativindie.com/
- Artistic Director: If you are one of those triple-threats who can write an amazing book, market the hell out of it, AND pull together a kick-ass cover – don’t tell anyone, they will lynch you. If you’re more like me, you’ll need to find a creative genius to help with book covers and promotional material. Providing them with clear, direct and useful advice on what you would like to see is crucial. Find your creative co-genius at:
- Tech Genius: In this digital age you’ll need to be across a range of IT solutions, innovations and tools – from social media, to html, to mail list management, to website creation. Don’t stress – there is lots of help out there! Just figure out what is most important to your brand right now (for me, its the website), and start there.
Hope that helps! Good luck!! And don’t forget to share your own self-publishing journey in the comments.
Mikhaeyla Kopievsky 
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