(Originally posted 25 Nov 2013 at trenchkamen.livejournal.com.)

I’m torn between my adolescent tendency to fuck the system at any and all times and the fact that most of the self and/or vanity-published books I have read are awful. So at Comikaze, as at all cons, I browsed all of the authors’ tables, took bookmarks, flipped through books trying to make snap judgments, while talking to bright-eyed and eager and courteous authors putting their heart’s blood out there for all to see. Most books I can pick up and scan a few pages to tell whether or not the prose is brain-meltingly bad, and I try to keep my face neutral because the author is sitting right there, and I can feel their attention on tenderhooks. And I do admire them for getting their stuff out there. In that regard, I shouldn’t be talking; a small (or mediocre) task completed is greater than a great task planned, and about a billion times better than a mediocre task planned, so whether or not you think I’m worth my salt as a writer, they top out. So now I ask for excerpts and am universally given bookmarks and business cards, so I can look them up online. I’ve been burned once-twice-three times by my desire to give people a chance, and by burned, I mean I spent $20 on a book that I found I was incapable of finishing, it was so painfully bad. Even though it had a personalized message on the inside cover thanking me for my support. And since, I have never regretted looking up a book excerpt online. I have yet to be wrong about the ‘quality’.

For what it’s worth, I’m if anything more suspicious if part of your promo copy is that you have mostly five-star reviews on Amazon, or won this or that book festival. I look them up, and 99% of the time they are pay-to-play author-mill type things. Ironically, several of the usual suspects were discussed this week on Writer Beware. And the more I see mediocre-to-bad books receive rave reviews (equally poorly written) the more I lose faith in the credibility of reviews. One article of many on that whole subject.

This is, I maintain, the major reason prose hasn’t been able to take off in the indie market like visual art (think artists alley), comics, etc–in other words, like anything the quality of which can be assessed quickly. The market is already glutted to overflowing with books that have been filtered through the gatekeepers of publishing houses, which, while far from flawless (Fifty Shades of Grey), and largely dictated by marketing considerations and not artistic merit, are, at the very least, scanned for basic readability and given several thorough edits by somebody with a basic command of prose. Agents and editors say 90% of what they receive is absolutely unreadable. I have no trouble believing this. And while God knows I may be wrong (to be honest I haven’t looked very hard), I don’t see online original fiction being given much of a chance, even if it’s free, just because of the time investment. So we rely on gatekeepers, publishers, friends, etc, to filter things out for us. It comes down to a lack of time. Sure, people will read 100,000 words of fanfiction a day, but they already have an emotional investment in the story and characters–a lot of the heavy lifting is already established in the readers’ mind, the setting, the nuance, etc. And some of it is really goddamn good, though I maintain, as somebody who has written both fanfic and original work, fanfiction is considerably easier. But in that regard I consider people who publish original stuff, no matter how bad it may be, as artistically far above me until I actually get something original out there.

For what it’s worth, I know you’re not supposed to judge a book by its cover, but if your book cover is a poorly Photoshopped facsimile of pulp fantasy novel covers, and goddamn if you use Papyrus font, I’ve already made a gut decision. And I’ve never been wrong.

Anyway.

I’m sure there is some damn good self-published material out there, that for whatever reason didn’t seem like a commercial success to publishing houses. It’s just so goddamned hard to find.

——–

So it is rather exceptional that I bought a book at the con. Two things caught my attention: the book was funded on Kickstarter, and I didn’t wince upon reading random pages. It is a very handsome product–heavy paper, subtle cover (not at all usual fantasy novel TITLE IN HUGE LETTERS by AUTHOR), interesting visuals. The publishers call it a ‘novelzine’, given its layout is a synthesis of prose in columns and collage-print illustrations. So the visuals are good, and by design it relies on looking sleek, but that can’t compensate for bad writing.

Fortunately, it doesn’t have to. Parabolis is solidly-written. Better-written than many conventionally-published books I have read. It’s a slow start but I see the seeds of a good story here. It’s typical steampunk-noir with thinly-veiled references to real-world politics, and ends on a cliffhanger. It’s pulp, but in a relishing way. I see strong influences from China Mieville’s Bas-Lag trilogy in the setting and atmosphere.

As I said, it can run slowly, and in some parts I feel the energy level is far lower than it should be given the events. I can’t articulate why succinctly, but I didn’t feel the tension. I caught two or three typos (I can’t be arsed to go back and look for them), which is a damn low number for a self-published book but nevertheless, and the large-print quote excerpts can be distracting and corny. It works in some spots and feels gimmicky in others. But I can also see the pulp appeal, insofar as the novel is formatted like a magazine, and the quotes make it seem like a sensationalist rag you might find sold on a street corner in Carnival City. In that way, the gimmick works because it’s a gimmick.

Overall, I see a great deal of potential in these authors, but they are nicked by the cost of self-publishing a high-quality book: the product is expensive. I know to break even self-published physical copies have to cost around $20/book, but that is no higher than most trade hardbacks, and the book itself is physically of a higher quality than most of those. It’s also artistically of a higher quality, but that is harder to quantify, given the price wars on eBook pricing. In any case, I’d rather pay $20 for a solid book than $0.99 for a painful mess.  And I’m stoked I found a self-published book I can genuinely say that about. I desperately want to cheer for the little guy. I would love to see more solid indie productions. The only other indie-published work I can recommend is Oliver Sheridan’s Heart by Sara Haasis, which I still think about from time to time, two years on.

Give it a chance. There’s an excerpt on the website.