Stepping to the stage is: Ca$h
When you turn on your Kindle today and browse, looking for an urban banger to read, you have hundreds of thousands of urban and street lit books to choose from, and just as many authors. KDP or Kindle Direct Publishing has made it easy and free for authors to self-publish. It allows you to self-publish your books and make them available on Kindle, iPad, iPhone, Android, Blackberry, Mac, and PC. Many authors have made a name for themselves, along with a fat duffel bag, through the KDP program.
No one should hate on the next person's hustle, right? Well, many do. They point to KDP as the primary reason that the urban street lit genre is oversaturated with poor quality books. There may be some truth to that, but I say that it was no different than when you had to go through the traditional channels to get published. Just because a book is released by a major publishing house or a well-known independent does not guarantee that the book will be fiyah. No doubt, the books released by majors will be better edited than those self-published on Kindle, but the quality of the story simply depends on the author.
Does it validate an author in your eyes if they are with a major publisher? Without KDP many authors would have never become known, their talent and their voices would have been silenced forever. So no matter how saturated the genre becomes, I believe that the cream will always rise to the top.
I came into the game with a publishing deal, and I'm appreciative of the recognition that I received on Wahida Clark’s publishing imprint. However, there is no comparison to the freedom that I have using KDP's services. It is my belief that the top, best-selling, self-published authors on Kindle can compete with those signed by major publishers. What's your view?
Having experienced both sides of the game, as an author with a highly respected publisher (Wahida Clark Presents) and self-publishing through Kindle Direct Publishing, I personally prefer KDP. However, I wouldn’t be the writer that I am if it were not for the valuable lessons I learned dealing with the professional editors that worked with me through the publisher. The biggest difference in novels written by self-published authors and those written by authors that are with established publishing houses is in story and character development.
My advice to self-published authors is that they read novels that are published the traditional way and pay attention to the development of characters and plot. No author is a good editor of their own work. To help elevate the genre, we have to take pride in what we publish and give our readers a quality product regardless of what route we take to publish. KDP is not a curse in my eyes, it is a godsend.
Hailing from Ohio but later calling Atlanta his home, Cash is the author of TRUST NO MAN 1-3, BONDED BY BLOOD, THUGS CRY, and SHORTY GOT A THUG. He’s writes fiction but not make-believe. There is a difference.
I agree that it's been a Godsend, even though I haven't used it yet. But I'm hoping that it remains so in the future, you know every time there is a good thing going they always change it.
ReplyDelete