10 Steps to Self-Publishing your novel: highlights.

As I sit, 33,000 words and 25% into the draft of my next 70k word Junior Rangers Investigative Club Novel, no one can accuse me of being short on words.

Last week, I released my Top 10 Steps to Self-Publishing a Novel in 2025, in two parts. But that article was long winded and included my justification for everything. I thought that it might be helpful to clarify a few points, but also to simplify. So, below you will find a brief description of your publishing options followed by bullet point list for suggestions about self-publishing. Then, if you want to jump back and read the longer description of any points that I make, you can find them here.

So, let’s dive in. (if you know the difference between Trad-publishing and Self-publishing skip to the next Tazo (image)

You have a manuscript. You want to print it. So, what do you do? There are two options. #1 Traditional Publishing. #2 Everything else.

Traditional Publishing: Step into a bookstore, scan the shelves around you. This is the step most of those authors have taken to get their books on those shelves. It’s the tried-and-true method that pays you. You, write a novel. You send your manuscript to an agent (or multiple agents) in a process called querying (which will be discussed in more depth by authors who have done it.) If you are lucky, and your manuscript is great, an agent chooses to represent you, and then uses all of their industry contacts to try and sell your novel to a publishing house. If you are lucky again, and your manuscript is something they are looking for (or really wows them,) they buy it, pay you and publish it. You probably still want to market your book. Big publishing houses might help you do that.

The upside: they pay you! Once the publishing house buys your book they will do the layout, illustration, and other work necessary to get it published. (some authors still get input on the rest, some don’t.) This also ensures your book the best possible chance of wide and public distribution. (Books on shelves in bookstores.

The downside: Your agent makes a cut, Yuck! (This is a joke, it’s entirely fair, they did all the work to sell your book and it’s how you access the bigger publishing houses.) You loose control. While some authors get input in decisions about their book, how its put together and marketed etc, most do not. Also, rights to the characters and stories may now fall to the publisher. Also, with rare exceptions expect long delays and many rejections.

Or

Everything Else – (aka) – Self Publishing

Self-publishing encompasses a wide range of options today. But basically, you write your manuscript and then take all of the steps necessary to publish it yourself.

The upside: You have more control. You make all the decisions. You make any profit from the sales of your book. Your book can succeed with smaller margins. (Publishers need to sell lots of copies to recoup the $$ spent on publishing your book.) There are active communities of self-published authors willing to help. A few more wacky ideas may get through. (I don’t mean crazy, I mean stuff that isn’t “on-brand” right now.) Maybe the big publishers aren’t interested in a gritty realistic story about an astronaut stranded on Mars, because they don’t think audiences will care. Maybe they are wrong, and that novel is good enough to pick up traction and even become a movie. Your idea might buck the market!

The Downside: You have more control, so you have to make, and fund, all decisions related to publishing your book. You do not get immediate access to bookstore shelves and will have to work hard for it. It’s a complex and involved process. There are lots of scammers looking to “help” by taking your money. Marketing is a pain, and there is still a bit of a stigma behind ‘self-published’ as lesser. Your idea probably wont buck the market. I’m not knocking your original idea, or well written manuscript. I’m overly proud of my own work, so I am confident that there are authors out there who are much more talented, sitting on even better pieces today who cannot gain traction and want to self-publish. If you want to you should! But in the world of self-publication, where new books pop up on Amazon everyday by the dozens, a flawless manuscript with an amazing story might fall through the cracks. I’m certain some have.

Anyway

I may make a better case for or against self-publishing later. But today I promised a brief bullet point list of the tips to self-publish your novel. Again, if you want the longer walkthrough start here. (Feel free to skim to the appropriate parts.)

So having decided to self-publish, and annoyed by all of the words above. I promised you a bullet point list of my suggestions for self-publishing

Here it is:

·       1. Write the book. You don’t have to have a complete manuscript before you decide to self-publish, but before you set up your KDP account, contact an illustrator, or start your presale campaign you should probably finish the story.

·       2. Edit that manuscript: Plot holes, poor pacing, spelling errors, errors in tense. You may have typed The End. But everything before that should be in question. Your manuscript is very-probably not perfect, but it should be as close as possible before you Publish. Some mistakes will make it through the cracks, but too many or really bad ones will turn potential readers into 1 star reviewers.

·       3. Decide: This is why I described both the traditional route and self-publishing above. It’s not too late. Browse the internet, learn more about both processes, and make certain you want to self-publish. It’s easier now than ever before, but it’s still hard work and you might not make enough to justify it.

·       4. Develop your vision: There’s more to a book than words on a page. There’s cover illustrations, layout, print decisions like: hardcover or paperback, sizes. Or you  can skip 90% of that and just do an eBook. Time to start thinking about what you want to hold in your hand once your finished.

·       5. Find Experts (aka: An Illustrator/someone for layout)

Let me make this very clear. If you are a very competent illustrator/photographer, and your art is one of the selling points of your novel then do the cover yourself. If you know enough about computers to follow all of your printing platform’s guidelines, it’s possible to do your own layout.  Otherwise, hire someone to do it. “Don’t judge a book by it’s cover” is a nice saying. There are lots of books, readers will judge your book by its cover. Also, don’t use AI. It is theft. It also sucks. If you want more about why I’ll have an article about that soon.

·       6. Print Methods: There is a choice before you publish: Bulk print your book, or use online platforms like Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing or Ingram Spark. I’ll save you the trouble of reading more about this one. Unless you have a sure market, a large warehouse, and want to buy more than 100 books at a time (and have the money for it) Use an online publishing platform.

·       7. Find Support Groups and Avoid Scams: Go out and look for advice on how to do things. Also avoid scammers. These might seem contradictory, but they aren’t you’ll have to check out the in-depth article to read more about this, but the general rule is that there are people who will help you on public forums, often attached to specific printing platforms. (Amazon’s KDP has a forum only accessible to people with a KDP account for instance.) There are also lots of scams offering to take your money to ‘help you publish’ your book. Do not pay a publisher to publish your book. That is, very simply, not how it works. Here is a link to Writer Beware which goes into a lot of these scams in more detail.

·       8. ISBNS and more: Unless you want to be platform exclusive, I advise getting your own ISBN. These are the numbers on the back of the book barcode (excluding price) that tie your book to you. This is what actually gives you control over self-published manuscripts. There are other numbers you may want to tie to your book. See the other article for more.

·       9. Get feedback: It’s never too early to start getting reviews. (well, don’t send your first draft to book reviewers before you edit.) But before you push publish, most platforms will offer you an opportunity to buy proof copies, and some reviewers will review your proofs. Continue to seek out reviews after publication, and maybe even put a request for reviews in your book.

·       10. Publish that book: Assuming you’ve followed all of these steps, and found more information out there besides my website. It’s time to publish! Do it!

This is nothing but a simple overview of everything necessary to self publish a book. It should not be your only source of information. It might not all be necessary. The entire reason I wrote all of this is because A: I want to support other new authors, and to let them know that even if they don’t choose the traditional route, self-publication is a possible end goal for a manuscript. B: I don’t want people to be scammed, and to know what they are getting into. Self-publishing has never been easier. It’s still a lot of work. And almost all of the people offering you a shortcut for $ are simply scammers trying to take that money. Hopefully these steps help to give you an idea of what you need to do.

Now,  get out there and #1. Write!