Episode 22 - Trad VS Self-publishing

I share the good news I received this week!!! Plus I tackle traditional VS self-publishing (VS indie). How to find out which route is more aligned for you when deciding how to publish your first novel, the multiple reasons why I personally chose trad, and why it’s not a set-in-stone decision.

Mentioned in this episode:

• Instagram post that inspired this episode
• Support the podcast on Ko-Fi
• The Submission Grinder
• Plot Twist Podcast
• Deadline City
• Write Where It Hurts
• Publishing Rodeo
• Ink In Your Veins
• N.K. Jenisin talking about time VS money (at the end of the interview)
• Brandon Sanderson
• Print Run Podcast
• Sign up for my newsletter

Recorded on June 22nd, 2026

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Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to Leftyobe's writing podcast, where I share with vulnerability and positivity my journey towards making all of my writing dreams come true. I hope you learn with me as I go from the things that go well and what doesn't go so well. But mainly, I wish it inspires you to pursue your own writing dreams. Now let's begin.

SPEAKER_01 0:27

Hello and welcome to Lefty Always Podcast. I'm so happy that you're here with me this week. The topic of this week is going to be trad publishing versus self-publishing. This is a podcast episode I've been sitting on for literally since the beginning of recording this podcast because this has been a decision that I spent year and year and year thinking about, never being really sure if I was taking the right decision. And when I finally decided, okay, no, traditional publishing is the route for me, I never looked back, but it was such a long process of deciding. What really came about and what made me say, okay, this is the time for me to record this episode, is I saw a post online. I'm going to link to it in the show notes where the author was talking about she was querying and wondering when's the moment to say, okay, should I self-publish this? And I wrote a comment, but of course I could not go deeply in the comments about all the nuance of this topic as it usually is on social media. This is something I see coming up often in the writing community, especially from authors who are querying and not having the success they hoped they would have with querying. So I really thought it was interesting to bring this about. And now, anytime I will see this question, I could just link them to the podcast episode to have the full information about what I think you should consider when you decide to take this path. So this is coming up in the topic part of the episode, but for now, here's my update. So before I go into the update, just wanted to remind you that there's a Ko-Fi page for the podcast. If you like what you hear today, or if you liked the previous episode, please consider supporting the podcast. It helps me to cover the cost of this podcast, which I really appreciate. And I'll give you a shout-out on the podcast. Link to the social media of your choice if you want to in the show notes too. So if you like the podcast and want me to continue, this is a beautiful way for you to show that support. So I didn't record a podcast episode last week because, again, like I said, life is pretty crazy right now. I didn't have much to say, to be honest. There wasn't a topic where that really was speaking to me. And I really wanted to focus my energy on writing. So that's what I did last week instead of recording an episode. But this week, like this subject was really boiling inside of me. Plus, I have some news, so I really wanted to record an episode in between my writing. So since the last episode, I submitted short story to seven markets. Now, despite what I said two episodes ago with saying I will not be submitting old short stories anymore, I just had that moment of saying, My ghost post-apocalyptic story, I really love that story. And I was like, it got accepted two times. So it won an honorable mention at a contest way back, and I was offered publication, which I turned down because it wasn't paid, and I hadn't submit the story to all the paid market. I could have the contest if you won the tree first place, there was a payment. And I didn't know, to be honest, that there was going to be an ontology out of this contest. I thought it was just a contest. So when I received this offer of being published but not paid, I decided to turn it down. Was it the right decision or not? I will never be able to know. So one time it was selected, honorable mention out of, I think there was 10 winners and honorable mention in this contest out of hundreds of submissions. So it came out in the tops. And then there was this other anthology, it was a pro paying anthology, accepted it. The anthology didn't end up working because the editor changed his mind basically and decided not to publish it. So I was like, this story got accepted two times. It can be accepted again in French. I don't know if you say that in English, but never two without tree. That's the saying we have in French. It sounds weird in English. Anyway, I was like, okay, it can be published again. So what I did is I searched on Google and I searched post-poc short story submission, something like that, or fiction submission, something like that. And I started scrolling through the result I got. Usually I always use the submission grinder to find a place to submit my stories, but with this one, I had checked the submission grinder a lot, and I was like, okay, maybe I can see something else. So I did that, found an anthology that would have been perfect. My story would have fit perfectly in it, but the submission period was ended. Sadly. I also found three other markets that I never had submitted to. I think either token payment or non-paying, but I was like, at this point, like I've been paid a professional rate for the story. Now I want it to be published, so I submitted it to those three markets, and I submitted the new flash fiction story I talked about in last episode to four new markets too. Since the last episode, I also received six rejections on my short stories. So five for the new flash fiction that I just told you about, and one for the ghost post epoch. But I also received a good news, and oh my god, that feels so good. It was like finally a little glimmer of something good. I really felt good after all those rejections to just get something. So it's not an acceptance, but it was an R for this ghost epoch short story. And it was an easy R. Like it was just some bigger stuff, really easy to edit. They wanted me to add a chapter for the ending, which I had previously written, taken out because I wanted to keep it under 5,000 words because most markets accept up to 5,000 words. So I was like, I want to increase my chance of getting it published, so I'm going to lower my word count. But this market publishes above 5,000 words. So I was like, okay, I can add in my ending chapter which shows the character after the resolution. I really like it. And I actually rewrote, I did that this morning. I actually rewrote the ending to make it more in the moment. So the version I had written years ago was more of an overview ending, and now I really put it in the moment. So actually, I think it's a really stronger scene than what I've previously written, but with the same notion about it. So I did that this morning. I submitted to them. So I hope by the next episode, or maybe in a few episodes, I hope that I will be able to announce that this story is getting published and shared links so you can finally, finally read it. And if it's that magazine that it's accepted in, a good thing about it it's a free magazine online, so there will be no barrier for you to go and experience this story. So that's a good thing about this market. And I really love the vibe of the magazine. I read a bit of what they published, really enjoy the vibe of the magazine, so I feel also like the story would be a good fit in it. So we'll see what happens, but that's a good news. And oh my god, does it feel good to have a good news coming? So it had been since November that I got my last acceptance. And if this one is accepted, it's my third acceptance total for 15 years of writing. So it does feel good. Anyway, all that also to say that sometimes you just need to keep on submitting. If you want to have those, yes. So this story I will have submitted to 65 markets. So if it gets published now, like it will be 65 markets total who I had to submit it to before it found a place. Now it could have found a place sooner, but you know, I just already shared that. But anyway, this career is by no means linear. Anyway, so that's about it for the short story side of things. Now for my novel. Since last episode, I finished rewriting three scenes according to the draft pass that I'm doing right now. So if you go back and listen to the past episode, I've been stuck on one scene for multiple weeks. I'm happy to report that finally I'm progressing again. And I had to stop a bit with the scenes just because I've started applying the mice quotient in the mystery boxes way of analyzing a story and plotting a story. So I think the subject of the next episode is going to be this My Scotion and Mystery Boxes, because this is a tool in craft that's super interesting. And since I learned that, I really like to see it that way. The mystery box is to keep the reader reading because the reader always has a question in his mind that is unresolved. And the MyScotion is about satisfying the reader. So, anyway, I'll do a whole episode about that because that's super interesting. Probably coming up. I don't know next week, but probably next episode. So I started doing that, finished four scenes. Life is still crazy. We have only one week of craziness left. Thank God for that. Thank myself and my partner too for that. So next week I should be able to start writing more regularly. And I don't know with the recording what it will look like because the kids will be with me basically all the time all summer. But they have been getting better at playing by themselves because they are older, of course. So I might be able to sneak in a little podcast episode here and there. So we'll see for the publishing schedule of the podcast for the summer. But one thing's certain, I will be able to write more regularly, which I hope will translate in this draft pass moving along further because I'm only at scene six, and I have no idea how I'm going to be able to not only finish this draft pass, but I have another one to do after that before I submit the scenes to my agent. The good thing is that that next draft pass, I don't need to finish it all before I start submitting to my agent, which is something I had just forgotten. So this is making me panic less. Because I only have one draft pass to go for the entire draft before I start submitting scenes to my agent, which makes it more possible that I do start sending her scenes this summer, which is the goal. Would really love to submit this novel to editors in the fall. This is the goal. We'll see what happens, but this is the goal, and with more time, it should be easier to make that goal. So that's about it for my update in writing since last episode. So now we'll go to the topic part of the episode. So, like I said, the topic came from a question on Instagram, and I really feel like this is a question we all ask at some point, and it's a good thing to really consider the path. So there is traditional publishing, indie publishing, and self-publishing. All of this a caveat. This is what I've picked up from 15 years of being in this industry, of watching other people, listening to other people, seeing writers publish in every one of those route. But as always, with anything in life, do your own research too. Go seek out the information for yourself, too. This podcast episode, I want it as just a beginning for you of what you need to think about, what you need to research before you can make a decision for yourself. So just wanted to say that upfront. And the way that I've gathered through the years is that traditional publishing is when you get published by a big five publisher. These are the big ones that have the most money to put in, that you absolutely need an agent to submit to the big five. You cannot submit on your own, except there was Berkeley, who did open submission to everyone, I think one or two times maybe, but that's really not the norm with traditional publishing. You really need an agent to get into traditional publishing. Then there was indie publishing. So this will be defined as when you're being published. And again, indie is sometimes being used to mean self-publishing, because some authors who are publishing themselves have an imprint, which is a good decision, I think, to make as a business. And so they call themselves indie publisher. This is not a wrong way to see it, this is just one version of the word that could be used. But the way I'm talking about it, because in my genre, particularly, and again, I'm talking a lot about the genre that I know, which is horror. Indie publishing means being published by a small press. So those press, usually you can submit your novel directly. You don't necessarily need an agent to submit to those imprints. You can submit to indie press, small press with an agent, too. This is something we have done with my book. This is something that's possible. Depending on the genre you're writing in, this could be a really good way to get started. A really, really good way. I've seen many horror writers start out with indie publishing, starting with small presses and slowly working their way up to a traditional deal, to a big five book deal. They started either with or without an agent, got an agent, and finally managed to publish in traditional publishing with the big five. This is a path that could be a good option for you, especially if your book is how can I say this? Maybe it touches on an issue that's maybe the big publisher won't risk publishing. So sometimes small publisher will take risks on a really good book that maybe you could say, ah, that could be harder to sell, but oh my god, that's so good. An indie publisher, a small press will maybe take the chance. And I've heard, I'm sorry that I don't remember the author, but I've heard multiple authors talk in podcasts about the publishing journey. They started with a small press who absolutely loved their book. The big publisher didn't want it, but the small press was like, we love this. And even though the sales number tends to be really lower with indie publisher and small presses, and usually the advance also will be way smaller or even sometimes inexistent, there could still be an advantage to having this route just because with those small presses, there tends to be a readership who really loves what a particular press is doing, the type of books that they are publishing. And usually because it's smaller, the team is way more ends-on with you, you get a big collaboration. That's what I've heard again. I haven't lived it personally, but that's what I've heard that you get more of a say into what happens. I've heard authors say that they had more of a say in what their cover were, their title. This is the type of thing that you sometimes will have with traditional publishing that I've heard, but that you can also not have at all with traditional publishing, tends to be more present with small presses. So there are definitely advantages to small presses, but I think it depends on the genre too. So do your research with your genre to see if this is an option that's available. But I don't really see it as another decision that you gotta take when you have your first book in your hand. Except if that's what you want. And if your goal is just to publish one book, you don't really want this to be your career, you know that what you wrote is a little bit different than what you read with big publishers, maybe a small press is the perfect way for you to go. Especially if you've read a lot of books by your small press, you love what they do, you feel like what you wrote really aligns with what they are doing, go right in and go directly that route. But if you want to make a career as a writer, which is the angle I always have with this podcast, I think the decision will really be between traditional publishing and self-publishing. So that's why that's all I will say about Envy Publishing. If you want to know more, again, do your research and you will find plenty of information. Podcast episode, YouTube video, article online, you will find it all. The information is all there. But for the remainder of the episode, I will really focus more on traditional publishing versus self-publishing because this is really a decision you actively need to make, because you will need to actively pursue one or the other. Now, first, I want to break like something that I've heard say and that I don't like, that I don't agree with. And it's the notion that you cannot choose traditional publishing. You can only choose self-publishing because you're doing it actively versus traditional publishing. There's people who need to say yes to you. At least two different people need to say yes to you. It's way more than that from my personal experience. A lot of people need to say yes to you before you're traditionally published. But that doesn't mean that you cannot choose that route. You choose it by deciding this is what I want to do, and I'm going to do it, and I'm going to be published there. I don't know when, I don't know with which book, I don't know exactly how it's going to look like, but I'm going to pursue this until it works. This is a decision you can take. And deciding to self-publish because it doesn't work with traditional publishing, it's still the decision that you need to take. And when you do that, you still remove that book from the possibility of it being traditionally published. Yes, there are books that were self-published. We then got a book deal, a lot of them. We see more and more of them. But the only moment that happens is when the book was super, super, super, super successful. So you need to have a lot of success in self-publishing before you can translate that same book to traditional publishing. This is not the norm. And I don't think you should take your decision based on something that's not the norm. You should not self-publishing thinking maybe it's going to be a big success, and then I will have a traditional book deal if your goal is to have a traditional book deal. That's the only caveat to this. Like, yes, it happens, and I will talk more about the different ways you can build a career in both paths, which is called hybrid author, which is amazing. There are beautiful examples of this in the publishing world. But the way this conversation is built, the way the information I'm giving you right now is built is for your first book. When you're starting to write your first book, you want to publish your first book, or you haven't published any book and you have a new book in front of you and you want to decide how do I publish this, you need to take that decision between do I want it traditionally published or self-published. And if you keep on trying traditional publishing, this is my I'm basing my whole life on this belief that if you keep on trying, you keep on learning, you keep on writing books, you will eventually get traditionally published. This is just my core belief in life. Maybe I'm wrong, but this is just I've seen it happen often enough with people I was following online who finally got their book deals after years of trying, after writing so many books, querying so many agents, and who ended up getting a career in publishing. I've seen in enough time to know that it happens, and it's not because you've written five books, queried five books, had five books died on submission that you'll never be published. Like I saw it often enough to know that it happens. Also, I didn't think I would say that now, but it just feels right. No matter which path you choose, there are difficulties in either path. Yes, you can decide tomorrow, I'm going to self publish my book. And if your goal is only to have your book available for reader, yes, you are guaranteed to attain your goal. But again, if your goal is to have a career in publishing and make enough money to support you through. Through publishing, it's the part where success isn't guaranteed or easier in either path. Let's say it that way. Success isn't easier in either path. Because traditional publishing, what's hard is starting, what's hard is getting published. But even then, like once you have your one book out, success is still not guaranteed because times have changed, and long are gone the time where a publisher would invest in a writer, publish 10 books out of them without them being bestsellers. You know, if your sales goes down, that's just again the throat. It can get harder and harder to publish books, but it can still happen. And you can always, I've seen it again, you can always write under a pen name and then submit again. Riley Seeger, I think, is the biggest example of a flourishing career that was based off of just using a pen name because the agent was super tired of his previous book sale determining the deal he would have or the print money would have when she knew that her book, I think it was a a women agent. Like I'm not one interpreture, super sure there. But their agent saw the potential, saw that there was a place for Riley Seeger's book to be big in the market, but they were always being lowered. The advanced were lower, the print one were lower because of the previous book. So the agent said, let's just change your name. We'll just submit under a different name. I will not tell the editor who is behind that book. We're debuting you again, and then boom, like Riley Seeger has this amazing career. So this is something that's possible too. You can switch genre. There are so many possibilities to keep having a career in traditional publishing. But it's as hard in self-publishing. Like it's not because you have one book do really, really well in self-publishing that you're certain that every single book you pop out there will be big too. Like there is work to be done in either path. And success and maintaining success will be a challenge in either path. So I'm saying this because I think sometime when we're deciding between traditional publishing and self-publishing, we can sometimes think which path will be easier, which path will come with the least challenge, which path will guarantee me success in any way, shape, or form. And it's just not something that happens. There is challenges in both paths. So that's why I want to take this off the table as not something that will help you decide which path to take. And again, other thing that you shouldn't consider, there are so many things that are exactly the same between each path. You still need to do a lot of learning. So if you want to traditionally publish, you need to learn a lot about how to query, what it takes to have a good query, good first pages, research agent, what makes a good agent. There's all of your learning involved in just the publishing. But if you decide to self-publish, you shouldn't just put your book on Amazon. You should do your research to know, okay, what works with covers, what should I do? There is lots of things to be learned also to self-publish, and again, in the optic of having success. So boat route, you need to do a lot of learning. Boat route, you need to write the best book you possibly can. This is non-negotiable. Yes, if your book is less good, you will be capable of still publishing it with self-publishing. But you need the book to be good so that readers, when they read it, they leave a good review, they recommend it to people around them, they talk about it. It's important, it's part of the marketing. If you write a bad book, the chances that it's going to be a big success are really lower than when you write a really good book. For example, The Martian was self-published, became this big success. Why? Because it was really, really, really good. People were reading it, telling their friends, you gotta read that thing on the internet. That's so good. And it went like that. So writing the best book possible is non-umptional with traditional publishing. It's getting really competitive to be traditionally published. You gotta write the very, very best book that you can. But it's also really important in self-publishing. In the boat route, you need to know the market you're getting in. You need to read a lot of books that are published in the market that you're going in. So if you want to be traditionally published, you need to read a lot of traditionally published books recent in your genre. Same thing with self-publishing. So this is the thing that's the same with both. You will also need to do your own marketing, no matter which spot you go in. Yes, for traditional publishing, there is marketing done in-house. The number of that marketing will change a lot depending on if you're a lead title or not, how big your advance is, that will all influence the marketing that you have as a traditionally published author. But you will still need to do your own marketing. This is absolutely you have to do it no matter which way you will go. And what you will need to is patience. Yes, in both places. Because even if you can publish your book tomorrow as a self-published author, again, before you can have a career, I'm thinking the time could be similar. Maybe not always. Sometimes success happens overnight, yes, but the majority of the time it still takes some time before a career builds up, and you can really have that career. So a notion of patience will be required in both route. Although, let's be fair, there is definitely more patience required in traditional publishing, if only because there is part where you cannot do anything. Like when you're waiting for agents to respond to you, when you're waiting on editors to respond to your agent, when you're waiting on your contracts to be signed, which can be really, really long, when you're waiting on your book to be published, all of this is super long and there's nothing you can do except write the next book. Whereas in self-publishing, there is action you can take to propel yourself either in the process of publishing or marketing that book or writing the next book. So definitely a lot of patience required in traditional publishing, but again, it doesn't mean that self-publishing everything is instant. You need to build your readership. Either path for this is the same. And this is the part where maybe traditional publishing has a hopper hand into the readership because just the fact that your book is published by traditional publisher, it will be in some bookstore. Again, the number will depend on how big your book is in the eyes of the publisher, but it will have some visibility because it's traditionally published that you will not have as a self-published. So it will help with selling copies. But it's not always so much copies as you may think, but it's still more copies on the get-goes that you will have self-publishing, especially when you're starting from zero, which is again the point of view of this episode is when you start with nothing. So now that I've covered everything that shouldn't come into your decision about traditionally publish or self-publishing, what should you use as a way to decide which route is the best for you? Which route is the more aligned for you. So first go see what it's like to be published either traditionally or being self-published. Go see what it's actually like. So you can do that by listening to podcast episodes. So there used to be less podcasts about traditionally published author. There is more and more. And those I know plot twist podcasts, of course, caveat, those are two big authors. So this will not reflect the life of every single traditionally published author. Absolutely not. But it still gives a good idea of what it's like, their relationship with the editor and everything. There's Deadline City, they are not releasing podcast episodes right now, but they used to be. There is Right Where It Hurts. I will link to all of those in the show notes. So they're right where it hurts. Those are two, I want to say mid-list authors, but I'm not totally sure. But they are traditionally published authors, and they talk about what it's like to be a traditional published author. There's also publishing rodeo, which was another really interesting one about traditionally published authors. And what's fun about this one is the point of view, they talk also with other traditionally published authors, and it's the point of view of two writers who debuted in the same year with the same publisher, but one got a really big advance and the other one not. And you see how that impacted both of their careers because of the advance that they had at the beginning. So it's really interesting, also, and I think it's important to know what it looks like from success and also from less success because you don't know where you will fall into all of that. And I don't think you should go about it thinking it's going to go badly, but also it's important to know the reality of the industry you're going in. So you can listen to podcast episodes, you can check. There is Rachel Aaron also who has ink in your veins. She's an eyebrow author, so she talks about the perspective from both paths, but also she has this other part of her podcast, which are called the Black Aaron episodes, and she talks with Asha Black, which is a really successful self-published author. And so you could see also with that what it looks like to be self-publishing. So listen to those podcast episodes, follow authors on social media, read about what it's like they in a life of a traditionally published author versus a self-published author, and do a bit of research on each path to know what it takes. All of that to help you to see what it's really like when you're published in one way or the other, and then try to visualize yourself in the life of the traditionally published author and the self-published author. Now, if it excites you to work with a theme, to have your cover designer say, This is the cover we made for you, and you find that really exciting that there's a team working with you, that might be a sign that it's a good idea for you to traditionally publish. But if giving your book in the ends of other people and having them take basically all the decisions, if that's something that frustrates you, you really need control with that, then maybe the self-publishing would be a better route for you. And also, if you decide to go with self-publishing, it doesn't mean that you need to do everything yourself, but it needs to be exciting for you to hire your cover designer, hire your book designer, find the ways, okay, which platform to publish, which would be the best, which format do I want to publish in. All of this needs to be really exciting to you. And that was part of the decision for me was that this business side of publishing wasn't exciting to me at all. What was exciting to me was the idea that I would have professional who works in this working with me on my book to then put it on the market. That was exciting to me. The idea of having to figure it out myself and at least be like the project manager of everything wasn't super exciting to me. So this is already something that will help you decide a lot because you need to be excited about the path that you want to pursue. And also visualizing you in a day in the life of a traditionally published author seemed really more exciting to me than a day in the life of a self-published author who needed to deal with whatever new thing Amazon was doing, whatever, you know, that that wasn't so exciting to me. There's also, and I got this from NK Jemison. I will try to find back the post and link it in the show notes. But she talked about the decision as because you always need to trade something. And she talked about you need to decide what's more important to you, money or time. And I see it in two ways. So there's a notion of time versus money before the books get published, and there's a notion of time versus money after the book gets published. So what NK Jemison was saying is that now she's published. Her books are out there. She preferred giving up a part of her money as in royalties, because the royalties are lower with traditional publishing than they are with self-publishing. She was happy to give out a big portion of the money that she was making on each book to the team working with her through a traditional publisher in order to get more time dedicated to the books. Because this is a reality. Although both needs to do marketing, there is a big portion of your time as a self-published author who will be dedicated to the publishing side of things. So if you rather spend your time, although you will not spend all of your time just writing as a traditionally published author, as a self-published author, you will have to spend your time doing a lot more than just writing. So if it's something, if it even if it's just like project management of working with other people to get your book published, if time has more value to you, time dedicated to your writing and to other things too, because you can spend the exact same amount of time writing as a traditionally published author or a self-published author, but you could then have your time to do other things, to have a slower rhythm of life if you are a traditionally published author versus a self-published author on that front. But there is a lot of self-published authors who say, I don't care putting in all the time to get my book published. I want the maximum amount of money per copy sold possible. This is my money, this is my work, this is my IP, I want it all. And that's a not all, but the majority of it. And that's a really respectful way to see things too, in this regard of saying, I rather have more of my money and give away more of my time. And in my case, just like in Kate Jamison, I really prefer long time to give away a portion of my money to keep more of my time. This is also for me, like when looking long term in a publishing career. This is a trade I'm super happy to do. But there is also a notion of time versus money when you're starting your publishing journey. And it's not in what you're ready to give up, but it's what you have available. If you want to have the biggest chance of self-publishing, you will need to invest out of your pocket a lot of money. Because to publish a quality book, you will need to invest money in it. Money for editing, proofreading, copy, design, cover, you will need to do all of those things, and all of those cost money. And you will probably need to invest in multiple books before you start having a return on your investment. Because the number you get, even if you get the majority of the royalties when you self-publish, the amount that you'll get per copy sold will not cover the costs at first. It will be true having a readership. So I knew right away that I didn't knew, I it was just a fact of life. I didn't have thousands of dollars to invest in publishing multiple books before I can get money coming back. And the money that I did have and that I still have, I rather I really more enjoy spending it on vacation with the people I love, traveling with the people I love, than in publishing my book and then having to do all that is implied with self-publishing. Again, for me, all of those components work together. I prefer the life of a traditionally published author. I prefer the three-duff at the end of having more time versus more money. I prefer the life of a traditionally published author, and right now I don't have the money to invest in publishing multiple quality books before I get a return on investment. So for me, upfront, it would have been a challenge to come up with the money to even publish. For some people, maybe you have a partner who supports you really well and that gives you the funds necessary. Maybe you have money from your family, maybe you have a really high-paying job that you can allow yourself to work less or you can accommodate the time that it takes to self-publish, and you have the funds necessary to fund your book and to publish your book. If that's an option for you, then of course self-publishing becomes more interesting for you. But if it's not the case, if you don't have those funds and you cannot see a way that you can have them, the big advantage of traditional publishing is the publisher makes the investment in you and they pay you to publish your book. The number of the advance will vary a lot, but they are the one who takes the financial risk you don't. That's why it's so competitive, that's why so few get chosen because it is an investment either for agent or for publishing house. It's a risk taking on a new author. That's why it's so hard to get in. But once you get in, then you're the one who gets money right away and you don't have to take any financial risks. So if money is an issue for you, of course, traditional publishing becomes more of a room that's interesting just because it's an opportunity for you to make money and it doesn't allow you to get into even more stress financially, this option. But what I did have, not in excess, but what we frankly all have is time. So I could invest time in my writing, even not knowing it would work or not. This is a time that I was happy to invest in learning about publishing, writing the best book that I can. And I knew that I had years in front of me to keep on trying. This is something I could dedicate to my publishing right now, whereas money was not something I really had that much to invest into publishing. So these are all the things to consider when you're choosing traditional publishing versus self-publishing. And this is a book-by-book decision, and I think this is something we all need to remember. Of course, there is a big learning curve of learning either traditional publishing or self-publishing. So, of course, it's not like easy like that. I'm going to switch sides. But if you've been trying self-publishing for years and the sales are not like the way that you want them to be, and you don't seem to be reaching the readers, you can always say, Okay, this book, I'm going to try to traditionally publish it. It is a possibility. It's also a possibility that you've been publishing traditionally for years and it's not really getting you what you want, and you want to try out self-publishing, you absolutely can too. You're never married to a path. And there is also a way to marry. Like there is many stories like Brendan Sanderson started as a traditionally published author, founded his company, and now he self-published a lot of his books. I'm not sure if it's all of his books, but he self-published a lot. He does Kickstarter, he's doing really well. There are other authors who started with traditional publishing and then moved to self-publishing, like Rachel Aaron. She's an example of that, where she does both depending on the project, depending on what makes sense. She even has, and it's if it's something that you plan on doing or you think you could do at some point. Be sure that you discuss it with your agent before signing with them. There are agents who are super open to the hybrid model and will be super happy for you to help you do that. There are other agents who maybe are less open to that, so you need to know it. But for example, Rachel Aaron, I know that she has some of her traditionally published books that aren't available worldwide in English because of the deal that the publisher bought, and she self-publishes the version of the book, the ebook, in the other territory. So this is something that's possible. You could self-publish your audiobook. I think Rachel did that, although I'm not sure. But you can be an hybrid this way into balancing some other rights, could be self-published. I've seen self-published authors getting an agent for certain types of rights that they wanted an agent to help them with. But their ebooks, they decided right away I will always keep on self publishing my ebooks. But for I don't know, audiobooks, I want an agent to deal with this. So there is so many possibilities of what you could do with your career long term. So So it's not really about all of that at day one. I think at day one, it's really what excites you, what you would like your career to be, what you're able to invest in your publishing right now, and what you want long term. Those should be the things that determine which path you decide to have. But what I know is it never should be out of anger or spite at traditional publishing not working that you decide to self-publish. And either way shouldn't be like that, too. Because, like I said, succeed isn't more guaranteed with one path or the other. So it should always come out of the love for the publishing path that you want to be a part of. That should be what drives your decision at the end of the day, and not just, oh, I think this will be easier or I'm done with this. Like I've seen author not having success in traditional publishing, not getting an agent and deciding to self-publish. And it, I'm not saying it's a bad thing, it's a really great thing, but when it's done as a business decision, as uh I think my book could work, I believe in my book, and I'm going to learn what it takes, and it's an empowering decision. It's what it needs to be, because it can be because like traditional publishing didn't work, and you decide, no, I want this book out and I'm going to publish it. But it has to be an empowering decision. Because if your book doesn't work in the traditional path, it doesn't mean it will never get published. Like right now, we still don't know the end of the story. Maybe my book will be published. My first book. I'm still waiting to hear from editors. So there could still be a book deal in my horizon. But if it doesn't work, I don't intend to self-publish my first book. I will just keep it in the virtual drawer, and we will wait, my agent and me, for me to publish other books, and then we will take it out, and maybe it could be part of a two-book deal at some point. I know this book will be published because I still believe in it. I still think it's good. It still reflects my brand as a writer. The only reason is I think it could be harder in the market right now, but we never know. Something could happen, and baby book becomes super big, and people want baby horror books all of a sudden, and then boom, we can get it out and maybe snap the market. This is something I've heard too. I've heard of a writer who had the book, tried to traditionally publish it, couldn't get an agent, I think, even with because they were saying, like, okay, this particular genre, no editors want it right now. We cannot sell it, so we'll not represent you. And then she waited on it a few years, and then she saw that there was this big demand that was coming up for this particular genre, which I'm sorry, I don't remember, and I don't remember who that was. I'm so sorry. But she saw a demand growing for that particular book type of book, the this particular genre, and she said, let me try again. So she re-queried it, and I think really fast she found an agent, and really fast they went to the market and they published it. She said she didn't edit the book, like it was just waiting on the market, being at the right spot for this book. If traditional publishing doesn't work, if you don't get an agent, if you don't get a book deal with one of your books, it doesn't mean it will never get a deal. Sometimes it's just about awaiting on that book. I remember also Laura Zatz from Print Run Podcatch, which is another great podcast to listen to. She had one author who had a vampire book. And for years she waited because the market did not want anything to do. Like, no editor wanted to touch a vampire story with a 10-foot stick. Like no one wanted to touch it, but she was like, I know the market will turn around. I know at some point this book is absolutely amazing. It got vampired, but it's so, so, so good. And she waited until the market was ready for it, and then boom, she sold it. So there is never an expiration date on your books. So if you really want to traditionally publish and it doesn't work, it doesn't mean that your book will not get published. So just something to keep in mind also about the debate of deciding to self-publish because traditionally published doesn't work. So that's it for me with the topic for this episode. So I have my newsletter that you can subscribe to when my short story gets published. I don't know when, and I'm not sure where, but when it does, it will be the first place. Then I will send the link to read the story. 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