Two Deals, a Pandemic, and a Drawer Full of Fears
Jun 14, 2026
I didn’t set out to self-publish. I set out to land a traditional book deal like a normal person.
For a while, it looked like that was exactly what would happen. I had two deals. Two. And both fell apart, the second one quietly swallowed by a pandemic and a publishing industry that was doing some soul-searching of its own. I understood. I was also furious. I put the book proposal and my manuscript in a drawer and told myself I was “taking time to reflect.” What I was actually doing was eating a lot of chocolate, watching a lot of sports, and avoiding the document entirely.
A few years later, I started paying attention to what self-publishing actually looked like in 2024. Not the vanity press horror stories from 2003. The real version, where authors control their covers, their timelines, their rights, and their royalties. I have a marketing background. I’ve run a business. I’ve managed teams and budgets and client expectations. I kept waiting for the part where self-publishing would seem beyond me.
It didn’t come. Which meant I was out of excuses and had to get honest about what was actually going on.
The truth was simpler than I wanted it to be. What I was afraid of had nothing to do with traditional or self-publishing. I was afraid nobody would read my book. And more than that, I was afraid somebody would, and they’d decide I was a terrible writer who wasted their time.
I’m still afraid of that, for the record. The book is at the printer anyway.
The other fear was my family, specifically my oldest son, who is woven into the story in ways that matter. Not that I’d hurt his feelings exactly, but that I’d crack open things he might not necessarily want aired. That one took longer to work through.
The thing that finally moved me was simple. This is my story. Not his. Mine. He’ll have plenty to say about his own life someday, and I hope he does. But this part, the part about who I was and what I eventually figured out, that one belongs to me.
So I pulled the trigger. Of course, “doing it yourself” in self-publishing is a relative term. There's a designer, a photographer, a line editor, beta readers, and ARC readers incoming. Self-publishing just means the buck stops with me. I am very familiar with that arrangement.
The book is out later this summer. I’m terrified. It’s fine.