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Originally Posted by Balthazar  But I have no doubt I will be published in the traditional manner. Hubris? Me? Yeah. |
That's the spirit, mate - don't let the naysayers grind you down. It's not being arrogant to believe in yourself. Many people write "for themselves" and have no wish to be published. They're just happy writers, and more power to them. Personally, I wanted to see my book in print (and to be fair, it's not out yet so I still haven't!) and I don't think anyone should make apologies for admitting that that is their goal.
That said, there seems to be a sort of literary snobbery when it comes to POD/Self-publishing works. Some people look down on these efforts as though "they weren't good enough to get a real publising deal." It simply isn't true - as someone pointed out, there are plenty of traditionally published books out there that are utter rubbish - especially in the fantasy genre (which I'm coming to loathe as time goes on - why were Gemmell and Jordan taken from us? The world is a poorer place without them).
Conversely, there are some excellent self-published works...and, for a genre fan, self-published works are a source of never-ending joy. Me, I love action-historicals set in the classical period. There's plenty of trad-published (did I just make up a new phrase!?!) books, of course, but I've also spent many joyful hours reading the POD works. "Legion" by William Altimari springs to mind, "The Gladiator Isarna" by Sara Pacher, "Shades of Artemis" by Jon Edward Martin (Yay, Spartans!). All of these are POD books, all of them are excellent.
But...self-belief is essential if you're going to take up the gauntlet thrown down by trad-publishing. As discussed elsewhere in this forum, you're going to get knockbacks, rejections and you WILL suffer from self-doubt. I was going to bin my book - the day I made the decision to try to write something else and forget about "Gladiatrix" was the day I got an email from the publishers wanting to meet me. So - just believe in yourself and believe in your work. Listen to advice from other people by all means, but always remember that advice is another word for opinion. You go with your gut.
Best of Luck!
Russ