/lit/ - Literature

>>20391773
I've published 3 books through KDP and advertised them all here, which is what I suspect many anons in /wg/ plan to do. Whether or not it's "worth it" depends on what you're hoping for:
>Profit
That's gonna be a solid no. I've sold two digital copies, and moved about 25 free units. For a total of $4.12, after spending $60 on advertisements. Competent editing will run you at least $1000 for a novel.
>Prestige/Discussion
Also no. Unless you already have a social media presence, like Waldun or Q, or you're willing to completely debase yourself through constant shilling, nobody is going to give a shit about your book. Doesn't matter if you really manage to capture the zeitgeist of 4chan, or include a bunch of wacky memes, or give it away for free, people will just flat-out not care. Despite running ads for weeks now, I only saw one organic post about my books, and the thread died pretty quickly.
>Satisfaction
This one kinda ties back into the first two points, so I'm going to call it a no. I'm proud of my books. The prose, the plot, the characters, and the covers I designed, but the truth is that even the most diligent self-editor is never going to catch all of his own mistakes and even though I've moved on to other projects, I still find myself thinking of ways that the books could be improved.

That being said, I'd still encourage you to do it. In the process of publishing the three books (KDP is a bit trickier than you might think) I lost sight of how much work actual writing is and what an accomplishment it is to finish just a single novel. It's somewhat like the hedonistic treadmill, when I started my first novel and eventually began to realize the magnitude of what I had set out to do, it seemed impossible to ever finish the first one. I never planned to write another, let alone two more. There was a time when I looked forward to the day when I would release my first book and say "well, I finally got that out of my system" and sometimes, if I close my eyes and go back to that moment, I can look forward to the present and realize what I've accomplished, and even though it hasn't really brought me much in terms of objective success, it's a good feeling. And I don't think I would feel the same way if it were just a random word file saved somewhere on my hard drive.