Lessons from 23 Years as a Self-Publishing Novelist | Jane Friedman

My agent, Joe, had guided me through endless rewrites and three rounds of submissions to publishers in New York and producers in Hollywood. We had some serious nibbles-big name editors took me to lunch, and over one weekend in April 1998, 26 producers read the manuscript in advance of an anticipated auction of the movie rights-but we never got an offer. Joe was willing to work with me on one last rewrite, believing we still had a chance of getting a million-dollar payday. But I had reached my limit. I was flat broke and my wife and children had had more than enough. My dream of literary stardom had cost them plenty.

I formatted the book, got an ISBN number, designed a cover, and somehow convinced a local printer to print 5,000 copies on credit. The printer released a few hundred books to me and locked away the remainder in their warehouse. The deal was that as I sold those books and paid down the bill, the printer would release the rest-in increments.