Without a True North: Tactical Approaches to Self-Published Fiction

Abstract

In 2007, American online retailer Amazon.com launched both the Kindle ereader device and its associated independent publishing platform Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP). In the years subsequent, the integration of KDP within the Amazon retail environment dramatically altered the digital self-publishing landscape, effectively paving the way for today's vibrant - and, at times, crassly entrepreneurial - self-published fiction communities. These communities operate in a chaotic zone of production located beyond the 'knowns' of traditional publishing. In this paper, I aim to map out some of the dominant beliefs and values extolled by successful self-published fiction authors. Over time, the fiction community around these writers have enacted various tactical approaches that specifically strive to tame their chaotic marketplace, and they have occasionally succeeded. Taken as a whole, their approach is lofty, effectively aiming to further democratise publication via increasingly sophisticated virtual and translocal scenes. In the doing, these ad-hoc communities act to geographically re-centre publishing's production hubs and foreground histories and business practices seldom discussed within the traditional book industry. Yet despite their brash commercialism, these authors desire operational autonomy, stable revenue-streams and fulfilling craft-based production within a field plagued by a disparity of capital and power.