For years, since I started publishing in the small press in 2006, I absolutely abhorred the idea of self-publishing. I really thought that if someone else cannot see the quality in your work then it must be pretty terrible.
After being an editor for many years of various small press zines it was easy to back that knowledge up. Having to read gobs and gobs of poetry that did not move me a millimeter was tough and often left me less likely to want to produce any work myself, let alone self publish.
Enter my friend Josh Olsen's book "Such a Good Boy" which he made on Createspace (an Amazon company). I have yet to order the book but I know his work always stands up to a certain credibility so I will be ordering it. I was curious the process for Createspace so I looked it up. It is pretty simple. You upload the work and the cover art, you choose how much you want to sell it for and if you want it to be available as an e-book (you get higher royalty) and if you want it available internationally. They even give you a calculator that will show you exactly in each form how much royalty you will get for each book. I was pretty impressed. The best thing is that they will set up space for you in their online stores so all you have to do is drop links.
I have been contemplating putting out several books this way. In the last three years I could give a hot steamy crap about being published and getting semi-not-really famous. I gave up on the game so to speak, but I would like to have collected works available to friends and family that want them. The cool thing is that I don't have to promote them if I don't want to or I can try and make a little money. Either way, I'm not out money or any significant amount of time.
I'm pretty sure the first book I will be working on is one called "Reasons for Never Sitting Still" and it will have this cover:
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