Indie Publishing in 2023

My Humble Observations

It's tough to keep up with the latest trends in indie publishing. One minute it's AI-generated literature, and the next it's holographic books. I’m not a fan of hopping on “the latest thing.” I have never been an early adopter of anything. Not even the iPhone. That being said, it’s important to keep up with what’s going on. That way, when a trend picks up steam, you can hop aboard.

If you write and publish books, let’s look at a few things that might affect your business plans in 2023.

AI in fiction

I’ve already spoken on this a bit. Just a bit :)

And the consensus from authors, at least from the ones I follow on Twitter, ranges from “Hell no, not ever! I won’t be your friend anymore if you use it!” to a more tempered “Meh, it seems like more bother than it’s worth.”

In terms of fiction, like I said in my video, the technology isn’t there just to press a few buttons and have the AI spit out a passable novel. But if you use rapid-release as a publishing model, using AI to generate your outlines and help shore up your description could help you write faster.

It won’t do it for you. And it definitely won’t write in your unique voice. But keep an eye out for ways it can help you write faster or better, or if it can just help you stay organized.

Rapid release publishing

Some genres like Romance have “whale readers.” Meaning those chicks (mostly) can read an enormous amount of books in a month and their appetite is almost unceasing. Tap into what they like, and you can clean up nicely if they know you’ll be releasing a book every month.

Alternatively, you could go with fast-paced serial fiction, which is becoming popular with readers who want bite-sized chunks of story that they can read on their commute or during their lunch break at work. Kindle Vella is the ideal platform for serials if you don’t imagine getting a whole book out every month is quite your style.

That being said, I have heard some readers grumble a bit about the Vella interface, so it might be worth it to do some market research before you dive in.

Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) and Authors

If you're familiar with Amazon's Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP), then you probably know that it's the most popular self-publishing platform in the world. Not publishing on Amazon is a rare decision for an indie author, as they’re the powerhouse.

KDP offers Kindle Select, which makes your ebooks exclusive to Amazon for three months at a time. You have the opportunity to unenroll your books in the program every 90 days. Recently, more authors have been unenrolling their books.

Why? Because Amazon did two things: reduced the per-page payout to authors… and raised the price for readers.

Dick move, Amazon. Dick move.

While enrolling books in KU has been a safe bet for many authors, starting this year, it may be worth looking around to see if going wide would be better in the long run.

Conclusion

The future of independent publishing is a bright one. I have never been so glad I decided to publish my own books back in 2015 and sometimes I get confused when new authors start looking for an agent. But to each their own.

For those of us making our own way in the sea of new books released every day, I’d say the future is still bright and I’m enjoying the ride.

How about you?