Out of curiosity, I looked up how many books are published in a year.

Although I received an online Kirkus Review (starred!) a few months ago, the review is now appearing in the official Jan 2025 edition of Kirkus Reviews.

The novel has been shortlisted for the Reedsy Discovery Editor's choice award! (UPDATE: But did not win.)

On November 20, 2024, my novel A Life Full of Quarks reached #3* on Amazon!...

*..in the niche category of "absurdist fiction."

You can’t just launch a novel and assume the world will find its way to your door, or even to your cash register. You have to advertise, and part of advertising is giving readers a good reason to plunk down their money to read your story.

In principle, you can slap a book onto Amazon, add a few search terms, and then sit back for the profits to roll in. In practice, given there are many thousands of books published each year, you have to gain attention for your book. This is doubly so for self-published authors. And this is the most painful part for me.

I had written, and rewritten, and edited and polished my novel. Now it was time to move towards actual publication. 

This is my story towards self-publishing.  If you are thinking of self-publishing your book, it may be helpful, though it will likely not be exactly the same path.  There are many, many websites which offer services at almost every level for writers.