Once upon a time, I received a unique request at the bookstore. A couple came in and asked us at the front if we could point them toward the worst book we had. Not the best book; not our recommendation for a six-year-old boy who loves sports but is also frightened of any sized ball in any form (not entirely based on a true story, but not entirely not true, either)—but the worst book on our shelves. My coworker had no immediate suggestions, but I thought of one almost as soon as they asked the question. And I cringed a bit as I suggested it because, for one, I do not enjoy belittling people. For another, I especially do not enjoy belittling people for something they put passion and work and imagination into. And finally, I feel even worse about belittling the work of someone who —I highly suspected—is a fellow self-published author.
But I had taken a somewhat close look at this particular book before, and I cringed then, too. For more obvious reasons. And it was without a doubt the worst book I had ever seen in the store.
The couple was thrilled.
But more to the point: what is it that made me cringe about this book?
For starters, there were multiple typos in the synopsis. And I don’t mean little, “anyone could have missed that” typos. In one instance, the word “not” was “noy.” That’s how obvious these typos were. Now, the front cover was decent enough to pique my interest, if fairly simple. But the moment I turned the book over and caught on to those typos, I was already done. Because those typos showed me the author didn’t care enough about professionalism and craft to hire an editor, or at the very very absolute least, to give the text a good second glance.
The second atrocity? Even just a quick flip through the pages revealed to me that the entire book was formatted in double-space.
…I’m sorry, WHAT????
Not only does that show me the author didn’t know enough about the business of publishing to save themselves some money on the printing costs, but it also shows me they haven’t read enough books to get even a general idea of how they are typically formatted. Which tells me they have a limited experience with books. Which tells me they have a limited experience with stories. Which tells me they are equally limited with storytelling experience. And frankly, any person who clearly hasn’t read enough books to know how they are formatted is a person whose books I do not want to read.
I could probably have taken a closer look at this book and given you more, but it’s gone now. And as the couple pointed out to me before they left: Hey, weirdly enough, I actually helped that author sell a book. So I shouldn’t feel too bad, I suppose.
But I’m going to level with you: you could probably successfully self-publish a book without a fancy degree. You could probably successfully self-publish a book without having attended writer’s workshops, or shelled out 1,000+ dollars to hire a professional editor, or been writing books since you were seven. But you cannot expect serious readers to take you seriously as an independent author if you clearly do not know what you’re doing.
Your book does not have to suck. Whether or not you can even afford schooling and / or editors has no bearing on your capabilities here. You learn about story structure and format by reading books; you test your learning skills by giving your avid reader friends and family the finished manuscript and asking for feedback; you make a cover by commissioning a friend or relative with graphic design experience, or at the absolute minimum examining other covers from the same genre and seeing what they have in common, and then mucking around with Microsoft PowerPoint; you edit by looking through your text over and over again until you feel cross-eyed. And when you’re too tired to do more, you ask a friend or a relative to help you check for mistakes. And if you can’t make that happen—and even if you can—paste the text into virtually any word processing app and have the computer check for you. Because even a machine is better than no effort at all.
Self-publishing has come a long way. What used to be frowned upon as a vanity press surrogate where people who couldn’t make a book worth someone’s while—and /or didn’t want to put in the vast amounts of work it actually takes to write a good story—could pay money to have it printed anyway, is now a (mostly) respected outlet where talented people who, for whatever reason might be overlooked by publishing houses or else just want to keep their creative freedom thank you very much, can have their stories be seen. But it’s books like the one described in this post that remind us all why self-publication is still frequently sneered at.
Don’t be that author.
You don’t have to be.
Night Owls, what is the worst book you have ever read? What made it so bad?
