Zen Cho

Photograph by Panorama Media/PanoramaStock/Getty Images

How to self-publish an ebook

1) Write an unsellably self-indulgent story at an awkward length. (The jabs at colonialism were as much self-indulgence as the swoony romance.)

2) Fail to sell story to romance e-publishers.

3) Self-publish as web serial and ebook.

4) ????

5) PROFIT!!! –> Note: I haven’t actually profited.

Why I did it

I wanted a “proper website” mostly because my bibliography was getting too crowded and messy on my blog sticky post. Also, I’d self-published a couple of short stories which I wanted to make available as ebooks, and I thought having an FTP I could keep ‘em on would probably look slightly better than using a free file-sharing site. I figured there was no real reason for people to visit the new website unless I offered something new to look at, and Bloomsbury Girl (previous title of The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo) was just sitting around on my hard drive doing nothing, so why not publish that as a web serial?

I also decided to publish the novella as an ebook, on the basis that in the current publishing environment “knowing how to self-publish an ebook” is probably quite a good skill for a writer to have, like taking constructive criticism and refusing to comment on reviews.

I decided to charge for the ebook instead of giving it away for free just to see if anyone would pay for it. I thought people might, because there’s actual value in having an ebook even if the story is free to read online — I mean, I’d pay US$0.99 to be able to carry a story around in my Kindle.

I set the price at US$0.99 because my aim was to get new readers. I’ve seen arguments that books are undervalued at US$0.99, but if you think about it from the perspective of a reader in a world bursting at the seams with books, an unknown book by an unknown author is worth less than US$0.99. Heck, even if it was free I’m not sure it’d be worth the effort of hitting a button so it’ll download direct to my Kindle. That would mean I’d have get up and turn the wireless setting on my Kindle back on! I haven’t even started reading the book I bought yesterday by a massively well-known author whose stories I know for certain will give me pleasure!

So I set it at US$0.99 based on what I’d do if I’d never heard of me.

How I did it

I prioritised a) decent formatting and b) a cover I found aesthetically pleasing. I succeeded on the second point and think I succeeded on the first, but do let me know if you notice anything wonky with the formatting or typos or anything like that.

The formatting

Producing an ebook was no more difficult than uploading a story to ff.net. [...]

Here is an afterword for The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo! Thank you for buying the ebook, reading, reviewing, linking, retweeting and sending feedback if you’ve done any of that, and thanks for your patience with the daily spam if you haven’t. *g*

If you’ve read the story and have a couple of minutes to spare, I’d super appreciate it if you’d add a review to its page on Smashwords, Amazon or GoodReads. I’d appreciate it whether the review was good or bad — candid reviews are the best, right? I generally find reviews pretty useful when trying out an unknown author and you never know, somebody might be looking for cheap Kindle books or something like that and decide to take a punt on Jade.

Anyway, I wanted to do an afterword after the whole thing was posted, so here it is! It will contain spoilers and so it is going under the tag. Oh, and I’m gonna do a separate post about my experience self-publishing an ebook, so look for that tomorrow.

[...]

I’m posting a section a day of my epistolary romance novella The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo. You can read it online for free here (click on the “Perilous Life of Jade Yeo” category to access the other posts), or you can buy the ebook at Smashwords or Amazon. The ebook contains the complete 23,000-word novella.

3 Seddon Street, London

Tuesday, 26th April 1921

My dearest Margery,

I’m sorry I did not tell you I was going to leave before I did it. But when Ravi came I knew I should have to make a break for it, as if I were a prisoner escaping his gaol, or I should never bring myself to do it, but be stuck at Mrs. Crowther’s forever. It was my decision to go there and I felt duty-bound to stick by it.

Well, a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, Emerson says. I think I shall work on having a great mind from now on, like yours. Ravi is consistent, but that is because he is always right about everything. It comes to him naturally, as singing does to a nightingale.

My blessed girl, thank goodness you wrote him. I shall never be able to thank you enough for the favour you did me then. I shall dedicate my next article in Milady’s Boudoir to you–it is a delicious piece on this spring’s hemlines–but that can only go a very little way towards repaying the debt.

There is another thing I have not told you, and you will quite justifiably be cross that I haven’t, but I hope you will see why it had to be done in such a hurry. [...]

I’m so blur lah — apparently ASIM 54 came out last month and I didn’t even notice. My story is in it! That’s pretty cool. The story is called The Earth Spirit’s Favourite Anecdote and is Malaysian fantasy not set in Malaysia (at least not the one we know). Some of you will have read an earlier draft of this lo these many years ago — it’s the one about an earth spirit who moves out of her parents’ place and sets up house, but finds herself having to negotiate with an annoying landlord.

Yeah, my thematic preoccupations are super deep!

The story is told in Manglish. IIRC my main influences were Manglish, hobbits, and the Legolas/Gimli relationship. If those are the kinds of things that interest you too, you can buy a copy in print, pdf, mobi or epub format at their website: Latest Issue (scroll down past ASIM 35).

Table of Contents below.

[...]

I’m posting a section a day of my epistolary romance novella The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo. You can read it online for free here (click on the “Perilous Life of Jade Yeo” category to access the other posts), or you can buy the ebook at Smashwords or Amazon. The ebook contains the complete 23,000-word novella.

Tuesday, 12th April 1921

It is eleven o’clock at night and I have crept to an armchair to write this surreptitiously. I love the feeling of writing in a dark room. One feels like a quiet busy rat, going about its business behind the walls while the humans slumber in their beds.

How cold it is! And it is April. But soon spring will start tapping on the window, thinking of coming in–then May–then warmth, and sunshine again.

I am so happy! Why do my feet and hands not glow with it, why is my hair is not all a-frizz with joy? I feel reborn–newly washed–leagues away from the wailing old misery I was yesterday. Let me try to recount this day in full, so that when I am old and my knees ache, I can read this to cheer myself up.

It was a grey day this morning. I opened my eyes and saw the window silver-beaded with rain. And it kept raining as I dressed and went down to breakfast, and went right on after: a miserly persevering plip-plip-plip, nothing like a proper tropical thunderstorm.

I prefer a storm with some self-respect, one that puts its back into storming. At home you could expect thunder like God rolling barrels across the floor of heaven, and rain like spears that knocked trees over and destroyed gardens.

I sat in my chair in the thin grey light and tried to distract myself with Anne Bronte, hating everyone. Margery for going away, and Ravi for making me love him, and my parents for being tiresomely attached to the idea of my marrying Ng Wai Cheong, and Hardie for implanting me with the worm, and Diana for not hating me. And my poor wormlet most of all, for numerous sins, none of which were in the least its fault.

I was in no mood to see my visitor when Miss Thompson told me I had one. [...]

I’m posting a section a day of my epistolary romance novella The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo. You can read it online for free here (click on the “Perilous Life of Jade Yeo” category to access the other posts), or you can buy the ebook at Smashwords or Amazon. The ebook contains the complete 23,000-word novella.

Friday, 8th April 1921

Bad news today. At breakfast Margery was looking like a squirrel that had discovered the existence of peanut butter. She leant over to me and said:

“I am rescued!”

Her sister is coming next week to take her away. Her letters have been so sprightly even Reginald has been persuaded that science cannot justify Mrs. Crowther’s keeping her.

“And besides, Cordelia misses me,” she said happily.

I smiled, but I was soggy with self-pity inside. [...]

I’m posting a section a day of my epistolary romance novella The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo. You can read it online for free here (click on the “Perilous Life of Jade Yeo” category to access the other posts), or you can buy the ebook at Smashwords or Amazon. The ebook contains the complete 23,000-word novella.

Sunday, 3rd April 1921

I dreamt of my father last night. Ma comes to me in dreams sometimes, usually to say something pointed about money or the state of my clothes, but Pa never. He wasn’t there to give advice; it was a remembering sort of dream.

Pa had just had an argument with my grandfather, and I was upset. I don’t remember what the argument was about, but I remember Pa sitting by me and explaining, as he always did whenever anything frightened me. And as always he was making everything all right again. [...]

I’m posting a section a day of my epistolary romance novella The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo. You can read it online for free here (click on the “Perilous Life of Jade Yeo” category to access the other posts), or you can buy the ebook at Smashwords or Amazon. The ebook contains the complete 23,000-word novella.

Thursday, 24th March 1921

Today we finished Pride and Prejudice. I have been reading it to Margery for the past week, though we both know it almost by heart. When I had read the last word Margery rolled over on the ottoman and sighed.

“That is my favourite love story,” she said. “Jade, what is it like to be in love?”

“What makes you think I would know?” I said.

“Why, of course you do,” Margery said. “Why else would you be having Claude?”

Margery is convinced that the baby is going to be a boy, and not only that, but that he will be a Claude. I am not persuaded on either count, but there’s no harm in letting her suppose. At any rate Claude is better than Aloysius, which was her last guess.

“Pure wantonness,” I suggested.

Margery considered this, but she shook her head.

“No, no,” she said. “You’ve been in love. I think you’re in love even now. You have the look. I’ve never been in love myself, but I know it.” [...]

I’m posting a section a day of my epistolary romance novella The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo. You can read it online for free here (click on the “Perilous Life of Jade Yeo” category to access the other posts), or you can buy the ebook at Smashwords or Amazon. The ebook contains the complete 23,000-word novella.

Monday, 14th March 1921

I have made a friend! Those of us who loved not wisely but too well are quarantined from the decent women, so there has not been much opportunity for conversation with the other half. But I was struck down by a vile cold this past week, and have only been able to creep out of my room today. I was too late for lunch, but one of the Misses took pity on me and persuaded the cook to whip something up for me.

I was gnawing doggedly on a potato, alone in the dining room, when a girl came in and sat down across the table from me. She asked if I wouldn’t mind her horning in on my bread rolls.

“Please do,” I said.

I liked the look of her at once: she had untidy brown hair, and bright dark eyes that darted as a bird’s eyes do, taking in everything about her. She looked like a nice squirrel. “Are you sure you don’t want a sardine?”

“No–the plainest possible bread. A crust would be even better, in fact,” she said, extracting one from a roll. “I have been fed on milk and fat for days. Bread and water is my idea of heaven. What is your name? I am Margery.”

“My name is Jade,” I said. I don’t tell people my real name, after the way everyone at university mangled it. It’s fortunate that my name can be translated into a name that sounds sensible in English. Imagine if I had been named Swallow, or Plum.

“That is a pretty name,” said Margery.

“So is yours,” I said courteously. “What are you in for?”

Margery cast a look around to check that none of the Misses were hovering, and swallowed a crust.

“I’m mad,” she confided. “And you?”

“I’m bad,” I said. [...]

I’m posting a section a day of my epistolary romance novella The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo. You can read it online for free here (click on the “Perilous Life of Jade Yeo” category to access the other posts), or you can buy the ebook at Smashwords or Amazon. The ebook contains the complete 23,000-word novella.

Tuesday, 22nd February 1921

Well, here we are. We arrived at eight in the morning, me and the poor benighted worm who sleeps, chewing on its tail, inside me. The woman who runs the establishment is a Mrs. Crowther, a mouse-coloured lady with sharp eyes and a wobbly voice shot through with vibrato, which makes her sound as if she is always on the verge of tears.

She took my bag and led me to my room and brought me breakfast here, and now I am writing at my desk by the window, looking out at rolling green meadows.

Mrs. Crowther is a widow, but her assistants are Misses mostly. They are all very nice: they knit and are tremendously tactful. The food is British and hearty, and the furnishings are soothing, if plain. Perhaps they thought patterns might distress our minds further. Anyway there are plenty of shelves in my room, and a lending library in the village, so I’ll have enough to keep myself busy with.

I will be all right here. Diana and Hardie wanted to send me to his old nurse, who lives on a farm in Kent. I had nightmarish visions of an apple-cheeked old lady, who would feed me milk fresh from the cow and indulge me for her old charge’s sake, and call me “that poor young creature”. Horrors!

I knew I should have to come up with a plausible alternative if I were to avoid being drawn into the spider’s web. [...]