Hi guys, today I'm going to talk about my self-published Poetry Collection, some insight into my thoughts behind it, some reflection on it, how I did it, what other collections I have worked on and what I would like to do next.
Back in 2020, I finally made the decision to pull together a collection of what I believe were my best poems between the years 2013-2020. What's important here is that you know these poems were my personal favourites, pieces that meant something to me on a deep level, whether they were about true life experiences, held the essence of growth and accomplishment, or were just good writes with awesome feedback.
The selection process was hilarious. Up to that point I had printed all of my poems out on random different coloured paper and binded it together, with a makeshift cover. It was a collection of everything I had ever written, but I spent a lot of time sifting through all the poems in the homemade book and decided against publishing the majority of them.
Some of the poems I have written over the years were a little incoherent, didn't really fall into a theme or a strong subject, some were completely unpolished or I felt were still in an infant stage. There were a few I have just no love for, or didn't personally believe were good. I think by that stage I had found my writing style, and a lot of my earlier work did not feel like my writing.
I had some and bought some more indie poetry collections, and compared writing styles, layout, book covers and quantity of content. This gave me an idea of what I liked/disliked, the route I wanted to go down i.e. did I want to publish themed books only, did I want to split the book up into sections, did I want to date everything I wrote etc.
Now, I do have a lot of the poems I semi-dissed above there on this blog, and then reserved some of my pieces for poetry competitions I had intentions of entering. Ultimately, I decided it was time to put them all out there and move away from intentions. I just didn't want my pieces to get lost to the years.
Self-publishing process
For this collection, I used Lulu.com, it's a self-publishing platform where you can create your own books, receive proof copies in the mail and adjust as many times as you want. They offer a discount for the seller, they are a print-on-demand retailer and distributor and you can opt for global distribution.
Lulu themselves have their own store, and you can choose to solely sell the book through them for minimal fees. However, if you choose to go with global distribution, you pay a portion of the sale to the retailer the buyer uses. I found Amazon take the largest cut of the sale, and any sales I have made of the book have not brought in much money. I would need to raise the price of the book to make any quality money through Amazon, however the variety of places the book can be bought means this is not really a necessity.
Once you sign up for an account with Lulu, you can choose to create a book. They offer step-by-step instructions to build your book and provide templates you can use for the book interior. I mocked up my book cover using Adobe Illustrator, but they do offer their own cover page tool as well. I can't give much information on this because I have not used it yet, but it's a nice offering.
I was able to refer back a lot to the other poetry collections I had purchased and modified the template to match the style I desired. Considering the content was already written, it was just a matter of curating the poems in order I wanted and then I ordered a proof copy.
Editing and final decisions
I used the proof copy for edits, as wonderful as it felt to hold my book for the first time. It's littered with grammar mistakes, edit suggestions for wording and layout, missing numbering, missing pages. It even came down to a questionable front cover.
That was my first attempt. I was able to go back to the Lulu portal and update all these changes, replace the front cover with another option and then I started having an issue with the spine. If anyone bought my book at the very beginning, they may either have a wonky spine or none at all, it was bizarre.
Note: Lulu have since corrected the spine editing part, and it makes it much easier to get it right the first time now
I think I did at least 2 more proof edits and when I was finally happy, I published it for global distribution and it was reviewed and approved after about 2 weeks.
Thoughts and reflection
Honestly, it was easier than I thought it would be to get published. I understand it's not the same as getting picked up by an established publishing company, however some of my work has been published by other companies and I have received numerous edits from Poetry Ireland on my work. It's not the same as if I just wrote a bunch of poems and threw them into a book, when you look at it that way. However, it was simple as that, I did technically just pull together pieces I had written and created a book of them.
A few people have bought the book! You might be thinking "Who Joanne?! No one even knows who you are!!" but you would be wrong haha. I have a few followers across my platforms, and some of my family and friends purchased a copy for themselves when I told them I had published.
To go into a house of someone I know and see a book I published sitting on their shelf is just surreal. I have made myself proud with this one, I'll admit.
Having a book of my own out there did inspire me to continue writing, and polish anything that did not make the first cut. I want to be clear about my intentions with publishing this book - I did it for me. It was a dream of mine, it was part of my Before 30 list and therefore it was not about making money or creating a following etc.. Thank you to everyone who supported this dream and for continuing to support my writing x
Other projects
These days I don't spend as much time writing, but I do occasionally part-take in poetry enthologies and write content for those.
I was first contacted by a company based in India in early 2020 about publishing in one of their collections. It's a pay-per-page situation, and there is no monetary return for the writer, however it's good for writers to get some work out there and you get to meet other writers along the way. I have enjoyed working with that company, and a few others since, however what really bothers me is their distribution system. They only ever sell the book using publishing solutions in India, and do not offer any global distribution. A lot of the other writers were also based outside India and faced the same issue as me. I had to use a shipping service that provided a virtual postal address in order to buy and receive any of the books I was part of.
Outside of these indie poetry anthologies, I have started working on a second Poetry Collection but there is no real news on this as of yet.
What's next?
Like I mentioned, I have plans for a second Poetry Collection, and this will be a collection of anything between 2020-2025, with possibly some pieces from pre-2020 that were later edited or left out of the original choice for whatever reason.
Additionally, I have intentions to write my first novel this year. I have been in the ideation stage for almost 2 years on and off. I will post about this when the idea finally takes shift and may start doing some micro updates using my Instragram page, however I will also make more time for this blog and get back to updating at least monthly in 2025
Thanks for reading, make sure to drop me a follow on Instagram if you aren't already, IG: @joanne_heraghty
☑ Publish a Poetry Collection 📗
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