Each path to print comes with its own set of pros and cons. When I first decided I wanted to become an author, back when I was 19 and a sophomore at The University of Michigan, self-publishing felt like the most natural thing in the world to me. I’d grown up writing for myself, my little sister, and a few of my friends, and I decided for myself what was good and what wasn’t. So, I hired a freelance editor (the wrong freelance editor) and paid a vanity press (oops). The editor neither liked nor understood my project, and the vanity press preyed on my youthful ignorance.
After a frustrating round of edits that left me feeling embarrassed and confused, I put writing away for a few years.
The next time I seriously tried to get published, I was around twenty-seven. I’d rewritten my first book a few times and felt it was ready. I pitched it in New York and got gassed up when a big-time agent declared my book would earn a 7-figure publishing deal, a video game, and a McDonald’s happy meal. I was ecstatic, of course, and maybe the agent’s prediction would have come true, but I could already feel myself being pushed and pulled in directions I didn’t want to move in as a creative.
Too much time went by, and I let the opportunity slip away.
The next time, I was twenty-nine. I wrote a new book to market, and New York liked it again, but I lost interest in the project in the second round of edits. It dealt with Black trauma, and it felt heavy and forced. I wanted to write something lighter, something fun.
That’s how my current project, Songs of Aryam was born. It’s an upbeat, nerdy, fantastical story that will likely appeal to a small niche audience. It’s mine, though, and I like it.
So, here’s why I founded Mahogany Griot:
- Creative Control. The main reason I’m opting for self-publishing is for the immense creative control it affords me. In today’s digital age, especially, storytelling has evolved beyond confinement to books. Self publishing will allow me to experiment with transmedia storytelling, which was the focus of my capstone project for grad school.
- I’m a Lifelong Learner ??♀️. The publishing industry is a complex organism with lots of moving parts. I want to understand firsthand what it takes to bring a book to the market. Who knows? Maybe honing my skills as an author will open doors in the future.
- Reality. YA Fantasy is a popular genre. It’s saturated with books vying for attention—readers’ attention, agents’ attention, editors’ and publishers’ attention. The readers are eating these books up, but the gatekeepers (everyone else in that list) are picky and less willing to take risks on new voices. If I do this right, I can get my books right into the hands of readers, and probably much faster.
Finally, I’ve been playing with the idea of publishing for over a decade now. I just feel the time is right.
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