1. What inspired you to begin your publishing journey?
Many people have been asking me how they can live more “authentically” or with more “integrity,” as if this were a purchasable commodity like hot yoga, or which can be addressed in some “five easy steps” formula. Demonstrating to people what they already experience that is verifiable and accessible as an alternative to costly self-help and psychological and psychiatric interventions is the goal.
2. What led you to choose the self-publishing route vs. traditional publishing?
Traditional publishing opportunities are diminished, time-consuming, and access is restricted and formatting and intellectual property rights are all tightly controlled. Self-publishing is the least restrictive option in a sea of cloned content.
3. How did you select Gatekeeper Press as your publishing family?
I researched it on the Internet, looked at examples. The main thing about Gatekeeper is that authors control their own intellectual property; the byproduct of their creative efforts, while author managers handle much of the technical, timeline, and development process which is what writers need.
4. Were there any moments during your publishing journey where your expectations differed from the actual process?
The process has been very consistent from beginning to end. Everyone shares information about the project in the project management software and all the staff are quick to respond.
5. What aspects of the process did you find most enjoyable?
Lexi Tibet, my author manager, as well as all the other staff were extremely patient and effective throughout the whole process. They did an excellent job without stress or strain, especially just before printing when authors typically tend to start losing their presence of mind.
6. What challenges did you encounter during your publishing journey?
typesetting formats. I was not sure how to predict paragraphs per page or any type of minimum length. I do not spend too much time in the world, so social media promotion seems absurd. It seems like the books are sometimes secondary to content claims generated through parallel media formats.
7. Would you change anything if you could do it all over again?
The content of my book was only a section of about seven or eight other similar essays. I would have published all of the essays as a larger book instead of doing the smaller piece first. This would have saved time and money. I wanted to pilot the process first to see if it would actually work, and it did.
8. What were the most surprising aspects of self-publishing with Gatekeeper Press?
It actually worked! All the services were great, the quality of the book is great, all the technical elements of the book, like ISBN, registration, and promotion are things that I was not able to handle simultaneously while writing and editing, even though it was a short piece. Gatekeeper really did handle all of the non-writing elements of the process.
9. Would you recommend fellow authors self-publish with Gatekeeper Press?
Yes, I would.
10. With your dream book a reality, what goals do you aspire to achieve with your story?
My only goal is to demonstrate to people who are lost or looking for help that they already have what they need inside themselves already and that they can easily get in touch with this power without going down the self-help and psychological rabbit hole for years.