This is the last in a ten entry series of blog posts about my experiences self-publishing my first graphic novel, Tonoharu: Part One. I’m writing this informal “how-to” guide in the hopes that my limited experience might be of some value to aspiring comic book self-publishers.

This guide is offered with no guarantees. I’ve done my best to provide accurate information, but I assume no responsibility for any negative consequences that result from following my advice. For other important disclaimers, please see the first entry in the series. Links to other installments in the series can be found on the bottom of this entry.

Part Ten: The Long Haul / Conclusion
The Long Haul (Speculative)
Throughout this series, I’ve reminded readers about my relative lack of experience, and asked them to take my advice with a grain of salt.

If previous entries in this series should be taken with a grain of salt, then this entry should be taken with a brick of it. Up until now I’ve at least offered advice about things I’ve had some experience with (limited though it may be). The subject of this last entry is making a living as a cartoonist over the long haul, and since my book was just published earlier this year, I can’t yet say if cartooning will be a sustainable reality for me. If things work out well, I may someday rewrite this final entry from experience, but for now, bear in mind that the following is mostly speculative.

Alternative Revenue Streams
As I mentioned in an earlier entry, cartooning is a poor career choice. Even making a living wage is the barest sense is often difficult; only a handful of “alternative” cartoonists are able to make a living exclusively through cartooning. For other cartoonists who aren’t as talented/prolific/lucky, money has to be sought from other sources to supplement the lousy pay of cartooning. Here are a few of my thoughts on places to start. Continue reading How I Self-Published a Graphic Novel (10/10)→

This is the ninth in a ten entry series of blog posts about my experiences self-publishing my first graphic novel, Tonoharu: Part One. I’m writing this informal “how-to” guide in the hopes that my limited experience might be of some value to aspiring comic book self-publishers.

This guide is offered with no guarantees. I’ve done my best to provide accurate information, but I assume no responsibility for any negative consequences that result from following my advice. For other important disclaimers, please see the first entry in the series. Links to other installments in the series can be found on the bottom of this entry.

Part Nine: Marketing
One final book recommendation
Once you’re starting to think seriously about book marketing, it’s time to get one more book:

1001 Ways to Market Your Book by John Kremer

This is the only standalone book on book marketing that I’ve read, so I can’t say how it compares to other books on the subject. But it works as a good companion to The Self-Publishing Manual, and contains just what it says: hundreds and hundreds of ideas for marketing your book. Additionally, there are little tidbits about the book industry scattered throughout, which make this book a fairly good resource for information on that front as well.

On the down side, it’s organized poorly, and the author shamelessly self-promotes himself to the point where it becomes grating. I mean, it’s a book on marketing, so I suppose some of that is to be expected, but Kremer takes it too far. Every other page he plugs some project he is involved with, some of which only had a tenuous link to book marketing. It got on my nerves after a while.

But ultimately the good outweighs the bad, and 1001 Ways to Market Your Book is worth checking out.

Once you’ve skimmed through 1001 Ways to Market Your Book and the marketing section of The Self-Publishing Manual, you’re probably ready to start up your marketing effort. Continue reading How I Self-Published a Graphic Novel (9/10)→

This is the eighth in a ten entry series of blog posts about my experiences self-publishing my first graphic novel, Tonoharu: Part One. I’m writing this informal “how-to” guide in the hopes that my limited experience might be of some value to aspiring comic book self-publishers.

This guide is offered with no guarantees. I’ve done my best to provide accurate information, but I assume no responsibility for any negative consequences that result from following my advice. For other important disclaimers, please see the first entry in the series. Links to other installments in the series can be found on the bottom of this entry.

Part Eight: Distribution
If the intended scope of your self-publishing plan is particularly narrow, you could maybe get by without a distributor. You could keep it grassroots, sell your books on consignment at independent booksellers & comic shops in your area, sell them yourself at conventions and through your website, and maybe set up an account with amazon.com to get a few national/international orders.

But if your distribution plan is a little more ambitious than that, it’s best to work with a distributor. You can still do the grassroots stuff, while relying on your distributor to reach markets you otherwise wouldn’t be able to (like chain bookstores across the country, or whatever). Plus having a national distributor makes you seem more legit, making it easier to get media coverage and the like. Continue reading How I Self-Published a Graphic Novel (8/10)→

This is the seventh in a nine entry series of blog posts about my experiences self-publishing my first graphic novel, Tonoharu: Part One. I’m writing this informal “how-to” guide in the hopes that my limited experience might be of some value to aspiring comic book self-publishers.

This guide is offered with no guarantees. I’ve done my best to provide accurate information, but I assume no responsibility for any negative consequences that result from following my advice. For other important disclaimers, please see the first entry in the series. Links to other installments in the series can be found on the bottom of this entry.

Part Seven: Working with Book Printers
Before I get into this entry, I’d like to reiterate and expand on disclaimer #1 from the first entry of this series. I wrote that those planning a project that differs greatly from Tonoharu in terms of presentation might want to take my advice with a grain of salt.

Tonoharu: Part One is a 128 page hardcover book with two-color interior pages and a four-color dust jacket with metallic ink accents. Because of that fancy nonsense, the only economical way to publish it was to print up a couple thousand copies at once, via offset lithography.

I had a Xeric Grant (hopefully you will too by the time you start taking serious steps to self-publishing), so printing up all those copies in one shot wasn’t a financial risk for me. In fact, if I didn’t use the Xeric money within one year I would have lost it, so there would really be no reason not to print up a bunch at once. Continue reading How I Self-Published a Graphic Novel (7/10)→

This is the sixth in a ten entry series of blog posts about my experiences self-publishing my first graphic novel, Tonoharu: Part One. I’m writing this informal “how-to” guide in the hopes that my limited experience might be of some value to aspiring comic book self-publishers.

This guide is offered with no guarantees. I’ve done my best to provide accurate information, but I assume no responsibility for any negative consequences that result from following my advice. For other important disclaimers, please see the first entry in the series. Links to other installments in the series can be found on the bottom of this page.

Part Six: Preparing for Press
Hiring Help, or Not
As you begin preparations for press, you have to decide if you’re going to go it alone, or if you’re going to hire outside help in the form of graphic designers or pre-press specialists.

Personally, I went it alone. There were some hiccups along the way, but all-in-all I’m glad to have gone through it, and learned a lot of valuable lessons that I can use to improve the appearance of future books while keeping costs in check.

What’s right for you will depend on your background and circumstances. Generally speaking, I would say if you think you’ll only be doing one book, it’d probably be best to hire people to do all the prepress work for you. If you think/hope to be creating comics for the long haul, it would probably pay to bite the bullet and learn how to do it yourself.

Continue reading How I Self-Published a Graphic Novel (6/10)→

This is the fifth in a ten entry series of blog posts about my experiences self-publishing my first graphic novel, Tonoharu: Part One.

This guide is offered with no guarantees. I’ve done my best to provide accurate information, but I assume no responsibility for any negative consequences that result from following my advice. For other important disclaimers, please see the first entry in the series. Links to other installments in the series can be found on the bottom of this page.

Part Five: The Xeric Grant
Introduction/Benefits
If you’re thinking about self-publishing a comic book/graphic novel, you may already familiar with the Xeric Foundation, a non-profit organization that distributes grants to comic book self-publishers. If you’re not, please see this blog entry I wrote a while back, or better yet, visit the Xeric Foundation’s official website.

The Xeric Grant is great for a number of reasons. The most obvious being, it’s free money. You have to use Xeric funds for expenses directly related to the publication, marketing, and distribution of your comic (so you can’t use it to pay your rent or gambling debts), but other that that, it’s pretty much no strings attached. You never have to repay it, and you keep the copyright to your work. Continue reading How I Self-Published a Graphic Novel (5/10)→