Collaboration and Self-Publishing

by William P. Robertson
(Duke Center, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.)

Genre: High Fantasy

Collaboration is the Key to Self-Publishing Success

When I began self-publishing, I always tried to create the most professional book possible. I didn't want anything I produced to be labeled as a "vanity" endeavor. To escape that tag, I first built my resume by freelancing articles, stories, and poems to magazines worldwide. Those publishing credits lent instant credibility to the poetry chapbooks that followed. The chapbooks I then used primarily to promote my work and to gain further exposure in the publishing world.

After I had established my reputation as a poet, I decided to write a full-length novel. That was a daunting task, considering that my longest work to date was a ten page short story. Again, I was concerned primarily with penning a work of value and not some potboiler. I soon discovered that although I was long on creativity, I lacked considerably in the technical skills needed to succeed as a novelist.

It was then that I called on my teaching colleague, David Rimer, to help me tackle the project. He had taught composition courses at the local high school for over thirty years and knew far better than me the ins and outs of grammar, sentence structure, and the logical sequencing of ideas. By combining his technical writing skills and my creativity and drive, we went on to publish seven historical fiction novels about the Pennsylvania Bucktails of Civil War fame. We even got the first four published by a royalty house before switching to a POD company that gave us more share of the profits. The fact that our self-published books outsold three of the royalty titles speaks volumes for the success of our collaboration.

After exhausting the Bucktail material, I became interested in writing a Viking high fantasy novel as a change of pace. When David was not interested in exploring this genre, I contacted Fiona Ingram, a YA author I had met on the internet. Through our correspondence I had learned that THE LORD OF THE RINGS was one of her biggest influences and that she adored Norse mythology. She had also worked for a South African publishing house, so she was intimately familiar with the latest formatting and grammatical requirements of the industry.

Working with Fiona turned out to be a fruitful experience. From her I learned many ways to better my writing. First, she taught me the subtleties of using italic print to highlight a character's thoughts and for setting apart book titles in lieu of underlining them. She also quickened the pace of the novel by eliminating overly long descriptions of armor and weapons that I wanted to include for historical accuracy. Fiona improved the book, too, by bringing a female perspective to a decidedly male genre. One passage to which she strongly objected was having Shera the witch turn our hero, Dane Wulfdin, into a groveling weakling by planting sexual longings in his brain just before he battled a huge boar. Fiona felt that scene was totally corny and robbed Dane of his manhood. Then, she dug in her heels until I proposed a scenario that cast our protagonist in a better light.

Because I had no photos of Viking reenactors to use in THIS ENCHANTED LAND: THE SAGA OF DANE WULFDIN, I enlisted an artist friend, David Cox, to do spot drawings. David had created some fantastic pen and ink work for my poetry collection, THE ILLUSTRATED BOOK OF ANCIENT, MEDIEVAL, AND FANTASY BATTLE VERSE, so I knew he would be up to the task. Instead of dictating what I wanted, I sent David the manuscript and gave him free reign to design it as he saw fit. He immediately scrapped my spot drawing suggestion and instead created a full-page illustration for each chapter. Some of his character depictions actually caused me to look at those people in a whole new light. Originally, I described Doomona the witch, for example, as the stereotypical wicked, old crone. David made her sexy, which caused her to be Shera's rival for "man meat." Using his idea was much better, for it further explained the bad blood between the two enchantresses beyond Doomona's theft of gold from the queen's castle.

Designing the front and back covers of THIS ENCHANTED LAND was another challenge that became a collaborative effort for David, Fiona, and me. David favored a cartoon-style drawing of Dane Wulfdin, while I preferred the more virile portrayal that eventually evolved. Fiona helped immensely when she said that David's first drawings of Dane were too old looking. She also suggested the ring of runes that surrounded the wolf logo on the back cover. She felt that would give a more "Dark Ages feel" to the packaging.

As you can see, it's best to pick collaborators who aren't "yes men" if you want to create the best possible product, with give-and-take being the order of the day. A good example of such compromise occurred while we were doing the final edit. I had wanted to include many of my previously published poems in the book to add a "Beowulf-like" flavor to it. David Cox was quick to point out that some of these pieces had nothing to do with the overall theme of THIS ENCHANTED LAND and suggested cutting them. Although the ones he objected to displayed the best verse writing of my long career, in the end I had to agree. It then became evident that David's role had grown so much during the writing of our novel, that Fiona and I made him a full partner.

For more information about THIS ENCHANTED LAND: THE SAGA OF DANE WULFDIN, visit Viking Sagas, the website David, Fiona, and I created to promote our book. There, you will find sample drawings, spoken word passages, and further testament of a very fruitful collaboration among three authors who love the magical world of the Dark Ages. The novel, by the way, is available in both paperback and Kindle e-book versions.