With more than 1 Million new books coming out annually, largely driven by the Big Box conglomerate pushing the Publishing houses to the sidelines, it has never made more sense for "The Little Book Store That Could" to team up with the "Indie Publisher Who Might."
I run a podcast for authors. Airing on Fridays and recording on Mondays and Thursdays, I spend the rest of the week reading books and preparing to talk to up-and-coming authors of all genres aiming to hit the big time by creating the next great novel.
Some might do it, while others might not, but odds are better than not, all will see some form of success with their book eventually. Maybe not until after their death and maybe not in the manner that they wanted, but every author who puts pen to paper has the chance for greatness.
That is because there has never been a more democratic sharing of ideas and publishing than there is right here, right now. Anyone can write, publish and market a book and reach audiences around the world. With nearly 8 BILLION people worldwide, someone will think your book is the best thing since sliced bread, leaving the only question, when will they find you?
Imagine if you will, what the world would look like if Martin Luther had had an internet connection and a laptop? He could have uploaded his 95 Thesis to KDP instead of nailing them to the church door, and published an entire novella complete with illustrations and YouTube videos, and rocked the free world to this very day.
Alas, but it wasn't so and The Catholic Church still reigns supreme with all its failings.
It is the very fabric of mankind that humans write and share their thoughts. But it is the very volume with which humanity is writing right now that makes finding your very special reader that much more difficult.
Martin Luther had the advantage really of a captive audience. Most people didn't know how to read or write and to get a book published meant working in a monastery for 20 years. He had the means and the education to put a book out, but knowing no one would read it, he chose to nail it to a church door, the medieval equivalent of buying the cover of the New York Times.
In today's age, even the cover of the New York Times is missing 97 percent of the world audiences every day. Even if you as an indie author could afford to buy the New York Times cover, you would probably still miss your particular reader.
So where might you find YOUR particular reader who will love your work? Enter the Indie Book Store.
The unassuming, quiet little shop around the corner, with the smell of freshly brewed coffee and 10,000 years of dust rolling from its perfectly varnished front door complete with the little bell to announce your arrival. Some push pastries and music from local artists who sell their wares on YouTube and Facebook. Some specialize in children's lit and offer an imagination station for kids with collections of blocks and legos for the little shits to spread germs to each other with.
Whatever your favorite Independent Bookstore might offer, they are unique and the last bastion defending small business America from the Big Box Conglomerates.
Most shops struggle to survive and rely on their food or their music to elevate their bottom line above poverty, but somewhere between the non-dairy creamer and the day-old scones, there is a book from some unknown indie author sitting on the shelf, who lives just a few blocks away and dropped it off late one afternoon in May.
He was probably riding his bike to get ice cream with his grandkids. Just before he left the house, he grabbed a copy from the box of books he ordered six months ago when his book was still new and his hope for greatness still shined in the self-designed cover and self-edited pages of his manuscript.
Now the box of books, sitting quietly behind his couch, covered in dog hair and errant cheerios, mocks him every day and reminds him of his failure to launch into fame and fortune. He kicks himself for buying ten books when he only had two sold and now the eight remain, yellowing with time and indicting him for his naivete.
When the grandkids call for ice cream, he remembers the box behind the couch and thinks about the shop beside the ice cream parlor that everyone sees but no one visits. He reaches behind the couch and takes a volume of his self-published work and nonchalantly stashes it in the basket of his bike while he watches both ways before allowing the grandkids to cross the street.
He slows his beach cruiser as they ride along the sidewalk and turns to look in the window. He sees a bright-eyed woman thumbing through a dog-eared copy of Twelfth Night behind the register and decides today is the day he will screw his courage to the proverbial sticking post and ask her if she would like a copy of his book to sell.
When he dismounts his bicycle and opens the door, a golden retriever who seems older than the threadbare oriental rug that covers the ancient random-width pine floors barks as if to say, "Where have you been?"
The woman hushes the dog and looks up from her volume of Shakespear saying, " Welcome, come on in."
The man makes apologies for having no interest in purchasing anything, but holds his book before him and says, "I'm an author and this is my book."
The shopkeeper, an aspiring author herself, graciously accepts the novel and before the man leaves, he peruses the second-hand bookshelf and finds a copy of Cheever he decides he needs. He pays her the 50 cents before leaving to answer the beckoning calls of his Grandkid on their bikes in front of the store.
The novel finds its way to a shelf and sits there for days, weeks, months, and maybe even years before the reader finds it and falls in love. The shop owner may read it or may not. But she knows the author.
The reader will find it eventually, sitting on the shelf in the bookshop. But before the reader can even know that love rests on the pages of this new and wondrous novel, he asks the shopkeeper about it and she recalls the day the man dropped it off to her.
It is the shopkeeper that makes the match between the reader and novel and the poor little novel that languished behind the couch finds greatness in the hands of this reader.
That can't happen at a Big Box Store where teenagers stock shelves and middle-aged men with long-lost aspirations of greatness complete monthly inventory reports. It can't happen online where algorithms decide your fate and cat videos catch your fancy.
It can only happen in an Indie Bookstore, where time stands still and greatness sits around every corner.
The Indie bookstores are where indie authors go to be discovered. And no one knows which novel will be discovered next.
Much like the hardware stores of yesteryear who always had the right size washer or the hard-to-find alloy cotter pin that the big box stores never seem to carry because of their need for volume. The shop around the corner keeps the little things that time forgets, only to be found when the future thinks of look for it.
I intend to use my little podcast to shout the glories of the Independent Author Movement to the heavens and while I am at it, I aim to unite this team of talent.
Indie Bookstores are to Indie Authors as planes are to pilots, ships are to sailors and Churches are to sinners. They are the yin and yang of the printed word. The peanut butter and jelly of this new evolution in publishing.
The Author's Exchange Podcast is where authors can be heard. But Indie bookstores are where the author's books can be read. I intend to celebrate this love affair for the benefit of readers everywhere.
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