My Indie Publishing Journey

How I went from pursuing traditional publishing to loving the indie author life!

Every book has a journey behind it. Here's mine:

• I got the idea for The Never Heir in 2016 while I was running on the treadmill at the gym. I had forgotten my headphones and Ruth B.'s song "Lost Boys" came over the sound system. This got me thinking: "Peter Pan and Wendy occupy so many of the retellings, but what about the lost boys?" I wanted to write something with these lesser known characters at the front and center.

• Due to some life events, I wasn't able to get this story written until 2017 and completely edited until 2018.

• I started querying in 2018, then stopped when this story was accepted into an editing and publishing program at a local university. Students graduating with a degree in publishing worked on it as part of their senior project. This story went through MAJOR revisions and was my first experience with making hard writing decisions, cutting my darlings, and being on an intense writing schedule to meet deadlines. I grew a lot as a writer during this time.

• I started querying again. Then I met with an agent at a writing conference in May 2020 who loved the premise and asked me to send him my full manuscript.

• In the meantime, I received an offer of publication from a small press which I turned down. This decision was not made lightly and even now, I wonder what would have happened if I had accepted that offer, but ultimately, I feel like I made the right decision for me.

• The agent loved my story and offered to represent me. I accepted!

• I went through another round of edits with my agent before we pitched the story to publishers.

• From August 2020-July 2021 we pitched the story to publishers, big and small, but no offers. My agent repeatedly told me it wasn't anything to do with the story itself, and had more to do with current market trends and other books under contract at publishing houses. You may recall that in 2021/22 there were several other Peter Pan retellings published, which wasn't good for me.

• I amicably parted ways with my agent in 2021. This was a part of publishing I hadn't prepared for, but I'm learning that a book not selling/changing agents or publishing plans is really more common that you think!

At this point, my only option for this story was to let it die on my computer. Publishers rarely come back to accept a manuscript that has previously been pitched to them. I even tucked this story away for a bit and wrote an entirely new story in hopes I could move on. But the more I thought about it, the more that didn't sit well with me. My gut kept telling me that The Never Heir needed to be my debut, and I couldn't let this experience keep me from sharing this story with the world. So here I am. It's scary going the indie-publishing route. There's no validation that you're "good enough" (whatever "good enough" means in the publishing world) or that your story is "ready enough" and suddenly all the major publishing decisions are mine to make alone instead of with an agent/publishing team to guide me. There's a lot to learn and I'm terrified of messing it up. But I'm here. Thanks to a wonderful writing community, readers who enjoy reading and supporting indie authors, and lots of friends like you cheering me on.

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