Writing Solo: the benefits and drawbacks of self-publishing

Lily Fishman
The Eye
Feb. 13, 2013

Priscilla Becker would self-publish her work if she had a choice.

"Your work may be more accessible if you're published by a major publishing house," says Becker, a creative writing professor at Columbia and published poet. "But you don't get paid anything."

Becker isn't the only one to throw off the age-old taboo against self-publishing. Since 2006, the number of self-published books produced each year has grown by almost 300 percent. The unprecedented ease of sending a book into the world may have even begun to threaten long-established, profitable publishing houses. In July, Penguin bought Author Solutions, a company founded in the '90s to help authors self-publish. In November, Simon & Schuster worked with Author Solutions to create Archway, Simon & Schuster's imprint for self-publishers.