Welcome!
I write this as I get ready to press the PUBLISH YOUR SITE button at the bottom of the screen and finally send this project out into the world. It’s been a strange road so far, and I can only hope it gets stranger.
I had plans to attempt the traditional publishing route for this novel back when I started writing it in 2013. Then I went to grad school, got sidetracked by Victorian ghosts and Eve Sedgwick, picked up the novel again, transformed it into a part of my dissertation in literature, finished my PhD, and considered the traditional publishing route once more. But I changed my mind.
New plan: I am going to serialize Or Else, one week at a time. (Like queer fanfiction; like Victorian novels.) I’ll post the first three chapters on this website next Friday, 6/14, and then I’ll post a new chapter every Friday after that. It’ll be free, it’ll be easy to subscribe, and once the serialization is over, I’ll make it into an ebook for anyone who prefers to read it that way.
It took awhile for me to make this decision. As many overachieving millennials/eldest daughters/academics do, I like impressing people and appearing legitimate, and posting some gay stuff on the internet without anyone else’s approval isn’t really the way to do this. So I made a list of reasons to justify this choice:
messy methodology = messy structure = messy distribution
potential to reach a variety of audiences
queer local DIY/online spaces more ideologically in line with the project
not beholden to the market
accessible - fewer barriers to entry
the project is literally a critique of being overinvested in professional legitimacy
But in a lot of ways, the most important thing was the note I took next to this very reasonable, orderly list: a scribbly doodle of a ghost saying NO ONE CAN STOP ME!!
I am so looking forward to sharing this project with you.
Many thanks to those who have been there for this work at various stages, especially my grad school friends, the Burrow, and my dissertation committee. Love and appreciation to all of you.
A doodle of a ghost saying NO ONE CAN STOP ME!!