A new Beginning: KML Publishing

All things start with a new beginning. This is mine. Welcome to KML Publishing.

Ever since I was a little girl I wrote in my journal about my dream to become the bestest most amazing author of #fantasy and #sciencefiction. A pretty big dream for a little dyslexic girl who couldn't write. I still don't know if I am ever going to achieve that dream - or what that dream really means to be honest.

I often reread my journals in a seeking to understand the passion and drive of what once drove me so straightforwardly towards a goal. I was unashamed of my hopes, unashamed of my dreams. I fundamentally believed I could - and that I would - be all that I set out to be.

Due to starting out wanting to be an author so young, I've followed the publishing world for most of my teenage and young adult life. A good twenty years now. Much has changed in just that short amount of time. It has been an industry I have loved deeply. The whole concept of being able to take the work of an author and bring it into life in the form of a paperback or a hardcover book excites me so much and the more I learnt, the more I fell in love.

My dream of being an author gradually changed, growing into something even bigger (because, of course it did, isn't that what dreams do).

I didn't want to just see my books and world come to life - I wanted to see other author's books and worlds come to life, to see their books on bookshelves in bookshops. To see their faces light up in delight.

I want to publish books.

"Be the change you want to see."

This phrase kept repeating itself to me, over and over again the more I studied the publishing industry and the more I became disillusioned with it. It wasn't the difficulty of getting "chosen" by one of the major companies that frustrated me. When I was a teenager I thought it was one of the greatest achievements to be chosen out of a "slush pile" by a minor editor in a Publishing House. I would have worked my entire life towards that achievement (a blog for another day perhaps) - but over the past twenty odd years the industry has changed (and I am not just talking about the introduction of self-publishing, though I am sure I will talk about that someday). No. I'm talking about politics. I watched as the thing I loved most in the world became divided, and I no longer felt welcomed. I felt like an outsider. It was no longer fun, and exciting to attend events when those events only talked about how writing dealt with political things. I do not like labels. I do not like being placed in a box, and suddenly, it seemed as if I had to conform to ideals and labels others desired for me. To even submit a synopsis I had to label myself.

No. I refuse.

This is what I wrote in my journal awhile ago:

"I will succeed on the merit of my work. I am not who they say I am."

I am unsure of the context in which this was written as it was vague - but it was one of the building blocks in my resolve to be the change I want to see.

If this is the publishing industry today - where you must label yourself, identify yourself with some status to prove your worth, instead of letting your work speak for you (says the introvert) then I want to become a publisher who publishes books again.

Books people can pick up and love for being doors into new worlds. Books people can become immersed within. Maybe you'll never know the face of the author, but you'll know their passion, their love, their sorrow, their joy through the pages of that book.

However, there is a major hurdle I face. How to get into #bookshops without a distribution company behind me. This is a pretty big hurdle. I also face the hurdle of - frankly - being without money to do - well - any of this. But, I will not allow either of those things to stop me forging ahead with this dream. Therefore, in the coming year of 2020, I have decided to focus my efforts on distributing KML books throughout Adelaide and South Australia to begin the groundwork.

A new beginning has to start somewhere and I can only do what I can with what I have.

Therefore, Dearest Readers, if you have a local bookshop you know about, or a library I can contact, or even if you know anything about distribution that I might be interested in - let me know. I would love to hear your thoughts and your ideas.