So, I was doing some marketing work . . .

Yeah, I managed to say that with a straight face. People who know me know that I am the world’s worst promoter, so using the term “marketing” is probably stretching the definition some distance beyond what was ever contemplated by “Mad Men.” But I digress . . .

At any rate, I was doing some marketing, and I’m trying to set up a book signing at a local coffee shop, and I’m trying to figure out what to do about inventory and a whole bunch of other things. Then a good friend of mine, and fellow writer, Cheryl Meakins, tells me she was advised once to forget about profit and give thought to reach. By which was meant that, at this stage, you sacrifice earnings in the interest of getting your book in more and more hands.

I was thinking about that for a while, and it struck me that that should be my goal, anyway, shouldn’t it? I mean, as a unabashedly Christian author, shouldn’t it always be my purpose to just get the story out, and try to change lives?

I think that may be one of the great difficulties with Christian publishing, and a smallish part of why I chose to self-publish. Christian publishers, as with all publishers, have a pretty severely reduced amount of resources to play with compared to twenty years ago. That means they are less likely to take a chance on new authors, unless they stumble upon an astonishingly luminous talent (which excludes me and, well, almost everybody). Because, in the end, a publisher’s job, regardless of their mission, is to make money. They have to–if they don’t, they can’t do any of the other good things they’re trying to accomplish.

The difference is that a publisher is trying to make money; I, and I think most authors, Christian or otherwise, are trying to make a difference.

Don’t get me wrong–I want to make money, too. At some point, there has to be some reward for all the sleepless nights. But, in the end, what I really hope to do is change lives. And if that means deferring some of the financial things, then, well, that just seems like smart advice.