Ebooks - nowhere to hide

I've spent today revising a creative writing course I wrote several years ago, but which now needs updating to keep up with the fast-developing world of publishing reality.

Now Amazon is accepting self-published books and putting them in its Kindle store, I'm sure publishing is going to change radically over the next year or two. I've recently interviewed two self-published ebook novelists for Writing Magazine, people who have written really excellent novels, but who have found it impossible to place these novels with publishers. These two novelists have already sold thousands of downloads, earning themselves thousands of pounds and dollars, without the help of traditional publishers' publicity machines. They've used the readily-available tools of word-of-mouth, saturation-blogging and viral reader-recommendation instead.

So now, ladies and gentlemen, the revolution is upon us. There is nowhere to hide. Nobody will be able to blame their lack of success on the fact that they're not blonde, young, beautiful or Jordan. Ebooks have made publishing a level playing field on which ordinary READERS can make or break any writer you care to name.

So, if you've got a good but unpublished novel under your virtual bed, get it out now and put it on Kindle. It's easy, and there are detailed instructions on the Amazon website. Then see if readers throughout the world agree. Do you want to be a bestselling novelist, or not? It's up to you.

Oh, and before I sign off - get blogging, too...