So, I’m here as the resident English and Creative Writing student, doing work experience at CompletelyNovel in order to investigate today’s publishing world, particularly that part of it that resides online.

Things That I Have Learned include:

There aren’t as many sites like CN as one might think. There are Print On Demand sites like Lulu.com, which allow you to publish a book but not to discuss it; there are writing sites like Authorsden.com, which allow you to discuss a book but not to publish it; there are reading sites like shelfari.com, which allow you to discuss previously-published books. To my surprise, I’ve been unable to find a single site which combines all three.

It rains a lot in London. This is probably invariably true whether or not one is working in the cause of publishing.

Self-publishing isn’t as silly an idea as I once thought. Since the chances of any writer being picked up by a publishing house is very low, the chances of that writer being you even lower, and the chances of your work being successful (regardless of merit) are even lower than that, why not give your friends, family and anyone interested in your writing something to read in the meantime, and without the effort, loss of control or demand to make a profit required in so-called “real” publishing?

There appears to be no index to the Internet as regards to writers. Every community appears to be small or unstructured, and will rarely have links to anywhere else. Perhaps CN can shake this up a bit…