Blurb "Diary Experiment!"

All right, THIS is the reason I was getting all antsy about when the FedEx man was FINALLY going to deliver my parcel yesterday (and partly the reason I got off to a poor start with my NaNo): at the start of November, I had a 25% off code for Blurb, and I've been itching to see exactly what quality their books are, so I made a book!

No, it's nothing I'm going to mass-market. XD As it's just my "blog" (well, after a fashion) from University - so it's essentially something nobody in their right mind would be interested in.

The quality IS pretty good! It seems well-bound (I've heard stories of Blurb perfect binding not being quite SO "perfect"), the image-wrap cover is tough and well-printed, and all the inner pages are exactly as I wanted. It's also "bigger than I expected" - ok, so it's exactly the size I selected, at 8x10, I just pictured something smaller in my mind's eye.

Is there a reason for this, aside from "vanity press publishing"* my university diary?

Essentially, yes. I wanted to see what I was getting for what I paid, because I wanted to see if it'd be an option for when I (finally, ha ha yeah right) edit "Thunder Daughter" into something I wouldn't be ashamed to try and self-publish.

I just think that at £33.95 (before the 25% off) for just over 100 pages? And that's with me electing to use a fairly smallish font, Thunder Daughter would undoubtably need a bigger font-size and goodness only knows how many pages it would end up being... It'd have to be pretty special for anyone to want to buy it, and I'm not sure my art/writing is THAT good.

Oh well. I DO still plan to self-publish - sure, I'd love to be a "proper published author", I just don't think I have the time to devote to my hobby. (Or the dedication to hunt out a publisher for what is probably a VERY niche market.)

* is it still classed as "publishing" when you're only ever going to print one, for yourself?