Welcome, writers and book lovers. The Bleeders is a podcast about book writing and publishing.
Make sure you subscribe to the companion Substack: https://thebleeders.substack.com/welcome
Today’s guest is author and entrepreneur Ali Kriegsman, joining The Bleeders to talk candidly about her path through traditional publishing, burnout, rejection—and ultimately choosing to self-publish her debut novel "The Raise" on her own terms.
In this episode, Ali breaks down what it really took to launch a book without a traditional publisher: owning 100% of her rights, deciding not to invest in PR, building a highly visual TikTok-driven campaign, and treating herself as the CEO of her own book launch—and it WORKED. Ali even earned the Reese's Book Club stamp of approval!
Ali opens up about the ego hit of not selling her novel on submission, the mindset shift required to embrace self-publishing, and how redefining success helped her rebuild confidence in her creative work. We also dig into the realities of book marketing, the trade-offs between traditional and self-publishing, genre confusion, rights ownership, audiobook decisions, and why writers have to decide what they’re optimizing for—whether that’s bestseller lists, longevity, or adaptation potential.
Subscribe to Ali’s Substack
New Motives, follow her on
Instagram @alikriegs, and buy your copy of
The Raise on
Bookshop.org,
Amazon, or wherever books are sold!
The Bleeders is hosted by Courtney Kocak. Follow her on
Instagram @courtneykocak and
Bluesky @courtneykocak.bsky.social. For more, check out her website
courtneykocak.com.
Courtney is teaching some upcoming workshops you might be interested in:
