I decided to write an article for us about estate planning for self-publishers, to get us started on the topic. So, to get ready, I did a quick internet search on “succession planning for self-publishers”, and received two suggestions with generic titles. I picked one of them and discovered…. my very own article on the topic from 2019! Now, I assume that my own identity as a questioner was automatically included as one of the parameters in my search, so this wasn’t completely random, but it certainly gave me a start. 🙂

The article is here: https://selfpublishingadvice.org/author-business-estate-planning/

Despite the passage of several years, and a request for comments from people who had brighter ideas than I could come up with at the time, I’m really no further along than I was then about what to do, in a situation with no natural heirs. I had high hopes for a lot of little business men to develop in self-publishing, but that hasn’t happened the way I expected. Certainly, many authors have created sturdy piles of popular publications, using all the publishing and distribution tools of the industry, but (barring some meteors, like J. K. Rowling who become real businesses) few (to my knowledge) seem to have the succession urge to create long term businesses that can outlive them as businesses, say consolidating other self publishers into larger entities.

Anyone have any bright ideas? Have some of you started work on entities that can outlast you, with or without conventional heirs?

Without heirs, I’m not all that concerned about the passing along of my earnings. I’d be content to contribute the rights to another entity. But it would be depressing to think my books would not survive me in some form.