The answer (implied by Randy, but not said outright, I think) is it depends on how well it sold as a self-published book. If it sold well (I’m thinking many tens of thousands of copies, though it probably depends on the publisher), then they might be interested. Otherwise, no.

If, like me, your heart is set on traditional publishing, then the best thing you can do with a rejected novel is to take what you learned from it and write something new and better.

Randy sez: I’m not a publisher, but my understanding is that they’d be quite interested in working with any author who could show a track record of sales of more than 5,000 copies on a self-published book. If I were a publisher, I’d certainly be eager to back an author like that, because an author who can move that many copies on their own could probably sell 5 to 10 times that number with the marketing power of a major publisher. I met a young writer a few years ago at a writing conference who had sold 6,000 copies of her self-published urban romance novel in less than a year. She gave me a copy of her book and I read it on the plane going home. I introduced her via email to five agents who I thought might be interested in her. One of them signed her and fairly soon thereafter sold a series deal to a major publisher. In the past, this kind of thing was fairly rare. In the future, I think it’ll happen more and more often and will eventually become the new norm.

What A happy day!

Randy sez: I no longer have the mustache, but even without that impediment, I’ll have to pass on the smooch. Yes, my plan is to release all my novels, including the City of God series. Then I’ll release a couple of other books that never got published. Assuming those do well (and I have a great track record of launching electronic products over the last few years, so I have a strong feeling they’ll all do well), I’ll continue the City of God series for another 3 or maybe even 4 books. Stay tuned over the next few months as the details for all these firm up.