Nothing To Lose

Hello everyone,
      I have discovered a site on fb called Inkitt for showcasing my work and entered a competition they were running. If you win, you get your novel published, so I thought, why not? I'll give it a go, I have nothing to lose and maybe everything to gain.
     The competition seems to be judged by readers, you upload your novel to their site and other readers and entrants judge it's merit. Readers can also download a certain amount of copies for free. Not ideal, but my novel is better off on their site than hiding inside my laptop where no one will see it. It's also linked to my fb page and Reditt, It is called THE TORMENTED (and is really tormenting me at the moment) Please feel free to give it a look and a review. (PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE) The more good reviews I get the better.
     I have now sent said novel to five different publishers, although three were encouraging, they said it wasn't quite right for them. Austin Macauly said they loved it and would be delighted to publish it, at a price. It seems that because I'm a first time author and have no proper credentials, I would have to pay a percentage of the publishing costs, (nearly £3000) I declined.
     I am also entering a few short stories to various places. I'm scouring the internet and fb for free short story competitions, there are a lot that charge an entry fee as well as a reading fee, please do check the terms and conditions of any and all competitions as sometimes they are very well hidden.
     There are another three publishing companies I'm going to contact, (agents seem so aloof) I've contacted seven agents and only one of them was nice enough to reply, they said, no thank you, but at least they were polite, the other six just ignored me. So I'm busy tracking down publishing houses that allow you to submit unsolicited MSS,( they are more elusive than ghosts)
     Anyway that's enough rambling for now; I'm on holiday from work this week,( the days have flown by almost un-noticed) but I am getting a lot of writing done and my second novel is coming along nicely, good luck to all fellow scribblers; until next time.