Why The Hardest Part Is AFTER Your Publish

My #ROW80 Round 3 goals was to publish. I did that!

I heard in a couple of places that writing is the easy part, it's after you publish where things get tough. I secretly laughed. HA! I have marketing experience. HA! I love talking and networking with people. That's going to be the best part!

I was incorrect.

I won't say wrong, because I AM enjoying marketing. But I'm also starting to look forward to writing over marketing. Here's why:

1. I make mistakes out of my control to fix quickly. Even when I wrote non-fiction, the first few times you are using an uploading interface, you're going to mess up. It's inherent. Either the form instructions aren't worded correctly, or your browser makes a funky refresh half-way through, or you just have so many fields the chance of error is very high. I uploaded the wrong file to Amazon and Barnes and Noble at first, and didn't realize it takes 48-72 hours to fix that! Read that again, if you upload the wrong file, it takes 48-72 hours to fix it. You have to wait 24 hours for the wrong file to populate just to get access to change it, then you upload the right one and must wait another 24 hours to upload the new file. No big deal right? Except that the book is available for sale BEFORE the KDP or PubIt interface gives you access to fix it! Smashwords is MUCH quicker, and once I realized my mistake, I fixed it there and then made sales on the other sites and I didn't have access to fix it. 
2. Every interaction counts. I was still a little too high off my publication and stopped by Konrath's blog because he was getting down on himself and I wanted him to know his blog educated me, and now I was self-published. I didn't include a link to my book, I wasn't there to flog my book (that would be very bad manners). He gets a bunch of flak from people entrenched in their ideals, and I figured a thank you, even from a small author, would help. I explained that 6 people bought my book. He responded back "Make that 7, I just bought it for my wife." CRINGE. The file was wrong! Yep. Even worse, there were typos in my comment! Now, even just a comment can be a big deal. Part of me is hoping his wife never reads it, but the other part of me hopes she does and likes it. All of me hopes she doesn't read it and hate it. Dislike, okay. I dislike many books that aren't poorly written, they just don't appeal to me. 
3. Cliques are everywhere. I am working on a new paradigm in indie marketing: inclusive. There are so many books of the day, book of the month, today's review, today's deal promotions, increasingly more that you must pay for. Remember in school when we got the Scholastic book fair sheet? There were dozens of books. It was fun to read about all of them and circle the ones I wanted. If the teacher passed out a sheet with only one book on it? One book on it? Most of the class wouldn't be interested and Scholastic wouldn't make any money. Even B&N and Amazon when they email to me include numerous books in the newsletter. So I'm working on building http://ebookpromotions.blogspot.com for ALL authors of ALL genres to run monthly promotions that have traction because of the sheer number of authors participating. As a reader, which circular are you going to read? These 5 products are on sale...or...Over 50 products, now on sale! I know which one I'm going to spend my valuable time on because there is a greater chance there is something I will want. October we're putting together virtual Trick or Treating for Ebooks and every author is invited to join.
4. It's no longer the me show, but the us show. Marketing as an indie requires help. You have to get over asking for help pretty quickly. Then, once it's offered, you sure as heck better pull through on your end of the bargain. I asked for help and received 4 offers to guest blog. I have two entries due tomorrow for this week. I had to put two more on my calendar so I do not forget that I promised to contribute. 

So that's just the tip of the iceberg I'm sure. I'm also thinking about my next novel, wondering when/if I can let CANCELLED run on auto-pilot. Probably never. But things sure do seem a great deal simpler when I only had one book I was working on writing...

A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby. CANCELLED is available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Smashwords. 
WIP: SERVED A single father learns moving on with his life bring out the worst in his daughter's mother. (Sequel to CANCELLED)

My A ROUND OF WORDS IN 80 DAYS Friends: Visit their blogs and leave some writer love. This is our last week!

Self-Published Author: Making Tough Calls Like Moving a Publishing Date

Self-publishing is all about you. You the author; you the publisher; you the marketer. When the tough calls come, the pressure and decision stops with you. This is the predicament I find myself in, trying to publish my first book.


My husband is in the military and we have two children. My oldest is my super-stepson and he lives with us. Unfortunately, the reason he lives with us is because the other home is not very stable at the moment. Poor kiddo has seen too much. He is starting the 6th grade, and originally our move this year from Charleston, SC to Groton, CT was going to happen in October after he finished a 9 weeks here. Well, Navy housing completely let us down, and we have to rent out in town. I didn't want to risk waiting until the end of October for something decent to be on the market, and keep my oldest out of school for 2-3 weeks while we found something and moved in. So, I jetted up last weekend to CT to house hunt, and the hunt was fruitful.


We have the perfect house, and I love the little town and schools. We're going to live in Niantic, CT. The downside is me and the kids are moving Labor Day weekend now, and my husband can't follow us until the middle of October. Yep. Me, alone, with the kids, moving 900 miles. Good news is the Navy moves us, but I'm not 100% confident in them putting the bed back together, me hooking up the washer and dryer, etc. Other good news is my mother is coming with to help and just flying home to Virginia after staying with us a week or so. We're picking her up on the drive up. 


But that's all personal life stuff. The real question is how will this affect my publishing schedule. I admit, I was tempted to just move my publishing date to October. That's the easy answer, right? But let's think about this. I have a few irons in the fire that this will mess up. First, I gave my word to an editor with a small indie press that I would be published by the end of September so that I could recommend his author's book for October. If I publish in October too, then it becomes a competition thing. This relationship is important to me, too, and I want to be as good as my word. Second, my poor cover artist is waiting in the wings to finish the POD cover. She just needs a final page count. I can't get that to her until I format for the print book, and I can't format for the print book until I format for the ebook. 


And this is the big issue. I need to publish in September to get my writing career rolling. This is my first book. That's all. Not my last book, my first of many. I just need to get it out there, take my punches, and work on Book 2. I am getting caught up in this idea of perfect, perfect, perfect. I am human, far from perfect, last time I checked. This move is a bigger burden financially than we expected since we have to rent out our Charleston house. I would help my family out a great deal just by bringing in an extra $100-$200 a month. That's what I wanted when I started this, and then my eyes got bigger and bigger the more I learned about others' successes. You know, it's great that others sell hundreds, or even thousands of their books. I hope one day to have that success. But for me, I need to remember, even if it means telling myself over and over again, I only need small success. Yep. Small success for each book and keep writing. That's all.


So I'm going to keep pushing myself to publish by September 22. I'm not going to take the easy excuse out and miss my deadline. That isn't how a professional behaves. A professional keeps her head down, plugging away, even if it doesn't look like she'll make the deadline. A professional keeps working to deliver even if the deadline comes and goes, because that's what she said she would deliver. And I want to be that professional author.


"CANCELLED" arriving SEPTEMBER 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

Rethinking the Paperback's Place in Self-Publishing

I will be a self-published author. I have 0 designs of selling a paperback version of my book in book stores. First, it would never be on the front displays, it would be lost somewhere in the lengthy Romance fiction shelves, near the end, under "W" for my last name. No one would even find it back there, unless they were looking for it. If they were looking for it, they probably heard about my book online, which means they can buy it from Amazon directly, or read the ebook version.


Now, this doesn't mean a paperback version of my book is worthless. Far from it. But, it is more likely that the people who want a printed version have already read the electronic version and enjoyed it. Or, they know someone who read it and don't own an e-reader. In the first situation, I've already made my royalty off the reader, I don't care if they get the paper version for the lowest price possible. In the second situation, they're trying me out on the recommendation of a friend, so again, I'd like them to get a hold of the book for the lowest price possible. And, I'd like to encourage them to adopt e-reading as that helps grow author-centric publishing for all of us. 


SO HERE IS MY PLAN:


I am not in favor of long-term $.99 pricing for my ebook. That is just me, and I understand other authors will have different strategies for their works. That's great! For my plans, I will price my ebook at $2.99. This will net me roughly a $2 royalty per ebook sold.


My printed books with be POD through Createspace. I will sign up for the ProPlan for $39 a year, so that this plan can work. My paperback will be 6x9, 300 pages. Included in the purchase of the paperback will be an offer for a free electronic version (probably in PDF). I should preface all of this with I do not believe in DRM. My paperback price? $7.99. 


Royalty-wise this is roughly $.34 if a reader buys my paperback book through Amazon's website, and $1.94 if they buy it from my author site. 


This is how it would look:


Reader who wants BOTH e-book and paperback copy: Buy it from my site for $7.99 and get both. (I make $1.94)


Reader ONLY wants ebook: Buy it for $2.99. (I make $2.00)


Reader stumbles on my paperback on Amazon.com: I make $.34, but did 0 marketing for that sale, and hopefully the reasonable price makes the reader more likely to recommend it to someone else. Also, there will be an offer for the reader to email me and get an electronic copy for free.


I think the number of readers in the last category will be very small. This idea started from reading on another's blog (I honestly do NOT remember who's blog it was) that they offered the print version mainly as a service to their readers, they didn't expect major sales. Yet, the paperback version was priced at $12. 


This got me thinking...what does the paperback version as a SERVICE to readers really look like? And this is what I came up with. I'm happy to hear comments and concerns from others. Maybe there is an angle I missed. However, I think pricing the paperback as low as possible will be better for readers overall. 

"CANCELLED" arriving SEPTEMBER 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

Self-Published Authors: We're A Smaller Group Than You Think

As a relative newcomer to the fiction writing community, and self-publishing fiction writing community at that, I have made a startling observation: we're small potatoes. That's right. There aren't thousands and thousands of us seeking "professional" author status through self-publishing. By my count, there are probably a few hundred "self-published" blogs/"author platforms" out there and we're all linked together. Even me with my paltry 10 followers. 


Remember that game we played on car trips or to drink more alcohol? The Six-Degrees of Kevin Bacon? Self-publishing is like the two or three degrees of J.A. Konrath/Dean Wesley Smith/Amanda Hocking/ and the other big names. Our blogs are linked. We spend time commenting and linking to each other's blogs. Of course the big names don't really have as much time to comment on others' without running the risk of ticking off other followers for not commenting on their blogs. However, I was pleasantly shocked and honored when Lucy Kevin commented on mine ;)


And I am SO tired of reading that only crap is self-published. That's ridiculous. You want to know what I think is crap? William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying. Most of the Hemingway crap I had to read. Cold Sassy Tree. And so on, and so on. Then there is crap I changed my mind on. 17-year-old me forced to read Pride and Prejudice? Didn't relate to any of the characters, couldn't really understand or respect the time period. Hated it. Labeled Jane Austen as crap for many, many years. Want to know what changed my mind? Maturity. Oh, and watching the 2005 movie. Yep, THAT one loathed by Colin Firth lovers everywhere. Once I saw the nuts and bolts of the storyline, I was able to read with pleasure every one of Austen's words. 


And you know what, speaking of Austen's times and much earlier, self-publishing is NOT new. First people to invest in a Gutenberg? Pretty sure they didn't have agents. I'm not excusing work that isn't given even a cursory edit. However, I'm not 100% convinced every book I've bought, especially lately, is given a thorough look-through. I'm not talking about typos, but clunky descriptions, characters I can't stand, and pages and pages full of bleh. Yes, bleh is a technical literary critique term ;) 


At the risk of naming names, I am a huge Sophie Kinsella/Madeleine Wickham fan. Even her cheating Lexi in Remember Me? However, one book I couldn't believe was published by her was Twenties Girl. I am even such a die-hard Kinsella fan, I pre-ordered it back when it came out. A few months ago, it was donated to Goodwill. I thought it was slow. So slow, I couldn't even finish it. I tried five different times to read it, but couldn't find anything remotely redeeming about the characters, ghost or no. 


But I'm not Sophie Kinsella's editor or publisher. I am also in the minority of the review opinions for that book. But what if I WAS her editor or publisher and said "Sophie, this isn't going to work. You're going to alienate your readers and jeopardize your illustrious career." My goodness, that would have been horrible for the hundreds and hundreds of people who loved that book! People who maybe had cranky, overbearing relatives that made Sadie endearing to them (I lack such relatives).  


Thank goodness Sophie Kinsella didn't stop writing. I LOVED, LOVED, LOVED Mini-Shopaholic. I mean, I laughed so many times my husband asked me to go read upstairs! Maybe it was because I HAVE a 2-year-old. Thank goodness she doesn't say "Mine" yet, but she knows how to grab candy and put it on the conveyor belt at the grocery store when I'm not looking. And she has grabbed my credit card out of my hand to be the one to swipe it through! They learn so fast...


Here's the point. We can't make blanket statements about self-publishing vs. traditional publishing and the quality of work both produce. It's at the individual work level that critiques should be made. I have read horrible self-published works, and horrible works that were published through other means, including commercial outlets. I've played fantastic independently published video games, and seen commercially sold games riddled with spelling mistakes, bugs, and graphical catastrophes. Are we such a corporate-ocracy that we only believe quality exists when it has a company selling it? If so, then I have a Sham-wow to sell you. It's great, because it's made in Germany.... 

G. P. Ching recently talked about the literary bullying that goes on all the time on her blog So Write. The sad part is everyone has had someone come before them. Even those with contracts to scrutinize and a "marketing department at their disposal," had other writers that acted as inspirations or role model. We should be encouraging each other, not tearing each other down. Together, indie published, self-published, or Big 6 published, all of us are fighting to increase readership of books, period. We're competing against TV, video games, and other forms of entertainment. Not each other. And the sooner we realize that the more books in a given genre there are for a fan of that genre, the longer the reader will stay reading and not doing other leisure activities, the better off we'll be.




"CANCELLED" arriving Late Summer 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

Self-Published Author: On Vacation

I am on vacation. It's been very difficult with my laptop in tow to not "work" while I'm on vacation. I don't count writing in this, I have written a small amount each day I've been here. No, the work I'm talking about is building a following, staying present in the online writing community, and all that jazz. THAT has been difficult to stay away from. 


This blog post is technically breaking the rules, but I figured it better to announce where and why I'm gone, than to just be gone for nearly 2 weeks. I will not return home until June 15th, and then I will be recovering from vacation. I don't expect to be back at work until June 20th. 


My first draft is taking a little longer than I anticipated, not a horrible thing. Better to have a goal to work towards and maybe not make it than to have no goal and just work on it willy-nilly. After speaking with a few people in my accountability group, they all agree it is better I push back my publication to September and put out the best book I can than to slap-dash something together just to make an arbitrary deadline. This doesn't mean my personal deadlines aren't important, they absolutely are! However, in reality, this novel is my first fiction project and I made the deadline on a best-educated guess. I wasn't too far off, only about 25% time-wise. In the corporate world, projects run over all the time. 


I will admit I was disappointed, and nervous to even set a new deadline. But, after a few days of letting those feelings work themselves out, I got over it. Some days I worry that I'm not up to snuff to write a novel. Then I have days where I'm ready to charge the literary world! I'm sure every writer goes through this, and I will have many more up and down days before any reader ever gets her hands on CANCELLED.


"CANCELLED" arriving Late Summer 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

Self-Published Author: Deadlines, Making a Living, 10-year plan

Going to be close on deadline, but I can do it! Tuesday at midnight is the deadline for my first manuscript. I'm currently sitting at 48,000 words. I have about 20,000 more to go. Then let it simmer, and work on outlining second book.


Which brings me to one of my favorite activities: GENRE SNOOPING. That's right. What are people in my genre writing? What are they pricing it at? What does it read like? I've mentioned Lucy Kevin before in regards to her ebook pricing strategy, and was surprised to realize why I couldn't find a ton of information about her. She doesn't exist. Okay, she does, but her main writing name is Bella Andre. No, I'm not unmasking a superhero, she plainly lists her pseudonyms on her main site. 


Bella Andre is an indie publishing goddess! She has over 16 titles and even better, she's like me! Let's write those modern, contemporary stories about love in the real world! Melodrama? Yuck. Weak females? Double yuck. Super strong females the male must "tame?" Super double yuck. June looks like it's going to be me devouring her entire Lucy Kevin line. It might be the first series I can put in my section of books I have personally read and like for my readers waiting in between my novels (check out my Catering to the Readers post)


So there is hope for my writing style. +1. I next played with the real numbers posted by one of the wonderful brains behind The Writer's Guide to Epublishing, D.D. Scott, and also by YA author Megg Jensen, writer of Anathema. At $2.99, Megg saw sales in the range of 50-150 books per month. D.D. Scott's $2.99 offerings, with a $.99 intro (Bootscootin' Blahniks) sees monthly sales between 200-290 books per month.


Why would I forecast my own writing? After all I have 0 data for my own books. True, but I can set goals. I know I will sell at $2.99 for a royalty of roughly $2.00, to make the math easy and to account for slight variations in royalty calculations between Amazon, Nook, and Smashwords. I currently have a publication schedule of two novels per calendar year. This year is only one, but it's my first year. I have Book #2 of the Red Ink Collection, PAST DUE, slated for March 2012, and Book #3 SERVED which is a sequel to CANCELLED slated for August 2012. 


If I average 100 books per month, per title (yes, some months might see CANCELLED sell 150, but PAST DUE only 57, and vice-versa. Calculations are based on an average, so I can even have good and bad months and not panic, Hitchhiker's style). In 2012, I will make $5,400 on my three novels. That meets my second goal of writing when I began my fiction career: Make $5,000 in one calendar year from my fiction writing. 


What if I do better than that? What if my numbers are higher, say 150 books per novel per month on average for the year? That's $8,100 in 2012. 


The highest I hoped for was to average 200 books per title per month. Again, we're talking averages, so having a few outlier months that are awesome would be enough to pull the average up. This is like big dreaming. That would be a nice $10,800 for 2012. Or 5,400 books sold in the year.


Now here is where the math gets interesting. Once I have more titles, assuming I can keep the average up (which it looks like is possible given D.D. Scott's numbers on her older titles, remember just average, not every book must sell the average number each month), in 2013 I would have 5 novels (no idea what book 4 and 5 are, but I have ideas that could flesh out, too far in advance to think concretely that far. Maybe PAST DUE gets a sequel, maybe it doesn't.) Average of 100 books per month per title (5) = $10,200 for the year. Average of 150 books per month per title = $15,300. Average of 200 books per month per title = $20,400. 


That's moving from intern to entry level hire.


I continued my two books per year production schedule up to 9 novels, or 2015, which is where I think a little burn out might occur. Then I stepped down to 1 novel per year. I calculated out for the next ten years because that is the length of my husband's naval career at the moment. Here's where I'm looking at this as a career path:


2021, ten years in the game. I'm 39 years old. 15 novels in the game. 
100 books average per month per title = 17,800 books $35,600.
150 books average per month per title = 26,700 books $53,400.
200 books average per month per title = 35,600 books $71,200.


Over my ten year career:
At 100 books avg. I would have sold 114,000 books, made $228,000.
At 150 books avg. I would have sold 170,900 books made $341,800.
At 200 books avg. I would have sold 228,000 books and made $456,000


What's The Point? My writing, while keeping me sane, doesn't come without trade-offs. For every 30 minutes of wordmongering, that's 30 minutes I'm not hanging with my family or doing something else. Some things, my writing is way more productive over, like over me playing video games. Other things, like playing with my daughter or playing a family game I wouldn't necessarily put my writing down as more important in comparison. For the record, doing laundry does not override writing time. :)


I've been writing for 4 years (non-fiction articles). I took off considerable time when I became pregnant and had my daughter. About 14 months of maternity leave :) I made $4,000 my first year writing, $2,000 my second (I became pregnant that year after struggling for over a year with fertility issues), and $1100 my third (didn't start writing again until daughter was 6 months old). Last year I claimed a $500 profit, because as she learned to walk, I got busy. Very busy. Now that she's almost 2, there is more time she is independent. 


I have to look at the monetary value of my writing and decide if it matches up with the qualitative value of my life. Does the money I make for the hours I work add to my family's well-being by giving us money to take vacations, by keeping Mommy from feeling restless/worthless, by growing a retirement fund for me to perhaps lessen the financial burden later? I think it does. 


Why forecast 10 years? In ten years, my daughter will be 12. With 15 novels, I could easily take a long hiatus and still see some money come in. There's no telling what life will be like between now and then, or even after that date. I do know most likely my husband will be leaving the Navy and that will be a big transition. That extra money will probably come in handy in reducing the stress between military and civilian job. 


10 years is also a good length of time to plan a career path. No one goes from grunt to manager level in one year. It's important as indie writers we seriously sit down and look at expectations. We're not all going to be Amanda Hocking, J.A. Konrath, and Dean Wesley Smith. In fact, this year, I'm the equivalent of the girl getting the coffee. I'm writing my first novel, and politely talking to those ahead of me already published. Next year, I'll be the new girl in the cubicle farthest from a window, only part-time until a full-time position opens up. :)


But, we're in a growing industry. Who knows? Maybe I sell an average of 300 novels per title in 2012, breaking my highest expectations. Maybe I go from intern to full-time employee, with benefits. It's entirely possible with the double digit growth in ebooks. Of course, that also means more competition. So maybe I won't break an average of 75 books per month per title and spend more time in the windowless corner, still being asked to make the coffee once in awhile. 


I urge all of you to sit down and crunch some numbers. Have a goal. Have a realistic goal (100 books per month), a fantastic goal (150 books per month), and a super-awesome screaming from the top of the mountain goal (200 books per month). Reassess every year. 


For now, my 10 year plan is going in the front of my writing notebook (a three-ring binder with sheet protectors for my goals, current project, and next project). I will see it everyday. And work towards it every time I jump in my role as a writer and publisher.




"CANCELLED" arriving Late Summer 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

I Want to Self-Publish Because of the Cerulean Sweater

I have not read The Devil Wear Prada but I've read Everyone Worth Knowing by Laura Wesiburger. I tried recently to get through Last Night at Chateau Marmont, but it wasn't a good time for me reading-wise, I was more focused on writing energies. Okay, I have no idea if this scene is in the book, but I loved it in the movie version with Meryl Streep. The famous cerulean sweater.

In the movie scene, Meryl Streep's character as the editor-in-chief of New York's hottest fashion magazine, nay, bible, informs Anne Hathaway's character that she didn't choose that sweater, but a fashion line two seasons ago featured cerulean as a color. Then the next season other designers featured cerulean in their collections and that made it's way down the fashion lines to the bargain-bin sweater she was now wearing. 


Here's why I'm self-publishing: I want to be the person putting out the new cerulean line two seasons before everyone else wears it. Come again? Elizabeth, you're writing a book not designing clothes. I know that. My point is that I know my story isn't typical. I don't want to be typical. Craft wise, yes we should all be well-read in our genre and know the rules. Then break them. If you are writing a book just like another story already published, you're not going to make it out of the bargain bin. 


I know there will be readers who are annoyed my ending isn't perfect and I follow the hero's trip down Cupid's Path, and not his fiancée or the mother of his baby. And I do get flashes of scenes from the women's point-of-views. Such as Alexis calling her sorority sister from undergrad and talking about wedding dresses. You want to know what Johnathan's concerns about the wedding dress is? Is it in budget? Yes? Okay, then I can't wait to see you in it on our wedding day. That's it. He doesn't care about the fabrics used, the length, the line of the skirt. But if this was a traditional chick-lit, I would absolutely throw in a gushy, trying on the wedding dress scene. Shoot, chick-lit Hall-of-Famer Becky Bloomwood (Kinsella's Shopaholic) has TWO wedding dresses, and the drama of choosing between the two lasted nearly the entire novel! 


But so much about the publishing world is about what other books is your book like? As if your book must be similar in details, with just minor permutations or the silly, ignorant reader won't know what to do. In my opinion, there is wearable couture, and then there is the ready-to-wear lines. Wearable couture? Dan Brown's conspiracy thriller making secret societies cool and stuffy academia suddenly equips the hero physically and mentally for a life-or-death chase across countries, with no military involved. A spy type thriller with no military? And you're replacing the Establishment with the Vatican? Stephenie Meyer's vegetarian vampires. Vegetarian vampires? Whoever heard of a friendly vampire? Even Rice's Louis killed. 


With indie publishing, there aren't editors deciding which plot lines and story constructs are hot at the moment. I'm not arguing we don't need editors, we most certainly do. In fact, I am not proud of the way book releases are handled by many self-published novelists, with first drafts going to print. Editors welcome there! What the book world doesn't need is the bandwagon approach to publishing. Don't chase a reader trend, make one. Write to make people pause and decide if they like it. Be prepared to hear more from the people who don't like it than from the people who do. 


Forgive my constant pep-talk posts. They help me get excited all over again about my book as I'm currently stuck in the middle doldrums. Here's an excerpt from what I wrote yesterday in the dentist's waiting room and finished this morning, there's 1,000 words total to this scene:

     “Didn't you wear that same tie yesterday?” Eric gestured to the slate blue accessory with a satin geometric design around Johnathan's neck. Johnathan grabbed the tale and looked at it. 
     “A gray one like it.” Of course it was the same tie. He forgot to pack a different tie in his overnight bag. Yesterday's became today's recycling after he and Alex woke up at her place that morning. The last two weeks were a blur of dinning out, sleeping over, and alternating who packed an overnight bag.

    “No, I don't believe so. I believe that is exactly the same tie you wore yesterday.” Eric thumbed screens on his smart phone and showed the impromptu pictures from yesterday with the Claw, the mechanical hand at the end of the Hedis armature. It wasn't operational yet. He zipped through the scenes of showing what most men would do with a sudden third hand. Finally, he found Johnathan's poses. There was the CEO, struggling against the inactive Claw around his neck, and a slate blue tie with a satin geometric design dangling underneath.

    Johnathan hung his head. The cement floor of the work cave was a piece of abstract art. Various oil and lubrication stains made a random pattern of darkened splotches. Rainbow bits of electrical wire hid here and there, temporary visitors until their heavily modified Roomba was released. Neon drops of epoxy and other unidentifiable materials held permanent positions. At least until a good floor scraping.

     “And I also believe...” Eric held his pointer finger in the air, as if testing the wind, then brought it down and pointed it back to his best friend.  “You are in love with Alex.”

     No shock. No shame. Johnathan faced his oldest friend with a sheepish smile and eyes full of defiance. “She loves me back. I was going to tell you, but she had all of these rules at the beginning and I just tried...it was a miracle I didn't screw things up.”

     Eric played with an actuator on the work bench in front of them. He flicked the toggle switch back and forth. Click. Click. Click. Johnathan waited.

    “I'm not stupid. You two sucked at hiding.”

"Cancelled" arriving Late Summer 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

Self-Published Novel: Investigate Your Genre

Courtesy of Dmitry Maslov from Dreamstime.com

KNOW THY ENEMY....
Okay, okay enough fightin' words. Recently I was part of a good-natured debate about the pricing of ebooks, especially indie books. It pays to research your genre before deciding on a firm pricing structure...


It's easy, really. Go to Amazon, search in your genre. For example, my book will be labeled a contemporary romance. The main storyline is about who the main character will or will not end up with, his fiancee or the mother of his baby. It has a happy-for-now ending like most chick-lit/women's fiction titles, but deals with love and romance in an urban and contemporary context.  


My awesome news is that my genre has strong showings by indie authors in the top 10 and top 20 downloads. Also, pricing varies from $0.99 to $9.99 (traditionally published). There are many indie authors in the $3-$5 range. I plan to price my first book at $3.25. I have a couple of reasons for this:

• It's my birthday (A gimmick I will use and abuse)
• It will grab attention in a list of prices all ending with $.99 (don't believe me, check yourself, read down the list of prices and see if you aren't paused by $4.67 or some other ending...)
• It's good price point to offer sales from without dramatically impacting my profit, at first.
• It's the earliest full price of a movie ticket I can remember buying with my own money.

The biggest things that seem to set the indie/self published titles vs. traditionally published titles are the prices, cover art, and author photograph. Professionalism doesn't seem to be a deciding factor since the traditional romance genre is well-known for quantity over quality (publication wise, most books are NOT error free, as least not the ones I've read), there are even comments on a few traditional offerings complaining about crappy formatting. 


I am not a big fan of the $.99 pricing while a title is in what I call "first-run." First-run meaning it's the newest ebook offering an author has. I'm not terribly crazy about the $.99 pricing forever, either. I am interested by the strategy author Lucy Kevin is employing. She has one book offered for free, "Spark Fly." Then the next two in the series "Falling Fast" and "Seattle Girl" are both priced at $2.99. Her "box set" of all three is priced at $4.99. 


This is very smart to me, and I love the idea of packaging my books together. People can buy books individually, or for less than the price of two, can get all three! I might try to contact her and see how that pricing strategy is going, maybe after I have a few more followers here.


Regardless of what you price your self-published novel at, make sure it is a price that falls well in your genre. I noticed most of the books at the $.99 price point in my genre listing were published over a year ago. 


"Cancelled" arriving Late Summer 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

Reading About Craft, Trying to Write

I've had a very bad case of the insecurities lately. I keep reading about self-publishing and how it's all crap and slowly that mentality started to freak me out. What if I'm writing crap? what if everyone hates my book? What if no one buys it? 


Then I began reading On Writing by Stephen King. Phew! All of this is totally normal. And I don't suck. I didn't really get these fears with my non-fiction writing because I started that with 0 expectations. I wrote, it sold. Each random transaction was regular confirmation that I AM a writer and one that makes money doing so.


Writing fiction is a completely different beast. I don't get regular confirmation that my writing is good. I think it's good. I enjoy reading it, even over and over again. I have the first 9 chapters written, and most of the end of the story. I just need to fill in the gaps, about 12 more chapters worth. I have 15 days to do it. I made a pot of coffee for tonight, and will try to get as much as I can done.


I can see the finish line. It's taunting me. Today in church, one bible passage stuck out to me from my New Living Translation: Galatians 6:4 Pay careful attention to your own work, for then you will get the satisfaction of a job well-done, and you won't need to compare yourself to anyone else. Even if you aren't of the Christian faith, it's sage advice. I need to worry about my own project and seeing it through to the end. Who cares if my book isn't as good as other chick-lit/romance writers? They aren't me. And maybe my different style and voice in writing will catch an audience who loves a good love story, but nothing too sappy. 


Grooveshark on. Writer open. Time to get busy.


"Disengaged" arriving Late Summer 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

Day 19 : How to Overcome Distractions from Writing

I believe it's called getting back in the saddle? Because I definitely feel as if I fell off the writing horse! For the last two weeks, I have managed to eek out only half-ish of Chapter 8. First, I was in Virginia the last week of April, and between running around for social obligations, and visiting with family, my novel was on the back burner. I also wasn't getting great sleep since I was sharing a queen sized bed with my toddler who managed to push me to the very edge every night!

This past week, replacing my car took up so much time. Between test driving, then buying a Dodge Journey (only to take it right back the following day due to mechanical issues) I am now the proud and super thankful owner of a fully loaded 2010 Honda Pilot (Touring). People have told me before they love their car. Previously driving a 1999 Honda Accord that had seen many better days, I always rolled my eyes, if only internally, at the idea of becoming enamored with an inanimate object. But I LOVE my Pilot! Though, I can argue my car is not 100% inanimate -- I can give it voice commands and it responds back! 


So back to my novel. I am so behind. And the longer and longer it goes on, the easier and easier it is not to write. This changes today. I will write this morning as much as I can. And this afternoon. This evening, my husband has softball, so writing might prove more difficult. Even right now will be difficult as my 2-year-old is climbing on me, trying to give me kisses. 


"Disengaged" arriving Late Summer 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

Day 17: Book Cover Artist, Title Change, and Vacation

I am on vacation for the week in Virginia, visiting my family with my 2-year-old daughter. It's been a nice respite from home.


BIG NEWS: I have a cover artist! Suddenly, my release date just got a great deal closer! My cover artist is the wonderfully talented Melissa Oyler. We have some very exciting ideas cooking up between us, so stay tuned!


The title changed because Melissa kept calling my book "Cancelled." Man, that was a lot cooler than "Imperfect Timing." After a brainstorm session and an impromptu poll, "Disengaged" won as the new title. It might seem odd, but picture it with a cancelled wedding invitation on the cover and you'll get the joke.


I am home in South Carolina now. Writing has not been going to plan as I thought it would in Virginia and today. I spent most of today unpacking and getting the house/family ready for Monday. But! I planned out my weekly schedule for the next three weeks as follows:

1. 1 hour of house work every morning. (Get it out of the way)
2. MWF 30 min of cardio at home, extra 1.5 hours to write.
3. Tues Thursday 2 hours at YMCA (weights, travel time)
4. Lunch/Eat/Put my little monster down for a nap
5. 12-2 More writing
6. Outside play with kids (oldest starts standardized testing next week, we're pretty much done with 5th grade)
7. Dinner prep, clean kitchen

So I have 12 hours of scheduled writing. I am not scheduling writing hours in the evening/weekends so I can use that time to make up writing time I miss (I have to go grocery shopping and errand running sometime). 


Goals for the week: Get 12 hours of writing in. Get cover information to Melissa so she can start her magic. 


"Disengaged" arriving Fall 2011. Johnathan Michaels, a robotics engineer, jeopardizes his engagement with his business partner when a previous one-night stand surfaces, carrying his child.

Day 16: Marketing Jargon for Self-Published Novels

*** I haven't actually worked in marketing as a full-time employee, but I freelanced for two different marketing firms for over two years and picked up a great deal of information.***


Do you know what a clip is? A clip is any instance of advertising for your book (or product/service, but this is a self-published novel blog, so let's stick with book). 

• A comment on a blog read by anyone with your name that links to a website/blog promoting you and your novels.
• A purchased advertisement.
• A review
• A tweet

Judging marketing campaigns requires channels, and being able to count the number of impressions a particular channel makes. For some channels, this is easy. Others, more subjective. For example, buying a one-day advertising slot on Kindle Nation. If you use a unique coupon code, you could track how many sales/impressions you made from that channel. Comparing number of sales (or profit) to the cost of the advertisement gives a ratio that can be used to compare the effectiveness of all channels on equal footing.


But what about "free" advertising?


Technically, nothing is ever free. Either it took time or there is a string attached you must later address. The channel method still applies. Instead of money, use time as the variable as compared to sales or impressions.


For example, say you create a unique shortened url to go directly to your book for sale on Amazon. In my case, I might buy a shortened URL that I can use Bit.ly Pro to customize for shortened links. Why? Because readers are increasingly skeptical of the generic shortened URLs, but one you can customize lets you lend credibility. http://eaw.book/ip1 vs some jumbled mess. By customizing the tail (ip1 or whatever) (Or use tiny.cc where you can custom the tail for free). I can create a clickable channel. Now, I can see which blogs gave me the most bang for my time, a niche or massive audience? You might be surprised by the results. A focused, contributing comment in a list of 4 or 5 is more likely to be read by a reader than a comment just hocking your book and competing with hundreds of comments.


Marketing is all about creating channels (individual paths to your book that you can measure and judge against the cost in money or time) and clips (mentions of your book that you arranged or bought or happened spontaneously). Luck is going viral.  


How to be effective in your marketing


There are tons of novels, scams, and programs dedicated to this topic. Effective marketing is results, plain and simple. If commenting on blogs in your genre for one month bring you a boost of an average of 10 more books sold per day, that's effective marketing. Optimized marketing is doing the smallest effort for the greatest increase in sales. That will always be an individual calculation. You could assign a pain ranking to each channel, meaning how much pain did utilizing the channel give you. For some authors, free blog comments are a real pain, a 10. Others, that's a 1 and something easily done while watching Dora the Explorer with your toddler. Using these types of rankings makes it easier to decide where to put more effort or money. If you love to make book trailers, debut a new one every few months to keep it fresh. Or to put in different channels. If you love graphic arts, play around with print advertisements you can put in forum signatures, or email blitzes (where you email a very short, graphical email to everyone on a contact list announcing your book and ask for a forward).


I will write more about niche marketing and things I learned from watching non-profits later on. Here's an update on my book, "Imperfect Timing" for today. I fixed my digital story board alleviating the writer's burden that was preventing me from jamming out the chapters. I wrote 492 words, almost completing Chapter 7. I started pages on my major settings with pictures, addresses and descriptions for handy reference. I fell in love with sheet protectors in a notebook and dry-erase markers.




"Imperfect Timing" arriving Fall 2011. Johnathan Michaels, a robotics engineer, jeopardizes his engagement with his business partner when a previous one-night stand surfaces, carrying his child.

Day 14 - Not Writer's Block, A Crisis of Writer's Security

I'm slightly ahead of schedule on my writing, and so I took this weekend off a little. Only 932 words so far. We'll see if I get possessed to do a marathon session tonight. 


I just finished reading Sophie Kinsella's Minishopaholic. The chance to laugh out loud to a novel was a nice respite from fretting over my own. I read some of the reviews the book has received and goodness! To see some of the backlash against the main character's parenting skills threw me for a loop. Who reads a fiction piece for parenting advice? Or maybe they just have never gone, or can't remember, shopping with a 2-year-old. I can. I do it weekly. My little girl hasn't mastered "Mine" yet, but she's figured out that everything in the cart gets bought and brought home. She throws things into our cart, and any unsuspecting person next to us, making me apologize profusely and remove the items. She is fascinated by my credit card. She likes to hand it to the cashier, and she has to "sign" the credit card slip, too. Does this make me a bad mom? NO. And Becky Bloomwood, the Shopaholic we all love, isn't a bad mommy, either. Or mum. :)


The last 24 hours have been a little hard on my psyche. After the run in with the readers on a romance novel forum, I am more than a little flustered. I read a review of a book that has a very similar plot to my own, well the author made it her twist, but it was handled very poorly and the author took the other path for resolution of the situation that I am not taking. On one hand, I should be glad my thoughts are in line with the rabid readers, that most modern women would not accept continuing a relationship with a man who had an infant on the way with another woman. I agree, I had a hard enough time wrapping my mind around being a stepmother to a 3-year-old when I was 21. I think anything younger than 2 is just too close to the old relationship for another woman to come into the picture without questions about her priorities, intentions, or adultery.


But, I did have my first feelings of never publishing this novel. I don't know why...I didn't think I would get this attached to it. But as the weeks go by, and my word count increases, my bond to it is increasing. I'm hoping the month I plan to take off from writing in June will help me get over it. I really need to put a stop to the feelings that this book somehow validates me as a writer. That's such nonsense! I'm many things before I was a writer, and despite one reader accusing me of not having a real job (HA! I'd LOVE to just have a 40-hour work week and a job that came with VACATION TIME). This is the same person who threatened to never read my book. When I'm finished, I'm going to send them a free copy, on principle alone.


Well, all this talking has inspired me and I think I will get to work on my novel again. I'm still stuck on Chapter 7 and this scene of Johnathan and Kellie in a deli to talk about the pregnancy. I think it's the setting. I think they need to go walking outside somewhere....Johnathan sitting there spinning his silverware isn't cutting it. I think a new location would make adding the awkwardness much easier.....




"Imperfect Timing" arriving Fall 2011. Johnathan Michaels, a robotics engineer, jeopardizes his engagement with his business partner when a previous one-night stand surfaces, carrying his child.

Day 13: Got My Tough Skin On!!!

I do know better than to expect logic, humor, and rational thought to rule an internet forum. So in my first experience of approaching a reader forum, some vital lessons learned.

• Most people won't agree with you, and aren't inclined to do so.
• A handful of members feel a need to swing a big you-know-what around online.

But I am surprised, at myself. I had some very irrational insults slung at me. How dare I challenge the sacred happily ever after by suggesting a romance novel can end with just a happy ending that shows the reader the characters will still have to push to maintain that happiness? Anyway, it didn't upset me. Not in the least. How could I be upset at someone who said "I didn't even read your entire post and I don't like you already?" Wow. What was really funny, from an illogical stance, is one person stating that my book is not in this genre and he or she will never read it. Well which is it? If is a romance book, then I would be worried about you threatening to never read it because you only read romance novels. But if it isn't a romance novel, then you wouldn't read it anyway, so I didn't lose anything.


It amazes me the people who will say things online that they wouldn't say in real life. Could you imagine being in a conversation with someone and they hold up a hand and say "Let me stop you right there, I don't like you so :shrug: just go away now." But I pulled out my Southern upbringing and killed them with kindness. I thanked them for their advice, even the mean spirited, and believe me, I *am* learning from it, and moved on. Now the will power will be to not respond to any replies. But I can do it, I'm too busy! :)


UPDATE: Proof that you must always respond with kindness, the responses are now somewhat apologetic for labeling me a spammer, and more reasonable towards the idea of a degree to the happily ever after ending.


Speaking of busy, this morning I wrote 932 words in about an hour and a half. This scene is near the end of the novel, and I cried my eyes out writing it. I loved when I read it aloud to my stepson, he sucked in a loud breath "Heeeeehhhhhhh" right the moment I wanted. I figure if he gets it, my readers will too. It was painful. I had to write about a mother who gave birth 12 hours earlier and wasn't allowed to ever hold her baby. Yeah, talk about some serious pain! 

The closest I can come to that heartache is how I felt after I woke up from my own C-section. I was groggy and still coming to, when my husband dashed into the door frame. I remember concentrating to focus on him and he was antsy. Why was he antsy? I asked how is our baby and he said "I don't know, I haven't seen her yet." I pushed myself up, while the nurse fixing my IVs urged me to lay back down. "What? Why not?" And then the nurse's face blanched. She had forgotten to tell my husband he could go to the nursery and see our daughter when my surgery was done. My daughter laid, parentless, for the first hour and a half of her life under a warmer. 

Writing about giving birth from the emotional side of things is fun, even if it is exhausting and impacts your tissue supply. Not the classic "Push, push, push" scenes, which I never experienced first-hand, but the million, billion questions and concerns that fly through your head and heart in the first few hours of the baby's arrival. Before you're too sleep-deprived and dirty to even care about the outside world.


Here's a little sample of what I wrote this morning, it's the end of the scene.



Returning his phone to his pocket, Johnathan finally made good on his initial intention to return to his daughter. Scrubbing his hands and forearms in the sink between the nursery's double door entry, he smiled. Once inside, Anna handed Charlotte to her father and he eased himself into the rocking chair next to her plastic bin.
“Daddy has everything under control,” he cooed. Charlotte squinted her little eyes open in recognition of her father's voice before making a newborn yawn and turning her head further into his chest. Johnathan's mouth remained fixed in a smile. He kissed his daughter's forehead and relaxed his own head back to rest.



"Imperfect Timing" arriving Fall 2011. Johnathan Michaels, a robotics engineer, jeopardizes his engagement with his business partner when a previous one-night stand surfaces, carrying his child.

The Debate Between Romance and Chick-Lit Wages On

I read this post over at a blog I follow, BigAl's Books and Pals, where BigAl and his team of readers review self-published and independently published Kindle books.

BigAl's Books and Pals: Chick Lit and Romance Fiction / A Defining Moment: "A note from BigAl: A few weeks ago, I reviewed 'Taking Love in Stride,' a romance novel by Donna Fasano. In that review I talke..."

I can appreciate this blog post because I am struggling with those same rigid formulas of a romance novel and a chick-lit novel. My novel fits them like an octagon peg going into a circle hole--doesn't fit perfectly by just the slimmest of margins. Why? First, I am using a male POV. I won't change this. Selfishly, I want to explore what we women look like to men, even if it's a purely fictionalized simulation. Am I going to perfectly capture every man's reaction to a situation? Of course not, men are just as different as women are. But I hope to mostly capture a masculine reaction to the situations that most females would respond with a decidedly feminine approach.

For example, in the scene where Kellie, the one-night stand, tracks Johnathan down to tell him she's pregnant and it's his, she is carrying his shirt that she "borrowed" the morning after they slept together. She's nervous. She doesn't exactly know how to tell him. Putting myself in her shoes, I'd be nervous. What if he started yelling at me, wanting me to abort the baby? What if he wants to support me and the baby (my biggest hope)? What if he refuses to talk to me? etc. etc. etc. She doesn't feel comfortable explaining the real reason she is there at his work place, that's his turf. She wants to go somewhere neutral, so she feels better about making an escape if everything goes horribly wrong.

Johnathan however recognizes she went to an awful lot of trouble just to return a shirt, but doesn't take it any further than that. I base this mostly on my husband. He doesn't do "what if?" He likes to make assumptions and decisions on the facts on hand, not extrapolate various possible scenarios or outcomes so he feels ready to deal with what may come. He has a confidence that he will always be able to deal with what comes. My character Johnathan recognizes an undue amount of trouble to return a shirt, and when Kellie asks if they can go somewhere to talk, he reasonably assumes she is trying to get a second date.

So my POV character kills my ability to call my novel a straight chick-lit, and my ending kills my ability to call it a straight romance. After my 10-year-old son heard my original ending, this was his response. "The Daddy has to end with someone to be the Mommy. The baby has to have a Mommy." It still makes me melt just thinking about his very clear understanding of the story and what has to happen in the end. It's what changed my heart towards my character, Kellie. I wanted to nail her. Being a stepmom myself, I wanted to just rub this woman into the ground as a representation of all of the birth mothers who don't deserve to care for their children because they are terrible parents, but always win out in custody battles with fathers because of their gender in the parenting team.

Once I explored my storyline and wrote a few chapters though, I realized Kellie didn't deserve to be rubbed out of her child's life. She made a mistake. We ALL make mistakes as parents. She does pay for her mistake in the ending, but nothing she can't overcome with time. So, I gave my story a happier, though not happily ever after, ending. However, if this was a straight up romance, Johnathan would either end up with his fiance or the baby's mother. And he doesn't. At least not clearly, without a doubt. Instead, he ends up happy in a way HE never thought of, but not without a tough trek ahead of him.

I responded to the BigAl's Books and Pals blog that I think more and more indie authors are going to be just like me. We're tired of the formulas set forth by the publication guidelines given by traditional publishers and agents.

A chick-lit must be from a women's point of view. Why? Isn't what really defines a genre is the audience most like to read it? Couldn't a book appeal to the chick-lit audience if it's a modern, sometimes comedic, story about balancing romance and career? Because that's how I define chick-lit and the books I like to read.

A romance must have steamy scenes, but no references to specific genitalia, and the hero and heroine must live happily ever after. Why? Isn't the point of a romance for the reader to escape into a whirlwind romantic tale? Can't it be just as titillating to see a steamy, hot relationship fizzle out because most can't sustain that level of passion? Can't a reader read a romance, love the thrills of the ups and downs and finish by saying "Wow, glad that isn't my life." and be just as satisfied? I think romance readers are pretty savvy women, who can take a more realistic ending as long as the romantic elements of the story are strong.

I hope these genres explode with more offerings and more ideas. Love is complicated. Work is tough. And together, these two make up our everyday lives. And for anyone who thinks my storyline isn't plausible, let me tell you about a man I sat next to on a plane who was in the middle of divorcing his wife, got another woman pregnant, and then his wife wanted to reconcile. And they did. The wife was at the hospital when the baby was born. And no, they didn't have any children together. My son was 5 at the time (I was escorting him home to his Mom, he couldn't fly by himself yet). 5 years later, that story STILL swirls in my mind. And I hope my book will do the same. Time to go write.

"Imperfect Timing" arriving Fall 2011. Johnathan Michaels, a robotics engineer, jeopardizes his engagement with his business partner when a previous one-night stand surfaces, carrying his child.

DAY 11- Story Plotting: Too Many Ideas Can Be a Very Bad Thing

Working on updating my digital copy of my story board with all of the pencil notes I've written on the first paper version of it, I pulled a thread and unraveled my entire middle section. It's mush right now. 


The problem is I like to build my scenes upon each other, meaning I ask myself "If A happened, how would Character Blue respond? What consequences would that have?" and so on. Only problem, is my middle is a serious crossing point of two sub plots and the main plot. Craziness. Everything has to fall into place at the right time or it sucks. Just because my story isn't a "thriller" doesn't mean there isn't a bit of mystery to the plot. 


I know what I need to do. I need to write my ideas down on notecards and remap them on my bulletin board. My beginning and end are solid. That won't really be changing anymore. Right now my middle is just a challenge to keep the story going and also capture the two relationships my main character has: one with his fiance and the other with his baby momma (not in a double sexual relationship, but relationship like his growing friendship with the mother of his child).


This brightened my evening: http://pbackwriter.blogspot.com/2011/04/self-publishing-911.html It's a hilarious script of a fictional 911 operator taking the calls of problematic self-published authors. I laughed so hard! It makes me even more excited about what I'm doing: pushing to self-publish my own work with great quality and a professional look. But tonight, I'm going to bed early and taking a break from mangling my own plot. I pushed myself hard in my work out at the YMCA this afternoon and my body and brain are screaming at me to sleep.






"Imperfect Timing" arriving Fall 2011. Johnathan Michaels, a robotics engineer, jeopardizes his engagement with his business partner when a previous one-night stand surfaces, carrying his child.