Adventures in Self Publishing

Available July 1st!!!

JENN McKINLAY: Recently, I was having lunch with a couple of author friends. We are all traditionally published but one of us had also ventured into self-publishing. She had written an historical mystery series and sold the first couple but the historical mystery market dried up and the publisher passed on any more books in the series. She was disappointed because she’d had more stories in mind for her character and so decided to write them anyway. This happened to coincide with the rise of e-books and self-publishing so she decided to give it a go. Well, in a few short years she paid off her house and bought another one all with the profit from the mystery series that had been kicked to the curb -- and it’s still going strong.

She is the first to admit that a lot of it was luck and timing and the ability to work quickly and hire good people, copy editors and cover artists, but it was also the first time that she, the content creating author, got the biggest slice of the published book pie. The other author and I were enthralled, like kids listening to a fairy tale at bedtime. The idea of having so much control over your work – wow, just wow!

I mentioned to my author friends that I’d recently gotten the royalties back to my first romantic comedies but I was intimidated by the time and the formatting that would be required to get the books up on Kindle, Nook, Kobo, etc. The self-pubbing author pantomimed typing and hitting send. She gave me a rueful look and said, “Truly, it’s about that hard.” Mind blown.

All this time I thought self-pubbing was so difficult and time consuming that I pretty much disregarded it as not being for me, especially since I didn’t have a backlist of titles whose rights had reverted to me. But since I'd just gotten my rights back, I had to rethink. I mean I had these books, they’d already been professionally edited, why not get them up and out? 

Well, the first problem was that I wrote them fifteen years ago during the height of chick lit, you know, back when you actually mailed in a paper copy of your manuscript with a floppy disk. Yes, I know, it’s very 2002. I no longer had the computer I wrote them on or any other trace of them save for the final product of a tangible paperback. I thought about retyping them myself and editing as I went. Yeah, no. I’d rather poke myself in the eye with a hot fork. Luckily, I found a typist who was willing to do it quickly for a couple hundred bucks. Sweet.

Once that was done I was off to find some cover art. Thankfully, the other author friend at lunch with us had self-pubbed a YA novel just to see how it did, and she had a fabulous website that is basically a network of cover artists where you can buy one of their covers exclusively and have it customized to your book for anywhere between $70-120. I went looking at SelfPubBookCovers and, lo and behold, staring out at me from a cover was my redheaded heroine and she was even wearing a yellow dress. Perfection!

Next I got onto Barnes and Nobles and Amazon’s self pubbing platforms and all hell broke loose. Okay, not really, but it was a teensy bit more complicated for me than I would have liked. I soldiered on. Finally, it felt like everything was all set but then the book wasn’t appearing on Barnes and Noble’s site like it was on Amazon’s. Huh. I thought perhaps it just needed time. No, what it needed was for me to click the button that says “Publish”. Seriously, that’s what I had missed. (Insert Homer Simpson “Doh!”here). 

I opened the books up for pre-orders and was officially amazed that the book started moving. Now we already covered my dislike of math this week, but let me just say that even with my limited accounting skills, I could see that 70% accrues a heck of a lot faster than the 8% or 12% or 25% I’m used to. Not to be redundant but wow, just wow!

Now I know the world of self-pubbing is rather terrifying. There are unscrupulous people trying to copyright words, page stuff, and all other manner of nefarious misdeeds. Honestly, it feels like the slush piles of old have become sentient beings with really sharp teeth and claws. Gah! And unfortunately, the self-pubbed books that are truly brilliant but can't find a New York publisher because they are beyond the abilities of traditional publishing, get lost amidst all that rabble unless they find a champion. 

In truth, I don’t see how a writer can even make a living at indie writing if they don’t already have a name that people know to look for, but I can absolutely see the appeal of self-pubbing in regards to having all the say about your content, your cover, your price point, and so forth. My problem is that while I didn’t mind picking the cover for this book and uploading the book wasn’t as horrific as I feared, mostly, I had to acknowledge that it’s not what I want to be doing with my time. I don’t want to spend my days haggling over art, devising marketing plans, distribution schedules, blog tours, etc. I just want to write. Period. 

Will I ever self-publish again? Probably, I’ll put up the other two books when I have a minute. And maybe, if I have an idea that I am thrilled about and no publishers want, I’ll consider going rogue (that sounds more badass than indie, IMHO), but until then I’ll wait and see how TO CATCH A LATTE does and we’ll see. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

How about you, Reds and Readers, any interest in self-pubbing, re-releasing old titles, or going rogue? 

TO CATCH A LATTE by NYT Bestselling author Jenn McKinlay is a mystery romantic comedy mashup full of laughs, heart, and suspense. Stop that espresso! Annie Talbot's coffeepot has been turned upside down when her cafe is declared a front for a money laundering scheme and the FBI suspects she is the mastermind. So now her sexy new tenant, Special Agent Fisher McCoy, is sifting through her coffee grounds looking for the real culprit while trying to keep his hands off the delightful Annie. Marriage-phobic Annie is doing her best to ignore FBI hottie Fisher, but he is so distracting, her lattes are steaming over and she's thinking crazy thoughts like marriage and happily ever after.

A Few Tips for Formatting Books and E-Books

ROSEMARY HARRIS: I'm about to embark on my first self-published ebook adventure. So many people have done it  - why not me?
Weeeeeelllll - because I'm terrified? Because I'm afraid I'll mess up the formatting and earn a slew of one star reviews because the indentations are too big? Too small? Non-existent? Because I'll click Yes on something that somehow prevents me from doing something else - or worse - mangles the book?

So to give myself a little confidence, I asked one of my more experienced buddies to share his knowledge of self-publishing with me and the JR gang.

VINCENT H. O'NEIL: I’ve prepared numerous books for print-on-demand and e-book production, and there are many ways to go about this. There is also a wide range of publishing sites and services, each with its own advantages and disadvantages, but the most common questions I hear involve formatting. It’s not as challenging as it might sound, and so here is an approach I’ve found useful.

NOTE: Some of the detailed instructions here involve MS Word, but the concepts discussed should translate to other software. My experience with e-readers is largely confined to Kindle and Nook, but hopefully most of this guidance will apply to other versions. The conversion software is steadily improving, and so some of these considerations may soon become outdated.

The basic idea is to create a single book file which will be copied as two separate files that are then adjusted, one for print-on-demand and one for e-book. Here we go:

 Unless the book is going to be very long, use 12 pt font or higher.

1. Single space the entire book.
2. Make sure you include a copyright notice, an Author Biography, your website, and a list of all your other books in a “Books by this Author” segment.
3. Avoid underlining (for example, “Chapter One”) because in an e-reader conversion the blank lines following that underlining sometimes appear with what looks like a dash because the underlining continued past the underlined words. Bold face seems to have no negative consequences.
4. Consider putting a marking symbol (such as a black dot) in the center of the blank line between segments within a chapter; this helps people reading the book on an e-reader to know a segment has ended.
5. In Page Setup / Margins / Pages, select “Mirror Margins”. This will let you see the pages as they will appear in the printed book, as well as create proper margins.
6. In Page Setup / Margins, set the inside and outside margins according to the chart below (Leave the “Gutter” at zero).

Total Pages                                  Inside Margin                                    Outside Margin

 

24-150                                     at least .375”                                       at least .25”

151-400                                   at least .75”                                         at least .5”

400-600                                   at least .875”                                       at least .5”

>600                                        at least 1.0”                                         at least .5”

 

Don’t get overly concerned about this; the “Preview” function in most print-on-demand software is pretty good and you can adjust from there. For a standard-sized book (roughly 220 pages) I use .7” for top, bottom, and outside margins and .8” for inside.

8. I recommend setting the tab / paragraph indents at .3 to save space. Also select “Justify” so that the words on each line stretch from margin to margin.
9. Insert the page numbers, page breaks, and section breaks that you want for the printed book; many of these will be removed by the e-reader conversion, but there are fixes for the ones you want to keep.
10. Once the file is complete, save it as a Print On Demand file and an e-book file because you will be doing different things to each.

For the Print On Demand File:

1. Add a blank page in front so that the book opens on a blank page instead of the title page.
2. Any time you want to leave the page numbers off (for example, the title page and the dedication) add a Page Break, a Section Break (continuous), and another Page Break on the last page before you want the page numbers. Then select “View Header / Footer” and open the footer for the first page that will have a page number. Click inside that footer and then unselect “Link to Previous”. Then move up to the footer above that one (it should show a different number, as in “Footer Section 1” versus “Footer Section 2”) and delete the page number manually. The page numbers should remain going forward.
3. I generally start new chapters on a new page, roughly halfway down.
4. Depending on the service you use, you will be able to preview the final document digitally after it is loaded. The digital review will reveal any glaring errors, but it is still important to get a proof copy and review it thoroughly before putting the finished product on sale.

For the E-Book File:

1. When you load the file onto whatever site you’re using, the conversion software is likely to remove much of the Print On Demand-specific formatting.
2. If you want to keep a page break, enter a Section Break (continuous) where the original Page Break was. I generally only do that at the beginning (title page, dedication, etc.) and let the completed chapter scroll right into the next one.
3. The Page Numbers will be removed automatically; they’re not needed.
4. Different e-reader platforms (Basic Kindle, Kindle Fire, Nook, etc.) emplace indents on their own or fail to recognize the indents in some files. Although it’s a bit of work, here is a fix that has worked for me: I recommend removing all indentation so that every line (including the indented first line of each paragraph) is left-justified. Then highlight each segment in turn, go to Format / Paragraph / Indentation and select Special / First line and set it to .3. All of your paragraphs will indent to .3, which should keep the indentation standard across platforms.
5. The Preview function in most e-reader setup software is usually very good, so once the file is loaded go through the entire book and see if anything looks wrong. Most problems are fixable by adjusting the file, reloading it, and checking it again.

 

ROSEMARY: Vinny will be checking in today to say hello and answer questions. He'll be back tomorrow to tell us all about his latest novel, Interlands AND you can learn more about the writer Marilyn Stasio of the New York Times called "a polished writer with a breezy style." at his website www.vincenthoneil.com 

 

Wow - high praise indeed. To me, he's just fun lovin' Vinny as you can see in one of my favorite pix. That's the two of us at Crimebake's Vampire Ball.

 

 

Adventures in Self-Publishing

ROSEMARY HARRIS:  If anyone had told me five years ago - or even two  - that I would be self-pubbing a book, I would have said Absolutely Not! In fact, even a few years back there was still the faint whiff of disapproval or sympathy regarding self-pubbed authors.  And I was on the fringes of that camp.

I didn't come to my decision on a soapbox ranting about the evils of NY publishing.  I had - and still have - a great agent - and I've had four books traditionally published, including the one I have just self-pubbed in paperback. My first three books were hard/soft with MacMillan. Originally Slugfest, the fourth book in the series was to have been released in paperback by the hardcover publisher. There it was...listed on Amazon with a March 29, 2012 release date. My agent and editor confirmed it. I planned Spring 2012 accordingly.

And then, I got the news that they had changed their minds. O-kaaaayyyy. The reasons are varied and are best told at the bar at Bouchercon, but I didn't see why I shouldn't try my hand at self-publishing. All of the others had had some life as pbs. I wouldn't have the advantage of publishing the ebook, the original publisher had retained those rights, so I wouldn't be able to give my book away for free or sell it for .99 and then claim it was a bestseller. I was going the route that conventional wisdom said was a dead end - trade paperback publishing.

I investigated both Lightning Source and CreateSpace and truth be told their numbers, offers and potential were very similar. I chose CreateSpace because their website was slightly easier for me to negotiate, but that might not be the same for everyone.

They offered three cover design options which basically allow you to have as much or as little help designing your cover as you like. I took the middle road. I found the artwork, wrote the back cover copy and communicated via email with a designer who made numerous changes at my request. I'm pretty happy with the cover although if I had it to do over I might have made the title bigger (tough to do with an eight letter word but elongated type might have helped.)

Then I had to decide on price. If I wanted to avail myself of CS's Expanded Distribution (and not lose money on every book sold) I'd need a cover price of $11.99. Expanded distribution would enable me to be listed on Baker&Taylor's website and Ingram's. There was also the possibility of a sale to B&N. But no guarantees. And no salesperson except for me. And I'd be busy trying to let consumers know that the book was now available in paperback. If I said no to Expanded Distribution, I could go out with an $8.99 price point - more consumer friendly and more competitive with other cozy or light mystery titles - and it was trade, not mass market sized. So that's what I did. I felt it was a longshot that B&N was going to carry the reprint and most libraries that wanted the book had bought it in hardcover. I am sorry the book isn't going to be available through independent bookstores, but it wasn't going to be anyway (if I hadn't self-pubbed.)

The CreateSpace process was remarkable. Fast, easy and responsive to my frequent calls and emails. (There is a system in place that let's you click a button that says Call Me Now! and dang if someone doesn't call you about your book.)My out of pocket costs were about $500 - the lion's share of that being cover design, $350, so it could have been a lot less.

And it seemed to me that was a reasonable price to pay  to learn if any of the promotional activities, social media, mailings, etc. I was doing were generating sales or if it was all still about being on the front table at Barnes & Noble. Few things compare to getting that kind of exposure, but I'd only had that for one of my previous books anyway (Pushing Up Daisies) and over time the paperbacks had sold so why not try it for my self-pubbed book?

In the last two weeks since the book went live on Amazon, I've solicited reviews, written a few guest blogs, and sent out a newsletter and press release (cross your fingers that the fellow from the Washington Post likes it as much as he liked the first book which went into a second printing. And that Garrison Keillor actually reads it, likes it and chats it up!!)

I've also sent an email to about fifty writing pals asking for help in getting the word out. I confess that was a little awkward but I was absolutely heartened by the response I got (and I will flog forever books written by those authors who were kind enough to give me a shout-out!)

So that's where I am. I try not to obsessively check my CreateSpace or Amazon number but I am human. ;-) One interesting side note, sales of my first three books have seen a little spike since I started yakking about Slugfest. 

I have very realistic and modest sales expectations for the book.  If the shelf life of a traditionally released paperback is somewhere between milk and yogurt, I'm told a self-pubbed release is more like good scotch - but I certainly hope the book doesn't take 12-20 years to sell! I will make a determination on the success or failure of the project at the end of the year. And then we'll see. I still hope to have my WIP traditionally published, but I am keeping my options open.

 

So.. as Dr. Pangloss might say....any questions?