Writing...Just because!

Now with three self-published books under my belt I thought it might be a good time to share a few of my favourite self-publishing tools that I have in my repertoire. There are hundreds to choose from and these are a select few that keep cropping up each time along with a couple new ones I found (or that just evolved) as I prepared to publish Deep Deceit .  Photo of me and Burj al Arab in b/g by Katie Foster, book covers all designed by Creation Booth Kindle Formatting Template from Shelley Hitz It was about three years ago that I started following Shelley Hitz and getting her newsletter, participating in her ebook publishing webinars (Get Your Kindle eBook Done!) and reading her books. Since then she has partnered with Heather Hart and they continue to offer great resources to indie authors through their company Training Authors . I still pull out her template and re-watch the video each time I get ready to convert my manuscript into a Kindle ready document for uplo...

Image courtesy of Photostock on freedigitalphotos.net As I hurtle headlong towards my self-imposed launch day of March 8 th , the To Do list is waffling between a satisfying series of checks and the inevitable daunting additions that hadn’t even occurred to me! Am I enjoying the process? Absolutely! Is it riddled with moments of elation as well as bursts of sheer panic? Oh yes! And, the unexpected, that every good planner knows should be factored into the timeline (especially when attempting something you’ve never done before).   I always appreciated my publisher of @Home in Dubai (Jo Parfitt at Summertime Publishing ) but I’m starting to have a whole new appreciation. Here’s one item that I thought would take just a few minutes… The Kindle Template I really thought I had this one locked down. I had taken a few online webinars and bought a video series and template and even tested it on a short e-book. I was ready to roll. Not! There’s a little thing t...

  Image courtesy of freedigitalphotos.net - David Castillo Dominici I’ve discovered that the most important thing to do first, once one decides to self-publish (other than writing the darn book) is to put together a timeline starting with the desired launch date and working backwards to the current date showing on the calendar.   It’s a real eye-opening experience to realize how many moving parts there are to the process. Making sure you have everything slotted on the timeline is critical otherwise that deadline is going to whizz by while you're staring wild-eyed at the ever-growing ‘To Do’ list. This really shouldn’t have been such an earth-shattering revelation for me since it’s what every good event planner or communications strategy developer does every time a new project presents itself.   Since that’s my background, it should have been a no-brainer! It’s now been a little more than a week since I’ve made my pronouncement that I’m going to self p...

This image courtesy of suphakit73 at freedigitalphotos.net What a wonderful day yesterday with family gathered together reminiscing about 2012 and talking about what's in store for 2013.  The next generation of my family are just the type of young adults who are going to change the world!  Really... I'm not biased... they're brilliant!  Okay, maybe just a little but I'm allowed to be a proud auntie, especially since I don't have children of my own. Anyway... During the past year, I had some great projects to work on, including assisting in the launch of the corporate division of 'embers of the world' as well as working with the Dubai office of DBM as they merged with Lee Hecht Harrison (as of January they will be LHH Gulf ). I also started on my journey to find an agent for my for my first novel, Mental Pause and it's been a year now.  I've had a little interest, many asking for the first few chapters and one NY agent who actually asked to ...

Several months ago I started to query literary agents for my first novel, which I wrote last year during NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) .   At the time, I considered writing the odd blog to keep everyone updated on the progress… does the term wading through cold molasses mean anything to you?   Rejection hurts! Well, due to a variety of assorted reasons (excuses), the plan to write a series on agent querying ground to a halt after the first five polite rejections.   It really doesn’t matter how polite the rejection is, or how stoic you’ve received them at the time, it still stings.   Even though I kept reading on all my writer/author forums that so many very famous authors were passed over hundreds of times before a publishing company picked them up, I still didn’t want to publicly share my humiliation. Then I realized how cathartic it would be to share with people who care or who have been through the process before and can reassure me...