Tag Archives: Indie Author

Writer’s Resources

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Writer’s Resources

Natalie Bright

 

A writer’s job never ends. When you’re not writing, then you are probably thinking about writing. Our characters and stories are not familiar with the term “taking a break.” They constantly ramble around in our head, or at least mine do. When you need a break from the life stuff and you need to turn off the story sparks in your head for a few minutes, think about listening to Podcasts. I’ve got into the habit of listening while I get ready for work every morning. Here are a few of my favorites.

Story Craft

Writing Excuses. “Fifteen minutes long because you’re in a hurry, and we’re not that smart.”

Hosted by several Sci Fi and Fantasy authors along with their guests, they’ll be talking about characterization all year.

http://www.writingexcuses.com/

Indie Author Self-Publishing and Promotion

Joanna Penn conducts great interviews covering a variety of topics relating to self-publishing and promoting your books as an Indie Author.  Podcast episodes are posted every Monday and include interviews, inspiration and information on writing and creativity, publishing options, book marketing and creative entrepreneurship. At episode #361 this week, she has an extensive backlist of interviews covering every topic you can imagine relating to the business. Well worth your time.

https://www.thecreativepenn.com/podcasts/

The Publishing Business

Sell More Books Show keeps me informed about the top news stories relating to the book industry. This is a weekly podcast focusing on helping new and experienced authors stay up-to-date with the latest self-publishing and indie news, tools and book selling/marketing strategies. The two hosts discuss and report, plus their easy-going, humorous banter makes this a fun listen.

http://sellmorebooksshow.com/

Educate Yourself

Maybe you can find a few minutes in the day to tune in while you’re working out, folding laundry, loading the dishwasher, driving to the day job. As publishing professionals every bit of knowledge inspires, teaches, and guides us to become better at what we do. Thanks for following WordsmithSix!

 

Promote You: Are You an Indie Author?

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Promote You: Are You an Indie Author?

Natalie Bright

To better promote yourself, you need a clearer picture of the path you want to pursue.

The old west, history of the U.S. and the hardiness of the people from that time period has always fascinated me.  I ran across this quote from the Editor of the Cheyenne Valley News, Harry Lovald, who wrote: “The trouble with most of us is a restless spirit. Instead of making opportunity come to us, we are chasing our legs off running after it.”

That description of early pioneers perfectly describes today’s Indie Author.  This week, someone asked me, “What is the term you keep saying? Indie Author? What does that mean?” For me the choice is finally clear. After four years, I terminated the contract with a literary agency to become a proud Indie Author.

For those of you who are new to the creative art of writing and publishing your book, here is a quick review of today’s terms.

 

  1. Indie Author: independently published author, meaning an author who not only is the creator of the work, but shoulders the cost for putting that work into production for the consumer and maintains complete control of the intellectual property. An Indie Author realizes there are many opportunities and paths to realize their goals. They can do everything themselves or put together a capable team of others to help.

 

  1. Traditionally Published: an author who uses the traditional gatekeepers of publishing such as literary agents and editors of publishing companies. A traditional publishing contract transfers ownership of the intellectual property from author to publishing company.

 

  1. Hybrid Authors:a fairly new type of author that has emerged meaning they are both traditionally and independently published. A) They may have obtained their rights back for their backlist of traditionally published books, and are now putting that work out themselves. Or,  B) they may have started as an Indie Author and realized great success in the rankings to garner a substantial fan base, and then was offered a deal from a traditional publisher.

Either way you look at it, it’s all good and it’s a wonderful time to be the creator of original content.

“It is a great responsibility to be pioneers in so great a world.” NARCISSA WHITMAN

 

Formatting Your eBook for Publication

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Formatting Your eBook for Publication

Natalie Bright

I tried.

With open mind, I tried to learn everything about book formatting, because smart business owners should have an understanding about every component of their operation. Because I kept reading about issues with Microsoft Word conversions, I decided it might be best to make sure my book looks perfect in the format each distributor prefers.

The Scrivener online class was great [learnscrivenerfast.com] and I LOVE how organized my writing projects are, but the power of Scrivener is in the compile feature. I don’t like those 15 space paragraph indentions when my book comes up in the Kindle previewer and I cannot make them go away. Uhggg.

Another online class on Adobe InDesign for my picture books, researching conversion software with reviews out the whazoo (use this one vs. never use it, only use this one…), more instructional videos. And yes, I know there is exceptional software for MACs only. Don’t own one.

Appeals to our 20-something office manager who is supposed to be keeping our other stuff going while I do book stuff. Even she couldn’t help me, and she’s brilliant, so moving on. 1 month, 2 months, 3 months. What did I write during that time, you might wonder? A few blogs and the draft for an easy reader, and we did finish parent taught driver’s education which is HUGE and has nothing to do with my writing career.

Here is a rundown on the different formats to take our book “wide”. In a nutshell, set up an account and submit your properly formatted manuscript:

Amazon Kindle: MOBI

Kobo: refer to their conversion guidelines, but everything is converted to EPUB.

Smashwords: prefers DOC, DOCX which goes through a MeatGrinder, which turns it into an EPUB.

CreateSpace: PDF for print; fonts and pics must be embedded.

Ingram/Lightning Source: refer to the 37 page “File Creation Guide” (yikes! This made my stomach hurt.)

Draft2Digital: Their process creates an EPUB. Good news: you can skip the distributors above, as D2D will do the conversions for free and put it everywhere you want for 10% of your sales.

The Question

So, it boils down to this very important question: would you hire me to do your book formatting?

Absolutely NOT. Are you crazy? You are a savvy Indie Author and a smart business owner to boot. I wouldn’t hire me either, so I fired myself. There is this guy I know who is an absolute whiz and saved me another three months of learning software that I have no desire to understand.

Thank you, Phillip! www.GessertBooks.com

The Next Question

Accounts are set-up, submitted books are approved, tiny prayer for no typos, and then I am moving on to the next question. Who are my readers and where can I find them?

 

WRITE ON!

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WRITE ON!

Natalie Bright

 

We had a great discussion at critique group about the myriad of publishing options for today’s writers. One of the reasons I love our critique group, is we each have so many different projects in the works and we write in various genres. Somebody is always coming up with a new story idea. It’s like an inspirational feeding frenzy of words.

This week, one of our members brought the first draft of a children’s book about a rodeo horse based on one of his published magazine articles. What a great idea! Someone pointed out that kids books have a longevity because there are always new generations of readers waiting to discover your book. You just have to keep telling parents about it. I got to thinking that it’s not just children’s literature. With electronic books, our work will stay out there floating around in eBook land long after we’re gone. Will my kids keep tweeting about my backlist? Will Amazon be around in 10 years? 25 years?

Regardless of the opportunities to choose agented traditional publishing or to be an Indie Author, the decision to become a writer and publish your work is for the long haul. You will be talking about your stories and lugging books around for the rest of your life. This is a marathon, just like any passionate career choice. The bad news, there is a new title published on Amazon every five minutes. It’s getting more and more tedious to get the word out and connect with the readers who care. The good news, authors are finding ways to connect directly with their fans and readers like never before. Crafting an engaging story is hard work. Identifying your target market—the people who will love your book—is an even bigger challenge.

“If you can’t figure out your purpose, figure out your passion. For passion will lead you right into your purpose.”

Formatting Your eBook for Publication

Posted on by
Reply

Formatting Your eBook for Publication

Natalie Bright

I tried.

With open mind, I tried to learn everything about book formatting, because smart business owners should have an understanding about every component of their operation. Because I kept reading about issues with Microsoft Word conversions, I decided it might be best to make sure my book looks perfect in the format each distributor prefers.

The Scrivener online class was great [learnscrivenerfast.com] and I LOVE how organized my writing projects are, but the power of Scrivener is in the compile feature. I don’t like those 15 space paragraph indentions when my book comes up in the Kindle previewer and I cannot make them go away. Uhggg.

Another online class on Adobe InDesign for my picture books, researching conversion software with reviews out the whazoo (use this one vs. never use it, only use this one…), more instructional videos. And yes, I know there is exceptional software for MACs only. Don’t own one.

Appeals to our 20-something office manager who is supposed to be keeping our other stuff going while I do book stuff. Even she couldn’t help me, and she’s brilliant, so moving on. 1 month, 2 months, 3 months. What did I write during that time, you might wonder? A few blogs and the draft for an easy reader, and we did finish parent taught driver’s education which is HUGE and has nothing to do with my writing career.

Here is a rundown on the different formats to take our book “wide”. In a nutshell, set up an account and submit your properly formatted manuscript:

Amazon Kindle: MOBI

Kobo: refer to their conversion guidelines, but everything is converted to EPUB.

Smashwords: prefers DOC, DOCX which goes through a MeatGrinder, which turns it into an EPUB.

CreateSpace: PDF for print; fonts and pics must be embedded.

Ingram/Lightning Source: refer to the 37 page “File Creation Guide” (yikes! This made my stomach hurt.)

Draft2Digital: Their process creates an EPUB. Good news: you can skip the distributors above, as D2D will do the conversions for free and put it everywhere you want for 10% of your sales.

The Question

So, it boils down to this very important question: would you hire me to do your book formatting?

Absolutely NOT. Are you crazy? You are a savvy Indie Author and a smart business owner to boot. I wouldn’t hire me either, so I fired myself. There is this guy I know who is an absolute whiz and saved me another three months of learning software that I have no desire to understand.

Thank you, Phillip! www.GessertBooks.com

The Next Question

Accounts are set-up, submitted books are approved, tiny prayer for no typos, and then I am moving on to the next question. Who are my readers and where can I find them?