Milestones

SPE has now been up for a year. One year of this journey and I don't feel like we're all the way into the adventure yet. Each step is a small milestone to the big picture. We all dream of six figure (or bigger!) book deals, that would be able to buy us a mansion and solve all of our money woes. (Cause let's face it, we all have them.) But normally, you don't get there over night, you have to reach little stones first. One step at a time.

I look back on this year that SPE has been around and I think about things that we could do better and things that we have done well with. The same thing goes for my writing. I wish I could have worked faster, but I'm happy with the current results of In Black and White. I'm proud of Mia for coming as far as she has. I've read over her manuscript twice now and I've loved it both times. We have come so far, yet we have so far to go. It's time we celebrate the little victories, and support us and fellow writers in them. When we release our first SPEs (yes, there will be more) they will probably not be a six figure seller, but it is a victory nonetheless.

A milestone, a goal, whatever you want to call it, as soon as we hit that publish button we have reached a point. We will take time and celebrate and then we'll move on to the real work of market. As you go about your writing journey, keep the big picture in mind, but ask yourself, what are you milestones and your goals to get to that big picture?

Promotion & Marketing

A lot of being successful in publishing is promotion and marketing, when you self-publish all of that falls on your shoulders. So what can you do and how much does it cost? You can do a lot, and as it turns out a lot can be done for free.

Since I am still new to all of this and I'm on the verge of self-publishing my first book I am overwhelmed by both promotion and marketing.... But I have a plan.

I am going to utilize the free social media sites I am already on:

Facebook

Twitter

and Google+

But I am still going to strive for the 80/20 rule. 80 % of what I post isn't direct marketing and the other 20% of the time I will be selling myself hardcore.

Another avenue I really suppose I should dive into is Tumblr. But I am still floundering in my ignorance of that site.

Next up are the book sites:

Goodreads

Smashwords

Shelfari

Booktagger

And I might check into some other sites like: Authors Den, and Internet Book Database.

I might even travel down the crazy road of Press Releases, there are a number of sites that have free press release distribution.

Cross promotion can be helpful too, I have seen it work well for several self-published authors. When my book, Waking Up In Bedlam, comes out I will be running some cross promotions with a fellow self-published author A.L. Kessler and with Alexandra. Cross promotion can run the gambit in terms of what you want to do, it can be anything from hosting giveaways on eachothers blogs, facebook pages, or even something as easy as hosting an interview, a cover reveal. All of our cross promotions will be revealed later.

Next up on my promotion and marketing list will be a blog hop, I am already signed up for it and it will run very near to the time with Waking Up In Bedlam will be released so it will be perfect. I've never done a blog hop and I am definitely nervous about it but I'm looking forward to getting my name out there a bit more.

Last but not least on my list is Book Reviews. This one makes my tummy flutter with ten thousand butterflies. It really did seem like an easy task, simply find sites to review your book, give them a copy in exchange for an honest review... But the more I looked into sites that I knew did book reviews I found most of them no longer reviewed Indie/Self-Published authors. I found myself back at square one, luckily I've found a few sites that review self-published authors and they review the genre of Paranormal Romance, which is what I write. One thing I've learned about book review sites is when you send them a request to review your book make sure to make the email personal, they don't like to get a blanket email that was obviously sent out to several sites all at once. So when I send out my requests it will personal emails only and then I will sit back and cross my fingers and hope for the best.

I'm sure after a couple of releases all of this will like second nature to me but this is without a doubt very stressful. I think I've gained some gray hairs from thinking and over-thinking all of this stuff. But if it helps me to reach readers that I might have not been able to reach than every gray hair will be worth it. I love my story and I want it to reach as many people who will hopefully love it just as much as I do. That is the goal, share my story.

Dark War Chronicles Blog Tour- Character Interview with Lucius

As part of the Dark War Chronicles Blog Tour we are honored to be interview Lucius, one of the characters from Book One: In The Light Of The Moon (Release 6/11/13).

Synopsis:

Stripped of all control, panther shifter Kassity has no choice but to be a killer for Lucius. Obeying the vampire was simply her way of life, until Jax comes to town and brings trouble with him. When she recognizes Jax as her fated mate, Kassity must deal with betrayal, secrets and Lucius in order to be with him. 

With a war raging between all supernatural creatures Jaxon must decide who he is fighting for-and against. What started as a simple job turns into a complicated game of hearts when he meets Kassity, the woman he thought he was rescuing. But not everything is as it seems in Lucius' territory.

Welcome Lucius! To start off can you give us your full name and without giving too much away can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Lucius, that’s all you need to know about my full name. I come from Europe originally before I came to the Untied States under the instruction of a vampire named Zaaren. I’m a very old vampire, just one generation down from the Originals. I have an ever-loyal human by the name of Tegan and she has been with me since I was a young vampire. I worked hard for my territory here and intend to keep it at all costs.

Do you feel you were accurately portrayed in this book?

A.L. Kessler does a decent job at portraying me. I feel she softens some parts up, but she knows things about me that the readers do not yet. I can be much more terrifying than she leads everyone to believe.

If your story was made into a movie who would you like them to cast as you, Kassity, and Jax?

For me: James Callis, for Jaxon: *growls* Alex Pettyfer  Kassity: Susan Coffey

Do you have a personal motto or favorite quote?

“I don’t believe in happily ever after, I believe in compromise.” Is the one A.L. Kessler has stuck to me. It is very true. As for a motto, “I protect what is mine.” I don’t care if that means lover, servant, killer, or someone who happens to get attached to one of my people. If I consider you mine in anyway I will protect you.

What is your strongest trait?

My determination to keep my territory and the power I’ve worked so hard for. It is what allows me to do what I must to keep people safe.

What is your weakest trait?

I am always suspicious. It makes me hard to negotioiate with and hard to get along with. I see the worst in people and the damage that they can do to me and mine.

Do  you have any hobbies that we might find surprising?

What kind of hobbies do you expect a vampire to have? Kassity points out that I have a thing for collecting rare items, take that as you like. Archery is something that I find calming, but it’s not something I often get to take part in.

Do you see yourself as the villain or the good guy?

I see myself as a little bit of both. Things are not black and white in our world. There are certain situations where I have no choice but to be the bad guy and there are people who will not see past those choices. As the good guy, I truly do care for my people and there are those who see that. Tegan is truly the only person who sees me only as the good guy and that is because of our past together.

Do you think the fans will root for you?

I think some will, but I think there are those who will hate to love me and love to hate me.

In your opinion, what is one minor character in this book that we should keep an eye out for?

Without giving too much away there are two in this book that you should keep eye out for later, Coran and Sarah. Coran holds a special place in my people and Sarah well, she is part of Kass’ Clan.

Do you believe in happy endings?

That depends on what you classify as a happy ending. Do I believe people get some things that they want, yes, do I believe they get everything, no. That is why I believe in compromise, you give some you get some.

Will we be seeing you again in any future books?

Without a doubt, yes, even the books that don’t deal as much on the vampire side of things you will see me here and there. The series does take place in my territory after all, wouldn’t be complete without me.

Amazon and Smashwords

So while Mia and I are both working hard on our edits, I thought I would cover distribution a little bit. When I first looked into this, I was completely overwhelmed. There's Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Sony, Kobo, Ibook and so many others out there. What was I going to do? I want my book out to as many readers in as may formats as I can. At one of the conventions I went to I sat through a panel that kept mentioning Smashwords, and I had to wonder what on earth was this magical website where authors only had to formate one document and were able to distribute to all kinds of different places? Naturally, I went home and I googled it. Now, I plan (and have used under my non-penname) to use Smashwords and Amazon to publish the digital copy of In Black and White.

Amazon is fantastic for Kindle and it's rare that Smashwords will distribute straight to Amazon (I'm not sure what the trick is behind it.). Kindle is easy to format for and simple to upload. Amazon has their KDP Direct program, where you have certain benefits for only having your book on Kindle for a specified about of time. I've never used this program, nor have I talked to others who have, so I can't tell you if it's worth it or not. Personally, I won't participate in this because I feel like I'm isolating my readers who don't have a kindle.

My Pros for Amazon:
-Widely known and trusted site
-Easy for readers to purchase and leave reviews
-Easy to up load and sell

My Cons for Amazon:
-Kind of a pain in the butt to run sales
-Other authors cannot leave reviews
-Kindle only
-Cannot offer free book without hassle

Smashwords to me is magical. I know a lot of people who have problems with Smashwords because they are DRM free (Digital Rights Management, read Smashwords' comments on it here in the FAQs). I read through their thoughts, did some research and decided it wasn't a deal breaker for me. Smashwords has guidelines you must follow in order to make it into their premium catalog so you can be distributed to the different companies they work for. It's a super simple guideline and easy to follow. They also have many different formats on their website (including Kindle, even though it's rare they distribute a book to Amazon.). I love the idea of uploading one document and them converting it for me. It saves me a ton of time. The biggest downfall to this is some times it takes a while for the book to show up at Barnes and Noble and Ibook, because of the days that Smashwords 'ships' books out. (But I feel they make up for that by offering all the different formats from their website.)

Pros for Smashwords:
-Different formats and distributions options
-Easy to format
-Easy to change price and run sales (Also offers coupons, great for giving free copies to review blogs.)
-Easy for readers to review
-Easy to put up a free story

Cons for Smashwords:
-Not widely known to readers who are new to the indie game
-DRM free (though again, not a deal breaker for me)
-Lots of smut and crap (There seems to be more on Smashwords than Amazon...)

So there you go, some basics on the two of them, a small comparison. My advice to you, read into it, do some research and see if they are both right for you.

Showing Support

Indie writers need support. Doing this whole self-publishing thing is a long and lonely road without support. You need to establish fans, friends, and network your ass off. Seriously. This isn’t a road for the lazy to travel and unfortunately for me I do tend to have a huge lazy bone.

We can make all the excuses we like (and I do!) but the bottom line is when deadlines are looming sometimes life gets in the way and other times we just forget. Today is one of my (many) “forgetful” days. Between life being chaotic and looming self-imposed deadlines stressing me out I have once again forgotten my SPE post. Luckily for me I had already figured out what I wanted to write about, which was supporting those who support you. Isn’t it advantageous that my forgetfulness works into a post about support? Why yes, yes it is.

Anyways, so here I was lying in bed nursing one of my killer headaches that usually lays me out for at least a full day when I get an inbox from Alex gently reminding me that today was my SPE posting day. Alas, when it needs to be done you drag yourself out of bed, pull up your boot straps and get to work. That is what I am doing now.

Now Alex didn’t send me a bitchy email saying “Hey lazy, get off your ass and post! You are messing up my blog!” No, instead she was supportive, knowing what a busy morning I’ve had, she knew that I had just finished eating and was dealing with a headache, it was a gentle nudge, a reminder not a demand. If my headache was already to the point of no return then I wouldn’t have been able to get up and start typing but it is at a moderate pain level that I can deal with for the time being, so I let her know I’d be getting to it. Communication. It is key in every type of relationship, professional or personal, you will ever have. Alexandra and I communicate, if I’m feeling under the weather I let her know, if I forget something she lets me know.

On the Twisted Tales blog we are on there are seven different writers all with different schedules, family lives, spouses, significant others, children, no children, pets, jobs, obligations. We can’t always get our posts out on time, but we try and when we can’t we let the rest of the writers know. Not because we are obligated to, but to communicate so that everyone knows what is going on.  And when we post we do our best to promote everyone’s writing, not just our own. We tag, we share links, and we spread the word for all of us.

Support. It’s a huge thing, sometimes it is the only thing that keeps you going.

Support from colleagues is the same as it is from fans and friends who support your writing. When a friend of mine posts a link to one of my projects, or my author page, or recommends that people follow one of my blogs I always do my best to acknowledge them. These people who recommend my page, or share a link to our blogs, they are doing so because they like what they read and want to share it with others. They aren’t asking for a kickback, they do it because they are great people, great friends and as such I am always extremely grateful.

  

I’ve seen other people who do not acknowledge when a fan shares a link and tags them in a post praising their books, but that is not my style, I can’t be like that. I’ve seen some people flat out ignore fans comments or questions in a thread because they are too busy sharing inside jokes with their close friends. I always think to myself, “I never want to exclude anyone.”

This is all just my own, personal little musing on how I want to conduct myself as a professional. I want to cultivate relationships (friendly relationships, get your minds out of the gutter) with the people who support me. I never want people to see my every post on social networking as “Oh poor me, come listen to me have a pity party for myself. Nobody likes me. I’m getting rid of all my friends. If you don’t talk to me then why are you on my friends list?” kind of thing. Everyone has their moments (and my personal page is different from my author page. On my personal page you will probably see the random bitching about my husband who just did some really dumb thing that made me mad, or you might see me posting about my kids… And honestly a whole lot of food pics but my author page has none of that). We all have our sour moments in life, but we should never be sour when it comes to people showing us love and support.

I got my start writing again in the role playing world, because of that I always try to show mad love to the RPers on Facebook, I promote them on The Indie Writers’ Collective and on my personal page. I show love to other authors that I enjoy reading, the authors I write with at Twisted Tales, and to my friends. My friends, most of whom I’ve met through social media and Facebook Role-Playing, they keep me going. They encourage me and pick me up when I’m feeling down. But even the people who are on my friends list that I am not close with (yet) I still show as much support as possible. Even if it is somebody I don’t talk to, I still enjoy seeing their posts in my newsfeed and “like” their posts.

I hope that one day when I’m an attending author at a convention and someone from FB comes up that they are actually excited to meet me because I’ve been accessible online to them. And yes, I realize that being a featured (or attending) author at a convention is a huge pipe-dream, but you just never know, it might happen for me one day.

And so in this crazy, lonely, scary world of Self-Publishing relationships and support are key.

That is my goal, no matter what happens in my writing career. I will support others and be kind. You never know what someone else might be going through or dealing with, a “like” or a nice comment can sometimes turn someone’s day around and that makes taking a second to show some appreciation, a like-back, or posting a random *hug* to someone who has supported me is totally worth it.

 
<3

A look into my revision process

Originally I was going to do a post on self-editing, but I decided to give you guys a look into my SPE project by how I revise. In Black and White is 73k words, give or take. I've sent most of it out to betas for first round, this is what I look for from them first round:

Flow
Plot holes
Constancy in characters/actions/events
Anything that sticks out at them

Now, I do go through it before I send it out. As an author though some things escape me because I see it different in my head. This is why you should always pass your work to a beta at least once. So when I get it back from them, I compile the notes. I see what is most common, then second most common, and then each nitty gritty detail each of them picked up. I combine all these in one document using track changes. It can get confusing this way, but 1) I can see all the changes and 2) I can see a little more clearly where the most work is needed.  Next I go through it again and make the changes that I think are needed. This time hoping that I fix all the big stuff (plot holes, flow you know the stuff that makes for super bad writing and I asked my betas to point out.) Then I send it out again if there were some major things, In Black and White will be going out for a second time because there are a few things that must be changed up to flow a little more.  So the second time around I will be asking for:

Flow (in the places that I'm fixing)
Sentence structure that is awkward that I didn't catch
Any last minute thoughts over all

So right now you're asking me, what about grammar, I don't see that on your list. Well I save that for last, because I don't like to waist people's time. How would you like to spend a couple hours going through something and checking every comma, every period, every nitty gritty grammatical thing just for me to completely rewrite the section and you having to go through it again for those items? I also have a special person who will get Black and White a third time, she will go through it in hard copy and fix the grammar, a week to two weeks before the release she'll hand it back to me, I'll finish it up and send it to everyone to reread through for typos.

So that's how I tackle a project. With Black and White I send a few chapters at a time to the betas so they don't get overwhelmed. I also only do a few chapters at a time to keep me from being burnt out. I hope you guys appreciate all the hard work my betas and I do to polish up this project for you!

Cultivating My Brand & Progress

This is an exciting and frightening time for me.

When +Alexandra Webb  first asked me if I wanted to be part of this experiment I instantly said yes and as the months have passed I have come to realize the importance and the seriousness of that answer. Who would have thought that one simple word—just three little letters would alter my life so dramatically. But it has and it will continue to do so. Every move I make on social media, every blog post, every Tweet, every Facebook status on my author page, every comment has to be carefully weighed against my brand as an author. And yes, authors are brands in and of themselves.  Granted I am a small name, practically unheard of brand, but it is my brand I am trying to cultivate.

At the beginning we each knew we were going to need a “SPE Project” the one work we were going to use to break into the Self-Publishing business to try to make names for ourselves, to see how hard this industry really is to become successful, and to catalog our ups, our downs, our hits and all of our misses. My project for SPE is “Waking Up In Bedlam” and as for my downs, here they are: I’ve been stuck on Chapter 12 for over a month now. I am procrastinating, sometimes not even consciously, sometimes I think the fear of reaching for my dreams triggers something in my brain that says “Let’s take a break even though you’ve only written 12 words and play “Where’s My Perry” for a little bit.” And off I go. Because it is frightening when you are reaching for your dreams. And as the famous quote goes:

 If your dreams don’t scare you, they aren’t big enough.

I’ve seen this attributed to Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Albert Einstein, Eminem, Winston Churchill, and Dr. Seuss. I don’t really care who said it (although it is quoted in Madam President Sirleaf’s book, so let’s just go with that), it is the truth. Your dreams should scare the ever-loving-crap out of you. End of Story. And every move you make should be pushing you towards that goal. So yes, I procrastinate. I play “Where’s My Perry” when I should be concentrating, I slack and get distracted by Facebook posts and even worst Facebook drama. But I always manage to pull myself back and remind myself that just because I’m scared of what it will mean for my life when I finish this project that I am only ever a failure, a true failure if I do not try.

So I am still trying. And for the record, Chapter 12 is the last chapter in Waking Up In Bedlam, so far it stands at 52k+ and I’ve already sent Chapters 1-9 out to some of my beta readers, I’ve already gotten feedback and things are looking good. Even while procrastinating my efforts are still going towards my dream and my goal. While I’m playing my stupid Perry game on my iPad I am usually combing through the previous chapters, fixing little things here and there. Even when I’m not posting about my progress I am still focused while goofing off.

I read my manuscript from Prologue to Chapter 12 at least once a week, to alter, edit and make sure I’m not overlooking stuff.  Self-Publishing gets a bad rap for having spelling mistakes, grammar mistakes, looking unprofessional, with shoddy editing, and plot holes.  I am striving to make sure that I can polish this baby as best as I can, that I take all of my beta readers advice and suggestions and that I do all that I can so that I do not fall into that stereotype.

I have this reoccurring nightmare that when my book is released it is so bad that I become the most hated person on the internet, the people in my small town all revolt against me and drag me out to the center of town and burn me at the stake with the ONE copy of my book that sold. I wake up in a cold sweat, panting and breathless, usually in tears or screaming. My poor dog and husband probably think I’ve gone insane. I am a writer, I think it is safe to say that my sanity-boat sailed a long time ago.

I don’t want to be burned at the stake, I don’t want to be roasted on the proverbial pyres of the internet either. I am my brand, my brand is me and I want to succeed, even if it means taking longer than I had hoped for the final product.

So where does Waking Up In Bedlam stand as of now? We are at 52k, one chapter left to write. Three chapters left to send out to my beta readers, then it is time to start the editing process. After a couple of rounds of that and final edits it will be good to go. I am aiming for mid-July.

I am also taking an online course for self-editing called “BeforeYou Hit Send” by Angela James. I’m hoping that will help me because I know grammar isn’t my strong suit and because I know I have a lot to learn.

One thing I can say is this: I am proud of myself. I’m proud that I am sticking with this even if it is slow going. I am proud that I am taking steps to get my name out there, to have my name in constant publication, I do that with the Twisted Tales blog. It is a project that is far more than just writing a fun little fairytale, it is more ways of cultivating my brand, my name and having a body of work that others can enjoy on a reoccurring schedule. I am proud that I am stepping outside of my comfort zone to do things like take the “Before You Hit Send” course and setting up my “Smashwords” acct in anticipation of publishing Waking Up In Bedlam. I am proud that my beta readers and friends like my story. I love when they email me that a piece of dialog made them laugh or that they want more. Those things make me feel incredibly good.  It lets me know that I am on the right track.

As for my reoccurring nightmare, I think in time it will pass. I know there will always be haters. People will hate on me and my books without even reading them. I know this, it is the nature of the internet.  I know I will get drive-by 1 star ratings from people who dislike me personally, or don’t like paranormal romance, or who think using the word “cock” means I should burn in hell. These are bound to happen, that I am prepared for. What I fear is letting myself and the people that believe in me down. That would be the worst.