If you're a writer with a brain full of ideas for novels, short stories, and true-life stories, start writing! For a small outlay, you can get them published in e-books and get them online to all the places where readers look for books.
Even this blog that you're reading right now will one day be an e-book, an autobiography of sorts! I plan to call it Search for Myself. I think that's what our entire life's journey is all about.
Tips for Getting Ready to Publish
When you've finished writing a book, get it ready to publish by taking these steps:
- Find an editor--not just a friend, but a person with a formal education and a strong background in English who can read for logical content, sentence mechanics, grammar, and punctuation. Even the best writers need editors! Readers don't like to find spelling and grammar errors when they're reading a book.
- Ask your editor to help you find a proofreader to give your book a final read-through. The editor who has already spent hours working with your book may not be the best proofreader.
- Decide if you're going to target your how-to book or story for the enhanced electronic readers or just for the standard electronic reader. If you haven't already, go to Barnes & Noble and ask for a demonstration of their electronic reader, the Nook. They have a standard reader that shows just B&W text, and they have a new enhanced model out, the NookColor. An author can add music, videos, color photos and even animations to the e-book for the enhanced version. The NookColor is hard to pass up! You might want to add in music and pictures for future readers with fancy gadgets!
- Decide how you want your book cover to look and gather photos for it, if you decide to have them. Look up the standards for a professional book cover. How should it look in order to sell well? Then you can judge whether the graphic artist creates a cover that meets those standards.
E-Book Formatting/Publishing/Distributing Companies
Decide whether you will format your e-book yourself or send it off to a company for formatting. BookBaby's ads (see more below) say that they will help you format your own book if you go with their company. That might imply that they will not do the job for you, but give you the directions for doing it yourself. Listed below are some options for formatting and distributing your e-book:
Amazon
Amazon.com has guidelines for formatting an e-book for their Kindle reader. My new Facebook friend, Allen Applen, has written e-books, formatted for Kindle and sold on the Amazon site.
He wrote that his understanding is that readers with the Barnes and Noble's "Nook" can also access and read a book formatted for Kindle.
For more information, go to this site:
Then click on "Community" and then go down to "Voice of Author/Publisher" Allen writes, 'Whenever I have a question I ask and someone answers."
This is a professional design, editorial, sales, marketing, and project management provider for the book and publishing industry. They select only projects that have strong market potential. Check out this web site for what is involved in publishing and marketing a book.
Smashwords
Smashwords
This is a free service that will format your e-book, give it an ISBN number, and distribute it in the required format to each of the major retailers online. You submit your book in Microsoft Word. You will earn 60% from major retailers; 85% for each download from the Smashwords site.
BookBaby
BookBaby
They will format your e-book, and they'll distribute it in the required format to each of the major retailers online. (On their ads, they say they will "help you" format your book.) You submit your book in Microsoft Word. You will pay up front for their services, including the cover and ISBN number, but you will earn 100% of the sales. Charge for formatting and distribution is $99. BookBaby will not show you your book formatting, because they say it looks different depending on what device it’s being displayed.
Publishgreen
Publishgreen
They will format your e-book and distribute it in the required format to each of more than 28 major e-book retailers online. You submit your book in Microsoft Word. You will pay up front for their services—$400-$1000. You will keep “up to 100%” of the sales.
Evergreen says they will format your book by hand, and not “smash” the words together like the other ebook companies. They say “smashed” books are "ugly books." You can download sample e-books on their site to see.
CD Duplication Companies (for audiobooks & music)
Evergreen says they will format your book by hand, and not “smash” the words together like the other ebook companies. They say “smashed” books are "ugly books." You can download sample e-books on their site to see.
CD Duplication Companies (for audiobooks & music)
If you're going to write a book and you have a budget that allows for it, why not also record your story? You can record in your own home if you have recording software, or a Mac. You can also buy studio time, or trade services with a recording studio owner. You can duplicate your tracks into CDs (Short run! No one needs 1,000 copies piled up in the basement!) for selling at events, and CDBaby will distribute your audiobook online to all of the places where readers can download it. Here are the links:
You will also need a marketing plan in place. Facebook is not the only answer. You'll have to accumulate a great e-mail list and write on all of the social networking sites. There is a lot of marketing how-to information online.
It's Time!
Robert Fritz, in his book Creating writes that the time to begin creating is before you think you're ready.
Get busy and write the Great American Novel. Dash off a self-help book if you have information about a subject or a skill to teach. Write your life. You know it's a good story! I'll read it--as soon as I publish my stuff.
My first priority: e-book and audiobook titled Life with a Buckskinner--my memoir and published stories about my husband Whitey and me in the 1970's-80's. My sister giggled through all of the stories while I recorded them last week. Maybe other listeners and readers will, too.
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| Mountain Man Whitey on his horse King |
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