Ever
since Indie (formerly known as Autharium) closed down in February this
year I’ve been trying to sort out the republication of the two books I had
published through them. I found myself
hesitant and uncertain of which direction to take. Should I once more tackle the traditional
route or should I persist in my stubbornness and continue to self-publish?
I took
the opportunity to rework the books I’d previously published and at the same
time continued working on new projects. But
I know that deep down I’ve been dithering and feeling a little unsettled about
the whole process. After all, Indie had sorted
out the two things which terrified me: formatting
the text and royalties. I would now have
to tackle these on my own along with front cover design and marketing.
by Nathan Vidler |
I’ve
been extremely lucky in the front cover stakes.
For my first novel (Six Dead
Men) a friend’s son used an image from his university work which suited
the feel of the novel and he designed a brilliant cover for me.
by San Jaya Prime |
When it
came to my Sci Fi novel (Where
Rainbows Hide) I found a fantastic cover designer through the site Impossible.
Artwork by Kids do Art |
My
children’s book (The Lonely Dragon)
could not have been easier. All I did
was use the marvellous drawings the children from the Tooting based group called
Kids Do Art and Louise Pearce at Inkhead helped me put the cover
together.
Now I’ve
finally decided to continue down the self-publishing path and relaunch everything,
including a republication of a new and improved version of The Lonely Dragon, through Createspace. This means that my books previously only
available on Kindle will now also be in paperback
albeit through print-on-demand. This leaves
me free to focus on learning how to improve my marketing skills while editing
and finishing off projects I started last year.
I finally joined ALLi and am already reaping
the benefit of their wonderful experience.
I’m also currently following a publishing course run by Mark Dawson which is giving me vast
amounts of insight into how the whole business operates. I can’t claim to
understand everything he talks about, particularly when it comes to
understanding the graphs on Amazon but I think it’s all taking me to where I
want to go for now.
So the
major news to take from this post is that there will be staggered launches of
the following books in October:
Where Rainbows Hide
Six Dead Men
The Lonely Dragon
I
would like to take this opportunity to thank all the people who’ve been
unfailingly supportive of my endeavours while I faffed about trying to decide
what to do. First of all, my wonderful
writing pal up in Sheffield. You know
who you are. Also special thanks to my
terrific Facebook Street Team and my best London pal who lets me drag her to
tango and any other diversion imaginable.
Before
and during the relaunch keep your eyes peeled for special offers both on Twitter and Facebook.
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