Perseverance: 1.Steadfastness in doing something despite difficulty or delay in achieving success. 2.Continuance in a state of grace leading finally to a state of glory.

Well as of late, I've found myself a bit uninspired.  I've been wanting to write a blog post but having no interesting thoughts to write about, blogging has been pushed to the side.  This in itself has finally given me something to write about... perseverance.

Having recently self-published my first book, I find myself a bit discouraged at times with my lack of sales.  I know there are millions of books and authors out there and to stand out amongst the crowd is a tall feat in itself.  Self-promotion seems exhausting when it feels so pointless.  But... I know that if this is something I really want to do, I must persevere.

Silly me, before I published my book, I had all these great ideas about how many copies I would sell.  I reasoned with myself that because I had so many different groups of friends, they would tell their friends and word would spread like wildfire... not so.  I know most authors don't like to share how many copies they've sold but I'm not embarrassed, I've sold 13.  However, probably half of those have been gifted in exchange for honest reviews, which I haven't received yet.  Now if only I could sell 1988 more, then I might be able to get an agent's attention.  Yes I just laughed aloud at myself, it's okay you can too. :)

When I first self-published, I was so excited by the response and I had such high hopes.  It seemed like quite a few people said they would purchase a copy, now I don't know if they forgot... but it didn't happen.  As for my facebook page, I must say, that was a bit disappointing at first too.  Again, I depended on my friends 'liking' my page and actually found myself a bit insulted by those who didn't.  However, after joining some groups on facebook, with one little request, other authors showed me so much support and seriously spiked my number of likes.  Authors really are supportive of one another!

On top of all of this, the one review I have received was so disheartening, as I mentioned in another post.  All the reviewer did was summarize my book, which bothered me because she basically gave away the story, and responded with the same three stars I'd given her.  With that, I'd rather have no review at all, instead of a false, ego-based one.

So, my whole point of my little rant is that self-publishing is easy, self-promotion seems to be the tough hurdle, but perseverance must be the key.  I keep hoping that the more I persevere, the more I will get the word out about my book and once more people are talking about it, perhaps more sales will be generated.  One can hope at least.  Right?

Anyways, on a side note, in celebration of Canada Day, since I am Canadian, my book will be free on Smashwords from today June 29th, 2013 - July 1st, 2013.  I hope you'll stop by and grab a copy. :)  Here's the link.

And to all you other self-published authors, keep pushing on, I have faith we'll all get there some day. :)

The exciting, fantastic, terrifying road of self-publishing

Having finally taken the plunge into self-publishing, I'm slowly beginning to realize the challenges that come along with self-promotion.  For that reason, I hope to help other indie authors get themselves out there and possibly find new readers. 

With that being said, I'd like to introduce you to Ella Medler, author of Blood is Heavier, a really exciting and captivating read.

Did you seek agent representation before self publishing?  Or do you have an agent now?

Back in the days when I believed in doing everything by the book I did look for agents. I began querying one agent a week and kept going for twelve weeks. Not all even bothered to answer, but of those who did only one saw the potential in my book being contract-worthy. Unfortunately, they didn’t ‘do’ my genre. I lost patience and began querying publishers directly. It took a year, but in the end I had three contracts to choose from.

I've heard of a lot of writers who began querying publishers when querying agents wasn't going so well, most of them seem to have been successful.

What made you decide to self publish?

I’m an impatient person who needs to see the results of my hard work pretty much right away. Traditional publishing tends to work at a very slow pace. To give you an idea, I was offered a contract for my second book end of 2011, and I wouldn’t have seen a pay check from it until sometime in 2014. The contract option was kept open for me throughout 2012, but I never exercised that option. Instead, I re-wrote the book so it developed into a trilogy, published book one, and I’m about to publish book two.
Wow that is a long wait!  Self-publishing seems to have so many positives. 


It seems like a bit of a daunting task, did you have any difficulties? Or was it easier than one would think?
It is a really straight-forward process, much easier than I expected. If you can read a booklet of instructions, you can self-publish. By far the most problems were caused by IRS requests for foreign authors. Jumping through hoops doesn’t even come near! For an American, it should be easy as making a cup of tea.
I agree the IRS forms were somewhat scary to me, I felt so lost I haven't even bothered with them yet.  I'm sure minus these pesky forms the self-publishing process must feel a lot less stressful.

Have you done anything to promote your book?

Nope. I only had a facebook account at the time my first book was scheduled for publishing. I set up a twitter account and I think I had about 20 followers by the time the book became available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, etc. I bought a domain name and a software package and learned how to make a website from scratch. It went live about a month after the book’s release. Later on, I expanded into wordpress, LinkedIn, and a few others, but promo-wise, I still do nothing. Occasionally I post excerpts from my books on my blog. That’s it. Does that count? Some of my fans offered to do interviews, but I could probably count them on the fingers of one hand. Thank you for having me around on your blog, by the way. I appreciate it.
Always happy to help. :)

Would you take on an agent if they offered representation now, or is it something that even interests you?

I am not interested in an agent by their old job description. However, there is space in the market for an agent of sorts, someone who has the author’s interests at heart, and if someone like that came around, and was able to prove their worth to me, show me exactly how they could improve my writing business, so to speak, I would like to talk to them. Just a word of warning: I can smell a fraud a mile away!
It's nice to see that so many authors are completely comfortable with taking charge of their own career and recognizing they have a right to choose a perfect agent if they want.  I like to think that authors are winning the control a bit.

What was your first manuscript?

The first is an un-named teen spy story and it’s gathering virtual dust in a folder on my laptop. If you’re referring to the first published one, it’s Martin Little, Resurrected. It’s a light-hearted fantasy satire which mocks our current way of life. One of my readers described it as complete escapism. I’m ten thousand words into its sequel, Martin Little Takes Epic Action.

How long did it take you to write it?

Oh, I played around with the first three chapters, writing and re-writing to makes sure agents – see the conditioning? – liked the beginning. All the way through the summer holidays, I’d take the children to the beach and keep writing whilst watching over them. Then the new school year started and I completed the rest of it in about a month. I had to! I had sent the first chapters to agents and the book wasn’t finished yet! What if they had asked for the whole manuscript? That was a hell of an incentive!

Did you have it professionally edited? 

Yes, I did.

Did you have any critique partners?  If so, how many?

I gave the manuscript to all and sundry – people I knew and people I’d met only once. Never kept track of them all. Not all the copies I gave away returned to me. I take that as a good sign. I took all the comments seriously and, indeed, I found them all helpful. I’m sure the book is so much better because of all these people’s input.

If you could change the way things have gone with your writing career, is there anything you would change?

Maybe... I remember feeling so high for having written a book, so happy I’d signed a contract... And then I submerged myself deep inside the writers’ community and realised one book is nothing. Promotion takes time and skill. Or a lot of money. Time to write books two, three and so on is limited as soon as you begin to promote book one. If I could turn back time, I’d write ten books, and hit the market with all at once.
That's an interesting thought... makes sense though.  I've seen this so much, the more you have out there, the more likely you are to get noticed.

This is my most touchy question and a lot of authors choose not to answer, but how many copies have you sold?

Enough to pay some bills with the money raised, but not enough to retire. And even when I do retire, I’ll still be writing! My definition of success doesn’t involve figures.
I think it's very important that the definition of success doesn't involve figures.  I personally, and I think most writers would agree, just want to move someone with my writing, I want people to fall in love with my characters and got lost in my world.

If you want to find more information on Ella Medler and her books, you can check out her blog or Facebook page.  The sequel to Blood is Heavier is coming out soon.  I'd be interested in reading it and seeing where the story goes and I hope you'll take a look too.  All the best to a great author on her exciting writing journey.

 

On a side note, IndieAuthorland is helping me do some promoting by featuring me in an interview on their blog tomorrow June 18, 2013.  Here's the link:   http://www.indieauthorland.com/ I hope you'll check it out. :)

Ineffable: 1. too great or intense to be expressed in words; unutterable 2. too sacred to be uttered 3. indescribable; indefinable

Having finally published my first book, beyond the excitement is the exhausting exercise of self-promotion.  Knowing that a lot of readers rely on reviews when making their purchases of choice, I have been bothering a multitude of reviewers.  Not having much luck, I was excited to be offered the chance at a review exchange.

I went in with a completely open mind, a bit of excitement and a purely positive outlook on the whole thing.  By the end of it however, my experience is something that I would consider completely ineffable.

Reading through the book of my 'review partner', I was a bit disappointed.  There most certainly were some good parts to it but there was also a lot I didn't like.  And the amount of spelling errors and grammatical mistakes was somewhat appalling.  As I read through, I became more and more concerned with the review I would have to give.  The last thing I wanted was to hurt another author.  So... I focused on the positive as much as I could, assigned the book a three star rating, and gave my explanation.  Knowing how sensitive authors are about their work, I mean come on now, it's like another child to us, I was a little worried about the other reviewer giving me a low rating simply to get me back.  Therefore, I waited until she had posted my review first.

I was astounded, disgusted, and disheartened to discover what came next.  This lady sent me an email telling me that it is customary to simply give each other five stars and focus only on the positive.  Well what's the point of that?  What's the point of even reading the book then?  Man was I bothered.  If that's the case, then all those reviews that readers look to are worthless.  And on top of all that, why would any author want to just be handed an undeserved five star rating?  I certainly don't.  It would just feel so empty.  I want to earn those five stars.

Anyways, once this woman realized what I'd done, you know told the truth and all, she said she would 'adjust her review to a more honest one'.  Oddly enough, a few minutes later I found myself with a three star review instead of the original five.  I just had to laugh.  Honestly, I really did laugh out loud.  Okay it was more of an irritated snicker of disbelief over the lack of maturity from what I expected would be a mature lady.

The worst part was, the write up in her review was nothing but praise and simply didn't match the three star rating she gave me.  Which led me to the obvious... she'd simply reciprocated out of hurt.  The ol' tit for tat.  The thing I had been fearful of from the very beginning had come to fruition.  I guess there had been no point in me waiting to post my review then.

I am curious to hear what your thoughts on this matter are though.  The whole thing just left me with such a sick feeling.  It's just so dishonest.  Would you gladly exchange five stars for a sub-par book to receive five stars yourself?

On a side note, at least being let in on this little secret of 'protocol' made things a lot clearer.  Having read the book, I was quite shocked to find that it had received mostly four or five stars.  But now, after being alerted to the falsity of it all, I see it's all empty anyways.  I am open to the idea that this was strictly my opinion and perhaps others truly did see this writing as exceptional, but with such a thing as false reviews, how will I ever know?

Liebster Award :)

Well since I've received four nominations for a Liebster award in the last little bit, I figured I'd finally follow through with this.  First off I'd like to link back to those who nominated me: MV from A New Year...A New blog, Dawn Marie, Sharon Bradshaw and Brandy from Brandy's Bustlings.  Thanks :)

The Liebster award is given to up and coming bloggers who have less than 200 followers.  What is a Liebster?  The meaning: Liebster is German and means sweetest, kindest, nicest, dearest, beloved, lovely, kind, pleasant, valued, cute, endearing, and welcome.

Here are the rules for receiving this award:
1. Each person must post 11 things about themselves.
2. Answer the questions that the tagger set for you plus create 11 questions for the people you’ve tagged to answer.
3. Choose 11 people and link them in your post.
4. Go to their page and tell them.
5. No tag backs!


Here are the 5 questions from Brandy:
1. If you have published a book (most of these nominees have, some more than one), describe in three words how it felt that first time? If you have not published a book, how do you think it would feel?
Exciting, terrifying, fantastic.

2. Have you taken part in Blog Blitz before or is this your first time?
I've been a part of the Blog Blitz from the beginning.  I love the idea and am so grateful for DL Hammon's beautiful idea.

 3. Have you ever run a contest/blog hop from your blog?
I tried to run a blog hop for other authors to promote their book.  I had six sign up, but only one participated in the first week so I had to cancel.

 4. What is your favorite genre to read?
I love classics!  Always have.  Always will.

 5. Where is your favorite place to write?
Well I don't know that it's my favourite... but it's my only.  I always write while sitting on my couch.


Here are the 11 random facts about myself:
1. I can't stand tomatoes yet I love spaghetti sauce and tomato soup.
2. I'm so terrified of cockroaches that when I lived in Singapore I couldn't use our garbage shoot and took a small bag of garbage downstairs to the public garbage can every day.
3. My favourite animal is a hippo.
4. I'm not a very good swimmer and almost drowned once. Well... maybe more than once.
5. Despite #4 I LOVE the water!
6. When I was younger I wanted to be a marine mammal trainer.
7. I believe in LOA
8. I love flowers and get super excited every spring when they start to come out.
9. Everywhere I've lived I've always had a place to escape to when I needed to clear my mind, this place has always been somewhere near water.  Ironically however, I have no such place like that at the moment.
10. I lived in the Rocky Mountains in one of my favourite towns; Canmore, Alberta.
11. I have a bad habit of eating something sweet after every meal, except breakfast.


Here are my 11 questions for those I'm tagging:
1. What is your favourite day of the week?
2. What is your favourite TV show?
3. Out of all your family members, who are you closest to?
4. What is one thing you are grateful for today?
5. Who is the one person you've lost contact with over the years and wish you could get in touch with.
6. Do you believe in marriage?
7. Salty or Sweet?
8. What is one of the most beautiful/amazing things you've ever been a witness to.
9. What is one thing you've done to help make a stranger's day better? 
10. If you had one wish for the world, what would it be?
11. What made you start blogging?

Feel free to answer any of these questions in the comments, I asked them because I'm truly interested in learning the answers. :)


And here are the 11 bloggers I'm tagging, I don't know if it's cheating but I'm choosing from my list of friends, all people I've met through the A-Z challenge:
1. Amanda Dollak: Parenting from Aaah! to Zzz
2. Amanda Trought- Mixed Media Artist
3.CJ: Ramblings of a Homeschooled Escapee 
4. Rebecka Vigus: Ramblings by Rebecka
5. Masked Mom
6. Rowena
7. Barbara in Caneyhead: Life & Faith in Caneyhead
8. Jen Forbes: We're living a full life
9. Michelle: Ardour of a Dreamer
10. Lorena: My life with phtographs
11. Dennis & Roberta

The exciting, fantastic, terrifying road of self-publishing

Having finally taken the plunge into self-publishing, I'm slowly beginning to realize the challenges that come along with self-promotion.  For that reason, I hope to help other indie authors get themselves out there and possibly find new readers. 

With that being said, I'd like to introduce you to Sarah Cradit, a wonderful, beautiful soul who goes out of her way to help other authors by hosting them on her blog.  Her first book St. Charles at Dusk (The House of Crimson and Clover) has had some great reviews and her next book in the series, The Storm and the Darkness will be coming out in July.

 

 

 

 

Did you seek agent representation before self publishing?
No...I was planning to, but after researching it I decided self-publishing was a better route for me the first time around.

What made you decide to self publish?
Several years ago, self-publishing was not a very healthy option for most writers. It was expensive, clunky, and the market wasn't really ready for indie authors. All that has changed. Many writers go this route now, so the culture has shifted and so has the market. Print-on-demand makes it a realistic option. The other big reason I made this decision was learning that most traditional publishing houses would require the author to be responsible for all their own marketing anyway. To me, that was the biggest benefit with going the traditional route and, without that, it made self-publishing a lot more attractive.
I didn't know that traditional publishing houses made the author do their own promotion, for this reason alone self-publishing makes much more sense!
 

It seems like a bit of a daunting task, Did you have any difficulties? Or was it easier than one would think?
Daunting is the right word...but its a good kind of daunting, because at the end the reward is that much sweeter. Editing was obviously a challenge (it took many, many revisions before it felt clean). Formatting was even worse....it was a lot of trial and error with margins, font, styles, etc before I finally found one that I went with. The good news is that once you've done it, you know what you're up against and future books are less work.
I agree.  After going through this process with smashwords I feel much more confident in my ability to do this a second time around.

 

 

Have you done anything to promote your book?
Not until very recently. When I published it in 2011, my marketing primarily consisted of creating a FB page and sharing it with friends and family. I wanted to do more but it was overwhelming and my job was taking up all my time. It wasn't until the past four months or so that I found the time to start doing more activities- creating a blog, networking with other authors, offering my book in giveaways, etc. I think ramping up your network and fanbase is a slow process, but I've met some awesome folks in the process and I feel a lot more in control of my author image and marketing plan.
I feel relieved to hear that it's a slow process. :)  But I agree it is quite overwhelming.

 

 

Would you take on an agent if they offered representation now?
Maybe. It would depend on what my research produced and how much benefit I thought that specific agent could offer. If it wasn't much more than I can do myself, I'd pass. I'm already doing all this work, might as well get the agent's cut of the royalties!
Well said.  After doing all the work oneself, one would feel cheated I would think to have someone earn a cut off all their hard earned money.

 

 

Was this your first manuscript?
Sort of. It was my first formal one. I wrote a novel when I was in junior high as well, but never edited it or took it very seriously. As well, I wrote a 10-book YA series with a friend of mine back in 1999. We originally released it online, but its since been removed and we're considering taking the scissors to it and throwing it out as a real series.
Wow!  10 book series!  In junior high!

 

 

How long did it take you to write it?
That's sort of a trick question for me :) I think if I were to take the amount of time I spent on it and remove all the breaks and lapses in writing, I would say about a year. But in reality, it was 10 years. I started it as a fun project in 2001, and then would come back to it about once a year and play with it and then shelve it again. It wasn't until about 2009 that I decided it was good enough to do something with, and I started sharing it with close friends and family. I started researching agents and publishers around that time and then determined to go with the self-publishing route. I buckled down on edits in early 2011, and it was out by September.

 

Did you have it professionally edited?
I did not. I debated this one heavily. I am well-aware of the importance and benefits of doing it- from story issues all the way to technical errors. But paying a thousand dollars for an editor was a deal-breaker for me. It was the difference between being able to do it and not do it. So I did about a hundred rounds of edits and had some friends beta the heck out of it.
This is one of the hardest decisions to make for sure.  The expense of an editor can be a slight deterrent.

 

 

How many different critique partners did you have?
I have one formal partner (where we mutually assist each other), but I have a bunch of beta readers. I also use the critique program on youwriteon.com
I haven't heard of that program before, I love learning new things.  Thanks for sharing. :)

 

 

If you could change the way things have gone with your writing career, is there anything you would change?
I would have networked with other authors sooner. I've learned a lot from other writers and it would have not only saved me a lot of headache, but it would have helped me get my marketing off the ground at an earlier point. It also helps with writer's solitude...its inspiring to know you're not alone!
I agree, the support of other authors is an amazing feeling, they know exactly what you're going through.  Not to mention their eagerness to help each other out is beautiful!

 

 

Do you have any other books out?  Can you give us a taste of your book that's coming soon?
The second book in my House of Crimson and Clover Series (title: The Storm and the Darkness) is going to be released in July. I have three other books in the series written awaiting edits, and more to come after that. You can learn more about the series (as well as some fun "extras") here.

Here's a teaser for The Storm and the Darkness:
Ana Deschanel has always been introspective, finding it difficult to share herself with others. She is an only child, and the person closest to her, her cousin Nicolas, is the only person who understands her decision to leave New Orleans for a while in attempt to understand- and hopefully put behind- the darkness that has been slowly creeping over her thoughts for years. Beyond that, there is a darker reason for her escape...one she has kept even from Nicolas, because she knows he would never forgive her.
She finds herself spending the winter in an old Victorian home belonging to her family on Summer Isle, a quaint island community off the coast of Maine. The village is small and tight-knit, and it becomes clear to her early on that she is an outsider, but she is determined to make it work.
Her neighbors, the St. Andrews brothers, have mixed feelings about her arrival. The younger, spirited Finn, a fisherman, greets her with warmth and curiosity, and observing her reading on her porch becomes a welcome part of his daily routine. The older, reclusive Jonathan is less enthusiastic and is even rude to her when she seeks out his veterinary services in a moment of desperation.
A month into her stay the first big storm of the season hits. Following a surprising but charming dinner with Finn, Ana finds herself naively braving the storm in order to return some keys to Finn. Along the way she stumbles and falls, and purely by luck the brothers find her and begin nursing her back to health. They save her life, but she remains unconscious, and with a growing storm and lack of resources, the brothers know things will get worse before they get better.
As the brothers watch over her, and the storm only worsens, communication is cut off from the island to the outside world. Things only get worse when their food storage is discovered to be spoiled and they slowly begin to realize that there are other sinister forces at work, involving someone they’ve known their whole lives who is harboring a dark secret. At the same time, Nicolas begins to worry when he hasn’t heard from Ana, and he enlists the help of his friend Oz to investigate the situation. All of these situations begin to escalate as the storm grows, and finally come together in a dramatic conclusion.

Which method did you use to self publish and which avenue do you find sells the most copies.
CreateSpace and KDP. I will definitely be using it for all future self-published books. I've sold most of my books through Amazon, as that seems to be where people trust the reviews the most.
This is really great info!  Thanks for sharing. :)

 

If you want to find more information on Sarah Cradit and her books, you can check out her Facebook.  I hope you'll take a look at her book and have a read.  Wishing a wonderful soul all the success in her writing career.
 

 

 



Promote Your Book Bloghop is Cancelled

Only six people signed up and I'm not sure if everyone forgot or changed their minds but there hasn't been enough participation to continue on.

A special thanks to Joyce Lansky who took part in the Meet & Greet. 

Yay! I did it!

Not only did I make it through the a-z challenge... I just took the plunge and self-published my first book.

There it is... my cover!  Can you tell I'm excited?

Well I would love it if you would have a read.  You can find it here.
I can't wait to hear what you think.  It's been pretty nerve-wracking, thinking about sharing my work, so hopefully you enjoy it.

Yay for self-publishing! :)