Friday, June 29, 2012

Mini Checklist for Self Published Book

So, I made it through my final edit that will include major rewrites. Yay! Party time! I'm nearly done! Er - maybe not.  While the book itself is going to require only one more read from me before I send it back to my editor to be proof read, yesterday I realized I still have a lot of work to do.

GOODREADS:  In a writer's group I belong to, someone asked if you should put your book up on www.goodreads.com prior to publication and the answer was yes. I didn't even know I could do this. I went and checked it out. You have to have fifty books on your Goodreads shelf and then you can apply to become a librarian. Once a librarian, you have the ability to add books; thus adding your own book pre-publication. I try always to listen to the advice of people who have done this before, so decided to add my book, and then realized I have some things to do before this step.

COVER ART:  When submitting to Goodreads (or when you publish the book) you will need cover art. This is the first shot you have at grabbing your readers attention, so it needs to be catchy. I know a lot of people who are doing this on their own and if you have the skill, you can save some money. I'm not so skilled, unfortunately. My cover art was done by LFD Designs for Authors at http://mycoverart.wordpress.com/services/ and I've been extremely happy with the outcome.

BLURB:  I wrote a blurb for Always & Forever once, but I didn't really perfect it and decided to worry about it later. Now, it's time to worry. I submitted it to my writer's group and they had great ideas on tightening the writing and cutting information that doesn't need to be included. What I mean by blurb is the short book description that can be found on the back cover of a paperback book or in the product description on-line. This is important to get right, because it's the first sample of your writing potential readers will look when making a decision on whether or not to read your book.

AUTHOR PICTURE AND BIOGRAPHY:  This is tough too. I'm still working on the bio, but I finally found a picture to use. The tough thing about pictures, I'm usually the person who runs the camera. Most shots of me are pictures I took by turning the camera backward and snapping the picture myself! :-) Not a good picture for something professional. I finally found a few decent photos and picked one. Perhaps in the future I will have one professionally done, but for now I think this is fine.

My bio is trickier, I'm not sure what to include. Other authors have suggested people like to know a little personal information about the author, so I'm trying to include some of that. Do people really care that I live happily with my family and our pet cats?  I'm not sure, but I'll probably include that information anyway. I plan to go on Amazon and read other author bios to get a better idea of what to do here.

There is more work ahead once I get my book back from the publisher, but hopefully having all these things done in advance will save me time as I get closer to publication.

Happy writing, my friends. I hope you have a terrific weekend!

10 comments:

  1. Chantel, it sounds like you have a great start here. :)

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    1. Thanks, Christina! Still more to do. If only it were as easy as just writing the book ;-) Have a great weekend!

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  2. Great info, Chantel! I didn't know that about Goodreads and the librarian status. Interesting. It's good to know that even though you send your story off to the editor, you still have work to do! Keep up the awesome work. I can't wait to read your book in the final form.

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    1. Well, and it's definitely more work if you self publish. I think publishing houses take care of some of these things if you traditionally publish (pretty sure they at least write your blurb). I hope submissions are going well for you! Thanks for commenting!

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  3. Yeah, I think they do write your blurb. And help you with editing and whatnot. You'd prob still have to provide a pic though.

    Hag and struggles and pleasures of publishing (both indie and traditional)!

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    1. Gah! not "Hag"

      hahah...my bad!

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    2. :-) Work to do either way, right? The blurb is hard!! At least for me. My editor is going to look it over at least so I can improve it the best it can be.

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  4. Chantel:

    How did you go about finding an editor? My son is in the process of writing a book and this is something that I'm sure he is going to need to know. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I admire your passion.

    Duke

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    1. Hi Duke! I actually found my editor through a private board I belong to from a writing class. However, there are many editors available. If you do a google search for freelance editors, you will get a lot of options. I would definitely recommend taking advantage of a few different editors who offer a "free sample" (usually the first 5 pages) and see what they can offer before hiring one. Editors can be VERY expensive. Also, he only will need to hire a freelance editor if he is self publishing. If he goes the traditional route and gets his manuscript accepted by a publishing house, they will pay for the editor.

      My favorite web site and the place I get a lot of my information is www.critiquecircle.com The basic membership is free and he can submit his work and have it critiqued by other authors. This is a great learning experience. Plus the forums there are a terrific source of information for both traditional and self published authors. Also, through these forums a lot of people will have information about whether certain editors are reputable or not.

      I'm still learning about publishing, but hopefully this helps. If there is anything else you or he has a question on, I'd be happy to try and help or see if someone else I know has the answer. My e-mail is chantelrhondeau@gmail.com if you have more questions.

      Have a great day and thanks for reading!

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    2. Okay - I went on the forum and found a few editors people at Critique Circle are using/suggesting.

      http://www.critiquemynovel.com/

      http://www.tristipinkston.com/p/author-services.html

      http://www.documentdriven.com/

      You can also find some on the yellow pages of the kindle boards at http://www.kindleboards.com/index.php/topic,50419.0.html

      I have no personal knowledge of these services, but it will give you a place to start looking. Have a great one! ~ Chantel

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