Good morning everyone! I have a special announcement. On Wednesday Spetember 4, 2013, I self published a short story collection called: The Stories We Tell When Drinking Coffee: A Collection of Short Stories and Flash Fiction. It is available on Smashwords.
I am proud of myself for seeing a project through and not thinking about if people will like it, read it, if it is something people want to see, hear, or read. Those thoughts crept in but I pushed them back. I have been doing that way too long; listening to self doubt and nay sayers. It was back in high school when I had a teacher who said that I didn't have what takes to be a writer. I don't expect to receive overnight success, fame, fortune, NYT Bestseller's list. I just want to get my stories out there and for people to enjoy.
How did I get into self publishing? I signed up for Smashwords two years ago, but never did much with my account. I would read author bios, download some books here and there, and recently started reading author interviews. I had some of my stories saved and I decided to go back and clean them up and add to them. Well, I made the decision to publish them. I proofread my work Tuesday night, and tossed and turned all night. I woke up at 4:00 am to upload my ebook. I encountered problems with the upload of my Word file. After a few tries, I went back to bed. Several hours later, I tried again and the upload didn't go through. I was frustrated after using two different internet browsers. Finally by the afternoon, the file went through. I had to change my Word 2010 file to Word 97-2003 doc. file. I previously had it in rtf, dot, and Open Office. Why didn't I figure that out hours ago?
The next day, I had to fix outo vetter errors, my book cover size, and add an ISBN. I spread the word about the ebook on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and LinkedIn. I priced the book at $1.99 but I haven't sold a single book. This morning I decided to lower the price to $0.99. I know that some would say I'm selling myself cheap, but we will see what happens.
This experience was nerve wrecking and still is. It doesn't quite feel real. I have been writing truck loads of web content for the last three years, and things have been a bit sour in that department since the summer. Looks like the writing is on the wall, I need to ease away from content farming and focus on my own projects. I don't know where self publishing is going to take me, but I have to stay possitive. It's scary to think what if no one never buys your books? Then what? I'm sure that all authors go through these same scary feelings.
I realize that not everyone will think my stories are good. I will admit, I have read a lot of stories that I wasn't impressed with. Some readers like romance, some like thrillers and suspense, and some perfer mysteries. We all have different tastes and reading preferences because that is what makes us unique.
I also did an interview with Smashwords. You can check it out here.
Have a good weekend everyone
I am proud of myself for seeing a project through and not thinking about if people will like it, read it, if it is something people want to see, hear, or read. Those thoughts crept in but I pushed them back. I have been doing that way too long; listening to self doubt and nay sayers. It was back in high school when I had a teacher who said that I didn't have what takes to be a writer. I don't expect to receive overnight success, fame, fortune, NYT Bestseller's list. I just want to get my stories out there and for people to enjoy.
How did I get into self publishing? I signed up for Smashwords two years ago, but never did much with my account. I would read author bios, download some books here and there, and recently started reading author interviews. I had some of my stories saved and I decided to go back and clean them up and add to them. Well, I made the decision to publish them. I proofread my work Tuesday night, and tossed and turned all night. I woke up at 4:00 am to upload my ebook. I encountered problems with the upload of my Word file. After a few tries, I went back to bed. Several hours later, I tried again and the upload didn't go through. I was frustrated after using two different internet browsers. Finally by the afternoon, the file went through. I had to change my Word 2010 file to Word 97-2003 doc. file. I previously had it in rtf, dot, and Open Office. Why didn't I figure that out hours ago?
The next day, I had to fix outo vetter errors, my book cover size, and add an ISBN. I spread the word about the ebook on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and LinkedIn. I priced the book at $1.99 but I haven't sold a single book. This morning I decided to lower the price to $0.99. I know that some would say I'm selling myself cheap, but we will see what happens.
This experience was nerve wrecking and still is. It doesn't quite feel real. I have been writing truck loads of web content for the last three years, and things have been a bit sour in that department since the summer. Looks like the writing is on the wall, I need to ease away from content farming and focus on my own projects. I don't know where self publishing is going to take me, but I have to stay possitive. It's scary to think what if no one never buys your books? Then what? I'm sure that all authors go through these same scary feelings.
I realize that not everyone will think my stories are good. I will admit, I have read a lot of stories that I wasn't impressed with. Some readers like romance, some like thrillers and suspense, and some perfer mysteries. We all have different tastes and reading preferences because that is what makes us unique.
I also did an interview with Smashwords. You can check it out here.
Have a good weekend everyone
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