The Niagara Gazette is the hometown paper for Niagara Falls (as readers of WTGIB will learn if they aren't local), and they have chosen to add me to their coverage of Niagara writers. They include those who live there or once lived there, which is generous.
So an excerpt of the story will be published on Saturday, May 5th, and there will be a signing at 1 p.m. in Niagara's only surviving bookstore, the Book Corner. Now I have to make sure I have relatives to come by because I've learned how much of a beating one's ego takes sitting at a signing table when there're no interested readers. Perhaps I should buy a stack of girl scout cookies as a fall-back...
Seriously, I'm pleased. I hope some people decide to buy the book. In the end I don't expect to make money off this - in fact I make a very small percentage off this event, none if I calculate travel costs. So we'll use Hollywood accounting and charge the cost of the trip to visiting family. Which it also is.
Currently the book can be downloaded on Kindle, and purchased in paper from here. I'm expecting it to appear in paperback form on Amazon any time now. The Book Corner in Niagara Falls will have copies as of next Saturday.
Friday, April 27, 2012
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
WTGIB_Latest
I've published a version of WTGIB. I call it a version because Lulu lets the writer go in and revise, apparently as often as desired. I finally saw a print copy and discovered a) I thought I'd put the ISBN on the verso, but there it wasn't. So I went in and fixed that. Aaaaand my cover photo in the back looked like a billboard. Writers are all a little vain but I shrank it down some. Finally, I thought the price would magically appear, not unlike the way the ISBN code will automatically appear on the back page. Not the case.
Adding the price was the hardest part (there's some irony there but I'll leave it). I had to go into Paint and pull up the file and add the price on the back. I republished it but it kept not appearing, so until someone orders a new edition, I have no idea if the price appears properly.
In the course of this self-publishing 2012 odyssey, I've refreshed my understanding of electronic publishing, specifically formatting and compatible files and ways to change the size of pictures (Paint works best and is generally available). Back in the day (2001), you uploaded your Word file, waited a week to get the digital galley back, opened it and screamed. "Chapter Six is all in italics?" Word, when used in electronic publishing, adds a lot of junk to the code, so I've learned.
The last unfun part of this is marketing. Tooting one's own horn. Hard to do, and one must be persistent to have any success.... sigh. It reminds me that the part of this I most enjoy is the writing.
Adding the price was the hardest part (there's some irony there but I'll leave it). I had to go into Paint and pull up the file and add the price on the back. I republished it but it kept not appearing, so until someone orders a new edition, I have no idea if the price appears properly.
In the course of this self-publishing 2012 odyssey, I've refreshed my understanding of electronic publishing, specifically formatting and compatible files and ways to change the size of pictures (Paint works best and is generally available). Back in the day (2001), you uploaded your Word file, waited a week to get the digital galley back, opened it and screamed. "Chapter Six is all in italics?" Word, when used in electronic publishing, adds a lot of junk to the code, so I've learned.
The last unfun part of this is marketing. Tooting one's own horn. Hard to do, and one must be persistent to have any success.... sigh. It reminds me that the part of this I most enjoy is the writing.
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Print. It isn't dead yet...Niagara Writers
I got some good news today, that the Niagara Gazette will do a feature on the story, under the column Niagara Writers. Since WTGIB has only been available on the Kindle thus far, it's time to move to print. So I pushed the button. Rather anticlimactic, really, except for the torrent of emails I got from Lulu. congratulations!!! you wrote a book!!!!
It does seem more tangible to hold the book in hand. It seems spooky to open my Kindle and see my words on the screen. Especially when I spot a typo. Yes, I can post a revision, but it seems like cheating. I guess I'm working with a print mind.
The fun part about the Gazette story is that I'm asked to write an intro to the story. The family history connection to a local landmark seems to write itself. And that's when I go back several years ago and relive my enthusiasm when I started this project, thinking how cool this would be and, well, to be honest it's been a hard project to finish, especially near the finish, but it's done and out there and that's a relief.
It does seem more tangible to hold the book in hand. It seems spooky to open my Kindle and see my words on the screen. Especially when I spot a typo. Yes, I can post a revision, but it seems like cheating. I guess I'm working with a print mind.
The fun part about the Gazette story is that I'm asked to write an intro to the story. The family history connection to a local landmark seems to write itself. And that's when I go back several years ago and relive my enthusiasm when I started this project, thinking how cool this would be and, well, to be honest it's been a hard project to finish, especially near the finish, but it's done and out there and that's a relief.
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
About the cover photo
Assuming you've found this blog via the ebook... welcome. The cover photo is from the inside of the Gate of 5 Nations, looking out towards the river. That might seem the wrong angle if one is going snooping for gold inside the fort but...
Stephanie and I had driven back to the falls from Massachusetts for Christmas, as we've done for several years. Knowing I needed a cover photo, and that none of the hundreds of shots I'd taken seemed quite right, we left Christmas Eve day open to go to the fort. I checked the fort's website and yes, it was open. We did get up a little late that day and had to run an errand, and when we reached the fort at 11:30, I grabbed my trusty Canon and followed the posted signs to enter through the Visitor's Center.
Which was closed. It's not really shocking to find an establishment closed early on Christmas Eve. But I hadn't planned on it. I return to our Subaru, Steph looking concerned because I'm back waaaaaay too early. "Closed!" I erupt. The rest of the conversation will be expunged due to profane language. I decid to try climbing the grass berms that surround the fort and see if I can't get a useable angle on the French Castle. I climb like a mountain goat and... no, you just can't get a clean shot. But I saw some people wandering around in there, and that seemed odd.
By the time I'd given up my quest, thinking over the shots on my computer and whether I could doctor them (I'm not gifted at doctoring photos), Steph calmly points out that people have just walked out. She's good at this.
So I announce, well, I'm going in. I figur I can do a fair job of begging and pleading any poor sap stuck guarding the fort today. "Two pictures, man, that's all I need. I'll be gone in ten minutes. Fifteen if the lighting isn't good."
Turns out they closed the Visitor's Center, and they closed the French Castle, but they left the grounds open. That was wonderful. But I was hoping for Fort Niagara in the snow and it was the beginning of this almost snow-less winter. That was a little dismaying, as much of the historical part of the story is set in winter. But you work with what you've got. I fired off around fifty shots of the French Castle, then on the way back saw that the Gate of 5 Nations had potential as well. Trying to picture a book cover, I'm shooting angles that leave open spaces for titles. I'm feeling much calmer at this point.
A couple months later, after proofreading and prodding my wife and friends into looking over the story, I'm working on a cover. The front of the gate was my first choice, but the handrails they've put in for pedestrian access take away some of the historical feel. So then I realize I took a shot from the other side. It's the 'wrong side', but I framed it, and started working with the type... and so that's the cover shot. I discovered using a basic app on the computer that I really didn't want or need all that white space. I had to do my best to crop it out. This is publishing today, folks.
For those who've read The Stone House Diaries, the publisher shot the cover from a stone house in western Pennsylvania, so the lesson to take away is, cover shots are to books what the picture of the food is to the stuff inside the plastic. Hmm... that implies the story will taste like undercooked food. Let me get back to you with a different analogy.
Stephanie and I had driven back to the falls from Massachusetts for Christmas, as we've done for several years. Knowing I needed a cover photo, and that none of the hundreds of shots I'd taken seemed quite right, we left Christmas Eve day open to go to the fort. I checked the fort's website and yes, it was open. We did get up a little late that day and had to run an errand, and when we reached the fort at 11:30, I grabbed my trusty Canon and followed the posted signs to enter through the Visitor's Center.
Which was closed. It's not really shocking to find an establishment closed early on Christmas Eve. But I hadn't planned on it. I return to our Subaru, Steph looking concerned because I'm back waaaaaay too early. "Closed!" I erupt. The rest of the conversation will be expunged due to profane language. I decid to try climbing the grass berms that surround the fort and see if I can't get a useable angle on the French Castle. I climb like a mountain goat and... no, you just can't get a clean shot. But I saw some people wandering around in there, and that seemed odd.
By the time I'd given up my quest, thinking over the shots on my computer and whether I could doctor them (I'm not gifted at doctoring photos), Steph calmly points out that people have just walked out. She's good at this.
So I announce, well, I'm going in. I figur I can do a fair job of begging and pleading any poor sap stuck guarding the fort today. "Two pictures, man, that's all I need. I'll be gone in ten minutes. Fifteen if the lighting isn't good."
Turns out they closed the Visitor's Center, and they closed the French Castle, but they left the grounds open. That was wonderful. But I was hoping for Fort Niagara in the snow and it was the beginning of this almost snow-less winter. That was a little dismaying, as much of the historical part of the story is set in winter. But you work with what you've got. I fired off around fifty shots of the French Castle, then on the way back saw that the Gate of 5 Nations had potential as well. Trying to picture a book cover, I'm shooting angles that leave open spaces for titles. I'm feeling much calmer at this point.
A couple months later, after proofreading and prodding my wife and friends into looking over the story, I'm working on a cover. The front of the gate was my first choice, but the handrails they've put in for pedestrian access take away some of the historical feel. So then I realize I took a shot from the other side. It's the 'wrong side', but I framed it, and started working with the type... and so that's the cover shot. I discovered using a basic app on the computer that I really didn't want or need all that white space. I had to do my best to crop it out. This is publishing today, folks.
For those who've read The Stone House Diaries, the publisher shot the cover from a stone house in western Pennsylvania, so the lesson to take away is, cover shots are to books what the picture of the food is to the stuff inside the plastic. Hmm... that implies the story will taste like undercooked food. Let me get back to you with a different analogy.
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Kindling?
A couple of months has passed since I added to this blog and I can summarize most of it by saying I was looking for a publisher, and then the last two weeks I've been fighting with buggy free software while trying to publish on Kindle. And the interim issue was that, once I accepted the self-publishing option, I knew I had to proof read the manuscript exhaustively. The best way I've ever heard to do this is to read it in reverse. It picks up soooo many mistakes that your eyes are just glossing over from too many rereads. So I did some close editing.
I was waiting on a tiny publisher who'd expressed interest in the book, and finally heard from them. They wanted to know how I was going to sell the book. Actually, their word was 'market'. All of the small publishers I've contacted now begin the process by asking for a marketing plan along with the 'blurb for the story, so this wasn't unexpected. And it's not unreasonable. The only exceptions are the ones that announce they've already signed up work through 2020 and please get back to them in 2021.
I responded by saying, well, I'm willing to go on foot to bookstores and generate what attention I can to try and get it on shelves (they required that), if you can get me some reviews. They sidestepped that point, trying to dismiss the importance of reviews, and that's when I knew they were no great improvement over doing it myself.
Around this time I read the announcement by Amazon that downloads were outselling hardcover fiction.
Of course, self publishing has become both more expensive and more complicated than it was eleven years ago. Iuniverse's cheapest publishing option today is nearly $500, and many others charge that and more. That's for a basic plan, assuming you can clean up your own files. They pad the options with editorial services, marketing plans, and artists to design the cover. These would all be services you'd get from a publisher, so it's perhaps unfair to label this as modern three card monte. The difference is, of course, with a publisher that does this for you, they've put their money in limbo and will actively market the book. Self-publishers get their money up front and there goes the sales incentive. The only service you couldn't manage to buy in the old days was a reivew. Well, Kirkus Reviews, a well known publishing entity that reviews books, has become the first to sell their services. For $500 you can get a review from someone suitably professional.
The only benefit with the present day is that virtually all the self-publishing outfits give the writer several copies. Iuniverse, back in 2001, gave me one (1). So yes, I ended up buying a dozen more just to send off for reviews.
So anyway... I live among the rest of you in a cybernetic world and my wife gave me for Xmas a Kindle fire. Neither of us are using it much, both being printophiles, but it does intrigue us. And as I considered the marketing options for printing WTGIB, I realized I could push it into Kindle World for nothing. And that was irresistible. If, like me, you aren't expecting fat royalities, then it's all about people reading your work. I have published Where the Gold is Buried on Kindle, for the price of $1.29, which is the same cost as a current hot song on Itunes. (Because my audience is less likely to be Kindle-friendly, I expect to crank out a print edition. For that I'll probably use Lulu, and I'll have to actually pull out my credit card and buy copies to get into stores.)
As to Kindling...I have to say, the software guidance Amazon offers for producing a clean electronic facsimile of a book is useless. And if you accept the crappy looking file you end up with and try to publish it, they will reject it (don't ask how I know this). You have to search for better options - and they are out there. I learned that, this being a html document, I was better off cleaning it up in Dreamweaver, which I did with limited success. Word is the primary tool, and another roadblock I encountered was the version at my job is Word 2007, and the version at home is the old XP. And the commands for Table of Contents are very different between these editions. At this time I still don't know if this conversion process affected the file.
Then I learned that to get the cover photo on the damn cover I had to zip it with the book and upload the whole zip file. But then the Table of Contents disappeared. Actually it was there, but the Kindle software was blind to it. Some kindlefile posted some html tags to use to make Kindle see the cover. I tried that, withotu success. So then I found this free downloadable program called Calibre. Calibre did a good job of attaching the cover photo, though it trashed the author photo in the back and not only put in a Table of Contents where I asked it to be, but tacked another one on the end of the manuscript.
A mistake I discovered early on was uploading files to Amazon under the assumption that I was overwriting previous files with the most current uploads. That was not the case. I was uploading and uploading and tweaking and uploading and kept seeing the same damn mistake. (Picture cave man screaming, pounding fists against stone wall).
So then it occurred to me to delete my entire entry and start over. It gets a little tedious, like running an obstacle course, but after I saved my cover blurb it got pretty streamlined. As I said, Calibre gave me beaucoup T0Cs, and the current version up on Amazon probably has a TOC in the back because I couldn't seem to delete it.
So I consider this as much an experiment as Weathermen was back in 2001. I read that I can give out five free copies, but I don't know how to do that yet. I was going to drop out of Facebook (ironically the postings I kept going back for were my nieces', my sister's, and the self-publishing blog I signed up for). I have noticed writers of ordinary fame using it for self-promotion, and that's the other reason I stayed signed up. Once I'm sure the book is out there, and that its production values aren't too embarrassing, I'll post the link whenever and wherever. And I'll almost certainly push it on Linkedin as well.
I was waiting on a tiny publisher who'd expressed interest in the book, and finally heard from them. They wanted to know how I was going to sell the book. Actually, their word was 'market'. All of the small publishers I've contacted now begin the process by asking for a marketing plan along with the 'blurb for the story, so this wasn't unexpected. And it's not unreasonable. The only exceptions are the ones that announce they've already signed up work through 2020 and please get back to them in 2021.
I responded by saying, well, I'm willing to go on foot to bookstores and generate what attention I can to try and get it on shelves (they required that), if you can get me some reviews. They sidestepped that point, trying to dismiss the importance of reviews, and that's when I knew they were no great improvement over doing it myself.
Around this time I read the announcement by Amazon that downloads were outselling hardcover fiction.
Of course, self publishing has become both more expensive and more complicated than it was eleven years ago. Iuniverse's cheapest publishing option today is nearly $500, and many others charge that and more. That's for a basic plan, assuming you can clean up your own files. They pad the options with editorial services, marketing plans, and artists to design the cover. These would all be services you'd get from a publisher, so it's perhaps unfair to label this as modern three card monte. The difference is, of course, with a publisher that does this for you, they've put their money in limbo and will actively market the book. Self-publishers get their money up front and there goes the sales incentive. The only service you couldn't manage to buy in the old days was a reivew. Well, Kirkus Reviews, a well known publishing entity that reviews books, has become the first to sell their services. For $500 you can get a review from someone suitably professional.
The only benefit with the present day is that virtually all the self-publishing outfits give the writer several copies. Iuniverse, back in 2001, gave me one (1). So yes, I ended up buying a dozen more just to send off for reviews.
So anyway... I live among the rest of you in a cybernetic world and my wife gave me for Xmas a Kindle fire. Neither of us are using it much, both being printophiles, but it does intrigue us. And as I considered the marketing options for printing WTGIB, I realized I could push it into Kindle World for nothing. And that was irresistible. If, like me, you aren't expecting fat royalities, then it's all about people reading your work. I have published Where the Gold is Buried on Kindle, for the price of $1.29, which is the same cost as a current hot song on Itunes. (Because my audience is less likely to be Kindle-friendly, I expect to crank out a print edition. For that I'll probably use Lulu, and I'll have to actually pull out my credit card and buy copies to get into stores.)
As to Kindling...I have to say, the software guidance Amazon offers for producing a clean electronic facsimile of a book is useless. And if you accept the crappy looking file you end up with and try to publish it, they will reject it (don't ask how I know this). You have to search for better options - and they are out there. I learned that, this being a html document, I was better off cleaning it up in Dreamweaver, which I did with limited success. Word is the primary tool, and another roadblock I encountered was the version at my job is Word 2007, and the version at home is the old XP. And the commands for Table of Contents are very different between these editions. At this time I still don't know if this conversion process affected the file.
Then I learned that to get the cover photo on the damn cover I had to zip it with the book and upload the whole zip file. But then the Table of Contents disappeared. Actually it was there, but the Kindle software was blind to it. Some kindlefile posted some html tags to use to make Kindle see the cover. I tried that, withotu success. So then I found this free downloadable program called Calibre. Calibre did a good job of attaching the cover photo, though it trashed the author photo in the back and not only put in a Table of Contents where I asked it to be, but tacked another one on the end of the manuscript.
A mistake I discovered early on was uploading files to Amazon under the assumption that I was overwriting previous files with the most current uploads. That was not the case. I was uploading and uploading and tweaking and uploading and kept seeing the same damn mistake. (Picture cave man screaming, pounding fists against stone wall).
So then it occurred to me to delete my entire entry and start over. It gets a little tedious, like running an obstacle course, but after I saved my cover blurb it got pretty streamlined. As I said, Calibre gave me beaucoup T0Cs, and the current version up on Amazon probably has a TOC in the back because I couldn't seem to delete it.
So I consider this as much an experiment as Weathermen was back in 2001. I read that I can give out five free copies, but I don't know how to do that yet. I was going to drop out of Facebook (ironically the postings I kept going back for were my nieces', my sister's, and the self-publishing blog I signed up for). I have noticed writers of ordinary fame using it for self-promotion, and that's the other reason I stayed signed up. Once I'm sure the book is out there, and that its production values aren't too embarrassing, I'll post the link whenever and wherever. And I'll almost certainly push it on Linkedin as well.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Writing about Niagara when I don't live there anymore
A couple nights past I was scrolling through the channel choices, skimming past known and suspected shows I'd find boring/irritating. The signal from the remote travels through some hidden labyrinth of copper and fiber optics, and seems almost independent of my choices, which is a long-winded way of saying the channel selector rested on a show 'Rock Stars' that I normally would have skimmed past. Which rock stars? I wondered, and selected it, expecting perhaps another interview with fifty year old burnouts with bad hearing, tales of the road, talks of a 'new album'...
Instead I see Niagara Falls and within seconds realize 'Rock Stars' is a really bad pun. It's a reality show about a crew that specializes in dislodging boulders before they come down on their own, inconvenient and potentially dangerous, schedule. So I watched the show, less for the repetitive footage of guys on cables stabbing the gorge walls with picks, than to figure out from the backdrop where in the Gorge they were.
I've now lived in Massachusetts longer than I lived in Niagara. At one time that depressed me a little, but no more. I considered myself from Niagara, and in the popular sense still am, but to my wife, when we travel back to Niagara (and we do regularly) we refer to Massachusetts as home.
So why do I keep writing about Niagara when I don't live there anymore? Well, it's a unique place and like anywhere, it has unique history. In this case it's interesting history. By comparison, my present home is in the town of Westford, and I visited their small museum recently. For what it is, it's not a bad collection, but Westford was just a farming community that evolved into a well off bedroom community. Nothing very interesting has ever happened here. I include in that assessment the tale of the Westford Knight.
I consider myself fortunate (and sometimes unfortunate) to have been born and raised in Niagara Falls. It has always fascinated me, and wherever I am if there's a reference to the falls, if I see a passing sign or TV screen, I always look and try to determine a) where and when the shot is and b) do I know any of the people. After twenty eight years I rarely know the people, unless (here's where age kicks in) it's an obituary.
A lot of history happened around Niagara. I wish the city would organize a museum, but in its current state as Atlantic City 2. 0 there aren't the resources. So in that sense I don't miss being in Niagara. And I can foresee the day when I don't come back for regular visits, but it's still fascinating to me.
So the trick is, write about the history of the place. I won't ever be an expert on the history of Niagara, not like some others are, but I'm pretty well read in certain areas. And besides, I work pretty exclusively in fiction, where we are not required to be fact checkers.
Instead I see Niagara Falls and within seconds realize 'Rock Stars' is a really bad pun. It's a reality show about a crew that specializes in dislodging boulders before they come down on their own, inconvenient and potentially dangerous, schedule. So I watched the show, less for the repetitive footage of guys on cables stabbing the gorge walls with picks, than to figure out from the backdrop where in the Gorge they were.
I've now lived in Massachusetts longer than I lived in Niagara. At one time that depressed me a little, but no more. I considered myself from Niagara, and in the popular sense still am, but to my wife, when we travel back to Niagara (and we do regularly) we refer to Massachusetts as home.
So why do I keep writing about Niagara when I don't live there anymore? Well, it's a unique place and like anywhere, it has unique history. In this case it's interesting history. By comparison, my present home is in the town of Westford, and I visited their small museum recently. For what it is, it's not a bad collection, but Westford was just a farming community that evolved into a well off bedroom community. Nothing very interesting has ever happened here. I include in that assessment the tale of the Westford Knight.
I consider myself fortunate (and sometimes unfortunate) to have been born and raised in Niagara Falls. It has always fascinated me, and wherever I am if there's a reference to the falls, if I see a passing sign or TV screen, I always look and try to determine a) where and when the shot is and b) do I know any of the people. After twenty eight years I rarely know the people, unless (here's where age kicks in) it's an obituary.
A lot of history happened around Niagara. I wish the city would organize a museum, but in its current state as Atlantic City 2. 0 there aren't the resources. So in that sense I don't miss being in Niagara. And I can foresee the day when I don't come back for regular visits, but it's still fascinating to me.
So the trick is, write about the history of the place. I won't ever be an expert on the history of Niagara, not like some others are, but I'm pretty well read in certain areas. And besides, I work pretty exclusively in fiction, where we are not required to be fact checkers.
Sunday, January 1, 2012
Time to break down and pick a self-publishing tool
I have decided that it's time to self-publish Where the Gold is Buried. I'm disappointed I couldn't find a traditional publisher for it. I've read too many stories about novels published by obscure publishers and figured if I kept snooping around online I'd find a home for it. Not being agented, I naturally sought the small, indie press, and from that group tried to find those that would take on a work of historical fiction. There are a lot of small presses that specifically support groups (lesbians, poets, south americans, women poets, people from Canada, gay writers from Michigan, etc.). Bless these folks for providing outlets for titles that would not be picked up by bigger presses. I didn't find one for middle-aged white males writing historical fiction.
So then I pursued the many companies that offer self-publishing. Since I did Weathermen in 2001 the field has deepened considerably. There is a fierce debate within the self-publishing community consumed with the stigma of it. Some argue that they have opportunities with traditional publishers and choose to self-publish because they get more control, make more money... maybe that's true. My traditional publisher made some fundamental errors in marketing and timing books to market... can you say made it into stores on December 23rd? Sort of missed the Christmas rush... I can say that the experiences I had with mismanagement (the publisher, Barnes and Noble) were magnified and extended by other writers I've spoken with.
So maybe the stigma of self-publishing (your book isn't good enough to get a real publisher) will fade at some point. I finally chose to self-publish because in my hometown, where this novel is set, friends of my family who read the first book kept asking if there would be a second. Since I have an audience, however small, I might as well publish it.
So picking the right self-publisher... I'm leaning towards Lulu as they offer services free, simply asking you to pay for the books. There are dozens of self-publishers and they all charge several hundred up to the thousands for their services. And I can all but guarantee that they are all thieves, as the irony of the process is that if one gets a traditional publisher, one is best off self-promoting. (wait for a small, indie publisher to organize readings, etc., and you can spend a lot of time writing the next book).
I am setting up my own imprint. Cataract Press. Keep an eye out.
So then I pursued the many companies that offer self-publishing. Since I did Weathermen in 2001 the field has deepened considerably. There is a fierce debate within the self-publishing community consumed with the stigma of it. Some argue that they have opportunities with traditional publishers and choose to self-publish because they get more control, make more money... maybe that's true. My traditional publisher made some fundamental errors in marketing and timing books to market... can you say made it into stores on December 23rd? Sort of missed the Christmas rush... I can say that the experiences I had with mismanagement (the publisher, Barnes and Noble) were magnified and extended by other writers I've spoken with.
So maybe the stigma of self-publishing (your book isn't good enough to get a real publisher) will fade at some point. I finally chose to self-publish because in my hometown, where this novel is set, friends of my family who read the first book kept asking if there would be a second. Since I have an audience, however small, I might as well publish it.
So picking the right self-publisher... I'm leaning towards Lulu as they offer services free, simply asking you to pay for the books. There are dozens of self-publishers and they all charge several hundred up to the thousands for their services. And I can all but guarantee that they are all thieves, as the irony of the process is that if one gets a traditional publisher, one is best off self-promoting. (wait for a small, indie publisher to organize readings, etc., and you can spend a lot of time writing the next book).
I am setting up my own imprint. Cataract Press. Keep an eye out.
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