Tag Archives: Publishing

Cerberus, Distribution

Out now…


Even though it’s the weekend and under our self imposed house rules I’m not supposed to be working, the one minor correction has been made to ‘A Falling of Angels’, the second Paul Calvin Adventure and it’s out on Lulu.com. Adverts and other links will be up late Monday morning via Goodreads.com and AuthorsDen. Previews are already available.

There’s been no Distribution problems reported with any of the main platforms (Kindle, Nook, Kobo et al) in the past two weeks, so go-ahead has been given for the project to go ‘live’. For a paltry CAD$4.99.

Links are available via my ‘published works‘ page. Or from the links below.

Cerberus Conspiracy
Book One
Head of the Beast Kindle eBook edition.
Book Two
A Falling of Angels eBook available via Lulu.com.

Cerberus, Distribution

Waiting for proof


Proof copy of ‘A Falling of Angels’ has finally arrived and will be approved shortly. There’s a couple of minor issues, but nothing major or unfixable. The blurb text has one minor grammatical error and there were a couple of odd printing marks on the title page. The rest is fine. I might alter the layout slightly before final distribution approval, but aside from that it’s all good. There’s no sense changing the spelling standard for the US or Canadian marketplaces, my sales simply don’t justify it, so Oxford English will continue to trump Merriam-Webster. When it comes down to ‘ise’ vs ‘ize’ I’m with Shakespeare.

After a weekend that saw Angie and I dashing around on unexpected errands of mercy all is well. I have a new pair of tall chisel toe Blundstones and now a heater for my otherwise chilly west facing office. I’m also a waist size down. Things are looking up.

Sidebar links will be up shortly to the approved version for anyone interested. I haven’t had any negative feedback on the eBook distribution side, so am keeping my fingers crossed. I’ll quickly change the blurb and excerpts now I can work for more than half an hour in my little refuge without getting icicles in my beard.

Cerberus, Distribution

Done


4:10pm Pacific Standard Time. ‘A Falling of Angels’ pocket paperback is now ordered for printing. Can’t say I’m overly impressed with the end price of CAD$22.50, but that’s print to order I’m afraid. No economies of scale. The eBook version just went out for distribution at CAD$4.99, so I’m much happier about that.

Tweeted. Sent. Links will be posted here and at my Authors Den page when approval for distribution comes through. The latest Paul Calvin adventure has all been quadruple checked and I can go and deal with my Citizenship Interview with a clear conscience. Now I’m going for a lie down in a darkened room.

Cerberus, General musings

Submission


This is always the most teeth-grindingly, nerve fraying end of writing. Publication. The eBook version begins processing today, and I’ve spent two days eyestrain formatting and triple checking a pocket paperback version of ‘A Falling of Angels’, the second in the Paul Calvin series. I found one typo and changed a grand total of eight sentences, very minor changes at that. Mainly tense and syntax. Alterations of meaning that only really matter in my mind. So this afternoon, sometime around 4pm Pacific Standard time 4th November 2014, I’m going to press. I think. A day earlier than schedule, but that all depends on your time zone, as it will already be the 5th of November in Australia.

After that I’m going to do some more reading for my citizenship interview on Thursday in Nanaimo. Angie and I don’t have to do the tests because we’re both over 54, but we’re studying for them nonetheless. Just in case someone changes their mind at the last minute. We’ve both worked long and hard for Canadian Residency and Citizenship; gone without, left comfortable social structures behind, spent a lot of emotion and money, but now we’re going to see if all our expenditure and effort has been worth the time. In that way it’s rather like writing a novel. Huge amounts of time spent working, writing, re-reading, studying and crowbarring information into recalcitrant neurons, all in the hope that someone else will like it enough to accept your work, and by the same token, you.

Seen from that viewpoint, immigration and novel writing both look like massive exercises in self validation. Like gambling. Win, it’s all smiles and massive whooshes of happy relief. Time for Champagne and celebration. Lose, and you simply have to pick yourself off the floor ready to try again. My paranoia has been on overdrive, trying to think of ways things might go wrong and then making sure they don’t. For a given value of certainty. I have so many contingency plans it is hard to remember them all.

It all comes down to the wire on Thursday. I’m so tense it’s hard to sleep properly.

Cerberus

A Falling of Angels


Well that’s it. I’m finally happy with the Manuscript, storyline etcetera for ‘A Falling of Angels’, the second in the Paul Calvin series of telempathic Policeman sci-fi novels. I’ve even written a brief foreword. I’m sticking with my chosen cover art, and will be making it available as an eBook and paperback. The eBook will retail CAD$4.99 or about £2.80GBP, which fits in with my coffee and a cookie pricing policy for eBooks. It’s taken me almost two years to get to this point, so I think that’s more than fair. Whether anyone likes my work enough to buy is another matter. I’ll just punt the end result out there and get on with the next in the series. Considering the big publishers are asking double the price for eBooks, I think I’m giving value for money.

The one thing I’ve tried with this series is to keep my lead characters humanity front and centre. Paul is a cop-with-a-conscience trying desperately to keep in touch with his children while battling a bureaucratic Hydra and putting real bad guys away. I’ve also tried to veer away from the usual whodunnit formula. In my stories he is both predator and prey, enforcer and victim, playing his part in much larger investigations, but being key in bringing the bad guys to book. Both cog and Deus ex machina.

Release date for the paperback is going to be end of November 2014. The eBook should be available via iBookstore etc, by then as well. I’m pretty well au fait with the ins and outs of self publishing now, so frustrations caused by those pesky formatting distribution rejections should be minimal. All I need to do is fill and reformat the text, which will take until Tuesday and the Lulu.com eBook release date should be November 5th. Firework or damp squib is not my judgement to make. We shall see. I’ll post the links here and my Authors Den page.

The rough text on the ‘excerpts’ page has changed significantly in the finished product, which is a lot more polished and a better read. At least in my opinion. Which is all an author ever has when everything is ready to pitch out into the great unknown. In the meantime there’s a cover and marketing blurb to write and refine. Right now, I’m going to hang up my keyboard and go for a pleasant evening out in downtown Victoria, hoping not to trip over too many vampires, zombies and werewolves. Unless they are the names of cocktails on the menu.

Cerberus, Distribution

Up the Amazon


This is proving an education in so many ways. ‘Head of the Beast’ is now available on Amazon, and I shall be adding the heavily revised editions of ‘Sky Full of Stars’ and ‘Falling Through the Stars eBooks in the next two weeks. They’ll take a week to ‘go live’ on the major Amazon web sites.

In addition, last night I revisited Lulu.com for the first time in months and was delighted to find that their eBook distribution now covers both the Kobo and Kindle platforms as well as the Nook and iBookstore. All I need is to double check what’s available and tick two boxes. Hooray.

On the downside, what this means for me is a lot of administration. Creating and updating author pages and profiles. I’ve had one on Amazon.com some time, now the task has to be repeated for Amazon.co.uk. Authors Den and other promotional profiles need to be tidied up and improved. Adverts added to sidebars and a whole host of other time consumers. Not sure whether I want to become an ‘Amazon Associate’ though.

Also I’m writing again. Last nights contribution was a dark little tale of techno-convenience gone wrong. A 2500 word piece I’ve been struggling to finish called ‘Blink’. Today I have some domestic tasks to do before doing the weeks shopping. After that, while I’m in the mood, I’ll revise another 5000 word tale I’ve given the working title ‘the Immortality bug’. Thence another go at ‘A Falling of Angels’. It’s going to be a busy week.

Cerberus, Distribution

Publication schedule


The updated Paul Calvin eBook ‘Head of the Beast’ has (finally) been submitted via Amazon to their Kindle Direct program. Paperback and Hardback versions have been withdrawn from Lulu.com for the moment, but new editions will be available shortly with updated text and better cover art. Link to Amazon Kindle format will be added to my Authors Den page and this blogs ‘Published Works’ page around ten am Pacific Standard Time, Saturday 23rd August.

Per previous blog post, work on its sequel, ‘A Falling of Angels’ continues. Less than 12,000 words and a denouement to go. First eBook edition should be available shortly before Christmas.

To close, I must say it isn’t easy being a one man writing, publishing, and marketing band. I really do find these final submissions quite stressful so I’m off for a quiet lie down now until my hands stop shaking. Many thanks in advance to everyone who likes my work enough to spend the price of a cup of coffee and a cookie on it. Enjoy.

Cerberus, Distribution

Back in action


It’s been a rough few months since March. A lot of profoundly distressing things have happened, including getting cleaning fluid on both hands which caused the skin on my fingers to break up. This halted typing for over three weeks with predictable consequences. For six weeks thereafter it was one wretched thing after another, meaning I didn’t write a word. Therefore all my good intentions lie shattered at my feet. Transatlantic travel and jet lag are not good for study or the creative writing process. Neither is multiple bereavement. Nor is being handed post mortem revelations about close family. None of which I intend to share on a public forum. Although I think I will miss my dog Amos most of all.

Today the clouds lift. Since we returned from the UK I’ve been working on the Kindle edition of “Head of the Beast”, cleaning up text errors and minor glitches in punctuation, even rewriting certain passages. Forcing myself to re read and rewrite until I thought my eyes were going to bleed. The story remains the same, but it reads much better. There’s also new cover art, which is one of the low resolution examples below. A volume of short fiction is forthcoming, which is a work in progress. Maybe in late November, maybe not. Recently the sound of self imposed deadlines whooshing overhead has been deafening. There’s a number of back catalogue stories I intend to include, including some published over ten years ago. Rewritten, extended and improved. No title as yet, but I have a number of possibles.

Artwork and poll for Kindle edition of the Paul Calvin supernatural sci-fi title ‘Head of the Beast’ below.

Head of the beast cover Version A
Head of the beast cover Version A

Head of the beast cover version B
Head of the beast cover version B

General musings

The dark art of prophecy


The nature of science fiction is all about how a change in scientific knowledge or technology can alter human society. To play the ‘what if?’ game with a vengeance. It is a literary tree with many branches. From the ‘hard’, based on an extrapolation of historical understanding, real life human psychology and proposed technologies, to space opera and sword and sorcery fantasies. It’s a prophesy game, which is the key dark art of the genre.

Most of the early prophets, like H G Wells in “War of the Worlds” and “The shape of things to come” had elements which have been since come to pass; substitute lasers for ‘heat rays’, mass airborne bombardment, poison gas. Wells saw all these things in humanities future. Jules Vern’s “Voyage to the moon” and “20,000 leagues under the sea” foresaw moonshots and submarine warfare, but not in quite the way he surmised. Arthur C Clarke is credited with predicting communication satellites, and in one short story the widespread availability of pornography via satellite TV. In Clarke’s version, his protagonist was going to use the technology to subvert Western society. Forget the title or what collection it’s in. Either “The Nine Billion names of God” or “Tales of Ten Worlds” I think. Used to have copies, but they either got read to death, or lost in one of many house moves.

Today I finished a dark, ironic, even cautionary little story about the misuse of satellite technology. What starts out as the ultimate weapon against individual terrorists gets hijacked by a couple of bored slacker programmers, who inadvertently create devastation by tinkering with what they think is a ‘simulator’ package. The premise and outcome are fairly straightforward, the mechanics of the story not so much.

At six thousand, six hundred and sixty six words I find myself, for my own perverse reasons, liking both length and content. What gives the story punch is the proposed technology is one of those ‘on the horizon’ things. Just on the cusp of possibility. To be honest, I’ll be surprised if something very similar hasn’t already crossed some defence analysts desk as a serious weapon systems proposal.

Without giving too much away, I drew heavily on my knowledge of computer networking and security, wide area networks, orbital mechanics and ablation in order to tie various elements into a plausible, dramatic whole intended to both amuse and stimulate. For some it might prove a bit too geeky, for others overly simplistic, but that’s the fine line walked when you’re trying to mix in complex story elements with the cynicism of experience. What can a character do when their carefully defended world is going to hell, and everything that happens seems to make matters worse? Simply because they’ve been pushed into making a beta level system fully operational.

When I have another few of these stories completed, at present I’ve half a dozen as ‘works in progress’, I’ll put them into a little eBook collection and give it a punt into the great nowhere. See what happens. In the meantime it’s back to working on ‘Darkness’ and ‘A falling of Angels’.

Distribution

Getting on to Goodreads


Struggling a little with Goodreads yesterday.  Spent a good three and a half working hours learning and navigating their Author program, and still no idea whether I will be listed.  Especially as I share an author name with a guy who writes spiritual and religious tracts.

According to one LinkedIn poster, I’m probably wasting my time as Goodreads is ‘Troll City’.  Frankly I’m not bothered.  There are few opportunities for the self publisher to get out there, and if a few whack jobs want to play bougres stupides , well that’s just fine by me.   In three years walking street patrol, getting verbal abuse every working day my skin thickened, and I can give far worse than I get, if it’s even worth responding.  My tongue and pen are honed to a razors edge.  If I really have to waste the time, there are ways and means to deal with mere abuse.  Bring it on.

It all goes back to the simple truth about self publishing in a niche market.   Getting your work into the public domain is all about networks.  Listing on Amazon, listing on Barnes & Noble, listing on iBookstore, on Kobo,  Authors Den, Goodreads.  Not to mention other distribution platforms.  They’re all networks with their own quirks and special requirements.  There’s a learning curve associated with each one.  Boxes to be ticked.  Procedures to be followed.  Teeth to be gnashed.  Hair to be torn out by the roots.  Pass the antidepressants matron, I’m just off to my padded cell to have a quiet little scream.

You get there eventually, but it takes time and energy better devoted elsewhere.  No wonder others prefer the Traditional Publishing route.

Writing, rewriting, repeatedly re proofing and editing a hundred and fifty thousand word novel is a piece of cake by comparison.  That’s just the third in the Stars trilogy.

Distribution

Taxes, Grants and subsidies….


Here’s the good news; the government of Canada subsidises and gives tax breaks to publications. Can I or any other independent Canadian writer access these valuable tax breaks?

Sadly no. They only give funds and tax breaks to publishing companies, not individual self publishing writers. Application notes here.

Today I am going to talk to the local Chamber of Commerce regarding company registration. I know how it works in the UK, but not over here. I shall invest a little time today in business conversations.

Update: There’s a tax break for publishers in BC – From Income tax act, too. Probably doesn’t apply to independents, either.

General musings, Observations

I keep on hearing this….


Browsing through varying LinkedIn forums, I keep on coming across sweeping broad brushstroke statements to the effect that most self published works are poorly formatted and written rubbish. If this truly is the case, then why bother stating the obvious? Of course badly written, scrappy looking work won’t sell. But what is also true is that even brilliantly written, spectacularly perfect work may not sell either because it is not what the market wants right now, and as is repeatedly demonstrated, not even the ‘professionals’ get it right. Remaindered book shops being the singular living proof.

Yet, if we are to believe what some say, to self publish is to be forever damned by the traditionalists. Had the temerity to put a piece of work in the public domain without their consent? Only to be denied access to wider bookshop markets because the distributors won’t list a work with less than so many thousand pre printed stock available? Even then, will mainstream bookstore buyers touch self published works? Experience says no. Unless someone knows something I don’t, and I’d love to hear of a low cost entry level way into this section of the market. Apart from the eBook route.

So, what to do? Do I, as one who chooses to eschew the traditional publishing route of Agent and Publisher repeat what I did for so many years, write, submit, then wait, and wait, and wait, only to be handed a non specific “Sorry, no.” after three (or even on one particular occasion, six) months? Or simply go for it full thrust, transition, and try to blow a hole through the blockade like some of my characters repeatedly do in ‘Falling’ and ‘Darkness’? Should I ‘write for the market’ like we are all exhorted to do by creative writing classes and tutors? Okay, say I, but who defines what the market actually wants? What is ‘The Market’? I don’t know. The literary marketplace is diversifying so rapidly, I don’t think anyone else really knows, either.

‘Writing for a market’ might be the ‘safe’ option, but I’ve never really cared much for ‘safe’. If I did, I’d never have slung a leg over the saddle of a horse or motorcycle. Even after repeated falls and many bruises. Or handled bad tempered animals with teeth bigger and more dangerous than a large diameter circular rip saw. Or any of the other dangerous pursuits that get my heart pounding. So I write what I want. Not what others would have me write.

On the whole I think those who demonise independent self publishers do both themselves and their employers / companies a great disservice. Whenever I hear someone vouchsafing thus, it makes me extremely reluctant to deal with their company. To me they represent an elitist world view, rather like the voices who simply can’t bring themselves to believe that an English market town grammar school boy could become the most celebrated playwright in the history of the English language. Shock horror! The man never even went to University! How dare he! Yet the name of William Shakespeare echoes across time, even four hundred years on. One small town boy made good.

But then, we all have to start somewhere, be our journey in this life short and spectacular or slow and barely noticed. The only sin is not to try. Damn the dissenting voices.

Distribution, Stars Trilogy

Don’t forget the formatting


Just had notice from Lulu.com that ‘Falling’ has been bounced back from the distributors for a single formatting error. Easily corrected, and at least this time they didn’t just tell me the problem was in the ‘Metadata’. One word in the title should have been capitalised, and I missed it. Bummer. No matter, it’s all done and dusted and back to the Distributors again. Same price, same artwork, same everything but the one letter in the title that needed capitalising.

The word? Was ‘through’ which should have been ‘Through’. That was it. Two minutes later I’ve revised and put ‘Falling’ back into the publishing mill, which grinds exceeding small. I’m not fussed in the slightest because it was such a little thing after all the time and effort that’s been expended.

Currently chilling at the kids place in Stratford upon Avon, giving Angie the occasional shoulder massage before popping out for provisions and ensuring everyone gets fed. Have put in a little work on a couple of short stories whilst we’re here, and will be applying the latest lesson in Distribution to everything else that goes into the marketplace.

Technology

Facebook back up and running


After a delve through the locked files on my laptop, I came up with the coded answer to my Facebook security question. Thank goodness for that. Now I can access my Facebook page again. No doubt I’ll have to repeat the performance when we go over to Ireland on the 20th, and again on our way to Amsterdam on the 24th and 25th. Thence on my way back to Vancouver and home. Yet now I’ve gotten the answer I need, that shouldn’t prove a problem. Have had to decline one invitation in London, as I’ll be in the wrong country. Sorry chaps.

Lots of discussions within the family about the future, in more ways than one. There are plots and counter plots in the offing which will be great if they all work out. Haven’t been able to get back together with old friends because they probably don’t check their Facebook messages that often. Pity, but there you go. This is real life, and I’ll have to put up with it until something better comes along.

‘Sky’ and ‘Falling’ have been uploaded through Kobo’s ‘Writinglife’ programme to get them out to a wider market. No negative bounceback from iBookstore and Barnes & Noble, so I think I’m all good there. I thought writing and proofing the books on its own was pretty hard work, but the learning curve on the distribution and marketing side is pretty steep too. That aside, I feel a lot more comfortable with what I now have out in the marketplace.