My Self-Publishing Journey

When you come to Finding Bliss, you expect to see an article of some aspect of  writing or publishing, right? What if once a week I wrote a post about what's going on in my personal writing life? 

A big part of what I do here is invite writer friends to share their experiences so that both you and I can learn from their mistakes and successes. I don't really talk about what I'm doing, and it's time to get out of that habit.

Six Questions with Maggi Myers

Today's Six Question guest is Maggi Myers, author of The Final Piece. She's also a veteran of the Twilight fandom that I was a member of what seems like a lifetime ago.

Welcome to Six Questions Maggi!

LOVE BITES Blog Hop

This Valentines Day, we invite 

you to join us in thumbing our 

noses at Cupid, Love and the 

Whole Schmaltzy Holiday!!

Introducing …

LOVE BITES: An 

Anti♥Valentine Blog Hop

Hostesses: The Inklingettes

Theme: Love Run Amuk, 

Aground or Otherwise Off Course

Schedule: Friday, February 8 through Thursday, February 14

Word Count: 250 Words

Incentive: Community spirit, inky fun and awesome prizes:

All About ISBNs For Self-Publishing

Ripley Patton is the award-winning author of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror.

Today she's bringing us a clear, concise comparison between getting your own ISBN and using one from a third-party.

Surviving Your First Draft

Welcome to my spot on the official Just Breathe Tour featuring
one of my favorite people on the planet, Kendall Grey!

Fasten your seatbelt and prepare to be amazed as you learn Kendall's tips on how to dig in and hammer out that beastly first draft!




My first experience with drafting a book was pure heaven. I had no inhibitions, no worries, no clue what I was doing. I didn’t get hung up or stressed about making the book perfect. I focused on getting the words out. When I finished, choirs of angels sang. Rainbows beamed from my head. Disco balls twirled.

Then other people read the book.

And hated it.

Apparently, the beautiful baby I created wasn’t nearly as beautiful as I thought. I locked myself in self-torture chamber of humiliation and shame. After a few weeks of self-loathing passed, I emerged from my hidey-hole, tail between my legs, and humbly sought advice from other writers who told me to pull up my big-girl panties and deal with it. Writers must accept things they don’t want to hear. Like, “Your baby is butt-ass ugly and needs a major facelift.”

Eventually, I grew enough courage to seek out a critique partner, who helped me tremendously. Over the course of thirteen rewrites (not revisions, REWRITES) spanning four years, the story improved. I self-published INHALE in May 2012.

But when it came time to draft the second book in the series, doubt paralyzed me. What if this baby was even uglier than the first? What if I had to rewrite the book thirteen times again? I didn’t think I’d survive another ripping. I considered quitting before I even started.

I scrounged more courage and drew on my experiences with writing the first draft of INHALE. Instead of worrying about writing a book that would please everyone else, I wrote the book for me. I wrote it as if no one else would ever see it. The change in focus gave me the freedom I needed to push the limits and let my imagination go crazy, just like I did the first time around.

And guess what? The second book was better. Yeah, it was still ugly and required a lot of make-up before it made its first public appearance, but this one needed less work. Reviews for the second book are better than the first, too. I must’ve done something right.

My advice for surviving a first draft is:

• Write for yourself first. If you don’t enjoy your story, it’ll show, and readers won’t enjoy it either.

• Practice patient persistence. The more you write, the better you write.

• Accept the fact that when you’re done drafting, you’ll have a lot more work to do. Drafting is the easy part, so enjoy it while you can. Revising takes twice as much time and concentration. Don’t like revising? Tough.

• Trust your critique partners—they have your back. Don’t fuss over little things like word choice and grammar in a first draft because your story is likely to change in the revision stage anyway. Crit partners will help you fix the big issues first. Worry about the details later.

• Keep your blinders in place. Don’t get distracted by Ms. Prissy Pants Author’s glowing reviews, rankings, and sales. You’re not her. Focus on your work. She’s irrelevant.

Hard work pays off. You might not see the fruits of your labors right away, but if you keep at it, your writing will improve, and so will your chances of selling a lot of books down the road. :-)

  

   

 

 

 

          

a Rafflecopter giveaway a Rafflecopter giveaway

Six Questions with Rebecca Berto

Happy Saturday, writers.Today I'd like to welcome Novel Girl Rebecca Berto back to Finding Bliss!

Rebecca is the author of novella Precise and is getting ready to release her first full-length novel Drowing in You.




What is your method of plotting out a new story?

I take time to gather my ideas for a story. From these ideas I brainstorm a whole heap of story problems and conflicts I can put in the way of the characters.

Secondly, I flesh out character bios.

Thirdly, I create a beat sheet/scene cards. In 1-3 sentences, I detail a summary of what will occur in each scene of every scene in the manuscript.

This means the story has a backbone and all other necessary structural bits.

However, I tend to deviate from what I plan with spontaneity and all (those characters are so stubborn), but for the most part, I stick to it and I spend minimal time writing and editing compared to with my first serious manuscript. *shudders at the thought*


What is your editing process?


After the first draft is complete, I put the manuscript aside for at least four weeks. That’s crucial to get out of the “author” headspace, forget what I wrote, what I meant to say, and such.

I come back to it, trying to think with the mindset of another person, i.e. a reader, and I do a structural edit. This means I look out for:

• Unbelievable character actions and plot events
• Unlikeable characters
• Flat characters who aren’t broken down and built up to be even stronger by the end
• Boring scenes
• Scenes that don’t forward the plot
• Paragraphs that are written really, really well but do nothing for the story (Kill Your Darlings)
• And more!

I don’t worry about:

• Typos unless I stumble on them
• Awkward phrases
• Word usage not fitting a type of character

Next, I copy edit, send to beta readers and incorporate their advice if I agree, more rounds of copy editing, finally proofing, and then I send to my copy editor.

Then I proof. Again.


When you published your first book, how did you spread the word?
I blogged about it for several weeks before publication, asked for reviews, planned a cover reveal with many bloggers (including your fine self), added it to Goodreads lists, had a Facebook launch party, held Rafflecopter giveaways to increase interest with entries that would increase my popularity on social media and for the book’s visibility on Goodreads, and much more that won’t come to mind at the moment.

What has worked the best for you as far as finding the right readers for your books?


My first book, Precise, is a novella and is a cross between dark contemporary and literary fiction. As you can imagine, it’s not the most popular of types of books or genres, so I looked out for people who enjoyed other books with a similar plot, theme or feel to mine and hunted down those people. (I didn’t really. I like chatting to everyone and I am nice about it.  ).

Also, I have been blogging since October 26, 2011 so I have many kind blog readers and friends I made through Novel Girl who were thrilled to be able to read, review and spread the word. << That, by far, worked best. Thank you all who helped!


How do you keep in touch with your readers?

In too many ways! Argh, seriously, I’m on the internet too much. We connect through my Facebook Profile and Page, Twitter, Novel Girl blog.


What is the one thing you’d change about your road to publication if you had a chance?

Oooh, well I’d give myself more time to promote and publicize my book; give readers more anticipation. I’d have organised a blog tour.

I don’t regret what I’ve done—just wish I had time to do more!

How do you find the right readers for your books?

COVER REVEAL: Awaken by Jaime Guerard

TITLE: Awaken

AUTHOR: Jaime Guerard

GENRE: YA Paranormal Romantic Thriller

EXPECTED RELEASE DATE: March 15, 2013

AGE GROUP: 14 - 20+

COVER DESIGNER: ALLIE BRENNAN (B DESIGN)

MOON IMAGE/TREE DESIGNER: STEVEN ASKEW (RED AND BLACK WALLPAPERS)