2012 copyrighting , editing , questions , writing 2 Comments

Lately people have been asking me questions regarding writing and publishing, so I figured I’d do a post on it. I mean, maybe whoever is reading this might have been wondering the same thing, right? Okay, here goes . . .

Should I publish my book even though I’m afraid nobody will buy it?

Absolutely. Don’t ever allow fear get in the way of your goals. If nobody buys your book or your sales aren’t very good . . . so what? Yeah, it sucks. Yeah, it would hurt your feelings, but like the old saying goes: Rome wasn’t built in one day. If you love to write and are determine to do it for a living than keep writing. Try not to focus on sales or compare yourself to other authors. It’s hard I know, but we all have our own paths to take. You just have to believe in yourself and trust in it. If writing stories makes you happy, don’t give up. Walt Disney’s first animation company went bankrupt. He was also fired by a news editor because he was told he lacked imagination. And he was turned down countless times before he got financing to create Disney World. So just think if he would have allowed his fear or all those rejections get in the way of his dream; this world would have missed out on a lot of cool shit.

If I get a bad review, I’m going to cry. How do you handle bad reviews?

You need to toughen up, missy. Every single artist has had bad reviews. You can’t please everyone. When I get a bad review I have the sudden urge to explain to them why the things they didn’t like about the story was written that way. I want to defend it like why my main character in Beyond the Eyes is stubborn, naive, seems selfish and cries a lot halfway through the book. There’s a reason for it. However, it’s best to let it go and move on. Don’t ever base your self-worth on other people’s opinions. If all your reviews are bad, it just means you need to improve on your writing or story telling. It doesn’t mean you’re a failure. You’re not. You wrote a book for Christ sakes! You are the bomb.

Should I copyright my book?

That’s a personal choice. Legally your book is already copyrighted. However, if you pay to get it copyrighted it goes into public record, and you get a certificate of registration. So if somebody were to steal your work, it would be a lot easier to press charges because your story is registered.

I have a critique partner, and I’m really good at editing. I don’t have the money for an editor so I think I’m going to go ahead and publish my book without having it professionally edited. What do you think?

Bad, bad idea. I know money is tight, but you need to have your book professionally edited. I don’t care if you rock at editing. You need another set of eyes who edits for a living. If you don’t have the funds, try the barter system. Go to some writing forums and see if you can hook-up with one there. I did that with my cover artist who designed the cover for Beyond the Eyes. The deal was this: she would do my cover for free if I’d mention her in my acknowledgment page. It was a smoking deal. She did an awesome job & is now working on my cover for my next book in this series.

What are the things you’re doing to market your book?

I’ve been doing everything I can think of to spread the word about my book. Soon I’ll have to do that with Dark Spirits as well, which is going to be a whole new can of worms. But anyway, to answer your question I’ve done the following . . . blog, Goodreads, Podcast, book signing, radio interview, press release, book bloggers, giveaways, blog interviews, TV interview, and I just created an author page on Facebook. Oh! I’m also on Twitter, Pinterest, Book Daily and some other sites as well. So yeah, I’ve been marketing the shit out of this book, but I’m still learning about it.

Sales are not my thing. I’m horrible at it and much rather write.

Yeah, me too! I’m hoping someday I can pay somebody to do most of my marketing because sales are not my thing either. However, even if you traditionally publish, you’ll still have to market your book. So buck-up because marketing and selling your book is part of the package. Writing books is a business. If you really want to succeed and write stories for a living, you’re going to have to sale it. Sorry. It sucks ass. I know. But it is what it is.

So those have been the questions I’ve been asked lately. If more comes my way, I’ll share them with you. I hope this helps some of you. I know I didn’t know some of those things when I first started writing.

Have a good weekend! J