Tag Archives: Friesen Press

Reassessment Time

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If you’re over the age of two, I’m guessing the essential process of reassessment rolls around periodically. I admit to never enjoying this turn at the wheel of life. Think about it. The root word here is assessment . . . not such a terrific start. Add the revisiting prefix and you see what I mean . . . like it wasn’t bad enough the first time around. Just saying . . . .

This blog started out with the purpose of sharing my self-publishing journey. Was the intention to inspire and inform? I’m not sure. I’m a bit too ego conscious to make such claims. I wanted to write the kind of blog that I might want to read.

With that in mind, I’ve had a few struggles since Disappearing in Plain Sight was published, and these relate to the self-publishing route I chose. I’m not going to go on a rant. I will provide two enlightening links to material that I wished I had read before skipping, gleefully down my chosen path.

A discussion forum related to the various claims made by Friesen Press

Alliance of Independent Authors – and informative post on Agent Assisted Publishing

Suffice to say that I am now saddled with just about every negative part of the assisted publishing process they describe. I’ll let you, my astute readers, connect the dots.

One should always strive for balance when in the process of reassessment. My book is available through a number of distributor channels, the trade paperback and hardcover books are of good quality for the price point, the book is selling, the marketing guy I worked with was very friendly (well, to be honest, almost everything he gave me I could have gotten from the internet, but still – friendly does count for something), I may have spent a lot of money in my opinion of things, but it was only a fraction of how bad it could have been.

Have you ever had the experience where your priorities for choosing something were the entirely inappropriate things to be focusing on? (i.e. I grew up in the era of Trudeau mania and so I’m all gaga for Justin Trudeau, or Christy Clarke is a woman, and we should have more women as Premiers in Canada, so I’ll vote for her. Hmmm . . . maybe not the best logic.)

Setting out on the self-publishing journey, I was nervous. I wanted someone to hold my hand and lead me through the process. As it turns out, there was a high price tag for that service (upfront and ongoing) and the hand holding didn’t turn out to be all it was cracked up to be – like many such promises in life.

Here’s the crux of my reassessment: I didn’t know what I didn’t know, so I didn’t know what questions to ask when I went out Googling for information. I’m not sure what the answer to that dilemma might be. I’m sure blog posts like the one I’m writing now were out there.  

One kind person told me that every self-published writer has gone down a road or two they wished they hadn’t. It’s comforting to be in such good company.

Writing update: I wrote close to 5000 words yesterday and the first draft of The Light Never Lies is almost ready to be printed out in hard copy. When that happens, I’ll let it rest a bit before plunging through the pages on the lookout for glaring inconsistencies, parts that stretch the believability quotient, redundancies, and the vital emergence of themes that I didn’t even realize were there. I find it hard to believe that I can write something and actually miss what it is I’m writing – but it happens.

Epilogue – I am actively seeking a new road for the publication of The Light Never Lies. Insights welcome.

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Exciting News

Why does good news always make me want to run away and hide somewhere? Must be those early childhood experiences that contribute to my ability to write while making the real world a bit of a challenge.

Anyway – today I have two exciting pieces of news to share.

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Drum roll please – my novel, Disappearing in Plain Sight,  is now being previewed on the Friesen Press site and should be available for sale through them by Tuesday, March 5th. Just follow the words YIPPEE to have a look. The release date for Amazon will be two to five weeks later.

The second piece of news has to do with a writing contest I entered on the blog – Postcard, Poems, and Prose. I won an Honourable Mention for a short piece of fiction. The winners will be featured on the site during the month of March. I encourage you to check out this WordPress blog – it’s a very eclectic showcase of writing with interesting contests being offered most of the time. I’m really enjoying reading the work of the author’s they showcase on the site.

Pricing–it’s not just complicated, it’s Machiavellian!

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The end of the almost ten straight days of rain saw the sky a brilliant blue and snow touching the mountaintops like frosting. Of course sunshine streaming through the windows told me one thing – get out the dust cloth and the vacuum and get busy. But first, off for a walk with the octogenarian dog.

Got back to the cabin psyched for the cleaning. I decided to check my email first. Note to self – never let anything divert you from cleaning once you have finally set your mind on doing it. Anyway – my email contained a new message from my author account manager at Friesen Press. It is now time to set prices for the e-book, the paperback, and the hardcover editions of Disappearing in Plain Sight.

I was warned this stage of the publishing process could be complicated and that is not an understatement. There are many things to consider. Friesen Press does supply a handy little calculator that allows me to see royalties going down as I drop unit price. And it’s more than just what I think the market can bear in terms of my book. Working with Friesen Press, I have two distribution channels to consider – them and everyone else. They offer me a higher percentage of royalty return per book sold, which means I can set the Friesen Press price lower – making them a more competitive choice in the online marketplace of book sales.

But even that is complicated because the other distribution channels are going to immediately discount the price I set for the book by 20 to 30% – so I need to make sure the Friesen Press price comes in a bit below that mark. I return to the EEEKKKK of my title.

Forget about the calculations based on when I might recoup the investment I’ve made to produce the book – the number of sales required to accomplish that seems pretty pie in the sky, at least for this moment in time. But an author is nothing if not optimistic. What else would keep us going on our solitary projects for months at a time (or dare I say, years)? I’ll keep you posted on how this all works out.  But for now – I think the above photograph says a lot.

The Novel is Gone

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Two days ago, I pressed upload on my author’s account page and the manuscript was gone – off to Friesen Press  for the next stage in my self-publishing experience. I know, I know – I wrote these same words in a post about six weeks ago. Well, it did go then, but it got a review that suggested a bit of final polishing would help – which, by the way, was as necessary as the review said it would be. After innumerable edits there were still incidents of missing words, clunky repetitions and even duplication in a chapter break section. I could hardly believe my eyes. Oh well – that is why we edit and edit and edit.

I confess to having had very mixed feelings when I sat back in my chair in front of the laptop and realized that the novel was truly gone – that I was finished writing Disappearing in Plain Sight. It was most definitely elation mixed with high anxiety. My anxiety is partially about my baby going out into the world, but I also feel anxious because I keep asking myself – what now? What am I going to do now – all day, every day?

Yesterday I had to approve my three book industry subject and category codes – my author account manager sent along a spreadsheet with what looked like a million codes to choose from, but it’s actually simpler than it looks – once you get into the Fiction category the field is narrowed considerably. I have decided to go with Fiction – Romance/Contemporary; Fiction – Literary; and Fiction – General.

Then I had to come up with 7 keywords for book buyers who will look for my book online – flags for online databases. I chose love, relationships, grief, bullying, trauma, counselling, and British Columbia. Choosing these seven words was difficult – it seemed like an important part of the process. I’m now working on a section of acknowledgments and a dedication to be included with the novel.

I want to let this process of self-publishing unfold and by that I mean – not ask what is coming next or how long the next stage will take – just go with it. Take a wait and see approach, be patient, be open to the whole process. Sometimes this feels right to me and sometimes I feel like I’m an idiot – why not ask about time frames and next steps? The truth is, I am simply overwhelmed by all that I don’t know – even asking a question is challenging.

I was approached by Friesen Press via email the other day with a special offer to upgrade my cover package – an extra $299.00 would buy me a far better cover. No doubt it would, but as I’ve made clear before – I’m not spending any more money than I already have. My supporters have mixed feelings – one comment went like this – reading this email makes me think that if you don’t take this upgrade you’ll end up with a shitty cover. My response was – if you decide not to take the extra-large fries with your burger, in doesn’t automatically follow that they make you a crappy burger. Another comment took a more pragmatic approach – don’t sweat it – that’s their job – all you have to do is say no. Yup – true enough.

Today, I will continue to work on character sketches for the sequel to Disappearing in Plain Sight – The Light Never Lies. I have quite a cast of new characters and plan to expand on some of the original settings – get into more detail on the mechanics of a small sawmill operation and an organic bakery that makes use of an outdoor, wood-fired oven. I’m reminded of Stephen King writing (On Writing, 2000) that his books and stories are often situational driven. In contrast, I can see that my writing is very much character and setting driven. For me, the first step is always getting to know the characters and the setting. Once that work is done, I can toss them all together and things will start happening. The characters will tell me what they want to do and where the story is supposed to go.

I guess there are things to get busy with after pressing the upload button!

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I’m including this picture because it strikes me as the perfect mixture of elation and anxiety – depending on whether you are the lion or the horse. Entitled Lion Attacking A Horse, it is currently on display at the Getty Villa , located on the Pacific Coast Highway near Malibu, until February 2013. On loan from the Capitoline Museums, this is the first time this statue has been on view outside of Rome in over two millennia. It’s breathtaking and gripping and to see it is almost worth a trip to California in and of itself.

Editing – The Never Ending Story

Home to our comfy cabin in the woods – well it will be comfy again when we build up some heat in the place. This morning I feel like I’m getting back to reality with a jolt. And that means back to the reason I started this blog – to share my self-publishing journey.

When I left on the marathon trip I thought the editing of Disappearing in Plain Sight was done. I clicked the upload button on my author account page with Friesen Press and like magic my four hundred page Word file went off into cyberspace. My overriding thought at the time was good riddance. Now, like the proverbial bad penny, or hot potato, or whatever tired old analogy one could use – it’s right back in my lap.

To quote the editorial evaluation – The manuscript is at an advanced stage of readiness for publication and needs only minor polishing up in mechanical terms. I recommend a professional proofread before publication to catch a few spelling and punctuation errors that will be distracting to the reader.

OK – I admit – my first thought was that any polishing had to be pretty minor. There couldn’t be that many errors – the manuscript has been gone over so many times. And not just by me, thank goodness. But of course, every time I made one change, I was running the risk of screwing up something else. No doubt there are issues.

Before I write the next bit of this blog, I want to qualify what I am about to say. Friesen Press is a business – I totally get that. Businesses are about making money. There is nothing wrong with wanting to run a successful business that makes money. Heck, I would like to make money someday – though the likelihood of that happening seems fantastical at the moment. There is money to be made in up selling – there’s a good reason you get asked if you want fries with that burger every time you go to a fast food restaurant.

I inquired about the cost of the minor polishing up my editorial evaluation called for – $1925.27. The very next day I received an email telling me that Friesen Press was offering a special 15% off of the type of editing I required. Again – no criticism here – this is about up selling and making money. I get that.

I will stay firm on this issue, though – I’m not putting out any more money than I already have to get the book published. One of my first questions to my author account manager at Friesen Press revolved around a fear I had that once I got into the process I would be pressured to spend more and more money. She assured me there would be no pressure and there hasn’t been!

So – it is back to the world of editing for me and two wonderful people I have enlisted to be my second and third set of eyes.

Here is the plan:

First, I must compare each chapter, line by line, with my editor’s suggestions – yes – again! I realize now that I missed a few things, especially in the earlier chapters. I guess real diligence to change came with practice. Someday I will write an entire blog about my use, or more correctly, my overuse, of the word just. I’m wondering if it relates to a way of thinking and ultimately of being in the world – a means of qualifying speech and thought. Anyway, it’s so natural for me to insert the word just all over the place (especially when writing dialogue) that I barely notice I’ve done it. When I reread, my eyes just skim over the word just like it isn’t even there. (You see what I mean – I had no idea I wrote the word just twice in one sentence – crazy!)

After making sure I’ve really done all the changes needed, I will reread each chapter with an eye for any typos that I have missed previously or recently created. Then I will recheck the formatting to ensure nothing has gone out of whack in that department. The next step will be a printed copy of the chapter that all eyes can poring over word by word. Then back to the computer to clean up any typos or issues we have spotted in the hardcopy. I will check the computer copy one last time and then move onto the next chapter. EEEK – but it must be done. I don’t get out of this editing purgatory until I’ve completed the process.

Bruce took this picture in a small grove of Eucalyptus trees near Pismo Beach in California. There were 5000 monarch butterflies in the grove that day. What was even more enjoyable than watching so many butterflies flit through the trees, was the looks on peoples’ faces as they entered the grove and looked up – sheer wonder followed by huge grins. Butterflies are free and right now I am not – but I’ll be flitting among the upper branches soon, too – only forty chapters to go!