Journey to the Published Land! by Chris Keys

Hello there, it’s been a while since I’ve added a new blog to any site that I’m on and it’s about time I think I to do so. I’ve been quite busy trying to get my first book published and I’m proud to say that I have done it. I am a published author. Perhaps more importantly is the fact that I am an author who is making money from the sale of his book. I’m not wealthy yet, but the book is selling and I’ve yet to get my act together enough to promote it. That book would be, The Fishing trip—A Ghost Story! You can find it at Smashwords.com as an ebook, available for most readers or at CreateSpace.com, Amazon, Barnes and Nobel and several other on line sites and soon, with a little help from readers, your local book store. ISBN#1451588003.


As I mentioned a few months ago, I was embarking on a journey of discovery, the journey that leads to self publishing. It is not a journey for the faint of heart. Don’t get me wrong, you can do it provided you feel strongly, as I did, that you have a story people will want to read. Because it will take an effort, on your behalf to make it happen. So if have such a story, then by all means do it. However, let me explain some of the hurtles you will have to clear on the way.

All of the steps that you have to take when working with a big time publisher you will have to take when self-publishing, plus a few more. There isn’t anyone to make contact with the printer to decide what print size or font, your book will be printed in. There is no one interviewing artists from which to pick the right person to do the cover art. There is no, on staff editors, that will be assigned to work with you. No proof readers to make sure that the book is error free and reads right. Nor is there any guarantee that the one you find on your own, eventfully, has ever edited a book in your genre’ or has ever edited a book at all. The list goes on and on through marketing and distribution to public relations help and more. But let’s focus on the publishing portion.

In the publishing field there are no licensing requirements of any kind. Any one can claim to be a publisher, a printer, an editor, a graphic artist, a proof reader, or whatever. There are no set prices for any of the services offered by anyone. Basically, it comes down to buyer beware. A sad truth about the overall industry is that even if you should become an author the big publishers want. You still need to watch every move they make. The only thing they are interested in is, to make money for themselves. As the writer of the book they are selling, you are an expense to them and everyone wants to keep their expenses as low as possible. Keep that in mind if you ever get the opportunity to sign with a big publisher.

To begin your self-publishing journey you’ll need two things, a good manuscript and money. The actual publishing of your book can be done for free or very minimal cost. The expense comes in when you start preparing a professional product for the market. The first thing you’ll need to find or rather, the first person you’ll need to find is the editor. In my experience, I found this was a difficult undertaking. First, I answered ads in the writing magazines and was about freaked out by the prices the first dozen or so quoted me. They were in the $2000 to $2500 range. At the time I started, I was a proud creator of a 140,000 word monster of a novel. I’d already fallen for the rip off publisher who provided a great deal of praise, while promising to that the book would be published at no cost to me. But before we reached that point, we needed to have the book prepared professionally with critiquing, editing, framing?, another critic and a proof read. This by the way was to be done at my expense. The rip-off started when they asked for just a thousand dollars to help defray the costs of such undertaking and then they started to do the nickel and dime you death routine. It’s only another fifty dollars for this and another for that and another for another and another and another. I had wisely chosen to use a monthly payment plan and had only given them a few hundred when the con started in earnest. What enlight me to what was happening was that I had asked a specific question about my book and what they was as needing fixed and they took three months to respond and then they responded by telling about how had to write better dialog between the two main characters who were having a love affair behind the whole towns back. I haven’t any lovers in my book and when I questioned them in regards to this they stopped talking to me and referred me back to the publishers representative who wondered why I was concerned. As it turned out the publisher’s representative, had never read my book, neither had the supposed editor. Be very careful when dealing with any publisher. Check them out with Editors and Predators on line and with your states Attorney General’s office. The company I had signed with was be investigated for illegal business practices with over 1300 complaints.

In my search for an editor, I was turned down by several editors, simply because it was too big and time consuming. Many didn’t even want to read a few chapters to see just how much work they needed to, they just wanted me to commit to paying the money. Once they had received all the money, they would then begin. Again it was just about the money and had nothing to do with helping me present a better book.

I next encountered the type of editor, who after reading a few chapters, claimed the book was really good but it did some work. They were excited to work with me, but they needed all the money up front, no payments. They were somewhat less expensive so I considered them for a short time but finally passed on them after reading an article in a writing magazine that suggested if the editor was any good they’d take payments.

I next found what I thought was reasonably priced editor, but after they read a few chapters suggested that I get ghost writer, which by the way, they just happened to be. For a somewhat larger fee they’d fix my book so that it was a best seller. Of course they did say they couldn’t guarantee it would sell but all the required items for success would be there. You know the professional style and layout, the proper technical English language and the twists and turns that the big publishers what. I passed, because it is my book my way or it’s their book.

I then came across several ethical people who represented that they felt they were pretty good at editing and that they had published a few books of their own already with minor success. They offered to help me, for a very reasonable fee to get my book in shape. After exchanging several emails with several of them I finally picked one. We worked out a payment plan and went to work.

Here’s the thing. Even though we went to work and we felt we had set a reasonable time frame in which to get the work done, there will always be bumps in that road. Things like your full time job or their full time job might get in the way. A family illness may pop up any eat in to the money you had available to pay them with or someone in their family may become ill, requiring more of their time. You need to be flexible. They are people just like you.

Anyway, we worked on the story for sometime working through the bumps in the road and finally I was, at least I thought, ready. But there was one more step I needed to take before I published the book. It is actually two separate books now, instead one large one. Here’s where it can get very exciting but not in a good way You’ve got a good manuscript it’s been edited by someone, who you trusted and have spent the last few months working with and now, you have to have it proof read, by a third party.

I talked with dozens of other writers and they all assured me that I had to have an outside proof reading. Proof reading is designed to catch all of the typo’s, misspelling, and glaring grammar errors. It is not supposed to be a reedit. You’ll need to watch out for that.

No matter how good you are at writing and reading, you will miss some errors in your book for the simple reason that you have read it and read it and read it. You know exactly what is supposed to written and where. Your mind will skip right over typo’s like leaving out the words to, of, at, or and a. If you have a word that you’ve misspelled from the first day you started writing, one that spell check didn’t catch it. Chances are, you’ll never catch it either. Your mind once again has decided that it right and that’s that.

You need to be careful when hiring your proof reader. They need to have some skill with the English language and it would be good to have someone who has written a book or two, themselves. At the minimum they need to be college educated so that they understand grammar and punctuation. Those are my two worst areas.

It is very important at this stage, that you have a comfort level with your book. You have to believe in it and believe it is a very good story, worth every ones attention. Otherwise you may find yourself hiring someone to rework/reedit your book, because the proof reader made it sound as if the thing was junk. Everyone, for the most part, is operating with good intentions towards you, they want you to succeed but you need to remember they are also out to make money. You have to please yourself first and foremost. I’m going to tell you to listen carefully to what they have to say and then find another proof reader. That way you’ll have second opinion which is critical. Much of what any editor or test reader or proof reader is going to suggest you change is their opinion, especially, when it comes to wording. Punctuation and grammar, I’d just pretty much do as they say, but even here beware, they are not perfect. Of the five editors I did work with over the last three years on both The Fishing Trip-A Ghost Story and Reprisal! The Eagle Rises! They have all had trouble keeping the context of the story straight when making changes. Every word you write ties to another word you write, when you change the words, you change how they interact with each other. By changing one thing, you could be changing another from current tense to past tense or visa versa, all the way through, or maybe even taking the whole story line in a new direction. Watch your context like a hawk while editing. I have found that the wording in one chapter can change the way the words in another chapter read, which changes everything else. Don’t be afraid to tell your editor, “No, I won’t change that part.” It’s your book remember that!

Once you’ve been thru the ringer over the editing and proofing and deciding if the book is too long or too short, it’s on to picking who you will publish through. There are a few dozen help you self- publish publishers out there and several publish through us, On Demand Printers. The main difference is the help you self-publish publishers, will charge you an upfront fee to shepherd your book through the process and then once it is printed at your expense, they will provide some distribution, mostly to Amazon and then to the lists that the book stores can order from. Then when and if your book should sell, they get a fee from each book for the printing, handling and distribution efforts. They will tell you whether the book should be a hard cover or a paperback. They will tell you what size to make your book. 5x8, 6x9, 10x15 etc. They will tell you how much to charge for the book as well. Yeah, that sounds like a lot work and cost there and it is. But for some people it’s worth it. I may have gone that way if I could have afforded it. The help you self-publish publisher, will recommend an editor, a critiquer, a proof reader, a cover artist and marketing specialist, plus pretty much whatever else you may need all at alacarte rates.

Don’t get me wrong there are a couple of very reparable firms out there. They will shepherd your book through the process and even provide a very important service for the retail market. Book returns in case the books don’t sell. The big book stores will not order books they can not return if they do not sell. As my writing career grows, hopefully, I will more than likely utilize the services of one of the help you self-publish publishers to gain that all important return book policy.

The On Demand Printers are the least expensive way to publish your book. Few charge you anything up front for their services. Of course their services are quite limited. They basically print your book on a demand basis. Print on Demand means, they only print a copy when a copy is purchased. They charge a printing fee and a distribution fee. When all is said and done, this is the place you’ll make the most money per book as a writer just starting out.

The money comes at a cost to you, however. You will have to decide if your going to publish a hardcover or a paperback, (not all on demand printers do hardcovers), you’ll have to decide what price to charge. You’ll need to decide your books size, genre and the market place before you set a price. The On Demand Printer will tell you approximately what it will cost to print your book. Providing you with the inside knowledge of how much they will charge you per book. That includes the printing and distribution costs. I know of a doctor, who has purchased a few hundred copies of his new book and is selling them to patients at a big discount simply because he makes more money by doing so, about four dollars a book, more, than he’d make if he let them buy it from the publisher. By knowing the upfront cost you can know approximately what your royalties per book will be. So you’ll need to do some research when it comes to setting your price. Plus, not all On Demand Printers, charge the same fees so you’ll need to research that before choosing one. If you find one that doesn’t supply those numbers before you publish, run away fast. It’s a rip off!

Ok, you’ve figure out that you’d like to use a certain On Demand Publisher, great. Now your ready to figure out how they want to book formatted in order to mesh with their system for printing. Do they need PDF, PJG, word or something else? Also do you need to format the manuscript to the final book size? If so do you know how to do that? I figured it out, thru trial and error, so you can to or you can hire someone to do it for you. Some of the little pitfalls in the formatting process that I was blindsided by were that I had to format the manuscript to the book cover size. That I had to eliminate all of the space bar spaces, tabs settings, blank spaces and weird punctuation to end of sentences. Luckily, I discovered that most if not all the things, I needed to fix, were fixable through word, if you knew where to look. The part of about formatting to the book cover size, was a total surprise and I still can not find it in their style guide, yet they wouldn’t go to print with it being done. I strongly suggest that you follow their example for the books layout to the letter. Use a copy of their copyright page, with your info substituted, of course. They will be picky.

Now your on to your cover art. I liked the cover art development process. I gave the artist my impression of what I thought might make a good cover and she came back with a great cover based on my concept. What’s not to like? What’s not to like, is the hunting for a cover artist and having gone around in circles with several of them over price, choices, preliminary designs, final JPG files, ownership after the fact and how the money would be paid. No all artists have the same skill level or the same level of imagination. I was at my wits end when I finally found a great one, through a recommendation from a proof reader no less.

An important part of the book cover that is more often then not over looked is the spline. That is the part of the cover that holds the front to the back on the side of the book. But you knew that. The spline is important because it has to be sized to fit your book in between. It’s size is based on the number of pages you have. Let me make this is perfectly clear. You will have an even number of pages. No if ands or butts! Your pages will be counted two ways. First as pages and then as leafs. Leafs are the double sided pages that will make up your book. Some On Demand Printers may require you to have a couple of blank pages in the front and back. Some won’t. Read the printers requirements. Remember the more pages you have the more expensive your book will be.

Other things that you will have to include on or with your books cover. Your ISBN#- on the back with bar code, you can get this number from most On Demand Printers or you can go out and buy it on your own. You’ll need to include your name, the title of the book, maybe a small bit about you the author, maybe a picture and if you have them good reviews. One final comment about your books cover, make sure it is the responsibility of the artist to submit it back to you submission ready. It has to meet the printer’s specs and has to be properly formatted with the proper spline calculation. With out those things, you have pretty picture of no value as a book cover.

Next you’ll be contacting the copyright office in Washington DC. and copyrighting your book. It does cost a little bit but without it, you could face lots problems. Get the copyright. Then you’ll be going across town in DC to the Library of Congress. Here you will register your book with them and with that registry you will have an official book that libraries will stock, if they think its good enough. But with no registry, no library. The good news is that both of these can be easily on line. Do it!

The last really important step in publishing is also the hardest for any of us to over come. It’s also pretty simple. Bill Cosby said, “The quickest way to fail is to try and please everyone. Please yourself, for that is all, any of us can do.” It’s your book, write it the way you like it.

So now you are ready to go to print. You’re only a few short hours from being a published author. If you’ve submitted the manuscript in the proper format, within 48 hours you will be able to order your book. Now the real work begins. What? The real work? Haven’t you just spent three to six months working your ass off? What real work? MARKETING!

As a self publisher you have the responsibility of marketing your own work. If you picked a good On Demand Printer or a good help you self publish publisher you may have some minor help. Many provide the ability to list your work on all of the lists that are used by libraries and stores to purchase books, usually at an extra cost. They provide an E store for book sales and they certainly have you listed on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Books a Million and several large on line sales outlets. Your job is to get bookstores to purchase your book to sell to the public and/or to drive buyers to the E stores to buy it. I’ve written at some length about this part of the publishing adventure in the past and will repost those blogs so that you can see how this all runs in context now that I have finally got a book on the market.

Good luck, I hope this was helpful and informative. Just remember, this blog and five bucks will get you a Starbucks.

Your friend, Chris Keys

Write what you know, write it with passion—set the world on fire with your dreams! ChrisKeys@2010