It's September, which signals the final phase of summer. Summer used to be the time of entertaining kids and finding ways to keep them busy. Instead of focusing on kids, this summer I've been focusing on writing and publishing. I have three non-fiction books out with a publisher. Earlier this summer I decided to do an e-book. To do that, I set up my own company, High Canyon Books. At this point, the company has only one client, me.  Angel Sometimes is now available as an e-book on Amazon. My plan is to next get it ready for printing. Then I'll work on putting it up on other sites via Smashwords. You may take a different path. I have a good friend who went print first, then Amazon. She has been a wonderful mentor and learning partner. You can check out her book on Amazon. I've hired a publicist to help once it's out in print. I keep using the word "I", but I've had a lot of help from friends, both online and in the real world.  If you'r...

To be a happy, successful author, you have to be passionate. To be a selling, successful author, you have to be organized. There was a time long ago … okay, not so long ago … when writers could sit in their office or coffee shop and write. Then after months of writing, they would compose a query letter and send it to their top pick of agents, then another agent and another until someone agreed to take them on. Today, hooking an agent is getting quite difficult. More writers are turning to independent presses or going it on their own - self-pubbing their own print books or e-pubbing. They’re also figuring out that taking this route is a blessing and a curse. A blessing because they can make as much if not more by going solo on the e-pub route. A curse because to be successful you have to do all the promoting on your own while you write the next book. Plus, you may have to pay people to edit your book, design the book cover , and help with formatting before it’s uploaded and each pl...

When I signed up for Colorado author and publisher Brian Schwartz ’s workshop on The Fast Path to Publishing , I had every intention of formatting my own manuscript for Kindle and the rest of the e-books on the market. It was a great workshop, but I quickly realized the process would take more time than I had available over the next few weeks. My second published novel won’t be eligible for e-book publication for at least a year, and by then, the rapidly changing world of digital publishing could make all that learning obsolete. In addition, while older book contracts rarely included digital rights, it will be harder for authors to retain those rights with future sales. These two books may be my only opportunities to convert manuscripts for digital reading devices. The published author with an extensive backlist and enough time to do the work on his own will save money and possibly gain enough experience to set up his own e-book formatting business. In my case, remaining a e-dunce was...

By Brenna Lyons, guest blogger from EPIC (Electronic Publishing Internet Coalition) A lot of readers state that e-books should be sold for pennies, “because the money preparing the book was already spent on the print release and there is no physical printing and shipping involved.” In their mindset, that means there are no additional costs to preparing the e-book for sale, and therefore, a book should cost little or nothing in e-book. There are a lot of holes in this theory. For one thing, not all publishing ventures produce the print version first. Most indie presses either produce the e-book version first or the two concurrently. Even in NY conglomerate, lines like Carina Press and Spice Briefs (both Harlequin ventures) produce only the e-book version. If there is print, it will come later. That means the costs of producing the book fall solely or primarily on the -ebook version. Assuming the print version was indeed produced first, this line of thought disregards the fact t...

With the popularity of Kindle and the iPad, more readers seem to be hopping on the e-book bandwagon. I now have my newest book, Follow the Dream , on Kindle, so I’ve officially entered the “big time” of e-publishing. I was also recently was given the honor of winning an EPIC award for my first novel, Cowgirl Dreams . The first question I usually get is, “What is EPIC?” EPIC, the Electronic Publishing Internet Coalition, is a professional organization for published and contracted e-book and print authors. It was established in 1997 to provide a strong voice for electronic publishing. Even though E-Publishing is a relatively new venue in the big picture of publishing, many readers, writers, and traditionally published authors believe this is one of the major marketplaces of the future. EPIC was designed to help professional writers learn more about the best publishing opportunities on the Internet and to provide networking opportunities for information about promotion and market grow...

With Borders getting into the act, there will soon be four platforms on which authors can self-publish e-books directly to readers. I summarized them for comparison and thought I would share my findings. Amazon: Digital Text Platform This venture has been around the longest, has a reported 76% of e-book sales, and publishes content directly to the Kindle bookstore. Authors can upload a Word, html, or PDF file, which Amazon reformats as mobi file. Or authors can create their own mobi files to upload. The latest requirement is that files have active TOCs. For books priced between $2.99 and $9.99, Amazon pays a 70% royalty. For everything else, it pays 35% of the list price. Authors can price their books however they want, but Amazon reserves the right to discount the book. To be in compliance with the 70% agreement, authors can’t sell their e-book cheaper anywhere else. Amazon pays monthly and deposits royalties directly into the author’s bank account. Most DTP e-books are purchas...

This week the Blood-Red Pencil is launching a series of posts about e-books. What do you know about this emerging segment of the publishing market? Take this quiz to see if you're up to speed! True or False? 1. Kobo, Ectaco, Nook, and Aluratek are all names of Native American tribes. 2. E-books still haven’t quite caught on. 3. E-books will replace print books. 4. E-books are cheaper to produce. 5. E-books are mostly bought by young techies. 6. All digital readers can read all e-books. 7. Authors make less money from e-books. 8. Digital reading technology will evolve and render currently owned e-books unreadable. 9. E-publishing is only for book-length material. 10. Self-publishing, subsidy, non-subsidy, vanity, royalties, reseller: the age of e-books will simplify the publishing process and negate the need to learn all these terms. Answers: 1. False. Okay, I was trying to throw a bone to all the rank beginners out there. (Like me, before I researched the...

Welcome Blood-Red Pencil Readers, Starting tomorrow, editors and guest bloggers will present a special series about e-books and everything we can think of related to the topic. From a history of e-books to the newest trends and statistics, we'll try to cover the good, the bad, and the ugly in this publishing phenomenon. We'll run with this until the end of the month, so visit us daily. Tomorrow we start with an e-book quiz compiled by team blogger, Kathryn Craft. Stop by and see just how much you know about e-books! And Scott Nicholson's imfamous disappearing e-book post will reappear, for all the fans following his three-month blog book tour. ;) ~~~~~

With the publishing industry undergoing vast change and new avenues opening for authors, the choice of career route no longer leads straight through Manhattan. With authors able to directly upload their manuscripts for the growing digital market, the temptation is there to bypass agents and publishing houses altogether, going for the immediate reward and readership–however large or small. Self-publishing was long considered “vanity press” and the mark of a frustrated amateur, but as more established authors release their own backlists as e-books and a new generation of authors embrace the do-it-yourself indie spirit, it’s no longer a dirty word in the literary world. Vicky Tyley , an Australian mystery writer, finished her novel Thin Blood four years ago. After numerous rejections on two earlier novels, she found an agent, who then approached all the major mystery publishers. After he kept hearing “we can’t consider an Australian mystery,” he encouraged Tyley to put it on Amazon f...

Over the past ten or fifteen years e-book publishing has steadily grown as an industry, but the debate continues as to whether it is a legitimate outlet for quality books or just a repository for work not up to standard. As the e-book reviewer for ForeWord magazine for several years, I would have to say that a lot of what has been published was not up to standard, but more and more e-publishers are taking a stricter stance on what they accept and doing a much better job with editing. For a new writer, going with an e-publisher might be a good option. There are a number of e-publishers that have been in business for a long time, such as Hard Shell Word Factory , New Concepts Publishing , and new ones such as Uncial Press . In addition, there are there are a slew of new publishers for erotica. A directory of publishers can be found here So, should you as a new writer consider going the electronic route? Before you decide, there are a number of things to consider: Are there benefits to an...