Ruth Ann Nordin's Blog, page 15
August 7, 2022
Reaching the Point of No Longer Caring (A Perspective on Being an Indie Author)
I don’t know if this is something every author who has been publishing long enough eventually reaches, but I have now reached this point.
When you’re starting out on this author thing, you obsess over every little criticism someone throws your way. Every thing, no matter how small and insignificant, is a huge deal. I mean, authors will argue over just about anything. I’ve seen threads of arguments devoted to word usage (ex. “walk” or “stride”), active or passive voice, plotting or going by the seat of one’s pants, how often to publish a book, whether to use white or cream paper in a paperback, buying ISBNs vs using the retailer’s identification number for a book, and uploading books directly to every retailer or using a distributor to send the book out to multiple channels for you. Back in 2010, authors had heated debates over paperbacks vs. ebooks. This largely went away because of the popularity of ebooks, but back then, it was all, “You can feel and smell the pages of a paperback. Therefore, ebooks aren’t ‘real’ books.” Today the big debate has become, “You need a human narrator for an audiobook. Using AI narration will ruin the listener’s experience.” I already know how the human narration vs AI narration will go. We still have paperbacks, but ebooks are accepted. Likewise, human-narrated books will still be around in the future, but AI narration will become accepted as a whole. It’s the same stupid argument. It’s just a different format we’re talking about. There’s a place for both, but authors will devote a ridiculous amount of time arguing over it. And some authors are not making AI narrated books in order to appease the critic, even though they really want to.
When you’re a new author, acceptance is everything. You want everyone to love you. You want to be accepted by every author and every reader on the planet. You might logically know you can’t please everyone, but your heart wants to please everyone. Feelings are delicate things. I’m sure they’re more delicate in some personalities than in others. I happen to be “softer” in the emotional area than others. I feel things deeply. It doesn’t take much to get to me. But, over time, I have noticed that I’ve been developing that tough shell experienced authors once advised me to get ASAP. I think it was back in 2010 or 2011 when one author said the only way I was going to survive long term in this business was by letting all of the criticisms I was facing roll right off my back. Her exact expression was, “Let it roll off your back like water rolls off a duck.” It was good advice, and it’s advice I’m offering to anyone struggling with the critic today.
Recently, I posted something in a group where I upset a lot of authors. I knew I was planting something unpopular in the group but felt it had to be said because everyone was ganging up on this poor author who didn’t have the experience under her belt that I do. This author wanted to do something a certain way, and everyone was criticizing her. Her idea was just fine, so I spoke up and said something. I don’t believe in engaging with authors in these arguments anymore, so I didn’t engage any of the critics. I just posted my opinion directly to her in the thread. I had a gut feeling other authors agreed with me but were too scared to say anything.
The purpose of indie authorship is to do things your way. If you’re right, you’ll find an audience. If you’re wrong, you won’t find an audience. If you’re wrong, you can change your course and do things the other way. This business is composed of trial and error. You’ll succeed in some areas; you’ll fail in others. But failure is okay. Failure is a learning opportunity. You’re not strapped down to your failure. You can rise above it. Just change course. Simple as that.
If you have it in your heart to do something a certain way, go for it. Why let someone else make decisions about your books for you? They’re not paying your bills. They’re not dealing with your readers. They’re not stuck with your books in their library. I understand wanting to get advice, but you need to take that advice and tailor it to your specific situation and your specific interests. We are not all the same. We are not all meant to do things the same way. Being indie means you are the owner of your business. It means you have to ultimately make the decisions that are best for you and your business. Your business is not meant to be run by these other authors. Too many authors run their business by committee.
It takes time to get to the point where you will do things your way, and you don’t care what some other author out there thinks about it. It took me 14 years to get here. I’m sure if I wasn’t so emotionally wired, it would have taken me less time. The only way to arrive at this point is to make a decision best for you and stick with it. (Like I said, if you turn out to be wrong, change course, but if you’re right, stick with it.) At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what those authors think. The only thing that matters is that you are free to do what you want with your books without the need for someone else’s approval.
August 1, 2022
Daisy’s Prince Charming is Now Available!
This is the last book in the Husbands for the Larson Sisters Series.
And I’m going to miss writing about this particular family. These sisters were so much fun to work with. Sometimes the dynamic between characters just sparks, and this is one of those series. For the Regencies, I feel that spark with Ethan and Christopher, which is why I keep bringing them back whenever possible. For historical westerns, Tom and Joel were my two personal favorite characters to bring together in the Nebraska Series. In this series, all of the sisters were equally fun to work with. I can honestly say that this is one my personal favorite series.
What this book is about:
This is a cute romantic comedy that was partially inspired by the “frog turns into a prince” fairy tale. This story starts with a trip to Lewistown, Montana. Remember the Montana Collection?
I don’t know how many times I’ve been asked if I ever wrote about Rachel Larson or Eva Connealy, but I have. Since I bring these two characters back in Daisy’s Prince Charming, I’m making a special mention of it in this post. Eva and Rachel get their happily ever afters in Boaz’s Wager.
Daisy’s Prince Charming happens shortly after Boaz’s Wager in my “historical western” timeline. So if you haven’t read Boaz’s Wager yet and want some backstory on Eva and Rachel, that’s the book to pick up.
Daisy’s Prince Charming starts with Daisy, her mother Jessica, her aunt Mary Larson, and Eva’s mother Margaret going to Lewistown to pay Eva and Rachel a visit. Daisy and Eva are best friends; hence why Daisy is tagging along for the ride. Jessica is there because she’s best friends with Margaret and friends with Mary. (If you’ve read all of my books, Mary is from Eye of the Beholder, To Have and To Hold, and Forever Yours. Jessica is from A Bride for Tom, and Margaret is from A Husband for Margaret. So there is some overlap between the series at play.)
Anyway, while they are in Montana, there’s this ranch hand names Otis Mills who takes an immediate liking to Daisy. (I did briefly introduce Otis in Boaz’s Wager. He almost won the race that would have allowed him to marry Eva. Boaz won the race instead. I always felt sorry for poor Otis, so I thought I’d give him his happy ending in Daisy’s story since the timeline happens to match up.)
Daisy has her idea of the ideal man, and Otis doesn’t fit it. If you read Suitable for Marriage, you’ll know what I mean. Daisy does her best to gently let all of the men in Lewistown know she’s not interested in them, but Otis is a bit clueless, though he’s very sweet. He ends up believing she wants to marry him, so after she returns to Nebraska, he shows up at her door, ready for marriage.
I’m not going to say any more than that because I’ll spoil the book. It’s a cute romantic comedy.
If this sounds like your kind of book, you can find it at these retailers:
Kobo (also in Kobo Plus)
Audiobook version: Google Play
July 24, 2022
Finished Two Books
I finally did it. 
I finished the first draft for Heiress of Misfortune and Secret Admirer.
This book finishes the Marriage by Necessity Series.
My goal is to have this edited by August 1. After that, I’ll send it to my editor. My plan is to release this in October. I don’t have a date yet.
When I started this book, I expected it to be a comedy, but it didn’t turn out that way. I also expected it to be more suspenseful than it turned out to be. While there’s a glimmer of suspense, it’s not the focal point. I thought the father was going to be doting on his daughter, but he was more interested in how she could help him look good in the Ton. I expected the hero and heroine to end up marrying about halfway into the book, but that didn’t happen, either.
So this is a book that pretty much took everything I thought it was going to be and flipped it on its head. I might not know what is going to happen in any book I start, but this was one of the hardest ones I’ve had to write because of how it kept going off in a completely different direction from what I had planned. This is probably why it took me so long to write it. Would you believe I started this in November? In that time, I have completed The Cursed Earl, The Loner’s Bride, Suitable for Marriage, and Daisy’s Prince Charming. I’m used to a first draft taking me about 3-4 months to write.
Secret Admirer is done too!
This is the first book in the Marriage by Obligation Series. (Below is the order I’ve decided on for this series. I intend to stop the series with Worth the Risk.)
I’m waiting until I finish my initial edits on Heiress of Misfortune before I do them for this book. I might be able to write more than one book at a time, but I can only edit one book at a time. When I edit, it takes me about two weeks per book.
I’m planning this one for January. I have no desire to publish even Book 1 in a series unless I’m confident I can finish the entire series. Any time I start a series, I want to complete it. I hate loose ends. I’m hoping I can finish the next three books in this series by the time January comes. At that time, I should have a good idea if it’s worth getting this series out there into the world or not. We’ll just have to see what the future brings.
July 12, 2022
Updates on What I’m Doing
I decided not to make a post for my monthly newsletter since I didn’t write more than a couple thousand words in June. I had nothing to really say. So far, it’s looking like that will change for August 1. I’ll do a bit of an update here.
Over the past two days, I actually did some writing! I had a total of 1700 words yesterday and 2500 words today. That’s huge after not being able to write for so long. I’m hoping that this will continue. It feels good to finally write again. They say walking and sleep is good for stress, but I think for writers, writing is also good for it. I feel more relaxed today than I have in over a month.
Daisy’s Prince Charming(This is due out July 31.)
This is the last book in the Husbands for the Larson Sisters Series:
Book 1: Nelly’s Mail Order Husband
Book 2: Perfectly Matched
Book 3: Suitable for Marriage
Book 4: Daisy’s Prince Charming
I have links now for this book where it’s available for pre-order:
Kobo (will be in Kobo Plus)
A note about Radish, Scribd, Smashwords, and Payhip. These sites are not set up to allow for pre-orders. That’s why I’m not listing those channels right now.
A note about the audiobook version. I am also going to put this book up as an audiobook using the AI narration on Google Play and Kobo, but that is going to be around July 31 to August 3, depending on how quickly I can get the files all uploaded. Kobo does allow pre-orders for audiobooks, but I’m not sure about Google Play. (I’ll look into it. I have to make the audiobook with Google before I can get it up on Kobo.)
Heiress of Misfortune (Marriage by Necessity Series: Book 3)
I’m at the point where I know how things end in this story. I’m 63,000 words into this. My average book is about 55,000 to 60,000 words. I am thinking this will be about 70,000 words when the first draft is done. I tend to lose 2,000 to 3,000 words when I get to the second draft. Then it’s off to my editor. My hope is that the first draft will be done at the end of this month. I’d like to get this book out in October. We’ll see how things play out.
Secret Admirer (Marriage by Obligation Series: Book 1)
I’m not sure if I’m more at the 3/4 point. I’m approaching the critical moment of the story which is where everything is turned on top of its head (so to speak). All I know is that when I started this story, I knew the heroine was going to end up falling in love with the butler, and after this happened, a pivotal moment in the story was going to happen. I’m at this point right now. Once the story goes in that direction, I’m not sure how much more needs to be written to complete the story. If there’s not much more to tell, then the story will be wrapped up pretty soon. So I might really be at the 3/4 point right now. I’d go into more detail, but I don’t want to spoil things.
I started Midnight Wedding (Marriage by Obligation Series: Book 2)
I’m only in Chapter 1 right now. Remember Lord Quinton from The Cursed Earl who was highly superstitious? He’s the hero of this book. I decided to start the book up with his abduction. I build up to this abduction in Secret Admirer. I am not going to rehash events in Secret Admirer, so I guess, technically, this is not a “standalone” book, but then, a lot of my books tend to overlap. Sometimes I’ll even overlap a series.
I think of all of my books as part of a large quilt. They all take place in the same world (whether historical western or Regency), and it takes reading all of the books to fully appreciate the overall picture. I could separate each series out so there is no overlap. I’m sure that would make life easier since people wouldn’t have to piece together how characters and events line up between books/series. A lot of authors do it that way. But I love crossovers. To me, they are like fun Easter eggs that people can discover. So I connect up things whenever I can. Daisy’s Prince Charming, for example, has a lot of Easter eggs in it. That’s part of why I enjoyed writing it so much. The more Easter eggs, the better. 
I’m in the process of uploading AI audiobooks on Kobo. So far, I have The Earl’s Inconvenient Wife and A Most Unsuitable Earl on there. It takes me roughly 2-3 days to upload one audiobook on Kobo. Google Play already has all of my romances on audiobook, but the process was quick and easy over on Google Play. It took about 15-20 minutes per book to create the audiobook over there. It takes considerably longer on Kobo. So Kobo is going to be a slow process. As far as I know, Google and Kobo are the only places that will allow AI audiobooks. (Audible doesn’t, but I know some people have snuck them in. Audible is ripe with theft, so I’m not surprised.)
I am adding links to these audiobooks as I get them up, but since I have 95 romances out, I’m not linking to them out in a blog post. That would be crazy. I am putting the links on the pages with the books. The books are divided up by series.
If you want to check out the audiobook links, you can go to this link and then go to the book you’re interested in.
July 7, 2022
Things I’m Currently Doing
I’m finally in the process of getting Daisy’s Prince Charming up on pre-order.
I decided to put it out on July 31. I don’t have links yet because the retailers need time to set things up on their end. I am putting it on the retailers that I usually do, along with including it in Kobo Plus. I’m waiting to get close to July 31 before uploading it to Radish and before I create an AI audiobook version on Google Play. It will be on Scribd, too, but that page doesn’t go live until the day the book comes out.
Before someone says something, I need to warn everyone that I had to go back to the $3.99 price. After going through my record keeping for the accountant, I ended up taking too much of a loss at the $2.99 price point. So I had to go back to $3.99. On the plus side, I loved writing this book a lot, and I can honestly say it’s one of my personal favorites. I feel that way about all of Tom and Jessica’s daughters’ books.
Still registering copyrights.
When I went through all of my copyright registration letters to organize them, I found out that I had never registered the copyright on a few of my older titles. I’m currently working on that right now. I figure I might as well while I’m doing all of this. Since I had sent in paperbacks to copyright my books in the past, the US Copyright Office requires me to do that for all of my books now. That required me to go and make some paperbacks. I’m not really a fan of paperbacks since I can’t read them anymore. I’d prefer to stick with ebook or audio, but I need to create the paperbacks, and sometimes making a wraparound cover is a pain-and-a-half to work with. Bookbrush makes it easier, but I still struggle in this area. Sometimes I opt for Draft2Digital’s option of just uploading the ebook cover and going with a plain back cover that only has text on it. That saves on time. If I have someone special in mind when making a paperback, though, I’ll take the time to do a full wraparound cover because it does look nicer.
The paperback book for the family friend has finally shipped.
It took about two months of fighting with formatting issues and the full wraparound cover, but the book finally met with the Draft2Digital’s approval process. It was shipped out yesterday. The sad thing is that I even had my editor’s help because some of this stuff was over my head. She does formatting in addition to editing. If you need a good editor or formatter, let me know in the comments, and I’ll pass along her information. Anyway, I am crossing all fingers and toes that this book is in the “ready to publish” stage. This guy is 91. He doesn’t have a lot of time left to see this thing in print.
Still running around doing errands.
Typically in the summer, things settled down on stuff I have to do that takes me away from writing, but this summer is different. Everything keeps piling on. It’s been any number of things. Sometimes it’s repairs around the house that can’t wait. Sometimes it’s getting IDs or renewing them. Sometimes it’s helping a kid with with driving and (God help me) parallel parking. Sometimes it’s dealing with a program through the school where I find out too late that I don’t have some ducks in a row, so I need to scramble around to get them all lined up. I don’t know why, but I had this vision in my head that when the kids got older, I would end up doing less for them. The opposite is turning out to be true.
Thoughts on technology.
I love the internet. It’s opened a world I never would have had. I don’t think I ever would have published a book had it not been for the internet. But I hate the texting, emails, and dealing with a phone call while I’m out running an errand. All this technology has done is create an atmosphere where I am never truly “away” from it all. I often leave my phone at home to get a break, but when I come back, there’s a text, email, or phone message about something I need to do, and most of the time, it’s something that needs to be done right away. The worst messages are about the things I forgot to do. *sigh* I think back on what my mom had to do, and I don’t recall things being this crazy for her. Maybe it’s me, but this world is just too fast-paced. I can’t keep up.
As I was writing the last paragraph, I realized why I’m having so much trouble writing. It’s not that I don’t want to write. I do want to write. I love what I write. I just don’t have enough time to write. I feel like I’m constantly being handed a To Do List, and the worst part is, the list never seems to go down. As soon as I’m done with one thing, another item pops up. I did manage to get 3,000 words written this week. That felt surprisingly good. It felt like some of the pressure was released. I just wish I could get more writing in. Then I would feel like I’m not treading water in these stories I want to get done. Would you believe I started Heiress of Misfortune back in November, and I’m still not done with it? I can’t believe it, either. I’m just shaking my head in disgust, but I also realize I can’t make more hours pop up in any given day. I have my limits, and I’ll have to learn to deal with them.
June 28, 2022
What Goes Into Making a Book
There seems to be a myth out there that runs something like this: it takes absolutely no effort to create a book. I think this myth came about because reading is a passive experience. Reading is also quick. Depending on how long the book is and your reading pace, you can finish a book within an hour to a few days. So if something seems easy on one end, we’re apt to believe it was easy on the other end, too.
Therefore, some people conclude that books aren’t worth paying for. I’ve been publishing romances since 2009, and the most common feedback I get is about price. I get stuff like, “You’re breaking my bank”, “I’m on a limited income and can’t afford to buy books”, “Unless you’re a New York Times Bestselling author, you aren’t worth paying for”, “I love your free books and wish there were more of them”, “This book has been out for a year. Isn’t it time to make it free?”, and “Why aren’t you in KU? I can’t get your books unless you’re in KU”.
Some (not all) of these people have the audacity to turn around and post pictures on social media about their new car, their vacation, their Starbucks drink for the day, the new movie they just saw at the theater, etc. These particular people have the money. I’m not the only author this happens to. Other authors go through the same thing. For some reason, other stuff is worth buying, but an author’s book isn’t.
It doesn’t help that there are videos and posts out there teaching people how to read any book they want for “free”. Essentially, these videos and posts promote a read-and-return scam. So instead of using an online library, which is totally legitimate, these people opt to use a retailer as a library. When someone reads a book from an online library, the author has been paid for the book by the library. When someone reads and returns a book from a retailer, the author gets paid nothing. The same is true for audiobooks on Audible. I stopped putting audiobooks on Audible for this reason. (Though I still claimed my books on there to prevent thieves from getting their hands on my content.)
Yes, KU is legitimate. Authors get paid per pages read, but to be in KU, an author can only be on Amazon. (At least this is true for us indie authors.) Kobo Plus and Scribd are legitimate places to read books under a subscription model, and best of all, they don’t require authors to only be on Kobo or Scribd. Authors are free to be on other retailers. The exclusivity clause in KU is why I am not in KU. KU has shut me out from using their program. But I am on Kobo Plus and Scribd. I’m also at online libraries. I have a way for people to legitimately get my books without buying them. And these places exist outside the US.
I don’t know if people don’t realize this or if they are just trying to get a free book, but when people complain that I put a price tag on my books, all it tells me is that these people don’t value the time and money that went into creating my books. I didn’t just snap my fingers and the books magically created themselves. Every book took work and money to create.
Today, I’m going to share what it takes to create a book.You need to write the thing in order for it to exist.
I don’t use ghostwriters. I don’t use AI. Every book I write is from scratch. This means I have to sit and think about what I’m going to write before anything gets on the page. I have good writing days and bad writing days. A good writing day is when I wake up ready to write, and the words just flow naturally from the mind and onto the page. This is a no-effort day. I only have these days about 20% of the time. Most of the time, I know what I want to write, but I have to struggle for 30 minutes before the words start to flow. If someone interrupts me during these 30 minutes, I won’t get anything written that day, and a lot of people don’t see writing as “work” so they will interrupt me a lot.
I consider myself to be a fast writer. I have published 6-8 books a year since 2009. This doesn’t count the other genres I’ve dabbled in. I have just over 100 books total now. But that doesn’t mean writing those books was easy. There’s rewriting. There’s stopping the story to figure out what comes next. Then there’s times when I had to swap scenes around and then revise those to make them fit in the story. I might not have put in an 8-hour shift of doing physical labor, but it’s still tiring to write for 3-5 hours a day (five days a week) and then turn around to do the non-writing part of this business. If you totaled up all of the time I put into this writing business between writing and non-writing tasks, I work about 50 hours a week.
Some authors are faster than me. Some authors are slower than me. But we all put in time in order to create the book. The reason some authors use ghostwriters and AI is because creating a story from scratch is harder than it looks. There’s a lot of work the brain has to go through in order to connect the dots from the beginning of the book to the ending of the book. And these dots need to be connected in a way that entertains people.
After the writing comes the polishing process.
I go through every book one time before I send it out to an editor. It takes me about 2-3 weeks to go through this. Sometimes it takes me a full month. I like my work, but I can only handle a chapter or two a day because editing is tedious. I have to look at everything that’s wrong with the book. Also, sometimes I have to listen to any previous books that led up to this particular one. I’ve learned long ago to go through any connecting books to make sure I’m not running into consistency issues. This is all why it takes me so long to go through the initial edits.
Then I send the book off to an editor, and I give the editor a month to work on it. For people who wonder if I use an editor, yes, I do. I am not the only person who goes over my book. I try to make every book free of errors, but something always seems to fall through. I have read plenty of traditionally published books (and even watched enough movies and TV shows) where errors slipped into them. Errors happen. All an author can do is their best. All an editor can do is their best. I’ve been “cold called” by a couple of editors in the past, and even THEY missed something. No one is perfect, and quite frankly, I’m sick and tired of people acting like authors never take the time to have their books edited. Most of us do take the time. It’s just that no one ever finds every single thing. Ironically, those complaining about the error they found often write their comment with an error in it. /rant
The cover is either made by the author or made by a cover artist.
Hands down, the cover artist will do the best job unless the author happens to be familiar with making covers already. If the author creates the cover, that will take time. The author will need to find the pictures, get the right fonts, and then put these all together. This can take anywhere from a couple of hours to a couple of weeks. If the author needs to keep tweaking the cover, it can take weeks. (I’ve done this, and it is exhausting.)
I prefer to either hire a cover artist or buy a pre-made cover. This takes the time off of my back, but it does put the time onto someone else. When working with a cover artist, the author has to describe the book, mention what they want on the cover, and clarify the genre. Sometimes the author will submit pictures they already found to the cover artist, but sometimes the cover artist will search for the pictures. Then the cover artist will come back with some mock-ups. This is where the author will either pick one they like or suggest something else. This whole thing can take up to a month. Usually, it’s a week or two, but cover artists have lives of their own, so you have to work with their schedule. This is why I get the cover before I even write the book. If you go the pre-made route, you can eliminate the mock-ups and the “describe your book” process, but even then, you will have to make some touches to the cover or tell the cover artist your title and name. So there’s still some time, but this time is not very much.
Formatting comes next.
Now comes the part where you format for the ebook. If you do paperbacks, you need to format for that, too. I format for paperback while writing the book to save on time. The only reason I do paperbacks these days is to send the book to the US Copyright Office because of the non-ending harassment from Amazon to constantly prove my copyright to them. I create the ebook next. (I think most authors create the ebook first.) To create the ebook, it takes about an hour to format. This is, by far, the easiest part of the process, but I’ve been doing this since 2009 and I format in the simplest style possible to best fit all e-readers. Some authors like to get fancy in their formatting. The fancier you want to get, the longer the formatting will take.
Making the book costs money.
You need money if you hire a ghostwriter, buy an AI software writing program, hire an editor, hire a cover artist, buy pictures and/or fonts for your cover, buy a pre-made cover, and hire someone to do the formatting (whether it’s for the ebook, paperback, or both). If you don’t want to upload the book yourself, you’ll need to pay for that, too.
On average, I spend $300-$500 to create a book. This is why those emails from people who complain about the price of my books is so irksome. I paid a lot more than $0.99-$3.99 to even MAKE the book. Most authors pay way more than their asking price to produce their books, too. The truth is, authors need to make money with their books in order to keep writing more books. Most of us aren’t independently wealthy. Most of us are on a budget. Most of us are struggling to make ends meet. We need people to buy our books so we can pay for food, keep a roof over our heads, and keep our lights on. My internet alone is $85 a month. I need the internet in order to upload my books to the retailers, to communicate with editors and cover artists, and to maintain a blog and website.
Also, authors don’t keep the total price of their book. When you buy a book for $2.99, the author doesn’t get all of that. The retailer gets their cut from that price. Essentially, the author pays the retailer for having their book on the retailer’s storefront. Typically, the retailer’s cut will be about 30-40%, but it can be more depending on the country, the retailer, and the price of the book. If authors sell direct from their website, the cut will be a lot less, but most people want to buy from a retailer. If someone buys a paperback, the cost of printing the paper and cover will be combined with the retailer’s cut. Some might balk at a $14.99 paperback price for a romance book, but I only see about $2-$3 of that amount for the US and less if it goes overseas.
Then after the retailer takes their cut, the taxes come in. Authors are self-employed. Retailers don’t take taxes out for authors. Authors need to figure out their tax burden and pay the federal and state government (at least in the US) themselves. I hire an accountant for this. That accountant costs me money, too. Some authors figure out taxes themselves, but I am not a numbers person, so I hire out. Some authors don’t make enough to even pay taxes, which means they can’t cover their bills and groceries from their book income. They need another source of income to make ends meet. Contrary to popular belief, most authors aren’t making a ton of money. By the time most authors pay to make the books, the retailer takes their cut, and the taxes are removed, they are doing good to stay afloat. (And I didn’t even discuss ads or other promotional opportunities authors pay for in order to get people to even realize their book exists.)
Support the authors you enjoy.
The bottom line is that it costs authors plenty of time and money to get these books out there. If you have an author you appreciate, the best way you can thank them is by buying their books. Words of praise are nice, and we certainly love hearing them, but we also need the money if we are going to be able to keep writing more books. I know some authors who quit writing because they had to use their time to make money by getting another job. If I ever get a “traditional” job, I’m not writing anything because I won’t have time for it. (I barely have time to write as it is.) I understand why these authors dropped out of writing. Authors need financial support in addition to the emotional support.
June 27, 2022
Haven’t Been Writing Lately
I put all writing on hold after I finished the first draft of Daisy’s book. That was close to the end of May. I’ve been having to clean up a lot of non-writing related stuff.
This is what I’ve been up to:
Making a family friend’s life story into a book.
I have been working on a paperback for a family friend. This is a book about his life, and he has a ton of pictures. All I can say is that formatting a paperback with a lot of pictures is a nightmare. Typing the text in from the pages of the binder and scanning the pictures into the computer were easier. I broke down and hired out for the formatting, and she had trouble, too. We went through about three rounds of “does this work?” before we came up with something that passes for a proof paperback copy. The cover artist I usually work with has been gone, so I’ve had to deal with this cover myself, and I’m currently on the third round. This morning, I got another “rejected” email. (I’ve been messing with making this cover on and off for two months.) This time it was the text being too close to the ISBN thing on the bottom right of the back cover. I hate making paperback wraparound covers. I’d rather just do the ebook cover on the front and the generic back cover, but since this book is uniquely special, I’m hoping to make this work. I think I finally have it. If not, I guess we’re stuck with a generic back cover.
I have no intention of being the publisher of this book. This is just to give this family friend a physical copy of the book so he can see it and point out anything else he wants to add or delete from it. My plan is to help him create his own D2D account where I will upload the files for him. From there, he can go directly into his dashboard to order any author copies and handle the copyright and tax stuff himself. There is no way I want to be a publisher for other people. I have enough problems managing my own work. I don’t want to take on someone else’s.
Teaching my deaf kid to drive.
I’m in Montana, and you need 50 total hours in the car before you can go to the DMV for a license. Now, I don’t know if this is only for those under 18, but all of my kids were under 18 when then got their licenses, and I had to tally up those hours for all of them. Fifty hours doesn’t sound like a lot, but by the time you’re done, you feel like you’ve been in sitting in that car forever. This is the last kid I’ve had to do this with, thankfully. Since he’s deaf, it’s been more of a challenge. I can’t just scream out if something goes wrong. I have to rely on hand signals or taking control of the wheel. Some things happen within seconds. Even with a hearing kid, this part of parenting is stressful. I held off on doing the bulk of the driving with him until school was out so I could put in some 2-3 hour chunks of time for the drives. He did take the class at the deaf school, but nothing really prepares you for driving like doing lots of driving. My goal is to get him a driver’s license by the time school starts.
One thing I did successfully accomplish getting done was the Google AI audiobooks.
I finished getting the AI audiobooks put up on Google, but it’s going to be SLOW going on Kobo. I have almost 100 romances, so this is not something that takes a day or two. Kobo requires a chapter to be uploaded at a time, and this looks like it’ll take about 2 or 3 hours per book. I’m waiting until I get back to writing so I can upload them while I’m typing away. Google took the epub file, let you edit the text, and converted the whole book pretty much right away. I could get a book done in 15-20 minutes. I got to say, I’m very impressed with Google Play’s system for making AI audiobooks. I was unable to get Eye of the Beholder or the Virginia Series up on Google Play because I signed contracts with a narrator at ACX back in 2020. Those books are locked in over there, meaning they can only be on Audible and iTunes. All of the other books are on Google Play and will (eventually) be on Kobo.
Radish is going to take forever.
I was working on getting my backlist up on Radish (again with almost 100 romances in my catalogue), but that is also time consuming because I have to break the book up into 1500-2500 word episodes. I had fun with it, but it takes up so much time that I had to cut back on it. Plus, something about the site bugs my eyes. I don’t know if it’s switching from the internet screen to my Word document screen, but when I finish uploading the episodes that make up the entire book (typically 20-30 episodes), my eyes get worn out.
Working on Daisy’s book.
The editor got it done, and it’s back to me. I haven’t had time to format it yet. I have no idea when this will be ready.
Making the most of the time with the kiddos.
I’ve been taking time out to walk with my kids since it’s summer and we can take advantage of the parks. I have a treadmill, but I prefer to be outside. I like the change in scenery. My oldest will be 20 in August, but he’s going to the local community college and working at a fast food place. My second is 18, has graduated high school, and has a full-time welding job. His goal is to save up the money to get his teaching degree in high school history. To cut on expenses for these kids, my husband and I agreed to let them stay here so they don’t have to rent. The third (that’s my deaf kid) will be a senior next year, and the fourth will be a junior. Anyway, I’ve been putting some of the “writing time” on hold to spend time with the kids because once they do move out, I don’t want to look back and say, “I wish I had spent that time with them when they were still here.” I heard that a lot from my father-in-law when he mentioned his own kids. I might not get everything right in this life, but this is one area I want to get right. I also spend time with my husband, but he doesn’t like to go for walks as much as the rest of us do. Plus, a lot of his time is spent helping his mom out now that his dad is gone.
Which brings me to another topic. I think each spouse needs to know how to manage and run a home in the event the other spouse dies. In my case, I pretty much run things. My husband was in South Korea for two years, and I’ve had to do everything myself. That was good training grounds. I know I’ll be okay if he dies. I think he’ll be okay if I go before him. But his mom is at a total loss. Her dad used to make all the decisions for her. Then her husband came along and did the same thing. This has been to her detriment. She panics over a lot of things that shouldn’t be major issues. As a result, her health has gone down, and it’s looking like she won’t be able to live on her own for long. I’m just the in-law, so I can’t intervene. All I can do is watch while her two sons pick up the slack. Anyway, it’s been eye opening on how important it is for both the husband and wife to know how to manage life if you have to be on your own.
When will I get back to writing again?
I wish I knew. I thought I’d be able to get back to things this week since I am officially done from my “writing break”, but there’s more stuff that keeps popping up. Then there’s the question of if it’s even worth it to write anything with inflation skyrocketing the way it is. Will people even want to buy books when they are struggling to buy groceries and gas? I can’t make all of my books free. I have bills to pay, too, and I need to put a price tag on my books to do that. Plus, I pay for edits and covers. It’s not even free for me to make books. I don’t know. It just doesn’t seem like there’s much of a reason to get back to it. I might just finish up Heiress of Misfortune and be done with it. That way I will have completed all of the series that I started. Everything will be wrapped up. There will be no loose ends. I hate loose ends.
June 8, 2022
Be Careful If You’re Going to Hire a Ghostwriter
In my opinion, you’re much better off writing your own stuff because you know YOU 100% own your story. This becomes important when copyright issues pop up. But, I understand that some people want to use ghostwriters, so I am going to share a cautionary tale about an author and ghostwriters. Then I’ll follow this real life story up with some advice to best protect yourself.
In my last post, I made a reference to not wanting to put pre-orders up anymore on Amazon because I believed the new scam of the day was for scammers to arbitrarily pick authors’ pre-orders, claim infringement on them, and get Amazon to remove the pre-orders. I wouldn’t have been surprised if Amazon allowed scammers to do this because of all the things Amazon has put authors through in the past. I’m not saying other retailers don’t have their share of junk, but Amazon takes the cake when it comes to “anything that can go wrong will go wrong” in an indie’s career. But in this case, I was wrong about what I thought was going on. As long as you have written your book, it should be safe to put it on Amazon as a pre-order. And believe me, that is a huge relief.
But what if you hired a ghostwriter? Can you be confident that Amazon will not remove the pre-order? No, you can’t. Below, I’ll share why.
The incident below that really happened:
Author A made a plot for a story and sent it to Ghostwriter 1 to write out. Ghostwriter 1 sent that plot to Ghostwriter 2. Ghostwriter 2 wrote the story and sent the story to Ghostwriter 1. Ghostwriter 1 never paid Ghostwriter 2. Author A paid Ghostwriter 1. Ghostwriter 2 noticed the book on pre-order on Amazon and filed a copyright infringement complaint. In this case, Ghostwriter 2 has a legitimate case. Ghostwriter 2 was never paid. If Author A had just written the story, there wouldn’t be a problem. But here we are, and there is a problem. Author A is out the money paid to Ghostwriter 1, and Author A cannot publish the story. The most Author A could do against Ghostwriter 1 was to have Ghostwriter 1 removed from the site where Ghostwriter 1 was offering their services. (This won’t stop Ghostwriter 1 from assuming another name and continuing to work.) But that is outside Author A’s control.
Author A has the option of paying Ghostwriter 2 for the story. Yes, it sucks to double pay, but it’s also not Ghostwriter 2’s fault this happened. Ghostwriter 2 was just as scammed as Author A was. If Ghostwriter 2 doesn’t want to take payment, that is Ghostwriter 2’s right. Ghostwriter 2 never made an agreement with Author A. If Ghostwriter 2 refuses to sell the book to Author A, the only option Author A has is to come up with a brand new story. Yes, that also sucks, but I don’t see what else Author A can do at this point.
A side issue with the dangers of ghostwriting:
There are some ghostwriters out there who will take books currently out, copy the content, and sell that content to unsuspecting authors. A couple of years ago, one ghostwriter got caught doing this. Anyone can put a profile on a site and offer their “services” to authors. You need to vet them out before going with them.
Let’s talk about protecting yourself:
The big thing I’d recommend is asking the writing community or your author friends for trustworthy ghostwriters. I know some people are not a fan of Facebook. (I’m not a fan of it, either). But when it comes to the writing communities, Facebook is the best place to be. (Yes, you still want to research outside of Facebook, but Facebook is a great starting place.) I hate to say it, but MeWe isn’t that great for indie authors. Most writers there want a publisher. There’s nothing wrong with wanting a publisher, but if you are an indie author, Facebook still has the best writing groups geared specifically to you. I highly recommend the Wide for the Win group over there. That one is my personal favorite. There is a wealth of information there, and authors are more than happy to pass on recommendations for editors, cover artists, ghostwriters, etc that they have personally used.
Another tip is to do your own outline and give that to the ghostwriter. That way you know the story is your idea. Then be sure to read through the story when it comes back to you. To be safe, I would even go a step further and rewrite the story so that it’s in your voice. The more authentic this story is to you (the author), the better your chances are of buffering yourself from future problems.
If there is a specific ghostwriter you’re thinking about hiring, you could ask for a list of clients they worked for. I understand that some authors don’t want a ghostwriter to disclose this information, but maybe this ghostwriter has worked with some authors who are okay with sharing their names. Maybe this ghostwriter has a list of authors on their site. Check out the authors’ books, and if you feel up to it, contact the authors and ask about their experience. If you want to go a step further, ask the writing community about this particular ghostwriter. Chances are, the community might recognize him/her.
Get a contract if you want to be better protected. I have signed contracts in the past when the other party wanted our agreement in writing. I’ve done this for covers, edits, and for co-authoring books. I see nothing wrong with contracts as long as they protect both parties. This is up to your comfort level.
If you have successfully worked with a ghostwriter and have some ideas I didn’t think of, please share. While I have no intention of hiring a ghostwriter, it’s possible someone reading this post might want to.
May 30, 2022
What I’m Up To (AI Audiobooks, Copyright, No More Pre-Orders, Got a Book Finished)
Despite the lack of frequent posting over here, I have been keeping busy with book stuff. I’ll try not to ramble too long about it all.
I’m finally getting to this one. It was one of my main goals for 2022. I wasn’t sure how I was going to be able to accomplish this. I thought I was going to have to buy some fancy software and work on learning it. Thankfully, Google Play opened up the option for authors to convert epubs to audiobooks. The system is slick. The technology is AI, so it’s digital. There is no human reading the book. While some people argue that they “need” a human voice, I don’t. I never did. I have been using the Kindle’s text-to-speech feature since 2010. You can get used to the robotic quality of the AI voice if you open yourself up to it.
The main perk to generating AI audiobooks over on Google Play is that I can now price audiobooks at the same price I have my ebooks at. I wasn’t able to do that before. The reason I can now is that it doesn’t cost me anything to make these audiobooks AND I can make it in 15-30 minutes. This is a huge win-win. It’s a win for me since I can finally get my books into audio format, and it’s a win for those who would like to listen to my audiobooks but haven’t been able to afford them.
At the moment, I’m about halfway through my books. I have almost 100 books, so it takes time to get these converted to audio. I am taking a break with writing to focus on this. I have found if I try to do these “business end” tasks while trying to write, I spread myself too thin and burn out.
I’m working on copyrighting some books.The US Copyright Office has (again) modified their website, so it took me a little bit of time to navigate my way through it this weekend. Thankfully, I’ve done this enough times where it wasn’t too bad, but I do think if someone has never done this before, they will probably get confused. Yes, I know you own your copyright when you write your book, but there have been too many times when authors have been required to show proof of copyright to a retailer (mostly Amazon, though some author did get hit by Barnes & Noble a couple of months ago). The best way to prove your copyright is to file it with the US Copyright Office.
I realize the $65 standard registration fee is a good chunk of money, but I’m actually in favor of it because that fee will stop a thief from taking my work and trying to copyright it. In a world where theft is rampant, I like safeguards.
To put things in perspective, recently an author in a FB writing group got a false takedown notice on her pre-order. Now, a pre-order has no sample, so you can’t see the text. Yet, someone in another country claimed it was their book. Amazon removed her pre-order and said if she didn’t prove her copyright, they would not re-instate it. Amazon does not care about the specifics of the situation. If someone wrongly accuses you of theft, they will remove your book and tell you 1) prove your copyright OR 2) deal directly with the accuser and get the accuser to tell Amazon they were wrong. Guess what? This accuser isn’t backing down, and she has no US Copyright Registration Number. I’m telling you, that thread is every author’s worst nightmare. Don’t think a lawyer can help you if you get hit. One author spent $24,000 trying to settle things in his favor, but the person he was up against was in another country, and it didn’t work. In the end, he had to rewrite his book so Amazon would take it. Now that $65 to register your copyright doesn’t look so expensive.
I’m not doing pre-orders anymore.In light of the situation with the author I mentioned above, I’m not going to do any more pre-orders. Instead, as soon as I’m done with the final draft, I will send it to the copyright office and just publish it right away. I don’t know if it’s rare that someone out there will claim copyright infringement on a pre-order, but I see no reason to look for problems. I’ve had enough times in the past of having to fight Amazon. You get hit enough from Amazon, and you don’t mess around anymore. I need to do whatever I can to protect my work.
I did finish the second draft for Daisy’s Prince CharmingAnd I have sent it off to my editor. I don’t know when I’ll be publishing this. It all depends on when I can get things ready for the copyright office.
May 28, 2022
Trivia for Suitable for Marriage
(Suitable for Marriage is Book 3 in the Husbands for the Larson Sisters Series, and it features Tom and Jessica Larson’s third daughter, Erin.)
In this story, Alex knows Erin is trying to get rid of him and plays along with it in hopes he can eventually change her mind. I almost went with this plot in Nobody’s Fool (a Regency I wrote), but I decided to go with him being oblivious to the heroine’s schemes instead. That freed me up to use this particular plot for Suitable for Marriage.
Eva Connealy is the heroine in Boaz’s Wager, a book I wrote years ago. Suitable for Marriage takes place before Boaz’s Wager in the timeline. So I thought I’d have fun. At one point in Suitable for Marriage, she says, “Alex, I like you as a friend, but I have no desire to end up with someone who works with animals. I thought it over, and such a man is all wrong for me. I’d be much better off with a university professor, the conductor of a great big music hall, or a literary critic.” In Boaz’s Wager, she ends up with a man who trains horses who is in no way a professor, musically inclined, or a literary critic. In fact, it was Boaz’s friend who played the violin and made Boaz jealous when Eva gushed on and on about his friend’s talent. Since she ends up with someone who was completely unlike what she planned, I thought it’d be funny to put this section of dialogue in this book.
When I lived in Nebraska, tulips grew up every April in my front yard. Those things are hardy flowers that come back every year with no work at all. I loved them. That’s why Alex gives women tulips in this story.
In this book I wrote, “Some people love to read. Every time I read a book, I pretend I’m the person I’m reading about. It’s more fun that way.” I started reading this way in high school to make the boring books the teacher required me to read more interesting. Since then, I found it fun to do it with every book I read. When I write books, however, I never see myself as one of the characters.
As I was writing this book, I kept thinking that Daisy (Tom and Jessica’s youngest daughter) reminded me of someone. It wasn’t until I was editing the book during a scene where Daisy is in the barn with Erin and Alex that I realized she reminds me of Joel Larson. She’s a bit on the conceited side, and she has a mischievous spark in her.
When Erin and Daisy visit Patricia in Patricia’s large home, Daisy says, “Eva let me borrow a book where a distinguished gentleman hired a young lady to be a governess. The two fall in love, but it turned out he had a wife who went mad and was confined to the attic. Maybe there’s a secret wife hiding somewhere in a secret room here. Are we sure that Jim came to Omaha all by himself?” This book Daisy read was Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë.
I bring in Natalie (heroine in The Perfect Wife and Mark Larson’s wife) for a scene in this book.
There is a woman named Lisa who shows up in this book who says she can’t entertain a courtship with Alex because her cousin is mad at Alex for losing to him in a bull riding contest, and if she were to be with Alex, her family would give her grief over it. I know this seems far-fetched, but I have experienced a scenario similar to this in my own personal life. I can’t go into detail, but something that happened almost 20 years ago has pretty much made me the “black sheep” with a certain family member. There are petty people out there who will hold a grudge forever. Sometimes something from an author’s life will find its way on the page. Names, situations, and events are always changed, though.
Quite frankly, I was surprised that Nelly still worries whenever her sisters come by and see Val. I didn’t plan for her reaction to be the way it was, but every character has their quirks, and this is Nelly’s.
In this book, Tom Larson gives a reference to the time when Clyde ran off and left Jenny (Tom’s sister) when he was supposed to marry her. It is so much fun to have a cast of characters who have a history I’ve already written about so I can I bring the past up whenever I want. That’s what makes the Larson family and my Regency characters so enjoyable to write about. I never truly have to say good-bye to any of them.
At the end of this book, Tom argues with Jessica and Alex’s parents that a woman can have some say in whether the baby is going to be a girl or a boy. This is a reference back to Eye of the Beholder where he and Jessica have the same argument. I thought it’d be fun to bring it in for old time’s sake.
Since Tom had all daughters, I was going to give him all grandsons, but then I got to Daisy’s book, and that changed. Jessica will be getting some granddaughters in the future.
