Publish & Print

Dave and I published our first novel, Fluke, in April.

As you can imagine, it was (is) an amazing experience.  I had a mixed bag of emotions, all of them good.

During the publishing process we reached a point when we could look at virtual, online proof copies of Fluke.  For me – pure joy.  The anticipation of holding a real copy in my hands in the near future was almost too much.  But, we had waited 10 years, so what was a few more days, right?

Some time passed by.  I strolled into the mail room on Ramstein Air Base daily to see if my hands would be graced with a copy of Fluke.  It took a couple of weeks, but the day finally arrived.  Looking through the tiny window, i could see that my mailbox contained the slip of paper that signaled there was a package to pick up.

I got in the package line and waited, ID Card in hand, trying to be patient.  It was a good day – I handed my slip over to the folks in the window after just five minutes.  Seconds later, the package from Createspace was in my hand.  The tough part to believe is that I actually made it back to my car before ripping into the box.

That’s when I held the first printed copy of Fluke.  Wow!

My fellow aspiring authors, I have one nugget of advice.  Even though your sales & marketing may be a mostly digital venture, take the time to get at least one print edition of your book.  There isn’t much in this world that compares to holding the result of dreams in your palms.