Dale’s Comments (group member since Sep 15, 2017)

Dale’s comments from the Navigating Indieworld Discussing All Things Indie group.

Lit Up and The Writing Cooperative are co-sponsoring a contest this month. My entry is Reunion.

There's some backstory to this one. Long ago, back in the mid-1990's I think, I wrote an SF story called "Deuterium" about a run-in between a female pirate named Anna Grande and a security patrol commander named Len Vandermeullen. It turns out that Vandermeullen is Grande's adopted son (sort of). Grande rather captured my imagination, and I tried to write an origin story for her, about how she became a pirate/freedom fighter. I got some of the basics down but was never able to complete that story, which I had envisioned as a novel. I've gone back to that manuscript several times over the years but never got anywhere with it. When this contest came up, somehow it jarred my memory and I thought it would be fitting to write a new story with Grande and Vandermeullen, this one set probably a decade earlier than the original.

And there it is...

Alex wrote: "That would be great, it'd be nice to know how it goes.

I have a regular promo for one of my 99c books today, and I even have Google Play set up, which I didn't have before, so fingers crossed it w..."

Yeah, I noticed that. And thank you.

Alex wrote: "No, I haven't done 'deal of the day', but I have done the series offer on Freebooksy which was about $150 where the focus is on book 1 in the series but they also list other titles in the series."

Okay, thanks. I'm going to set up normal promos for Fibonacci and True Death, then I might try the deal of the day for Ice on the Bay. I'll let you know how it works.

My science fiction/humor novel Space Operatic will be released sometime this year. Here's a draft blurb. Comments and suggestions welcome. Thank you.

Curse be damned!

Roberto Maccarone has taken his company, Space Operatic, to the the fringes of the solar system in pursuit of artistic acclaim. But in the cold dark of the Oort Territories where the culture scene is lower than that found in most petri dishes, Lady Luck plays hard-to-get. Maccarone's theater blows up, a power-mad businessman tricks him into spying on a gang of malcontent miners, and a horde of ruthless mercenaries descend, guns blazing. Really, now, how hard can it be to stage a performance?

Some say it's the curse that has followed the company ever since that incident on Titan, but Maccarone will never lose faith, especially since he's discovered the most fabulous theater in the solar system just next door, cosmically speaking. If only he could play that theater, Maccarone's success would be assured! But the keys are held in the icy grip of the local Culture Minister, and nothing--not Maccarone, not obscene amounts of money, not even that guy who juggles flaming kabobs while singing an ancient song about how great America was--can pry them from her fingers. Will it be fame for Maccarone and his troupe? Or unemployment in Beelzebub's outhouse?

The one issue I have run into is that my original KDP editions didn't automatically link up with the new Ingram editions. So I had to use the Amazon Author Central help form to ask them to link them up. Once I did that, my reviews appeared on all editions, then I unpublished the KDP editions and all was well.

For new books, of course, that won't be a problem. I'll set them up on Ingram and they'll flow through to Amazon without trouble . . . I hope! But the Author Central people are pretty good at helping out if there is a problem, at least in my limited experience.

D.J. wrote: "Ok question: how does the expanded distribution of POD on KDP work? Do I republish with my own ISBN and tick a box on KDP?

Seriously thinking of just sticking with KDP. I don’t have the time to l..."

You don't need separate ISBNs. I was rather surprised by that, because I had them originally through our own little company. But all you have to do is set up your print book and your epub, and Ingram sends it to Amazon. Amazon converts it to Kindle format and assigns an ASIN. The ISBN ends up being the same for both epub and Kindle editions.

Alex wrote: "The longer term will come, Dale"

By the by, have you ever popped for the "deal of the day" (twice the cost but much bigger reach)? If so, did you notice much difference in the results?

D.J. wrote: "Dale when you did IngramSpark recently, did you put in a table fo contents?"

No, I normally wouldn't do that for a work of fiction. I don't even have tables of contents in the books themselves. I would for a nonfiction work, however.

I don't think it's that bad, but it could use a bit of editing. I've pared it down to this. Bear in mind that I'm making guesses about the content. I may not have captured your story properly:

Rosalee's hood is on a downward spiral. She can deal with the hookers, drug dealers, and gangs. They've learned to leave her alone if they don't want to get smacked down hard. She's a rose with thorns.

But now something very different is afoot. Her young, defenseless neighbors are bought and sold, abused, eaten, even transformed into nightmare creatures, and Rose is their only hope. Caught in a whirlwind of incomprehensible events, suddenly armed with strange powers she doesn't understand, can she save herself much less the victims?

D.J. wrote: "Alex wrote: "Go you, that's a big step in my book, I haven't found the courage to do it."

I'm still worried that I've done something wrong with it all. We'll see. I'm looking at IngramSpark to set..."

Write the full description first, then pare it down for the short version. That's how I approached it.

Alex wrote: "I try not to look at profit/loss on the day, Dale. I keep track of what I spend (I've been a bit slack recently with one thing and another, need to catch up) over the course of each month/year and ..."

Thanks again! You're right about not looking at it on a per-promo basis. It's the longer term that counts. I just don't have a longer term yet. :-P

Alex wrote: "You're probably right, Dale, I've spent over $1k with them in the past 2 years.

Fortunately, I'm running at a modest profit over my costs during that period."

I need to list with them more often, too. I did one for each of my 3 books last year. One of those turned a profit, and the other 2 lost money. Since then I've been focused on other things, but now that I have all 3 books reissued, I should start promoting them again.

FYI, the author acknowledged she'd made an error (I thought it might have been a typo) on the price. Apparently she read the information wrong and thought it was $49 for the print edition plus $49 for the ebook edition (making $98 total). It's $49 for the print edition, but you can also get print plus ebook together for $49. And if you catch one of their coupons, it will be free.

M.J. wrote: "...FINALLY, my 4th book is coming out. April will make one year since I lost my mom, and I'm proud to say this book will be on the shelves before that. I know she'd be proud."

Congratulations!

Alex wrote: "I run an ad with them every month, Dale, a different book each month."

Interesting. I'll bet that's making you one of their better customers and thus the offer.

I think they have a typo. The title setup cost for print + ebook on IngramSpark is $49, not $98. (See https://www.ingramspark.com/features.) But also, Ingram does periodic promotions for free title setup. I've set up my 3 novels for no cost using the NANO promo (which ends at the end of March).

I like the fact that Ingram is more store friendly and offers hardcover book production, if decide to go that way, but it all depends on your situation and your plans.

Alex wrote: "I've just had a wonderful surprise in my emails, free promotion, woohoo."

Great news! How often have you advertised through them?

Erica wrote: "If I lose money 3 years in a row (over a 5 year period), then my author status would change to a hobby instead of a business."

I had always heard that, but I wonder if that only applies to a sole proprietorship? Our LLC has lost money for 9 years running, and we always filed schedule C for it.

To keep the same EIN, I'm going to rename the LLC but keep the management structure (my wife and I co-own it), which I hope lets me report losses as they occur instead of worrying about it.

Sam (Rescue Dog Mom, Writer, Hugger) wrote: "Dale wrote: "Do you have a federal EIN for your business (employer I..."

I actually do have an EIN because I thought it was the only way I'd be allowed to write under a pen name. Thank you."

Great, then you're all set. ;-)

Carole wrote: "We used 99 Designs for my son's books and were thrilled with the covers."

You may not know this, but I went there because you had previously mentioned them. So thank you, belatedly!