Evelyn’s Comments (group member since Apr 12, 2018)

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

Does anyone have any experience of http://www.independentauthornetwork.com/
The web is full of big promises, for money, but the promos seem to be written by the same person. Grateful for any advice on this and/or other promo sites.

L.T. wrote: "Hi All!

This is an awesome idea. We follow many indie authors on Twitter and Instagram. Going through this post and following everyone on Twitter, Instagram and Goodreads.
Thanks so much for this!..."

Followed you on twitter.

Carole wrote: "But who says any slave could be happy? That illustration alone could be a lesson on slavery- What was the price for a slave showing anger or hurt in any society? Slaves were subject to their captor..."

Humanity has a cruel side. The fact is that throughout history ordinary people have shown the loving good side of human nature by finding happiness, even fleetingly, in small things and ways. If people were unable to rise above their condition there could be no humanity and homo sapiens would no longer exist.

It is pointless to judge the past through today's lens. After all future generations may find us as abhorrent as we find some of our ancestors. In my view we need to celebrate the human spirit and although not PC, yes, I can well imagine slaves being happy making a cake for someone who treated them well.

Theodore wrote: "I have to tell you in all candor, though; once I passed 70, I gave up worrying about other people's opinions. (;>)"

Me too.

An ancestor of mine was deported to Australia for poaching pheasant (I still have his recipe for catching them!) He served his time, an equivalent to slavery, learned and then worked hard becoming a successful farmer. He came home years later on a visirt and gave everyone a chicken. Point is that I am proud of a man, who deprived of his freedom made the best of it.

Williams Marks claims that “happy slaves” making a cake for George Washington is hurtful and insulting. Why? That was their situation and terrible as it was they made the best out of it. Rather than insulting their memory she should join me in thanking ancestors who rose above their condition and passed on those positive genes to future generations.

Matt wrote: "So I'm reading this article: http://bit.ly/2tuO5jk about "sensitivity readers" and I'm thinking, Are we going too far here? and isn't this concept in direct conflict with the craft of creatively ex..."

I think we are in danger of people living in a 'now' cocoon refusing to understand that each age, generation and culture has its mores and it's impossible to be creative or educated if one refuses to recognise that. I lived for some years in Nigeria. The main square was called Tinubu named for Madam Tinubu 1810 – 1887 a pre -colonial slave trader. It is a simple historical fact most sub-Saharan west African were slaves owned by other Africans and that the biggest slave dealers (not only of Africans, but Europeans too) were Arabs. Slavery is appalling, but to pretend it was inflicted on innocent Africans by a bunch of white guys prancing around the bush with nets is absurd. This, in my view, nonsense from Williams Marks is dangerous - it seeks to not only re-write history, but to apportion blame and ignore or excuse the actions of others. No one can learn from half-truths and no one can learn anything by pretending that they are not the result of a mix, good and bad, of all the influences that made them and their nation. We don’t need 1984 in 2018.

Anna Faversham wrote: "I didn't realize that there has been a big problem with bookstuffing. I imagined it was the odd few - sigh, I must catch up. Very pleased to hear that removing them will make KU profitable again - ..."

I don't do digital, but think that Amazon's rating list cause the problem. Since physiologists teemed up with accountants the approach to sales has been that consumers are stupid and will follow a herd. That's why if you search for a book you are instantly shown its 'Rating' and alternatives. AS far a Kindle is concerned. It seems that giving away free counts as a sale. Maybe Amazon should also address the issue of the meaning of words. Sale = being paid. Or maybe they are going to change their name to Humpty Dumpty.

M.F. wrote: "At present, I'm only here and on Medium."

Followed on GR. I must get around to looking properly at Medium.

Rosie wrote: "I recently joined this group and just dropped by to say 'Hello!'.

Would love to make new friends, either on Goodreads and/or F/B and Twitter.

https://www.facebook.com/RosieBoyesAu...
https://tw..."

Hi Rosie,

Just followed you on Twitter.

Evelyn

My books are illustrated and I gave up on MS word, A) Because it's difficult to position graphics and B) because MS word has an irritating habit of changing between US and UK English as well as suddenly reformatting everything in sight.

I use Scribus, which is a free open source program that, for any one who remembers it, is better than Page Maker. There is a learning curve, but once mastered you can typeset manuscripts to professional standards including fixing type sizes and spacing that don’t exist in word. You can also make text flow round images.

If you have illustrations please remember that to print colour they must be CMYK in TIF format and a minimum of 300 dpi. B&W also TIF need to be minimum 600 dpi. I know that e-books use 75 RGB jpeg, but that will not print successfully. Scribus has an excellent conversion to PDF and checks the manuscript for typesetting errors before export making sure you have a perfect upload.

Incidentally the benefit of templates is that they give the precise margins, bleeds and page sizes that you can use to set up your ms in Scribus. Plus CS and Ingram have cover templates generated from your description giving spine width etc. Hope this helps.

Petra wrote: "I know nothing about this and need to learn, so thank you for the information. When you sign up for an ISBN do you upload your book to them too? Or just the cover? How long does the process take?"

Hi Petra,

I'm no expert, but http://www.isbn.nielsenbook.co.uk/con... are helpful. The minimum number you buy is ten and there is a one time registration fee. The number identifies you (as a publisher) and the book you have assigned each number to. The number goes on the book. When you use one you tell Nielsen (if you are in the UK) or your issuing agency - e.g Bowker in the US. You load up details of the book - page number, number of illustrations, price, distributors etc. Also a copy of the cover. You don't upload the manuscript. Hope that helps. I think many people just use a "Free" number not realising that the number actually identifies the publisher and you can't use it elsewhere. For example, I use Create Space and Ingram and if I have a big print run I can use a Chinese printer - If I used someone else's ISBN I could not do that.

Most probably know all this, but I hope it might help someone. I prefer my own ISBN numbers as they give me a wider choice of potential markets. What is not clear are the number of places one needs to register numbers and titles.

Based in the UK, I buy from Nielsen. Then one needs a free account with https://www.nielsentitleeditor.com/ to load details and cover image. If you hope to sell to UK libraries you also need to upload to https://www.bdslive.com/page/publishe... (on this page there is a link "Upload Data" - you don’t need an account - just follow the instructions.) I sell in the USA too and have just created a free account with Bowkers where I can register my books with their UK ISBNs. The point of all this is that organisations like Libraries can only source books listed in the databases.

Whether ISBN’s issued by firms like Create Space are registered everywhere I have no idea.

Julie wrote: "New here, looking forward to meeting some fellow indie authors - hopefully learn some wisdom.

I tried my best to follow everyone, for me Twitter is the easiest way to follow me, I am bad at updati..."

Thanks for the follow Julie. Please can you explain about the Twitter lists - sound interesting, but I've never heard of them before. Should we subscribe?

Bill wrote: "D.J. wrote: "I’m sure I’ve heard of it. Haven’t used it."

D.J. wrote: "Anyone heard of https://iAuthor.uk.com? The creator followed me on Medium so I looked at his website. You add your book for f..."

There was a discussion https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

It's a one man start up with no serious reviews (about it) and very low web impact according to monitoring sites. However, everyone needs to start somewhere and this guy 'seems' to be offering a different approach so deserves support.

Many may share my view that many sites are really nothing more than places where you are charged to give away your work so that corporations can make money and appear generous, for example BookBub which boasts of 'Free Books' and chooses the following comment as one promoting its values.
“I would tell anyone to just sign up without reservation. I now have more books than I can read in a lifetime.”

If iAuthor is an alternative to mindless magpieism I think it's worth a try.

D.J. wrote: "At 2.45 pm BST I submitted another request for a proof copy of Missing Remnants. Even if Amazon's four hours to send the email is during US office hours-I should get something before I got to bed t..."

I use both Ingram and Create Space - Amazon. The problem with the Amazon is that they refuse to print proofs in the UK and I once waited over five weeks for one. Ingram do print proofs in the UK, but you can't order until you accept and if there is anything wrong it costs money to revise. Catch 22 anyone?

Del wrote: "Working on my new facebook page and I am looking for followers because I'm lonely. Will follow in return. https://www.facebook.com/Del-Henderso..."

I followed you on Good Reads, but I don't do face book - if you are on twitter I'll follow - I'm @EwOwl

Incidentally I have never felt comfortable with FB. I joined years ago and before I'd started I got an e-mail from them with the addresses and PHOTOS of a bunch of my friends! Yikes - scary - I stopped right there. Keep being told to try again, but I really feel uncomfortable.

Carole wrote: "lol Indie Authors Monthly https://www.indieauthorsmonthly.com/j...

It's a magazine created by RL Jackson, Julie and me ( or is it I?) when we couldn't find afforable advertising for our b..."

Thank you Carole, all clear. I did Google the acronym, but sadly did not get a link to the magazine. I've found that a free press release gets one into Google.

Looks great by the way.

D.J. wrote: "RL Jackson-one of our authors who deals with lots of things including the IAM magazine."

Thank you, however I'm still in the dark. IAM could mean Institute of advanced motorists, Institute of asset management, Institute of Identity and Access Management or IAM French hip hop group. Probably this is a case of WDSSA*, but frustrating never the less.

*We don’t speak the same acronym

Alex wrote: "Hi, everyone.

As many of you know, R.L. is always interested in receiving articles for Indie Authors Monthly, and some of us have submitted articles and seen them published, which is a wonderful ..."

Sorry, but RL Radio Liberty? I don't know the acronym - maybe the whole issue of acronyms or an acronym dictionary would be an idea for article(s)

Alex wrote: "The problem is not the terms that have been reported, at least to me, it's the fact that after initial communication they went silent for over a week and then only re-sent emails and information pr..."

They took a time to get back to me. They explained they'd been swamped with enquiries and were just getting things under control. I can understand and accept that. Personally I think it's an opportunity and I'm happy with it and them. Time will tell, but I remain confident and happy to accept that they are genuine people seeking to help Indie authors.

Alex wrote: "That's disappointing, Ted. These opportunities are few and far between, this bookstore could have put themselves in a good position if they had handled it well. reply | flag *
"

I just received a contract from them. Before retiring I spent many years in International trade and with all respect to everyone I really don't see the problem. The contract is straightforward and asks for five books maximum of each title one chooses to work with. So it's (for me a simple question) Worst case - no one likes my books how much can I afford to lose - I'm not rich, but my net cost for twenty books in return for a new showcase is not a bad investment. I happen to think my books will do well and have to take the view that if I don't believe why should anyone else?

This is a bit like the old advice on gambling, stand in front of a toilet and get out a roll of notes. How many can you afford to flush? That's your gambling stake.

I hope others might re-consider, there are very few opportunities given by bookshops (A small chain I approached in London would not even talk to me) and these guys in LA deserve at least the same chance they offer me. I just signed.