Self-Publishing Resources

On Saturday, I gave a talk on self-publishing at my local Romance Writers of America meeting. Our local chapter is the Heart of Carolina Romance Writers, and I have been a member of the group since 2007. If you are a writer in the Raleigh/Durham area, I highly recommend joining or at least coming for a visit. I had such a great time talking about my experiences so far as an Indie author.

For the talk, I decided to put together a series of handouts and walk-throughs people could refer to if they were interested in learning more about self-publishing. Since I took the time to create those resources for the RWA group, I figured I might as well put them up on my website for everyone to use.

If you are interested in learning more about self-publishing or you have been considering publishing a book of your own, please feel free to check out some of the free resources I put up on my website. You can find them here. So far, there are step-by-step walk-throughs about how to publish your novel on Amazon and Barnes & Noble. Also, there's a list of the different pages you need in the front and back of your eBook, answers to frequently asked questions, and an explanation of everything you need to have prepared before you're ready to publish. In the future, I hope to add more resources, such as info on how to create a book cover, and a cheat sheet for how to format your novel according to the Smashwords style guide.

I certainly don't know everything, but I've been working hard to learn as much about self-publishing as I can so far. I am hoping my small success so far can help others to create their own career as an Indie author. Check out the resources there if you're interested and continue to check back for more pages soon.

20 Minutes At A Time

I've been sitting at my local Panera most of the day writing. I wanted to take a little break from SHADOW DEMONS for a few, so I'm hiding out on my blog.

When I first started writing full time (about three years ago), I had a really hard time motivating myself to work all day. I never realized how hard time management could be. I always thought that people who worked for themselves were just so lucky and they had it so easy. God, was I wrong! Working for yourself and setting your own hours is HARD. It definitely has its rewards, but in order to make it work, you have to truly learn some self-discipline.

I am not the most disciplined girl in the world. My bathroom is always messy. My computer desk is crazy unorganized. Hell, even the desktop on my computer is cluttered. I like to stay up late and sleep in. I spend hours a week gaming. And I love to shop. Before I found my motivation, I used to waste most of my days. I could hardly get 500 words a day written, and most of the time I just threw out whatever I was writing.

Fast forward three years and I'm writing 2,000 words a day on average. I've written and published three full books since September, and I'm already halfway through Book 4. So how did I do it?

In 20 minute spurts. I started with a little kitchen timer and now have started using my cell phone timer. I set it for 20-30 minutes depending on how I'm feeling, and just go go go. When my 20 minutes is up, I take a break. I pamper myself and do something fun. I watch an episode of something fun like Arrested Development (I heart Netflix) while I do my nails. Then, I set my timer again and get back to work. Somehow, I manage to fit in 2,000 words, two long walks a day, meals, chatting time with my husband and friends, and I still have time for social networking, blogging and yes, gaming.

Instead of sitting down to write this very daunting daily word count, I break it into small, manageable chunks. It makes the day seem do-able. I just write out my to-do list in the mornings (okay, some days it's 11:00 when I crawl out of bed, but for now, we'll just call that "morning"), then go about completing the list 20 minutes at a time. I'm not perfect by any means. My desk is still a mess and I probably have dirty dishes waiting for me at home, but I'm writing and besides spending time with husband, that's the most important part of my day.

And now my 20 minutes is up, so I'm going to wrap up this blog post and get back to SHADOW DEMONS.