Last week she contacting me saying that she was looking for a second opinion about whether her book was “good enough.” After learning more, we decided a manuscript review would be her best option to start with. For a small investment, a manuscript review can save you thousands of dollars over the long haul. Maybe her cousin is an excellent editor (after all, my cousins could say that about me! haha). Maybe her cousin is an excellent copy editor but not an excellent content editor, but how can this author know without an objective professional opinion?

A manuscript review will give her a report on the overall effectiveness of the book, its organization, marketability, a determination of whether it needs additional editing or proofreading, etc. Sure, if further work needs to be done on the manuscript, it will cost you more money. But if you reached this same conclusion after you printed 1,000 books, that would be a very costly mistake!

If you think your book is “good enough” to publish, but you’re not entirely sure, a manuscript review is one of your best bets to ensure your book has a fighting chance in the competitive world of book sales.

I took a look and my heart sank. The manuscript was 70+ thousand words. The first 5 pages, while it didn’t have many technical mistakes, were written poorly: clichéd writing, stilted dialogue, and poor descriptions. I actually wondered if the author was in high school. Now, don’t get me wrong—I’ve edited lots and lots of books. Some of them needed a great deal of work, some not as much, but, as an editor, I can only work with the writing quality I’m given (unless I want to rewrite the entire thing, which I don’t!). I was struck by how much time the author spent on this manuscript when the end result should probably be rewritten or scrapped altogether.

She should have hired me as a writing coach much earlier in the game. A writing coach can give you immediate feedback, help nip any writing problems in the bud, and help you make your writing time as productive as possible. An editor can fix errors, point out inconsistencies, and smooth out your writing. But if you have any questions about how your manuscript is progressing, whether your writing is good enough, and if you’re achieving your objectives in your manuscript, bring in a writing coach earlier in the process. You’ll save yourself a lot of time, hassle, and potentially money.

This book has some moments when you ask yourself “Really??” and you have to entertain some pretty hardcore suspension of disbelief. The main character, Russell, is a pretty tortured soul in an unhappy relationship, stuck in a job he hates and more than a decade later, illogically blaming himself for his twin sister’s death. The plot has many twists and turns and mysteries. An aging dog Russell parties with, a dysfunctional family led by a quacky, washed up faith healer dad, an alcoholic mother and an untrustworthy older brother. Burned out on religion, Russell runs into some characters and situations that make him question his lack of faith. Despite his shortcomings, Russell is very forgiving, and by the end of the book seems to be a bit surer of himself and what he wants out of life.

A professor once told me that a book needs to have a “satisfying” ending. I’m a bit bothered that not all the loose ends were tied up in this one and that I still had some lingering questions. But it’s not so bad that I regret reading the book either.

I like the author’s writing style, the interesting characters, and the lack of a “holier than thou” tone. It wasn’t perfect, but it kept my attention, I enjoyed it, and I finished it in two days. Definitely worth the read. I gave it a 4 star review on Amazon.

It’s probably easier than you think. And I’ll also give the standard disclaimer that I’m not an attorney, though I do know some good ones if you need a referral!

You need to set up a publishing company. Pick a good name for your company (you need an actual business name, don’t just use your own name, unless you want to name your business “Lauren Hidden Publishing Co.” Do some research to see if there are any other publishing companies with that name. You want to be unique!

Create a logo (or hire someone else to do it) for your company. You’ll put that on your website and on your books.

You need to get any business licenses and insurance. This is a good item to check with your attorney and insurance agents to see what exactly you need.

Get an EIN number (or you could use your SSN as your Tax ID number)

Register to pay state sales taxes

Buy the domain name for your company

Once you have all these beginning steps done, you’ll want to have a website, a shopping cart so people can buy your book directly from your site, and then you need to go through all the process of writing, printing, marketing, and distributing your book. But hopefully this post gave you an overview of the business side of self publishing.

I welcome any input or additional questions!

Most people would define “published” as their book being represented by a major publisher. In this scenario, the publisher often handles editing, layout, cover design, ISBN numbers, getting the book printed, etc. Once printed, the publisher secures distribution so the book can get into the major bookstores. The publisher fronts all the money in the process and the author is paid a royalty on each book sold.

Another method of publishing is “true” self publishing. Where an author creates her own publishing company. The author (now self publisher) fronts all the money for the process of getting the book to readers (often this includes editing and proofreading, layout, cover design, printing, marketing, shipping, etc.). An advantage to this system is that you usually receive more money per book sold since you don’t have to share the profits. You also retain complete creative control over the project. The disadvantages are that you front all the money, and have to deal with all the aspects of publishing yourself so you’ll be processing orders, doing all your own marketing, etc. Both of my books were self-published by my co-authors.

Another option is to do Print on Demand. Infinity Publishing, Author House and Create Space are examples of these companies. You usually pick a package, and you pay a rate for them to do the layout, a simple cover design for your book, get the ISBN numbers and barcode, and the ability for bookstores to order your book through their distributor.

Another (bad) option is so-called vanity publishers, that act like a traditional publisher except you pay them a ton of money upfront for them to take on your book. Run, don’t walk, away from them.

This was a very simplified overview of some of the publishing options. Please add your input if you’d like. And if this post sparks any questions, please ask!

Now, 20+ years later, I spend a lot of time undoing that practice. Not for me; I stopped double spacing between sentences years ago. But for my clients. Anyone who is my age or older must have had the same typing teacher I did!

Now that typewriters are obsolete, and our fonts are porportioned correctly, we no longer need to double space to set off our sentences. In fact, it looks weird if you do it. (see the example on that page). It also creates formatting issues, and wastes precious character limitations on microblogging sites like Twitter.

If you can, break the double spacing habit. If you can’t, go to the “find” feature in Word and hit the spacebar twice. Then “find” and it will find all the instances of double spacing. But don’t do an auto search and replace. Sometimes you need a double space–mostly after colons. In time, you will probably tire of this step and break the habit during the writing process!

Log in to Facebook
Look down the left hand side of your screen and click on ‘ads and pages’
Find the fan page and click on “edit page”
Then, towards the bottom of the page, and about 2/3 over toward the right, you should see “Admins”
Click “add” (to the right of the word “admins” and above your picture)
Start typing in the name of the person you want. Click on the picture, then go down on that screen and click “Add admins”

Voila! You’re done. Not a fan on Facebook yet? Join us here.

But then, well, it did. But that’s okay, I’m still here, business is picking up, and I’ve learned a lot over the past year.

This year I edited a few books, did some writing coaching, continued to do content editing on a variety of pieces for a legal consulting team, did some project management, formatted a book for Kindle and did some social media set-up for some past clients.

This year I also served as the Marketing Director for IVAA, which will end on 3/31/2010. That’s been an interesting experience too as I’ve talked to the media, wrote copy for brochures, and represented the association at several events and conferences. The highlight of that responsibility was traveling to Minneapolis to present at the IAAP conference. What a fun group!

This year I got to travel to (either professionally or personally): Phoenix, Montreal, Niagara Falls, Minneapolis, Hilton Head SC, Savannah GA and Charlotte NC. It’s always fun to see new places!

This year I also took the Social Media Marketing Specialist certification course through VA Classroom. I guess it shouldn’t amaze me that services that never existed a few years ago can now be offered to my clients as I’ve helped them set up Twitter accounts, Facebook fan pages, blogs, and linking everything together! I really enjoy teaching people a new skill or improving on an old one.

Speaking of which, 2010 will include some changes for me as I test out this fondness for teaching on a new group of subjects—and no, I will not be coaching or training VAs! More details to come.

Above all, 2009 has taught me (and I expect I’m not alone here) some good lessons. Plan ahead, be grateful for what you have, never stop learning, and constantly think of new ways to meet your customers’ needs.

Wishing you prosperity, health and happiness in 2010!
Lauren

This book was extremely well-written, and got even more engaging the longer I read it. Ken’s character seems utterly believable–most women I know have run across someone like him. Why did he do what he did? Who knows. But the book is less about the consistent character–Ken–and more about how each of these women entered into a relationship with him, realized it wasn’t as they anticipated, and resigned themself to that life anyway. I found myself wondering what I would have done if I was each Mrs. Kimble.

Highly recommended! One of my favorite novels I’ve read in 2009.