[authorme] PUBLISHING EMERGING WRITERS, AUGUST, 2007
- From: "Bruce Cook, AuthorMe.com" <cookcomm@xxxxxxx>
- To: authorme@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 29 Jul 2007 07:08:46 -0700 (PDT)
You are receiving this periodical because you marked a request on a website in
the www.Author-Me.com group.
If for any reason you'd rather not receive this periodical, simply write an
email to PublishingNewWriters@xxxxxxxxxxxxx and write the words "no more" in
the subject box. Thank you.
============================================================
In this issue...
INTERNET AUTHORS AREN'T LOSERS -
Scantelbury.....................................
YOUR BOOK - IN PREPRINT - Cook
.............................................................
THE INSIGHTS OF AN INSPIRATIONAL WRITER - Levy .................................
============================================================
INTERNET AUTHORS AREN'T LOSERS
By Mike Scantlebury
Ask the majority of so-called 'gurus' to talk about business or
self-improvement, and here's a funny thing. They start talking about sport.
That's odd. Sport isn't the same as life. It's completely different. As Brian
Tracey says, in sport you get three chances to hit the baseball and then you're
out, but in life you can go up to the mound as many times as you've got the
energy and the inclination, try hitting the ball, miss and still keep coming
back for more. Or, to be precise, keep on swinging until you hit the home run.
That's not allowed in the actual sport. They're very strict. Three strikes and
you're out.
Yes, if sport is definite about one thing, it's this. It has rules. It says
that you have to pick up the bat and try to hit the ball. It defines how many
people can play at one time, where they stand and what they have to aim to do.
That's not like life. In life you can choose anything as an aim, you don't have
to aim for 'the goal' that everyone else is looking for. After all, don't
forget, the only reason we have a new game called Rugby in England is that a
young schoolboy picked up the ball in the game of soccer and started running
with it. Wow, he invented a new game. They came up with some rules to allow for
handling, and now England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and France battle
it out every year for a metal cup (plus fame and honour). That's fine, but
guess what would happen if someone decided they didn't like running in the same
direction as their team mates now? No, they wouldn't have invented a new game.
They'd be ruled out and sent to sit on the bench.
Those are the rules.
Having one agreed goal gives the game a major advantage. You can tell who's
doing well and who's doing badly. You can measure success. You can tell who's
won. That's not like life. The glossy magazines are full of stories of rich and
famous people who are having miserable lives, divorces and diets. Have they
'won'? Your neighbourhood is full of people, some of them in big houses and
some in small. Who's winning? The only way you could tell is if you made it
into a game, with the rule that the person in the biggest house is the winner.
Of what? Well, the 'biggest house' game, of course. Okay, that's true. But it
makes no sense. Would that 'league table' tell you if they were happy? Or if
their kids were doing well and going to college? Or if they weren't ill?
In the world of publishing they've invented a game too. The rules are that
authors have to send their manuscripts to posh people in smart offices in the
middle of big cities, and these business people then decide which offerings get
printed and put into bookshops and which don't. Any writer who gets taken on by
a publisher is 'a winner', which means that every author without a publishing
deal must be ? by the rules of the game ? a loser. But what if that writer puts
their book up on the internet and signs up with a print-on-demand publisher?
That's not in the rules! But they've got their book printed, and, if they pay
extra, they can have an ISBN issued, which means it gets listed in catalogues.
As far as readers are concerned, there's no difference. These shoppers go into
a bookshop and ask for a particular author. If that person is an Internet
Author, the bookshop is unlikely to have the book on its shelves, but they can
order it from the publisher, (someone like
Lulu.com). Even stranger, if a reader goes to an on-line bookstore like
Amazon, they can flip through the novels on offer ? and not be able to tell
which ones come from Traditional Publishers and which don't! If they order a
book that's listed, they'll pay for it and have it delivered to their door
whether it's 'won' the race to get to an old-style publisher or whether it
hasn't.
=================
Mike Scantlebury currently lives in Manchester, England, home of football and
Morrisey, the eclectic singer. He is an Internet Author with books, stories and
education material to his credit, including videos. He has 5 novels listed on
Lulu.com but you can find more about him on his download site, try
http://www.mikescantlebury.biz and see what's on offer.
=================
YOUR BOOK - IN PREPRINT
By Bruce L. Cook
Writer - Are you familiar with the preprint process?
We writers are typically aware of two elements in books production. One - we
write the book and revise it, and then submit it for publishing. Two - 100
finished books come back to us, at home, in a box.
We need to be aware of, and respect more, the preprint process which comes
between steps one and two.
For example, in print on demand publishing.
Once you have sent the manuscript away, and it has been accepted (or you
established an account which will permit you to create a book from it), several
steps have to occur. But, during this process, please remember - it is too late
now to begin making revisions to the text. While text revisions before you
submit only take seconds, from a technical point of view, text revisions during
preprint stages are often an insult to book production specialists, for they
take a long time and totally disrupt the process.
In the preprint process, someone, hopefully a person familiar with acceptable
book design, will put your pages in place (a process called pagination). In
traditional print days, this was the fellow with the trays of lead type that
had to be sorted into rows of text, and - believe me - this bloke was not in
favor of last minute revisions to the text! (Neither am I, in 2007.)
At this point, such banalities as page margins, running heads, page numbering,
and the like become very important. And a well-placed header or footer in Word
will not necessarily help the book;s designer.
If you are uploading a file to a self- publishing company, the process is much
the same, but you can lose control of exact page placement - especially if you
prepared your book on 8 x 11 inch pages and expect this to translate directly
into whatever book size you are using. (When you write, think of the writing.
When you publish, let your designer take over.)
Next a cover style is selected and photos and/or text dropped in place, along
with a tricky "spine" label which must not be printed in error outside the
book's spine area. (Or there may be no spine label, as in many cases with new
writers, the manuscript only has about 10,000 words, and the resulting book is
more like a pamphlet.)
Finally the book can be ready and one copy ordered for proofing. (No matter
that urgency usually sets in and multiple orders are made right away, well
before anyone sees errors in design. This is the chance you are taking when you
rush the traditionally slow book production process.)
The book production process is slow, especially when it comes to preprint work,
and this is for a reason. Books are held to the highest standards in the
publishing hierarchy. From lowest standards to highest would be blogs & other
automated postings, Internet publications (like this one), daily newspapers,
magazines, and then books, which are written and produced with great care.
As someone who respects the preprint process, please accept my challenge to
writers. Send complete and final work, stand back, and enjoy the result. When
asked d to make choices, please do. But try not to micromanage the process,
which can become highly technical and time consuming, and well outside your
level of technical competence.
If you can do this, you will have a better experience with your first
publication and then, hopefully, come back and do it even better next time.
=================
Bruce Cook is publisher of the Author-me.com Group
================
THE INSIGHTS OF AN INSPIRATIONAL WRITER
By Michael Levy
Can a writer compose their own inspirational script of life in an intellectual
world that demands perceptions and opinions in the place of truth and wisdom?
Well, let's compare my life now to what my life was like before I became a
writer some nine years ago and see if you can spot the constant synchronicity.
When I first started my own business at the tender age of nineteen and only
sixty dollars, everybody told me it would be impossible for me to succeed. They
said at best I was a foolish joker who left school aged sixteen without a good
education and the deck was stacked against achieving any meaningful success.
For the next twenty-seven years I enjoyed playing the games of business in
textiles, commercial property, stock market and commodity investing/trading.
Never did I get into debt, nor take any unnecessary risks. Throughout this time
many acquaintances called my way of joyful playing at being a businessman
stupid, while at the same time, respecting my honesty and sense of humor ...
The more they said I could not succeed, the more prosperous I became.
Then one day they stopped calling me stupid and wanted to partner with me. That
is when I retired from the business world, aged forty-six. My joy of life has
always been constant, continuing to climb on a higher scale of reality
After a six year break in which I asked myself many profound and searching
questions, authentic answers eventually came into my mind..... I then began to
write inspirational poetry and essays without any effort or difficulty. Since I
rarely wrote any letters and never read any books, this was indeed a major
change of direction.
In 1998 I wrote my first book in only ten days titled - What Is The Point. Sure
enough as soon as it was published clever-minded folks, who lacked inner
wisdom, began to call me stupid. This gave me the endorsement I needed to write
another book.
The next book was titled "Minds of Blue Souls of Gold" Once again I was looked
on as stupid and my philosophy flawed. Wow! I thought, I am a success, for if
these folks with erroneous lifestyles do not like my philosophy, then my
philosophy must be authentic.
And so I went on to write six more books, making eight to date ....
Enjoy Yourself It's Later Than You Think.
Invest With A Genius.
Worry Causes Wrinkles
Ultra Violet Haiku De-Lights
The Joys of Live Alchemy
The latest book is one that I have revised and renewed from public domain about
a little girl named Goody Two Shoes, written by an anonymous author in 1765. It
is now re-titled; The Inspiring Story of Little Goody Two Shoes.
I continue to enjoy the game of being an author, poet and philosopher with the
understanding ... If my philosophy continues to convey unbounded health, ample
wealth and twenty-four hours a day of divine bliss to anyone who lives it, then
why would I listen to the folks who call me stupid ... And then they run to
sophisticated experts asking for help to manage relentless depression, deep
debt and extreme stress.
Gandhi once said; "First they fight you, then they ignore you, then you win." I
feel quite sure the media and academia will continue ignoring me for many years
to come. However, the day they start to agree with me, I will cease to have a
need to write about authentic living and the world will once more become a
secure, wholesome place to live.
So, just maybe, enjoying writing and being oblivious to the opinion of
close-minded people pays big dividends. In essence, every writer who enjoys
writing from the soul cannot fail for they understand a golden rule of
authentic writing ... Enjoy - never - Endure!
================
Michael Levy is the author eight inspirational books. Michael's poetry and
essays now grace many web sites, journals and magazines throughout the world.
Michael's new book "The Inspiring Story of Little Goody Two shoes" will soon be
available at all bookstores.
http://www.pointoflife.com/
============================================================
Please rate this Ezine at the Cumuli Ezine
Finder.http://www.cumuli.com/ezines/ra79672.rate
Note: This issue is sent as plain text. For an html view, go to
http://www.author-me.com/newsletters/current.htm
============================================================
Publishing New Writers, August, 2007 (No. 808)
Publisher: Cook Comm - Bruce L. Cook, P.O. Box 451,
Dundee, IL 60118 USA.
Submissions and comments to cookcomm@xxxxxxxx Links are welcome. To receive
monthly e-mail copies of this periodical, go to:
www.Author-Me.com/member.html
To review our archive of past issues, go to
www.Author-Me.com/newslist.htm.
AuthorMe.com is dedicated to the memory of David C.Cook III
Visit our recent websites...
Innisfree Journal - Greg McBride, Editor - WWW.INNISFREEPOETRY.ORG
Enskyment - Dan Masterson, Editor - WWW.ENSKYMENT.ORG
Reserve Books - WWW.RESERVEBOOKS.COM
Thanks,
Bruce Cook
Other related posts:
- » [authorme] PUBLISHING EMERGING WRITERS, AUGUST, 2007
