Mar 1 2019

Traditional vs. Self-publishing

Posted on March 1, 2019 by KristaLakes

Traditional publishing: send your manuscript off to a publisher or agent. They decide if they like it. They do all the work. They get a percentage of the profits.

Self-publishing: You do all the work. You make all the profit.

It's a tough decision. Traditional publishers have a lot of skill and knowledge. They have cover artists, editors, proofreaders, marketing teams, and bookstore contacts. They have decades of experience publishing books and marketing them to readers.

If your book gets selected, then it has a good chance of being successful. You don't have to learn how to pick a good cover or run Facebook ads.

You can focus on just writing.

However, you will have to deal with rejection letters when they don't want your book and you will get less money when they do want it.

On the other hand, as a self-publisher you get to pick your cover. You get to hire an editor that you like and not one that someone picks for you. If the books succeeds, it's all because of what you did. And, you'll get all the profits. It's a lot more risk, but a lot more reward.

I love self publishing. From the couple of books I've pitched, it's very possible that I wouldn't be published at all if not for self-publishing. (Here's a link on how to get started!) However, my books sell well enough that this is my full time job.

It's a lot of work. I would love to get a publishing contract (it's actually one of my goals this year) because I want to write more and do the publishing side less. I'll still self-publish because I love the freedom and choices. I love not getting rejection letters, too.

The best of both: pitch your book to a publisher. If they don't want it, self-publish it.

Feb 22 2019

Impostor Syndrome

Posted on February 22, 2019 by KristaLakes

Impostor Syndrome: Feeling like a fraud. That you don't deserve anything you've worked for and that everyone will see you for what you are.

I feel like this all the time.

I didn't go to school for writing. (I wanted to be a doctor.) I don't have a fancy publisher that picked me (and even if I did, I would worry that it was a mistake.) I know that a lot of luck went into my success as an author.

How do you deal with this feeling?

Acknowledge it and put it into perspective. I feel like an impostor because I don't have fancy credentials. But, that doesn't mean that I'm not good at things. A person doesn't need fancy credentials to be successful.
Reframe how you talk to yourself. The only difference between someone who experiences impostor syndrome and someone who does not is how they respond to what's happening to them. You are as good as you tell yourself you are.
Talk to friends and coworkers. Odds are, they feel the same. It helps to know you aren't alone in this feeling. Plus, they will tell you the truth of if you are an impostor or not.

This is something that a lot of people struggle with. I see other authors doing better or posting on social media about their latest release and I feel like I'm not doing enough. Like I'm not earning my position as an author.

Even writing this blog, I question my own credentials. I've been writing and publishing romance novels for seven years. I've made enough money doing it to support my family, yet somehow, I feel like I'm just getting by on luck.

It doesn't help when I have a book that fails. If anything, that just solidifies how much I don't know what I'm doing. That I got here purely on luck.

Logically, I know that isn't true. When I talk to other authors and we share knowledge, I know that isn't true. I know a lot about what I'm doing. That doesn't mean that I don't have a ton to learn, but I'm not a newbie either.

Impostor syndrome is hard. It never goes away. It's always whispering in the corners of the room, hinting that there is a fraud.

The only way to get through it is to keep going. Keep learning. Keep trying. Keep talking.

Feb 15 2019

How to Self-Publish a Book

Posted on February 15, 2019 by KristaLakes

Welcome to the amazing world of self publishing!

These are the basic steps for self-publishing a book. It's an overview, not a guide. Entire books are written about this subject, so this is very bare bones but should give you a good place to start and give you a basic idea of what to expect.

CREATING

1. Write stuff. (You've done this part! Good job) Now figure out what genre you fit in (contemporary romance, urban fantasy, paranormal, ect). Look at Amazon and figure out similar works. Look at their covers, blurbs, excerpts, and categorization. You will want to mimic successful books.

A note for e-readers: anything more than about 3-4 sentences looks like a giant wall of text on small screens. Thus, try and make lots of small paragraphs to make it easier to read.
Do not use tabs to indent a paragraph. As your book will be read on a multitude of electronic devices, the tab is too much for most of them. Instead, in your word doc go to tools>paragraph>first line and set it to 0.3

2. Get a cover. A good cover is critical. People won't click on your book to even read the description if the cover doesn't catch your eye. This needs to be professional looking or no one will pick up your book. I don't recommend making your own unless you have a lot of practice making book covers. However, if you can't afford a premium cover there are plenty of premade covers available for reasonable prices.
(www.goonwrite.com andSteveRicherBooks.com/covers/ are great options)

3. Write your blurb. To write a good blurb, it should sound like a movie announcer is reading it. Keep it short and sweet. This is harder than it sounds, so keep in mind that this is what is supposed to entice a reader to click buy. Read the best seller blurbs in your genre to get good examples of the tone and wording your readers are looking for.

PUBLISHING

The big player is Amazon, especially with their Kindle Unlimited (KU) program. (Read about choosing between KU and being wide!)

*If you want to make going wide easy, you can distribute through draft2digital.com (D2D) or https://publishdrive.com. You upload your stuff and they will format it and send it out to Amazon, B&N, Kobo, and Apple. They just take a portion of your sales as payment for the service./

Decide on a price. On Amazon, you will get 70% royalty if you price $2.99-9.99. If you price under/above that, you only qualify for 35%. Some countries are only 35% royalty rates, but they aren't the big ones.
Format your book. There are services (like D2D) that will do this for free or you can pay someone to make it super fancy.
Follow the directions on the screen and publish! It will take a few hours for it to go live, but you will get an email when it does.
Be sure to use your keywords! This is how people will find you!
KDP Select/KU: This is an OPTIONAL program for KDP authors, where you can choose to make your book exclusive to Amazon for a 90-day period.
Please note that returns are common on Amazon. Their return process is crazy simple so a lot of people use Amazon as their own personal free library. If it feels like you are getting a lot though, check your formatting to make sure they are actually just being cheap and that there isn't something actually wrong.
Rank: the more you sell the lower your rank. It is based on how all books in the store are selling compared to your book. The lower the number, the better you are selling.
Physical copies: Kindle Publishing and IngramSpark are venues to use Print-on-Demand publishing. You will need to format and make a print cover for your book.

PAYMENT

Retailers pay out 60 days after the end of the month, so you won't see any money for the first two months.
Please note, you will need to pay taxes on this income at the end of the year. Taxes are not withheld like at a normal job.
Don't get discouraged if you don't sell very much. It is a tough market to get into (especially with the first book). Get on some blogs, goodreads, send out to reviewers, tweet, facebook and promote.

My first book barely made back my costs (cover, physical copies, and some small promotional stuff). I took it as a learning experience and wrote something a little more mainstream (a billionaire novel).
Sometimes stuff just doesn't sell and then other times it will take off. The best advice is just to write more. If something doesn't sell, leave it. You can either spend your time trying to fix it (which might work) or you can write something new (which probably will work, and if nothing else brings in more readers).

Good Luck!

Feb 1 2019

Heroes

Posted on February 1, 2019 by KristaLakes

I need a hero!

Since the reader will see themselves as the heroine, you have to make the hero someone the reader wants to be with.

The Physical

The hero should always be inwardly attractive. It helps if he's outwardly attractive too, but it's possible to have a scarred, deformed hero that we still love. (Jane Eyre for example, or even the Beast in Beauty and the Beast.) He doesn't have to be handsome on the outside, but he does have to have a heart of gold.

Most women still say the tall, dark, and handsome look is preferred. Taller tends to be more attractive.

Hair, skin color, race, eye color, and builds can vary. They need to take care of themselves, though. They don't have to be Mr. Universe, but they shouldn't be Homer Simpson either.

There is definitely a wish fulfillment aspect here. We want to be with the hot guy. We want to have the prince. So give your reader that if you can.

The Emotional

Your hero must be intelligent. Since this is a book, we only get a description of the physical but we get a play by play of what he says. He needs to have a brain or your reader will lose interest. If he's just a pretty face, why would our heroine (us) want to be with him? We'll be bored since we don't actually get to see those rippling muscles.

Intelligence, humor, and kindness will win the hearts of your readers.

The hero can be dark and brooding. He can be locked away inside himself with his emotions, or a bad boy with a dangerous past. He can be an assassin, a gangster, a soldier, a doctor, or a gigolo.

But he must be intelligent and have a good heart. Why would we fall in love with him if he didn't?

Dec 21 2018

Heroines

Posted on December 21, 2018 by KristaLakes

Not the drug, but the person.

The heroine should be someone you would like to be or someone they could be best friends with. Since they are one of the two main characters in a romance story, they should be someone that the reader will enjoy. The reader will be spending at least two hours with this person, so they should like them.

(There are of course exceptions to this rule. There are always exceptions.)

We want to live another life. That's why we read fiction. It gives us a chance to fall in love with different people and live lives that we could never have. I will never be a 16^th century courtesan, but I can read it and give my brain the sensation that I am. I'd love to fall in love with a handsome billionaire, but my husband would miss me.

That's why I read instead. I get all the thrill, but none of the work.

As such, make your heroine someone that your reader will want to be. Make them funny or sweet. Make their life more exciting. They can have danger and drama without the risks. They should never be boring or rude. We have to like them, even if we don't agree with their decisions.

You can have a strong heroine. She can be brass. She can be ditzy or even a little self-centered, but we have to like her. We need to see something redeemable inside of her. Romance readers want the happily ever after (that's why we read romance and not other genres) so she needs to be capable of not only having that good ending, but deserving it.

Your heroine may not be everyone's cup of tea, but she should always be kind. She needs to be someone you want to spend the next week with (as a writer and a reader.) I'm a shy introvert, so I don't always see myself as the bold, uber-friendly heroines. However, I would LOVE to be their friend. I can get behind a heroine that could be my best friend.

Your heroine can make mistakes. She should make mistakes. If Elizabeth Bennet wasn't prejudiced, we wouldn't have a story. But, the important part is that even though Elizabeth has all the wrong ideas about Darcy, we still like her. We understand why she's sure that Darcy is a prideful snot, and we can see a bit of ourselves behaving that way too.

Keep this in mind while writing your character. The heroine is your reader. No one wants to think of themselves as rude or unkind. We all want to be Cinderella with animals that come rescue us because we are so damn awesome. She shouldn't be perfect, but she should be someone we want to be. Someone we would want to be friends with.

The main point here is that the heroine should be likable. We should want her to succeed. We need to feel that she deserves this chance at happiness.

As you write your heroine, make sure that she's always someone you'd want to have around. Even when she's sad and mopey because she's lost the love or her life, we should want to bring her ice cream. We can want to smack her upside the head, but we should want to do it because we love her and want what's best for her.

Not because she's annoying the crap out of us.

Your heroine should be someone you want to be or someone you want as your best friend.

Dec 14 2018

Creating Characters

Posted on December 14, 2018 by KristaLakes

Characters are what make the story. You have to have good characters or the story won't matter. We need to care about these people and what happens to them. I would bet your favorite movie has interesting characters that grow and change through the story.

Boring people don't sell books. We all know too many boring people in real life. We want a chance to escape into a more interesting world for a while. That's why billionaires, princes, aliens, shifters, pirates, historical, and motorcycle clubs are all popular genres. We want something new and original in our lives.

The best part is that you don't have to come up with a brand new character all on your own. You already have hundreds of them in your head.

Think of your favorite movie. I'm guessing you have a favorite character. They probably have something interesting about them. They probably have someone that they interact with that is interesting too. There is a relationship that makes it fun to watch. The way they react to problems speaks to you.

You can have a Mary Sue (someone with no real characteristics) as a main character, but only for self insertion. Think of Twilight- most people don't really love Bella, but we can easily insert ourselves into her head. She's a blank character. If we were reading this from someone other than Bella or Edward's point of view, we wouldn't see why Edward is so enamored with this very normal/boring girl. She could use a little more humor. Or a hobby. Or something that makes her stand out more than just she smells really delicious. We can't love her based on looks/scent/can't read her thoughts alone. We need to like HER. Not her attributes.

Being pretty isn't enough. Being handsome isn't enough. We need some flaws. We need something that we can connect with.

Let's create a character for a book. Let's call him Joe.

Joe is prince charming. He's handsome. He's rich. He's in the perfect age range.

Do we actually like Joe? Would you talk to him at a party? Would you set him up on a blind date with your sister? What kind of date would they go on?

We need more. He can be handsome. He can be smart, but we need to show that intelligence, not just say it. Instead of “Joe was smart” we need to say “Joe sped through his advanced physics homework. He didn't even need a calculator.” We should also clarify if he's book smart or street smart.

Then we need a flaw. It doesn't have to be something terrible, but something that trips them up. For Aladdin, he is a street rat with too much confidence. For Thor, he's not all that bright sometimes. Loki is self-centered and a trickster. Edward Cullen likes blood. Mr. Darcy has way too much pride.

These flaws make the story much easier. Why can't Mr. Darcy find love? He's got too much pride.

It makes the character relate-able. If the character is too perfect, we can't put ourselves in their shoes. We don't care about them. The Stepford Wives are only interesting as plot devices, not as characters.

Your hero and your heroine both need a flaw. If their flaws clash, even better. Your hero has too much pride? Your heroine having some prejudice against prideful people is great. We have drama.

In creating characters, use what you know. Is there a friend that you adore? Can't stand? Why do you feel that way? Take them and make them a character.

Same with TV shows. Do you LOVE Dr. McSteamy? Why? What makes him real to you? He's kind of an ass, but there's something charming about him. Use that.

There are so many amazing characters out there. Use literature (Pride and Predjudice), TV (Grey's Anatomy), Movies (Disney Princesses) and make them your own. Make Disney's Mulan meet Mr. Darcy, but they're on an alien spaceship. Maybe Arya Stark should have a meeting with Marvel's Loki, but they're both high powered business lawyers.

Imagine the possibilities!