In March 2011, I finally decided to self publish (some) of my future novels. Eager and laughably ignorant, I journeyed through the great internet to research and snoop around for information to aid me down this rather daunting road. These are the resources I came up with, my gems. Links with an asterisk (*) are the ones I highly recommend.
If there are any broken links, please comment or email me at elisamwriter (at) gmail (dot) com, and I’ll fix or remove them.
If you have any suggestions, anyone or anything you feel is a great and valuable resource to add to the lists, comment or email me the link and I’ll consider putting them up.
Ebook
Ebook Conversion Services Directory: Literally a list of the businesses that provide ebook conversions. Great for shopping around and comparing prices.
*Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing: Again, a great author resource. This is where you go to upload your ebook onto Amazon’s Kindle store. There, an individual author can get the full royalties that come with selling an ebook (30-70%). Need help formatting an ebook? See the conversion directory above.
*Barnes and Noble’s PubIt!: Like Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP), PubIt! allows an author to upload their ebooks and get a nice chunk of the royalties (40-60%). The ideal option would be to upload your ebook onto all three sites, Amazon, BN, and Smashwords (though Smashwords is the least useful). Many do that.
*Smashwords: distributes ebooks for authors and small presses and publishers. Your royalties will be anywhere from 60-85%, according to their FAQ. This link directs to their About page.
Here’s some tips I wrote on self-publishing ebooks after Dominant Race, my first novella, debuted July 2012.
Blog
*Dean Wesley Smith’s blog: One of the most valuable places for a self-published writer. Read every post he has on publishing and then read it again. He’s incredibly helpful and has loads of experience. Also, read his wife’s blog, which is…
*Kristine Kathryn Rusch’s the Business Rusch: While her blog has other areas in it, this one is the most helpful for self-published writers and writers in general. She has a long career in the publishing industry and knows her business. Please, please, please read the entire Business Rusch series. Even if you don’t agree with her opinion, she still provides a lot of great information that every writer should have in order to make smart decisions.
JA Konrath’s A Newbie’s Guide to Publishing: Probably the best place to get solid, factual numbers about the sales of one JA Konrath. Who is he? Honestly, he’s a horror-thriller writer who went indie (I wouldn’t say he’s 100% self-published anymore since he’s signed on with Amazon’s imprint). He has guest posts from indie writers, most of whom are successfully making money, some of whom aren’t.
Joanna Penn’s The Creative Penn: Her website started me down this rabbit hole of self publishing almost a year ago (as of Feb. 2012). She’s got a lot of great information about, marketing, how to make a great novel, formatting tips. The works.
Jane Friedman’s Twitter page: Not quite a blog, but the links she provides are awesome, and most are to blog posts, so that’s how this technically counts. She does have a blog. She used to work for Writer’s Digest and has many useful tools for any and every writer.
Jody Hedlund’s blog: for writers section: A traditionally published author, she’s extremely polite and helpful. Her posts are great for learning about marketing and the traditional side of things. She doesn’t discriminate and gives simple bullet-point tips on how to establish (or, sometimes more importantly, what to avoid doing to) your author platform.
Kristen Lamb’s blog: Kristen’s blog is (mostly) about marketing and how to avoid certain social media pitfalls. Her expertise is in sales and promotion, but she also has good posts about editing.
Nathan Bransford’s blog: This blog has given me a lot to chew on in terms of traditional and self publishing pros and cons. He knows a lot about the traditional sphere because he used to be a literary agent. A lot of his posts are witty, humorous, and completely revealing about the mechanics of the publishing industry.
