Tonight for me is another writing night. I’m hoping to have a workable rough draft of my next project within a month, and I’ll let you know what it is when it’s complete. I do have reviews and other discussions coming in the near future, but for now I’d best be off to bed or I’ll be useless tomorrow.
Category: Update
Goals
I got a lot going on these days, so it’s getting harder to post regularly. But we are still on track with the books. Two more novels are coming out soon, the first being Dead 2 Rites, which will release on the first of September. I also met today’s writing goals for my next project.
I need to update this site’s info about my book projects, but I’ll let you know exactly what I’m up to soon.
Buy ‘Jake and the Dynamo’ Today
The wait is over. Instant gratification can now be yours.
The DRM-free eBook features full-color illustrations. The paperback features new, more readable formatting with illustrations in glorious black and white.
And if you read, remember you can do me a solid by leaving an honest review.
Jake Blatowski can’t wait for high school—basketball, calculus, and a cafeteria that isn’t under investigation by the health department.
But he’ll have to wait: A computer malfunction has assigned him to the fifth grade!
It’s bad enough that he bangs his knees on the desks or that Miss Percy is going over long division . . . again . . . but Jake has to sit next to Dana Volt, a perpetually surly troublemaker determined to make his life a living hell.
Worse yet, Dana secretly belongs to a coalition of girls who protect humanity from the horde of deadly monsters plaguing the city—monsters that have chosen Jake as their next target!
Jake’s no hero; he just wants to make it to varsity tryouts. But now the impulsive and moody Dana is the only one who can save Jake from certain death—and Jake is the only one who can save Dana from herself.
- Kindle eBook: $3.99
- Paperback: $14.91
- Kindle Unlimited: Free with Membership
Last Chance to get ‘Jake and the Dynamo’ for 99 Cents
Tomorrow, , begins the book launch of Jake and the Dynamo, first volume in a new series full of adventure, laughs, and lots and lots of magical girls.
Upon release, the book will be available as a DRM-free eBook with unlimited lending. It will also be available on Kindle Unlimited and as a paperback.
This is the last day of the low, low preorder price of 99 cents.
Read the novel that fans already call “hilarious, insightful, poignant” and “a great story for anyone who likes humor, adventure, and a truly unique setting.”
The eBook will be an Amazon exclusive for three months. I will announce when additional purchase options become available.
‘Dead 2 Rites’ Coming Up for Preorder!
I just submitted Dead 2 Rites for preorder on Amazon. As with the first book, Jake and the Dynamo, this should give me enough time to get th the kinks worked out before the book actually goes up for sale.
As stated before, I’m new to all this. I’m really glad I decided to have a preorder period even though, as a new author, I don’t have any name recognition to build excitement with. Thanks to the preorder period, I’ve been able to adjust keywords and categories to get Jake and the Dynamo situated where it belongs on Amazon’s site: It’s gone through adventure romance and gay romance, and appears to have finally settled in where it belongs with satirical works, harems, and adventure light novels. Next, I’ll email Amazon and ask for a manual adjustment to refine it further.
Then, once it releases, the ad campaign begins.
Even though Dead 2 Rites will not release until September 1, I am beginning the preorder period now so potential readers can see that this series already has two books and that they won’t have to wait long for a sequel. Both novels are only 99 cents on Kindle during the preorder period. They will also be on Kindle Unlimited for at least three months before I push them to other platforms.
Both eBooks are DRM-free with lending enabled because I believe the books you buy should belong to you. Paperback versions will also be available after the release dates.
‘Rags and Muffin’ Is Finished
I know I’ve been radio silent again for a while, but that’s because I was again in one of those stages where I have a project I want to complete but it seems to be taking too long. But, today, I have it done—the final edits and formatting for Rags and Muffin, the novel I am planning to release after Dead 2 Rites, which will release after Jake and the Dynamo.
This took longer than expected for several reasons, both related and unrelated to the project itself. One thing that took a while was inserting all the internal links: This novel has a glossary in the back, mostly because, when I was a kid, I thought novels with glossaries, such as Dune or Watership Down, were extra special. But in the world of eBooks, a functional glossary requires hyperlinks in the text. Vellum, my formatting software, has a limited ability to add internal links (though it has fewer options than I would like), and today, I got the links done.
The cover art for this project hasn’t been made yet. However, I uploaded the PDF of the paperback and mocked up a fake cover on Amazon KDP so I could use the previewer to make sure the internal margins are correct.
The chapter headers and section breaks are from Barbusco comics. At the moment, I only have the one chapter-header image, the gun next to a teacup. I’m thinking about commissioning a few more so there isn’t just one image at the head of every chapter, but if I do that, I can get them in the same dimensions so they won’t affect the page count. The complete PDF of the paperback clocks in at 490 pages, including the front matter.
Real Life
The only remaining delay has to do with real-life stuff: The magical girls and I are buying a house. We had been shopping for a while, but a house that met our wants came available suddenly and unexpectedly. We’re supposed to be moving in at the end of next week if all the paperwork is complete on time, and for that reason, after this post, I’m going to go radio silent again for a bit because I’ll be focused on packing, closing, and moving.
Release Dates
Because we suddenly had to drop money on the house to avoid losing it, there isn’t a lot in the kitty for my publication and advertising costs. After we’ve made the down payment, I’ll be better situated to assess our budget and figure out what I can do, but I think we should have enough for some modest promotion.
For that reason, tentative release dates for the books are:
- Jake and the Dynamo:
- Dead 2 Rites:
-
Rags and Muffin:
I am also (cross fingers) hoping to have the fourth volume of Jake and the Dynamo out by the end of the year.
Those are tenative, and I might tweak them by a day or three as I learn the business and, for example, figure out which days of the week are best for a release. Some unforeseen disaster or delay may also happen, but since two of the books are ready to go except for minor tweaks, I don’t think there should be any serious problem.
This has, of course, taken longer than I originally, optimistically anticipated. I can’t say I’m surprised because I haven’t self-published before; I’m just glad I didn’t have a Kickstarter because delaying release on a pre-funded project is bad form. I may, however, consider Kickstarters in the future when I’ve got the hang of this.
‘Dead 2 Rites’ Is Good to Go
Obviously, I’m still absorbed in my projects over here. I worked with Barbusco Comics and Nodsaibot to fix the issue with the cover of Dead 2 Rites. They were both very accomodating.
As you can see from the post’s eye-catch, I’m looking over the previewer on Amazon’s KDP module to make sure the paperbacks look the way they are supposed to. Once that’s squared away, I can look over the eBooks.
I can see that Vellum, despite its gigantic cost, has saved me any number of headaches. Since this is the first time I’ve done this, I now know I did a few things in the wrong order—for example, I should have already uploaded the manuscript and reviewed it before commissioning the cover art. Fortunately for me, Vellum’s presets are built to accommodate Amazon’s requirements, so, for example, my inside margins aren’t screwed up. If I had to widen those, that would throw off the page count, which would then throw off the cover art again …
Anyway, it appears my first-time, amateurish disasters have been largely averted so far. I learned a few lessons, but they have been mostly pain-free.
Also, Amazon’s software is more user-friendly than I expected, at least when you have all your files pre-built. (I understand that trying to build your paperback from a Word file using Amazon’s software is a major headache.) It automatically checks the margins on everything, and it automatically requires a deeper gutter for Dead 2 Rites than for Jake and the Dynamo because the former is considerably longer.
At least for now, it seems that the greatest difficulty comes from the requirement that the cover—front, spine, and back—need to be a single image, which means the book dimensions have to be set in stone. On the other hand, that makes wraparound covers a possibility, and that’s what we have for these two books.
Volume 1 Is Fine; Volume 2, However …
Looks like the cover for volume 2 has been rejected by KDP because the dimensions are slightly off. Looking back over the files and prep, I’m pretty sure how it happened. I’ll be going back to my artists to get this resolved; I think it’s fixable, but I’ll keep you all posted.
Preparing to Publish
I am currently wrestling with the Amazon’s esoteric system in an effort to get Jake and the Dynamo published in the new edition. I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw the preview and realized that I and the artists had, in fact, got the dimensions correct. There is just the slightest error here, easy to repair—and props to you if you can spot it.
Looking at the interior, it appears also that Vellum, the software I’m using, behaves as advertised: I haven’t been through the whole thing, but so far, it appears that the formatting is correct with now weird artifacts or margins. I believe this new version will be even more attractive and readable than the original paperback publication, which I was already quite pleased with.
Final Cover Art Is In!
I just got the final covers from the logo artist, so Jake and the Dynamo and Dead 2 Rites are almost ready to go out the door. I need to get some last ducks in a row, but it’s now for sure happening.
I’m really excited and also nervous. I’ve never done this before, so in my head, I’m envisioning getting the printed paperback and finding the cover all screwed up because I miscalculated something. I suppose if that does happen, I can probably (?) go back to the artists to fix it. Both were a pleasure to work with.
I’m currently finishing up my final work on Rags and Muffin, so commissioning the art for that is on my radar along with the launch of the two for which the art is complete. Considering my experience, I might go back to exactly the same people for the artwork.
With that in mind, my thanks to Barbusco Comics for the art and Nodsaibot for the logos. Their prices were reasonable, their demeanors upbeat and professional, and their turnaround times good. Barbusco, especially, is crazy fast.