writing – Linda Nelson

Goings On-

No, I did not work on any of my wips this week. I still did do some writing, with my weekly assignment for class. This term is Organizational Behavior and Fundamentals of Taxation. I never knew that doing taxes could be so interesting. I am already compiling a ton of deductions that I may be able to take in the coming year.

Since I was not working on any of my manuscripts, what have I been doing?

InDesign –

I have played around some more with the Adobe software, InDesign. The more I use it and poke around with it, the more I like it. I can see that once I have mastered that program as much as I have mastered Microsoft Office we are going to get along really well.

I am hoping to have my skills up to par by either February or March when I plan to tackle more of my backlist and get them transferred to Ingram Spark. With any luck, maybe I will have a new title to publish by then.

School – Is going well.

I am about to hit another milestone next month. I will be on the last leg of my bachelor degree. October will see me become a senior. Graduation for the Bachelor degree will take place in October 2019, but the official commencement will be May of 2020.

I will then continue to complete a Master’s of Science in Accounting.

Ten years ago, I never thought I would be learning to crunch numbers let alone go back to school. College was nothing more than a long-lost pipe dream that I had given up on, but things changed in 2016 causing me to see that it was possible to go back to school 30 years later.

It has all been hard work, but well worth the effort. I feel so much better about myself. I even have a better understanding of people because of it.

When I first started out with my education, I was pursuing an Integrated Study plan of Business and Social Services with the hopes of becoming an HR Manager someday. But several people pointed out to me that the job market for HR was too competitive, and my education could be a waste of my money. So I decided to change my education track to accounting which will come in handy as a writer. Who knows what might be waiting for me around the corner in the next five years? I certainly never suspected that I would be going to school five years ago.

Keelaa B Publishing

Keelaa B models for the position of company mascot.

I have created my publishing house. I am in the beginning stages and will continue to develop my marketing and business plan. The first step was to secure the company name, which I completed. Next, I will use my publishing house to publish my books, and as I gain more knowledge about using InDesign, I will be able to open my submission door to providing services to others to help them get their titles published with Ingram.

The decision to go ahead with my own publishing company is an inspiring time for me. With only two years left of school, I am looking to get this company up and running by 2021, and I can’t wait!

Publishing World is always changing. Sometimes it is difficult to keep up with all the changes whether it is technical or business wise with publishing houses closing.

woman sitting on gray chair while writing on table — Photo by LinkedIn Sales Navigator on Pexels.com

I’ve been away from writing and publishing for too long. My goal for the rest of the year and the coming year is to reestablish myself as a writer. It is time to say goodbye to writer’s block excuses and begin filling paper after paper with lists of this and that to give me jarring ideas for the stories that I have in progress. I need to clean up my to be finished pile and start publishing new stuff.

Is this a Lack of Commitment?

– Maybe

Truthfully it has been lack of time.

Class work eats up most of my free time leaving me with the need to use whatever little time I have left for some form of entertainment. That entertainment may come in the form of playing Sim City – my way of trying to learn about economics, World of Warcraft – for the adventurer in me, or attempting to create some craft project. Those craft projects never get very far before I give up due to lack of time and forgetting where I left off.

So why the change?

– School is not over yet but

The publishing world is moving on without me, and I don’t want to be left behind or forgotten. Look at the changes going on with Amazon’s KDP and CreateSpace. I have used those sites for years to publish my works, but I don’t want to have to move everything and receive fewer publishing services. I want better distribution for my books.

That is why I am moving my works, slowly, away from KDP and CreateSpace. I needed to find a better distribution program for my books which is why I started removing my Wings from Ashes series from KDP and CreateSpace.

For beginners, I am using Draft to Digital for the eBook distribution. My books will still be on Amazon Kindle, but they will also be on Kobo, Barnes & Noble Nook, iBooks, and several other outlets. The print versions will be moved to Ingram Spark so that bookstores will be more willing to stock my books in their stores. However, because of the cost involved, this move will happen slowly over the coming months.

In the meantime, I will begin plotting and planning as much as time allows. NaNoWriMo is right around the corner, and I want to be able to say done by November 30^th this year.

Whom do you use to publish your books?

Are your books published with Ingram Spark?

Just the print?

Just your eBooks?

Do you publish both formats with Ingram Spark?

Please share your experience with me!