Celebrating Independent Authors
DW Davis is the readers’ choice in this week’s Indies Unlimited Flash Fiction Challenge.
The winning entry is rewarded with a special feature here today and a place in our collection of winners which will be published as an e-book at year end.
Without further ado, here’s the winning entry:
Shattered Reality
by Brenda Perlin
Genre of this Book: Contemporary Fiction
Word count: 52,000
When Brooklyn meets Bo, their lives are instantly turned upside down.
Brooklyn and Bo, each unhappily married to someone else, have to decide whether to stay with their spouses or give up everything for each other. Find out what Brooklyn’s husband and Bo’s soon-to-be ex-wife do to break them up.
Shattered Reality is the first book in a three part series that follows the main character, Brooklyn throughout her childhood, adult life and then what seems like an “endless” journey towards redemption.
This book is available from Amazon. Continue reading “Book Brief: Shattered Reality”
Last week, we focused on identifying and avoiding scams. That’s really just the beginning point. Outright scams are a little easier to avoid than many of the other pitfalls awaiting indies. While most of these other considerations are not necessarily categorized as predation, they can be calamities nonetheless.
As you probably know, there is a lot more involved with being an indie author than just writing your book. Those other necessary steps, including editing, formatting, cover design, and marketing may fall well outside your wheelhouse. There are plenty of people selling those services, but you have to be careful. You do not always get what you pay for.
DO NOT BUY ANY OF THESE SERVICES FROM A PUBLISHER. Legitimate publishers do not charge authors for editing, formatting, cover design, and marketing. Continue reading “Indie Pitfalls”
My understanding is that when an author publishes a book on Amazon that there is a box, pre-checked for your convenience, to elect putting DRM or Digital Rights Management on your book. I’ve also heard that once you say yes, you’re stuck with your choice. I’m going to argue that the best choice is to unclick that box. But first, the case for sticking with the default.
Copying an MP3, ebook, or other digit content is normally a trivial exercise. You do it every time you send your latest opus to an editor as an email attachment, copy your final manuscript to an external hard drive for backup, or drag a copy of your work-in-progress to a jump drive so you can polish it a bit at work. (We’ll pretend that last part is just while you’re on break or lunch.) In essence, DRM is a scheme that is supposed to prevent someone from copying digital content or that prevents it from being used on a device other than those authorized. For example, if someone purchased your book and gave a copy to a friend, DRM should in theory prevent the friend from being able to read the book on their Kindle.
When presented with the choice of DRM most uninitiated authors are going to go with the default (that must be the best choice, right?) or investigate to see what DRM is, and end up at the same place. Why would you want to make it easy for people to pirate copies of your book? Think of all the money you’ll miss out on from any lost sales. It seems like a logical choice. It probably isn’t. Continue reading “Just Click No for DRM”