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Why Independant Publishing?

Authors work hard, with little acknowledgement, begging publishers to pluck them from the mob and tell them their work is valuable. So it is understandable that recent stories of ebook millionaires and how Barry Eisler, an established author, turned down half a million dollars to self-publish is a beacon of hope. We could be in control? And be paid for what we love?

Those eBook and Kindle stories, such as Amanda Hocking (who now has a 4-book deal), are accompanied by a lot of disagreement and, to be blunt, arguing. Traditional publishers feel threatened. I’d still love to use them, but I also am incredibly pleased that authors have more options.

But hearing about the option to epublish didn’t make me truly understand it. How does the market work, and if I choose to put my book up will it be difficult to format? To price? To understand it better, did a dry run with a previously aired short story to which I still own the rights. Reselling a short story doesn’t bring much money from a magazine, so I’m not taking a huge risk. Before publishing, remember to ask yourself what your goals are. Self-publishing may bring in money if you are willing to promote it, but it can make selling to a publisher more difficult.

Publishing on the Kindle

Now, if you haven’t tried this, publishing to the Kindle is far easier than you may think. Assuming that you have a cover and a polished text it takes only the amount of time needed to create an account, write up a blurb, and upload your cover and word document. Simple, but you do have to wait up to 24 hours for the book to appear online. It’s so easy, there’s a five minute youtube video you can follow along while you submit.

Publishing on Smashwords

Submitting to Smashwords took much more preparation and time. I followed the instructions in a very long guide to format my document according to their specifications. My story was simple text with very little formatting. I cannot imagine the headache of books with elaborate tables or special fonts. I’m especially glad I tried this with a short story and not my novel. After a few struggles, I loaded my story and it entered a queue to be re-formatted by their automated system that took several hours. Still, Smashwords will make the story available on many markets (e.g., .pdf, Mobi, ePub) so I consider them well worth the time. See it here.

Pricing my Ebook Short Story

For me, the hard part was pricing. Should I offer Undergrowth, my science-fiction/horror short story, for $0.99 or something higher? I chose the lower option, even though it makes only 35% royalties, since this was my first work and relatively short. Even so, I had self-doubt and second thoughts. Had I been pricing my novel, I know my qualms would have been much worse. Debates rage in online forums and over twitter about pricing. Are authors devaluing their work? Will a lower price get more downloads and therefore a higher income, or at the very least drive enough sales to move you up in the ranking? But aren’t royalty percentages lower at low prices? In other words, the same questions that have driven markets since time immemorial.

Putting a single short story on Kindle for $0.99 isn’t going to have much of an impact on my income, but if it goes well I’ll use stories I already have for an anthology. And hopefully that will build my fan base, leading readers to the next important purchase, my upcoming novel. I’m working on it now, and I value it highly.

I hope others will also.

Subscribe to H.E. Roulo’s blog for more articles.

Listen
or download Episode 42 

INTERVIEWS

Heather Macauley Noëll

Heather Macauley Noëll is an Inspirational Speaker and Published Author with endorsements from Deepak Chopra, M.D. and other best-selling authors. Along with hosting her own live, radio talk show in Hawaii called Mind-Body-Spirit, Heather is also a professional singer, actress and narrator. She currently lives in Sedona, Arizona.
Ebook Version: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/29932
Web site: http://aspaceoflove.com/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/aspaceoflove
Twitter: http://twitter.com/aspaceoflove

Gillian Andrews

Gillian lives in Mallorca, Spain and has written other books, including one published by standard methods. This one, Valhai, is self-published through Lightning Source.
This is her first science fiction novel, which will be part of The Ammonite Galaxy series.
She is currently studying for a masters in Astronomy and Astrophysics online. She is a great fan of Star Trek, Dr. Who, and Janet Evanovich.
Web sites: www.valhai.com, and www.gillianandrews.com
Valhai
for the paperback version and Valhai (The Ammonite Galaxy)
for the kindle.

NEWS

Podiobooks.com Costs Increase

You may have noticed an outage that lasted several days. This was the result of Podiobooks.com maxing out and needing to replace hardware. Already on the cusp, Nathan Lowell’s newest book tipped Podiobooks.com over the edge. But the new upgrades carry a cost. If you enjoy the site, help offset the cost directly by donating at Podiobooks.com or donate to an author and Podiobooks.com gets 25%.

Rob Kaay’s Newest News

Rob Kaay spent ten years in various bands and ended up being signed to one of the biggest major record labels in America. In 2008 he released his first book about his experience in the music industry called, Robkaay Journals; (Vol I) My Glorious Nightmare.

In 2009 he released an urban fantasy novel called, Silverbirch; A Tear in the Fabric of the Night Sky, which cracked the Amazon Top 1000 (out of 7.5 million!) during its first week of release. The podcast version of the book saw him added as a guest speaker at Supanova – Australia’s pop-culture expo, where he was invited to sign copies of Silverbirch at the Borders Books stand.

Rob’s third book is entitled, Robkaay Journals; (Vol II) This is what it’s really like being in a band, and will be released on February 17.  It is available to pre-order right now from his website, www.robkaay.com.

Vote for Out of the Coffin

Nominated are out for the Out of the Coffin Dr. John William Polidori Awards for Excellence in Vampire Entertainment! Some familiar Podiobooks.com authors are in the running, including horroraddicts.net for Best Vampire Podcast of 2010 and Emerian Rich, P.G. Holyfield, and Philippa Ballantine for Best Author Interview on the Out of the Coffin podcast 2010. Please vote for your favorites!

Jake Bible Amazon Rush on March 1

Jake Bible, author of DEAD MECH, is releasing the ebook for the Kindle and is asking for your help to rush Amazon on March 1. It’s just $3.99 for a copy. Listen to the promo on our show and check out his website at jakebible.com. And here’s a link to a contest he’s running called Contest of a Lifetime!

Podioracket Presents-Glimpses is Open for Submissions

Glimpses (Volume Two of Podioracket Presents) is OPEN for submissions. We are accepting submissions from Podiobooks.com authors who wish to have a short story that takes place in (one of) their book’s world included in the Podioracket Presents-Glimpses anthology. Submit text to prp@podioracket.com. See our PRP Submission Guide for information on what to submit. Submission period ends Monday April 4, 2011.

NEW AND COMPLETED RELEASES

New Releases

Harmonics: Rise of The Magician by Collin Earl and Chris Snelgrove Science Fiction
Heritage and Empire by Tom R Baynham Fantasy
The Gnome and Mrs. Meyers by Susan Klein Magical Realism
Bone Machines by John Dodds Mystery

Released Complete

The Arwen Season 5: Dyson Sphere by Timothy P. Callahan Science Fiction

Now Complete

Parallel Worlds: Nothing is as it seems… by Heather Macauley Noell Inspirational Fiction
Surviving The Theseus by Randy Noble Science Fiction
Impariamo l’italiano a Tropea by Antonio Libertino, Giuseppe Meligrana Non-Fiction

Listen

or download Episode 27

Interviews

Craig Robertson

Website: http://www.myfavoriteauthor.net/

Twitter: www.twitter.com/craigrobertson


 

Peter Chowney

Website:  www.paraffinwinter.org.uk

Email:  paraffin.winter@btinternet.com

Paul Elard Cooley

Website: www.shadowpublications.com

Twitter: @paul_e_cooley

Facebook: His Facebook Page

News

Smashwords

Smashwords.com makes grand progress in distribution and services to its writers. If you are not a Smashwords author yet, now is a great time to get on board.

1.  Smashwords signs distribution deal with Apple for the iPad iBookstore launching April 3rd.

2.  Smashwords adds ISBN support; offers low-cost and free ISBNs

3.  Preparing large shipment to Sony Ebook Store

Fried Green Zombies a Breakthrough Novel?

Fried Green Zombies makes the quarter finals in the Amazon.com hosted the “Breakthrough Novel Awards.”
The novel started out competing with 5000 other entrants, which was narrowed down to 1000, and then again
for the Quarterfinals was narrowed down to 250. Support Podiobooks.com author John Allen by taking a
few minutes and head over to Amazon.com, and reviewing it.

Website:  http://www.friedgreenzombies.com/

 Blog Talk Radio and Edge Publishing

BTR-PR April 8th presents Edge Publishing LIVE. Set your reminder now.
Meet some of their authors and find out what they are looking for in
their big selling authors.

New Releases

Famous Potatoes by Joe Cottonwood Literature
Dead Hunt by Kenn Crawford Horror/Dark Fantasy
Dead Mech by Jake Bible     Science Fiction

Completed

Heretics by G.K. Chesterton Essays

We wanted to speak for all the authors out there and say ‘thank you’ for all the donations and notes of encouragement. More than simply money, the donations are an affirmation for authors that despite offering their product for free, people appreciate their work enough to value it and their efforts. It encourages authors to continue to work and validates the time spent writing, recording, editing, and uploading. For most of us, the amount is modest but meaningful.

Podiobooks.com collects the donations and provides 75% of the contributed amount to the authors. I do not know how much they make, but I imagine it isn’t enough. I know that Podioracket doesn’t make enough to cover even our hosting costs. Or Rhonda’s phone bill for international BTR shows!

We’re coming up on the final show of our season, but we’re working behind the scenes to package some great guest interviews, blog posts, and will have be asking you to complete a survey to make sure the show is meeting your needs. If anything, the next 6 weeks will be busier than ever for our listeners!

SEASON FINALE for BTR-PR!

Blog Talk Radio simply isn’t the same without Rhonda and there will be no substitute during the haitus. Catch the final interview of the season as she interviews Mark Coker, from Smashwords! Bring your questions and find out how Podiobooks.com authors are being incorporated into the Smashwords site. The LIVE interview is Thursday, November 12 at 6pm Pacific Time. Set a Reminder.

Operation EBook Drop is a program run by author Ed Patterson to connect  Indie authors with troops. Authors who have signed up will provide free ebooks to the deployed men and women in the Armed Forces for use on their reading devices. There are 70 participating authors so far.

Smashwords recently had an article on Operation Ebook Drop.

EBook Drop authors, sound off on the Amazon Kindle Thread. Tell everyone about yourself and your books.

If you are interested in becoming a participating author you can find out more when BTR-PR Interviews the founder, Ed Patterson, who is an author himself! He will share with us how easy it is to set your book up on Operation EBook Drop. Set your show reminder now!

Listen

or download Episode 18

The Inner Chapters: Volume 1

 by Thomas Gideon
Non-Fiction
Website: http://thecommandline.net/
Want to help? The unbook- http://thecommandline.net/wiki/The_Inner_Chapters_Unbook
Twitter: @command.line
Email: feedback [at] thecommandline [dot] net.

“Thomas “cmdln”

Gideon is a self described hacker, curmudgeon and hacktivist who discusses on his twice weekly podcast, The Command Line Podcast, among other topics the practice and profession of programming drawing from over a decade of professional experience and a lifetime spent hacking.”

Acts of Desperation

by Tim Dodge
Thriller

His website: http://www.timdodgestories.com

Email:  tim[at]timdodgestories[dot]com

“Dodge is the author of the podcast novel ACTS OF DESPERATION, the forthcoming PURGATORY, and the host of the podcast HEARTWARMING STORIES BY TIM DODGE. His work has been published in Winter Sky and Down In The Dirt magazines. He is currently at work on his fourth novel. Tim lives near Syracuse, New York with his wife, three sons, and German shepherd.”

The News

Announcing a casting call from @bignutter. He’s looking for Bible Readers to do Genesis 1:1-10, Mark 16:15 & 1 Peter 4:10 all KJV, and also another unspecified quote. He’s accepting Male and Female readers. Certain Male voices are ideal, such as Fractured Horizon Promo Voice. Sorry nutter the our VOG (Voice of God) belongs to us! But we will spread the word.

Support our Troops by opting-in to Operations Ebook Drop founded by Ed W. Patterson. Smashwords is joining with Ed in the endeavor. Mark Coker put up a great blog about how this operation is going to work. Here is the link to the blog post.

Contests

New site is live! Register and play along

The Mark of a Druid has a new website and contest 11 is now live. Let Rhonda now what you think of the new site and sign up.

Help Name Characters in Sea Hawk

Arlene Radasky needs names for her characters in her new novel SEA HAWK. When you email her with your suggestions, she will put your name in the hat for a FREE signed copy of THE FOX, sent anywhere in the world. Winner will be drawn on October 30, 2009. For all the details go to her website.

Calling all Podcasters and Podiobooks.com authors

Enter the Podioracket.com sponsored Podiobooks.com Promo Competition! Simply create your one-minute promo, the perfect storm of persuasion and enthusiasm, then email it to contact@podioracket.com. See the complete list of rules and suggestions in our handy-dandy guide.

Our most recent entry was played in this episode and submitted by Mark A. Rayner, author of Marvellous Hairy – a novel in five fractals.

Handbook for the Criminally Insane Contest

FACBOOK RADOM SELECTION– Click on “become fan” on Brian’s Facebook author page. He’ll give away one signed copy each week in October to randomly selected fans through Facebook.
QUICK ANSWER WINS A PRIZE– The first three listeners who email Brian with Betty’s secret (from the book) will get a signed copy. 2) The first listener who emails Brian and tells him what weapon Monica uses(and how she uses it) in the last scene will get a book.
See http://www.darksidesally.com for all the details or facebook at  http://www.facebook.com/pages/Brian-Holtz/53769912948

BTR-PR Schedule

Shownotes are coming on these shows at BTR-PR. You can set reminders and not miss a show!

September 24th 6:00pm PST Drew Beatty

October 1st 2:30 pm PST Wayken Seagrave

October 5th 6:00pm PST Scott Sigler The Dark Overloard himself

October 15th 6:00 pm PST Ed Patterson of Operation E-Book Drop

October 22 6:00 pm PST A.P. Stephens

October 27 6:00pm PST J.C. Hutchens Rush day for 7th Son and we are giving away some amazing schwag!

October 29th 6:00pm PST Brian Holtz

New Releases

Time Crystal by Wyken Seagrave Science Fiction
AMNAR: THE INHERITANCE by Isabel Joely Black Fantasy
The White Shadow Saga: The Stolen Moon of Londor by A.P. Stephens Fantasy
Loner In Space by Steve Simons Science Fiction Family Friendly

Now Complete

KIRINS: The Spell of No’an by James D. Priest Fantasy Family Friendly
Borrowed Time by Keith Hughes Science Fiction

Podioracket welcomes Drew Beatty, the author of Lost Gods, as he shares his observations about e-books and Smashwords. Welcome Drew!

Follow Drew on twitter @drewbeatty and see his website.

The Smashwords Approach to E-books

While I am not sounding the death knell for books, I think it is important to realize the phenomenal growth of the e-book, and to consider the opportunity that comes with this growth. A recent article on bNet had this to say:

“E-books sales jumped up by 136.2 percent for the month over June ‘08 (to $14.0 million), reflecting an increase of 149.3 percent for the year.”

Okay, what we have here is runaway growth, though not quite as impressive as the nearly 400 percent annual growth rate we saw in Q-1. Nevertheless, e-books continue to grow at rates that traditional books cannot, which is an indicator of which way the wind is blowing.”

I think the biggest takeaway from this is that traditional books cannot maintain the same growth trajectory as e-books. As more and more devices enter the mainstream, more and more people are going to be looking for content to consume on these devices. Amazon’s Kindle, Sony’s eReader, and the multitude of portable devices that support e-books are helping to fuel this phenomenal growth, but there is  a caveat. Most of these devices use a proprietary format. What that means is that if you want to release your book in an e-format, you have to have several different versions of it. One for the Kindle, one for the Sony reader etc… Formatting your manuscript into multiple versions can be difficult, time consuming, and technologically frustrating.

Fortunately Smashwords.com has come along to make the process idiot-proof, or at least as idiot-proof as possible.

As long as you have properly formatted your manuscript, Smashword’s “Meat Grinder” will parse it and reproduce it in a variety of popular formats. These include common ones such as HTML and Plain Text, but, and this is where it gets really interesting, it will also produce versions for the Kindle, Sony Reader, Palm Reader, Stanza and more. Writers and publishers can, in just a few simple steps, make their work readable by most of the major e-readers, set the price they want to charge, and have a new distribution system in place. The biggest hurdle is formatting your work correctly. They have easy to follow instructions, but depending on the complexity of your manuscript, it might take some time to get everything in order so that the Meat Grinder can do its magic. It took me an evening of playing around before I got everything working well, but there is nothing overly complicated in the process.

For readers, Smashwords has thousands of books in a variety of genres. Most authors choose to freely share at least part of their work, so that you can get a feel for the story and see if it captures your interest. Most are also reasonably priced, ranging from pay-what-you-want to a few dollars. There are some very talented authors who are part of Smashwords, and eagle-eyed readers will have noticed that Podiobooks.com now links many of its titles to Smashwords.

I think that the true winner in this will be the readers. Multiple formats allow for a great deal of flexibility, and the cost of the e-book is traditionally much less than even a paperback. My novel, Lost Gods, costs $15.00 plus shipping through Lulu.com, but if you get the e-book from Smashwords you can set your own price. While there are still many people who love the feel of hefting a paperback, if all you are interested in is the content, Smashwords is a great place to check out! Oh, and did I mention the files they produce are DRM free? They are!

Drew Beatty will be appearing LIVE on Podioracket Blog Talk Radio on September 24th at 6pm Pacific/9pm Eastern.

As you probably know by now, Podioracket’s Blog Talk Radio Extension continues to move at a mad pace, and brings you extended LIVE interviews and give-aways with some of your favorite authors.

In this episode, we’re going to grab a clip from a recent BTR show. Rhonda interviewed Tee Morris, the author of Billibub Baddings & MOREVI about his new book, All A Twitter. 

Rhonda also sat down with Arlene Radasky to talk about one aspect of Podiobooks 2.0 — getting rights to the music that accompanies an audio book.

Listen now:
[audiohttp://media.podiobooks.com/podioracket/Podioracket-Ep15.mp3]
or download Podioracket-Ep15.

All our past Blog Talk Radio interviews are available in archive at blogtalkradio.com/podioracket, and we have a player on our website.

Tee Morris

Follow Tee @teemonster

Website: allatwitterbook.com

Show: birdhouserules.com

Arlene Radasky on music rights

Twitter: @aradasky

Website: www.radasky.com

Email: Click here

Music by Steve McDonnald

CONTESTS

Mick Bordet is still giving out download codes for the music in Some Other Scotland. You can get the codes by tweeting the link to his interview and emailing him.
He will be running the contest now until the interview on August 31, 2:30 pm PST/5:30 pm EST. He is gaving away a free book for the best BTR question and allowed a listener to name a character. Here are the details.


Philippa Ballantine will announce the winner of her New Zealand Basket on Friday, August 14th on our Blog Talk Radio Extension.


 
Paul J. Joseph, the independant filmmaker and author of Homesick and Marker Stone, will award an signed, original draft manuscript for Homesick. How do you win this memorobilia? Simply leave a comment for Paul at Podiobooks.com, Itunes or on his website and then shoot him an email.


Rhonda Carpenter is starting her contest #10! Give her a review and email her.


Listen to the episode to hear one of the submissions for the Podioracket.com contest seeking Podiobooks.com’s Perfect Promo! Hope it inspires you to enter!

Simply create your one-minute promo, the perfect storm of persuasion and enthusiasm, then email it to contact@podioracket.com. See the complete list of rules and suggestions in our handy-dandy guide.

News

Podiobooks has just made an agreement with Smashwords. This is going to allow the two sites to link to each other so that users can get their audio and, if they just want more, the text versions of authors who participate. Watch for your favorite author to put their book out there!

In further news, Podiobooks is continuing to move toward that 2.0 release that we’ve been telling you about. Rumor has it, we’re just a couple weeks from testing.

New Releases

Vatican Assassin – Remastered by Mike Luoma Science Fiction

Completed Works

Weather Child by Philippa Ballantine Historical Fantasy

How to Succeed in Evil The Novel by Patrick McLean Fiction

The Inner Chapters, Volume 1 by Thomas Gideon Non-Fiction