What a whirlwind the last six months have been! I’ve said for many years that I am too busy to act as my own publisher and that when the time comes to publish my novel-length work I will seek an agent and go the traditional publishing route where I have professionals every step of the way. Editing, book cover design, formatting, publishing, marketing… it all takes skills I do not have. But when I decided that I wanted to publish a collection of short stories, I realized that all of them had already been through edits and all I really needed to do was collect them in a single place. I have friends who have skills who were willing to help me and who made it all seem so effortless.
Let me tell you: IT WAS NOT EFFORTLESS! This may have been the most reckless thing I’ve done in a long time, in fact. It’s been a while since I’ve shared details of my writing journey here and I thought, they deserve to hear about the journey!
I came up with this idea mid-summer last year (2023) before my day job exploded with an intense project that won’t be done until late 2025 and has me working far more than 40 hours a week. More on that as I walk through the timeline!
First, I collected all my previously published stories and read through them to see what theme I could come up with. Where I realized that one of my earliest stories was not really worthy of being included so I had to rewrite it. Which also meant I had to go all the way through the editing process with my critique group and hire a copyeditor. This took several months from start to finish. It was during this part in the fall of 2023 that I put the whole project on hold until the overwhelm of work at the day job was a little more managed.
Once that side quest was done, it was spring of 2024. I still had to come up with a theme that tied all of my stories together and figure out what order I was going to put them in. This may seem like a trivial step, but it was fraught with peril. Maybe that was partly due to my perfectionism and knowing that no one else could do this step for me (I know, because I tried to get advice from everyone in my closest writing circles) and that I had to live with the decisions forever. This was happening during the same timeframe as the last stages of editing and rewriting of that one story, so that was a partial win at least.
Second, I finally had a file ready to hand off to my wonderful friend with formatting skills for hire and a shiny title to go with it. She quickly turned around a proof and told me it was time to order my cover. Exciting and also much more expensive than I had been ready for. It’s only money, right? And this was an exciting step which I thought meant I would be almost at the finish line. HA! I was wrong. That was back in September.
Third, going through my first proof, I realized that past Terra had not planned ahead and set future Terra up for success in this endeavor, because several of the files I had saved were NOT the versions that had made it into print as I thought they were. What gave this away? The return of a pesky little problem with quotation marks pointing the wrong way that I found and which I then recalled vividly from almost a decade ago. Luckily Big Sister has aspirations of being an audiobook narrator and was willing to record audio version from the print versions so I could compare and update. This took several weeks. And resulted in extensive edits in the formatted file. Which also took a couple of weeks.
Fourth, I got an updated proof to go through with a fine-tooth comb to find any formatting or grammar issues before finalizing things. I employed my trusted critique partners for proofreading so a fresh set of eyes could find the things I’d missed. Assuming at this point there would likely be none to find. It was during this read-through that I realized that while I had benefitted from copyedits and proof reading with every previously published story, there were style inconsistencies over the years and over the different publishers I had worked with. Which meant that my collection was not consistent in its style. To my horror, I had early stories where internal thoughts were italicized, even! (Yes, this is horror inducing, trust me!) Plus, formatting rules for ellipses have a tendency to change regularly! Getting these things all consistent throughout the book took several more weeks.
Finally, I was at the finish line and ready for the final files. Which meant purchasing ISBN numbers (the fancy catalog numbers that tell anyone who will sell your books the identifying features of each format.) Which meant I had to have a business name. Which meant I had to decide if I was going to do an LLC or something else. And do I need or want a business logo to include on my cover? Because despite the horror-inducing graphic design class I took during my undergraduate studies, I still don’t have any of those skills! Another bunch of money later (which I didn’t even realize was going to be an expense), a late-evening design session with my talented friend, and navigating business filing waters I’d never even dipped my toe into, and here we are. The actual finish line!
I have advanced reader copies out to several people who asked along the way and the kindle version went live for pre-orders a couple of days ago. It was only two weeks later than I had originally planned but it still is super exciting! Check it out HERE if you prefer eBooks. Once paperbacks are available (and I’ve figured out THOSE next steps) I hope to have a way for folks who want a signed copy to purchase those and get them shipped out. If you’re a local friend, I’m also working on a book launch where you can get signed copies locally and save us all shipping costs.
At the end of this journey looking back, I’m so glad I didn’t put this off until the perfect time because I know there is no such thing. I just had to take small steps and keep pushing forward to make it happen. New achievement unlocked: a book with only my name on the cover everywhere books are sold!
Terra Luft - View From the Crystal Ball 