Turtle Steps

Excellent news! The Lioness has agreed to copy-edit the first 3 chapters of Elementals! Yea! I just added a layer of accountability to my goal of manuscript submission. That's important, since my first reaction is to retreat into my shell until October is over.

More excellent news! Blogspot has returned my spell-check button. I can't believe the spelling errors I've been making lately. I can see them only after I've published the post, and, unless I write them down, I can't find them when I sign on to edit. Weird.

I've been doing some reading at PYP's website and FB page. It's important to "know your audience," after all. I like this editor, but it's possible I like all editors. Anyone with the gumption to start a small business in our current economy is either a real scrapper or a real idiot. Maybe a little of both. I respect the former, and, hey, who hasn't been an idiot at one time or another? Without the entrepreneurs, our free market would collapse. So, go small presses!

Yeah, that's a topic for Old-Fashioned Thoughts.

The one thing concerning me most about PYP is the very clear disclaimer that marketing will pretty much be up to me. That's true of small presses, by the way, even Marcher Lord. They don't have the money for extensive advertising. On the other hand, it's not much different than if I self-published, so I'm trying not to freak out too much. If this is the deal-breaker, so be it.

They want to know my marketing plan. I don't have a plan. Well, I kind of have a plan. Once upon a time, Elder Brother gave some excellent marketing advice in a comment on my first whiny-butt post. I'll start with that. I also have some time to read up a bit on marketing. I bet Dave Ramsey has a few recommended books on the subject, or Seth Godin.

They recommend a FB page. Got that. It's currently coated in FV posts, but I have one. I will probably try creating a "business" FB page if this goes well. No point in creating one until I'm ready to use it, and I'm not quitting FV to look serious about writing. Of that, I am certain. I will farm less, but I will not stop until The Users pull the plug (God forbid). I also don't want my FB page to be open to just any yahoo who claims to be a fan. Only real fan yahoos need apply. A business page will, I think, take care of that.

A website is recommended. Got that. Spent yesterday updating it. Now that I have a printer with a scan option, I want to upload some of my illustrations for Elementals. I have a few drawings of Caissa, too.

They want a "book proposal" along with the chapters. I'm not sure I know what they mean by that. I should probably ask.

There's a questionnaire to fill out if I catch their interest. It's posted on their site. It doesn't concern me too much. For all my arrogance, I don't think anyone would classify me as a "prima donna," and that's what many of the questions seem intent on probing. My first reaction is always "no!" and "run!" but I rarely commit to my first reaction. I know my instincts suck. I do need 24 hours to process, but does that make me hard to work with? I'd rather balk at the beginning and do it, than agree first and not do it. Didn't Jesus have a parable about that?

When PYP first came to my attention, I intended to write a post about "timing," and how I'm either early or late. I realized, for once, this seems to be right on time. That doesn't mean it will work out. It just means for me, "poor timing" seems to be a subjective issue not an objective one.

We'll see how it goes.