Tag Archives: Self-publishing

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Guest Post: Why I Chose to Self-Publish after Being Published by New York

One of my favorite things is hearing about the publishing experiences of other writers. Today, author Carole Bellacera tells us why she chose to self-publish her novels after having had deals in the past with traditional publishing houses.

I admit it. I was a snob. Back when I finally sold my first novel to a major New York house, I looked down my nose at anyone who’d self-published their books. For thirteen years, I’d struggled to sell a novel, coming close a few times, but always falling short. But even then, after working with three different agents, and suffering years of rejection, I held fast to my belief that if I had to stoop to self-publishing, I wouldn’t be a “real author.”

And now here I am, almost 30 years later, a self-published author. How did that happen? Well, it’s a rather familiar story to many authors. After my fourth book came out by the New York publisher, my editor left for greener pastures, leaving me an unwanted orphan. No one else, apparently, saw in my work what my editor had, and all support dried up. Of course, my sales sucked swamp water, which, I’m sure, accounted for the lack of excitement on Fifth Avenue.

Burned out and discouraged, I took a few years off from the business side to renew my love affair with what was important to me – writing. I wrote two complete novels and then waded back into the quick sands of publishing – only to find that I was starting over from the very beginning. Agent hunting, editor hunting… rejection followed by rejection. Having a track record didn’t seem to make a difference.

That’s when I decided to take back control of my career. I was sick of being told “no, your work is not worthy.” I knew it was worthy. I was the same writer I’d been when I sold four novels which earned raving reviews, if not sales. So I got my rights back from my New York publisher and put my backlist out on Amazon’s Kindle program. But I didn’t stop there. I’m in the process now of reissuing all my backlist in print, too. And then I took the two unsold books I’d been shopping to New York and put them out through Amazon’s CreateSpace.

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Bryan Adams and ‘Baby Grand’

So I’m doing what I do every morning, checking out various social media sites for news and trends, and I come across the new song “Don’t Look Back” from Bryan Adams, one of my all-time favorite recording artists (his was my very first concert when I was a teenager):

http://twitmusic.com/embed/songs/don-t-look-back

And I think to myself, Hey, this is perfect for BABY GRAND. “Don’t look back” is a recurring theme in my debut thriller. And the song’s opening line, “Look into the eyes of a child,” made me think of little Charlotte Grand, who is at the center of the story.

So I ask Bryan Adams — via Twitter, of course — if I may declare “Don’t Look Back” the unofficial theme song of Baby Grand and he says yes.

How cool is that?

So there you go. New theme song. Next on the list is to get Robert De Niro to agree to play Gino Cataldi. Hmmm…

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Let the BABY GRAND-palooza Blog Tour Begin!

One of the most important — and challenging — aspects of publishing a book today, whether you self-publish or traditionally publish, is marketing. Getting the word out. I just came across a sobering article that says that half of all self-published authors earn less than $500 a year. Holy cow!

That’s why when my novel was published last week on Amazon, I revved up the marketing machine immediately and reached out to bloggers to see if they might need some help writing posts this summer (as a blogger, I know how difficult it can be to come up with new material regularly) and would like a guest blogger or an eager interviewee. The response has been wonderful.

Today is the first stop on what I’m calling the Baby Grand-palooza Blog Tour. Thank you to Belinda Frisch, who was kind enough to interview me. You can check out the interview here and here. Of course, while I’m looking to promote my debut novel, I also want to be able to provide useful insight into the writing, editing and publishing process. Hopefully, I succeeded. :)

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It’s a Book! ‘Baby Grand’ Available on Amazon Kindle

It’s finally here! My debut novel, Baby Grand, is available on Amazon Kindle for the promotional price of $1.99.

It will be available on the Nook and other devices and as a print-on-demand paperback later this year.

Right now, I am completely overwhelmed and exhausted and excited and cannot think of anything clever or interesting to say. Just know that this book is what it is because of your support over these past two years — through all the writing, procrastinating, editing, more procrastinating, promoting and more.

Thank you. Truly.


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Writing Tip #80

Hire a professional copy editor. Some people are surprised when I tell them that I had the manuscript for Baby Grand professionally copy edited.

“But aren’t you an editor?” they ask.

“Yep,” I say. “And as an editor I know the importance of a good copy edit.”

Copy editing, or line editing, is going through a proof or manuscript, line by line, in order to find errors (grammatical, continuity, etc.). Baby Grand just went through copy editing and, as it turns out, was relatively clean (as it should be, since I am, indeed, an editor), but the copy editor did catch quite a few formatting and grammatical (e.g., en dash vs. em dash) issues and asked astute questions with regard to plot and characterization. As I clicked through the manuscript, I kept thinking how happy I was to have had this critical eye go through the copy one last time.

Keep in mind that copy editing is a professional service. It’s not really something you can ask your friends to do for you. On the other hand, anyone can be a “beta reader,” who is also someone who reads your manuscript for errors, but that person will probably not be as meticulous or familiar with style guides as a professional. Both have their place and can be very helpful in making your manuscript the very best it can be.

Professional copy editing or proofreading rates vary per project, and copy editors may charge you by the hour or by the page. For a 300-page manuscript, you may pay something like $600 to $1,000, but, again, pricing depends on the person or company you use and the services needed. It’s probably a good idea to ask around, too, and see if any of your writer-friends can recommend a copy editor whom they found to be affordable, yet thorough. After seeing the kinds of things my copy editor found that escaped my eyes, my advice is not to skimp on the copy-editing. It’s worth every penny.

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Advance Praise for ‘Baby Grand’

Here’s a sampling of some of the advance praise for Baby Grand. Thank you to all of you who took the time to read my debut novel. I am grateful for your kindness and humbled by your kind words.

  • “A perfect thriller from Dina Santorelli—heart-stomping, emotion-packed and utterly surprising. Readers will be gripped by the tightly woven story and richly layered characters. A terrific read!”
    —Ellen Meister, author of The Other Life
  • “What an enjoyable read! It pulled me in at the beginning and didn’t let go until the last page. Very difficult to put down! I’m already looking forward to the author’s next book.
    —Joseph Mugnai, publisher, Family magazine
  • “A superb debut for Dina Santorelli. A well-crafted novel that’s also a page-turner. Baby Grand’s a winner; you won’t want to put it down.”
    —Julia Markus, critically acclaimed biographer and winner of the Houghton Mifflin Literary Award for her novel Uncle
  • “Dina Santorelli has the gift of a natural storyteller, and Baby Grand sweeps along at a frantic pace, plunging the reader into a tale with wonderfully real characters you care about. It’s very human, very exciting, and absolutely engrossing.”
    —Chris Nickson, author of the Richard Nottingham series of historical mysteries
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Cover Reveal: BABY GRAND by Dina Santorelli

Today, I am THRILLED to reveal the cover for my debut novel, Baby Grand, which will be published as an eBook on Amazon next month. What do you think?


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Why I’m Self-Publishing ‘Baby Grand’

Why am I self-publishing my debut novel Baby Grand? In short, because it feels right.

As many of you know, I’m no stranger to the commercial book world. In addition to being a professional writer/editor for more than 20 years (I’ve had freelance articles written in Newsday, CNNMoney.com, etc.), I served as the “with” writer for the nonfiction title Good Girls Don’t Get Fat (Harlequin, October 2010), authored by Dr. Robyn Silverman, contributed text for the upcoming dessert cookbook, Brown Betty (Wiley, October 2012) and am currently editing a book for a 2012 release. Traditional publishing was something I had always considered for my first novel, simply because that’s the world I worked in professionally.

In January 2010, Stonesong in NYC signed-up Baby Grand, and, after I finished the first draft of the manuscript and three rounds of revisions, we started querying selected publishers last year. When the rejections started trickling in, as they do (as a freelance writer who’s spent many years querying editors, although rejections always sting, you learn that they’re part of the business), I found the nature of the rejections intriguing – some editors just weren’t crazy about the book for one reason or another, which is fine, and others really liked it, but blamed other factors (genre-crossing, etc.) in their reluctance to sign it, which is fine too.

But I have to tell you: The process was frustrating me, especially the waiting. And there’s lots of waiting involved in traditional publishing, mostly because agents and editors have to read your manuscript – and they’ve got lots of manuscripts to read. The thing is, I was willing to wait, had been planning on waiting (although it’s kind of like parenting – you know it’s going to be hard, but don’t really know how hard it is until you’re there, in the middle of the night, wiping up vomit). But I started to question exactly what I was waiting for.

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Breaking News: ‘Baby Grand’ to be Released as eBook

Well, it’s official. My debut novel Baby Grand will be released as an eBook through Amazon’s KDP Select program. Final draft and cover should be ready for upload by mid-April with publication in late April/first week of May. I’ll keep you posted on the details.

And I’m happy to announce that throughout the publishing process I will continue to work with Stonesong – the New York-based literary agency that signed-up Baby Grand back in January 2010 when the manuscript was merely a third completed. I don’t know what I would do without the support and dedication and amazingness of Judy Linden and the entire Stonesong team who have been staunch supporters not only of this book, but of me, and I am so happy to be doing this with such a dynamic group of women.

In the coming weeks, as we get closer to Baby Grand’s publication date, I will be answering questions you may have regarding this announcement, such as why I chose to self-publish, why I chose to go with Amazon’s KDP Select, etc. And, as always, I will share with you the ins and outs of the process, from copyediting to price-setting to making myself nuts watching sales stats (and I will!).

Expect the big cover reveal in the coming weeks as well as advance praise for Baby Grand!

What’s more, I have plans to make Baby Grand available as a print-on-demand paperback for those of you who like to read books the old-fashioned way (I know you’re out there!). I would include my Mom in this group, but she just told me last week that she would read my novel anywhere, even if it were written on a napkin. :)

I look forward to sharing all the exciting news surrounding the release of this book. Thank you to all of you who have supported me since I started writing this blog (my two-year anniversary is March 30) and for your support of authors and reading.

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Meet Ethan Dreilinger

We’re mixing things up a little today. I’d been meaning to feature my friend and colleague Ethan Dreilinger on this blog to discuss his first novel, Out of the Dust, which he self-published last June. But that wascally wabbit went ahead and published his second novel in October, before I had the chance, making him, technically, ineligible to be featured here. So we’re working around that minor detail today by showing my interview with Ethan for “The Writer’s Dream,” which aired last fall — before he published his second book. Enjoy!