Sonia Marsh - Gutsy Living

Publish like the Pros

November 8, 2012 by Sonia Marsh

Have you thought about starting your own publishing company but don’t know how to start? I’d like to introduce you to Michele DeFilippo, owner of 1106 Design, a Phoenix-based company that assists authors in self-publishing their books. She has written a guest post to help you answer some questions.

A Guest Post by Michele DeFilippo

It happened to other bloggers and it finally happened to me: I convinced myself that if I had enough words in me to write a blog then I had enough words in me to write a book. Several months later, I self-published my first book Publish Like the Pros: A Brief Guide to Quality Self-Publishing (and an Insider’s Look at a Misunderstood Industry).

Self-publishing is not a simple process and many authors don’t know where to start. I confess: I own 1106 Design, a Phoenix-based company that assists authors in self-publishing their books, so I knew exactly where to start and I had a terrific team at hand to help me. But many authors—viewing self-publishing as very complicated—are stymied from the start by the question: Just who is the publisher?

The answer might seem obvious, but to many people it’s not. Traditional publishing companies are held in awe. They are the gatekeepers, determining who gets published and who doesn’t. Also, there are many “self-publishing companies” out there who know exactly how to capitalize on the confused author’s emotions, promising “easy” (and ultimately, expensive) solutions that are nothing more than classic bait-and-switch schemes. But authors don’t need a self-publishing company at all, so be savvy and steer clear. Remember, if you are self-publishing, YOU are the publisher!

The name you create for your independent publishing business (or “indie” publisher) is the “imprint” – the brand name under which the book is published. Having a logo created for your imprint will add a lovely professional touch to your book cover.

OK, so you’re an indie publisher; now what?

First, treat your endeavor like a business with you as the CEO and your book as your product. Your product should be the result of a lot of research. Hopefully you have researched the market potential for your book. Unfortunately, many authors write a book and then try to find a market for it. Instead, authors should determine a need in the marketplace and write a book to meet that need.

After your book is written, it needs to be polished and packaged into a high-quality product that meets industry standards and is attractive to buyers. No CEO can do this alone, and this is where your team comes in, which at a minimum, should consist of a book designer and an editor and proofreader.

A great cover and well-designed interior pages are essential to a quality product. Anything less will scream “self-published!” and surprisingly, a goal of self-publishing is to create books that don’t appear to be self-published. Your cover should deliver a compelling message and stand out from other books. The pages should be visually appealing, hold interest, and be easy on the eye. Consciously or subconsciously, these are factors that buyers consider when deciding to purchase a book. Book designers are trained professionals, and as such you should hire a book designer rather than attempt to do it yourself. In addition, your book designer can help you with your barcode, your logo and other aspects of the publishing process. Note that you can obtain your own ISBNs from Bowker (www.myidentifiers.com). Beware! Don’t allow a so-called “self-publishing company” to provide you with one of theirs!

An editor is also critical to the book’s success. Writing a book is much different than writing a blog! At a minimum, an editor will:

Check the order, flow and consistency of your material.
Ensure the content is not repetitive or redundant.
Edit for mistakes in terminology or logic.
Smooth out your writing, correct your errors, fix your typos and check your grammar.

You will also need a company to print your book. We suggest Lightning Source and CreateSpace as print-on-demand solutions, and yes, you can and should open your own account with them, putting you firmly in control. Print-on-demand services are a cost-conscious way of printing only enough books to meet current demand. You should also consider producing an eBook edition.

Once you’ve hired your team, you can think about marketing and distribution. You may wish to hire a marketing consultant; in fact, you can bring in a marketing consultant during your research stage to help you define the target market before the design process begins. Other services are available to help you along the way, such as a book title consultant, a copywriter to write your back cover copy, someone to index your book, a designer to create your press kit, and more.

Many companies offer self-publishing packages, with book design, editing, printing and other services bundled together at a reduced price. Personally, I think that being your own publisher puts you into a position of strength, where you get to choose the professionals that you want to work with. Good luck!

Michele DeFilippo owns 1106 Design, a Phoenix-based company that works with authors, publishers, business pros, coaches, consultants, speakers . . . anyone who wants a beautiful book, meticulously prepared to industry standards. After helping almost a thousand authors make their books a reality, Michele has just self-published her first book Publish Like the Pros: A Brief Guide to Quality Self-Publishing (and an Insider’s Look at a Misunderstood Industry)

Sonia Marsh says: After researching what goes into creating a professional looking book from various sources, including the book designer, Joel Friedlander, an expert in book design, I started my own publishing company, “Gutsy Publications.” I also looked at many design and formatting companies, and finally selected 1106 Design.

1106 Design did a fantastic book cover for me, ( my book cover,) a company logo and interior formatting as I could never have done such a professional job myself.

Michele DeFilippo is the author of Publish Like the Pros: A Brief Guide to Quality Self-Publishing

In case you didn’t already know, I’m a huge fan of 1106 Design. I’m so glad I discovered them for my indie-publishing needs.

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Please vote for your favorite October “My Gutsy Story.” You have until November 14th to vote, and the winner will be announced on November 15th. You can read all of them and vote here.

SCROLL DOWN ON SIDEBAR TO VOTE. Only ONE vote each.

Do you have a “My Gutsy Story” you’d like to share?

NOW is the time to submit your own “My Gutsy Story” and get published in our Anothology. Please contact sonia@soniamarsh.com for details.

To submit your own, “My Gutsy Story” you can find all the information, and our sponsors on the “My Gutsy Story” contest page. (VIDEO) Submission guidelines here.

Our first November “My Gutsy Story” is by Jerry Waxler. You can read it here.

“My Gutsy Story” by Jerry Waxler

November 5, 2012 by Sonia Marsh 43 Comments

My Search Led Me to Story

When I graduated high school, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. Like my brother before me, I would study science and then go to medical school. At 18, I flew from my peaceful row home in Philadelphia straight into the turmoil of the anti-Vietnam War movement in Madison, Wisconsin. After six years of marijuana, rock and roll, and rebellion against “the system” the only thing I was certain about was that I didn’t want to have anything to do with growing up.

By 1971, I lived in a garage in Berkeley, California, going for days and then weeks without speaking to anyone. After attending a lecture by anthropologist Jane Goodall, I realized I could fulfill my destiny by living like a chimpanzee. I ate only fruit and stopped wearing my glasses so I was legally blind. I sold all my possessions for a one-way ticket to Central America where I would live on the beach and pick food from the trees.

When I was ready to leave, an old friend handed me a book which said my soul longed to return to God and that I would never be satisfied until I turned within. My mind leapt at the explanation so I replaced my chimpanzee-centric view of the world with a spiritual one and started to meditate. However, my passion for the inner life did not relieve my need to earn a living so I moved back east to be near my parents and got a job.

I still had to find my role in society, so I went to a therapist and each week told him about my struggle to live in the world. These weekly talks helped me tame my crazy decisions and feelings. Over time, I noticed these talks had a beneficial side-effect. To prepare for each session, I developed the habit of organizing my thoughts. Without realizing it, I was learning to tell my story.

The more I learned about my own story, the more curious I became about others. At 50, I returned to school and received a master’s degree in counseling psychology. As a therapist, I witnessed the soothing effect on clients when I asked them to tell me their story. Yet something was missing from these one-hour sessions. My clients’ lives, like my own, felt fragmentary.

I reached out to a mentor who suggested that to make sense of the whole journey, I should list events in chronological order. I went home and created my timeline. From that simple exercise, parts of my life that had always seemed disjointed began to fit together like the pieces of a puzzle. To help me turn these ordered memories into readable prose, I took a memoir class. There, I met other participants who were doing the same thing. We were finding our stories together.

To learn more, I read memoirs by the score, watching the years roll by through each author’s eyes, ears, sensations and thoughts. They let me into their lives and enriched my understanding of the world. I looked for more memoir classes, and found them offered in writing groups, senior centers, libraries, and schools. The bookstore offered an increasing number of memoirs by ordinary people. Talk shows featured more memoir authors, and I met an increasing number of people who wanted to shape their lives into stories. I had stumbled on a trend.

Like any trend, not everyone loved it. Some critics complained that writing about yourself is narcissistic. I tried to understand their point. According to the dictionary, narcissists believe they are admirable and above reproach. By contrast, most successful memoirs reveal flawed authors who make terrible decisions. Perhaps critics don’t think it’s healthy to spend so much time engaging in introspection. If that’s the case, their attitude contradicts the wisdom traditions of the world that promote introspection as a method to deepen selfless attitudes like generosity and forgiveness. Anyway, introspection is only the first half of writing a memoir. The second half requires craft and communication. Memoir writers build bridges across the chasms that separate us.

To learn more about the power of memoirs, I studied the thing called Story. From literary scholars and mythologists, I learned that since the beginning of recorded history, humans have been telling stories in order to make sense of life. I was experiencing this effect for myself. In the pages of my evolving manuscript, I watched my younger self desperately search for guiding principles, first in science, then in the counter-culture and finally in spirituality. Throughout those years, I craved pure rules and theories. Now, decades later, I discovered a unifying principle that tied it all together. In the shape of a story, I grasped real life with its messy wants, disappointments and realizations.

When I looked for teachers, I found them everywhere. I learned from literature professors, therapists, and creative-writing teachers. Above all, I reached out across the bridges that memoir writers had created from their lives to mine. In my younger years, I searched for my truths alone. Memoirs transformed my search into an enchanted one, looking for the story that connected me to society. Through blogs, groups, and social media, I found tribes of aspiring and accomplished memoir writers. By reading and writing together, our loosely knit groups fostered deeper appreciation for the power of Story within our own lives.

I decided to call this trend the Memoir Revolution. By exploring our lives and sharing them, we are breaking out of isolation and drawing together into a global community in which we empathize with each other’s race, religion, gender, economic and geographic history, infirmities, strengths, and longings.

Jerry Waxler Memoir Rev — Click on cover to order on Amazon

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Jerry Waxler is a lifelong learner. Starting in his teens with an obsession on math and physics, each decade he has devoted himself to a discipline of study. From his spiritual search in his twenties, to computer technology in his thirties, and psychology in his forties. In his fifties, he realized that the entire journey is a story, and he has been obsessed by memoirs ever since. His blog contains hundreds of essays about reading and writing memoirs, and his book Memoir Revolution describes the social trend that is opening our culture to explore and share the stories of our lives.

He has a BA in Physics, and MS in Counseling Psychology and teaches writing at Northampton Community College in Pennsylvania.

Please check out Jerry Waxler’s websites: http://www.jerrywaxler.com

http://www.memorywritersnetwork.com/blog. Join him on Twitter, and Facebook, as well as LinkedIn: Jerry Waxler.

Sonia Marsh Says: What an amazing journey you’ve been through starting with a rebellious youth, attempting to find your role in society, and how writing parts of your life gave you a clearer picture of who you are.

I am on board with your global vision of sharing our stories and breaking down barriers through a Memoir Revolution.

As you mention, through your research,

“I learned that since the beginning of recorded history, humans have been telling stories in order to make sense of life.”

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Please leave your comments for Jerry Waxler below. He will be over to respond. Thanks.

Also, don’t forget to vote for your favorite October “My Gutsy Story.” You have until November 14th to vote, and the winner will be announced on November 15th. You can read all of them and vote here.

SCROLL DOWN ON SIDEBAR TO VOTE. Only ONE vote each.

Do you have a “My Gutsy Story” you’d like to share?

NOW is the time to submit your own “My Gutsy Story” and get published in our Anothology. Please contact sonia@soniamarsh.com for details.

To submit your own, “My Gutsy Story” you can find all the information, and our sponsors on the “My Gutsy Story” contest page. (VIDEO) Submission guidelines here.

Vote for your favorite October “My Gutsy Story”

November 1, 2012 by Sonia Marsh

VOTE BADGE — Just Like the 2012 Presidential elections: VOTE

This month he had 5 amazing “My Gutsy Story” submissions.

Please vote for your favorite story. You have until November 14th to vote, and the winner will be announced on November 15th.

SCROLL DOWN ON SIDEBAR TO VOTE. Only ONE vote each.

Duke Marsh shared his story about never giving up on your dreams and never taking, “No” for an answer.

Don Darkes lives a life full of adventure and shares how he fought the fear of meeting his birth father for the first time at age forty-five, with another fear.

Kimberly Brower takes her three young sons to live on a farm away from city life, where she questions her marriage and where she belongs.

Doreen Cox questions what happens when you become your mother’s mother? It’s a story about coming full circle.

Patricia McKinzie-Lechault left the U.S. at 23 for Europe and made a bold decision that changed her life forever.

Do you have a “My Gutsy Story” you’d like to share?

NOW is the time to submit your own “My Gutsy Story” and get published in our Anthology. Please contact sonia@soniamarsh.com for details.

To submit your own, “My Gutsy Story” you can find all the information, and our sponsors on the “My Gutsy Story” contest page. (VIDEO) Submission guidelines here.

“My Gutsy Story” Patricia McKinzie-Lechault

October 29, 2012 by Sonia Marsh 29 Comments

Cornfields to City of Lights –

Gutsy Globetrotter Breaks Barriers In Basketball

“What kind of operation?” Mom inquired

“Will she walk again?” Dad asked the doctors.

What if I couldn’t play basketball? I fell into a restless sleep with my legs trapped in traction. The phone ringing beside my hospital bed woke me at midnight.

“Allo, dis ze trainer for Asnières Club de Basket. We want you play in Paris?”

“What? I can’t understand you.”

“You play basket in France wiz us?”

“Yes, but I have a back problem.” I said.

“What you say? No problem? We pay you go back. We pay plane. We pay flat and car. ”

“No. It is my health.”

“’Ealth? Sink about it. I call few days.”

I hung up the phone, bewildered. He was talking about the star forward. Not me, the invalid, who couldn’t crawl to the bathroom.

Weeks later I had rehabilitated from a slipped disk in time to debut in America’s first Women’s Professional Basketball League (WBL), but my team declared bankruptcy at Christmas. I was one of the causalities, limping from a bad back and broken heart. However, when Francis, the French coach, called back the next summer, I was ready to forfeit all to embark on an odyssey playing basketball abroad.

“What about your coaching contract?” my dad asked when I broke the news.

“I got out of it,” I answered tying my shoelaces. I was dressed in shorts, T-shirt and high-tops, always ready for a game.

My dad rattled off arguments as to why I should quit playing professional ball. He was right. I would never make money, or have job security.

“What about your back?” he asked.

My back. I squeezed my eyes shut and saw my crippled body strapped to a white hospital bed. My mind echoed Dad’s words, “No, no, no,” but my heart spoke louder, “Go, go, go.”

“When are you going to get a real job?”

“Dad, I’m only 23. How many chances will I have to play? To live in a new country, meet new people?”

My dad, first to disagree with my decision, was also the first to help me to prepare. I shot baskets; my dad rebounded in a musty fieldhouse as stifling as a sauna.

But what was I thinking? I dropped out of French class in school and had no idea where Paris was. In 1980, small town midwestern girls rarely left the State and never crossed continents. My friends, also clueless, told me to pack tampons and toilet paper as if I were moving to a Third World Country.

A week later, standing in a strange airport, my heart pounding, I spotted a man, waving a sign printed, ASNIÉRES, and yelling, “Potreesha!”.

I thought my dream to play basketball abroad had come true when my plane touched down in Europe. But when I looked out Francis’ car window and saw little people pecking cheeks and scurrying down cobblestone streets with baseball bats (baguettes) slung over their shoulder, it hit me, “Oh my God, I’ve landed on another planet.”

For the next six hours, I smiled and struggled to understand the conversation over dinner. First we drank the apéritif. Then wine with fish. Wine and meat. Wine and cheese. Dessert and champagne. I stared at the claret liquid, debating what to do. I grew up in a coach’s family, where drinking was taboo. How could I imbibe alcohol in front of my coach? Yet to avoid offending the hostess, I tipped my glass at regular intervals. Alarmingly, as soon as my glass was half empty, Francis filled it again.

My stomach ached from the new foods; my head pounded from the new words. And our first practice almost never started. A dozen players greeted one another by kissing each other on the cheeks four times. On our first road trip, before boarding a caravan of cars driving us to Belgium, we repeated the ritual under a street lamp. Then I hopped in Francis’s car, whisking us through Paris as the early morning mist rose above the Arch of Triumph and the deserted Champs Elysees.

Near the border, Francis asked, “You have your passport?”

“Passport? No, what do I need my passport for?”

“Customs!” Francis pulled the car off the side of the road.

“Dehors!” he shouted, his face crimson. “Out.”

I feared he would abandon me on the roadside. Instead, he opened the trunk and pointed.

I crawled in, folding my long limbs into a ball, imagining the news headlines, “American superstar asphyxiated when smuggled across the border in the boot of a car.”

During our first game, I was so rattled from the ride in the trunk that my hands shook. A teammate came in off the bench and whispered, “No pass. Shoot.”

I swished the next ten shots. We beat Holland in the final. At the awards ceremony when they announced, “Patreesha Mackencee, meilleure joueuse,” a pair of hands pushed me forward to accept the MVP trophy. I smiled as I shook hands with the tournament director, and then turned to face my teammates’ cold stares, longing to crawl under the floorboards.

Later, I joined the others in the bar, a standard fixture in European gyms where sports were as social as they were competitive. There, submerged in a cloud of smoke, teammates leaned on the table listening to a story. Just as I sat down, they burst out laughing.

Living in a foreign country was like always being the only one who doesn’t get the joke.

Still, at the end of the year, I did not want to leave France and felt devastated when the French Basketball Federation banned foreigners. Luckily, I received another garbled phone call in guttural German. What play ball in Germany? Learn a new language? Adopt a new culture? No way! But I boarded a train, crossed the border and fell in love with Marburg, the fairytale town immortalized by the Grimm Brothers.

…Ah, but that is yet another gutsy story.

***

Patricia McKinzie-Lechault Bio:

Pat McKinzie, a pioneer in the early infancy of Title IX, was the first female athletic scholarship recipient in Illinois, drafted into the first women’s professional basketball league, and part of the premier wave of American ball players in Europe. As a globetrotter, she traveled across Europe and lived in Paris and Dijon, France and Marburg, Germany, and Geneva, Switzerland. The columnist turned blogger, teaches and coaches at International School of Geneva. She lives outside Geneva with her French husband, Gerald Lechault, CEO of a Swiss printing company. Raised abroad, her Third Culture Kids, a daughter, now a pediatrician, and son, finishing his teaching degree, reside in the USA. Her book Home Sweet Hardwood, A Title IX Trailblazer Breaks Cultural Barriers Through Basketball will be published soon.

Please visit Patricia’s wonderful X-pat files from overseas website and join her on Twitter @PattyMacKZ. You can also join her on Facebook.

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Sonia Marsh Says: I loved your “Gutsy” attitude and what you said to your “Dad, I’m only 23. How many chances will I have to play? To live in a new country, meet new people?”

Obviously you never regretted your decision to move, and now live in Geneva, married to a French man. What a complete change you made in your early twenties.

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Please leave comments and questions for Patricia below. She will be over to respond.

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Voting for your favorite October “My Gutsy Story” starts on November 1st-14th. The winner will be announced on November 15th.

Do you have a “My Gutsy Story” you’d like to share?

To submit your own, “My Gutsy Story” you can find all the information, and our sponsors on the “My Gutsy Story” contest page. (VIDEO) Submission guidelines here.

Three other October stories are up. So far we have Duke Marsh “My Gutsy Story” and Don Darkes “My Gutsy Story,” and Kim Brower’s “My Gutsy Story,” and Doreen Cox, “My Gutsy Story.”

I hope you enjoy the “My Gutsy Story” series and share with others through the links below. Perhaps you’d like to submit your own. Thanks.

Indie Authors Can’t do it all. When to get help?

October 25, 2012 by Sonia Marsh 2 Comments

Jason Matthews started a wonderful show to help indie authors every Monday night at 6pm PST. The show is streamed live, and covers different topics every week. He asked me to host his show on Monday, October 22nd.

If you’re an indie author (a fancier word for self-published) or you’re thinking about becoming one, you may want to listen to an amazing panel of indie authors.

Sonia Marsh: Host for Indie Authors # 33

Sonia Author Photo Red SMALL — Sonia Marsh

Topic “Indie Authors Can’t do it all; When to get help?”

Topics and watch video below

Belinda Nicoll

Juanima Hiatt

Kathleen Pooler

Sharon Lippincott

You want to indie-publish your book, that’s wonderful, but are you sure you have all the skills you need to do the following?

Start a blog and build your platform
Design your author website
Edit your manuscript
Proof read your manuscript
Design your cover
Format your book
Promote your book
Use social media effectively
Get book reviews and endorsements.

Please listen to our panel of 5 indie authors, 4 published and one in the process, and get helpful information on what we’ve done.

Here’s another video for Indie Authors about social media, that Jason Matthews hosted.

You might want to join us on Gutsy Indie Publishers on Facebook. This is a place where all indie authors get together to answer our questions and help one another find solutions.

Share any questions you may have about indie publishing with us below.

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Do you have a “My Gutsy Story” you’d like to share?

To submit your own, “My Gutsy Story” you can find all the information, and our sponsors on the “My Gutsy Story” contest page. (VIDEO) Submission guidelines here.

Three other October stories are up. So far we have Duke Marsh “My Gutsy Story” and Don Darkes “My Gutsy Story,” and Kim Brower’s “My Gutsy Story,” Doreen Cox “My Gutsy Story.”

I hope you enjoy the “My Gutsy Story” series and share with others through the links below. Perhaps you’d like to submit your own. Thanks.