Another busy month has zoomed by in my indie publishing adventure. I’ve taken a few giant steps forward and a couple back, but I’m getting there.
It was exciting to receive the Cataloguing-in-publication entry for Flying through Clouds from the National Library of Australia and then to find the catalogue entry on Trove.
It was even more exciting when I received the laid out PDF file for the uncorrected proofs back from the cover designer / layout artist ready for printing. Well…I thought it was ready for printing until I discovered that the page extent needed to be a multiple of 16. So after minor reformatting I sent the PDFs of the cover and internal pages of the uncorrected proofs to Griffin Press to print 100 copies. I expect to receive the books back from the printers any day now.
I finished compiling an Advance Information Sheet (AIS) with book, publication and author details as well as front cover and author images. I’ll be emailing the AIS to bookshops, reviewers and bloggers in the coming weeks, and sending off uncorrected proof copies of the book when they come back from the printer. I also updated my website with the information on the AIS.
I now have a distributor – Dennis Jones & Associates. It’s important to get a distributor if Flying through Clouds is to be available in Bookshops and from online book suppliers in Australia.
It’s only in the last month that I’ve realised that my role as a publisher is quite distinct from my role as an author. It has been a struggle to temporarily set aside my creative side and concentrate on being a publisher – which I’ve never done before. I’m on a steep learning curve and it doesn’t look like levelling out any time soon.
I’ve commissioned a proof reader to proofread the laid-out PDF of the manuscript. After making appropriate changes, I’ll send the manuscript to the cover designer / layout artist to make the changes to the PDF using Adobe InDesign.
I recently drafted an Acknowledgements page for the book and I’ve been working on a media list. In the coming weeks, I’ll have to concentrate on my marketing strategy. Then there’s the eBook to think about…and Christmas!