The author’s journey has many roads
The author's journey has many roads less traveled, especially the first time.
First, conceive the story, draft it, edit and revise it, polish and proof it, and SAVE THE FINAL, the most important step by far, which is Stopping. We take weeks, months, or years to get to that point. In the process, there are beta readers, workshop commenters, or a professional editor.
Finally, we're half done. Our blood has dried on the keyboard, and we're Ready to Publish. Either go traditional or with one of hundreds of imprints, or self publish. (Never go with a vanity press, and be wary of hybrids.)
It's an easy decision: first self-publish on Amazon Books, Google Play and others. Then market it via social media and a little advertising, sell 5-10,000 copies, catch the eye of a Big Four publisher or imprint, land a contract and an advance, and sell more. And build a name and a brand.
The biggest decision regarding self-publishing is Print? Ebook? Kindle? Nook? What and how? That's easy too — do both print and ebook, and if smart, audiobook as well.
But Print is the gorilla in the room, physical paper, while an ebook is a slim, small and svelte, a Capuchin, digital. Paper cost is 80-100 times the cost of an ebook to produce, which comes out of the author's pocket. They are manifestly different, look and feel different, and are formatted and prepared differently.
In a print book, you can have headers and footers, text boxes, photos, etc. Not really the same in an ebook. A text box in an ebook shows as invisible. Photos (jpg) in an ebook adds megabytes to the cost and decreases your royalties. You need page breaks, section breaks etc. in Print, but not in an ebook except for a few.
So special formatting for text in the ebook version is critical to get right.
Then it's converting your final MS-Word print document (docx) to digital kpf (Kindle), or ePub. Back in the day, it was the mobi format if you wanted to be on Amazon. Then the Kindle came out, and KDP has Kindle Create, a program for that. But now too, KDP accepts ePub format even for Kindle. It's easy to create ePubs, if other internal text formatting is complete, by using Calibre, totally free, and worthy of donations to keep it supported.
Every book and version, print, ebook etc, must have an ISBN. You could (I think should), get it from Bowker, 10 for $295, a unique number for print, Kindle, ePub, etc. Or don't get your own (either in your name or your company's name), and let the publisher get it in their name, usually free. And you must copyright your book, hopefully print and ePub, and pay $65 for copyright protection if you want that.
From start to being on a store shelf, writing and publishing a book isn't simple, can be complex, but is doable with time, concentration, and effort. Then there are book launches, marketing, advertising, etc. Like I said, it's a journey, with many roads.
But not much else compares to being a published author. Awards and such fade, while your book lasts forever.
