I hope all of you are finding a good life and a clear outlook in this new year. And what a year it promises to be. I’ve been living the life of a recluse for too long. The image that brings to my mind is what Howard Hughes looked like during his last reclusive years atop his Las Vegas Casino. That wasn’t me. Okay, so I did wear an adult diaper after my prostate surgery, but that was short-lived (TMI?), and I did grow a beard, which I kept trimmed. Oh, and I went to a salon for manicures and pedicures. One more thing, I don’t own a casino.

So here I am all fresh and full of spirit with energy stored up to go out and talk about my newest novel, The Relentless Sun. It is the first book I self-published through Amazon Kindle. It was a learning experience going through that process, and I gained some insight into the publishing industry. The first thing I learned was it costs money to publish books. Hiring an editor to make it readable is possibly the second most costly part. Another cost is getting the right cover for the book. Very important. I found the perfect image to describe the book on a free image site called Pixabay and put it out there on the internet, and within a week, some guy wrote me saying his publisher used the same image for his book. I couldn’t believe it. I took it down and got the same company that edited my book to make a good cover that is my own and cannot be duplicated.

The most tedious and expensive part of publishing is advertising. Knowing how, when, and where can lighten your pocketbook and your head.

There is a lesson here, folks. Writing books is fun. Publishing and selling is hard, especially for someone who hates spending money.

I will be continuing with this subject matter in future posts.

Keep reading