The glamour of being a one woman band
To the traditional publishers who turned me down, may I just say I hate you. I am sure there is something to be said for you guys handling all the damn paperwork/packaging/postage!
This self-publishing gig is damn hard work, you know.
You, dear reader, may remember I had a little glitch with generating my invoices for advance orders. I forgot a minor detail: the INVOICE NUMBER! OK, so sending out invoices is OK once you get that minor detail right, but then one has to keep track of who has paid. Create a spreadsheet to keep track of the GST (who invented THAT anyway?) and the postage collected.
Box of Books
Today’s processing started with getting a co-worker to help me lug four cartons of books to the car. Each book weighs almost half a kilo, so muscles are needed.
By the time I left the office I had already autographed 11 copies of the book.
Stopped off at the store to buy a marker and a pen. Stopped at the post office to buy the padded envelopes and the boxes for the multiple orders. This meant lugging a half empty (luckily) carton into the post office to make sure I picked the right sized boxes. Naturally, the closest car park was half a block down the street.
Got the boys to haul the cartons out of the car.
Writing a memoir when memories are fresh
Love versus Goliath
Memoirs are usually of a time in one’s life that was long ago. A period of childhood, perhaps, or a time migrating to a new land ten or twenty years ago.
Love versus Goliath is a different kind of memoir. Recent. I am not the only person mentioned in this memoir, in fact in many ways I am not even the central character. How do the rest of my family feel about all this?
Each of my family have different reactions and I’m not sure all of them even know how they feel, really.
Mr O Jnr 2 thinks it is “sick”! He has probably been the most “into” it right from the start. He was keen to be in the media photos, the others were not so keen. He wants to be an actor (engineering seems to have lost favour as the career of choice); I think he believes any publicity is good publicity for his future portfolio! 
He is also the one who comes home and tells me the newspaper articles are on the noticeboard at school.
Mr O Jnr 1 is more involved in his part-time job, his budding football career and his studies. He doesn’t say much at all. Besides, he is 15. As any parent of teenagers knows, that says it all!
Miss O 2 just wants the book to sell “lots and lots” so she can have a mini-iPad for her birthday. She does tell me her teacher has read it. Or one of the teachers has read it. I’m not sure who specifically, Miss O 2 is not into the finer details of such things when there is television calling!
Miss O 1 has read some parts, but avoided any publicity shot opportunities. When she saw the actual book I think it finally became real for her and she said it is “really cool, Mum”. 
I guess for the kids it could be embarrassing. I hope not and I haven’t received any negative feedback. Before I published I made the schools aware, as a precautionary measure.
Self-publishing lessons learned
Watchful readers will have noticed that I distributed an updated ebook version of Love versus Goliath recently. Nothing major, just a few corrections that had slipped through my umpteen edits and my beta readers as well (so it wasn’t just me)!
All went swimmingly with Amazon and, I believe, iTunes.
I was checking my book on Kobo to see if there were any reviews there and ooops – got a message that the book had been deleted! Hmmmm. A search of Kobo revealed Love versus Goliath still existed, but with a new URL. Plus my rating was back to “new book” rating. 
It was suggested that perhaps Kobo could fix it if I contacted them so I did just that.
This is their response.
Hello Robyn,
We are very sorry to hear that you are having some difficulties with the Kobo Writing Life service.
Whenever you upload a new file for an eBook, the version of the book and URL link on our site will change.
You will also lose any reviews and ratings from Kobo users (but not ones from Goodreads, which are linked through the ISBN).We are working on making changes to how our system operates so that all versions of books will be linked in the future.
This will mean that the URL links for older editions will be forwarded to the latest one automatically. Ratings and reviews will also be retained.I hope that this has clarified this issue for you. If you require further clarification, don’t hesitate to contact us.
Sincerely,
The Kobo Team
So it is good to hear changes are in the works!
Print edition of Love versus Goliath update
Refer to Self-publishing: the printing on paper stage for the lead-in episode! Somewhere along the line I didn’t collect all the information about how the Lightning Source system works! I think this is because I spoke to several different people in the initial stages, so clearly something got lost in the communication. Either that or I didn’t scroll down far enough on a particular page on the web site. Or ask the right questions. Any or all of the aforementioned.
I believed colour book printing was available from the Australian operation. It was one of the reasons I picked Lightning Source. Guess what? Lightning Source only do black and white interiors in Australia at this stage. So while the proof copy of Love versus Goliath is now printing anf then winging its way here for me to check stuff like are the page numbers positioned properly and is the ISBN correct, it is winging its way from the grand ol’ US of A!
For a moment I nearly had a heart attack. I had specifically not used Bookbaby (who did the eBook) for the print edition due to the shipping costs from the USA to here. Did I have to start the whole print-on-demand process all over again?
I have been informed that I don’t pay for freight. Hmmmmm, well, not as freight anyway. If I calculate the cost of the book being printed and delivered in the USA versus printed in the USA and distributed in Australia, there is a considerable difference in unit cost which I can only derive is the shipping cost build into the unit cost.
When I had calculated the retail prices, I had based it on the price I was quoted, yet it seems I will pay a lower per unit cost in the USA which means I could set a lower retail price.
I might be an accountant, but I’ll admit I have having a little difficulty getting the costing details I want in order to make proper decisions on this.
People’s Choice Award voting is now open
This is the third Best Australian Blogs competition organised by the Australian Writers’ Centre! I have entered in each of those years: 2011, 2012 and now 2013. Got to be in it, to win it!
Entries for the judged categories have now closed and while the organisers decide on the finalists, readers get to judge in the People’s Choice Award. You do not have to be Australian or in Australia to vote, as many writers have readers from all over the world.
Click on the button above to be taken to the voting page. Love versus Goliath is on page 3. I know, I’m sorry – I should have a title that starts with an “A”!
Now, I’m not very good at the “Please vote for me” stuff, so I’m just going to say if you have enjoyed following us over the years, please vote for Love versus Goliath.
Thank you kindly!
If you would like to consider buying the book Love versus Goliath, please click on the book cover in the right side-bar for links to reviews and other details.
Mummy’s got swag!
That is the kids’ assessment of my first speaking appearance resulting from our book, Love versus Goliath. Mummy’s got swag!
Mike Jeremy hired me as a guest speaker at a migration agent seminar. This was my first speaking engagement related to our book. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Mike very much for taking the risk. Mike had never actually met me, he knew me only from social media. He had no personal experience of my public speaking skills, but he was intrigued by our case. I could tell over lunch he was nervous, but once I took the floor I do believe he was happy. Risk and reward – the risk paid off.
I did warn Mike I would go over time – I ALWAYS go over time. Actually, I don’t think I was too bad, I did try to watch the clock!
I really enjoyed doing the presentation. It was an opportunity to share information and our experience to a wonderfully attentive and interested audience. I have noticed some search terms hitting the web site tonight that are obviously the result of people wishing they had written down my website URL at the time! 
So many of the course attendees came up to me at the end and thanked me, congratulated me and asked questions. It was really lovely.
Mike sent these Tweets:
Mike’s reaction
I am doing it all again tomorrow!
A Common Enemy – The Planet Below
***Previous episodes of A Common Enemy can be found on the top menu. A little sci-fi in progress. ***
The alarm pierced his dreaming. He stretched out to silence the damn thing. Where the fuck is the bloody phone? He opened his eyes to find the glowing, blaring, technological nightmare he could never escape from. The noise silenced, he lay back against his pillow at stared at the ceiling.
Another day trying to stop people killing each other.
He slid his long legs over the edge of the bed and forced himself to his feet. He stumbled to the shower cubicle and turned on the tap. This was always a guessing game: would there be water or not? Today he was lucky, the water sprayed across his broad shoulders and trickled down his taut frame.
He dried himself off, brushed his teeth and dragged on his dark green uniform. The four stars over his chest glittered briefly as he passed the window, the last of the moonlight catching the metal surface. In the weapons locker he drew on his flak jacket, boots and helmet and strapped on his three guns. One day we’ll develop lightweight weapons, he groaned to himself.
Jeremiah. Nice to meet you. He smiled at himself in the mirror. A routine he had developed when he realised his morning smile to himself might be the only smile he would receive all day.
Jeremiah walked out of his apartment, listening for the auto-lock click as he turned left to the lift. He pushed the lift button and waited, hoping for a solitary trip to the car park. After killing three rogues yesterday, he wasn’t in the mood for company.
Death. Every damn day there was more death. Too many humans in two small a space. No jobs. No reliable water or electricity. Medical care for only those who qualified genetically or could afford to buy a genetic bio-chip. Jeremiah touched the small mark on his neck where his had been inserted. These days the bio-chips were inserted at birth, but they’d only been introduced ten years ago, when he was twenty.
