Expat Women Take Note

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Kissin' Cousins

While surfing for a pro-Muslim web site which might be in the position to review Suitcase Filled with Nails,” I stumbled upon Jihad Watch, and I don’t think it is the kind of site I was looking for.  Interesting though.

JIHAD WATCH.

Denmark: Muslim cousin marriages fills schools for retarded

“Cousin marriages has negative impact on intelligence, sanity, health and society. In Pakistan, 70 percent of all marriages are between first cousins (so-called "consanguinity") and in Turkey the amount is between 25-30 percent. Across the Arab world today an average of 45 percent (in some parts up to 70 percent) of married couples are related.

This phenomenon is allowed for by Islam's marriage law, which is delineated in Qur'an 4:23-34, making this something for which Sharia opens the door.

The lowered intelligence, psychiatric diseases and low status that result from handicaps that afflict many Muslim children as a result of inbreeding may increase the chances of luring people into becoming suicide bombers.”

Doesn’t this just automatically make you think of the Underwear Bomber?  And, the word retarded.  The Underwear Bomber will get his come-uppance for sure.  But the author of  “Denmark: Muslim Cousins Fill schools for Retarded,” will go Scott free.  Even though the author may have his statistics correct, ‘retarded.’ is just plain politically explosive. Maybe that was the author’s plan.

In Kuwait, I taught developmentally challenged students, the off -spring of first cousin marriages.  I attended the marriages of many friends who married her first cousin.  I don’t know how their kids will come out, or even if, the statistics cited by the author of the article above, will factor into their lives.   

I’ll just keep searching for other sites to support my platform and there are lots out there like the Middle East Forum, interesting, but still not quite what I was looking for.  In the mean time Suitcase Filled with Nails made the front page of EEK! Expats e-Mag Kuwait

Attachments

EEK! Issue #3, November 2011

Scroll down a few pages for excerpts.  It’s a nice sight.

You’re So Vain

 

Last week, I slogged through rain squalls, boarded a ferry boat and witnessed from the snug bow, a sea lion thrashing about, fish in mouth, run over and returned from whence it came, in the ferry prop wash.  Seriously, I am not kidding.  It’s not like an omen or anything, just another misfortune of traveling to a fro from the Olympic Peninsula.

 

I would drive the length of Whidbey Island, cross Deception Pass Bridge, my destination Skagit Valley, to attend a writer’s workshop.  There I met some publicists and inquired about their services.

 

I was told Suitcase Filled with Nails, would likely never be reviewed by the mainstream because it was published by a Vanity press, which immediately prompted me to zing off an email, subject line: ARGHHHHHHHHHH, to Randy, my publisher.  To which Randy replied with: ARGHHHHHHHHHH, and his reply containing the following albeit, some editing on my part.  My interjections are in italics.

 

“Unfortunately their brain is clearly stuck somewhere in the 20th century. I’m afraid most of their peers are, too. If  Authorcloud (AC) were a vanity press, you'd be out by about 30 grand by now (I paid AC $500 for cover and page design, ISBN, and liaising with printers & binders, and $300 for paperback and ebook cover design) and I would not be patiently cajoling booksellers to order the book, etc. etc. etc.  'Vanity presses' don't do this sort of thing.”

 

He continues.

 

“The old publishing paradigm is rapidly fading, I’ll use my own book,  MAN UP In Ten Lessons, which I am poised to publish as an extreme example -- the very definition of 'vanity' publishing! But wait a minute: I AM a publisher, with over three decades of work in the traditional trenches to prove it.”

 

He adds.

 

“As I recall, Bennett Cerf's works were published by Random House, back in the day. And who was a founder of Random House? Oh, that's right, Bennett Cerf. Who also published everyone from Faulkner to Rand. So, did the media refuse to review his own (wildly best-selling) works because they were published by his own company?

 

"At the end of the day (and 'the day' is ending very, very quickly), people in the trade are going to have to start to pay attention to works published by 'atraditional' houses, or they are going to be left far, far behind. The sad fact is, the vast majority of writers published today by traditional publishers are poorly served, on multiple levels.”

 

He kind of concludes.

 

“Similarly, if authors choose a publishing model that allows them to move forward with a project that would otherwise either not happen at all, or take close to forever (I spent four months sending out 135 queries and proposals to agents, publishers, all who agreed my story was timely but they just weren’t in the market for my type of book.) why is that automatically a "bad thing?"  Do publicists and media really believe that because a book has been published by a traditional publisher, it's going to be "good," that it's automatically worthy of a review, that the public is going to both want to hear about it and its author, then rush out to buy it? And conversely, that if a book is published by anyone other than a traditional house, it's beneath contempt?"

 

 

Yesterday I took the ferry boat to Seattle (no sea lions were observed being minced to pieces on this crossing). Judging by all the unsold books written by celebrities, I saw on the shelves of bookstores I visited to drop off copies of Suitcase, Randy may have a point.  Whether, I’m providing a platform for his publishing  passion is not the point.  The point is, even if Suitcase Filled with Nails, had been picked up by a traditional publisher, it could still take as long as three years to get it in print.  At least, that’s what the one publisher who actually made an appointment to see me, said before declining to publish my timely book.

 

It’s all about traditionally published books written in vain - overshadowing good books that have been published by atraditional press.  Getting published by the old guard is too much about who you are, who you know, not how well you write about what you know.

 

I mean, Ellen Degeneres could write, “My hair is highlighted and I wear high top sneakers.”  Paste this sentence between two covers, and I bet your britches, it would be picked up and promoted by a traditional publisher.  Seriously, I am not kidding.

 

Night Owl

Last night Henry, my little dog, took me out for one last pee (his) before going to bed.  He was a foot away from me in the backyard when the back of my hair flashed up in a sudden burst of wind.  I screamed.  Henry barked.  Both exclamations making their point because the owl which mistook my Chorkie for a rabbit, broke his dive and angled up and away from his prey, shot past the web of madrona and pine, smack into a full moon.

As with the night owl, I am bombarded out of the blue by emails on how to promote Suitcase Filled with Nails,- because I subscribe to blogs or newsletters, with free information that always leads to wanting me to purchase a service or product.

In the morning after the owl encounter, as Henry curled in his bed and I turned on the computer, there are four of these emails which  promise to help me:

• Reach the journalists and bloggers who matter through our 1.4 million–record database
• Engage the public directly through social media and easy online content
• Track and record every interaction, tweet, email, news release and media mention
• Analyze  results with quick and easy reporting

·        Boost my brand by starring in a professionally
produced video series

·        Create  editorial calendars :a master, specific event and spread sheet

·        Build my platform

·        Create a SEO (whatever that is)

·        Generate a bazillion tweets

By late afternoon, at least four more emails from various companies all promise to help me with some form of above.  One of these stood out from the others in its direct simplicity, Drew Gerber’s   askdrew@publicityresults.com  It’s worth a look.

At this point my platform is one simple book.  My calendar cost a $5 donation to the SPCA.  Pictures of puppies and kitties are posted above calendar cells inked with interviews, readings, and signings.

An owl hoots in the madrona now silhouetted by a rising moon.  It is time to turn off the computer and walk the dog on a short leash.

To Amazon or Not to Amazon: That is the Question

If my web mistress Heather thinks Paypal is the best thing since sliced bread.  I believe, my publisher Randy thinks Amazon is the blight of the literary famine.  He is not alone with his thoughts.

In the last week I’ve approached six different books stores about doing a reading/signing.  Half were and half were not receptive to a reading/signing but on the whole each book store was interested in carrying Suitcase.

Each time I mentioned Suitcase could be ordered through Amazon I was met with hostility.  “We do not order anything through Amazon,” one shop owner said.  One bookstore owner even refused to look up my book on Amazon.  Another said “You make it hard for independent bookstores to order your book.” I liked Amazon and thought everyone liked Amazon.  So I asked Randy Morse, authorcloud publisher for his two cents.  He gave me more than I bargained for.

Independent bookstores don’t like Amazon because… THEY SEE AMAZON LEADING THE CHARGE AWAY FROM BRICKS & MORTAR TO ONLINE BOOKSELLING. AN INDEPENDENT BUYING FROM AMAZON GETS A DOUBLE-WHAMMY: THEY RECEIVE A LOWER DISCOUNT THAN THEY WOULD IF THEY PURCHASED DIRECTLY FROM MOST PUBLISHERS, AND THEY'RE ESSENTIALLY HELPING FINANCE THEIR BIGGEST COMPETITOR. AMAZON IS NOW BY FAR THE WORLD'S LARGEST SELLER OF PHYSICAL BOOKS, AND ARE CERTAINLY ONE OF, IF NOT THE LARGEST SELLER OF EBOOKS AS WELL.

Since Randy answered this part of my email question in all caps I think it was to emphasize this point.  He also added, but in upper and lower case, “As  Amazon begins to behave more and more as a publisher (first CreateSpace, now "Amazon Publishing") as well as bookseller as well as printer (Lightning Source),”  they begin to create a “good ol' fashioned monopoly.”

This is why, as stated in the second paragraph of my last blog, the company I registered, Pomegranate Productions, will sell and ship only (in the U.S. only, personally signed or not) the book version of Suitcase.  The publisher, authorcloud will sell ebooks and ship books to anyplace in the world.  While the other afore mentioned will (at this point) sell only ebooks.   I think this arrangement will make everyone happy.

PayPal and Me

Heather, my website mistress, exclaimed “PayPal is the best thing since sliced bread.  I love it!”  She said this early in the morning as we set up a PayPal account to link to my website to sell Suitcase, through my new business, Pomegranate Productions which is listed along with authorcloud, Amazon, Barnes & Nobel, Sony Reader and Ibook.

         

By early afternoon Heather’s love of PayPal hadn’t wavered but her patience had.  Trying to make sense of the ordering business meant finding the right ordering button (check out cart, buy now, order now) and writing a definitive direction for each link.  Pomegranate Productions my company, will sell and ship only (in the U.S. only, personally signed or not) the book version of Suitcase.  The publisher, authorcloud will sell ebooks and ship books to anyplace in the world.  While the other afore mentioned will (at this point) sell only ebooks.

How to arrange all this information on a graphically pleasing, and comprehensible website page had both me and Heather hunch-backed, blurry eyed and brain dead by early afternoon.  TMI, and too many different directions, instructions, obstacles and dead ends.  We could not link to ibooks because neither of us own ipads.  Ironic.   I told my friends Suitcase was available through the afore mentioned, and my friends with ipads relayed they had purchased Suitcase.  When I went on line to see how this worked I could not access iBooks, because I do not own an iBook which you must own to have an iBook account in order to purchase Suitcase though iBooks.

I still write thank you cards by hand and mail them through the postal service.  I have a vast library of books because I only buy books. All of my three published books were first written in sloppy cursive on errant pieces of paper and in spiral notebooks.  So, this ebook, ibook stuff has me buggered.

After Heather had gone home to feed the chickens and I went on a long walk, with my short dog, I returned to my office, opened an email from Shelly Hitz, a self-publishing coach, which included this factoid:

“Amazon sold 22 million Kindles in the first half of 2010 with Kindle book sales outpaced hardcover books sales.  And the numbers continue to increase for ebook sales.”

It’s a fact of my literary life in need of an upgrade.  And I still haven’t got a handle on PayPal.

Humbling

When I was a really young (i.e. not even old enough to legally purchase alcohol) journalism student in a community college, my journalism instructor wrote a book. It was self-published under his own imprint.  After the book was printed and he began distribution, he would advise his students, “When you write your first book promote it first locally".

Beyond the five W’s - who what where when and why - all rolled into a 21 word lead, and the bit about self promotion, I’ve forgotten whatever else he taught me about journalism.

I regret the name of the publisher imprinted on the spine of the first two books I had published by Shameless Hussy Press.  Despite the rather unsettling name, Shameless Hussy did publish my books and arranged for book jacket blurbs, reviews book signings and interviews.   Now, with Suitcase Filled with Nails, published also by a not-so traditional publisher, but with a name I don’t mind having imprinted on the spine of the book; the work of getting it out there is in my hands and I find it a humbling experience, this shameless quest of self-promotion.

I began promoting Suitcase in my own backyard, as did my long-forgotten journalism teacher with his book.  Before I even started this humbling task, I was offered two opportunities by just mentioning I finished writing a book.  One is in the foyer of the local bead-shop/art gallery and scheduled on the monthly gallery walk night.  The other is in the high school gymnasium at the annual holiday crafts fair.  Neither venues are high-profile, but each are heavily trafficked and will put me and my book before the public eye and I am appreciative of the invitations. 

Then I approached my first bookstore, browsing the shelves and even asking if a certain title was in stock (it wasn't) before asking if I could do a reading/signing there.

           

“No,” we haven’t done author signings for three years.  Maybe only two or three people would show up.  It was time consuming doing all the publicity and embarrassing for the author,” said the owner of the shop who was,  "retiring soon.”

The regional library was very supportive and set me up with a 4-5:30 pm. signing. I would do all the publicity.  Buoyed by their generosity I approached my local library.  I was told the woman in charge was gone that day but would call me back the next day.  She did not.  Days went by and I called again.  She was not in.  I left a message.  Days went by.  I called again.  She was in.  Maybe in March I could schedule a reading.  Call back in February.  Same with the local book store.  They were booked through March.  Call back in five months.

Elliot Bay Bookstore in Seattle and Eagle Harbor Books on Bainbridge were more receptive.  As soon as I provide them with a copy of Suitcase they would get back to me about scheduling a reading/signing. These two inquiries were conducted over the phone.  I stood up while talking to project and air of professionalism.

Two days before Halloween I approach another out of town bookstore.  Like the first bookstore, I peruse the shelves.  After a bit I approach the woman at the check out counter, first making sure no customers were expected, and ask, a bit nervously “Who is in charge of scheduling book readings and signings?"   That would be the owner and she was not in.  The checkout woman handed me a terms of author book sales agreement and the owner’s business card. 

Everyone of the four book stores so far contacted said they would not order books from Amazon.com and would, if they decided to stock Suitcase, take books on consignment from me at the industry standard of 40% bookstore 60% author.

By Halloween night  hard copies of Suitcase are still at the printers, but it had been uploaded to iBooks and Amazon.  Priced at $4.99, I know already two copies have been sold because of postings (positive) on Facebook.  This is encouraging.  I only have 998,000 more copies to go before reaching my goal.