Small Publisher Organization

I was recently reviewing my 2011 writing output so that I could reformat it to reflect what I’ve learned, and I discovered that I’m an unorganized idiot. I also realize that my fellow small publishers, while not idiots, may also be ridiculously unorganized. Not to mention the aspiring small publishers who, theoretically at least, follow this blog. (There’s a lot of traffic, and I’m pretty sure it’s not all pornography.) So, now that I’ve done the muddle-through, I’ve systemized for your benefit the organization I (under the auspices of H2NH ePub et al) am and have been using in 2012.

GRAPHIC!

Presumably, you’ve already done all the Business of Publishing stuff, so make a folder titled “Example ePub”, then set up all these folders. I hope it’s not too complicated, but here’s a guide:

Top

Ads

Banner ads, book trailers and catalogues.

ARC PDF

Convenient access to all your prepared ARCs, for immediate e-mailing upon request.

Templates

Word and HTML templates, for the busy publisher.

Workflow

Checklists, macros, and miscellaneous time-savers.

Imprint

Your sexy publishing logo, in small and large size.

Author Name

Each pen name, or the names of fellow authors you’re assisting. You can do everything yourself, but what with all the labor-saving templates and macros I’ve made, I’d be happy to format your story up for Amazon, Smashwords and B&N (e.g. MOBI, DOC, and EPUB) for a cool fifty bucks, if you provide me with cover art (or don’t mind me using a generic text-heavy cover), and have already made a publisher account. Books and collections extra because I hate Smashwords formatting. Oh, and you’re not allowed to complain too much, as it’s only $50. (See blog footer for other suggested cover art and formatting services.)

000Current Project

This is the only part of the folder that’s allowed to be disorganized. Toss in all the chapter TXT, draft DOC, versions of documents in editing, up-to-current EPUBs you like - even some preliminary cover art/illustrations. Once the book is done, it’ll all go into a neat little folder and you won’t have to hunt for it. If the book doesn’t get finished and you want a new current project, you get to make an official ‘in-progress’ DOC or RTF file and put it in a Book folder for when you get back to it. Don’t let those pile up, though, or you’ll forget the characters.

Stories

This is where organization really pays off. You’ll probably write a thousand short stories (5,000,000 words!) in your career, so you’d better get organized, or your estate will curse you forever. You can’t expect filial piety if you didn’t do the basic ground-work.

You should probably subdivide your stories by year written, unless you’re writing more than 999 stories a year, in which case you should be making enough to hire a secretary and a minimal staff to organize all that, and you shouldn’t listen to me because I want to learn from you (I’m sure it’s possible, I just want to observe your technique!)

Title

001, 002, 003, 004, 005…c’mon.

Packs, Bundles and Collections

You should be collecting your stories. That’s just basic. There’s two kinds of short story customers: one sees a great short story blurb and says “Wow, that’s pretty neat!” and buys it. The other sees a great short story blurb and clicks on the author name to buy a collection. Cater to both. I use a simple system of “Packs and Bundles” to do the initial collecting, then I get fancy with Collections.

Five Pack

It doesn’t have to be five stories, but it should be at least 15,000 words.

Ten Bundle

Again, exactly ten stories is optional, but it should be at least two five packs, or 30,000 words.

Collection

Get fancy, choose a theme, select the stories for it, and get some great cover art. This is your short story showpiece, and will stand for all time as testament to your greatness. Anywhere from fifteen to thirty stories will do you, but I’d personally shoot for 60,000 words, here.

Price List.txt collects all the word counts and prices of the stories, so you don’t have to check.

Book

Individual books in here, bulking up each folder to The 13 Files. Do not, under any circumstances, add anything else into these. You’ll just get confused, and feel dumb. If the inspiration takes you, clear out Current Project and use that as your brain-dump until you’re ready to organize each book.

Series

Put all the books in the series in here, then put the cover art all in one place for your own convenience. Otherwise, each individual folder is the same as an individual book.

The 13 Files

Every single title folder shall have these (and only these) files, non-negotiable. Of course, if you use Photoshop, replace the GIMP file below with that. I just use GIMP because I'm on a 12" netbook and wouldn't be able to take advantage of Photoshop's many features.

See H2NH ePub Workflow for details.

A FocusWriter

01 “Title.txt” (plain text)

02 “Title.rtf” (edited copy, with italics)

B GIMP 

03 “Title.xcf” (raw)

04 “Title(cover).jpg” (final eBook cover)

C Microsoft Word 2007

05 “Title.doc” (Master, with styles)

06 “TitleDOC.doc” (Meatgrinder-ready)

(Smashwords to Kobo, Diesel, Apple, Sony et al)

07 “TitlePDF.doc” (PDF backup)

08 “Title – Author.pdf” (PDF)

(DriveThruFiction; ARC)

09 “TitleHTML.doc” (with )

D jEdit

10 “Title” (for entities)

11 “Title.html” (clean HTML)

E calibre

12 “Title – Author.epub” (checked EPUB)

(B&N et al)

13 “Title – Author.mobi” (checked MOBI)

(Amazon)

Backup

.zip the folder up, once a week, and store it in four places:

1. In the ‘Example ePub Backup’ folder on your computer’s second hard drive.

2. On an external hard drive.

3. On a thumb drive in a drawer in your house.

4. Somewhere else secure, but that is not your house.

Write more

If all these folders are empty at the end of a year, you’ll feel like a twit.

Good to go, but talk to me later, when I’ve done some Print-on-Demand.

daB

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Our Forever Is Certain

in which a lede is buried
The time has come, as it often does, for self-reflection, and introduction. So, let me tell you about myself, and I’ll use small words. Or, at least, small words for me. Please allow me to introduce myself, I’m

Smart

I’m very smart. But! Smart, by itself, is not an advantage. It just means I can’t turn off my brain by myself during the boring parts of life, and O! So many parts of life are boring. What being smart means, and has meant for my whole life up until now, is that I’ve had to find ways to amuse myself above and beyond the simple pleasure of just existing. This is remarkably difficult, and I have, in the past, cheated and simulated the goal with beer and other ultimately unsatisfying forms of intoxication.

Clever

I’m very clever. But! Clever, by itself, just means that I’ve read more than you, and have a better memory, chock-full of everything I’ve read, so I have a big pool of sources to steal from, when I’m being a wit. O! And I am a wit. I’m the life of the duller sorts of party, the type where everybody talks instead of dancing. I can’t dance, since I’m clever, and know that a clever person dancing is rather letting the side down.  

Genius

I am a genius. But! Genius just means I have the right sort of mental illness, the kind that focuses me into a convenient and profitable specialty without entirely preventing me from functioning in society, so long as nobody asks too many questions. Combined with cleverness and smarts, I have to say that it makes me, while at times insufferable, also rather happy, and, for a given definition of circular, a well-rounded individual.

Engaged

Smart, clever, genius, or otherwise, what I, individual, actually am—as of today—is engaged, so I’ll try not to mess it up too much. Having stumbled into happiness by pure chance, I intend to hold on tight with both hands and travel as far as I can go.

The Speech

Jirawan, I know that the world is uncertain, the economy is uncertain, life is uncertain; That is, that The Future is uncertain - but I also know that my love is certain, your love is certain; That is, that True Love is certain - and if I love you, and you love me? Our Forever is Certain. You are my property, and I will use you as I like…forever and a day, and you can never run away; Not from me, David.

I love you.

-daB

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Ambrose/Barron Convo 1: Wearing the Writer Hat

This is the second part of a recent Google DocTalk™ with my publishing pal Jeff Ambrose, and we had a broad conversation about this Writing thing we do. We decided to split it up into two "hats", writer and publisher. Last week? "Wearing the Publisher Hat" This week: "Wearing the Writer Hat". You'll be able to find the conversation on both of our sites.

Jeff Ambrose of The Window In The Basement is JA

David Barron of by David Barron is daB

“Wearing the Writer Hat”

David Barron: ...yaknow, Ambrose Barron would be a really fun pen name. He writes Civil War Westerns and smokes a lot.

Jeff Ambrose: Do you know a lot about the Civil War?

daB: I’ve dabbled. As a political scientist, it’s my duty to know about the birth throes of the Modern Era. (That sounds much more exciting than what it looks like in academic papers.) It wouldn’t have to be about the battlefield exclusively.

JA: This is why Ken Burns is such a blessing … though I’ve heard his documentary on the Civil War is slanted at times. But then, all histories are slanted, if they’re worth anything. Who wants just a list of dates and facts? Good historians offer opinions.

daB: All description is opinion. That’s what writers have to believe or they’re screwed.

Attitude

JA: Since we’ve been talking a lot about what “beginners” should know, I think it’s important to emphasize again where one gets ones information. One reason why I don’t talk too much, if at all, about the business side of writing is that I don’t know enough. I struggled with writing for over 10 years before I finally got into the groove, and 2012 makes my twelfth anniversary of trying to make a go at it, and my second anniversary of Getting Serious. So I have no problem talking about writing or telling beginning writers (i.e., writer with less experience than I) what they should or shouldn't be doing. Again, this isn’t in terms of business or even craft. It’s attitude. What attitude should a writer have. What kind of work ethic should they cultivate.

And yet, it amazes me how many writers look to their peers for advice (I don’t look to my peers, and I don’t expect my peers to look to me!). That’s silly. I want to be a long-term professional writer … so I look to my peers how to do that? I have to say, if you’re doing that, you’re beyond crazy. You’re an idiot. Here’s the rule of thumb: If you want to be a long-term writer, look to long term writers for cues of how to think and act, of which attitudes to cultivate, of which ones to get rid of.

daB: The standard mantra If you want to learn the business, find a few successful people and do what they’re doing. Then: innovate. If you want to learn something, find somebody who knows how to do it and do that until you’ve figured it out, then make it yours. It works for writing, of course: Read a Lot, Talk a Lot, then Practice by...Just Writing. For business, it’s even easier. Learn Business, by Watching and Doing.

My “First 200 Days” was all about how I got into that Mindset of Writing (and Publishing), and the only clear lesson throughout is “Copy, then Create”. ...obviously the thing to copy here is not ‘intellectual property’ but rather ‘best practices’.

Copying To Create

JA: I agree! And you have to make it yours, too. But how? By copying first. That’s the only way. One of my 2012 writing goals is to get serious about studying the craft in different ways. One way to do this is to copy out passages you like, passages that strike you as supremely well written. Dean Wesley Smith equates this to letting their words flow through your fingers in order to learn both by analysis and intuitively. Now here’s the thing. Dean says to copy out in Standard Manuscript Format. He says it a lot, too. Why is this important? I’m not sure, but I think it has to do with seeing words in the rawest form, without the pretty font, without the bookish formatting. At any rate, I’ve decided that this year I’m writing using Standard Manuscript Format. I’m copying Dean’s method to a T, no exception. And I suspect that by doing what he does, I’ll not only learn how to write better (because of all that copying I’ll be doing) but I’ll also understand, in part, why he thinks Standard Format is the way to go. Once I understand that, I’ll be free to make it my own.

Now that I said it, I wonder if I’m just too OCD.

daB: Could be, could be... But I’ll sum it up, I think. It’s to ‘demystify’ the process, taking the formatting and spellcraft and sticking the words in Courier New, just like yours. Except written better. Writers aren’t Wizards, they just Work Harder.

Workshops

daB: I know you’re going to one of those workshops [for short stories?], and I think that’s an excellent idea, especially for ‘journeyman’ writers (digression: well. The categories are a little loose. I’ll give my hand rule: 10 books = journeyman; 100 short stories = journeyman) I haven’t done it for the simple reason that I’ve had the Pacific Ocean between me and America for 27 months, but I’ll certainly do one of these things at some point in the next two years. That’s hard-earned practice, intense story, character voice, plotting, what-have-you practice, and overseen by Experts.

JA: The workshop I’m attending is the Character Voice & Setting workshop, a pure craft workshop through and through, and from what I’ve learned from past attendees, you write around 30,000 words that week, a few short stories as well as a bunch of exercises, I think. For me, I’m going for two reasons. First, to learn the skills it teaches. I did choose that workshop, after all. And second, from what I can tell from his blog, from what others have said, and a few private email conversations, Dean and I think the same way, beginning from an analytical standpoint. That’s great for me, because I have to figure out a way to take the analysis and make it intuitive, part of the creative process. My hope, beyond learning character voice and setting, is to learn how to about learning the craft of writing. Workshops take time and money, so you have to really suck the marrow out of them when you can attend. You have to learn how to fish, so to speak, and not just eat that which is given to you. Needless to say, I’m thrilled about going to this workshop.

Career

JA: Regarding “journeyman” status, for me it’s a million words. That was John D. MacDonald’s mark, and Ray Bradbury said you have to write a million words before you hit the “foothills of good writing.” I have no idea how much I wrote between 2000 and May 2010, which was when I Got Serious About Writing, but I estimated about 500,000 words over those ten years. If that’s true, then I’m at 1,230,000 words overall. If I don’t count those first ten years, I have 270,000 words to go to hit the million word mark. That’ll come sometime this year.

daB: Both good, of course, I just prefer to measure by ‘titles’. 1 book/10 stories; beginner , 10 books / 100 stories ; journeyman , 100 books, 1000 stories ; Expert. It’s metric! Considering how few people write even 1 book (or, for that matter, one story) the pecking order of competence isn’t that hard to figure out. Before I started my blog, I had 1,000,000 trunked words, masses of plot holes and spelling errors (the stories of some of which I have salvaged, of course, which is fine.) I don’t really track my word count, except on a ‘work’ basis, billable hours (Have I written X,000 words today? 800 words this hour?) Not really on a yearly basis. I want “at least 4 books a year (i.e. 1 a quarter) and at least 52 stories (i.e. 1 a week)”

JA: Tracking word count on a yearly basis is just the outgrowth of tracking word count on a daily basis. I have a spreadsheet in Numbers (Mac’s version of Excel), and the tracking keeps me honest. I can see which days I wrote, how much, and I also have a track record of how I’m doing month-by-month. Which is nice, in case I want to set up a goal, such as, Break my monthly record, or what not.

Word Count vs. Projects

JA: Recently, however, I’ve become wary of my obsession with word counts. The most recent story I wrote took a big turn I didn’t expect, and once I realized the ending, I had to go back through the story and add/change what needed to be added/changed in order to make the ending work. I cycled through the story twice -- once to make the changes, and a second time to make sure it all worked like I should -- before I wrote the ending. Took me two days. Didn’t get too many words written. I freaked a little, then thought, What the hell? The goal is to write stories, not put words on paper. So I decided to back off a little on word count this year. I cut my yearly word count down to something more reasonable. Even though I’m still tracking daily and month words (I do want to know just how much I write this year), my real focus is on projects: at least 4 novels, 20 short stories, and 2 nonfiction works (and that may change, cutting out short fiction altogether, focusing only on novels). And that’s conservative, and based largely in part that I have no idea how long my novels will be, or how long they’ll take to write. 2012 is the Year of the Novel for me. I’m set on learning how to write a fricking novel. Short fiction, for me, will happen between novels and when I have a house full of kids this summer.

daB: I agree on needing to learn how to write a novel. Most of my books thus far have been ‘long short stories’, but when I read, say, a John Grisham or, for that matter, a Stephen King...they don’t feel like that. So, I just need to let it roll, let myself be free, and let the characters do their thing, until they stop doing their thing.

Oh, and I just did the math on 4 novels and 52 stories, and it says 500,000 words. (60,000*4)+(5,000*52) This should teach me not to do math. (I’m going to now ignore that number forever and just write)

Writing Novels

JA: I must have started anywhere between 10 and 15 novels over the years, but have finished only 2. I haven’t published any. It hit me today that my problem has been trying to write a long novel in the beginning. I mean, we learn by writing short fiction, right? Why not learn to write novels by writing short novels, around 40,000 to 50,000 words? Why set out to write 100,000 words novels, especially in this New World of Publishing, when you don’t have to write that long? So even though my goal is 4 novels, I hope to write 5 or 6 -- maybe even 7 -- short novels. We’ll see.

daB: My very favorite story length is 20,000 words, almost exactly. I call it a Davidku. It’s long enough for about five characters, but it only takes 2-3 hours to read. Which is the length of time I usually have for reading, unless I’m on a bus.

But, I think the secret of writing a 100,000 word novel is to not write a 100,000 word novel. That is...make some characters, decide a setting and let them roam and see how far they get. Then kill them off one by one, with bathos. I assume one of my novels this year will explode in this sense, and others will be stitched together ‘mini-series’ of three connected 20k stories. They’ll all be priced at $4.99, so who cares?

JA: True enough. Getting my mind around the freedom of length has been a difficult adjustment for me. For so long, a short story was 7,500 words, about 30 pages. So when I’m writing a short story, as I near the 7000-word mark, I can feel myself tighten a little, thinking I need to end it. Short fiction length in this New World is far more fluid than before. Likewise with novels. I have to stop thinking a novel is a 400-page beast. It’s not. And you’re right, the best way to write a 100k-word novel is to not try to write something that long. Just gotta learn to let the story go where it will.

Good talk! 

I don't want this to be the last Convo I do, because I'm too lazy to write my own blog posts now. If you want to have a Convo with me (or Jeff) and have indie published some stuff, hit me up on Twitter where I exist as DavidalBarron, or shoot me an e-mail at DavidalBarron [at] gmail [dot] com !

-daB
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