Brief summary

• I use free and open source software throughout. See Tools I use
• I write the chapters pretty much sequentially. See How I write
• I elected to self-publish rather than hire a publisher. See Publishing options
• Initially I had a few decisions to make regarding tax and publishing as paperbacks
• In the UK you are legally obliged to send the British Library and others copies of your book
• How I don’t handle marketing
• I won some Awards

In detail

Tools I use

Creative writing probably requires only two things: an idea and something to write it with. So in the simplest terms you can do it with a pencil and paper. Writing something for publication requires a few more things, like a publisher. The choice of publisher will to some extent dictate the format of the file the writing is stored in and will certainly have an impact on how those files are arranged or formatted. As you’ll know I’m an advocate of freedom particularly with regards to software so my choice of tools was also dictated by that also. Here’s what I used:

• Vim - Text editor

  I use this to write the unformatted text. I use Vim in my day-to-day work so other options may suit other people but using a plain text editor enabled me to focus on the writing, spelling and grammar and not the formatting. Other distraction-free text editors exist for various platforms.

• Libreoffice – Office software

  I use this to compile and format the book and to produce the print-ready PDF required by the print house.

• Inkscape – Vector graphics editor

  I use this to create the covers and some other ancillary images used in the book.

• GNU Image Manipulation Program – Bitmap graphics editor

  As my kids did the drawings for some books I use GNU Image Manipulation Program to clean them up after scanning and convert them to 2-bit (black and white) images at the required resolution.

• Calibre – eBook-management software

  I use this to convert my eBook file into various eBook formats – including the kindle mobi format. It’s an excellent piece of software and I highly recommend it for not just converting but reading eBooks.

How I write

I usually write a book a chapter at a time, in order and I write each chapter in a separate file. This helps me focus on each chapter by itself and also meant I am able to read each chapter as I progressed to my editing team (i.e. my wife and children 🙂 ). For my first ful book it took me around a year from starting with a bare idea to finishing the epilogue. That’s mostly because I was fitting in the writing around my day job and I wasn’t spending all my spare time on it. This had an interesting side-effect though. I found that leaving it for a few days and coming back made me read back through what I had done previously and thus I became a secondary editor of my own work. Later books and short stories took a shorter amount of time but I was still found it helpful to leave it a few days and come back to it.

For books I start by writing a quick one-page synopsis of the storyline and split that into chapters. So each chapter had a sentence about it’s plot line and this gives me something to flesh out when I came to write the chapter. It isn’t set in stone though and I change aspects of the storyline following feedback from the editorial team and proof-readers. This means I had to go back and amend some earlier chapters as the story progressed but I find it somewhat easier that way.

For short stories, pretty much a setup and a punchline, I write without a synopsis and use the idea in my head. I then go back through it a few times and alter it as required until I am happy. Then it’s off for proof reading (again this is mostly my family).

Which self-publishing platform I use

When I started, I wanted to keep costs down and, for me, this is a hobby/interest not an income stream. I do not expect my books to be sellers, let alone a best sellers so I’ve never really wanted to go to the bother of a traditional publisher/editor. Never the less I wanted to make a print copy available and also one for Kindle. This is mostly because I had written the first book for my kids and they wanted to see their drawings in a “real book” – indulge me for being a Father trying to encourage his kids’ creativity.

Early on, I looked at a few different options – mostly the main ones: Lulu and Createspace came to the fore. I chose Createspace because being an Amazon company they kept the costs of putting a book on the ubiquitous portal down. Createspace is now the Amazon KDP platform and I still use it for both kindle and paperback sales. A few people have questioned mny use of Amazon here. I wrote a response as part of another page

As an experience I have found KDP pretty good. The online tools for things like proof-reading and covers well produced and easy to use. The cover creator is a wee bit simple but I produce my own cover images and so it was handy to use a tool that highlighted where things like the barcode or bleed area (e.g. print margins) go. I don’t subscribe to the Kindle Unlimited program because that requires your work to be exclusively on Kindle. Mine is never going to be that. That means I don’t get as much in royalties as I would for exclusivity but it also means I don’t get pinned down on where my work is available and, importantly, that I can make it available here under Creative Commons.

To publish to non-Amazon ebook platforms (iTunes etc.) I use Smashwords. This enables me to publish to a variety of commonly used platforms from one place. Smashwords allows you to manage kindle publishing as well, but as I already use KDP for paperbacks I stuck with KDP for that bit.

Of course, I also make all my work available to download from this very site in a variety of formats so I get a lot of downloads that way (10s of thousands a year per book at last count).

Publishing options

I get that, for some, writing a book is something they’d love to do but publishing one is not. Self publishing gives me the ability to publish paperbacks and put my work on popular platforms but I am happy to keep all the creativity and associated work in house.

If you don’t want to do that, traditional publishers are one way to go. In that form a publisher will do all the proof-reading. editorial, design and marketing work for you as well as production and distribution. You just have to pay them. This applies to ebooks as well as printed books.

Another option could be hybrid publishers. These try to bridge the gap between self and traditional publishers and offer services you can pick and choose from. e.g. You might be fine with cover design but need their editorial service.

As said, this is not much more than a hobby project for me and I am quite creative so I prefer to self-publish. The self-publishing process also suits my nature. I like doing things myself and I am able to take as long as I like with these books and stories.

Dealing with the IRS

The major (and as far as I can see the most cost-effective) players are based in the USA. This is fine for US citizens as the platform handles all the tax requirements on your royalties. For those of us outside the US it’s a problem though as the IRS (US Tax office) takes 30% of your royalties before you see a penny. The UK has a tax arrangement with the USA so we should be charged at all but in order to claim this you need a UK tax identifier (e.g. your National Insurance number). KDP have a TAX form you complete with this and they take care of the rest, meaning you get all the royalties. You’ll have tax to pay at home but I’ll leave that for you to sort out.

It wasn’t that easy before and involved calling the US URS on the telephone but thankfully that’s no longer the case.

Legal deposit

Publishers of any printed works published in the UK must, by law , send a free copy to the six Legal Deposit libraries within one month of the publication date. You must send five copies to the Agency for Legal Deposit Libraries and a separate copy to the British Library at a separate address. See ALDL FAQs for full details.

One of the nice things about using a print on demand service like KDP is that you can order your own books at a much cheaper price. This is because you are not being charged your own royalty.

Since 2013, you are also legally obliged to send copies of your ebooks to the British Library, although if you publish in both printed and electronic formats you need only send one and the Legal Deposit has stated that, in that case, it’s the printed one they want.

Marketing

I admit, I suck at marketing. I’m not good at writing ads, producing videos, doing social media marketing etc. I’m, at heart, an introvert and shy away from drawing attention to myself. In this instance, thats’ not an issue as I am not looking for these to be sellers, let alone best-sellers. Call it a hobby project or even a vanity project if you like but my decision to not do much marketing has led to me not having to spend money on this where I didn’t want to. Honestly I am surprised anyone reads this site, let alone this page :)

And there’s the crus. If you want people to spend money on your stuff, you need to spend money or time or (usually) both getting them interested. I don’t and I’m fine with that. If you self-publish though, all of that is down to you to manage. There are companies who will do it, algorithms to dance with and a million and one social media platforms to play with. For me that takes the fun out of the whole thing and fun is why I do this.

A quick note to any marketeers reading this: do not contact me offering SEO, marketing or other services, you won’t get a response. I don’t want or need such things. Thanks for asking though.

I do have a presence on some of the services I’ve mentioned before. For example I have an Author page on Amazon and Smashwords. I also have a presence on Goodreads. All of those largely serve to point people to this website though.

Awards

Many of the established book awards don’t allow self-published books to enter. There are some who do and the Wishing Shelf Awards is one of those. It’s the one I enter my books into and the one I have won.

The Wishing Shelf Awards offer more than just a medal though. Each entry is given to a reading group for feedback and this is fed back to the author. Winning entires get an Amazon and a Goodreads review as well.

The feedback is really important here, for me. For my books they give them to school classes to read and so the feedback comes directly from the children, their teachers and their parents. You cannot buy that kind of feedback. Actually you can and they offer it as a separate service alongside the awards. The feedback they gav eme from my first book, helped me improve when I wrote the second one - and that won the Gold Medal! Good (well constructed, useful and even critical) feedback works.

I am not affiliated with WSA, I just think they do great work and offer great value.