Sunday, January 29, 2012

The Plan For Half-Vampire #2

During the process of self-publishing Confessions of an Average Half-Vampire, I think I've made every mistake possible.  But I've learned a lot.  Right now, what is -- I think, as I've actually lost count -- my 7th proof copy is being shipped to me for review.  Once it arrives, I'm NOT going to read the whole thing again.  I'm not.  Because if I do, I'll want to keep making little changes and perfecting it, and -- let's face it -- my school librarian is getting a bit miffed, as he wants the book NOW.  Nope, I'm just going to check to make sure the last set of changes were made, and then I'm going to make it available for sale (sometime within the next two weeks, I hope).
Today I just uploaded the cover and interior files for All in the Half-Vampire Family on createspace.  Notice that I'm doing that FIRST and not putting the e-book out right now.  That's thing number one I learned with the first book: don't put the e-book out until I'm SURE it's ready.  And I'm not so sure HV Family is ready right now.
Once it's approved, I'm going to order two proofs of the thing.  I'll give one to my English department head to proofread, and I'll keep the other.  This time, instead of making changes and ordering new proofs several times in a row, I have a PLAN.  I'm going to read the proof, make changes, re-read the proof, make more changes, then rinse and repeat, then retrieve the other proof and make any changes from that -- all before I return to create space to upload the changes even one time and order a new proof.
I hope this will cut way down on the amount of time and the number of proofs I have to deal with.
In any case, I have made another step forward tonight.
What's next?  Re-reading and touching up Becoming Brigid to get it to the point where I can order a createspace proof as well.  But with that book I have the added problem of an unfinished cover.

Don't forget: you can still enter my drawing for a free e-copy of Confessions of an Average Half-Vampire!  Just click here.
Posted by at
Labels: ,

4 comments:

  1. AlexiaJanuary 29, 2012 at 7:17 PM

    Very cool cover!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Lisa ShaferJanuary 29, 2012 at 7:53 PM

    Thanks. It's the same as the previous one, only left in the original colors instead of neonized in black.
    Both are actually just photos of the same splat of cherry pie body wash on my bathtub. It's very blood-like, don't you think?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Martin WilloughbyJanuary 30, 2012 at 3:37 PM

    Cherry Pie Body Wash? I thought you used watered down ketchup.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Lisa ShaferJanuary 30, 2012 at 5:32 PM

    I had various stage blood recipes (most of them involving corn syrup) ready to roll, when I remembered that in "Psycho," they used chocolate syrup for ice cream. And suddenly I recalled a half-used bottle of cherry pie body wash. Since I was going to photograph the splatters in the tub anyway, I figured it'd be the easiest thing to clean up, and it was the right color. So I thinned it with some water in a bowl, then splattered it all over, took a few dozen shots as it began to run, then washed out the tub.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)