Two Kindle titles instead of one

Over the weekend I remembered that I have three short stories set in the same universe as my novel. If I brush them off, I can put them up on Kindle as a free book.Hopefully, some folks will download it, like it, and then buy my novel. At least that's my sinister plan.

I'll put the short stories up on my website as soon as they're ready, so interested folks can see them quicker.

Lots to do

Here’s what I’ve accomplished so far:

1. Wrote the first draft of the novel about 88,000 words (about 16 years ago).
2. Finished 2nd draft of novel (now about 87,000 words).
3. Created this blog.
4. Bought the web domain for my pen name: http://www.derekjcanyon.com./
5. Found and commissioned an artist for the cover (I’ll talk about this process in a future blog).

Here's what I need to do:

1. Finish third draft of the novel by 9/11/2010. Will probably need another draft after that.
2. Get final version of cover (by 9/30/2010).
3. Design the cover (title/author name placement, font, etc.)
4. Get friends to review the draft and give me feedback.
5. Research editing costs.
6. Write the Product Description.
7. Continue blogging.
8. Learn the Kindle submission process.
9. Create the ebook.
10. Submit ebook to Kindle by the end of October.
11. Hopefully make some money.

That seems like a lot, but I hope to get it done. I don't know how long editors take, so that might push back my schedule.

Inspired by JA Konrath

I’ve been inspired to publish to Kindle, and to use a blog to record my efforts, by JA Konrath.

Konrath is a successful print and Kindle author. But, he has decided to concentrate on self-publishing on Kindle and other ereaders. Why? Because he’s making more money on Kindle than through print. He’s even rejected offers from print publishers in favor of Kindle.

His blog contains a wealth of specific information about his Kindle sales numbers, experiments in pricing, opinions on digital rights management, predictions about the publishing industry, and all sorts of other publishing topics. Really, it’s an invaluable read. It also has a vast and well-informed fan-base that make pointed and helpful comments.

Kindle readers download thousands of Konrath’s novels, and he’s making a better living through Kindle than his previous print publishing career. For example, in six weeks he earned $21,000 on Kindle sales. If he maintains that, it’s $182,000 yearly!

Now, I don’t expect to make anywhere near that amount. Konrath has more than a dozen ebooks on Amazon, and that gives him various benefits that he discusses on his blog. Starting out with only one book on Amazon, I’ll be happy to make a 1/100 of that (okay, maybe 2/100).

But, nobody ever said becoming a novelist was easy.

And so it begins...

I’m an aspiring writer with a couple obscure short stories and articles on my meager resume. I'm trying to find an agent for a novel I've been working on for the past few years. However, the print publishing process can take a very long time.

Therefore, I’m also going to dust off an unpublished novel I wrote 15 years ago and see how it does on the Amazon Kindle ebook reader.

This blog will chronicle my efforts, including costs, time spent, artist search, Kindle data, sales numbers, and so on.

So, if you want to read about the Kindle efforts of a writer with near zero publishing experience, come on back and see how I’m doing from time to time. If you have experience in the epublishing arena, you can also give advice!

I'll also provide links to epublishing resources as I find them. I've already put some up to the right.