Book Production

My Life in Tweets

By / June 3, 2012 / 1 Comment

My brain and hours have been full. If I’m not actually doing a shipping preparation task, I’ve been planning or tracking some business related task. This next week is when It get to send out 1000 presents in the mail to all the nice Schlock fans who gave us money. It is important not to mess this up. It is also important to make sure that Howard doesn’t over tax himself and to make sure that the kids get some attention. There is no “done” this week. It is all in the middle. However there do come times when I stop. Then it is like that schwarma scene at the very end of the Avengers credits, the one that some people find mystifying. I get it though. I’ve been that tired. After high energy, fast-thinking, intense action, there comes a time where it is all you can do to sit and chew. The brain goes blank and minutes drift by without notice. When I am stopped, I have no energy for crafting words. This is why I’ve not blogged since the books arrived on Thursday. I may not blog again for a week. What I will attempt to do is post short updates, probably based on things I’ve said on Twitter. I can pause work long enough for tweet sized thoughts. This means that those of you who follow me on Twitter will be getting re-runs. Sorry about that. If I can muster the energy I’ll add commentary so it’ll be like DVD extras.

Thursday May 31:
Good morning Thursday. I hope you’re planning to bring me a large truck full of books. If not, then I’ll like Friday better.

Thursday, you are my favorite day this week. You brought me 5000 books.

“Better than pulling a dead mouse from behind the dishwasher” is my new measure for unpleasant jobs. In other news, guess what I did today. [Note: this mouse was the cause of the mystery smell I complained about earlier in the week]

Friday June 1:
The things on my to do list won’t stop arguing about what is most important. Sleep. Really. Sleep is most important at 1am.

Made my to do list yesterday, must now zombie walk my way through it because 4 hours is not enough sleep. Glad a smart person made my list.

I have written up The Plan for my next 14 days. It is a lovely plan, full of things. I expect the first plan revision to occur in 3…2…

This is a day for writing things down because my brain is made of forget.

Saturday June 2:
Next week I’ll be posting updates about shipping progress. Such as: “all Schlock sketched books in the mail” Follow @sandratayler now to play along.

Shipping update for Saturday: Sketch sheets printed. Invoices sorted. cover signing and shipping of unsketched books to commence on Monday.

Oh, that’s right. I need to assemble 4 panels for an art show so I can ship them to DeepSouthCon50 on Monday. How many hours left today?

Art show solved: put art into a box, sort it nicely on the other end, I’ll be there to hang it. No careful instructions needed. Yay.

End tweet list.

I should probably note that I am looking forward to this week. Shipping is the week when I can see that this crazy business model really works. It is the time when I work with my hands and we have money to pay the bills. It also presents fun organizational and logistical puzzles. My brain likes these sorts of puzzles. It is just kind of a lot all at once and I wind myself up with being afraid I’ll do it wrong. Even though I’ve done it all before. Even though I have amazing help lined up. There is still that voice in my head which reminds me that I am human and therefore likely to make mistakes. I think I’ll feel much more relaxed once I see the first pile of packages loaded into a mail truck.

Sharp End of the Stick Arrives

By / May 31, 2012 / 3 Comments

It is nice that I am sufficiently familiar with the printing and book delivery process that I don’t panic anymore. I remember spending an entire week eagerly anticipating the arrival of a truck full of books and fretting that somehow all the books would be broken or wrong. It was terrifying to be holding pre-order money and not have the merchandise in hand to send. It is still tense. I always feel something unclench inside me when I crack open the first box on the first pallet of books to see that all is as expected. Each shipment has had its own little adventures. Our first book, Under New Management, arrived a week late so we’d arranged a shipping party and had nothing to ship. Howard ended up renting a truck and driving to Salt Lake to fetch the books. I think it was Tub of Happiness that was delivered in several feet of snow. Teraport Wars was the book where the lift gate on the truck threatened to tip the pallets over as it creakily lowered them to the ground. Emperor Pius Dei gave us a brief fright because all the boxes were stamped with Emperor Plus Dei and we were suddenly terrified that all the books had been misprinted, even though we’d already seen advance copies. These stabs of terror are not rational and reason has trouble banishing them.

Today’s adventure was receiving an email from our printing company to congratulate us on receiving our books yesterday, which we hadn’t. I did not panic, because it is very common for there to be confusion and miscommunication about book delivery. Shipping over seas on a freighter is inexact. The time spent clearing customs varies. So until the books arrive in Salt Lake City, no one is able to give us an exact delivery day. Reason told me that our books had arrived in Salt Lake yesterday and that was what the email meant. But I couldn’t sit still, because What If… I called our printer to tell them that we did not have our books yet. She said she would call the shipping company right away. Then I proceeded to pace while trying to pretend I was not pacing. What if the books had been accidentally delivered to someone else? What if there were no books?

Fortunately about fifteen minutes into my pacing I wandered past the front window and saw a truck in our cul de sac. He had four pallets of books for me.

It turns out that he’d attempted to deliver yesterday, but someone with a forklift had stacked the pallets on top of each other and they were too heavy to move that way. So he’d hauled the pallets back to Salt Lake to have them unstacked. An automatic system notified our printer of the first delivery and confusion was explained. This is our 13th time receiving shipments of books. There is always something unexpected.

Now I can begin to nail down the shipping schedule in earnest.

Pre-Orders, Shipping, and Travel

By / May 26, 2012


Pre-orders for Sharp End of the Stick close in just five days. That is also when we’re expecting a truck to show up with four pallets of books. The arrival of those books will usher in the next stage of book shipping work. Howard and Travis will spend a day signing covers while the kids and I stamp the sketch editions. Howard will begin sketching and I will begin shipping. This time we’re changing our shipping process. Instead of having a single big shipping day, we’re going to have many smaller shipping days. It will spread out the work and thus lower the pressure, rather like spreading out weight over a larger surface prevents breakage. It is possible that we’ll hate this new shipping method, but we’re committed to trying it this time. I’ve got two teenagers to help me in addition to my regular shipping second in command. I think that the end result will be all the books shipped by June 12th. Which is pretty important because on June 14th Howard and I depart for DeepSouthCon in Huntsville Alabama. If you’re in that area, hope you stop by.

For this Memorial day weekend, I plan to catch up on sleep and watch entirely too much Sherlock.

Book Announcements and News

By / May 15, 2012

It is a newsy sort of day.

First and most important. Pre-orders are open for Sharp End of the Stick. They opened yesterday morning which meant that yesterday was not a good day for clear thinking. You’d think we’d be more relaxed about this after 8 books, but we aren’t. Too much depends upon pre-orders. I always have a pocket of fear that this will be the time that the whole system falls apart. Then we’ll have massive bills and no big pile of money with which to pay them. One of the scariest things about running our own business is accumulating bills that run to four and five figures. Book printing and shipping costs do add up. Lots. So on pre-order day I do one of two things, I either hover over the internet checking figures and obsessively doing math to see if we’ve made enough money to breathe easy for the next six months. OR I run away from the internet and try to pretend that it is not pre-order day. (I call this the “la la la, I can’t hear you” approach. Very mature, I know.) Yesterday manifested as a run away from the internet day. Today I settled in and began to process orders and do math. So far so good. I must say it warmed my heart to see that at least a couple of people ordered copies of Cobble Stones.


Which leads me to the next newsy thing: Cobble Stones is available as an e-book on Amazon. It will soon be available in the Barnes & Noble online store as well. (Any time now. *drums fingers*). And of course you can buy a physical copy in our store. If you have already pre-ordered Sharp End of the Stick and would like to add Cobble Stones to your order, just place a separate order for Cobble Stones and then email schlockmercenary at gmail.com with both order numbers. I’ll happily combine the orders and refund the extra shipping costs. This is the sampler book for which I’ll someday actually create a marketing plan, which will probably include sending copies to book bloggers and encouraging people to do interviews. The trouble is that I launched this book right in the middle of also launching the SEOS pre-order and that simply has to get more attention right now. But one thing I learned from Hold on to Your Horses is that my creative works do not need to be blockbusters right out of the gate. Hold Horses took three years to pay back its expenses, but it continues to sell at a steady trickle. More importantly it continues to be useful and make people happy.

While I’m finally putting my writing into formats where people can actually buy it, my sister has put together two anthologies containing my stories. The Awards Weekend Anthology includes my short story Immigrant, previously published in the DAW anthology Ages of Wonder. The Mind of the Beholder features one of my earlier stories Bethan’s Garden. For the longest time this story only existed on my website, but Nancy felt like it was a perfect addition to a book which addresses science fictional characters who are neuro-divergent in autistic ways. The book also features Nancy’s Nebula and Hugo nominated story Movement, which is worth the cover price all by itself.

Preparation and Follow Up

By / May 10, 2012 / 1 Comment

In the category of preparation:
Preorders for Sharp End of the Stick open on Monday. Before that can happen I have work to do. I spent a portion of today setting up our online store. I also need to set up some rules and logistics so that we can run a social media contest. At least three lucky Schlock fans will be able to get copies of SEOS a month before anyone else. These advance copies ought to go somewhere that they’ll be loved.

The other thing that is happening next week is my departure for Nebula weekend. I’ve got some sewing to do in advance. Howard needs some alterations for his steampunk costume. He departs for World Steam Expo only a few days after I get back from Nebula Weekend. I do not want to count on having brain cells available for sewing in those three days, so it needs to be done now. I’ve also got a couple of things I want to alter before taking them with me to Nebula Weekend.

In the category of follow up:
I went to a writer’s conference last weekend. While there, I met several lovely agents and editors. I need to package up some queries and send them off to these lovely people. My book has zero chance of selling if I never send it anywhere. I’ve also made some notes about things to update on my website. Even more importantly, I released Cobble Stones in a manner that was more like sliding it under the door than giving it a fanfare. I should do an actual marketing push for the book, which means contacting some of the nice book bloggers I met at the writer’s conference. Also, I should write new things.

My office is 85% complete (the remaining 15% is organization and shelving), but our family room is still a jumbled mess. It contains furniture and things which I evicted from my office for construction and have decided will not be going back. Some of it needs to be hauled to a thrift store the rest needs to be sorted and given new homes somewhere else in the house. Hopefully I’ll be able to vacuum the family room sometime before Sunday.

We’re three weeks out from the end of school. There are all sorts of trailing educational ends which need to be tied up before the school doors close for the summer. Kiki has to finish her AP art portfolio. Link needs to bring up his grades. Gleek and Patch have projects and performances nearing completion. My brain tracks all of this, even the things that the kids ought to be tracking for themselves.

By this time next week I hope to have it all done.

Brief updates

By / April 7, 2012 / 1 Comment

Copy edits for Cobble Stones are done. I’ve got a cover draft done. Schlock book layout is done. Up ahead are Cobble Stones back cover copy, Cobble Stones page layout, preparation and packing for a family trip. This next week is spring break. It is going to be an internet light week for me. I’ve got to meet deadlines and then spend focused time with family. Our trip location does have internet, but I’ll have to access it via my phone, which doesn’t allow blogging, or via my little laptop, which is currently limping along. When I get back from the trip I’ll probably have lots to say and some lovely pictures to go with the words.

In other news: my grandma is doing well. She’s been moved from the hospital into a rehabilitation facility where they’ll be helping her practice walking on her newly-pinned and healing leg. She’ll probably be back at my parent’s house in two weeks. The customs issue is completely resolved and the packages delivered. Patch’s book project is complete and turned in. The kid drama has also calmed down considerably. Having a week off from school is going to be really good for everyone.

In Which I Scatter My Thoughts into Text: Writing, Collages, Cover Concepts, and a Day of Errands

By / March 20, 2012 / 1 Comment

I just sent off my draft to readers and I’m now completely convinced that it is full of stupid, that the whole blog sampler book idea is stupid, that my blog itself is also stupid. Fortunately I’ve been a writer long enough (and I’ve hung around other writers long enough) to know that this is a normal stage of the creative process. I just have to trust that my decision to go ahead on this project was made wisely and rationally. I also have to trust that somewhere in the future I’ll believe in it again. And I will. Just not today.

I’m half way through drafting a big long post about silence and the words which can fill it. Hopefully when it is done it will be interesting or at least coherent. Right now it feels like a collage of words. Collage is a valid artistic choice. A well planned collage can be stunning. A poorly executed collage is a mess.

I have a new concept for my book cover. It is the right concept, now I’ve just got to make it be pretty.

Yesterday was filled with project fugue. Today was made out of interruptions. Patch had strep and thus needed a trip to the doctor. Then there were the two trips to two schools to drop off things to my two daughters, for which service I extracted extra chores. A trip to the pharmacy was also a featured part of the day. Howard spent the day unpacking his post-convention thoughts and his suitcase. I participated in both of those activities. Packages were mailed to customers. All of that on top of a poor night’s sleep. I need to go to bed early tonight.

Project Fugue

By / March 19, 2012 / 1 Comment

Rather unexpectedly my two days of drifting after sending SEOS off to the printer transformed into several days of driven project fugue. I discovered all of my creative energies and spare moments spent upon pulling together my 2011 One Cobble at a Time book. While I was doing it, I identified a pile of blog entries to be considered for my sampler book. Then I had a realization about what the cover needs to look like, so I spent energy on that. This tearing hurry is because I realized that if I want to have copies of my sampler book in my hands in time for LDS Storymakers, I need to send it off for POD printing by April 6th. I’ve only got three weeks for editing, layout, and cover assembly. It can be done, but only if I do not waste any time. Which is why I spent all of today on this. And now the 2011 One Cobble book is done. Tomorrow I will do a quick edit on the probable sampler blog entries and send them off for opinions from my two volunteer critiquers. Then I will emerge from project fugue and pay attention to everything else. Like my house, which definitely could use some attention.

My Projects and Lists for Saturday

By / March 17, 2012 / 6 Comments

Last night I went to bed with a list of things I was excited to get done today. So I bounced out of bed at 9 am to get started. I began with a trip to Home Depot to buy some cobbles. I came home with cobble-ish pavers. I’ll probably have to go to a stone company to get pretty cobbles. But with five cobbles I could do some practice photography. My sampler book is going to need a cover. So far this is what I’ve got:

Things I like about it:

  • The trowel implies a person. It also implies work. Both of these things are part of my book.
  • The cobbles in the background give depth and possibly imply a path or a journey. I would like my cover to imply a journey.
  • The sprouting tulips imply growth. Much of the content of the book is about growth. However there are no blooms yet, just the beginnings of growth. Blooms are finished, these plants are just getting started.
  • I kind of like the bare ground and winter grass as well.

Things I don’t like:

  • I’m not sure how to blend this into a cover image. I don’t really want to just bleed it off the edges of the cover.
  • There isn’t a clear space for a title. The grassy spaces will tend to obscure the title.
  • This picture screams “gardening” and while I do mention gardening, my blog sampler is not about gardening.
  • The pavers are not really cobbles. They aren’t natural stones and they aren’t all that attractive.
  • My blog talks a lot about parenting and nothing in this image implies parenting. (Or business, which I also talk about. But I really don’t want my cover to imply business.)

So, I’m not sure if I’ve got anything usable. Perhaps I’ll make a trip to a stone company and spend twenty dollars getting some pretty rocks. However if I want to use the sprouting tulips I need to hurry. They could start blooming as soon as next week. I may try doing some “studio” shots of trowel and cobbles against a drop cloth to see what that yields. In the end I suspect that the cover will be something I pull together, am not completely happy with, but will deem “good enough” because I simply don’t have the skills and expertise (nor the time) to make it better. This is one of the things I don’t like about self publishing, knowing it could have been better if I had more training.

So I turned to the words of my sampler book. I’m gleaning through last year’s blog entries and pulling the ones I think are entertaining / representative / useful. I’ve reached June and I’ve got 30 pages or 13,000 words. I’m hoping to make my sampler book slim. I figure it needs to be around 20,000 words. I’ll grab more than that and then choose and rearrange. Two good friends have volunteered to help me critique and edit. I’ve got a lead on a really good copy editor as well. Time is short, but I’m fairly confident I can get this thing done. If I hurry. So I pulled entries until my eyes crossed.

Then I escaped my house and returned to the Beauty in Belief exhibit. I didn’t go through it again. I just snagged a pair of ear rings from the gift shop that I’ve been thinking about ever since last Tuesday. They’re filigree leaves with Arabic script on them saying “The best people are those who help other people.” They are lovely and make my heart glad. While I was there I took a moment to close my eyes and listen to the chanting music again. It warmed my heart.

Now it is 5:30 pm. I discover that I’m not excited about the house cleaning aspects of last night’s list. I’d love to have the house be clean, but the motivation to do the work has gone missing. Instead I’ll probably delve my way through June looking for blog entries to pull. Hopefully tomorrow will bless me with energy and motivation to put my house in order.

FTP Defeats Me Again

By / March 15, 2012 / 4 Comments

I have a pretty good basic understanding of computers and internet things. I don’t run the back end stuff for my blog, but I do all the cosmetic changes myself. I email daily with attachments. No problem. I manage facebook, twitter, and Google+. I’ve even re-installed an operating system on a computer and then re-installed all my software. I’m not a computer expert, but I’m computer literate. However FTP appears to live in its own little pocket of ignorance in my brain. Howard has taught it to me multiple times. He’s installed a client for me to use. I’ve used the thing a dozen times over the course of several years. I understand the theory of it, yet getting it to actually work must require some incantations of which I’m not aware. Something goes wrong every single time. I spent all day uploading a file to our book printer. Then I noticed that it would reach 100% uploaded and immediately state “connection dropped” and start over at around 80%. Email with the printer confirmed that the file was corrupted. They’ve deleted it. I’ll get to start over tonight at bedtime, when I won’t be tying up the internet for our whole family some of whom need the internet for homework. If I don’t wake up to find that FTP has worked. I’ll just FedEx a a disc instead.

The good news is that this whole thing is only mildly annoying to me. In the past, incidents like this would plunge me into terror that I’d done everything wrong, that all my book layout work was destroyed, that our business was therefore a complete bust and we were doomed forever. I would try to beat back those thoughts with a great big logic stick, but the battle was exhausting. I’m so very glad that I can scowl a little bit, shrug my shoulders, and just plan to mail things tomorrow if necessary. I’m really good at mailing things.