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Old 06-20-2010, 06:20 PM   #1
johnyunker
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Reverse Windowing: The Tourist Trail

Hi everyone,

First off, I want to thank MobileRead for being here, as the forums have provided a number of valuable tips as I navigated the Kindle publishing process (and as I currently navigate iPad).

Second, I'm happy to say that my first novel is now live in the Kindle store: The Tourist Trail.

http://www.amazon.com/Tourist-Trail-.../dp/B001QOGM88

Like many in this forum, I too had an agent before self publishing. She did her best to sell the book. 31 editors passed on it -- not because they didn't like it but because they didn't know how to sell it.

Fortunately, there is self-publishing. But what I find particularly interesting is that while large publishers struggle with "windowing" - releasing print before digital -- we can do just the opposite. And because we have no middlemen, we can offer our books at a great discount.

Anyway, I'm excited to be headed down this road and look forward to learning more.

PS: Here's an overview of the book:

Biologist Angela Haynes is accustomed to dark, lonely nights as one of the few humans at a penguin research station in Patagonia. She has grown used to the cries of penguins before dawn, to meager supplies and housing, to spending most of her days in one of the most remote regions on earth. What she isn’t used to is strange men washing ashore, which happens one day on her watch.

The man won’t tell her his name or where he came from, but Angela, who has a soft spot for strays, tends to him, if for no other reason than to protect her birds and her work. When she later learns why he goes by an alias, why he is a refugee from the law, and why he is a man without a port, she begins to fall in love—and embarks on a journey that takes her deep into Antarctic waters, and even deeper into the emotional territory she thought she’d left behind.

Against the backdrop of the Southern Ocean, The Tourist Trail weaves together the stories of Angela as well as FBI agent Robert Porter, dispatched on a mission that unearths a past he would rather keep buried; and Ethan Downes, a computer tech whose love for a passionate activist draws him into a dangerous mission.
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Old 06-20-2010, 06:35 PM   #2
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Could be interesting if available in ePub format.
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Old 06-20-2010, 06:52 PM   #3
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Could be interesting if available in ePub format.
DRM-free epub format.
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Old 06-21-2010, 07:12 AM   #4
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Looks good, if only I could read it, but as a Sony owner..................
Best of luck though.
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Old 06-21-2010, 10:48 AM   #5
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Sounds interesting...

I wonder if you would publish it on Smashwords... They offer all the different formats, and people living outside the US don't have to pay $4.99 for you book.. Amazon charges an extra $2 fee for downloading outside USA, which you get nothing of.

Oh, and welcome to MobileRead...
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Old 06-21-2010, 02:12 PM   #6
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I was planning to use Lightning Source for the print version (instead of Smash Words). But I could also use Smashwords as an alternative to Amazon for ebooks -- I didn't realize they tacked on $ for intl. sales.

Thanks Lene.
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Old 06-21-2010, 02:39 PM   #7
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Sounds interesting...

I wonder if you would publish it on Smashwords... They offer all the different formats, and people living outside the US don't have to pay $4.99 for you book.. Amazon charges an extra $2 fee for downloading outside USA, which you get nothing of.

Oh, and welcome to MobileRead...
The $2 fee only applies in some countries; it's not charged in the UK, for example, although we (obviously) do get charged VAT. I too, though, wonder why the author is so dramatically restricting his market by publishing in Amazon's propriatory format, when ePub is the industry standard.
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Old 06-21-2010, 02:57 PM   #8
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The $2 fee only applies in some countries; it's not charged in the UK, for example, although we (obviously) do get charged VAT. I too, though, wonder why the author is so dramatically restricting his market by publishing in Amazon's propriatory format, when ePub is the industry standard.
I've been working with some people doing covers for them and they don't plan on releasing to any channels but kindle, nook and ibooks (no matter how much I try and persuade them to do otherwise). They're convinced that kindle is where the most money is, nook is a hedge bet and iPad (Ibooks) is where the most money will be made in the future. All these channels use non-industry standard or tied-down versions of ePub. I'm an advocate for ePub as a standard, but there's no denying that business people go where they can maximise profit (especially so with Amazon's 70% profit share about to kick in).

I wish, I hope, I actively try to persuade others that ePub will win out, but it looks like a combination of DRM laden 'store-exclusive' formats, geo-restrictions and little to no push from Sony behind the ePub format will combine to kill off ePub (at least to the mass audience).

More and more writers and publishers I meet up with care less and less about DRM and geo restrctions and more about where the most profit can be made. I hate to say it, but they don't even consider ePub in their 'marketing' decisions, especially if they're targeting North America. It's Kindle, Nook and iPad (ibooks) for them.

Last edited by Moejoe; 06-21-2010 at 03:03 PM.
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Old 06-21-2010, 03:04 PM   #9
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I've been working with some people doing covers for them and they don't plan on releasing to any channels but kindle, nook and ibooks (no matter how much I try and persuade them to do otherwise).
I would think: the more channels, the more money. And the additional work to publish ePub, once you have nook and iBooks, is almost nil.
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Old 06-21-2010, 03:15 PM   #10
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I would think: the more channels, the more money. And the additional work to publish ePub, once you have nook and iBooks, is almost nil.
Tell me about it. But those I've been working with (and remember I have no say in what they do, I'm just hired to do some covers) see no return in publishing outside of the the 'holy trinity' as they call it. They believe it to be wasted effort. It's not more channels for profit to them, but more channels, more hassle.

I'm not a business person (despite some of my qualifications), in fact I hate that whole side of the creative arts, it's just so much dryness and numbers, god, the horrible numbers in columns.
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Old 06-21-2010, 04:45 PM   #11
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I've begun with Amazon, but I'm by no means limiting myself to Amazon. This is a learning process for me and I began with digital simply because I'm better with HTML than InDesign. But I do plan to publish this book in print next month as well as with iPad. Regarding Smashwords, I'll check them out as well.

I'm not really worried about DRM issues. I don't think privacy is a huge issue with publishing, at least I haven't witnessed it. But I'm playing by Amazon's rules for the same reason I think most authors do -- that's where the people are. For now at least.
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Old 06-21-2010, 10:13 PM   #12
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Man, I wish I was so rich I could afford to leave money on the table. Maybe indie authors do better than I've always believed!
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