Maddy's Tail by BC Barry

What's good?      I wrote a book!

What's bad?        I self-published on Amazon Kindle.

What's the Difference?        I learned exactly how much I don't know!!



I haven't posted on here over the past couple of weeks, and for that I apologize.  I've been concentrating on an old/new goal in life.

As the title above states, I finally wrote a book.  This is something I've wanted to do for years, since high school actually, and have finally done it!!!  It's a short story based on the life of our beloved calico cat.  While some of the events in her life are true, the details surrounding them are pure fiction, born in the nooks and crannies of my warped little mind.

I was so proud when I typed that last word, so very excited at my accomplishment.  I read and re-read this wonderful book, over and over.  I made corrections and changes, modified sentences to clarify their meaning.  Then ignored it for a week before reading and re-reading it again.  I was proud of my work and proud of my accomplishment.  Along with my confidence, my sense of self-worth was finally starting to grow again, in fact, you could almost see it through a microscope.

Then I mustered up every ounce of courage I could find, mixed it up with a little bit of stupidity and a whole lot of determination, and self-published it on Amazon.  And there went my new-found confidence....right down the toilet.

Self-publishing is not as easy as it sounds.  I had created my own cover, but Amazon wouldn't accept it.  So, a dozen Youtube videos later, I created a cover they would accept.  I read page after page of instructions and guidelines, changed my book format to follow those rules, and published.

Then I bought my own book, downloaded it to my kindle, and listened to it.  Holy typos and bad formatting, Batman!!  Lesson One:  Have someone else read your work.  I might have proofed that thing a couple of dozen times, but I knew what it was supposed to say.  And when my eyes saw tow, my brain read two, same with through and though, etc.  Lesson Two:  Learn the formatting rules before you type it.

I won't even go into all of the listing, pricing, and marketing information I had to shove into my poor little brain.

So, I'm on about my 10th upload and I think it's finally, completely, perfectly correct.  Hopefully.  Now I'm just waiting for those changes to take affect and this wait is killing me.

In the meantime, I'm learning about promoting and marketing Maddy's Tail.  And I've written about 10 pages of book number two, not sure what it's called yet.  But keep up-to-date on my progress through my new Facebook Author's page and Twitter account.

https://www.facebook.com/BC-Barry-142212806192742/     for facebook and

@AuthorBCBarry for Twitter

Anyway, thanks for stopping by and checking out why my dishes haven't been washed over the past couple of days.  I'll talk to you soon.



As always, take your time leaving but hurry on back.  :)