My Publishing Journey

I’ve been asked a few times what it was like publishing; Was it hard? How’d you do it? What were your favorite and least favorite parts? and so on...

Let me tell you a little about how it happened.

I was a teenager when I wrote The story of Benny the Ostrich which became No Ants Please. I also wrote a couple other stories in the months after that. I bought all the proper books sent in my story to publishers, tried my best to get it published the only way I thought was possible, the traditional way. I almost lost my story to a company that turned out to be a scam. Yikes!

After that I took a long break, stuffed the stories away in my desk and in my computer. I kept thinking, I’ll just hold on to them, maybe one day they will get published. That day came sooner than I ever expected!! I came across a wonderful editor on Facebook one day, I messaged her and asked her for advice, I never expected it would happen as fast as it did after that. My book was then edited that night!!! She told me she thought it was ready to go to the illustrator! I was shocked, typically books are edited a couple of different times before being sent to illustration. After I found the illustrator I thought fit my story best it was incredible! Not only was my book actually beginning to go through the publishing process but I was now able to see my characters come to life on the page!!! I felt a mix of emotions; excitement, happiness, nervousness, impatience, disbelief and not knowing what exactly I was supposed to do next. Each step made me nervous, thinking if we made a mistake it would all just go POOF into thin air as if none of it had even happened. We took it one step at a time planning each payment for the illustrations methodically, which was the most expensive part of the process, but also one of the most rewarding!!!

The illustrations were done and are beautiful. Next step. Publication. Questions, so many questions, what size do you want your book? What type of pages? How do you want it bound? How much will you book be? Is it global? What percentage? And so many more questions. There go the nerves again, what if I choose the wrong option? It all went well, very well until time to hit the publish button, my imprint wasn’t working!!! After several phone calls and messages, I figured it out and the next day it all went through!!! Yay!!! Now I have a published children’s book out there on the market. Self publishing is WORK but totally worth it! Even typing it now, it doesn’t seem real, and I could not have done it without my amazing husband!!! My family, my friends, my editor, illustrator and more... even my awesome bank teller. Thank you for the support and thanks for reading with me!