Ebook piracy is real and growing…

Good Wednesday morning! Hope all of you are well and safe. I know several people in the flood ravaged south and I hope all of you are safe this morning. As I watch the news its devastating and tears at my heart. Prayers going up to all of you in the danger zones.

This morning I want to discuss Ebook piracy. When I started my writing career I was a little leery of putting my book on websites that I wasn’t familiar with. I’d spend hours checking out their ratings and BBB information before I’d even set up an account with them. We want to keep our work safe from those that want to take advantage, but what can we do in this day and age of cyber piracy? Nothing, not a thing…

I noticed about a year ago that when I googled my name, several websites came up that I didn’t recognize. Of course I checked them out and some of them are legitimate because they are distributors from Createspace that legally sell my book and I reap the royalties. But unfortunately a couple were actually pirating my books for free on their sites. A month ago I was searching out my books and found that the number of websites that my books are showing up on have more than doubled.

Of course it got me a little hot under the collar until a well known author told me something that hadn’t really hit me. She told me that it’s like free advertising. The word pirates as I call them were actually doing free promotions for my work. I still don’t like the fact that they steal your work and place it everywhere for free, but in a way it is getting my work out there. She also went as far as to tell me I should be proud that they picked my work to steal because that meant they evidently thought it would help them. Never thought of it that way either.

My question to several authors was how do you stop them, but all of them came back with the same response, you don’t. The websites change constantly and have crazy names. I keep a watch on it though because I don’t want someone else to list their name as the author of my work. Now that will spur me into action, but for now I’m just watching it.

I suggest if you’re a published author to keep an eye on your work. Do a cyber search frequently on your author name, book name and website. It’s just a precautionary measure, but it could save your work.

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

P.S. Oakley is coming out by the end of next weeks!!! I’ll be posting updates by the end of the week. So go over to my website at www.stephaniehurtauthor.com and subscribe to my newsletter to get updates on new releases or exciting news. Or go over to Facebook and like my author page to stay up to date at https://www.facebook.com/StephaniePayneHurt. If you’re a Twitter lover then check out my tweets at https://twitter.com/StephanieHurt4.

Tuesday morning glance at the past…

This morning I’m taking a look back at how things have changed in the self publishing world since I started in 2012. It’s amazing how it fluctuates. So many main stream traditionally published authors have gone back to self publishing and are enjoying the freedom that it provides.

Self publishing has come into it’s own in the last three years or at least in my opinion. There are more sites to place your books and they are more widely accepted. When I first put my books on Smashwords.com the distributors list was a lot shorter and now you can have your books spread out far and wide. Also, several traditional publishers are jumping on the bandwagon and looking at it differently.

The amount of self published books is phenomenal and the amount of best selling self published books has rose along with it. Now a self published book can actually go to the top without the hand of an agent or big publisher pushing it. Traditional publishing has it’s good points too. But for some of us starting out or maybe that have already been there, we’re venturing out and testing the waters first.

So, what’s your opinion on the growth of self publishing? Are you traditionally published or self published? Maybe you’re both…

As always, great writing and May God Bless You…

How do you like your eggs?

There are so many ways to have your morning egg. Boiled, scrambled, poached, sunny side up, the choices are endless. For me, well, I have one boiled egg just about every morning. I like scrambled eggs too sometimes with grated cheese. I’m an egg person.

If you think about it, eggs and romance novels go hand in hand. Yeah, I know, you’re saying ‘She’s finally lost it’, but you can’t lose what you didn’t have to begin with, LOL! Anyhow, as with eggs, romance novels come in many different genres. Everyone has a preference and when you start looking up romance on Amazon the choices are infinite. It’s amazing.

Some people like a laid back, relaxing romance that takes you away to faraway lands then others want that fast, racy romance that catapults you into another world and then drops you off somewhere you’re not expecting. Even with the different genres there’s sub genres. Yep, it get’s long when you hit that part of it.

When people ask me what romance genre I write in, well I have to think for a minute. I’ve written Christian romance, Historical Romance, Cowboy Romance, Contemporary Romance and the list goes on. Some of my books can fit into all of the above. It’s crazy how many are out there. It also drives a writer crazy when publishing because you need to make sure you put your book in the correct sub genre.

So, how do you like your eggs, ummm I mean romance 🙂

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

Don’t push that button!

It’s Friday people and it’s time to celebrate the weekend, well almost time. For me it’s already the weekend. I’m taking a couple of days off to get over the 12 hour days for the last three months. But of course I’m writing and working on publishing things that have been left out in the cold for too long.

Since I’m working on the finishing touches of Oakley, my mind goes to deciding when to publish. Well sometimes we get so excited about our finished manuscript that our need to get it out there for everyone overrides the fact that we’ve left off a couple of needed steps.

When you publish a manuscript you have a responsibility to your reader to make sure the work is polished and pretty… Have you read over the work. Have you read over it more than once? Are you feeling really good about the finished product? When I get my work completely finished and edited I have this feeling of “Yes it’s as it should be” and that’s when I hit the button. If I have any doubts I read over it again and usually I find something that I missed the other times. It’s worth the time.

So, make sure you feel good about the finished manuscript, not just excited that it’s finished. It’s your work, shouldn’t you want it to be the best it can be?

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

Oh it’s easy, anybody can do it…

Good morning all, hope all is well with you. As a writer I often hear someone say when they hear I’m a writer, “Oh it’s easy, anybody can do it. I need to write a book.” My response is always, “Go for it.” I try to encourage people to write if that’s what they want to do. But it’s not as easy as it sounds.

Writing is easy enough, but getting a manuscript down that could be published isn’t as easy. Most people can sit down and write many pages of a story, but can they make it stand out. A manuscript needs to make a statement. You need to have a start, a middle story and an ending. It may sound easy, but it’s not.

Here are a couple of things to think about before you start your novel:

1 – Are you willing to put in the time it will take to get it right? A novel isn’t written in a day.

2 – Writing the words isn’t the only step, you’ll need to edit, edit, and edit some more.

3 – The story will need to stand out in the crowd and I mean stand out. Remember you’re not the only one in the field.

4 – After it’s written, edited and ready for publishing, you’ve got more steps to go. Now you need a blurb, or rather you need the description that will make people want to buy your book. To me this is the hardest part of the whole process. In just as little as two paragraphs you’ve got to sell your book. Sound easy, well try it sometime.

5 – Then of course you’ve got to make the book look really good by designing an eye catching cover. This is the selling point of your hard work. Some people buy a book just from the cover so make it shine brightly and call out to your reader.

This is only a few points, but you get where I’m going with this. Writing is one of the most rewarding and heart wrenching things you can do.

As always good writing and May God Bless You…

Do you feel the luck of the Irish?

Happy St. Patrick’s Day to all! Can you find the 4 leaf clover in this picture?

How many of you have rummaged through a bed of clover looking for the 4 leaf clover? I’ve done this many times and found some, but mostly I found green stains on my knees and hands 😉 The back yard at our Church is covered in clover and the children scavenge through it constantly looking for the hidden treasure in the millions of little clovers. It’s fun to watch their enthusiasm as they try their best to find good luck, but do you get it if you find it? I don’t know, but it’s fun to try…

Sometimes I think publishing a book is like a clover field. There are so many authors out there publishing and trying the same as you. Will you be found in the clover field? Will someone pluck you from the field and give you the luck of the Irish? It’s the gamble we take every time we hit the PUBLISH button. But it’s worth it.

For me I feel as though my luck was found the moment I typed the first word and finished the first book. It’s been such a wonderful experience but I do hope to one day be pulled out of the crowd and maybe have some luck of the Irish thrown at me, but until then I’ll keep publishing and joining the crowd. At least I’m in good company among my fellow authors.

By the way, don’t forget to wear something green today unless you want to be pinched, then don’t wear any green. And yes, there are still those that keep up the tradition and I’ve carried the bruises many times to prove it…

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

P.S. Oakley is Coming!

When the mood strikes…Write!

Good Saturday morning! I hope all of you are well and enjoying a great day. Here in Georgia it’s cool, rainy, foggy, just plain out nasty, but it’s a great day to clean house and write. I’m coming off a great day off yesterday. I met my word goal and passed it. I’d planned on at least 2500 words but ended up writing almost 4000. Yes!

The funny thing about my excessive word count yesterday was that the mood just wasn’t there early in the day. I’d planned on writing early, but it just wasn’t there. I knew that if I started writing without the spark it would end up on the cutting floor in confetti, so I waited. Then later yesterday the mood struck and there it was. My fingers flew across the keys as the scene unfolded in my mind. I wanted to write faster, but these fingers can only do so much.

As you know I’m working on Ridge, which comes out February 14th. Yes I know, I’m running on overtime, but I had two main scenes that needed to be finished. Well, one down, one to go, then on to my editor. She’s chomping at the bit to get her hands on Ridge. It’s been a work from the heart and she’d sat listening to bits and pieces as the excitement takes over. Patience is the name of the game.

Just a peak at the man behind the book:

Cute huh! He’s mysterious, hard edged, a Cowboy, a Soldier, and family man. Yep he’s got it all going for him except the ride lady to spend his days with. Well, maybe the new vet can soften those edges and turn him around. We’ll see…

This morning I’m spending some time on cleaning my house, doing laundry and sorting mail, then on to Ridge. He’s filled my mind so much that some days I can’t concentrate. The next installment of this series is Oakley, but the funny thing is I’d love to start Chase next, but that’s not in the cards. But, I can write a couple of ideas into his portfolio. Yep, that’s in the works for today also.

What are you doing today? Staying in? Writing? Reading? Hope it’s great…

As always, great writing and May God Bless You…

If your story falls apart, use duct tape?

Duct tape is a house staple, just as salt, sugar and flour are food staples. For many years people have fixed almost everything with duct tape. At Church we even fixed a broken Christmas tree with duct tape, no really we did. It’s strong and durable. Also you can get it in any width and color so it’s versatile.

What if you’re story is falling apart? We all have those manuscripts that start out really good and we have a phenomenal ending planned, but the middle has so many holes and fractures that it puts a real stink on the beginning and ending. Well, put a little duct tape on it. What am I talking about? Well, here goes the answer in a nutshell.

By duct tape I mean sit down with your beginning and ending. Then really look at it. Where is the character headed? The middle needs some suspense or issue that needs to carry the reader over the hump to the end. It needs something that only the ending can shed some light on. This is where the duct tape comes in.

As I said above, duct tape is strong and durable with lots of versatility, so the middle of the book needs to be taped up neatly. But be careful not to just add fluffy filler that makes the reader fall asleep with boredom. If the first of the book is power packed, then make the middle explode with tension. This is the strong duct tape. Add an element of complete surprise. Let the main character have a major problem that needs solving, or maybe a secret that is threatening to come out, but the secret has to be life altering.

But make sure that it can mesh with your great ending. I did this one time and a book that started out being only around 30,000 words went over 50,000 words with a little duct tape application. Crazy, but true. I had this really great beginning that pulled you in and the ending left you breathless, but the middle was just a bunch of fluff. As I did my first read through I was almost dozing and that’s not good. I sat down and spread out the beginning and ending, then totally restructured my characters. I added a whole new dimension to them that took them on an adventure that meshed well with the ending and soon I had a complete story that I was proud to hit the publish button on.

So, get you some duct tape and pull that story together. If you use the right duct tape it will hold together nicely.

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

Thursday Morning Shout Out…

Good Thursday morning everyone. I know I’ve been a little lax in my posts, but I’ve been on a deadline with Her Wish For Christmas. It had to be downloaded by midnight Monday and I met that deadline with six hours left over. That book took a lot out of me because of the emotionally charged content. When I typed the last words and finished the edits I was tickled pink with the results. My editor finished the final read and when she was done, the smile that spread across her face was priceless.

It’s been a crazy couple of weeks around here. Of course with my other job as an Accountant, I had end of month, end of quarter and end of tax year. Also had Fall Festival and Trunk or Treat at Church. SO I’ve been a busy little bee lately, but if you’ve read many of my posts you know this is how I like it. The busier the better I always say.

Now that the Christmas book is in Amazon’s hands, I can focus on Ridge. It’s the first book in the new series that’s about a family owned ranch and it’s five children. Each one of them has their own special issues and personalities. Since I’m a cowboy romance writer at heart, this one is exciting. What can I say, I love cowboys and getting to write about them is fun. All I’m planning to say is I can’t wait for you to meet Ridge, the oldest brother. He’s my favorite sibling so far, but once I get into the other’s I’m sure I’ll fall in love with them too. Keep watching for updates on The Five Oaks Ranch series.

The article that I wrote for Southern Writer’s Magazine is out in their Nov/Dec issue. I’m really happy with the results and can’t wait to see the results. If you don’t already subscribe to this magazine, then I suggest you run, don’t walk over to their website and subscribe. It’s a must have for writers. Here’s a little snippet of the article.

Hope all is well with everyone and here’s a little shout out for my publishing service which is having a Christmas sale. We’re offering 10% off all services offered through our company. Find out more at our new website: horseshoe-publishing.com.

As always great writing and May God Bless You…

Self Publishing – A good thing…

I’m back in the grid again. I’ve been working on our Church’s Fall Festival, which was yesterday, so that’s why I’ve been out of the grid for the last couple of days. It went really well, other that the attack of the cotton candy machine. The wind decide to get a little brisk about the time we started the machine up. We all worked hard to get it caught up and bagged, but unfortunately I was covered in cotton candy. Pictures of this mishap are posted on my Facebook page by many friends that thought it was really hilarious…

Ok, on to today’s thoughts. As most of you know I self publish all of my books. It’s a decision I made for myself. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love for one of my books to be picked up by one of the big guys, but if not, that’s alright too. I’ve had a couple of publishers call me to inquire about what I have coming up, but once we talked about the percentage of royalties and what they’d do for me if I put my book with them, well I politely turned them down.

I’m a person that researches things a lot, well sometimes too much. I’ve looked into the good points and bad points of going both ways and when I look at the numbers, self publishing wins every time. I have control of what, where, when and all the things that happen with my work. I also make more in royalties than if I went with a publisher.

The tools available now for authors allow you to make awesome covers and publish really great looking books. There are so many outlets for self publishers to post their books for sale and advertising. It’s amazing the rise in just the last two years of the acceptance.

You might be saying, but wouldn’t you sell more with the big publishers. Maybe…but when I talked with one of them, they told me that I’d have to do a lot of advertising and social media myself, which I already do anyway. They didn’t offer very much in the way of marketing, well no more than I do now, so why do anything different.

This is a choice I made for myself. Now a big publisher might be the best fit for you, so understand that I’ve just not had a really good deal thrown at me. The couple I did get just didn’t push the right buttons. Self publishing is more widely accepted now than it was years ago. I’ve actually seen big, NY Times Bestsellers come from self published authors. Many big authors are going back to self publishing. That tells me something.

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…