Wynne Channing: Indie Author Budgeting & New Release

 

I Am Forever

So when 17-year-old Axelia falls into a sacred well filled with blood and emerges a vampire, the immortal empire believes she is this legendary destroyer. Hunted by soldiers and mercenaries, Axelia and her reluctant ally, the vampire bladesmith Lucas, must battle to survive.An ancient prophecy warns of a girl destined to cause the extinction of the vampire race.

(What Kills Me #2)

Axelia fought an army of vampires and survived. Once fated as the destroyer of the vampire race, she is now welcomed into the immortal empire and revered as a god.

But instead of relishing her victory, she faces a dangerous new world and an empire at war. Axelia is thrust into the position of supreme vampire and caught in the crossfire of battle. To make matters worse, her role alienates Lucas, the one vampire that she trusts.

Her power spawns evil enemies. And they know how to get to her — by hurting those whom she loves most.

Amazon US – Amazon UK – Kobo – Smashwords

Add I Am Forever to your Goodreads list!

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About What Kills Me (Book #1)

How will she convince the empire that she is just an innocent teenager-turned bloodsucker and not a creature of destruction? And if she cannot, can a vampire who is afraid of bugs summon the courage to fight a nation of immortals?

Amazon US – Amazon UK – Barnes & Noble – Kobo – iTunes

 

Wynne Channing

Wynne Channing is a national newspaper reporter and award-winning young adult novelist. Wynne loves telling stories and as a journalist, she has interviewed everyone from Daniel Radcliffe and Hugh Jackman to the president of the Maldives and Duchess Sarah Ferguson. The closest she has come to interviewing a vampire is sitting down with True Blood‘s Alexander Skarsgard (he didn’t bite). She briefly considered calling her debut novel “Well” so then everyone would say: “Well written by Wynne Channing.”

Website – Blog – Twitter – Facebook – Goodreads

Google+ – Pinterest – Youtube – Amazon Author Page

 

GRAND PRIZE: A stunning ballpoint pen filled with more than 100 pink crystals, a black leather note book by Canadian designer Jessica Jensen, an ecopy of I Am Forever (Book Two in the What Kills Me series) and a signed What Kills Me bookmark.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

 I Am Forever Tour schedule:

• March 17th | Vaempires (Review, Author Interview)
  
• March 18th | Proserpine Craving Books (Review, Excerpt)
  
• March 19th | Emma’s Ramblings on Supernatural Fiction (Review)
  
• March 20th | Sapphyria’s Book Reviews (Excerpt)
  
• March 21st | Nicky Peacock Author (Author Interview)
  
• March 24th | Unputdownable Books (Excerpt)
  
• March 25th | Happy Tails and Tales (Review, Guest Post, Excerpt)
  
• March 26th | The Bawdy Book Blog (Guest Post, Excerpt)
  
• March 27th | What the Cat Read (Excerpt)
  
• March 28th | Justified Lunacy (Guest Post)
  
• March 31st | Mind Reader (Review, Guest Post)
  
• April 1st | Nomi’s Paranormal Palace (Review)
• April 2nd | What’s Beyond Forks? (Guest Post, Excerpt)
  
• April 3rd | The Avid Reader (Author Interview, Excerpt)
• April 4th | Lusty Penguin Reviews (Guest Post, Excerpt)
• April 7th | Darkest Sins (Review, Excerpt)
• April 8th | Ash Krafton’s Demimonde (Guest Post)
• April 9th | Shah Wharton’s WordsinSync (Review, Guest Post)
  
• April 10th | Tana Rae Reads (Guest Post, Excerpt)
• April 11th | Mean Who You Are (Review, Guest Post)

 

And now, a special guest post from the author herself...

Indie Author Budgeting 101

It is entirely possible to publish your book at no cost.

But if you are going to treat this venture as a business — which you should — it might require some initial investment.

Where to start?

You need a budget. Ugh. I know, the 'B' word. And you’re a writer, not an accountant (unless you are, in which case high five). Personally, I under-budgeted for my debut novel, What Kills Me because I didn’t anticipate a lot of extra costs; then I over-budgeted for its sequel I Am Forever.

Begin by making a list of expenses that you might need, ie:

- copy editing
- proofreading
- cover design
- webpage, web hosting
- promotion/marketing
- book trailer
- giveaways, postage

Now you can pay a lot or a little for each of these things. It's up to you. There are ways to save, however.

Copyediting Most editors charge by the hour and rates vary according to the editor's experience.

There are at least three stages of editing: substantive editing (big picture stuff like plot and tone), copyediting (sentence structure, grammar, spelling, etc.) and proofreading (the final stage). Rates range from $30 to $50 an hour, according to the Editors’ Association of Canada. Estimates to edit my book (62,000+ words) ranged from 15 to 50 hours, depending on the stage of editing.

Ask several editors for quotes. Send them a portion of your manuscript, length of your project and ask for an estimate. My editor worked on my first page to make sure her edits were in line with what I wanted to pay for.

Now negotiate. Since my editor works by the hour, she gave me a list of common copyediting errors for me to fix before she began.

She estimated that a 73,000+ word manuscript might take her 45 hours at a cost of $1,800.

Cover design I contacted a few artists via Deviantart and got quotes from them regarding covers. The average quote was $275-$300. Make sure you negotiate revisions into the deal.

Webpage If you don't want to pay someone to design and build you a webpage, consider buying your domain name ($25 for one year via GoDaddy) and having it forwarded to your blog. (Set up your free blog via Wordpress or Blogspot.)

Marketing You can spend an infinite amount on marketing which is what truly drives sales of your book. You want to appear everywhere. Advertisers have this rule of how many times a consumer has to see an ad before buying.

Social media is a great free tool. Get on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest. Give books away for review on Goodreads and LibraryThing where readers are. Approach your favourite book blogs and offer yourself up for a Q&A. Create your own press release.

I spent $15 on a book trailer (via Fiverr.com). I gave UK-based Dark World Books $375 to organize a month-long online book tour for me where I’d appear on a different blog every day.

Formatting Many guides exist on how to convert your document into an appropriate file for Kindle, etc. If you’re not a techno twit like me, you can figure it out. I gladly gave Michael Mandarano, a copy editor and e-book formatter, $150 to rescue me and format What Kills Me. It cost me $172 for Stacey at Self Publishing Editing Service to format I Am Forever with gorgeous chapter separators, images, etc. in several file types, including a print version.

Trying to recoup your costs: This part is tough and sales are hard to predict. You can try to be strategic about pricing your books for maximum profit: Amazon gives you 35% royalties on anything under $2.99 and 70% for anything over. But part of the benefit of going indie, is that you can the adjust the price anytime you like to test different costs.

Once you’ve figured out how much you think you’ll need, start saving. I have an automatic savings plan that withdraws money every month into an account that goes to pay for “book expenses.” Now, all of my profits goes into this same account to be put back into the business. Good luck and if you ever want to talk the business of books, email me!

--by Wynne Channing