Dipping my toes in the indie waters, Part 2

If you want to read the first installment of my little series about my foray into self-publishing, please go here.

Okay. It's been about two weeks since I got my rights back to my short erotic romance. I honestly thought it would be uploaded and "out there" by now. I was so naive. Sigh.

Here's what I've done so far. I have a sexy new cover. Check this out!

Isn't it gorgeous? And hot? Thanks to the fabulous Tamra Westberry for designing the perfect cover for a reasonable price. Her turn-around time was quick, too. I highly recommend her.

I rewrote the blurb, changing it just a bit from the original.

Midnight Treat blurb:

Josh Panetti breaks into an apartment Halloween night, thinking he’s fulfilling the sexual fantasy of a woman he met at a costume party. Instead, he’s broken into Cassie Snow’s apartment. Cassie realizes immediately his mistake—she’d seen him at the party with her sexy upstairs neighbor. She should tell him he has the wrong apartment and the wrong girl.

But she’s always the wrong girl. Would it be so terrible to be the right girl for just one night?

*****

But now, the hard part. Formatting. Again, my naive little mind thought I'd read an article or two about how to format, then I'd take a couple of hours and format my story, and voila, it would be done.

Yeah. In my dreams.

Considering that I'm a techno-dork, I have a steep learning curve. I'm reading a series about ebook formatting at Author E.M.S. (a great resource for authors, by the way), and this blog post by Cameron Chapman. I don't know yet if I'll learn all the answers here, but I'll keep you posted.

Damn. I hope the next time you hear from me, it's to give you the buy links to my newly uploaded story.

Real orgasms with real men are better than the alternative

Welcome to Sunday Snippets, courtesy of the sexy and sinful Red Lipstick Journals. Last week, you read part of my opening and met my cursed and haunted hero, Thaddeus. Today, let's meet his heroine-to-be, Kate.

Kate Hargrove moaned as his tongue flicked across her clit and his fingers pinched her nipples. Ungodly pleasure radiated outward from her core, curling her toes under the sheets. Her body arched off the mattress as the orgasm ripped through her and a scream of ecstasy burst from her lips—

Dammit!
Her eyelids popped open. She was dreaming. Her studly lover wasn’t real. But her sated body told her the orgasm was real. Her pussy walls still throbbed in the aftermath.

"Holy shit," she muttered, scooting to a seated position in the bed, wiping the sweat from her forehead with the back of her wrist. Why couldn’t real orgasms with real live men be as good as that one?

Because great sex required meeting a man, which required dating or at least getting out more, neither of which she had time for.

Genre: Paranormal erotic romance
Length: 24k

Available now at Bookstrand

Coming soon to other online bookstores!

*  *  *  *  *

Find other steamy Sunday Snippets here.

DEEP BLUE Sunday Snippets #1

Welcome to Sunday Snippets. This is my first time on The Red Lipstick Journals. I hope you enjoy this snippet from my newest release: Deep Blue, available now at Bookstrand, and coming soon from most online bookstores.


He lifted his nose and sniffed the air. Over the strong, oily smells of the ship’s engine, he breathed in her scent. Her light, floral perfume couldn’t mask the sweet, musky smell of her sex. He closed his eyes and inhaled, focusing his thoughts between her legs.

Her soft moan cut across the waves, over the ship’s engine, and her startled eyes widened. Her hips shifted slightly, and he knew she felt his desire.

He smiled. She was the one.

"Good night, Kate," a couple said as they passed her. They said something else to her, but he no longer listened.

Kate.

If he still had a human heart, he might feel guilty, knowing what he was about to do, realizing the woman’s fate.

Death, for her, would likely be a blessing.

* * * *

Genre: Paranormal erotic romance

Available now|Bookstrand

To read some more great snippets and excerpts, go here.

Dipping my toes in the indie waters...

So easy a caveman can do it? We'll see.

I've been following with interest the journeys of my friends and fellow authors as they've decided to try their hands at self-publishing. Some of them have published original works and some have re-released stories that were originally published elsewhere.

Well, it's finally my turn. I just got the rights back to my erotica novella/short story MIDNIGHT TREAT, originally out with The Wild Rose Press in 2008. At first, it sold pretty well and garnered some great reviews, but now it's just selling 2-3 copies a month. On a good month LOL. I still plan to write for TWRP as they're an awesome, author-friendly publisher, but this story is making neither of us any money right now, so why not try self-publishing it.

MIDNIGHT TREAT has a Halloween theme, but other indie authors convinced me to release it now. Even though it's nowhere near Halloween.

I know next to nothing about self-publishing, so I thought I'd journal about the process on my blog. You can learn with me as I go.

The first thing I did, as mentioned above, was ask for my rights back from my publisher. I looked in my contract and realized they owned my rights for two years. It's been almost three. Your contract should specify how to go about getting your rights back. In my case, I just sent a simple email to the editor-in-chief. No big deal at all. I had the rights back within about a week. I was a little concerned about asking for my rights back when I hope to continue publishing with them, and mentioned this in my email to them. They were very kind about it -- no bridges burned there. Whew!

Next, I want to hire a cover artist. I asked around for some names, and already knew of some myself. I checked out their websites and portfolios, then contacted my top three choices. One immediately wrote back and said she's booked out and isn't taking on new clients. One never wrote back. But the third is available--yay!

Tamra Westberry was actually my first choice, so I'm really excited to work with her. She sent me a cover art questionnaire, which I'll be filling out ASAP.

What are my next steps?

1. Choose some stock photography that might look nice on my cover. This is easier said than done. Any idea how many zillions of photos there are out there? Holy cow. Trying to find one that suits my story is going to be a challenge.

2. Find out if I can use the original blurb, or if I need to rewrite it. If I need to rewrite it, then...

3. Rewrite the blurb

4. Read over the manuscript and make any necessary changes. After it was originally published, there were a few things I wish I'd written differently. Well, here's my chance.

5. ???? I don't know enough about this process to know what comes next. So, I guess I'd better start asking around, eh?

Until next time...

:)Becca

Welcome to my naughty little world

Welcome to my new blog. I figured it was about time I had a blog of my own, eh? I don't know how often I'll post. I guess when I have something to say, I'll post.

My exciting news of late is that my newest release, DEEP BLUE (see cover right over there. See it?) just came out with Siren-Bookstrand. It's available only at my publisher's website for about another month, then it'll be available at most online bookstore.

Thanks for visiting!