It’s always good to celebrate creative successes. This is one of those times.
When I first met my partner Linda she had started working on the novel she always wanted to write. That was six years ago, and the novel has certainly had its stops and starts over that time. Writing is not always an easy thing to do, and there were times when life just got in the way and it became difficult for her to keep moving that cursor to the right. However, I’m pleased to say that over the last few months she’s really pushed herself to finish writing the manuscript, and over the last few weeks it’s been through seemingly endless revisions and edits, fine tuning of words and sentences, and onto the final processes of typesetting and preparation for publication.
I’m proud to say that Linda’s first novel is now finished, published and available.
The novel, eloves me, eloves me not, is a contemporary love story in which 39 year old Kayte Wexford realises that she still hasn’t met her Mr Right and so decides to give Internet dating a try. As the story unfolds she experiences some hilarious, fascinating and occasionally scary insights into the pros and cons of finding love online. It’s a clever, wonderfully well written story, with interesting plot lines and an ending you probably won’t see coming. It’s got some really funny scenes in it, some others that get quite hot and steamy, and it cleverly weaves in a lot of useful lessons about finding love and staying safe in the age of the Internet. If you’ve ever tried Internet dating there will probably be lots of scenes and characters you will recognise and identify with!
I’m particularly proud of the fact that Linda decided to self-publish the book. As an independent author and publisher, she gets to have total creative control over the end product. She got to write the story exactly how she wanted it to be written. She came up with the vision for the cover artwork and managed a design contest through 99designs.com to bring it to reality. She leveraged a group of friends from around the world to read the first draft and offer constructive feedback. She got it typeset exactly how she wanted it. She managed the publication process through CreateSpace.com (Amazon’s self publishing division) as well as creating ebooks through Kindle Direct Publishing and SmashWords.com.
Of course, self-publishing is a double edged sword. While you get to maintain full creative control over the final product, you’re also responsible for creating awareness and demand for it. Right now, she’s working hard to spread the word that a) the book exists, and b) people should read it!
Needless to say, I’m incredibly proud of what she’s done, and would like to support her as much as possible. So, if you know someone who would enjoy reading an intelligent, funny and contemporary love story, please tell them about eloves me, eloves me not. It’s available through Amazon in both paperback and Kindle versions, and on SmashWords in just about every other format, including epub and mobi. (It’s coming soon to the Apple iBooks Store, Barnes and Noble and the Nook Store, but SmashWords can provide all those formats right now). If you know someone who would like the paperback version, may I suggest they get it through her CreateSpace store… it’s exactly the same price and version of the book as Amazon, but CreateSpace offers the best royalty payments for independent authors.
You can find out more at www.elovesmeelovesmenot.com
A Labour of eLove by Chris Betcher is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.