My third book, The Sneaker Tree, made it’s debut yesterday and I have a lot of great people to thank. First, I’d like to thank every single person that downloaded my book. Whether you be a friend who downloaded my book to be supportive or a stranger who took a chance on an indie author because the cover looked great or the book synopsis was interesting, thank you. My book isn’t on any top 100 list on Amazon and probably won’t make it to the New York Times best seller list, but when I woke up this morning The Sneaker Tree had made it up to #24,689. That may not sound all that impressive, but there are at least 2 million books in the Amazon.com store and, if only for a day, mine was in the top 5% of all of those. That feels pretty good. Thank you.
Until I started publishing my own books I had no idea what an Editor did. From now on when you read a book and you see an editors name listed, in your head give them some credit as well. No matter how brilliant an authors story may be, it isn’t nearly what it can be until a skilled editor painstakingly goes through it and polishes off the rough edges, corrects grammar and punctuation, and suggests a little nip here and a tuck there. I’m lucky enough to have found Cynthia Shepp, who is very patient with my books and my almost daily e-mail questions.
A great book is nothing without a great cover. The image is what draws you in and is in your head while you’re reading. Look at my first novel, White Picket Prisons, over there on the right. The cover is a snoozefest right? Not the artists fault. He rendered exactly what I described. If I had to do it over I’d put some blood on the fence posts and make the shadowy figure in the upper right window a little more obvious. But look at the cover of The Sneaker Tree! I’ve gotten a ton of compliments on it. I can’t take credit however. The wonderfully talented Rene Folsom (who is also an author) took my description and put it on steroids. A great cover is the best first impression that a book makes and for that I have Rene to thank.
I work hard at my blog, writing 3-4 times a week, but I’m not a website designer. The reason that The Sneaker Tree cover showed up with live links on the exact day the book was released is due to my wonderful friends Paul and Shelley of Webessentials.com . They help me change or fix things on this page at moments notice. To be honest, my website/blog here would look a whole lot better if I let them really have at it. For an author that wants people to be able to read my book easily, the fact that a live link is in my right sidebar exactly at the right time I need it is absolutely amazing. Thank you Paul and Shelley.
Lastly, I want to thank all my regular blog readers. I started The Phil Factor 8 1/2 years ago with no intention of writing books. After awhile I started to get some positive feedback from readers that made me believe that maybe I could write a little bit. If you’re just a casual blogger and blog reader, don’t underestimate the impact your “likes” and comments make. You too helped make The Sneaker Tree and helped make my day today. Thank you.
As always, if you enjoy #ThePhilFactor, thank you for sharing it on Facebook, Twitter and everywhere else. Without your help us indie authors would be lost.
Huge congrats to you, Phil! I’m one of those lucky ones that stumbled across you via twitter and glad that I did. My life has been enriched because of it! Can’t wait to read the new book!
Thank you for everything you’ve done as well. You’ve answered as many questions and helped me as much as anyone.
Congratulations! Thank you for giving your editor such wonderful credit. As an editor, I delight in helping people present their work in top-notch condition. It is very satisfying.
Thanks for the mention, Phil. It was my pleasure helping you. The book is awesome, and that was all you! 🙂
Giving this a mention in my post today, Phil!!
Aww..thanks Barbara!