Tag: author

A self-published author's diary, Self publishing, Self-pub corner

A Self-Published Author’s Diary: The Groundhog Day of Formatting and lip synching…

Elodie

If you’re signed up to receive my weekly emails and you are using Gmail, make sure to check your promotion tab…As always I share exclusive content in the emails. 🙂

Sometimes, formatting bilingual books feels like a Groundhog day. It starts over and over again and even if I feel like I have perfected the process, there are still issues. I have files that are called UPDATE 1, UPDATE 2, UPDATE 3….and so on and so on. Formatting bilingual books is slightly more complicated, in my view, than formatting my regular manuscripts, just because I have to ensure those pesky page breaks actually happen when they’re supposed to.

And some of you might ask, “But Elodie, why don’t you use all of this time to write and publish original content?” And this is a great question. Because I have plenty of ideas. I have ideas about a series, I’m finishing writing my first rom-com and I’m planning this as a series of standalone novels. So, I have ideas. And I am writing, albeit maybe not as much as I’d like to.

But I know that my bilingual books generate income.

And while I am developing a strategy (which I will share with you on this blog and more in detail in my weekly email) for my upcoming novels and series, I know that working on those bilingual manuscripts is helpful to my business. And as a language learner (currently learning Russian on Duolingo for 250 days straight :-)) and former language teacher, I love that those bilingual books might help people who are learning a language.

Talking about languages, I saw this post on Instagram the other day that really resonated and thought I’d share it with you all. It says, “If someone is speaking to you in a foreign accent, they are smart enough to know two languages and brave enough to do their job in their second.” 

Anyways…I spent a lot of hours this week finalizing another English/German book and this was only a tiny portion of the work that I needed to do for this particular book. And I’m happy to report that I did manage to publish EINE ZWEITE CHANCE (TEIL 1) / A SECOND CHANCE (PART 1) – Zweisprachiges Buch Deutsch / Englisch – Bilingual book: German / Englisch. (Amazon.de, Amazon.com, Google Play, iTunes, Kobo…)

To publish this book, I needed to:

(1) Using the manuscript in English and the manuscript in German, format the bilingual edition (manually) with one page in German and the corresponding text in English on the other side.

(2) Have a freelancer language specialist proofread the German translation one more time.

(3) Go through all the changes, review and implement the chances in the translation.

(4) Ensure that the pdf interior has the correct formatting. (that took FOREVER as every single time I would upload the word document, there was something wrong with it…one tab too many and that can really mess with the formatting. I use Draft2Digital to make the interior of the book.

(4) Design the cover.

(5) Add a series page on Kindle Direct Publishing, Draft2Digital and Google Play for “Zweisprachiges Buch Englisch Deutsch Nick & Em”.

(6) Add all the metadata on all platforms (summary, keywords, categories and so on…)

(7) Upload the files for the ebooks.

(8) Create the paperback in Kindle Direct Publishing…

As mentioned…the formatting can be slightly frustrating at times. If my husband would read this, he would chuckle at the “slightly”. 🙂

Some videos of the actual process are included in my weekly email...

But the process can also be fun. 🙂 While I cannot listen to music when I am actually in the process of copying and pasting the German text to fit the English text and vice versa, I do sing very badly or lip synch in this case, when I’m making sure the format is correct (headings where there’s supposed to be headings, page break at the right spot, no extra paragraph…).

I am sharing a video of my lip synching one of the Bridgerton’s musical demo song in my weekly email too..:-)

And this was a bit of behind-the-scenes of a tiny portion of the work behind my latest bilingual book.

Last week, I shared with my top 3 self-publishing mistakes, if you’d like to get a FREE pdf of my top 5 self-publishing mistakes and receive weekly emails from me: just click here or on this cover, add your email and you’ll get access to the full pdf…

Thank you for reading!

Did you enjoy this post? Do you want to help support me and my writing? You can forward this blog post to someone who might be interested, buy my books and/or audiobooks and as always, don’t hesitate to leave me a comment.

If you have any questions about my adventures in self-publishing or anything I shared with you today, don’t hesitate to reach out and I’ll make sure to reply in my email next week.

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A self-published author's diary, Self publishing, Self-pub corner

A Self-Published Author’s Diary: my Top 3 self-publishing mistakes…

Elodie

My top 3 Self-Publishing Mistakes…

Thanks for reading this post… If you just stumbled on this blog, I started self-publishing in 2014, so I got quite a few years of experience and made many mistakes along the way. And while I’m sharing my top 3 self-publishing mistakes on this blog, I am sharing my top 5 self-publishing mistakes in my weekly email. If you’d like to receive those as pdf and join my weekly email, just click here.

Before getting into my top 3 self-publishing mistakes, I’d like to share information on how to help stop hate against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. The rise in hate crimes against AAPI in the US has been staggering, but it’s not a new phenomenon. This post by USA bestselling author Tif Marcelo on Instagram is a must-read: “Don’t Avert Your Gaze” (please read it, and please don’t avert your gaze). As I was looking for more resources to share, Susan Dennard’s newsletter landed in my inbox with those words and the links below: “Please, educate yourself on AAPI racism. Please, speak up when you see it in action. And if you can, please donate to causes that can help.” I know I’m planning on doing all of those things. And I will keep on looking for resources as well. If you have any, don’t hesitate to let me know.

What are my top 3 self-publishing mistakes?

How many times can I say self-publishing mistakes in this post? I mean the first one I mention I feel is a publishing mistake many authors can make. And let me preface this by saying that I love daydreaming. I still daydream.

  1. Thinking my book would become an instant best-selling success – just because it was good. Let me tell you, that’s not enough 😊. Rationally speaking, I knew it might not be the case, but I thought that most of the early reviews were so positive, even from people I had never met! That was mind-blowing, and I did daydream quite a bit. I still do daydream very often. I sometimes fall asleep dreaming about my books being picked up by Netflix or the Lifetime Movies Channel. Or I daydream about my Gavert City audiobook series being downloaded thousands of times with people raving about Megan’s narration (which they already do, but now we’d have thousands of downloads daily 😊). Anyways…back in 2014, a little part of me thought maybe I’d be that overnight success. The one people talk about, not realizing that overnight usually means years of writing and sometimes years of publishing. I read at the time about authors succeeding in self-publishing, but (a) I didn’t really define what succeeding would mean, (b) I didn’t have benchmarks.

    Don’t get me wrong…I hadn’t left it all to sheer luck. Oh, no, no, no. I thought I had it all under control and was set for success. After all, I had a great cover, early reviews, and a release plan (with cover reveal, blog tours, Netgalley…). This meant I would release it and everyone would want to download it and I’d be set for success.

    Spoiler alert: In June 2014, when I published ONE, TWO, THREE, I sold 45 copies…So. Not an overnight success. 😊 Granted, that book has now sold many more copies. It has also been picked up by a French publisher, and I even received a message from a French teenager who mentioned that this book, this little book of mine, has gotten her to love reading!

    Sometimes, it feels that self-publishing is a sprint. And maybe sometimes it is. But not always…And marketing doesn’t stop with release month…
  1. Advertising to the wrong audience. When I first started self-publishing back in 2014, I thought it was essential to have a Facebook page with lots and lots and lots of followers – which may have been true if I had first analyzed the audience that would be most likely to buy my book. I went for a worldwide audience at a time where my books were (a) only in English, (b) on platforms that weren’t necessarily accessible to readers all around the world. And at that time, I was not really targeting my ads…

    So yes, I had many followers, but not an enormous audience of readers interested in my books. This is a mistake I’ve made again but more structured, as I’m still trying to see what ads work the best for different audiences. I’ve succeeded in France (and I’ll get into it in my weekly newsletter in the coming weeks), but my conversion rate (how many people actually buy a book after clicking on a link) is still too low for the US market. But nothing…nothing compared to 7 years ago.

  2. Not focusing on my newsletter. I remember reading years ago…and I mean yeaaaaaaars ago how important it was to have a newsletter because social media algorithms change (and man, do they change). That way, you may build more of a connection with the reader. Some newsletters I subscribe to are only letting me know when the author has a new sale. Others are expanding on the books they’re reading, how they’re writing, maybe movies or podcasts they’re enjoying, or other things going on in their lives.

    Have I ever bought or reviewed a book based on a newsletter? Yes. Yes, I have. I have a Facebook readers’ group (if you’re on there, thank you 😊), but I haven’t been spending a lot of time on Facebook. And I don’t have Facebook on my phone. And every single time I post something on my Facebook group, the reach (people who may see it in their feed) is about 35 to 50 out of more than 400 Facebook group members). More people open my emails. And it feels like people unsubscribe more when they’re no longer interested any long…. Still, I’m in Facebook groups I haven’t checked in probably years…so…yep, I’ve been refocusing on building my readers’ newsletter.

    I do wonder about that new platform Facebook announced on March 16th. They’re getting into the newsletter subscription area and do mention also the use of groups in there. So, will that change the algorithm? Apparently, it might give writers more tools and could help in audience growth…but again, one might be dependent on changes…

    Not like we’re also not dependent on changes with emails. When Google introduced the tabs in Gmail, some newsletters ended up in the Promotions tab, which is not necessarily read as often…Anyhow…😊

    Not focusing on my newsletter was one of my self-publishing mistakes, mainly since I don’t publish a book every two months or so. Newsletters help me stay in touch with my readers in-between (which I love doing) and grow my audience.

And those are my top 3 self-publishing mistakes.

Again, if you’d like to see my top 5, you can just click here or on this cover, add your email and you’ll get access to the full pdf…

I’ll be sharing more in the coming weeks as well as what has worked for and my current publishing updates…including some stats about my bestselling format and platforms.

Thank you for reading!

Did you enjoy this post? Do you want to help support me and my writing? You can forward this email to someone who might be interested, buy my books and as always, don’t hesitate to leave me a comment.

If you have any questions about my adventures in self-publishing or anything I shared with you today, don’t hesitate to reach out and I’ll make sure to reply in my email next week.

You can click here to start receiving those weekly emails or add your email below.

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A self-published author's diary, Self publishing, Self-pub corner

A Self-Published Author’s Diary: What is that “back matter” you speak of?

Elodie

Updating the back matter of my book…what do I even mean when I say that? Let’s talk a closer look, shall we?

Important: If you’re a newsletter subscriber, you’ve already gotten the full version in your email. Make sure you check your promotion tabs in gmail as this is where I received mine. 🙂 This blog post is a truncated version of what my newsletter subscribers have received, meaning I share more information with my “A self-published author’s diary weekly email” subscribers. You can subscribe here…When you subscribe you will receive access to past issues as well. 🙂

A. Update the “Little message to my readers”

In almost all my books, I have “A little message to my readers” at the end (I’m sharing that letter with my newsletter subscribers – don’t hesitate to subscribe here and I’ll make sure you receive it :-)) This email is not only thanking readers for their time (which I do truly appreciate)…I mean did you know there are more than 48 million books on Amazon. And while it seems very hard to get yearly data on how many books are being published each year, an article on PublisherWeekly based on Bowker’s data indicated that the number of self-published titles jumped 40% in 2018...So, yep, I am super grateful readers did pick mine up in an ocean of almost endless possibilities…

My “Little message to readers” aims to encourage readers to:

  • leave a review. Why oh why do I ask for reviews? Because reviews really help other readers discover new authors. Annnnnnd….it also helps get more visibility. Reviews don’t have to be raving for this to be true. One of my first review one of my best-selling book basically says, “this book sucks.” But the overall rating for that book is a 4.3 out of 5, so that means that even though someone clearly didn’t like it very much, it doesn’t deter other readers to pick it up. Sometimes, those bad reviews actually help other readers pick a book up. One of my low rating review for ALWAYS SECOND BEST mentioned it wasn’t the equivalent of an Oscar-nominated book but rather a Danielle Steel novel. And let’s face it, this was actually a pretty big compliment to me, because I’d love to have Danielle’s Steel career and her books are beloved by millions…Another one noted that my Gavert City series reminded them of Lifetime movies…which, again…yes, please! Those reviews actually helped me gain more readers and even narrow my marketing.
  • susbscribe to my newsletter: Subscribing to my author’s newsletter is very very important to me. Why? Years ago, I remember hearing how important it was to have your readers’ emails because you can contact directly with them. And I’ve seen in the past few months how true this is. Algorithms change and people may like your page that are also no longer interested in your books…So the audience might be slightly skewed…In a newsletter, if someone doesn’t open your emails for months or years, then you can remove them from your audience but even more importantly, they receive the news directly into your inbox. You don’t rely on boosting a post or crossing your fingers you’ve understood how to use social media, especially when changes are implemented about who sees what and what posts are given priority.
  • Follow me on social media. You might think, wait, you just mentioned how important it is for you to grow you subscribers’ list. True. But for people who might not feel like they want to receive an email from me, then they can check out my social media. It is true that social media definitely isn’t one of my forte (and I’ll go into details about that at another time) but if someone likes my page, I can at least have one more opportunity to interact with them and build a link with them and maybe, they’ll love another one of my books.
  • Create a connection. By adding a little message to my readers, I may create a first connection with a reader. And maybe they will follow my BookBub page or maybe they’re going to be more enclined to recommend one of my books. I do believe they’ll pick another one up if they loved the one they read but maybe they might remember that little message and talk to someone about the story they’ve just read…

B. Update the “Other books by” and maybe the sample at the end.

C. Make sure all the social media info + newsletter info is correct, as well as the short bio info had been updated, if needed: I mean for a while there, I had the wrong link to my Facebook Author Page. I had updated the handle for my Facebook Author Page to match my other social media but hadn’t updated that info into my books…DOH! By the way, if you’d like to like my Facebook Author Page it is: www.facebook.com/enowodazkij

So what am I doing.did I do this week? (I’m starting to write this on Monday and will update it throughout the week…)

  1. Upload the bilingual version of A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER (English/Spanish) onto Google Play and contact Kindle Direct Publishing about the metadata of that kindle book. I have chosen to list the language as “English” (I cannot list two languages for those books right now), but they got back to me saying the metadata indicated the language was Spanish. I just double checked using Calibre and it still says “English”…so trying to figure out what is happening and if I could indeed list this book as both English and Spanish. Once that it is resolved, announce the book on my blog and on social media. –> I did the first part. Still need to announce the book…
  2. Do some promo for the audiobook of SEE ME, SEE ME NOT. Share the full bloopers to my readers’ newsletter (if you’d like to subscribe to that one, you can do so here…) –> Did that and also shared one deleted scene of Megan singing.
  3. Finish formatting the ALWAYS SECOND BEST bilingual books (German/English) and review it. I have made some changes to the ASB manuscript and I have to make sure it is updated in the German version as well.–> I have formatted the first part of the bilingual book and am currently interviewing some proofreaders to ensure everything is correct before uploading it on all platforms.
  4. Enroll my French Gavert City series into Kindle Unlimited. –> Well, I did update the back matter for some of my books and enrolled LA PEUR EN PLEIN COEUR in KU, buuuuuuttt I need to wait for
  5. Finish this round of revision fo UNNAMED PROJECT (Actually it has a name. A name I kind of love) –> Still working on this. I really need to focus on this next week. It will be my main focus so that I can finally send it off to my wonderful wonderful critique partners. I started writing this book
  6. Announce ONE, TWO, THREE in Italian and boost one of my Facebook posts. I did! Yay. I’ve announced it on my blog and I’ve also announced it on my Facebook and boosted one my posts. I’ve shared a video on Instagram which you can also see below.

My newsletter subscribers will get more information about some of the results of that particular post boosting and what I’m learning about the particular audience I’m boosting it to.

This creative was done with BookBrush…

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Photography

The One With The Bird Pictures Or Refilling the Creative Well…

Elodie

Taking pictures is like telling a story: either the photographer, the subject or both.

And while I can’t count taking pictures as writing, it definitely helps fill the creative well. 🙂

And I’ve been taking quite lot of bird pictures in the past few months: from my window, my backyard and on Sunday from a park close to us…The pictures below are just a selection of the dozens and dozens of pictures I must have taken. 🙂

What do you do to refill your creative well?

As always if you’re enjoying this post, don’t hesitate to check out my books, audiobooks, subscribe to one of my newsletters (receive regular updates on my books, audiobooks and more / receive weekly emails about my self-publishing adventures) or forward it to a friend. 🙂

Thank you!

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A self-published author's diary, Self publishing, Self-pub corner

A Self-Published Author’s Diary: Let’s start, shall we?

Elodie

Good morning…I don’t know why I start with “Good morning”. Especially because I’m writing this post (and email) during a stretch of several days. Like, right now, when I’m adding this sentence, it’s evening here.

Plus, you may be reading this in a lot of different places and time zones…But anyways, here is it is “Good morning”: the sun is shining through the window, Plato the Dog is snoring on the couch and I have a lot of things on my to-do list. Including starting this weekly email…which will also be available in French.

If you’re interested: you can sign up here. for the English version and here for the French version…I’ll be sharing parts of this newsletter on my blog but I might not share it on my blog every week, while when you sign up for my weekly email, you’ll receive that weekly email directly to your inbox…

Why start a weekly email about self-publishing?

After all, I am not one of the big names nor am I making thousands dollars a month and the main reason I am able to still focus on my business is thanks to my husband and his job. I mean, granted, there’s also a pandemic and due to my stem cell transplant, I’m still considered to be in the segment of the population that needs to be extra careful. But I am able to take all necessary precautions thanks to my husband and his job. Others might not.

Anyhow.

I’ve been sharing some behind-the-scenes in my Instagram stories but (a) the reach very much depends on the algorithm and I don’t post regularly enough on social media I think to make the algorithm work in my favor, (b) After not being on social media very consistently over the past several years, it sometimes feel I need to start from scratch, (c) this might be helpful and/or entertaining and/or interesting to my readers, (d) I am currently changing the way I am working on my publishing career, (e) And yes, since I will also be talking about my books, maybe I might gain a few more readers. :-), (f) sometimes it feels like I’m talking in a void…

And did I mention there is a pandemic and that I haven’t interacted face-to-face for more than 15 minutes with more than 4 people (counting my husband) in almost a year?

And at least, when I write a blog post or a newsletter, it feels like my words may reach someone,

I feel the same way about writing my books, but there’s no instant gratification when it comes to writing novels or even short stories. I don’t publish them right away. There’s an entire process behind them.

I do receive emails from readers and I need to print out them and make an album out of them, because reading them always makes me smile.

And I know that for some authors, where I am at my career is a place they long to be. And for some other authors, they wish for something different. It’s all about expectations and I guess where you are in your writing journey.

Some self-published authors who started publishing around the same time I did have quit (for many different reasons – have I mentioned how lucky I am for my husband and his support?). Other self-published authors have risen to the top of the charts, mostly due to their hard work and business savy and marketing strategies and yes, a bit of luck. But honestly, that bit of luck wouldn’t be anything without the hard work they’ve put behind the scenes and the amount of novels they have written that are so good readers can’t get enough. And some are like me, continuing to write and publish, trying out different avenues and strategies, readjusting their goals…

See? I am musing right now. Thinking out loud. Typing…out loud? I thought about starting a patreon or a podcast, but writing seems to be my favorite mean of expressing myself and sharing information. Don’t get me wrong, I can talk, talk, talk about a lot of different subjects. And since I used to work as a press officer and an adjunct, I am used to and enjoy presenting on a variety of topics. And I am good at it. But…musings in writing? That seems more like something I can do on a regular basis. And I might read this out loud and actually add it as an audio file at some point.

What do you think? Would you like this as an audio file too? Let me know 🙂

What I am currently working on:

  1. Switching some of my French-speaking, German-speaking and maybe Portuguese-speaking books to Kindle Unlimited. Why? I haven’t published a new original book in more than a year and so the sales have been dwindling on all platforms and I am getting the rights back on some of my German and Portuguese translations. Plus, by looking at the overall sales and revenues in the last three years for my books in French, I did have a jump in revenue a few months after the hype of release week when I put those books in KU. By the way did you know that Kindle Unlimited has a different name in France and there’s a whole legal story behind it about the right of publishers to set e-book prices and there were quite a few articles about it back in 2015. I found this fascinating and will definitely read more about it. The TRUST ME, TRUST ME NOT French version has also never been in the French equivalent of Kindle Unlimited soooooo…waiting for the other platforms to delist LA PEUR DANS LE SANG, LA PEUR DANS LES YEUX and LA PEUR EN PLEIN COEUR and off they go into the French equivalent of KU.
  2. Working on two new bilingual books…I had a lot of foreign-languages editions of my books up on Babelcube. And I got a lot of the rights back on those books. And my revenue currently comes mostly from my bilingual books. So this means, I need to format, format, format and publish, publish, publish. I’m currently working on the English/Spanish version of A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER and the German/English version of ALWAYS SECOND BEST.
  3. Started Mark Dawson’s class on Ads for Authors: I have been wanting to take this class for years. Literally, years. It is definitely an investment. But it has already helped me, when it comes to my newsletter and making efforts to expand my newsletter subscription in other countries, such as France, where my books have been selling the best – especially as I’m currently drafting several stories. Some of which I am planning to release this year.
  4. Trying to find ways to reach more audiobook listeners. Megan Carter narrated FEAR ME, FEAR ME NOT and SEE ME, SEE ME NOT and those audiobooks are good. Really, they are really good. She’s an amazing narrator and I am so so looking forward to have more listeners discover those books. You can just listen to the samples (FEAR ME, FEAR ME NOT sample and SEE ME, SEE ME NOT sample). From a self-publishing/business perspective, I also want to make that Megan gets her fair share of downloads. We did a Royalty-Share Plus contract on ACX, meaning that I paid her a lower rate PFH (per finished hour) but we share the royalties on the books. So for me: I want to (a) recoup my investment, (b) make a profit, (c) make sure Megan also makes on this book at least what she would have earned if I had paid her her regular PFH rate.
  5. Going wide with the audiobook of A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER: what does going wide mean for an audiobook? That means that instead of listing my audiobook via ACX (which is the Amazon platform and only makes it available on Amazon, iTunes and Audible), I am using Findaway Voices and it will be available in libraries, Google Play and so many more places.
  6. Back to training my dragon…I bought a copy of the Dragon Naturally Speaking back in 2016 and didn’t use it a whole lot. As I am currently writing short stories (ghosts! witches! vampires!) with Susan Dennard’s story-a-month challenge and want to write a prequel novella to the rom-com I’m finishing revising, I need to draft faster. Drafting faster means getting the story out faster because I have noticed that I do much better in revising if I figure out the novel as I draft it. Yes, I am now more of a plotter than I used to be but there are still areas that I discover only once I have the story drafted.

So, this is what you might expect in my weekly email. More info about what I’m reading about the self-publishing market, results in some of my marketing methods and trying out different platforms…Some random thoughts about going wide / Kindle Unlimited, writing methods.

I’ll be sharing more about training my dragon (the transcription …), the ups and downs of self-publishing, more of a glimpse behind-the-scenes…and I’ll be crossing my fingers that, that way, I can connect more with readers and writers and people around the world, wondering about self-publishing or my experience with self-publishing…after all some people still find this blog by looking up ideas on self-publishing from years ago. A lot of things have changed in the self-publishing landscape. A lot of them haven’t. I’ll share with you how I think I became somewhat of a success in France with my self-publishing books (it has to do with a lot of luck and timing).

Okay, that’s it for now.

Did you enjoy this post? Do you want to help support me and my writing? You can forward this blog post to someone who might be interested, sign up for my newsletter ( sign up here. for the English version and here for the French version), buy my books…

Or simply leave me a comment…

Don’t hesitate to ask a question in the comment and sign up for my weekly newsletter. I’ll answer questions weekly as well. 🙂

Talk to you next week. 🙂

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writing

The One With A Day Behind The Scenes

Elodie

Okay, granted, it’s not a full-full day behind the scenes…:-) I do quite a few things before I start my work day and there are certain moments during the day that don’t make it to social media. But, a few days agaon on Instagram, I thought I’d share some of what a day in the life of this author (me) entails.

Writing, of course, but not only writing as you’ll see in the video. If I were to record my work day again next week, it would look slightly different as I am also now recording an audiobook (stories in French to learn French) that I was hired for…

So…why did I decide to share my day in video?

  1. I don’t post regularly and it has been a while since I posted on social media.
  2. I think that this could be interesting/fun (maybe :-)) for: (a) readers, (b) writers, (c) people who know me in real life,

In the video, you’ll see/hear me mention that SEE ME, SEE ME NOT is now available as audiobook (Audible – Amazon – iTunes). I am currently working on a promo video for it (stay tuned :-)). I will be sharing bloopers and more with my newsletter subscribers. So, if you haven’t yet, don’t hesitate to sign up here.

SEE ME, SEE ME NOT is the second standalone novel in the Gavert City series. You don’t need to read or listen to the first one to listen/read this one.

For fans of Criminal Minds comes an audiobook full of heartache, mystery, and romance.

After suffering through the horror of her sister’s unsolved kidnapping years ago, seventeen-year-old Tessa strives to achieve some balance in her life. While still struggling with crushing guilt over Mellie’s disappearance, she cares for her mom, goes to school, works two jobs, and dreams of getting into a college music program. And she’s even reconnecting with her old crush Luke, who stumbled back into town with a sad smile and plenty of secrets. As another fake psychic tricks her mom into giving her lots of money for very little info, part of her still hopes they’ll find Mellie.

Seventeen-year-old Luke didn’t plan on setting foot in Gavert City ever again–even if thinking about Tessa helped him during the years he spent in his stepfather’s doomsday cult. His stepfather could track him here. He could find his little sister who escaped with him. He could make his life hell again. But it’s not like he had a choice. Now, he only has to keep his mouth shut and work his ass off to make his older sister proud. She’s still stuck in the cult with their mother. Maybe he can even find a way to get her out of there too.

Mellie doesn’t remember what it’s like to be with her family. They forgot her anyway. They don’t care. Jeremiah said so. And he knows. He knows everything.

As their terrifying pasts are more linked than they ever realized, will Luke and Tessa be able to save the people they love before it’s too late? 

Here’s the full retail sample…

Audio Retail sample of SEE ME, SEE ME NOT.

And here’s the video of my day on Monday…

In this video which is made of my Instagram stories from yesterday, I mention that newsletter subscribers will get the full bloopers of SEE ME, SEE ME NOT … you can subscribe to my newsletter here…

Thank you for reading!

Books

The One With the Cyber Monday (and week) deals!

Elodie

Today is Cyber Monday…And for my books, it is Cyber Week! All week, I’m offering FREE e-books, FREE audible trial and DISCOUNTED e-books!

FREE BOOKS – FREE AUDIBLE TRIAL – DISCOUNTED E-BOOKS.

FREE E-BOOKS! Click on the cover for more info/links…

ONE DREAM ONLY
(Broken Dreams: Natalya’s story #0.5)		A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER
(Broken Dreams: Nick & Em #1)		FEAR ME, FEAR ME NOT
(Gavert City #1
– Erin & Dimi)

Try Audible for Free! And listen to the audiobook of FEAR ME, FEAR ME NOT…

START YOUR AUDIBLE FREE TRIAL…

Start your Audible Free Trial…

And listen to the audiobook of FEAR ME, FEAR ME NOT…available now!

FEAR ME, FEAR ME NOT retail sample…
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And the rest of my books are $0.99 for a limited time!!! (Some retailers are still matching the prices).

Click on the covers or titles for more info/buy links.

ONE, TWO, THREE
(Broken Dreams: Natalya’s story #1)		ALWAYS SECOND BEST
(Broken Dreams: Em & Nick #2)		LOVE IN B MINOR
(Broken Dreams: Jen & Lucas’ story)
SEE ME, SEE ME NOT (Gavert City #2 – Luke & Tessa)TRUST ME, TRUST ME NOT (Gavert City #3 – Lacey & Hunter)

And…if you’d like to receive exclusive bonus scenes and audiobook review codes, don’t hesitate to subscribe to my newsletter…

Self publishing, Self-pub corner, writing

The One With The Little Book That Could…or The One with 115 reviews for A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER on Amazon!

Elodie

I’m currently writing a book on self-publishing: my experience, some tips, some of my behind-the-scenes, expectations vs reality, the happy moments…It will not be a book on how to become a millionnaire, but hopefully a book that will give you insights, ideas, resources…If you have any questions you’d like me to tackle in this book, don’t hesitate to send me an email or leave a comment. This blog post will be featured in that book.

Did you know I wasn’t planning on writing A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER? Did you know that this is the book that got the attention of a French publisher, got picked up by said-publisher and enabled me to be in French bookstores? Did you know this book now has 115 reviews on Amazon?

I published A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER in July 2015. More than 5 years ago. And since then?

A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER has been translated in French, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and Chinese. It is currently perma-free in English on all e-retailers (Amazon – iTunes – Kobo – Google Play – Scribd – Hoopla). It is available in paperback on Amazon and very soon will be available on Bookshop.org. It is also available as audiobook. (Audible – Amazon – iTunes).

I sold more more than 1200 paperback copies of the English edition of A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER since 2015. And it has been downloaded for free more than 16000 times. I haven’t advertised this book in English for years and just last July, 400 people downloaded it and I sold 56 paperback copies.

The French version has even much better numbers: both for the paid e-book and for the paperback version. Especially since the French paperback version was picked up by a French publisher and was also sold in bookstores and supermarkets and Cultura and la Fnac and in libraries…:-)

It is truly the little book that could. 🙂

115 reviews on Amazon and counting…

Did you know the English version of A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER has now more than 100 reviews on Amazon?

I mean, granted, not all reviews are raving…the one on top of the Amazon page is a one-star review, telling readers not to read A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER because it will make you angry. And another one on the German Amazon site talks about the fact that this book isn’t Oscar Wild-esque and lacks moral…

I wanted to share those reviews, but apparently, Amazon reviews belong to Amazon due to copyright? Something else to check out in more details later.

Why am I sharing that this book has some negative reviews? To show you that all books get negative reviews. And that’s perfectly fine. Not everyone will like what you’re writing. Not everyone likes what I’m writing.

And some of those negative reviews might actually help your sales, believe or not. The sales of A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER didn’t dwindle since that 1-star review took center stage on the product page.

And while, I still get these little moments where my stomach clenches as I release a new book…wondering about those first reviews trickling in, checking my book page to see if anyone reviewed it or what readers thought about the story I spent months on…I don’t dwell on them as much.

And fine it’s also easier not to dwell on them when most reviews are four and higher, and some readers call A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER the greatest book they’ve read or that they fell in love with the characters.

And did you know A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER got reviewed in The Guardian? I mean that’s pretty cool.

The story behind A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER…

I wasn’t planning on writing A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER.

My goal was to write ALWAYS SECOND BEST as a standalone companion novel to ONE, TWO, THREE. But as I drafted ALWAYS SECOND BEST, I kept on thinking about that summer between Nick & Em. I kept on thinking I needed to really get to know them better. I kept on thinking maybe I should write it out.

So, I did. I did it as a way to really get to know Nick & Em and to make ALWAYS SECOND BEST stronger.

It was only supposed to help me understand the characters better, but I fell in love with that summer story.

And I drafted it very very quickly. It took me a few months only between the moment I started drafting it and the moment I sent it to my copy editor.

My critique partners loved the story and this was one I didn’t need to revise a lot. I had been thinking about it so much while I had started drafting ALWAYS SECOND BEST that I couldn’t wait to dig deeper into their summer.

And it ended up being A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER (Nick & Em #1). And the rest is history…

Languages and more languages…

A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER is available in French, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and Chinese.

I even signed with a French publisher!

Throwback to December 2016: Signing the contract with my French publisher for the French versions of ASLNO & ASB.

The French version really took off when I published it. It shot up the charts…I released ALWAYS SECOND BEST in French not long after and it also did very very well…and that’s how A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER caught the attention of a French publisher. And made me a so-called hybrid author (self-published and traditionally published).

On November 21st, 2016 I received an email from a French publisher, who contacted me by email to see if I would be interested in signing with them for the French versions of A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER & ALWAYS SECOND BEST. Plus a possible option book.

At first, I thought it was a scam.

Really.

I don’t have an agent and I wasn’t sure how to go about it. I don’t recommend selling your foreign rights without an agent. An agent may have been able to negotiate different aspects of the contract for me. I got lucky, I think. One, because I speak French 😉 and thus, I was able to do my research, see the story of their imprint, look at the other authors they had signed with, and negotiate with them directly. I only sold the rights to the paperback version and not other format or languages. Two, they have been very good with all follow-ups. They, unfortunately, no longer carry the YA line but they were part of a bigger imprint and thus, I still am receiving royalty information and everything.

They also ended up buying the option book! And they acquired the French version of ONE, TWO, THREE as well.

September 2018 – Signing my contract for the option book: The French version of ONE, TWO, THREE…

I got an advance. I got author copies. I got promotion. I even saw my books in French bookstores and grocery stores! Kind of like one of my books making it into Target-level of excitement!

Writing this still feels surreal, even though it happened about four years ago for the first contract and about two years ago

Bilingual copies…

A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER is available in several bilingual editions (I really need to add a tab on my blog for those 🙂 – coming soon!):

German/English, German/Italian, Italian/English, French/English…

And it will be soon available in even more bilingual editions, as I’m regaining the rights of several languages in the coming weeks/months.

The first sentence in different languages…

The pop music blasts from the speakers so loudly that it resonates within me.

Des haut-parleurs s’échappe une musique pop assourdissante ; le son est si fort que chaque note résonne dans mon corps.

Die Popmusik dröhnt so aus den Lautsprechern, dass sie in mir widerhallt.

La musica pop esplode così forte dalle casse che mi risuona dentro.

La música pop suena tan fuerte en los parlantes que retumba en mi interior.

Uma música pop explode nos autofalantes, tão alta que ressoa dentro de mim.

Bonus scenes, anyone?

If you’ve read A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER and would like to receive some exclusive bonus scenes, don’t hesitate to sign up for my newsletter. 🙂

Thank you to everyone who has given this little book of mine a chance, from my critique partners to my French publisher to all the people who have read it in whatever language and format. Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to review it. Thank you to all the readers who have sent me an email to let me know how much they loved this book…

Let me know if you have any questions…any behind-the-scenes you’d like to read more about…and don’t hesitate to send me questions about my experience with self-publishing that you’d like me to answer in the book I’m currently writing.

Self publishing, Self-pub corner

The One Where You Can Ask Me Self-Publishing Questions…

Elodie

I’ve decided to do National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), a slightly modified version to fit my November goals. You can find me here if you’re on the NaNoWriMo website. For those of you who may not know:

National Novel Writing Month began in 1999 as a daunting but straightforward challenge: to write 50,000 words of a novel during the thirty days of November.

Now, each year on November 1, hundreds of thousands of people around the world begin to write, determined to end the month with 50,000 words of a brand-new novel. You may know this mass creative explosion by the name National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo—but that’s not all that NaNoWriMo is!

(…) It’s a start-up incubator for novels (books like Water for Elephants, Fangirl, and WOOL began as rough drafts in November!). It’s a teaching tool, it’s a curriculum, and its programs run year-round.

Whatever you thought NaNoWriMo was, it is more than that. (Source: https://nanowrimo.org/about-nano)

Right now I am still finalizing my adult rom-com and will continue to do so in the coming weeks. However, I am planning on also writing a few short non-fiction books about self-publishing.

This won’t be about how to become a millionaire thanks to writing or how to become a bestselling author (because I’m neither of those).

It will be more related to questions you may ask yourself before self-publishing (why, how, is that right for me, what are my expectations and what are my goals and what are my dreams), during self-publishing (the process, the options…), looking at foreign markets, what has worked for me, what hasn’t and what I have learned.

Because I’ve learned a lot in the past six years. About a lot of things, but I’m still talking about self-publishing here. 🙂 I’ve become a hybrid author (self-published and tradionally published). I’m getting a lot of my rights back from my translated works in the coming months.

I’ll share some of my stats (paperback vs ebook, countries where I am currently selling the most…), definitely a lot of behind-the-scenes and reality-checks and hopefully usefully answers some of your burning questions (again…about self-publishing).

So…do *you* have any questions about self-publishing? Or about my years as self-publisher?

Don’t hesitate to add them as a comment to this blog post or fill out the message form below to send me an email.

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personal

How to pronounce “Elodie Nowodazkij”?

Elodie

I’m used to explaining how to pronounce my name: both my first and last name. I’ve done it for years.

A few weeks ago, Trish Doller tweeted about how helpful it would be for authors to have a pronunciation guide for their name.

I had been meaning to do that for a long time.

Some days, I do believe it would have been easier to go with a pen name for more reasons than one. Other days, I’m happy I decided to publish under my name. Lots of pros and cons. But I digress. Today’s post is about how to pronounce “Elodie Nowodazkij.”

“Elodie” is a common French name. And I may just have spent ten minutes looking at a graph showing its popularity per years. According to data extracted by several websites from l’Insee (National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies), I can share with you that there were 83 babies named “Elodie” in 1900, while 7118 babies were named “Elodie” in 1981. And I was one of them. It actually reached a peak in 1988. So you could say my parents started a trend. 😉 Based on this data, 58 babies were named Elodie in 2018.

Outside of France, it is not a very common name at all. I usually tell people, it’s like, “Melody without the ‘m’.”

For my last name, “Nowodazkij”, well it’s harder because one doesn’t pronounce all letters. The “j” at the end is silent for example. And for the little story, it’s spelled like this because it was transcribed that way from Cyrillic to German when my husband immigrated to Germany when he was a kid.

So, for those of you who are wondering how to pronounce “Elodie Nowodazkij”, you can listen to me below saying it (or you can click here).

At some point, I was thinking of starting a 5-minute podcast on “How do you pronounce…?” And ask authors to tell me one story about their name.

I might still do that…

Thanks for reading (and listening)!