Whether I like it or not, the time has come—my indie author book launch is official. Naughty Week is live, ahead of schedule as it may be. Regardless, I need to take my indie author book launch in stride.
I made my first big publishing mistake yesterday. I published the paperback to KDP without including the publishing date. Once the book is published, this is something that can’t be changed. I didn’t realize the mistake until yesterday morning and promptly emailed Amazon support. I received the following message, which is sort of followable in English:
Hello Matt,
I completely understand your concern, kindly note that you cannot specify a publication date when you submit your new paperbck book for publication through KDP. The publication date will be automatically set to the date we first make your title available for sale.
We wont be able to change the publication date for a existing paperback book manually from our end as well.
I understand that this might not be the response your were waiting for and I apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.
I hope you understand that if we had the access to change the publication date from our end I would have definitely changed as per your request.
Thanks for your kind understanding.
I am not going to fight it. It’s out of my control. I need to let it go. Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise. It makes the book available immediately, so what? All it does is force me to look take action. I can do that. I welcome that. I switched over the Kindle edition to an October release date, which is pending review. I went to IngramSpark and switched over the release date for the paperback and ebook there. When I publish the hardcover, it’ll be released October 1. The good news is Pintado seemed to have uploaded cover files this morning, so I might actually have it online for October 1.
So that happened. This indie author book launch is really happening. Something else that happened was more on a personal note. The girls’ mom and I have been going back and forth trying to figure out Thanksgiving. I wrote a long, thoughtful text about whether we should do it together. If we did it together, I would see that as being hope for us to be a family again. I asked her if that was something she was open to. Her response, in so many words, was that we should plan to do Thanksgiving separately.
I was watching the Thursday night football game, Eagles vs Packers, when I received the text. It was the first quarter. I made myself some brats and a soft pretzel and was enjoying an IPA. The text triggered something in me. It motivated me weirdly. I am due to write a Facebook post about my book. I could jump right to the cover reveal, but it would need some context now that the book is available. So I drew up this FB post:
It was December 26, 2010, the day after Christmas, and I was having breakfast at the Larchmont Bungalow with the fam. Laurel was only eight months old at the time and was enjoying a breakfast of Cheerios and sliced bananas.
This family entered. They had two boys, about four and six years old. Their mom and dad were ordering at the counter, and the boys got a little impatient and antsy. Pushes turned to shoves. They were misbehaving as boys might misbehave while waiting for their parents to order grown-up food. Their mom bent down and warned, “Just because Christmas is over doesn’t mean you can be naughty. Santa’s watching.”
“Yeah right, lady,” I thought to myself. “It’s the day after Christmas. Santa’s on vacation.”
And so a seed of an idea was planted. What if Santa did go on vacation between Christmas and New Year’s? And what if two brothers found out about it?
I initially wrote “Naughty Week” as a screenplay. I spent a good two years on it, writing and rewriting when I could find the time. It received some interest at Disney XD and Nickelodeon Films, but they already had their holiday franchises. According to my agent at the time, that was the end of the road for “Naughty Week.”
I thought it was a great idea, and anyone I pitched it to agreed. So about two years ago, I decided to write it as a novel. Writing it as a novel allowed me to go deeper into the characters’ backstories and add more layers and heart to the story. I’ve been told it’s a Middle Grade novel because of the main character’s age, though I didn’t set out to write a Middle Grade novel. I just wrote the story as I envisioned it in my head.
I am excited to announce that “Naughty Week” will be available in paperback, hardcover, ebook, and audiobook wherever books are sold. It will also be available to libraries nationwide.
The one thing I discovered that I never expected was how much fun it was to read it to my girls. It’s a great book for storytime. Sure, I’m a little biased, but others that have read advanced copies — including family, other authors, and my daughters’ school librarian — have had nothing but good things to say about it. Of course I want everyone to buy it and read it and love it and buy many, many copies as Christmas presents this year, but if you can’t can’t do that and you’re interested in reading my fun-filled Christmastime novel, then just go to your local library and ask for it.
After today, the cat will officially be out of the bag. I have already sold two copies. I bought one (no royalty there), and a friend told me she bought me one last night. Two down, 1998 to go! That triggers the rankings in my categories. I need to do that thing the Kindlepreneur recommends where I contact Amazon and request additional categories. Here we go….
