Debutante Ball staring "Watched"

Welcome to the Debutante Ball, 

A Feast of Debut Authors Blog Tour.

The party Ends today with me. So cool!

We're all giving away our books and some awesome swag. So, enter each day on each blog below on or before December 31st to win.

Announcing Watched, a contemporary suspense Novel by Cindy M. Hogan.

Released June 6, 2011.

What readers are saying about Watched:

"Fantastic read, full of suspense and excitement."

-Bullard GMTA

"One of those books you don't want to put down."
-S. Hill

"Well written and suspenseful."

-A. Brown

"Usually I'm prone to murder mysteries by James Patterson, and this kept me just as enthralled as his books."

-S. McClure

"This is my new favorite book."

-A. Ahlstrom 

Just for this contest and to thank everyone who has made Watched a success and spread the word even more, Watched is only .99 cents for all e-readers.  

Yahoo! Go get yours today
Nook
Kindle

all other e-formats also available. Get it at your favorite spot.

All you have to do to enter is comment and tell others about the fun Each time you comment, Tweet, Facebook or blog about the ball during the rest of December, you get an entry. Just leave a comment with the link to what you did. Easy!

Have fun and go find out about all these authors. 
                  One a day. 
                              Enter their contests and win.


Have fun and enjoy the books and swag!

12 Elizabeth Mueller elizabethmueller.blogspot.com

13 Regan Guerra www.reganguerra.blogspot.com

14 Melissa Pearl melissapearl.blogspot.com

15 Claudia Lefeve http://www.claudialefeve.com/

16 Joseph Beekman http://josephsstoriesandtales.blogspot.com/

17 Pendragon Innmen PendragonWrites.com 

19 Alex J. Cavanaugh alexjcavanaugh.blogspot.com

20 Gillian Schafer gillianjoy-livingtowrite.blogspot.com

21 Fiauna Lund formyfour.blogspot.com

22 Anastasia V. Pergakis http://labotomyofawriter.com/

26 Tanya Contois http://speedyreader-allthingsbooks.blogspot.com

27 Patti Larsen pattilarsen.blogspot.com

28 Red Tash RedTash.com

29 Annetta Ribken wordwebbing.com

30 Cindy Hogan watched-thebook.blogspot.com 

Leave me some love and comment!

Indie-Publishing Secrets Revealed #18 Publishing Mistakes and More Mistakes

#18 My world of indie-publishing :) A comedy of errors.

When I decided to indie-publish, I was pretty much on my own. Sure, there was a ton of "vague" or "theoryish" information out there, but nothing hands on. I had to muddle my way through it.

I freely admit that I tend to be a bit compulsive. What can I say? I'm an optimist through and through. I couldn't imagine anything going wrong with my hasty plans. How hard could it be?

I was about to find out.
Mistakes, Mistakes, Mistakes as well as some Problems
Don't make the same mistakes I made. (Links to solutions are in the titles of each section)


I was intending to find an agent. In fact, I had several requests for the first three chapters waiting for me to send them. I just couldn't and I don't know why.
ABNA
Because of the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award Contest, I had a free proof waiting for me at Createspace.

I went for it and created a book. When my proof came, I couldn't help but show everyone I knew and guess what? Those people all wanted to buy a book. Students in the schools I taught wanted the book. My neighbors wanted the book. 

I'd been working on it for a good 3 years and had a hard time accepting that if an agent picked me up, and if a publisher bought it, it would be at least two years before it would be on shelves.

So, I went for it.

I bought into the Createspace expanded distribution channel hype and talked to Barnes and Noble about launching my book. What I didn't know was that the expanded distribution channel did not put my books on bookshelves and bookstores would not order it even though it was in the Ingram catalogue. Sure, they CAN order it, but they won't. Never in a million years. I called Createspace and complained. I told them how misleading the expanded distribution channel was.  Funny, they've since changed the wording for this distribution.
Profits anyone?
Also, if anyone bought my book from B&N.com or other sources other than Amazon.com, I would only make .67 cents or so from each book. Yeah. .67 cents.
ISBN and Barcode Mania
Then I discovered the problem with the ISBN and barcode. The ISBN belonged to Createspace and the barcode was coded with 9000 and no price. The barcode is what stores scan into the computer when you buy it. The 9000 code gives no pricing info. Stores hate that. Most bookstores require the price to be encoded in the barcode and the price printed on the book. Createspace does not do that. I had to quickly add both of those things to the book for my launch and get it all re-approved through Createspace. What a pain.
Money, money, money
I also had to order and pay for all the books for the launch. Barnes and Noble wouldn't/couldn't order from a POD. (Print on Demand publisher) I bit the bullet and ordered 200.
Defective Books?
During the launch, after about an hour of signing books, I took a book from a customer to sign and noticed the title page was missing. I set it aside and started paying attention to the books I was signing. As the books came out of the boxes, I discovered all kinds of problems with them: the laminate peeled on some, the cover was only partially printed, bubbles were in the cover, major scratches and smudges were on the covers, pages  were turned or incorrectly added, pages were missing. 
No joke. It was real.
How many books had I signed with problems I hadn't noticed? I tried to stay calm and had my hubby go through the books before he brought them to me. We made it through the night and I had enough books. It was awesome to be the 3rd highest selling author ever at that Barnes and Noble. Yay! Later, after a big hullabaloo, Createspace did make it right-as much as they could, considering people probably got defective books.
LCCN? What's that?
Then I found out about LCCN's. Creatspace hadn't mentioned these. (Yes, I complained and guess what? Their new format does tell you about them) I researched and discovered I wanted one, but I had to get a new ISBN that belonged to me and re-publish in order to get one. Another two week process.
I want my books on bookstore shelves!
I also really wanted my books to be on shelves and had found a distributor who could put them there. I got the books printed and sent them to the distributor, cancelling everything with Createspace. Basically, I retired my book title.
More ISBN problems?
New problems came up. Createspace had somehow attached itself to my ISBN and my new distributor couldn't list the book on Amazon or on Ingram. My book had just been launched and no one could get their hands on it. Createspace kept saying they didn't know what was going on and Amazon was saying they couldn't fix it without Createspace. Createspace truly had claimed my ISBN and "couldn't explain how that happened". Finally, after 3 weeks, problem solved. What a mess.
Barnes and Noble madness
My print book is still not back on Barnes and Noble.com or in its stores because it has to go through another 6-8 week acceptance process, even though it had already been on their site. Crazy, I know. Anytime now.
More ISBN craziness
Also, I had to get my books combined on Amazon and Goodreads because it now had a new ISBN. Amazon won't combine the two, but Goodreads does. So much trouble.
Did I really miss that comma, spell that wrong, leave that out...
I thought I had my book proofed really well. Then, a couple of my good friends got their hands on it. They tore it up. I'm on my third printing now, and hopefully with their amazing help, I actually have a book (ebook and print) that is almost error free. Too bad I hadn't thought to have them fix it before the first printing. That's what happens when you're in too much of a hurry and way overconfident. Be sure your book is edited well before you put it out there. Take all the time you need. I know, you have looked at it a hundred times and can't see any errors anymore. That's why you need fresh eyes-one last time.

I did not write this post to discourage you from indie-publishing. On the contrary. Go for it. But do it with some direction. Sure, you may run upon some problems, some mistakes, but hopefully, they won't be the full-on horrible ones I made. I am doing this series for YOU.  Spare yourself some heartache and learn from me. Good thing I'm not prone to depression, right? I actually look back and laugh.

What a trip.

Happy Indie-Publishing!!

Celebrate The Release Of Watched With Us

And you could win lots of awesome prizes

                          and learn about             

        Watched,

        the hottest new teen novel,

       while making new friends.

Each of the following blogs is offering a different awesome prize!

(That's 14 prizes!) On this blog you could win a signed copy of Watched!

And the grand prize is a $25 dollar gift card to Amazon.

                  Quick, Fast Entry

Pick a blog, any blog to get started

(just click on the underlined name)

Better hurry! There's only 4 days to enter -Tues., June 21st-Friday, June 24th
 **(Need more details? More complete entry details at the bottom of the page)

1.   Follow Rachelle Writes and leave a comment.   Then follow Cindy M. Hogan and leave a comment about Rachelle's blog. (If you do both you get 1 entry into Rachelle's contest and one into the Grand Prize contest-You Must do both to enter either)

2.   Follow A Writer's Reality and leave a comment. Then follow Cindy M. Hogan and leave a comment about Melissa's blog.

3.   Follow Day Dreamer and leave a comment.

Then follow Cindy M. Hogan and leave a comment about Christine's blog.

4.  Follow The Queen of the Clan and leave a comment. Then follow Cindy M. Hogan and leave a comment about Danyelle's blog.

5.   Follow Jordan McCollum and leave a comment. Then follow Cindy M. Hogan and leave a comment about Jordan's blog.

6.  Follow The Crazy Daze of Motherhood and leave a comment. Then follow Cindy M. Hogan and leave a comment about Jane's blog.

7.  Follow I am a Pistachio and leave a comment.

Then follow Cindy M. Hogan and leave a comment about Rebecca's blog.

8.   Follow Chasing Dreams and leave a comment. Then follow Cindy M. Hogan and leave a comment about Tamara's blog.

9.   Follow Ramblings of a Random Writer and leave a comment. Then follow Cindy M. Hogan and leave a comment about Betsy's blog.

10. Follow Matthew Tandy-The Working Writera nd leave a comment. Then follow Cindy M. Hogan and leave a comment about Matthew's blog.

11 Follow Weaving a Tale or Two and leave a comment. Then follow Cindy M. Hogan and leave a comment about Donna's blog.

12. Follow Tristi Pinkston, LDS Author and leave a comment. Then follow Cindy M. Hogan and leave a comment about Tristi's blog.

13. Follow My Yellow Sandbox and leave a comment. Then follow  Cindy M Hogan and leave a comment about Abby's blog.

14. Follow Watched and leave a comment. Then follow Cindy M Hogan and leave a comment about that blog.

13. Enter all 14 contests and you get an extra 5 entries into the Grand Prize Giveaway. (19 entries)

14. That's not all! Get 6 extra entries by buying Watched here (print book) or here (e-book) and sending her a copy of your confirmation cindymhogan at yahoo dot com. Easy peasy.   Wow! That's 25 entries!

           

Have fun and good luck!

**More Details on how to enter

• Click on the blog name
• Follow that blog
• Leave a comment that you were there 
• Jump over to Cindy's blog
• Leave a comment about what you liked about the other blog. 

Congrats! You've entered that blog's contest and earned one entry into the Grand Prize Drawing!

Enter one. Enter two or how ever many you like, but...

If you enter all the blogs' contests you get a bonus 5 entries into the Grand Prize Drawing.
That gives you a total of 19 entries to win the

Grand Prize- A $25 gift card to Amazon.

And don't forget to get your copy of Watched for a bonus 6 entries.
(25 total)

Remember- you only have 4 days to enter.
(Tues, June 21st-Friday, June 24th at midnight)  

and you must comment on both blogs for entry into each contest.

Individual blogs will award prizes on June 25th

The Grand Prize will be awarded on June 28th on Cindy's blog.

Check back to see if you won! You have 2 days to claim your prize.

A big thanks to my awesome friends for joining in on the fun.

1.   Rachelle Writes

2.   A Writer's Reality

3.   Day Dreamer

4.  The Queen of the Clan

5.   Jordan McCollum

6.   The Crazy Daze of Motherhood

7.   I am a Pistachio

8.   Chasing Dreams

9.   Ramblings of a Random Writer

10. Matthew Tandy-The Working Writer

11 Weaving a Tale or Two

12 Tristi Pinkston, LDS Author
13.My Yellow Sandbox
14. Watched

Indie Publishing Secrets series will return next Tues

Win a free copy of Watched

Jump over to cindymhogan.blogspot.com for the details.

The contest is in a post from May 5th. Good Luck!



Win a copy of this book before the Launch on June 6th.

First Teen Review of WATCHED-Yippee

Just got this review from one of my teen reviewers. Bet you'll like it as much as I do!

"I loved the entire book!  Quickly after reading it, I became obsessed!  I found myself wide awake and still reading at midnight.  I took it everywhere; I read it in bed, at the table while eating breakfast, even during during biology (my biology teacher didn't like that too much), my only regret is that books aren't water-proof, otherwise I'm sure I would have read it in the shower.  I was constantly wondering what would happen next.  The plot was thick and juicy and the characters, to die for.  I definitely think there should be a second book!"
--
~LeXxI

Best New Teenage Novel Coming Soon!

Exciting News!

Cindy Hogan's debut novel, Watched, will be released as an e-book mid-May and will be in stores June 6th, 2011.

Coming soon-Book launch and book signing events!