Marinated Publishing

You can't be anywhere in the reading/writing blogsphere and not be privvy to all the self-publishing love it - hate it conversations going on.

When I was a wee child of advanced years (heh), self pub is what a person did because their writing sucked. Self pubbed = can't write. In fact, maybe about 5 or 6 years ago, I mocked a fan fic writer for self pubbing a horrible story because well, the story was horrible and she admittedly was doing it to try and cash in on the fan angle of fan fic.

She didn't know how to write and she seemed rather straight-laced and her book tanked as well as it should. But then a few years later JA Konrath started passing out the Kool Aid and Amazon was handing out the Kindle candy and everything changed.

I wanted to follow the trad route to publication. I'm not a young woman and my dreams have been around a long time. I believed in publishing as that golden tower in New York where agents were dapper and book deals were discussed over martinis and borscht in the Russian Tea Room and it was something.

I wanted that.

So I wrote a little book and got a couple of epubbed offers and I signed with Lyrical because they seemed classy and it was a good choice. I had an amazing editor, Antonia Tiranth and the process was awesome.

Carolyn subbed a story too and joined Lyrical and it was way cool.

Then we subbed our book The Bodice Rippers everywhere and got the best rejection letters ever. Everyone loved it and no one would publish it. So I badly formatted it and we self-pubbed it.

Carolyn has pubbed 4 books with Lyrical. I've pubbed three books with Lyrical, one with Noble Romance, two short erotica with a press that folded and I've self pubbed three novellas and an anthology.

I've gotten really good at formatting. Lea's covers are so excellent that we're trying to launch her as her own business. Antonia, my original editor, is willing to freelance edit for us and so we've decided to be our own business.

MARINATED PUBLISHING

The Marinated is a joke because we (Carol, Lea and myself) met on a fan board for a musical group called Il Divo. Carol and I are fan of the bariton Carlos Marin so we claim we've been marinated.

This is Carlos by the way. He sings even better than he looks which means he's fucking amazing.

Anyway, last night I uploaded a well formatted file of Letters from Greece onto Createspace and Lea tweaked and tweaked the cover to perfection. The ebook is being released on July 9 by Lyrical but we'll be releasing the paperback through Marinated.

After this, we'll be publishing as Marinated only. We have a roster of four authors right now and a release schedule of three definate books and more on the pipeline.

I know I'm crazy excited. I've discovered that the journey of publishing changed in my head from one of being agented and sold to a New York house to one now of endess conversations with Lea about covers, constant tweaking with formatting and planning sessions with Carolyn.

Controlling the writing from the first germ of an idea to the finished product is amazing. I'm glad we decided to take this step.

Stuff and Nonsense

I should have stayed in bed this morning.

It began on the Amazon forums. That's a crazy ass amount of whack-a-doodling. Those people are so freaking nuts. It's like a troll graveyard except the damned trolls refuse to die.

But what got me this morning was someone created a thread pointing out what she thought was plaigarism and was pointed out to her was not. And then (this is the wtf-uckery) mentioned how Janet Dailey had been accused of plaigarizing La Nora because she she kinda copied a paragraph or two.

I'm sorry. Can we all WTF! that one together?

She stole 2 stories outright and was found guilty in our legal system.

Now over on DA they're talking about self-pubbed authors rewriting their books after they've been put up for sale.

Okay.... WTF?!?!?!?!

For sale means complete. Not I finished my first draft and I want to make money. But it might not be done. Or it might. Depends on what kind of feedback I get.

Seriously, my bed looks really good right now.

Some really crazy shit in my personal life which I won't go into.

But we got a dog. That's him in my bed. Under my blanket. On my pillow.

Good thing he doesn't drool. Even better thing: he's banned from my bed so my daughter, her dog and the two cats have all moved into my daughter's bedroom and I got my bed to myself. Yes, After 11 years, I got my bed to myself.

I am not lonely.

Carolyn is supposed to have a/c back today so I'm letting her out of the basement. Also I can't afford to feed her anymore. That woman goes through a shitload of sweet tea and chips.

And I have my book with an editor and I started on Book Two (I'm doing my first series) and I tossed the whole thing because I realized today that I have the wrong heroine. So back to the beginning.

I really should have stayed in bed this morning.

Meet Elle

Elle's Designs

Sometimes you just need a book cover. And if you're like me, you need a few.

So there's this woman named Elle (she's also known as Lea but that's a secret just between us). She makes pretty book covers. She made that one for me (book will be released in August).

She also made Caboodle's and Bodice and Gift and well, oodles of covers.

If you know someone who needs a little extra oomph with cover art, send them to our gal Elle.

Isn't that just a gorgeous fucking cover she made me?

In and Out Masterpiece

I have to share this. It made me laugh.

Completely foul so don't watch it at work or around small children.

Hot Tin Roof

Hey everyone!  :-D

I'm still in the basement because we've had no A/C for about a week now. So Lori's nefarious actions were really a blessing in disguise because her basement is cool and my guys bring me lots of fast food so I won't take it into my head to cook again. I think they want me to take up permanent residence.  Ha! I have too much fun messing with their minds.

My thermometer says it's 86.2°F in my computer room. Time to retire to the basement again. Sorry for not joining any parties going on, but you know how that is. I thought I'd acclimatizied to the deep south, but looks like I'm still Canadian after all. Not a bad thing to be at all, but not when it's 95° outside, is what I say.

Fare thee well until cooler weather ....

We Get Mail

Oh, our inboxes runneth over. It's amazing the amount of mail we get. So I thought today I might share some.

Most of the mail begins quite sweetly. My Beloved.... I am writing to you with tears in my eyes as I am the last living relative of Jezumbabwalah Brazneedeshwahalah who died in a fiery plane crash....

I rarely read beyond that because I know that the poor dear is just going to beg for an autographed copy of The Bodice Rippers and the post office has banned me from the place till October because of that little box 'o dildoes incident. It so wasn't my fault they weren't properly off.

Then there's the really complimentary ones....  Dear Lori Green..... do you want to lose that belly fat now?

I know they just want an autographed copy of The Bodice Rippers but since they've hurt my feelings by suggesting I lose Henry (I named my belly fat, haven't you?), well I just can't bare it.

My favorite emails come from my biggest fans: The McCullough family. Here's a rough sample:

Bitch! I contacted the police and they'll be at your door momentarily. If you don't let my mother out of your basement, heads will roll. And I don't mean that the fun way!!

Bitch! Let Carolyn go! I need my supper!

Bitch! The first round of edits is in your email. Love, Carolyn.

Makes me feel tingly inside.

And because I promised naked men earlier, here's some pics.

I'm giving nothing away to any commenters because nobody comments. I might let Carolyn out of the basement later but then again, I might not.