Month: November 2023

Things I’m Learning From Publishing

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As someone who blogs posts on plenty of topics, I’m not new to the publishing world… Persée, however, in the world of publishing a book, certain things are different. Here is what I’ve learned so far when publishing a book.

Writing About Yourself Will Be Hard

I’m one that likes to talk about different topics in pop culture and also what’s going on in the world… past and present, but with creating a mini biography in this book, it feels weird. I love writing about my experiences, but it’s rare. Just to talk in a third person feels a bit cringe, but I have to sell myself, no matter the audience. There’s a certain level of professionalism within the whole process.

Writing An Acknowledgement Page is Personable

I plan on writing this at the ending of this whole project, even though I have so many that I plan on thanking. This is my first book, but I feel that this aspect of this project will paint a full picture of it, and give the reader a little more detail on me, the author, who’s been the main inspiration for me. My reasoning for writing this is because it will be the end of it all. Like thanking my loved ones on top of who will help with the visuals.

Finding the Right Artist is Crucial

I have someone in mind to literally put the picture together, but there’s always a backup that I need to consider. I want my vision to be in art form for the cover page, as this will be the selling point. Besides this, I just want it to look professional and cohesive. This by far has to be one of the most important aspect of this chapbook… besides the poems. This is the icing on top of the cake.

The Trials of Formatting A Page

This has been the most stressful part of conducting the format of each poem. From trying to fit the poems in a cohesive manner instead of it flying left or right or just jumbled up page by page…it’s been frustrating. Also, Amazon Kindle Publisher does not properly upload the word documents as pdf’s are your best bet of choice. The one tricky thing that I’ve been working around is fitting the illustrations within the lines of the book.

Choosing Between a Pen Name or My Legal Name

I’m so tempted to go incognito and create a name that would express my creativity… like being a true author/poet, but posting my legal name adds to the legal aspect of my work. I’ll get the proper credit for the work that I did, and who knows if I get discovered by someone within the industry. A pen name creates anonymity to my work and I can fully express my writing in full blast, plus the name would be a cool one too. With that being said… I’ll still be expressing myself fully too with my legal name. Oh, the decisions.

The process is still ongoing and I’m not sure when this will wrap up. I have a deadline in mind; this will be early next year. It seems so far from now, yet very close. There’s not much time for me, but yet there’s enough in the sense that I have to strategically set everything in the right place, and timing. Let’s see what happens. I am enjoying the process!

Update on The Publishing

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So I’ve started putting together the poems that I’ve written, placing them in a cohesive order. Just getting in the moment of organizing the pieces of work has been quite enjoyable, but there have been certain aspects that are less to be desired. The first thing is a formation on certain companies that assist with self publishing. Before I list where I’ll be conducting my work, I think it’s best that I discuss the work that I’m writing about. Foremost, my poems are all in interpretation. That’s the main thing, and this is what I’ve enjoyed overall in this project. 

The subjects that I’ll be covering is:

Self-Love

Self-love will be the main topic, I don’t think that this topic will ever tire out, because as cliche as it may sound (not to me), we all need to love ourselves first, before anyone else. So many of us have different ways of how we can do this while also sharing our unique experiences. For me, I not only had to look within myself on my experiences, but also listen to the surrounding people. It’s all in a combination of experiences, mended in a pot of art therapy for me.

Mental Health

Self-love and mental health are twins in a family, but sometimes this is often ignored. It’s never a tiring subject, nor does it make anyone weak. It takes a lot of bravery to speak about the experiences, heartbreaks, and the wins that we experience. Part of why I included this topic was because of my diagnosis with Epilepsy and also the Pandemic.

Love

Love can be romantic, but also having love for family, friends, a pet… etc. I also put myself in a space of thought about who I’d react to certain things and feelings. It’s a scary thing to be vulnerable no matter what. To show that part of yourself to anyone, including family, can be daunting yet rewarding. But first you have to look within yourself first before opening up to anyone else… because of the self-acceptance.

Identity

Everyone is something unique about them. For me, this is something that I wanted to explore, and share my experience, as a black woman, and someone who now has an invisible disability. This topic is based on what I’ve been through as a child, a teenager and now. It’s not necessarily to point specific fingers to one person, but as a collective… especially with society and the media. It’s also a sum of the other topics blended in together. Think of it as a dash of self-love, the focus or mental health, and loving others as the ingredients, identity as the equation… the cake of it all.

I don’t know if this will reach any audience, yet alone a large one, and I don’t care. All that I know is that at the end of this project, I will feel proud of myself for doing it. I believe in my work. I’m not sure how everyone will view it or critique it, but I’ve done a lot of critiquing myself, so I’m ready to put it out there. It’s also quite daunting and surreal at the same time. It may just get an audience from my family and friends, and I’ll be fine with that. But there is the possibility that it could reach to some sort of another target… who knows? Overall, I’ll be happy with whatever. No matter what, if it reaches one person who is positively affected by my work, that’s the main reward for me.