BOOK PUBLISHING SECRETS: HOW TO PUBLISH YOUR BOOK!: Book Publishing Secrets with Tom Carter

Name: Tom Carter

Book Title: Nashville: Music and Murder

Genre: Fiction (Suspense, Thriller, Crime)

Is this your first book?

Tom: No, I've written eighteen, half of which were New York Times or USA Today best-sellers.

With this particular book, how did you publish - traditional, small press, Indie, etc. - and why did you choose this method?

Tom: This is my first self-published book. I did so because conventional publishers no longer pay the lofty advances-against-royalties that I derived from my previous books. Also, my self-publisher (Ingram) pays much higher profits than royalties issued by conventional publishers.

Can you tell us a little about your publishing journey? The pros and cons?

Tom: I was a 17-year newspaper reporter who also wrote for Time and People magazines. I moved to Nashville, Tennessee in 1988 to collaborate with singer/pianist Ronnie Milsap to co-write his

autobiography. I eased from that book to an autobiographical collaboration with another celebrity. My momentum gathered, and I eventually co-wrote twelve celebrity autobiographies. I also

wrote six unrelated books in various genres.

What lessons do you feel you learned about your particular publishing journey and about the publishing industry as a whole?

Tom: My two books for 2017 were my first dance with self-publishing. I learned about self-publishing mostly through time consuming trial and error. My previous books were published by Simon & Schuster, Doubleday, HarperCollins, Random House, McGraw-Hill and Putnam. Once a deal was signed, the publishers handled all of the production and distribution. Not so with self-publishing, where a writer must learn the ins-and outs of the day-to-day rigors inherent to publishing, select a publicist, fulfill the publicist’s recurring demands, writing blogs, taking PR meetings, etc. I may return to conventional publishing just to avoid self-publishing’s busy work.

Would you recommend this method of publishing to other authors?

Tom: Yes.

What's the best advice you can give to aspiring authors?

Tom: Love to write for writing's sake. The odds of being commercially successful are stacked against you.

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About the Book:

As a teenager, Maci Willis fled the poverty and sexual abuse of her Louisiana childhood in hopes of finding a new life as a Nashville recording star or greasy spoon waitress. Despite the odds, the former fate unfolded, and Maci recorded hit songs for two decades while indulging a pampered lifestyle void of risks and regrets.

But all of that changed during one fateful performance.

While Maci sang a fourth encore to a crowd of 18,000, the music was shattered by a gunshot fired by an obsessed fan. She emerged triumphant from the attempt on her life — only to face another attempt shortly afterwards. Was it a coincidence? Or was something more sinister at work?

Nashville: Music and Murder follows Maci's frantic flight from danger — and toward redemption. Along the way, it exposes glamour of stardom, the loneliness of fame, and the seedier side of the Nashville music scene.

Antagonized by the mass media, victimized by her record label executives, stalked by deranged fans, and hunted by local and federal authorities, Maci leads readers through a fast-paced descent into hysteria, chaos and murder.

In an attempt to escape it all, Maci finds herself returning to the childhood she once fled. The woman who faced life on her own terms soon discovers that loneliness is a walking prison from which she’ll never walk away.