Book Publishing Secrets with Gina Heumann, Author of Love Never Quits

Gina Heumann is a true Renaissance woman: wife, mother, architect, designer, instructor, author, speaker, and sales rep for an award-winning Napa Valley winery. She and her husband, Aaron, adopted Landrey in 2001 from Guatemala and then went back for Maddox three years later. Gina’s love of learning and dedication as a mother inspired her research of different treatments and therapies that eventually led to this inspirational success story about conquering Reactive Attachment Disorder.

Her latest book is Love Never Quits: Surviving & Thriving After Infertility, Adoption, and Reactive Attachment Disorder.

WEBSITE & SOCIAL LINKS:

Website Link: www.ginaheumann.com

Facebook Link: https://www.facebook.com/loveneverquits

BOOK BLURB:

WHACK… At three in the morning Gina was sound asleep, yet somehow she was smacked in the head. She looked over at her husband, thinking perhaps he accidentally rolled over and flopped his

arm on top of her, but he was sleeping soundly and facing the opposite direction. She turned to the other side and glaring back at her was her eight-year-old child.

“Did you just hit me?”

“Yes, and I’d do it again.”

“Whyyyy?”

“Because you took away my video games.”

“That was EIGHT HOURS AGO. And you’re still mad about it?”

“I wish I could kill you.”

This is the true story of the hell one family lived through parenting a child with reactive attachment disorder, a severe diagnosis related to children who experienced early-childhood trauma.

This inspirational story covers over a decade of daily struggles until they finally found resolution and made it to the other side. The family remained intact, and this once challenging son is now achieving things never thought possible. 

ORDER YOUR COPY:

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Thank you for your time in answering our questions about getting published.  Let’s begin by having you explain to us why you decided to become an author and pen this book?

Gina: It’s a funny story, but I actually saw a woman who was a hand analyst – not a palm reader who foretells the future, but a scientific hand analyst who works with Fortune 500 companies to help them customize jobs according to the strengths and weaknesses of the employee. Apparently the lines in your hand mimic the neural pathways in the brain and can give clues to what you’re destined to do. This lady insisted I was meant to be a writer. At the time, I didn’t consider myself a writer, as I wasn’t an English major and didn’t even keep a diary, but she insisted I give it a try. I had this idea of sharing our story once my son was in a better place so we could highlight our success after struggling with such a rare and serious condition, and I wanted to inspire others. The timing was right so I just went for it!

Is this your first book?

Gina: Yes, it is… but now that I see how easily I am able to tell stories, I have ideas for more.

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

Gina: I self-published this book, because I am a designer and wanted to have full control over the cover design, interior layout, and editing process. I also wanted to maintain rights to my own story, in case I wanted to use it for other things in the future.

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

Gina: I self-published through a consulting firm called “My Word Publishing” and highly recommend them. They assigned a project manager to my book, who helped connect me to three different editors, each of whom provided a sample edit and a proposal. I was able to choose the one who spoke to me. We went through three rounds of editing and then a round of proofreading, so I know it was a thorough job.

My project manager also walked me through the bookstore to get ideas for cover design, and sent me to several different cover designers’ websites to view their portfolios and choose one that seemed to fit what I was looking for. I had actually designed my own cover, so I just needed someone to pull it together and make it look professional. I liked working with my cover designer so much that I kept her on to do the interior layout as well.

I really liked having ultimate control over the look and feel of my book, and it was important to me to maintain the rights to my story. I was also able to somewhat control the schedule and complete the project faster than I would with a traditional publisher. I would say the only “con” to self-publishing is that I had to pay for it up front, rather than getting an advance check.

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

Gina: I learned that there are so many steps to creating a published book. I never knew there were so many decisions involved! When my designer asked me where to put the page numbers, I was a little taken aback – that’s a thing? I also didn’t realize that an editor and proofreader were different people looking for different things in the story.

Would you recommend this method of publishing to other authors?

Gina: Absolutely. I really enjoyed the entire process.

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

Gina: I would say if you have an idea and you like to write, just do it! And if you have a consultant like My Word, someone will guide you through the entire process and help make it a professional job, teach you how to market the book, and more.

Book Publishing Secrets with Lee Matthew Goldberg, Author of The Desire Card

Lee Matthew Goldberg is the author of SLOW DOWN and THE MENTOR (St. Martin’s Press), which was acquired by Macmillan Entertainment with the film in development. He has been published in multiple languages and nominated for the 2018 Prix du Polar. The first two books in a thriller series, THE DESIRE CARD and PREY NO MORE, are forthcoming from Fahrenheit Press in winter 2019. His pilots and screenplays have been finalists in Script Pipeline, Stage 32, We Screenplay, the New York Screenplay, Screencraft, and the Hollywood Screenplay contests. After graduating with an MFA from the New School, his writing has also appeared in the anthology DIRTY BOULEVARD, The Millions, The Montreal Review, The Adirondack Review, Essays & Fictions, The New Plains Review, and others. He is the co-curator of The Guerrilla Lit Reading Series (guerrillalit.wordpress.com). He lives in New York City. Follow him at leematthewgoldberg.com and @LeeMatthewG.

WEBSITE & SOCIAL LINKS:

WEBSITE | TWITTER | FACEBOOK

BOOK BLURB:

Any wish fulfilled for the right price. That's the promise the Desire Card gives to its elite clients. But if the Card doesn’t feel like they’ve been justly compensated, the “price” will be more menacing than the clients could ever imagine.   

Harrison Stockton learns this lesson all too well. Harrison has lived an adult life of privilege and

excess: a high-powered job on Wall Street along with a fondness for alcohol and pills, and a family he adores, yet has no time for. All of this comes crashing to a halt when he loses his executive job and discovers he has liver cirrhosis with mere months left to live.

After finding himself far down on the donor list, Harrison takes matters into his own hands. This decision sparks a gritty and gripping quest that takes him to the slums of Mumbai in search of a black market organ and forces him under the Desire Card’s thumb. When his moral descent threatens his wife and children, Harrison must decide whether to save himself at any cost, or do what’s right and put a stop to the Card.

THE DESIRE CARD is a taut international thriller that explores what a man will do to survive when money isn’t always enough to get everything he desires. It’s the first book in a series followed by PREY NO MORE that focuses on other people indebted to this sinister organization, where the actual price is the cost of one’s soul.

PRAISE:

"Careful what you wish for, especially from a nefarious shadow organization, in this gripping start to Lee Matthew Goldberg's fast-paced, highly compelling, buzz worthy new series. If you love characters morally compromised, richly drawn, and constantly surprising, you'll love THE DESIRE CARD. I burned through the first book and can't wait to get my hands on PREY NO MORE to see where this endlessly exciting story takes me next! Loved it!” - Daniel Palmer, critically acclaimed suspense author

ORDER YOUR COPY:

Amazon

Thank you for your time in answering our questions about getting published.  Let’s begin by having you explain to us why you decided to become an author and pen this book?

I’ve always been a writer. It has been a dream career for me.

Is this your first book?

No, it is my third published book after Slow Down and The Mentor

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

This is published by an Indie publisher. They do great crime fiction and bought the first two books in the series so were a good fit.

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

It’s been a long ride. It took a while to get an agent and sell my first book. Even now, it’s not easy to sell every book. But I love to write and for me, that’s the easiest part.

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

To never give up. I’ve gotten so many rejections it would have been easy to just pack it all in, but I always was determined to be published and carve out a career.

Would you recommend this method of publishing to other authors?

Yeah, if a great publisher wants your book, sure, what’s stopping you?

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

Edit, and then edit more, and then edit again. Treat it like a job, but don’t forget why you love to do it.

Book Publishing Secrets with Patrick Stull, Author of Encounters

American artist Patrick Stull has spent the last eighteen years mostly creating imagery about the lives of women. He searches for what lies beneath the surface of his subjects, empowering each one he encounters. He has recently ventured into the realm of surrealism, creating powerful imagery that reflects on our humanity while dealing with the meaning and power of art.

Stull say's, "My work has allowed me to venture past the camera into the realm of a humanist, an artistic life, delving into the intellectual, a more cerebral life experience, creating what I call 'connectivism.'" 

His ongoing work is based in large-scale digital photography accompanied by sculpture/body casts, composition art, painting, poetry/prose and drawings.  His art is then integrated, collectively, into exhibitions to provide the viewer a once in a lifetime experience. The presentation of the work is delivered to the viewer in a unique and emotionally powerful way.

Stull, 71, a self-taught artist, works in many artistic disciplines. Educated at San Diego State University with degrees in psychology, economics and philosophy during the 1960’s, amidst the backdrop of the counter-culture revolution and the Viet Nam War, where his social consciousness and political views were shaped. Stull emerged from a Catholic Irish/German family, one of five children where work, discipline and religion took precedence over emotional expressions of the self – a different kind of loving environment. Being a husband of thirty-plus years and father to two has taught him the power of kindness, love and commitment. 

His latest book is the fine art photography book, Encounters.

Visit his website at www.patrickstull.com.

BOOK BLURB:

With photography at its base, Stull offers a nuanced explication of his encounters to allow the viewer an opportunity to form a relationship with his art. While looking within ourselves, exploring our own feelings, he hopes that he will inspire greater humaneness in response to his art.

ENCOUNTERS is the second in a series of six large-format books in which artist, photographer and author, Patrick Stull explores a wide range of experiences. Using light and the physical body, the written word and his artistry he creates imagery that examines aspects of the lives of women.

Compiled over the last 18 years, the images in ENCOUNTERS, Stull says, are meant to “inspire and challenge the observer while always empowering the subject.”

Stull brings a powerful sense of the surreal and the spiritual to his work as he plots a course along the many paths of the human experience. His imagery runs from the ghostly and ephemeral to the flowing and fiery.

As much as he concentrates on the human form, Stull never forgets to focus on the humanity of his subjects. His choice of the coffee-table style book format draws the viewer into an experience both intimate and universal.

Stull’s first book in his series, titled EVOLVE, was published in 2006. A third book, titled HIDDEN DIMENSIONS, is completed and awaiting publication. Future titles in the series include DHARMA, BEING DIFFERENT, and YOGA, A HEALING MOMENT.

Stull hopes that his readers come away from the book with “a love for art and a respect for the female who gives us life and challenges us to be better human beings.

ORDER YOUR COPY HERE

Thank you for your time in answering our questions about getting published.  Is this your first book?

Encounters is my second book, it contains 232 pages of unique imagery, prose, odes and drawings. I have five more books headed to print over the next two years.

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

I self-published and found the book printer in Asia through a Los Angeles fine art printing firm. I chose to self-publish, while sourcing the printer myself. When creating reasonable quantities (1,000 plus), you can’t efficiently print in the U.S. due to costs. Much of the cost is labor due to the hardcover binding process. If you are not producing a hardcover, if the volumes are 500 or less you might look into U.S based printers. I chose to print in Asia where I found a good balance of all factors.

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

The process of creating Encounters was daunting. Even though it was an effort of love, it required the integration of imagery and text which is somewhat unusual. This made things somewhat more challenging to promote to the publishing world. However, I did reach out to some publishers to understand the process. Once I had this understanding it was clear to me self-publishing was a better choice. Specifically, the publishing world is very difficult to navigate within a given timeframe. Costs and control over the product is relinquished by the author. It became apparent that self-publishing would be the best alternative for me. Finding a high-quality, fine art printer and deciding how I was going to market and sell the book presented additional challenges.
Self- publishing a book, allows control over costs, marketing and distribution. An author has complete ownership of the outcome. On the other hand, employment of a publisher affords a greater opportunity to generate attention to the book and perhaps greater income from sales.

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

If you are an unknown author the probability that you will financially break- even is challenging. When you look at the costs related to creating a book one must consider that the development, printing, shipping, fulfillment and storage, credit card processing and publisher’s expense leave little proceeds unless you can scale sales.

Would you recommend this method of publishing to other authors?

I am at the beginning of this publishing adventure so there is little to say except, I would reach out to publishers before self-publishing. This way you educate yourself as to what works for you. Keep in mind that self-publishing does limit your market exposure.

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

My advice is “less is more.” Avoid saturating the reader with who you are and what you think. Never allow your ego to dominate the message and always approach your reader/viewer with humility. This allows truth and reality to rise to the surface for all to enjoy.

If you decide to self-publish you should first consider what it is you are trying to accomplish: financial success, notoriety, the exercise of skills or simply personal gratification. Each of these things influence the effort. Life is random, so expect nothing from your efforts however, dream that the world will embrace your work and that you will have the opportunity to create more for their enjoyment.

Be patient and never stop doing what you love. Persistence is powerful.