• Use docs and a micro sd card on phone to write book
• Use Google docs to collaborate with a co-creator
• Use Unsplash (Internet site) for cover images, and (if used) illustrations
• Use computer running Paint Shop Pro to produce ePub cover
• Utilize Facebook Beta Reader Group for suggestions and light editing
• Input book into Reedsy (Internet site), chapter by chapter, in order to format ePub
• Go to Bowker (Internet site) to purchase isbn for ePub, and to register the electronic book
• Post the completed ePub on Gumroad (Internet site) to collect payments and dispense ePub copies
• Utilize Reedsy for print ready PDF
• Use the computer Paint Shop Pro program to make the print ready cover
• Use Blurb (Internet site) to print-on-demand the book, Blurb will supply isbn for the print book, accept payments, and ship the books
• Utilize WordPress (Internet site) for blog and writer website

I just completed these steps to the point of publishing an ePub on a site that specializes in dispensing electronic goods.

To write the book, I used the docs app on my phone and a micro sd card. Docs prefers to keep its files on the Google drive, but I prefer the micro sd card in the phone because it works even when the Internet is patchy. I do back it up to the cloud drive from time to time.

I live in close contact with another person. For that reason I don’t find myself using speech-to-text very often while writing. He would think I’m talking to him, and would be disturbed if he happened to be sleeping next to me at the time, or if awake would probably have plenty to interject on whatever subject I happened to be writing about. Most often I use Google keyboard, dragging a finger from letter to letter to spell a word. Typing on a computer might be faster, although not by much, I don’t believe, and you can’t very well type on a computer while in bed, or even sitting in a car waiting while your love partner shops a computer would be awkward. However the biggest reason that I don’t use the computer as often is because the computer battery doesn’t last long, and it needs the generator to charge, while the phone charges on the solar array, or in the car while the car is running. I hadn’t found a good way to make the cover on the phone though, beyond browsing for images.

I have 3 books in development right now. One of them is my husband’s bio. He is editing that one on Google drive.

I used Unsplash (Internet site) for the cover images for my novel, “Beyond the Dream”, and used them for some of the illustrations in my history of religion titled, “The Word Through the Ages”. I used Paint Shoo Pro on my computer to produce the cover for the ePub, “Beyond the Dream”. When I make the print book cover, if I get to that, it will just be a matter of resizing the ePub cover and adding spine, back, and flaps.

I did utilize Facebook Beta Reader Group for suggestions and light editing for the autobiography I am ghost writing for hubby.

I wrote “Beyond the Dream” in 2019, briefly publishing it as “Love and the Human Spirit” in 2022. Then I set it aside for several years while I worked on other projects. Then last week I looked at it with a fresh pair of eyes, edited a few things, input the chapters into Reedsy with the new name I had decided to change it to several years ago, and finished the new cover I had started several years ago. I found the isbns I had purchased from Bowker 3-1/2 years ago on an old email. Wow! After a few minutes of panic wondering if I had lost them, I found them and registered one of them for the ePub, “Beyond the Dream”: 979-8-9867560-2-8

Reedsy formatted the ePub for me for free, and I posted it on Gumroad.

Link

Three years ago was when I had Blurb print a copy of each of the two books I had then: “Love and the Human Spirit”, and “First Nations Native”. I had bought 10 isbns from Bowker (for almost $300) but Blurb supplied them so I didn’t need them after all. There was a procedure for making the print-ready cover in electronic form, and I did it on the computer running Paint Shop Pro. Blurb gave the directions on their site. IngramSpark also does print-on-demand, and also has instructions on their site. I haven’t done it in awhile, but it involves some specific measurements, depending on the book size you choose, and how many pages of that size are in your print ready PDF which is free from Reedsy. A print on demand book costs about from $15 to $25, less if you buy quantity.

I set up my writer’s website in my About-Me page on WordPress, although it is by no means finished and I might decide to move the book information to its own page.

Limk

I don’t like hearing that some publishing companies are abusing their workers. If I learn that any of my companies are doing that I’ll find someone else.