My Dad's Birthday, Self-publishing with Smashwords

January 26 is my dad's birthday. I always think of him on this day. The weather on or around his birthday was almost always not so nice.( Even in Florida! Yes, don't let the Florida Chamber of Commerce fool you, there are cold days and rainy days during the Florida winter.) He is pictured here with his first grandchild, Staci, who is now a mother of a college-age student.

Time passes so quickly. I lost my dad when I was 28 years old. I didn't think I would ever get through that first year without him. The deep grief that gripped my life that first year has been replaced by good memories and stories about him when the family gets together. He still lives in our hearts.

Dad was an undertaker, yes, a funeral director. He loved people. He didn't care if they had nothing or lived in a mansion. He was always good to every one of the people in our small town. He taught me to treat every person with respect and appreciate the small things in life like the intricate snowflakes or spider webs. He was a brilliant piano player and could play anything by ear, never needing to look at a sheet of music. And he was a night owl. But being in the funeral business he was on-call 24 hours a day and a lot of the calls were in the middle of the dark Illinois nights. 

You can probably understand then when I tell you I am writing my third mystery, and it will take place in a funeral home. Yes, really! Of course the family who runs that funeral home will have the same attention to detail and caring that were so important to my dad. 

I thought it would be easy to write because I know the characters so well.  I don't know if it's because it is my third book or because the subject is so close to me that I'm having a difficult time putting the story together. It's not writer's block, it's just my own tendency to get the words right the first time and this is an especially close-to-my-heart project. Stay tuned!

# # # #

I recently updated a previous version of my non-fiction book for girls, Girls Succeed! so I easily uploaded the revised manuscript and new book cover to Amazon and it went live the next day. I dreaded loading it on Smashwords because of my first experience with them. They are picky! LOL..I like that though. If there are problems, they tell you so you can fix them and put up the best e-book you can for your readers. Originally I had to upload my book about 19 times in order for them to allow it to be distributed to all their outlets like Barnes and Noble, Kobo, and Sony. So you can understand how I dreaded the possible hassle ahead with uploading the recent files. 

Image on the cover by majesticimagery.com

After uploading the new file, I checked it in the free e-reader for e-pub formats and found a couple of errors. It's so much easier to find them when you actually see them as an e-book on the Adobe Digital Editions instead of a Word file for some reason. So I quickly fixed those errors and re-submitted. The file was okayed to be put up on the Smashwords site and was fast-tracked to be checked for re-placing the e-book in the Premium Catalog for their distributors. Hallelujah! It was included in the catalog in only four days with no notes about any problems. 

So can you picture me jumping in the air like the happy jumping girl on the new cover of my book? Yes, I was a happy girl too when the e-book passed the muster for the premium catalog! Now I'm ready to get this revised book into the hands of girls to inspire them to dream big.