Although I read the Kindle version of Write, Publish, Promote, the printed book weighs in at 282 pages. As you probably can suspect, there are three major parts to this book: writing the book, publishing the book, and promoting the book. There are 25 chapters. The writing section has nine chapters, the publishing section has eight chapters, and the promoting section has eight chapters.
Write
Write, Publish, Promote focused primarily on developing and publishing a novel. Personally, I am interested in writing non-fiction; however, I found the entire section related to fiction writing fascinating. The last time I learned about writing fiction was in high school. It seems that I slept through that class. Martin did a great job explaining where to find inspiration for a book, writing major elements of a story, determining your audience, creating the plot and structure, developing characters and writing dialogue, setting the point of view, illustrating the time and place, and much more.
Martin shared countless tools for conducting the research, building the various elements, and writing the story. She walked through many examples to illustrate the points she was making. She used known pieces of literature as well as books she has written. Martin also spent an entire chapter on research and the need to get the details right.
Throughout Write, Publish, Promote, Martin provided links to resources that would help with each of the processes. These links covered every detail. She also included a robust appendix that was overflowing with great resources.
Publish
In the publishing section, Martin discussed different ways to get a book published as well as the pros and cons of each. She provided detailed advice for writing a book proposal and formatting a manuscript for publisher review.
Martin included a deep dive on self-publishing. She looked at different publishing platforms and discussed how each could be used and, importantly, when they should be used. She included information about securing ISBN numbers. She also stressed the importance of creating and distributing ebooks.
In this section, Martin shared detailed information about preparing a manuscript for print in both digital and print formats. Perhaps the best advice shared was picking up a copy of the Chicago Manual of Style, which I did. It seems I glossed over this advice when reading APE: Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur – How to Publish a Book. Now that I am in the editing phase of my book, the Chicago Manual of Style will come in handy. Martin said it was easy to notice if a book was self-published if it did not follow this set of guidelines.
As you are preparing a book for distribution, there are a number of details that must be taken into consideration. You must decide which categories to list your book under. Martin also stressed that you need to leverage keywords that will help you book be found. She walked through an example of how to find the right keywords and categories.
Promote
The last section focused on promoting a book. Martin shared a wealth of information to help get your book discovered and sold. She included information for building an author website, using social media, building email lists, releasing and pre-releasing a book, using Amazon for promotion, getting reviews, and much more.
While she discussed the importance of having a diverse distribution model, she did emphasize Amazon quite a bit. Martin also provided guidance for getting books into the hands of librarians and local booksellers.
If you are thinking about writing a book, I would definitely recommend that you had a copy of Write, Publish, Promote as a ready reference. As I mentioned, I liked the Kindle version so much that I have purchased a print version to have a reference.
Additional Reading
- Book Review: Published.: The Proven Path From Blank Page to Published Author
- Book Review: APE: Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur – How to Publish a Book
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