Not the Post I Wanted to Write Today

So, it’s February 5th, 2019. The date that I have been advertising for quite some time would be the publication date of my first novel, Wilding. 

I was expecting to have a post today about the book, and my excitement over publishing, and what’s coming next.

Instead I am writing a post about why it’s not being published today.

Sigh. I am discouraged, yes, but trying to find some optimism in the midst of it.

Why no publication today? Well, it came down to two factors. First of all, I have to set up a U.S. bank account so that Amazon and other retailers can direct deposit royalty payments there. Because I’m Canadian, that proves to be a bit tricky. I looked into this about a month ago, and although I got the information on what accounts to set up, I didn’t see anywhere detailed info about how long this would take.

I just got back from a two-week winter holiday. I had given myself about a week after getting back to get all the final pre-publication details in place, including the banking. But what I hadn’t thought about was that two of those days were weekend days, and one and a half of the other days were working days. I couldn’t get an appointment in the bank until yesterday, only to find out that I could not get this special U.S. account set up that day, I would have to make another appointment for later in the week. There is an online option to sign up for this account, but that would take about a month for the details to be finalized rather than the couple of days it will take through the bank.

Ack. In order to set up my Amazon publishing account, I have to enter the bank details. So I can’t actually publish until that is sorted out.

Faced with delaying publication in order to get that in place, I thought that I should probably have a think about all this. The other piece, which I’ve known for awhile, is that getting the details ready in terms of having a physical copy of the book available to order was going to take me some time. I knew that I couldn’t have that ready for today, but I was thinking I would go live with the digital copies and add that later, in about a month or whenever I was ready for that part. I know that it’s better, in terms of Amazon’s willingness to promote you, to have as many purchasing options as possible ready to go all at once, but I was willing to make that compromise in order to make my pre-announced publication day.

But seeing as I am going to have to delay because of the banking issues, I thought I may as well delay further in order to get the physical copy details sorted out as well. I’ve never done this before, so in a lot of ways I’m flying blind, researching things online and trying to wade through the weeds. But as far as I could tell it would probably take me at least a month for that, as I have to get the cover designed to add back cover copy, get the MS formatted for print, upload it to the site, and then order an author copy to make sure it all looks right. Plus make changes afterwards if I see things that need fixing. I don’t know how long it will take to get my author copy, because it seems that it might take longer (1-3 weeks?) for them to get it to me because again, I am in Canada.

That takes us to March sometime. Which causes another issue. I have something happening in my non-writing life in March (I think! Not guaranteed….life is so complicated, right?) that will make it impossible for me to work on book-related things. There’s lots of advice out there to take the month after launch and do a bunch of promo things – social media related mainly – and I won’t be able to do that if I’m in the midst of this other issue.

Argh. So, in order to give myself lots of time, and avoid having to announce a date and then not be ready once more, I’m pushing the launch out until May. Right now I’m looking at May 9th, but I don’t want to give a hard date until I know for certain how all this will play out. Some of it will depend on the timing of the other issue I’m having to work around, and I won’t know that for a month or so.

I’m sorry if I have disappointed you. I know there are some who are really looking forward to the book. Believe me when I say I’m disappointed, too!

Because this is the first time I’ve ever done this, I’m not doing it perfectly, that’s for sure! It’s a huge learning curve. The next time around, it will be much easier.

I will work hard to get everything in place for the launch, so that I don’t have any last-minute surprises. Once that is ready, I can turn my attention to Book 2, which is waiting in the wings. I’m looking forward to that.

I also hope to work on something special for my newsletter subscribers, as a little “thank you” for putting up with the delays. If you want to get in on that, sign up for my newsletter! You will also get the first chapter of Wilding as a thank you, to wet your whistle, so to speak! Generally you will get something from me once a month, with the occasional special edition. As publication looms you may get more frequent editions. But I won’t spam you, I promise! And I won’t share your email address with any one else.

Thank you again for all your patience, and for your interest in the work I do. I am so grateful. Hopefully the wait will all be worth it for you, once May comes along!