In this episode, Mark shares an early audio draft of the chapter on Professionalism for his forthcoming book THE 7 P'S OF PUBLISHING SUCCESS which will be released under his "Stark Publishing Solutions" imprint by the end of Sept 2018.

Prior to the audiobook excerpt, Mark shares a few personal updates which include:

• Attending NINC (Novelist's, Inc.) writer conference in St Pete, Florida, where he will be giving a talk entitled 5 CAREER KILLING ERRORS AN AUTHOR SHOULD AVOID as well as co-hosting an open discussion entitled BRAINSTORMING "THE FUTURE" FOR AUTHORS AND VENDORS
• Also, while at NINC, Mark will be visiting Haslam's Book Store which is allegedly haunted by Jack Kerouac (Mark wrote about it in his book Tomes of Terror)
• A thank you to the Patrons supporting the podcast via www.patreon.com/starkreflections
• A shout-out to Rook Winters for an awesome photo of some skull plates he shared on Twitter
• Thanking new folks who continue to fill-out the Stark Reflections Podcast Survey (with a mention of how the show has been modified in line with a few common comments from some previously rec'd surveys

Mark also talks about how the main content for this episode is a test/early draft for the audiobook version of his book THE 7 P's OF PUBLISHING SUCCESS and mentions the way he'll be using Findaway Voices (the sponsor for this episode).

In the main content of the episode, Mark talks about the importance of professionalism for authors and breaks it down to three main elements:

• Paperwork, Contracts and Content
• In Person Appearances and People Skills
• Adversity and Rejection

After the main section, Mark shares the behind a behind the scenes look at how the book this chapter is taken from came to be. Both it and another book, were originally chapters in the main book he had been working on to capture the many things he has learned in his decades of experience in the bookselling and publishing industry. But these two particular chapters grew a life of their own and became unique products as part of a larger line up of titles in the Stark Publishing Solutions Imprint/Series.

These books will be:

1. THE 7 P'S OF PUBLISHING SUCCESS (Sept 2018)
2. KILLING IT ON KOBO (Oct 2018)
3. INDIE PUBLISHING INSIDER SECRETS (Nov 2018)

While still finalizing re-writes and edits of the books, Mark talks about the desire to get them all up for pre-order as soon as possible. He shares where people can sign up to be informed about them as well as other related "Stark Publishing / Stark Reflections" updates: www.markleslie.ca/starkpublishingsolutions

Links of Interest:

• Findaway Voices
• Patreon for Stark Reflections
• More Information about Stark Publishing Solutions
• Stark Reflections Survey
• NINC (Novelists Inc)
• Haslam's Book Store
• Tomes of Terror: Haunted Bookstores & Libraries
• The 7 P'S OF PUBLISHING SUCCESS

The music for this podcast ("Laser Groove") was composed and produced by Kevin MacLeod of www.incompetech.com and is Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0