Stark Reflections on Writing and Publishing

In this episode Mark interviews bestselling author Bobby Hutchinson about her unique journey through traditional publishing and self-publishing.

Prior to the interview, Mark shares comments from recent episodes, a personal update, welcomes new Patron Skye MacKinnon and a word about this episode's sponsor.

This episode is sponsored by patrons of the Stark Reflections Podcast.

Learn more at: https://www.patreon.com/starkreflections

In their conversation, Mark and Bobby talk about:

• What prompted Bobby to start writing in 1980 at the age of 40
• Leveraging her training for the Vancouver Marathon in order to use that time in her head to decide what to do
• Her experience winning a Chatelaine short story writing contest
• Researching which books were selling by purchasing and reading 100 Harlequin novels before sending her first manuscript in which sold right away
• Selling 17 more of her books after those first two
• Signing with a New York agent who was recommended to her by her agent
• Writing and selling 40 more novels to Harlequin, and realizing that since she already had the relationship with them prior to signing with her agent, all her agent was doing for her was taking 10% of her cut of those sales
• Realizing that her agent was more interested in selling myself than selling Bobby's novels
• Giving up writing for a while to start a Bed and Breakfast in Vancouver - which led to a book she ended up writing called How Not to Run a B&B
• Hiring a vanity publisher prior to exploring the possibility of DIY self-publishing
• Getting the rights back to many of the novels she was written for Harlequin and self-publishing those books directly to Amazon
• The importance of writing the stories that she was super-involved in and passionate about writing
• "Going Wide" with her publishing through Smashwords in the beginning, but then being drawn into the world of Kindle Unlimited
• Accidentally getting screwed over by Amazon and having all of her books taken down from the platform because of a lone title that was still published in some obscure country
• Reading Mark's book WIDE FOR THE WIN about a year or so ago, at about the time her Amazon sales were starting to go down
• Bobby's recommendation to not take all your books down from KDP Select/Kindle Unlimited overnight
• Realizing that at an older age (Bobby is now 83), a person doesn't need nearly as much money as they used to
• The Public Lending Right registration (for Canadian authors) that Bobby has registered for
• The question, when re-publishing older books, on whether or not an author should update them to include more modern setting, such as adding cell phones, etc into them
• Being excited about Artificial Intelligence as a marvelous tool that authors can use
• How it's really hard to properly predict what is going to happen with a book when it is published
• The way that Harlequin was a fantastic training ground for Bobby
• Writing a book about living and traveling in a van (How Not to Vanagon)
• Discovering her love of camping and the new memoir (Me and Calamity Jane)
• Advice Bobby would offer to authors who want to get started
• The value of pretending to be a famous writer in whatever genre you're writing
• Why Bobby thinks that writing fast can make you a better writer
• And more . . .

After the interview Mark reflects on a few things that came up in the conversation with Bobby.

Links of Interest:

• Bobby Hutchinson's Website
• Episode 155 - Rebel Reflections with Guest Host Sacha Black
• Episode 336 - Coming Out of the Writer Closet with Bradley Charbonneau
• Episode 338 - An Amazing F*cking Pivot Into Sh*t-Tons of Money with James Fell
• Special Patron Coupon for getting Stark Publishing Solutions books for $0.99
• Stark Publishing Solutions Books - 50% off in the Smashwords End of Year Sale
  • Special Patron Only offer of $0.99 each for those books
• Mark's YouTube Channel
• Buy Mark a Coffee
• Patreon for Stark Reflections
• Best Book Ever Podcast
• Lovers Moon Podcast
• The Relaxed Author
  • Buy eBook Direct
  • Buy Audiobook Direct
• Publishing Pitfalls for Authors
• An Author's Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores
• Wide for the Win
• Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books
  • This Time Around (Short Story)
  • A Canadian Werewolf in New York
  • Stowe Away (Novella)
  • Fear and Longing in Los Angeles
  • Fright Nights, Big City
  • Lover's Moon
  • Hex and the City
• The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles
• Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard

Best-selling writer Bobby Hutchinson writes stories about almost everything, as long as everything involves romance, quirky people, outrageous kids, deafness, time travel, or medicine, most of which she's familiar with. (Well, maybe not time travel. But who knows?)

She started writing by making up a short story while training for the Vancouver marathon and reading a book called How To Write Short Stories.

She was celebrating being 50.

Chatelaine magazine was having a contest for the best short fiction in Canada, and she won first prize, $5000 for a 5000-word story called "Pheidippides Was Not A Family Man." She then wrote a romance for Harlequin Superromance, sold it and went on to write about 60 more.

With no real qualifications, she taught night school classes in Romance and Creativity at Okanagan College and a correspondence course at the University of Saskatchewan.

Bored with writing only for Harlequin, she wrote three long romantic comedies and sold them to Dorchester Publishing. She also sold romantic time travel to Avon.

In 2014, she began self-publishing, at first using a ridiculously expensive vanity service and then learning about Amazon.

If there's a mistake to be made in writing and publishing, Bobby has made it.

She published wide with Smashwords, and when KU started, she withdrew her wide books and became exclusive, accidentally leaving one solitary book up in maybe Angola. Amazon took all her books down. A begging letter to Jeff Bezos got them reinstated. She should have stopped while she was ahead and gone wide again.

A year ago, she came to her senses after reading Wide For The Win, took everything off of KU and began the tedious process of putting 50+ books up everywhere else.

She lives alone in a funky little cottage in Cranbrook, B.C., a small city in the Canadian Rockies. In the summer, she hauls her very small travel trailer, Calamity Jane, to campgrounds. In the winter, she hibernates.

She faints at the sight of blood, although her best-selling medical romance series, Emergency, does have the occasional scene involving bodily fluids.

These days, she still writes mostly romance, with a few short stories and memoirs tossed in for fun. How Not To Run A B&B, a memoir set in Vancouver, was chosen by the Kootenay Library Association as Best Book of the Year, and is now being made into a film. Slowly.

She lives in the land of possibility. And she's writing faster than ever because at 83, who knows when she'll head off to seek the Great Perhaps?

She needs to finish that last book on the last day; as any writer knows, that deadline's tricky!

The introductory, end, and bumper 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

Mark interviews James Fell, the Sweary Historian, and bestselling author of ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY SH!T WENT DOWN.

Prior to the interview Mark warns listeners of the adult language used in this episode, reads comments from recent episodes, and shares a word about this episode's sponsor.

Mark's Stark Publishing Solutions books are 50% off in the Smashwords End of Year Sale. (Ends at the end of day Dec 31, 2023). Patrons will be getting a special coupon to get the titles for only $0.99. Offer good until Jan 31, 2024.

In the interview, Mark and James talk about:

• How James is an author who "can't make up his F-ing mind"
• Advice James was given regarding how hard it was to make it as a writer and that most science-fiction authors also had other jobs
• Starting off writing health and fitness articles and getting columns at the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune as well as a few magazines
• The idea of SERVICE vs PRODUCT income
• Having the delusions of grandeur that he might one day have one of those books that would "blow up"
• The initial Random House deal he got for one book, then, a few years later, a US deal from St Martins Press
• How the publishers were interested in James' own platform for helping to sell the book
• The way James was crestfallen with the sales results of his first two traditionally published books
• Beginning to start a public speaking career just as Covid-19 hit the world
• James' background in University studying history
• The bike-riding epiphany that first popped into his head (a la the way he describes it in his book THE HOLY SH!T MOMENT) and the daily story about Mae West that was extremely popular and led to an even bigger "holy shit moment!"
• Ensuring that he did not miss a single day in posting a well-researched and funny post for two years straight
• James hiring a good copyeditor and also hiring Mark to help with his distribution strategy
• The more than a million views of his column of articles
• How most of the sales came from free daily stories on Facebook - and not really any other PR
• James' Substack experience and how he was able to leverage that via paid subscription
• The book sales taking off way beyond his expectations
• How 90% of the sales of the two versions of ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY SH!T WENT DOWN have been in print rather than eBook
• Receiving a respectable offer from a good mid-sized publisher about 14 months after the first volume was available for sale
• His agent being able to leverage that offer to pitch the book to a number of larger publishers
• The proposal that James wrote for this that was in the voice he used in the book (instead of in the standard recommended proposal format)
• The unexpected bonus of the publisher who bought the rights allowing James to keep the existing books live for almost a full year before their version of the book came out
• How James' career took off when he stopped giving a shit about "what the market wanted"
• Hearing "the voice is a triumph" from his New York Publisher Editor before she then "ripped the shit out of it"
• The pull quotes that were mostly selected from the interior book designer
• The fact that James sold more than 52,000 print copies of the book in print when it was entirely self-published
• The special arrangement that James had (and still has) with Calgary Indie Bookstore Owl's Nest for the procurement of signed copies
• A powerful story about solidarity among writers
• The 3 Rules of Marketing for Authors
• And more . . .

After the interview Mark reflects on the unique method by which James gave away two of his books entirely for free, but in an inventive "self-promotional" way that was blatantly salesy, but also provided incredible entertainment and value.

Links of Interest:

• James Fell's Website
  • Facebook
  • Substack
• Episode 060 - The Holy Sh!t Moment with James Fell
• Episode 190 - The Episode Where Sh!t Went Down with James Fell, Sweary Historian
• Episode 316 - Free Your Inner Non-Fiction Writer with Johanna Rothman
• Episodes with Editors as Guests
• Episodes with or that mention Robert J. Sawyer
• Stark Publishing Solutions Books - 50% off in the Smashwords End of Year Sale
  • Special Patron Only offer of $0.99 each for those books
• YouTube Video - Anatomy of an "Author Branding" Photo
• Mark's YouTube Channel
• Buy Mark a Coffee
• Patreon for Stark Reflections
• Best Book Ever Podcast
• Lovers Moon Podcast
• The Relaxed Author
  • Buy eBook Direct
  • Buy Audiobook Direct
• Publishing Pitfalls for Authors
• An Author's Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores
• Wide for the Win
• Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books
  • This Time Around (Short Story)
  • A Canadian Werewolf in New York
  • Stowe Away (Novella)
  • Fear and Longing in Los Angeles
  • Fright Nights, Big City
  • Lover's Moon
  • Hex and the City
• The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles
• Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard

My name is James Fell and I say "fuck" a lot.

Historically, I didn't write the word fuck that much, because the Los Angeles Times and Chicago Tribune, where I authored columns for several years, tend to frown upon such language. I also didn't swear in my 1996 history master's thesis, titled Rebellion and the Quest for Social Revolution in Latin America. In that academic work I did manage to get the message across that the CIA are fucking dicks without actually using the words "fucking dicks."

Anyway, in the spring of 2020, a year I refer to as a fucktacular shitnado of ass, I said what the fuck and began authoring a column titled "On This Day in History Shit Went Down." To my immense pleasure and no small amount of surprise it's proven quite popular, with several million readers each month. These columns were turned into two self-published volumes of the same name: On This Day in History Sh!t Went Down, and they sold so many copies that Bantam Books gave me an assload of money for the rights to republished them. The new and Big-Publishing-Company-improved version of Volume I is on sale now.

You can read free samples of my sweary history stories on my Facebook, and you should also subscribe to my Substack. You can get a free subscription or a paid one. I like it when people subscribe to the paid one.

I'm also on Twitter (blarf), and my TikTok channel is called Sweary Historian.

In a previous life I wrote about fitness and motivation. The cool and science-based kind of fitness writing, not the bullshit and/or fat shaming sort. Find my earlier published books here.

The introductory, end, and bumper 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

Mark interviews editor Erika Steeves about her experiences in working with publishers and authors as an editor.

Prior to the interview, Mark shares a brief personal update and a word about this episode's sponsor.

This episode is sponsored by HOW TO WRITE A HOWLING GOOD STORY by Wulf Moon

You can get this book in eBook, Trade Paperback, and Hardcover editions here.

Between Dec 15, 2023 and Jan 1, 2024, you can get the eBook for 50% off at Smashwords.

In their interview, Mark and Erika talk about:

• Meeting at the Waterloo Book Festival
• How Erika got involved in the world of writing and editing by starting off as an editorial internship at a regional Canadian publisher on Canada's East Coast
• Deciding to become a freelance editor in 2012 taking on academic projects and some book projects
• Pivoting over to do more editing on fiction in 2019/2020
• Erika's experience reading the slushpile from a publisher and how that exposed her to great manuscripts that she loved but which weren't suited for that publisher's mandates
• The difficult task of having to send rejection letters to authors
• Being a member of two associations that have directories of editors
• How Erika finds new writers to work with
• The various types of editing work that Erika takes on
• Contuinity editing and the style sheet that Erika likes so much
• How the editor's "fresh eyes" can help detect some things that writers might no longer be able to detect in a manuscript that has been re-worked numerous times
• Things Erika wished more authors knew about related to editors
• How all edits are suggestions and that the writer can decided which suggestions to take, and which ones to ignore
• Getting a sense of how many hours an editing project is going to take based on the sample edit that was done
• Things that writers should "look out for" in an editor they're looking to work with
• Why contracts are important for both parties
• Types of writers that Erika is cautious about working with
• Ideas for how a writer can find the right editor for them
• The "House of Zolo" publishing company that Erika and a number of other writers and editors put together
• Advice Erika would offer to writers
• And more . . .

After the interview Mark reflects on Erika's perspective related to things that empower and encourage writers.

Links of Interest:

• Erika Steeves' Website
• House of Zolo: Independent Publishers of Speculative Literature
• Mark's YouTube Channel
• Buy Mark a Coffee
• Patreon for Stark Reflections
• Best Book Ever Podcast
• Lovers Moon Podcast
• The Relaxed Author
  • Buy eBook Direct
  • Buy Audiobook Direct
• Publishing Pitfalls for Authors
• An Author's Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores
• Wide for the Win
• Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books
  • This Time Around (Short Story)
  • A Canadian Werewolf in New York
  • Stowe Away (Novella)
  • Fear and Longing in Los Angeles
  • Fright Nights, Big City
  • Lover's Moon
  • Hex and the City
• The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles
• Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard

Erika Steeves is a copyeditor and proofreader with a decade of experience editing fiction and nonfiction books. She started out as a publishing assistant for a traditional publisher, learning the ropes from the inside. After that, Erika started her freelance career and founded E.S. Editing! She also works as Editor-in-Chief of the HOZ Journal of Speculative Literature.

The introductory, end, and bumper 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

Mark interviews Bradley Charbonneau about his new book PROCRASTINATE and his new "Book in a Weekend" program for writers.

Prior to the interview, Mark shares comments from recent episodes, thanks Patrons, provides a personal update, and shares a word about this episode's sponsor.

You can learn more about how you can get your audiobooks distributed to retailers and library systems around the world at starkreflections.ca/Findaway.

In the interview, Mark and Bradley talk about:

• Bradley's love of Europe and his first eye-opening experience at the age of fourteen with the continent
• His early experience writing extremely long letters to his parents when, several years later, living in France
• The importance of the "audience" being yourself when you write
• The fact that on no calendar is there a day called SOMEDAY
• The concept of Stubborn VS Determined
• Bradley's first challenge of writing every single day for the month of November in 2012
• A further challenge of posting a YouTube video every single day
• The idea of "practice is perfect" (as opposed to "practice makes perfect")
• The long-time streak of writing every single day for 2808 days in a row
• Being painfully reminded of himself when he hears an author say that they have an idea for a book that they might write "some day"
• Avoiding regret by taking action
• Bradley's admiration for humor and improv
• The program to get your "opposite" book written as a critical step to getting to that larger "massive" project that has always been kept at the horizon
• How the humor aspect of writing your "opposite" book can help bring out new elements of creativity and how it can be therapeutic
• Bradley's book PROCRASTINATE, which was his "opposite" book project
• The "book in a weekend" program that Bradley is running to help other writers overcome the things he had to overcome on his own writing journey
• The idea of writing a book every year as a way of creating a "timestamp" of who we are - the same way creating a photo album every year (which his mother used to do) works
• The DIY option as well as the interactive "virtual" real-time and "real-life in person" and the "one-on-one" options Bradley is working on
• And more . . .

After the interview, Mark reflects on the importance of adapting "the rules" into something that works in the ways that work for YOU rather than some pre-prescribed notion that doesn't fit. If you have to break a few eggs to make an omelet, maybe it's okay to break or shake up a few rules in order to pave your own path to success.

Links of Interest:

• Bradley's Website
• Mark's Affiliate link to get 25% off BOOK IN A WEEKEND
• EP 334 - Welcome to the Stupidpocalypse with Brittlestar
• EP 335 - So You've Failed NaNoWriMo
• Building Our Christmas Tree Built Out of Books
• Draft2Digital Blog: So You Didn't Win NaNoWriMo
• Harley Christensen on Twitter (Harley's Website)
• Mark's YouTube Channel
• Buy Mark a Coffee
• Patreon for Stark Reflections
• Best Book Ever Podcast
• Lovers Moon Podcast
• The Relaxed Author
  • Buy eBook Direct
  • Buy Audiobook Direct
• Publishing Pitfalls for Authors
• An Author's Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores
• Wide for the Win
• Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books
  • This Time Around (Short Story)
  • A Canadian Werewolf in New York
  • Stowe Away (Novella)
  • Fear and Longing in Los Angeles
  • Fright Nights, Big City
  • Lover's Moon
  • Hex and the City
• The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles
• Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard

Before Bradley Charbonneau wrote his first book, he had written zero books. He spent years dreaming and wishing, chatting and hoping, but not actually writing. Finally, after years of procrastination, he wrote his first book. Since that first breakthrough, he's written 34 more. QUIZ: how many did Bradley write before his first book?

The introductory, end, and bumper 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

So it's December 1st, and NaNoWriMo is over. And everywhere around you, fellow author friends are posting on social media that they made it, they did it. They wrote 50,000 words in a single month.

You're happy for them, of course.

But you didn't quite make it to that 50,000 word goal yourself.

So what do you do?

Do you hang your head in shame and despair?

I say: NO.

I might be one of those "the page is half full" kind of writers, but if you're in the same boat as me, as an author who didn't complete the 30-day 50K word challenge, let me take over the paddle for a while and share a different spin.

Prior to the main content of this solo episode, Mark shares a brief personal update (explaining why there's another solo episode) and a word from this episode's sponsor.

There are plenty of books and tips on writing faster, learning more marketing tactics and strategies, trying to maximize your ranking, hitting the top of the charts, judging the algorithms, and hacking different ad platforms. But not enough guides to help you take the pressure off your art and enjoy the creative journey. Return to the love that brought you to writing in the first place.

Check out The Relaxed Author in audio, print, or eBook format.

Links of Interest:

• EP 212 - A Conversation with Joanna Penn on Co-Authoring The Relaxed Author
• Mark's YouTube Channel
• Buy Mark a Coffee
• Patreon for Stark Reflections
• Best Book Ever Podcast
• Lovers Moon Podcast
• The Relaxed Author
  • Buy eBook Direct
  • Buy Audiobook Direct
• Publishing Pitfalls for Authors
• An Author's Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores
• Wide for the Win
• Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books
  • This Time Around (Short Story)
  • A Canadian Werewolf in New York
  • Stowe Away (Novella)
  • Fear and Longing in Los Angeles
  • Fright Nights, Big City
  • Lover's Moon
  • Hex and the City
• The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles
• Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard

The introductory, end, and bumper 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

Mark interviews social media funny man Brittlestar (Stewart Reynolds) about his creative work and his new book Welcome to the Stupidpocalypse: Survival Tips for the Dumbageddon.

Prior to the main content, Mark shares comments from recent episodes, welcomes a new patron, and offers a word from this episode's sponsor.

This episode is sponsored by Mark's movie trivia guides to Planes, Trains and Automobiles and Die Hard.

In their conversation, Mark and Stewart talk about:

• Where the name "Brittlestar" came from
• Stewart's background as a musician and how he incorporates that into the parody music his does as part of his video skits
• How the music he now does for social media posts has broadly opened up the various styles and genres he can play and play with
• Stewart always writing stuff since he was a kid
• The way the book came from a series of topics that he wanted to riff on but which might not work as well for a video
• Being a fan of music and television and videos and trying to produce content from the perspective of the audience and of things he would like to see
• Beginning to do social media content back in 2013
• Some of the early viral videos including the "Put Your Finger on the Screen" series and "Summer is Not Over"
• How Stewart, his wife Shannon, and their two sons were all involved in the creation of their social media content, and how Disney and that social media business came along in the nick of time to save them
• The KFC-branded "Explaining Canada Day to Americans" video that rec'd more than 10 million views than that year's most popular Nike video
• The process of how they create these videos, often based on a concept and a punch-line with a bit of winging it
• Getting into writing specific scripts for these skits about five years ago, which led into the monologue-style videos
• Why their living room is often dubbed the place where ideas go to die
• The "The Morning Show Thing" show that Stewart and Shannon started in 2015 - which is returning again in a slightly differen format
• Having to convince Shannon to come out in front of the camera
• Stewart's new book WELCOME TO THE STUPIDPOCALYPSE: Survival Tips for the Dumbageddon
• Some of the differences between writing essays that were 1000 words verses a one and a half minute video
• The irreverence that Stewart was able to inject into the text of the book
• Being contacted by a literary agency that asked if Stewart was interested in writing a book
• The constant mistake humans make in compartmentalizing themselves into boxes such as "left wing" or "right wing" and how we get hung up on those things
• The foreword (written by Ryan Reynolds), the middleword (written by Mary Trump) and the afterword (written by Colin Mochrie) which was partially inspired by something Eric Idle put on the cover of one of his books
• Stewart's thoughts on the digital umbilical chord
• A strategy for dealing with trolls online
• The two times in the past ten years of being on social media where responding to negative comments actually worked out okay
• Stewart's theory that Canadian cuisine is a defiance
• Advice that Stewart would offer to other creatives: "Don't make art for artists."
• And more...

After the interview Mark reflects on the unique opportunity to chat with someone who has inspired you and Stewart's advice about not making art for other artists, but rather for the specific consumers of your product.

Links of Interest:

• Brittlestar's Website
  • YouTube
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • TikTok
  • Welcome to the Stupidpocalypse
• EP 333 - 10 Things You Likely Didn't Know About Draft2Digital
• Mark's YouTube Channel
• Buy Mark a Coffee
• Patreon for Stark Reflections
• Best Book Ever Podcast
• Lovers Moon Podcast
• The Relaxed Author
  • Buy eBook Direct
  • Buy Audiobook Direct
• Publishing Pitfalls for Authors
• An Author's Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores
• Wide for the Win
• Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books
  • This Time Around (Short Story)
  • A Canadian Werewolf in New York
  • Stowe Away (Novella)
  • Fear and Longing in Los Angeles
  • Fright Nights, Big City
  • Lover's Moon
  • Hex and the City
• The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles
• Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard

Brittlestar, a.k.a. Stewart Reynolds, is a bespectacled every-dad who has become a popular online media personality over the past decade. Every week, hundreds of thousands of people watch his videos on various social media channels. Some of Brittlestar's followers include Henry Winkler, Ryan Reynolds, Ken Jeong, Rex Chapman, Yvette Nicole Brown, and many other politicians and journalists. Brittlestar videos have been viewed more than a combined 600 million times, allowing him to gain a global fanbase, attend speaking engagements all over North America, receive an invitation to the White House, and engage in collaborations with celebrities such as Gordon Ramsay, Alan Thicke, and the Property Brothers.

The introductory, end, and bumper 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

Mark shares the audio from a presentation he gave in early November 2023 at 20BooksVegas called "10 Things You Likely Didn't Know About Draft2Digital."

This episode is sponsored by Mark's affiliate link to Draft2Digital.

Go to https://draft2digital.com/markleslie to sign up for a free Draft2Digital account.

The visuals and slides for this presentation can be downloaded here.

Links of Interest:

• Visuals / Slides for this episode's presentation
• Mark's YouTube Channel
• Buy Mark a Coffee
• Patreon for Stark Reflections
• The Relaxed Author
  • Buy eBook Direct
  • Buy Audiobook Direct
• Publishing Pitfalls for Authors
• An Author's Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores
• Wide for the Win
• Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books
  • This Time Around (Short Story)
  • A Canadian Werewolf in New York
  • Stowe Away (Novella)
  • Fear and Longing in Los Angeles
  • Fright Nights, Big City
  • Lover's Moon
  • Hex and the City
• The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles
• Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard

The introductory, end, and bumper 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

Mark interviews Johnny B. Truant about his new THE ART OF NOTICING podcast.

Prior to the main content, Mark leverages his digital AI voice from Eleven Labs to offer a brief introduction as well as a word about this episode's sponsor, the Patrons of the Stark Reflections Podcast.

Links of Interest:

• Johnny B. Truant's Website
• Mark's YouTube Channel
• Buy Mark a Coffee
• Patreon for Stark Reflections
• Best Book Ever Podcast
• Lovers Moon Podcast
• The Relaxed Author
  • Buy eBook Direct
  • Buy Audiobook Direct
• Publishing Pitfalls for Authors
• An Author's Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores
• Wide for the Win
• Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books
  • This Time Around (Short Story)
  • A Canadian Werewolf in New York
  • Stowe Away (Novella)
  • Fear and Longing in Los Angeles
  • Fright Nights, Big City
  • Lover's Moon
  • Hex and the City
• The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles
• Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard

Johnny B. Truant is a bestselling full-time author with over a hundred books to his name. His best-known book is probably Fat Vampire, which was adapted by the SyFy Network as Reginald the Vampire. Some of his other big hits are Pretty Killer, The Beam, Pattern Black, Gore Point, Dead City, Invasion, and Unicorn Western.

The introductory, end, and bumper 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

Mark interviews author, coach & CEO/Founder of Little Labradoodle Publishing April Cox.

Prior to the interview, Mark shares a brief personal updates and a word about this episode's sponsor, the Authorpreneur Summit 2023.

Transform your passion to profit! Unveil the business behind the book and elevate your business acumen with 35+ industry-leading authorpreneurs at the Authorpreneur Summit.

During their interview Mark and April talk about:

• April's background as a former IT consulting geek
• Leaving that corporate world to assist authors with their publishing goals and helping to make their dreams come true
• How her desire to write a story for her grandkids led to an entirely new and dynamic role and purpose
• Recognizing how she could make a huge difference being there to help authors who would normally be easy targets for so many of the predatory outfits looking to take advantage of them
• The origin of Little Labradoodle Publishing which was more of a legacy project
• How the consultant, programmer, and project manager in April were applied to help authors with navigating the complex world of publishing books for younger readers
• Why April puts so much free content on sites like her YouTube channel
• April's 12-week course that takes authors through the process of getting a book ready for publishing
• The importance of having a network of trusted professionals to work with
• Wanting to create a summit that focused more on the business side of publishing, which became the Authorpreneur Summit
• Some of the amazing interviews that have been lined up for this summit which takes place for free Dec 4 through Dec 8, 2023
• The bonuses April will be releasing for those who sign up for the summit early
• Advice April would offer to authors who are receiving numerous rejection letters from traditional publishing
• And more . . .

After the interview Mark reflects on the value when an author combines their passion with filling in a hole within a particular market.

Links of Interest:

• April's Self Publishing Made Simple Website
• April's YouTube Channel
• Mark's Affiliate Link to the Authorpreneur Summit 2023
• Mark's YouTube Channel
• Buy Mark a Coffee
• Patreon for Stark Reflections
• Best Book Ever Podcast
• Lovers Moon Podcast
• The Relaxed Author
  • Buy eBook Direct
  • Buy Audiobook Direct
• Publishing Pitfalls for Authors
• An Author's Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores
• Wide for the Win
• Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books
  • This Time Around (Short Story)
  • A Canadian Werewolf in New York
  • Stowe Away (Novella)
  • Fear and Longing in Los Angeles
  • Fright Nights, Big City
  • Lover's Moon
  • Hex and the City
• The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles
• Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard

April Cox is an Author, Coach & CEO/Founder of Little Labradoodle Publishing. She has successfully guided over 1,500 authors from manuscript to a high-quality, self-published book through her 90-day signature program, Self-Publishing Made Simple.

April is a passionate teacher and speaker on publishing topics and has personally launched over 400 books.

The introductory, end, and bumper 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

Mark interviews writer and indexer Stephen Ullstrom about book indexing and his recent release BOOK INDEXING: A Step-by-Step Guide.

Prior to the main content, Mark shares a personal update about a skeleton and license plate theft, as well as word about this episode's sponsor, the Patrons of the Stark Reflections Podcast.

In their conversation, Mark and Stephen talk about:

• Stephen's long-time interest in writing
• How his role working at UBC Press when he was attending university was his first exposure to indexing
• Using freelancing doing indexing to help support his writing, but how that freelancing kind of took over much of his career
• Still being interested in fiction, but how writing a book about indexing was a good full book-length project to complete
• Stephen's book: BOOK INDEXING: A Step-by-Step Guide
• His goal to make indexing simple and practical and more entry-level
• Why authors should care about indexing
• How indexing can become somewhat of a marketing tool
• The way an index can bring more value to a book
• The pros and cons of a keyword search (as opposed to an index, where the human filtering on what's relevant is being done for you)
• How an index can be much more granular than even a layered/multi-leveled table of contents
• The way an index works within an eBook
• What an embedded index is
• Cases where a fiction author might want to use indexing
• Considerations on whether or not it's best to do your own index or to hire that work out to a professional indexer
• The average length of time it would take Stephen to index a 200 page book (about 20 hours)
• The typical price range an author can expect to pay for having a book indexed (For example a trade book that's about 200 pages could cost about $800 to $900 CAD - about $4.00 CAD per page. A scholary book is usually about $6.00 to $6.50 to $7.00 CAD per page)
• The steps to go through when creating an index
• Stephen's use of the indexing software called Cindex
• Remembering that, ultimately, your index is for the READER
• How to hire Stephen if you're interested in leveraging his indexing services\
• A common misperception authors often have about indexing
• And more

After the interview, Mark reflects on the value of indexing as it pertains to some of his non-fiction and even fiction titles.

Links of Interest:

• Stephen Ullstrom's Website
• Mark's YouTube Channel
• Buy Mark a Coffee
• Patreon for Stark Reflections
• Best Book Ever Podcast
• Lovers Moon Podcast
• The Relaxed Author
  • Buy eBook Direct
  • Buy Audiobook Direct
• Publishing Pitfalls for Authors
• An Author's Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores
• Wide for the Win
• Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books
  • This Time Around (Short Story)
  • A Canadian Werewolf in New York
  • Stowe Away (Novella)
  • Fear and Longing in Los Angeles
  • Fright Nights, Big City
  • Lover's Moon
  • Hex and the City
• The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles
• Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard

Stephen Ullstrom is an award-winning professional indexer. He believes that the world is a better place with well-written indexes, and is passionate about helping authors, publishers, and the index-curious understand how indexing works.

The introductory, end, and bumper 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