In my quest to become self-employed by June 2023, I have made a few small steps forward. There’s nothing major to report yet, as there is a lot of prep work, but I have accomplished a little, so I thought I’d share it.

I have created a spreadsheet listing all of my published titles under my real name and pseudonyms. I recorded the dates they were published with KDP in paperback, as Kindle e-books, and Audible audiobooks through ACX. Tonight I recorded the dates the e-books will no longer be part of KDP Select so that I can put add them to Draft2Digital and go to wide distribution (more than just Amazon).

A few titles were already available for wide distribution via Smashwords, but I have never been happy with Smashwords. I had books in users’ libraries but were never paid for those. I didn’t understand that, and their formatting was confusing. Tonight, I unpublished all the titles I had with Smashwords.

Most of those titles were short stories or books under the Kimber Haig pseudonym. One exception was Inheritance. I made that my guinea pig and have just submitted it to Draft2Digital to see how I like that experience. If it truly is as described, both on the site and in books I’ve read from Joanna Penn, I think this is going to be something I use extensively for print, e-book, and audio in the future.

Why is this significant? If my books are enrolled in KDP Select at Amazon, I am not able to publish them in a place that makes them available for other bookstores or in other formats. Draft2Digital makes them available for B&N’s Nook reader, Apple Books, Kobo, Overdrive, etc. In print books, it will make it much easier for online retailers that aren’t named Amazon to stock my books. It will also make it so that brick-and-mortar stores can easily order my print books. (Hopefully they will!) Future titles published through D2D will have all the information from every retailer and every format on one page, and that will be nice.

Besides all that, I have submitted six articles to Medium. I have to have 100 followers there to start getting paid, so, you know, if you’re interested, follow me!

I have sent out a newsletter for October and set up a private page on my website for subscribers to receive free content. I’ve begun writing a brand-new story and planned another that I will offer exclusively to subscribers. Not subscribed? Click the Home link above and there’s a sign-up form.

I’ve been working on the musical intro to Werewolf Saga, the Podcast, and researching for the first few episodes.

The last significant piece of news is that I’ve begun making notes for a new Werewolf Saga novel. I’m going to set up a Patreon and will probably set a level where subscribers can read it as I write it like I did with You Want to do What? in my newsletter a few years ago.