Love at a Distance Published

It's here! My new book is called Love at a Distance. I published it this morning and I must say I love the ease and facility of the self-publishing platform on both Lulu.com and Amazon Kindle that can make your works of art come alive so fast.

The book started its creation at the end of February, and you will enjoy the script-like nature of the book. It is compiled from chats that took place with one person over Datehookup.com, as well as Gmail. You can buy it today at:http://stores.lulu.com/kakonged. You can also find it available on Amazon Kindle and Amazon in a few days.

Marketing the Key to Self-Publishing

It always surprises me when I speak to someone and they tell me that their books are not selling. Each and every time it is usually because no effort is going into marketing.

There are a lot of writers out there who depend on the their publishing company to do the bulk of their marketing for them. I'm one of those people who is a true believer that you, the writer, have the golden key when it comes to selling your books.

This is not to say that my book sales have been fabulous this month. There are a whole lot of things I could be doing that I have not been doing and at least I recognize that. Every time I am on public transit, I could be slipping my business card to someone with a book in their hand and telling them about my books. I could be hanging around outside bookstores and letting people who are coming in and out know about my books. I could be talking about them in casual conversations every chance I get. Perhaps it is my Canadian politeness factor that keeps me from being that aggressive. However, I am fully aware that I would be selling more books this way.

On an up note, I will be going to a "Faith and the Media" symposium on Thursday, October 1st in Brampton, Ontario. There will be 500 people at this event and I definitely plan to discuss my books. As well, I'm hoping to go to a Simply People festival in October and get a table where I can showcase my books. I just need to work out the timing so it will go well with my teaching hours. Today, there is Word on the Street that is a huge book and magazine festival in Toronto. I was planning to get a booth right after the last one happened called Writer's Block. This is something I definitely hope to work out for next year. My approach to Word on the Street has been "manana, manana," always tomorrow, tomorrow. Honestly, I prefer going to the event and it would be great if I had some business cards to let people there know about my books too.

Here's to self-publishing!

Using the Web to Realize Journalism Goals

It's a bit of a catch-22 having advertising on a blog site. Sometimes advertising material will be included that I, as the writer, do not agree with. I remember the days when the Internet was a free forum - and there are still things that you can get on the Internet for free. However, now, everyone seems to want to figure out how they can make money from the Internet.

I find myself spending a lot of my free time updating my sites and doing podcasts. I also spend a lot of time writing and self-publishing books. I do not make a lot of money from these tasks - definitely not enough that I could live on it alone, yet I enjoy doing these things immensely. My magazine Donna is a long-held dream of mine. I always tended to find that when I was paid to work for a magazine in the past, with the exception of New Dreamhomes and Condominiums Magazine - things always seemed to go wrong. There always seemed to be some sort of screw up, difference of opinion and people in the magazine industry can sometimes be difficult to work for. However, the joy of working for a magazine is exactly what I am sure keeps so many people in that industry.

Now that I have Donna Magazine, I have been able to bring to light some stories that had long since been buried. With the wonders of the Internet (which I do love), I have even made the magazine multimedia and I plan to start posting up some of my old documentaries on the magazine, as well as producing new ones.

As for the podcasts - well, this gives me a chance to produce my own radio episodes any way I would like to do so. I do not have to worry about CBC cuts, about getting bumped out of my job by senior reporters or even having to get my story pitches "greenlighted" by a producer. If I think the story is good - I can do it. The only thing I need to worry about is that I am using my allotted free space on Podomatic (I could also increase it by going pro). Plus, I can also put podcasts on my magazine.

My books are another story that I will get to in another post. Thanks for listening and I hope that if you have a love for freedom of expression, you find ways to make the Internet work for you too.