My 1st Time in Self-Publishing (PART 2)

Today, I'm continuing my story of how self-publishing had changed my life.

So, yeah, finding out that Barnes and Noble had their own self-publishing program was a surprise. I remember fireworks going off in my head, when I saw this tab on their website. I decided to give this program a try, because I was very familiar with Barnes and Noble, so this HAD to be totally legit (in other words, it wasn't a scam, or a website that asked you for money to publish a book).

So, I enter the credentials for my book, uploaded my manuscript and cover art. However, uploading those things were a chore to do.
The manuscript had to be a specific size. On the first attempt, I left my manuscript at 8x11 in., and when they sent me a copy, the book was too big--it looked like a children's book, not a novel. So, I had to go back to my manuscript and resize it to a smaller size (I changed it to 6x9 in.).
And then uploading a PDF of both front and back covers were also hard, because I was following a free template that they had provided. All that time, I was struggling to format it to where it didn't exceed 2 pages, so that it could be uploaded onto the thing. Finally, I learned the simpler solution of setting all margins of a Word doc. to zero, then copy and paste my cover art, and then save it as a PDF. And that worked, instead of inserting it on a template.

And pretty soon, I was holding my own copy of Dolphin Princess--a 6x9 in. book, 438 pgs. long, and a hardcover. That was when I became very proud of all the work I've done. After a few years of trying to get this story out, after having to reformat the manuscript and everything, I was finally able to sell my book online through Barnes and Noble. The only downside to all this was that since I had to redo the book at that one point where the book was too big, and the ISBN number having to be the same because I didn't know how to get another one (so that my book can be sold through other outlets like Amazon), the book is only available at BarnesandNoble.com. However, I have hope that the book's sequel could reach those other outlets besides Barnes and Noble, because of everything I've learned from this past experience of self-publishing. Here's what I've learned:

1. Size matters. If your book is a children's book, then use 8x11 in. But if your book is a novel, then use something reasonable like 6x9 in. Keep this in mind, when writing your story on Microsoft Word.
2. Don't be afraid to ask for help. The site had a Help Center that you could call or email, if you had any problems.
3. Have a lot of patience. When you're working on putting together the story, or waiting for your book to sell, you need to have a lot of patience.

I felt like self-publishing had changed my life, because all that time of me trying to find a publisher for my book, I should've found Barnes and Noble Press sooner. Though, at the time, I was too concerned about my book's safety--I didn't want my book to end up in the wrong hands. But I could trust Barnes and Noble.
Plus, it didn't take long for my book to be approved and go on sale. With traditional publishing, I would've had to wait months after mailing it to a publisher, only to get a letter of acceptance or rejection. With self-publishing, you cut out the middle-man: You send in your work, and you get published right away. So, what was holding me back all this time--all those years--was this fear of looking for alternatives to traditional publishing.

TO BUY MY BOOK: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/dolphin-princess-veronica-gonzalez/1129202183

Veronica Gonzalez