don’t give up

Promises In The Dark book getting closer to release

~ Beth ~ Leave a comment
Promises In The Dark photo
Promises In The Dark photo

I’ve been working on a new book since last year, Promises In The Dark. The book is about God’s promises versus the world’s promises. Had major writing resistance to this one, because I’m sharing much of my painful past. But it’s getting closer to the time of “the baby’s birth.”

I bought my cover photo at Istock. The photo is pictured at left. I buy almost all my pics for my books, ebooks, and blog posts at Istock. They also offer a free photo, video, and audio each week for you to download. Don’t you just love freebies? 🙂 You can also get pictures for your book at Shutterstock.com, FreeDigitalPhotos.net, and more places online.

My wonderful Graphic Designer!

I’ve been praying to work with a certain graphic designer to design my front cover, back cover, spine, and ebook cover, Christine E. Dupre. I’d seen her covers for other authors and she was highly recommended to me. She’s amazing. She does BEAUTIFUL work!

Recently I hired her and I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE my cover! I knew she was the right person to do it. You can find Christine on Facebook. She’s also creating an ecover for me so I can have the book in ebook format to upload on Amazon.  

Christine is expanding my vocabulary by asking me things like, “What is your spin width?” What the heck is a spin width?! It’s how wide the spine will be. You can calculate your spin width by clicking here. 

I’m using Create Space Self Publishing Company as my POD (Print on Demand) company to physically print the book, so that I can “hold my beautiful baby” and when I have speaking engagements, I can sell them on a back table.

I also have to buy an ISBN and barcode at isbn.org for my book.  You can buy a single ISBN, 10 ISBN’s, or more. The more you buy, the greater the discount. You can also buy a barcode with your ISBN’s. Bowker has several packages available, depending on what you want. 

Why do you need an ISBN?

From their website: “Bowker is the official source for ISBNs in the United States. An ISBN uniquely identifies your book, and facilitates the sale of your book to bookstores (physical and digital) and libraries. Using ISBNs allows you to better manage your book’s metadata, and ensure maximum discoverability of your book. Your book is listed in Bowker Books in Print®, which is used by all the major search engines and most bookstores and libraries.”

If you want to be a serious writer and professional author, sell your book in bookstores and ebook on Amazon, and have your book found by others, I highly recommend buying an ISBN and barcode.

The ISBN for your book will be different for your ebook. It’s best to buy the package of 10 if you plan to write more than one book (and I do plan to write more!). 

My next goals

My next goal/step (hopefully THIS week!) is to buy my ISBN and barcode and to finish writing my book. So far, I have 92 pages, with a goal of at least 100 pages. 

Please keep praying for my self-discipline to finish writing this book. My deadline (once again moved) is THIS month, April 2014.

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Promises In The Dark ebook

~ Beth ~ Leave a comment
Promises In The Dark
Promises In The Dark

Yea, I know. It’s been forever since I’ve posted here. No excuses! Just life happening.

Right now I’m working on a new ebook, Promises In The Dark.  Its theme is God’s promises versus the world’s promises. The world promises so much, yet comes up empty – and often its promises are LIES. God’s promises are true and forever, and fulfill and satisfy you.

The deadline for this book was last year. Just so much going on!

My new deadline is March 15, 2014. The plan is to put it on Amazon first as an ebook, then self-publish with the POD company Create Space, highly recommended by my speaker/author friend Karen Wells.

If you’re not on my ezine list at http://www.BethJones.net, the main hub, be sure to sign up with your name and email address and you’ll be first to hear about its release.

What about you? What are you working on right now with your writing – a book, an article, blog posts? Non-fiction or fiction? Leave your comments below. I’d love to hear from you!

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You are making a difference with your writing

~ Beth ~ Leave a comment

Sometimes you wonder if you’re making any difference here.

You know that this life is not all about YOU. But maybe you don’t want to just “play small.” Maybe you have BIG dreams and long for more. Being “average” and mediocrity are unacceptable to you.

Today we hear the term Rock Star which is supposed to be a positive, but stardom is fleeting and not always fulfilling, as Michael Jackson’s and Whitney Houston’s superstar lives and tragic, early deaths attest.

Or you finally reach fame and fortune, but get caught up in cocaine addiction and alcoholism like Belinda Carlisle (formerly of the Go-Go Girls) or Lindsay Lohan.

Or maybe you haven’t reached stardom at all, and you don’t WANT to, but you do desire for your life to make an IMPACT, a real difference.

Today I was encouraged with an email from a woman, who recently bought 50 copies of my book on women and spiritual warfare to teach as a Bible study at her church.

She said she appreciated, “your willingness to bring sensitive subject matter that is a real part of the human experience to the place where we can peel aware layers of secrecy or deliberate denial. Only God knows how each story is affecting each lady, but I believe this will have been a life-changing summer study.”

Jane VanOsdol’s chapter on her newborn baby dying from birth defects made the women in this Bible study cry. Many women also relate to Stephanie Buckwalter’s story of depression.

The Bible study teacher who bought my book said it is challenging her and the women in the class to look closer at what they believe.

More than anything, The Hands Of A Woman makes you much more aware of the spiritual battle that rages around us every day. If we could see or hear it, we would be shocked.

You are making more of a difference with your writing than you think.

Keep writing!

“We can do no great things – only small things with great love.” – Mother Teresa, Founder of the Missionaries of Charity

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Click here to learn more about my book, The Hands Of A Woman: Everyday Women In Everyday Battles

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