Francine Craft

We know very well that not everything is for everybody, but we often want to do things that others advise against.  To me, if it’s realistic and reasonable and I want it, I’ll go for it.  Not gonna break the bank for it or make myself sick with overtrying and overwork, but I will tap into how it can work for me.  This is how I felt about independent publishing, and still feel.  My journey into this “indie” field has been long and not without pitfalls.  I think I may be able to save you a few missteps, tears and missed meals if you’ll do the following:

l) Ask yourself if you basically like working alone, can encourage and sustain yourself.  If not, you may be able to work with a friend.  That was not for me and fortuntely I knew it.  I like working alone and often being alone.  Contemplating my emotional navel is one of my best diversions.

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Hopefully this will go thru as a note.  Someone wrote asking for help with addresses to get grants.  Their comment couldn’t go thru.  Info on grants is available on Google.  Make sure you phrase it well.  Librarians are very helpful.  Contact info at Smal Business Administration – SBA.  This will help.

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Changes are happening fast and furiously in the field of publlishing. You’ve read that over the past year or so, far more e-books have been published than paperbacks. Now, studies have found that people seem to be in love with e-books as never before.  Kindles, Nooks, and other e-readers abound. And it is presently the age of the $0.99 e-books to fill those readers.

What does this mean to and for you? Well, several things. If you’ve always yearned to self-publish, now may be the time to get in the swim, or at least swing your legs over the side of the pool, studying what’s going on; something I recommend.  Help with independent — indie — publishing has never been better. Read the rest of this entry »

Happy New Year to all! May this be one of the best years you’ve ever known. And may all the years to follow be years in which you walk with God, love and treasure yourself. Be the person you want to be and win what you want to win!

A few weeks back, as excerpts to Solomon and Sheba (to be released in October 2012) were coming to an end, I wrote that I would be giving you tips, help, encouragment with indie (independent) publishing you’re doing, on the verge of doing, or simply want to do. I’ve studied self-publishing for 20 or more years before doing it. Now I’ve been there, done that and I’m altogether willing to share what I’ve learned. It’s neither a thing of glory nor a can of worms. It’s something some do far better than others.

I couldn’t begin because my computer had sprung a gllitch. Hopefully that’s behind me and no later than February (early), I’ll be bringing youu these blogs. Meanwhile, remember there is on this site l segment of what Solomon and Sheba is about. (It’s based somewhat on the biblical Solomon and Sheba and keeps its intensity and heat.) There is a prologue and there are 5 chapters for you to read and decide whether you want to continue. Then there are six chapters from my voodoo mystery, Dying on the Edge, with a partial Haitian background.

I hope you’ll join me in the days to come. There’s plenty on this website for you to read until I begin the blogs. As I said at the beginning: Happy New Year! I look forward to your being here.

This is the last of the immediately  excerpted chapters of S&S. The book  is fully in outline and acted-out stages and the final writing has begun.  I will fill my blog now with guest blogs, helpful tips and links to help you with your writing and encouragement with all my heart to go ahead with what you want to write.  The time has never been more opportune.  E-books are blossoming all over the map and they’re getting better and better. 

From time to time until S&S is published in either July or  October 2012,  I will excerpt other chapters that I think you’ll find engrossing.  This chapter will stay on for approximately 6 weeks. 

I certainly hope you’re with me in this.  The topics I tackle in this book are so much a part of our world today.  We sorely need to feel the love of God and His blessings in our lives.  What better then than one of the Holy Bible’s most intense and treasured love stories.  Timeless love can be ours too.

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The trip to New Orleans had been uneventful, but Sheba and Marty were both nervous.  He rapped with the door knocker on the black grilled, white  door of the redbrick  house on Gentilly Boulevard, a house  that  he had slowly passed many times when he lived In New Orleans with his great uncle Charlie Cartier, his mother’s uncle.  Marty drew a sharp breath and held Sheba’s hand tightly.

The door opened quickly and they faced a beigeskinned sixtiessomething woman with close-cropped black curly hair and an oval face.  She was very attractive, but she held her lips in a bitter line as she invited them in, her eyes never leaving their faces.

“So you made it,” she said.  “I should be civil and ask about your trip, but you’ll find I’m not the most civil of people.  Come in and sit down and tell me exactly what you want from me.  I certainly know you very well, Martin, although I’ve only spoken with you by phone, and that  lately.   And I know  you, Sheba, from your beautiful voice when I listen to Marty’s sermons.  Yes, I do listen from time to time.  And you obviously know a little about me.”

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Yes I know, I’m skipping about and all for a reason.  I want you to get the full  flavor of S&S to see if it’s your cup of tea or java as I hope it is.  This novel has many characters, but only a few can be well delineated.  Those I only touch on will have enough meat on their psychic bones to let you know where they’re coming from.  There are wonderful black, white and couples of other races, happy and unhappy – and real.  I think you’ll  like the town of Marigold, Maryland on the Eastern Shore, its multiculturism and the striving of the citizens for a good life.  Sit back and savor it.  Read the prior chapters just under this one, all the way back to what S&S is about. This will be part of a series.   Happy reading!

Early December.  Dusk with an early moon.  Sheba thought the Chesapeake Bay had never been lovelier.  Greenish and rippling in the wind, that body of water had always been one of her favorites.  It was a cloudy day, warm for December and  she turned to Marty as they stood on the deck of Mark and Marguerite’s small yacht, The Heller.  “Hey, this is living,” she told him. ” I love being alone with you, but somehow I wish, too, that the whole congregation could come with us for a while, the children who need it most anyway.”

Marty nodded.  Right now he felt he only needed his wife; they should grab more time together with just the two of them. “I guess I hadn’t realized how tired I am. Last night’s sleep leaves me rested though.  It’s a good thing I got my Mother Vangie’s genes and her energy.”  Marty always seemed thoughtful when he spoke of Vangie. Read the rest of this entry »