Fail Forward

Have you ever noticed the word fail is almost an onomatopoeia?

No?

Then you haven’t allowed your forehead to hit your desk as often as I have. This week, I thought I’d share my five latest oops moments.

Schedule Snafu

I’ve experienced several schedule slips with Oil and Dust, and each caused a cascade of followup fails.

For example, I had one vendor promise they’d get the work to me “before the end of the month”. I took time off work in anticipation of having my manuscript back. On the last day of the month (having heard nothing), I emailed them and got a response saying they were a little behind, and would need an extra couple of days. Again, I didn’t ask for a specific date, figuring couple of days meant 2 to 3, right? Nope. A full week later, they delivered the product.

Several vendors have given me a specific date, then blown through the timeline they set by several weeks. I’ve learned I need to ask for a specific deadline, then send a “checking in” email before the deadline to evaluate progress and reset my expectations.

My scheduling woes didn’t cease once my book was back in my hands. I didn’t anticipate how long it would take me to upload to the different retailers, or how long the process took after submission. Processing times for ebooks ranged from 1 to 5 days. For the print versions, it took 1 to 3 weeks from submission to receive proof copies. Changes to the trim, paper, or content (oh yeah, keep reading) cause further delays.

Everything will take longer than you expect, so do yourself a favor and build in time for your schedule to slide!

Color Blind Blunder

Upon receiving author proofs from Amazon, I nearly blinded myself.

Did you know you shouldn’t print your novels on white paper? Yeah, me neither, until I looked at my book in print.

Doing a little Googling confirmed cream was the most standard color for fiction, unless you have a white cover. No big deal, thought I. I’ll just make a tiny little change to the file.

Did you know cream-colored paper is thicker than white? Yeah, me neither.

Second fail—my covers were suddenly a titch too small. I’ve uploaded the cream templates to my cover designer and I’ll have updated files early next week, but it still means I won’t have proofed copies in my hand for another week, adding to my continuing schedule slippage. Still, if I hadn’t ordered the proofs and experienced the blinding glare of white, I could have injured my readers. Always order author proofs!

Formatting Fail

I have two formatting fails to report. Both were user error and not Vellum’s fault. Don’t worry, I won’t gush about Vellum again.

First, I’ve learned if the first line of a chapter starts with dialogue, and you’re using Vellum’s larger drop caps, the edges of the left quote marks will cross Amazon’s bleed line. To fix it, I had to create a second file for my Amazon paperback, using the medium-sized drop caps. Nothing else changed—not the page count or any of the prose—but it bothers me the two print-on-demand products will look different.

It doesn’t bother me enough to change the file I uploaded to IngramSpark… because you pay for each change you make to your IngramSpark files. Another oops.

The second fail was another quirky, Amazon-related thing. This year, Amazon changed their file type for the Kindle devices from a mobi file type to an Amazon-specific epub file type. Vellum provides these new Amazon files, but (as I’ve just learned) they only work if your readers download from Amazon directly.

If you use a distributing service like BookFunnel to deliver ARC copies, the files are essentially side-loaded onto Kindle devices… which doesn’t work. BookFunnel’s literature says they will convert your Amazon epub to a mobi file (and my dashboard showed they had), but a reader let me know I’d messed my drop caps up. Luckily, Vellum has a workaround to generate mobi files.

Dashboard Dud

My forehead hit the desk several times over my confusion regarding Kobo’s dashboard. I’d uploaded placeholder files for Book 2, Graphite and Turbulence without an issue. However, when I tried to upload Oil and Dust, I kept getting an error that my ISBN was already being used in their system. Because, I’d purchased my ISBNs, I knew no one else could use the same number, except by accident. I searched for the ISBN on Kobo’s site without success. Next, I thought perhaps I’d accidentally enabled my aggregator, Draft2Digital, to submit the book to Kobo. However, when I checked their dashboard, I’d excluded Kobo from the distribution list.

Next, I attempted to contact Kobo’s customer service. I say attempted, because I used the mail program on the MacBook. Somehow, it sent my email in a series of 12 emails, each containing one line (MacBook fail). As expected, no response from Kobo. I didn’t know the MacBook had butchered the email until I tried to forward it to them again (another schedule slip) because I hadn’t heard from them. Shamefaced, I rewrote my support request, but still didn’t hear from them for six days (another schedule slip) by which time I’d figured out their dashboard.

The red and gray boxes on Kobo’s dashboard are filters; you only see what’s on sale OR in progress. I kept trying to resubmit my book because it wasn’t showing up next to the placeholder cover for Graphite and Turbulence. However, Kobo’s system wasn’t letting me proceed because I’d already started the submission process.

Mystery of the twice-used ISBN solved. Once I clicked on the gray box, I saw the cover for Oil and Dust and could finish submitting the book. Oh hey, Oil and Dust is now available on Kobo!

Overwhelm Oversight

This last fail is more of a personal quirk than an issue with software or systems or vendors.

I am not a multitasker.

I know, I know. This is not something many will admit. I can’t easily switch projects, so while I’ve been wrestling with getting Oil and Dust into all the places, I’ve completely stopped working on Graphite and Turbulence.

Which means the schedule for Book 2 is slipping. Oofta.

Fail Forward

In the first act get your principal character up a tree, in the second act, throw stones at him, in the third, get him down gracefully.

— Harry B Smith

In the first act, I wrote a book and put myself in the proverbial tree by independently publishing my book. However, now that I’ve thrown rocks at myself, I’m ready for the third act, where I let myself down gracefully.

I believe in failing forward—make mistakes, learn from them, move on. Hopefully, by sharing these fails with you, you’ll avoid some of them yourself!

Have you made mistakes along the way? What have they taught you?

Header Photo by the blowup on Unsplash