{"id":1750,"date":"2018-10-30T11:53:23","date_gmt":"2018-10-30T00:53:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.booksandpublishing.com.au\/independentpublishing\/?p=1750"},"modified":"2018-10-30T11:53:23","modified_gmt":"2018-10-30T00:53:23","slug":"ebony-mckenna-on-the-girl-and-the-ghost","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.booksandpublishing.com.au\/independentpublishing\/articles\/2018\/10\/30\/1750\/ebony-mckenna-on-the-girl-and-the-ghost\/","title":{"rendered":"Ebony McKenna on \u2018The Girl and the Ghost\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ebony McKenna, winner of the 2018 <\/em>Romance Writers of Australia\u2019s <\/em>Romantic Book of the Year, spoke with Independent Publishing about her book <\/em>The Girl and the Ghost<\/a>, and her experiences in self-publishing.<\/em><\/p>\n

Describe your latest book in under 50 words.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In\u00a0<\/em>The Girl and The Ghost<\/em>, publicity-shy student Morgan Parker has a family who lurch from one PR disaster to another. To Morgan\u2019s shock and surprise, she finds a ghost in her room. He\u2019s come with the house and provides a welcome distraction to the mayhem of real life.<\/p>\n

Why self-publish?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I love being able to control the timing of my stories to take advantage of different celebrations through the year. I have a Christmas story coming out in early December. I\u2019m part of an anthology of ghostly romances released last year around Halloween, and the next will go out in the lead-up to Valentine\u2019s Day. I also launched\u00a0The Girl and The Ghost<\/em>\u00a0on an auspicious date\u2014Friday the 13th!<\/p>\n

Self-publishing means I get to mix shorter stories in between longer novels and bring out incredibly useful nonfiction editing and business guides to help other authors.<\/p>\n

What year did you start and where are you based?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was traditionally published in 2010, then started self-publishing in 2014. I published ebooks to begin with, as distribution was so easy! A year later I dipped the proverbial toe in the \u2018print waters\u2019 and love how practical that side of self-publishing (and distribution) is now. I\u2019m based in Melbourne, and I\u2019m really lucky that the printer I use\u2014IngramSpark\u2014is in the same city. That keeps delivery prices low when I need copies.<\/p>\n

How many people did you contract on your book and what did you do yourself?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve hired editors in the past but these days I\u2019ve developed a thorough checklist, so I can edit my own work. This prompted me to create an \u2018Edit Your Own\u2019 series for authors to follow.<\/p>\n

When I first began and knew nothing, I used other companies to format and distribute my ebooks. Since then, I\u2019ve learned as much as I can about formatting for ebook and print, so I can do that myself. I also format for other authors.<\/p>\n

I buy my own ISBNs, fill all the forms in, register for lending rights, list my titles with library suppliers, contact libraries etc. I do just about everything myself these days except the covers.<\/p>\n

I always bring in professionals for cover designs. Covers are incredibly important and must convey to the reader that the book is not simply worth their money, it\u2019s also worth their\u00a0time.<\/p>\n

What makes your book unique?<\/strong><\/p>\n

My \u2018voice\u2019 is very Australian, with local references and humour.\u00a0The Girl and the Ghost<\/em>\u00a0is packed with lashings of swoon-filled moments and bold teenagers with crazy ideas that sometimes even work.<\/p>\n

What has been your biggest success?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Girl and the Ghost<\/em>\u00a0is my seventh and most successful novel\u2014the reviews have been consistently incredible and it recently took out the Ruby award for Romantic Book of the Year from the Romance Writers of Australia. It\u2019s unusual for a self-published book to win, and unheard of for a YA novel to win. Plus, I edited this book myself using all the methods I\u2019ve gathered over the years, so this feels like a true validation of my efforts.<\/p>\n

What has been your biggest challenge?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Cutting through a crowded marketplace is by far the biggest (and ongoing) challenge\u2014and it\u2019s not unique to self-published authors. Traditionally published authors also face this huge challenge, even when their publishers have marketing budgets. You must consistently produce the very best quality books you can.<\/p>\n

What would be your top tip for those starting out in self-publishing?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Be as professional as possible in all aspects of the business\u2014because this is a business.<\/p>\n

What will you publish next?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019m writing rebooted fairytales which tie in with my four-part ‘Ondine’ series. It\u2019s so much fun playing in this fictional sandpit. I\u2019m writing with a huge grin!<\/p>\n

For more information on the author and her books, visit www.ebonymckenna.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ebony McKenna, winner of the 2018 Romance Writers of Australia\u2019s Romantic Book of the Year, spoke with Independent Publishing about her book The Girl and the Ghost, and her experiences in self-publishing. Describe your latest book in under 50 words. In\u00a0The Girl and The Ghost, publicity-shy student Morgan Parker has a family who lurch from<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1752,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44,20],"tags":[50,53],"class_list":{"0":"post-1750","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-profile","8":"category-newsletter","9":"tag-ebony-mckenna","10":"tag-the-girl-and-the-ghost"},"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booksandpublishing.com.au\/independentpublishing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1750","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booksandpublishing.com.au\/independentpublishing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booksandpublishing.com.au\/independentpublishing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booksandpublishing.com.au\/independentpublishing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booksandpublishing.com.au\/independentpublishing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1750"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.booksandpublishing.com.au\/independentpublishing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1750\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booksandpublishing.com.au\/independentpublishing\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booksandpublishing.com.au\/independentpublishing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1750"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booksandpublishing.com.au\/independentpublishing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1750"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booksandpublishing.com.au\/independentpublishing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1750"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}