The Book Shepherds

Book shepherds (term coined by self-publishing guru, Dan Poynter) provide direct assistance and/or advice on book design (cover and interior formatting), proofreading and editing, sourcing printers, production, distribution and promotion. These are the responsibilities of a publisher. Many authors are intimidated by the "self" in self-publishing and fall prey to costly and unscrupulous subsidiary (vanity) publishers. A good book shepherd can help prevent costly mistakes and increase an author's chances for success, but their services can be expensive.

This Book Shepherds page is a directory of resources; some are sites and others are services. ML Barnes used many of them to help launch Flying Turtle Publishing and Parting River Jordan and continues to refer to them for assistance.

Writers

Charlotte Dillon’s Resources for Romance Writers presents useful advice for ALL fiction writers. http://www.charlottedillon.com/WritingRomance.html

Veteran author Tananarive Due blogs about her process at

http://tananarivedue.wordpress.com/

New Author Marian Perera offers thoughtful and interesting insights on her writing journey at Flights of Fantasy

Daily Writing Tips provides a bucketful of writing help from Dr. Maeve Maddox. http://www.dailywritingtips.com/

Preditors and Editors tells it like it is about publishers, publishing services and much more. http://pred-ed.com/

Traditional Publishing

QueryTracker is a must if you’re going the traditional publishing route. http://www.querytracker.net/index.php

The Association of Authors’ Representatives, Inc. (AAR), a not-for-profit organization of independent literary and dramatic agents. http://www.aaronline.org/

Self-Publishing

Morris Rosenthal www.fonerbooks.com

smashwords.com

Midwest Independent Publishers Association http://www.mipa.org/MIPA_Home.html

SPAWN—Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network http://www.spawn.org/

SPAWN has a great article that Mari wishes she’d found sooner: a time line for publishing your work. Check out http://www.spawn.org/editing/publish_timeline.htm

The article is written by Patricia Fry, the author of 30 books, including "The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book," www.matilijarpress.com, and the Executive Director of SPAWN. Her informative blog site is www.matilijapress.com/publishingblog.

Services

Covers
Nick Hartman
nicholashartman.com

Andy Prahin

Editing and Critique
Karen H. Rodgers
critiqueyourbook.com

A personal recommendation from ML Barnes: "Karen Rodgers walks her talk. She provides fast, excellent and insightful editing. She's respectful and considerate of an author's sensitive soul. She'll make you a better writer AND you'll want to have tea with her!"

Proofreading
Cynthia Knudson

Marketing and Promotion
JR Davenport