Jacob is Ready to Tell and Sell His Tails!

Yes, Jacob is now ready and willing to both tell and sell his Tails about our seven years of going ‘Back-to-the-Land’ on Cape Breton Island during the 60’s and 70’s (some of you could certainly recognize yourselves). We have Self-published!

And what a challenge and an adventure that has been. There seems to be as many places offering Self-Publishing services as there are offering Emergency Travel Medical Insurance - and the pricing is just as confusing. And that’s just the start of it. Even though some of them have book listings or catalogues, the author still needs to do all the Marketing.

Did you know that Amazon will list your books for nothing but charges between 55% and 75% commission on book sales? Chapters charges about 45%. The least I found was at a smaller book stores and is 40%. The clincher is that they won’t return the books, they rip off the front page and send that back. Horrors!

We ended up contracting with a printer in Calgary that seemed to offer what we thought needed. Blitz Printing not only prints the books, they have a public E-Catalogue called (phone #: 866-479-3248). They list “Jacob’s Tails . . .” in their catalogue; they warehouse the books; and they even take orders and ship out the book. They also accept credit cards which is a real bonus.

The easiest part was actually getting the E-book up and available. We found a service called ClickBank that takes credit cards and verifies them before the customer can download the book. (Click here to go to the web page)

The great thing is that all this can happen while we’re on the road.

Oh, yeah – we have a whole load of books coming with us as we move along. I’m hoping to pick up some book-signing opportunities, especially in Ontario and the Maritimes. So this is going to be a working (of sorts) trip but it should be kind of fun!

Oh, the Website is http://www.firstepbooks.com . Let us know what you think of it!!

Times Flies When You’re Having Fun

Here it is into July!! BLOG-time, eh?!

I’m not sure where the time went. Income Tax got done on time and on budget, the annual check-ups got done, on time and on budget – with no significant changes – just the regular lose weight and stop smoking – both of which we are really trying to do.

As usual – my anxiety about not being challenged or busy enough set-in right after those two tasks had been completed, so-o-o I immediately volunteered (Fred hates it when I do that) to edit the Newsletter for the Penwheels group (this is a group of Escapees Club RV’er who are writers).

I’ve never done anything like that before and figured I may as well try. That first Newsletter that came out this month took far more time than I expected it would but I was very pleased with it. I guess they were okay with it too, cuz they haven’t fired me yet.

Oh, by the way, I am now officially an author! Now, the saying goes (I just learned this) anyone can call themselves a writer, but you have to get paid to be an author!!

Yeh, yeh, finally, finally. I’m actually getting paid for two articles in the Escapees Club Magazine. Wow, what a thrill! The first one came out in the July/August issue and the second one is supposed to be in the September/October issue. I guess I was excited.

ALSO, after much research, disappointment and deliberation, I have decided to self-publish “Jacob’s Tails . . .” What is “Jacob’s Tails . . .” you might ask? Well that is the final name of the book I’ve been working on about our seven years in Cape Breton.

It really has been a labour of love but I am ready to move on. Actually, I’m getting kind of tired of Jacob!

This is the cover and I will definitely let you know when it is ready for sale.

Our initial plan was to get everything in order here in Lethbridge and then take off east. Then we thought about it. Why battle all the summer crowds (kids and all) when southern Alberta is really not that bad in the summer (no snow shovels, anyway) and we weren’t looking forward to coming back before we headed down in the fall.

The decision was made!! We are going to leave here right after Labour Day, travel across to the Maritimes, then go down the east coast to explore places we have never gone before (like Texas). We plan to go across the South-West and then up the west coast and home. We figure that should take us about 8 months and a lot of money.

Hell, what are we saving it for?? The only thing we resent is that a lot of those hard-earned $$ are going to end up going to the Travel Insurance people. But we won’t leave home without it!

We’ll keep you posted!!

Lynne & Fred