From Illustrator to Author

by Domonique Mayhawk
(Ypsilanti,MI, United States)

My First Journey Into being Self Published

I never knew that I would become a Self Published Author until about a couple weeks ago!

It all started when I was sitting at home with my roommate and I was illustrating for an author's children book and it dawned on me that I also had a story to tell about my childhood. One day I began to write and develop my character as well as drawing her and figuring out who this little girl was.

As I went furthur into writing I began to do my own research on what it takes to become a good children book author. I work at the library so I was able to get a lot of books to read on that subject. I then went to Borders and baught a couple of books on Children Author and Illustrator Publishing and How to become a Children Book Author and Illustrator. All the while I was gathering important information and looking up agents and publishing companies, I didn't think that I would get my story published. I was just gaining knowledge of what it took to become a children book author, I was already a children book illustrator.

As I was developing my story I was also developing the look of my main character and posting her on my blog and letting people know about this new character I was writing about. As I kept posting I was recieving responses about how cute the character was and people encouraging me to get it published. But I didn't have the money and I was doing a lot of leg work on how I needed to get my book published. I then put it on the shelf and decided to look for other illustration gigs.

One day about a month and some days ago, I was chatting online with a friend who had just signed with a self publishing company and told me about the deal that they had going that day and told me that I should go ahead and get my book published with this Self Publishing company. I decided to not give it a second thought and went on ahead and got it.

It was like God put it right into my hands. I loved it because I was assigned to a team of people: Editor, Layout Designers etc. They always kept in touch with me and were always available. Going with this Self Publishing company has saved me tons of money that I didn't have already, it was very affordable. They were very fast working on my book, I did all the illustrations in 3 weeks while working with them. I now love being an author/illustrator. After writing my first book I had so much fun with it I have decided to turn it into a series of books based on this character. So now I am a published author but am still learning more.

As far as marketing goes I think I have already started marketing my book and the character before making the decision of publishing it. I had started marketing it on verious chat websites including blogs. I have been visiting schools and developing relationships with teachers and prinipals which is important for my target audience.

Other ways that have been suggested to me by other people is to do writing and illustration workshops with children at different schools and getting customers to go into bookstores to ask sales clurks for my book to have the bookstores order the book! I am still learning and finding out great ways to market my book myself instead of dishing out tons of money. I love being self published especially because I am an illustrator and can do the illustrations myself.

Thank you for allowing me to share my story on how I am now a self published author. I will continue in this market, I think its my calling!

Take care and God bless

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