I’ve taken a longer hiatus than I would have liked from posting on this site. Part Holidays, part work, and part Rath Awards prep; I wanted to be sure I could dedicate thoughtful time here, not just some time.

Now that The Mask of a Marriage is out in the open (remember, you can get a free version by subscribing to this blog below!), I’ve been setting my sights on getting Infinitude out into the world. Perhaps surprising to some, but Infinitude has been ready for over a year now, even before The Mask of a Marriage. If I really wanted to, I could publish it within the next week or two. So why haven’t I?

The answer is simple, really. I want to take a good, big shot at making this a truly successful book. Part of that included shopping it around to publishing houses and agents – all of which were an unfortunate, but expected “no”. But most of it comes down to doing the things I SHOULD have done while releasing Agents & Angels, including objectives like building this site and starting my social media presence. But alas, I was naive then and am wiser(?) now, so let’s take a big swing for an adventurous story I care about!

For some, this may be dull while others may find it riveting. As a writer, I usually find things like this helpful to constantly be learning more about the process and what works/doesn’t. So, for those still with me, here are the main things I’m working on between now and [some undetermined] release day in 2024:

Hire a Cover Artist

Continue to Build My Brand

This part of the journey has been both rewarding, daunting, and exhausting. On one hand – I have an awesome author website that I made with my own two hands! On the other hand, I see bookstagrammers (sp?) and other authors posting daily on social media. I have a “day” career…how am I supposed to achieve that? The advice I’ve given myself is to enjoy this aspect of it (example: being vulnerable in a post like this) and do my best because it’s better than nothing. Between now and Infinitude, I want to make my site, Facebook, and Instagram feel like living entities…even if I may not be able to post all that often. How can you help? Interact with my posts! Share them, comment on them, follow me on social media. The more the merrier!

Finalize Release Strategy

This is really an exercise in working backwards from a targeted release date to see if everything fits. I’ve been watching a lot of YouTube videos on how to piece this all together (I find Bethany Atazadeh to be helpful), plus if you’ve ever met me in real life, it probably wouldn’t surprise you that I have an 11-tab Excel file of project planning and organizing for specific tasks. I’m not too worried about this one, but it’s still something that needs a crisp plan and wiggle room should life or work throw a curveball. How can you help? Keep encouraging me! Ask questions about how it’s going or what phase of the process I’m on. It’s often fun to talk about these things and even if I’m organized, it’s still a lot on top of normal work/life.

ARC Readers

Just what the hell are ARC Readers you ask? Advanced Review Copy readers are people willing to receive, read, and (hopefully) review your book for free. The free part is important as it’s something Amazon frowns upon if you’re paying for reviews – and they’ve been known to remove reviews completely if they discover it. ARC Readers are a MASSIVE lift and perhaps the most daunting thing left between now and publication. You have to solicit like crazy for them, provide them the book – physical or digital – and then fingers-crossed-hope they read and review it according to your timeline. Reviews can make or break a book, especially on Amazon. I’ll do a post about this more eventually, but I mean it when I say: if you’re reading an indie author’s book and enjoyed it, providing an Amazon review is the single best way you can help. With ARC reviewers, it can be hit or miss and I’d love to hit 50 reviews within the first week of Infinitude. A lofty goal, and one that likely requires 100+ ARC readers. But(!), leaning in here could be the difference between true success and fleeting sales. How can you help? In two ways: 1) if you want to be an ARC reader eventually, let me know now! I can give you more details later on. 2) Buy and REVIEW any and all J.T. Rath books! Agents & Angels I / II, The Mask of a Marriage…past reviews help to build credibility and reviewing takes mere minutes (assuming you’ve read the books already). To those that already have in the past: thank you; your reviews are cherished!

KDP & Ingram Prep

I’ve done this piece before and it’s not too bad aside from being annoying at times. KDP is Amazon’s publishing site and is [usually] pretty easy to nail down formatting, submitting, etc. Their Kindle eBook creator is far better than in the past, but can be a bit finnicky and may be tiresome as Infinitude has over 100 chapters. Ingram is another beast entirely and they’re pretty awful to work with. A necessary evil, but their site has minimal functionality to check your uploads, kind of ridiculous upload requirements, and my proof copy for The Mask of a Marriage took over a month to get to me. By that time, I’d already received 2 proofs from Amazon, fixed it in Ingram, and released the damn book. So yeah…suffice it to say I won’t be doing a proof with Ingram. How can you help? Nothing! Take the day off 🙂

Release the Damn Thing!

This is the fun part! Getting to an eventual release day, probably having a party for it, and pushing the book both before and after it comes out. I’m aiming to take some time off work when this happens and who knows? Maybe I can even do some cool things like book signings at some local bookstores! And the best part of all is this will officially be the point at which I can get back to writing whatever is next; I’ve missed writing dearly while I’ve been focused on the marketing aspects for a while. How can you help? Build hype with me! I want to generate excitement for a pulse-pounding story! Get excited with me both before, and after. Interact with my social media! Buy and review Infinitude once it releases! These are all things I appreciate more than you know.

I went quite long on this post – as I tend to do if you’ve ever frequented Rath’s Reviews – but so it goes. I’m sure I’m missing some to-dos, but these are the biggies. Eventually I’ll do a post about what Infinitude is, with some cool insider-details, and I’ll be sure to link the two posts once its complete. Thanks for the read and support!