Friday, June 28, 2013

West Virginia Signing~

Here are the details for my book signing in West Virginia


K.A. ROBINSON BOOK EVENT


  When: Saturday August 10th, 2013 

 Time: 6:30-8:30pm 

 Where: Black Bear Burritos Evansdale Location - http://www.blackbearburritos.com/ 304-777-4867 – 3119 University Ave, Morgantown WV 26505

 RSVP: By Wednesday August 7th, 2013, We want to make sure there is enough swag & seating.

 This event is casual.

 Food: Below is their menu – meal & drinks are self-pay http://www.blackbearburritos.com/menu.html

 Please contact me, Tammy McGowan, at TammyVoiced711@gmail.com for any questions & to RSVP.

 K.A. will bring: • Key Chains • Bookmarks • A teaser from her new project K.A. Will give-a-way both of her books to one lucky reader! Remember your camera & what you would like her to sign.

 Here are some links for the Morgantown area. http://www.morgantownwv.gov/ http://www.downtownmorgantown.com/ http://www.tourmorgantown.com/ For hotels: www.expedia.com Local airport: http://www.morgantownairport.com/

Thursday, June 27, 2013

Self Publishing - Part Two Royalties

I thought I would cover royalties tonight since so many were shocked when I explained how a self published author gets paid tonight on my Facebook post.

Again, I am keeping this SIMPLE.

S.I.M.P.L.E.

I'm only going to cover eBooks, because paperbacks are a beast all their own.


You've finished your book, paid for the cover, editing, and copyright. Now what?

It's time to publish.

You need to enter in the basic information - Title, Author, Description, and upload the cover and actual book file.

Next, you move on to pricing. What should you price your book at? $.99? $3.99?

There is no right or wrong answer for this. It's YOUR choice and yours alone.

One thing to remember is ROYALTIES. This is how a self published author makes their money. That pretty little $3.99 price tag? The author doesn't get that.

Royalties through Amazon are divided at the $2.99 mark. Anything below this price will ONLY EARN 35%. Yeah, you read that right. 35%

So if you price your book at $.99, you will only make around $.35 a book.

Now, if you price your book OVER $2.99 you will make 70% in MOST countries. There are a few that are just straight 35%. 

So at $3.99 the author makes roughly $2.79 per book at the 70% royalty rate.

But you must remember that you have to pay taxes on what you make so they end up with even less. See Part One on that.


Again, I am just giving you the basics on this. There are things like KDP select that I'm not going to cover. Also, different platforms give different percentages. I'm simply using Amazon because they are the most popular.

I am in no way bashing the platforms - they need to get paid too. They help us reach all of you and they work hard to do it. I wouldn't be where I am today without them. Am I a huge author? No. But I have managed to build a fan base through them that I am forever grateful for.

I hope this helped any new authors with questions. I promised to do a few of these for you.

And for any readers that are looking at this right now, I hope you understand why most authors charge at least $2.99. We spend months and HUNDREDS (editing, cover design) of dollars to get these books ready to go.

We're not being greedy, we just want to get paid a fair amount. :)

Friday, June 21, 2013

So you want to write? Behind the scenes Part 1 - Taxes

I promised I would do this, and I'm FINALLY doing it. Again, I'm pressed for time, so I'm going to give the short version of self publishing (behind the scenes.)

Taxes are a hot topic lately, so I'm going to start there.

First off, let me just put this out there:

I am NOT an accountant. This is just a quick overview of what to expect. Contact a CPA to keep things legal.


Let's skip over the actual writing. You've wrote your book, you have it edited, and your cover is ready to go.

Now what?

You hit the publish button.

And then you pee yourself a little while taking straight shots of Vodka.

What comes next is entirely up to fate. Your book might hit the Top 100 on Amazon or it might hang out in the high thousands. You can push it until you're blue in the face, but you can NEVER know what will happen for sure.


Let's say you do well. You sell.... 5,000 copies your first month. At $3.99 a book, you earn just under $20,000. Holy shit! That's awesome!

But wait.

You forgot that Amazon and Nook take a %. To keep it simple, I'm going to stick with making 70%. Each distributor AND country are different. Just FYI - You can earn anywhere between 35% - 70%.

So let's take that 30% off of $20,000.

Okay, we're still good. That leaves you with $14,000! Let's go on a vacation.

But wait.

You need to put money back for taxes. Darn. Let's deduct again.

The SAFEST way to save for taxes is to put back 40%. Yes, I said 40%. You have to pay state AND federal.

With 40% off of $14,000, that leaves you with $8,400.

Wow. That $20,000 just disappeared in the blink of an eye. You just paid out $11,600. OVER 50% of what the book made.

Yes, $8,400 is an AMAZING amount to make in a month. Especially if you're someone like me who is used to earning $9.50 an hour.


So, you've set that money back to pay your taxes with. What do you do with it? When do you pay?

You MUST pay quarterly taxes if you are in most tax brackets. Must. Or you'll be fined. It's not cool to get fined. Nope. No way. (Again, contact your CPA to know for sure.) You can NOT do this on your own, so you need to find someone who can. You need an accountant, preferably a CPA. And yes, you have to pay them. It stinks. I know.

Now you've found an awesome CPA to help you. S(he) will figure out exactly what you need to pay. Once they do, you send the checks in to your state tax department and the IRS.

PLEASE remember to do this quarterly. No one wants to get fined.

You do not need to pay taxes until you start turning a profit. We all know how Amazon holds the payment for 60 days, so you need to keep that in mind. You don't have to pay on that until it is received.

Also, you need to keep receipts for ALL expenses! (Covers, editing, signings (table fee, hotel, plane tickets, gas) giveaways you run, and anything else.)

If you are successful enough, you might want to consider setting yourself up as a small business. You need to talk to your accountant. There are A LOT of things I didn't cover here, but this is something to think about to get you started.

I hope this helped! <3

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Shattered Ties (Secret Project)

As most of you know, I released the title of my next book last night.
 
Shattered Ties.
 
Besides a few teasers that I've posted, I can't release much just yet. BUT I promise I will have the description up soon.
 
Shattered Ties will be a New Adult book. It focuses on Jesse and Emma, two teenagers who are seventeen to eighteen years old.
 
My plans are to keep their story down to TWO books. I've debated on whether or not to try to condense everything down to one book or not, but there is just too much happening and too long of a time frame to put it all in.
 
If everything goes as planned, the release date will be sometime in early November.
 
So, that is what I CAN tell you right now. More information will be posted soon.
 
 

Sunday, June 16, 2013

WV Signing

My fellow Mountaineers (And those of you in surrounding states) -

I wanted to do something different. I know a lot of the time when you're at a signing, you don't get to chat with the authors very long before you're forced to the next table.

Well, what if you were sitting AT the table with said author? That's exactly what we're going to do. Instead of the usual stand in line to get five minutes to chat, we're going to have an entire two hours to just sit down, eat, talk, and sign stuff.

No need to dress up or even do your make up if you don't want to. It's going to be casual and relaxed and SO much fun. I LOVE spending time with you guys and I seriously can not wait to meet all of you!

Sound like a plan?


If you're interested in meeting me August 10th in Morgantown, WV please check out the links below.


Facebook Group

Information (Date, Time, Place)

Thursday, June 13, 2013

Bloggers - I need YOU!



 Bloggers -

I am in the process of making a list of blogs to contact if I need promotional help (sharing giveaways, teasers, and things like that.)

If you are interested, please EMAIL me at karobinsonblogtour@aol.com (this is NOT about blog tours, I'm just using that email) so that I can add you to the list.

I don't care if you have 2 "likes" or 2,000, if you have a blog, I want you! (Preferably a Facebook page too.)