My guest this episode is Biba Pearce, an award-winning author with more than fifty novels across crime, romance, and cozy mystery. She's built a six-figure career as an author and now mentors writers who want to build sustainable careers of their own.

Find more author advice, tips, and tools at our Self-publishing Author Advice Center, with a huge archive of 2,000+ blog posts, and a handy search box to find key info on the topic you need.

We invite you to join our organization and become a self-publishing ally.

About the Host

Howard Lovy is an author, developmental editor, and writing coach with a long career in journalism and publishing. He works with writers at many stages of their careers, with a focus on helping them develop their ideas and strengthen their work while preserving their unique voices. He lives in Northern Michigan.

About the Guest

Biba Pearce is an award-winning, internationally bestselling crime author known for her gripping, atmospheric thrillers. She writes across multiple genres and pen names, including gritty crime as Biba Pearce and romance as Gemma Ford. A hybrid author published by Joffe Books and Liquid Mind Media, as well as independently through her imprint Mortlake Press, she has built a global readership across more than fifty novels. She is also a mentor, publisher, and founding executive committee member of Sisters in Crime UK/EU Chapter. You can find her on her website, Substack, Instagram, and Facebook.

On this episode of Self-Publishing with ALLi, Dan Holloway examines Draft2Digital's decision to introduce fees for the first time — a $20 account activation charge for new accounts and a $12 annual maintenance fee for low-activity accounts — and considers both the rationale and the concerns. He also reports on Bookshop.org's record $70 million in sales last year, a 55 percent increase, and explains why the two stories are closely connected.

Sponsor

Self-Publishing News is proudly sponsored by PublishMe—helping indie authors succeed globally with expert translation, tailored marketing, and publishing support. From first draft to international launch, PublishMe ensures your book reaches readers everywhere. Visit publishme.me.

Find more author advice, tips, and tools at our Self-publishing Author Advice Center, with a huge archive of nearly 2,000 blog posts and a handy search box to find key info on the topic you need.

About the Host

Dan Holloway is a novelist, poet, and spoken word artist. He is the MC of the performance arts show The New Libertines, He competed at the National Poetry Slam final at the Royal Albert Hall. His latest collection, The Transparency of Sutures, is available on Kindle.

On the Self-Publishing with ALLi podcast, host Howard Lovy talks to Allyson Longueira, associate director of publishing at the graduate program in creative writing at Western Colorado University, about what authors need to understand about book design, from typography and interior layout to covers and branding. They discuss how design choices signal genre, how authors can better communicate with designers, and where to draw the line between creative control and trusting the experts. Longueira also explains how thoughtful design supports readability and market positioning, giving authors practical ways to approach the visual side of publishing with more confidence.

Find more author advice, tips, and tools at our Self-publishing Author Advice Center, with a huge archive of 2,000+ blog posts, and a handy search box to find key info on the topic you need.

We invite you to join our organization and become a self-publishing ally.

Show Notes

• Long Valley Press
• Western Colorado University MA in Creative Writing
• Allyson Longueira MA

About the Host

Howard Lovy is an author, developmental editor, and writing coach with a long career in journalism and publishing. He works with writers at many stages of their careers, with a focus on helping them develop their ideas and strengthen their work while preserving their unique voices. He lives in Northern Michigan.

About the Guest

An award-winning writer, editor, and designer, Allyson Longueira has worked in fiction and nonfiction across multiple media, including newspapers, magazines, and books, for more than twenty years. She now works as a developmental editor, line editor, copyeditor, proofreader, cover and interior designer, and publishing consultant for authors of fiction and nonfiction through her company, Long Alley Press. As associate director of the publishing concentration at Western Colorado University's graduate program in creative writing, she teaches and mentors the next generation of publishers, writers, editors, and designers. Longueira is a strong advocate for preserving author voice in the editing process and trains editors to approach their work with the same focus through craft talks, conference lectures, and graduate-level classes. She has designed hundreds of book covers and interiors and has a deep interest in typography, including a willingness to discuss favorite and least favorite fonts at length. To learn more about Western's publishing MA program, contact her at alongueira@western.edu. You can also find her on LinkedIn and Facebook.

On this episode of Self-Publishing with ALLi, Dan Holloway reports on Amazon's decision to withdraw online support from Kindle devices released in 2012 and earlier, and what that means for readers who still use them—including a silver lining for indie authors distributing DRM-free books. He also sounds the alarm on a surge in sophisticated scam emails targeting authors, and reminds us of the enduring wisdom of Yog's Law: money flows to the author, not from the author.

Sponsor

Self-Publishing News is proudly sponsored by PublishMe—helping indie authors succeed globally with expert translation, tailored marketing, and publishing support. From first draft to international launch, PublishMe ensures your book reaches readers everywhere. Visit publishme.me.

Find more author advice, tips, and tools at our Self-publishing Author Advice Center, with a huge archive of nearly 2,000 blog posts and a handy search box to find key info on the topic you need.

About the Host

Dan Holloway is a novelist, poet, and spoken word artist. He is the MC of the performance arts show The New Libertines, He competed at the National Poetry Slam final at the Royal Albert Hall. His latest collection, The Transparency of Sutures, is available on Kindle.

In this member-first Q&A on the Self-Publishing with ALLi podcast, ALLi video content adviser Dale L. Roberts answers questions on how authors can use video to market their books, connect with readers, and build visibility for their author brand. Topics include the best tools for creating video content, when to start using video in the publishing process, and how to measure the impact of video on book sales and reader engagement. Roberts also addresses how to drive traffic to videos, whether book trailers still matter, how Amazon A+ Content works, and practical ways to get comfortable on camera.

Show Notes

• YouTube for Authors, by Dale L. Roberts
• Self-Publishing with Dale
• Daniel Batal

Find more author advice, tips, and tools at our Self-publishing Author Advice Center, with a huge archive of 2,000+ blog posts, and a handy search box to find key info on the topic you need.

We invite you to join our organization and become a self-publishing ally.

My guest this episode is Darnnell Reese, a Desert Storm combat veteran and former Military Intelligence analyst. During her service, she experienced trauma both on the battlefield and within her own unit, which she kept silent about for decades. With the encouragement and help of her daughter, she finally put that story into writing. Her work also draws on faith and focuses on confronting bullies in all forms.

Find more author advice, tips, and tools at our Self-publishing Author Advice Center, with a huge archive of 2,000+ blog posts, and a handy search box to find key info on the topic you need.

We invite you to join our organization and become a self-publishing ally.

About the Host

Howard Lovy is an author, developmental editor, and writing coach with a long career in journalism and publishing. He works with writers at many stages of their careers, with a focus on helping them develop their ideas and strengthen their work while preserving their unique voices. He lives in Northern Michigan.

About the Guest

Darnnell D. Reese is an author, Gulf War veteran, and retired federal IT professional. She is the founder of the Victorious With God imprint and the author of Blanket Party in Desert Storm: From Beatdown and Spiritually Broken to Eternally Blessed, a mother-daughter memoir co-authored with her daughter Deidra Wilson, along with Victorious! Defeating Bullies and Giants God's Way, In All Seriousness... Totally Funny Bible Stories, and the companion Defeating Bullies and Giants Coloring Book. She writes from a place of faith and lived experience, with a focus on confronting bullies and telling hard truths. You can find Reese on her website, on Amazon and on her ALLi author profile.

On this episode of the Self-Publishing with ALLi podcast, Dan Holloway reports on new insights into what bookstores want from publishers and how indie authors may be better placed to respond quickly to trends. He also examines controversy over Harlequin's AI-driven micro drama project, where authors say they were not consulted, and looks at wider tensions in the publishing industry as it both adopts and challenges AI in different arenas.

Show Notes

What Jane Friedman says bookstores want from publishers

Sponsor

Self-Publishing News is proudly sponsored by PublishMe—helping indie authors succeed globally with expert translation, tailored marketing, and publishing support. From first draft to international launch, PublishMe ensures your book reaches readers everywhere. Visit publishme.me.

Find more author advice, tips, and tools at our Self-publishing Author Advice Center, with a huge archive of nearly 2,000 blog posts and a handy search box to find key info on the topic you need.

About the Host

Dan Holloway is a novelist, poet, and spoken word artist. He is the MC of the performance arts show The New Libertines, He competed at the National Poetry Slam final at the Royal Albert Hall. His latest collection, The Transparency of Sutures, is available on Kindle.

Is Substack a smart marketing tool for indie authors? In this episode, Orna Ross explores the platform's strengths for marketing fiction, poetry, and nonfiction books—including reader community, discoverability, and subscription options—alongside weaknesses like limited e-commerce, conflicting priorities, and the risks of building on a venture-backed platform whose goals may shift over time. She concludes that Substack offers a powerful combination of features for authors who want to balance creativity with visibility, but is not a substitute for a solid book-selling strategy.

Show Notes

• Orna Ross on Substack (Embers & Ink: Learnings from Literature)
• Sarah Fay on Substack (Substack Writers at Work)

Sponsor

Our Creative Self-Publishing stream is brought to you by Orna Ross's Go Creative! program—helping authors harness the power of creative flow in writing and publishing.

About the Host

Orna Ross launched the Alliance of Independent Authors at the London Book Fair in 2012. Her work for ALLi has seen her named as one of The Bookseller's "100 top people in publishing". She also publishes poetry, fiction, and nonfiction and is greatly excited by the democratizing, empowering potential of author-publishing. For more information about Orna, visit her website.