The Bookwatch: May 2024

James A. Cox, Editor-in-Chief

Diane Donovan, Editor

Midwest Book Review

278 Orchard Drive, Oregon, WI 53575

https://www.midwestbookreview.com/bw/may_24.htm#writingpublishing

The Writing/Publishing Shelf

How to Self-Publish Like A Pro

Tina Koenig

Independently Published

9781736470527, $24.95 Paperback/$14.95 ebook

https://www.amazon.com/How-Self-Publish-Like-Pro-Comprehensive/dp/1736470523

With the publication of "How to Self-Publish Like A Pro: A Comprehensive Guide for Writing, Publishing, and Promoting Your Book", Tina Koenig covers all the basics for would-be self-published authors, from the initial structuring of an author's business to building and promoting an author presence and registering a book with the Library of Congress.

Koenig's extensive information goes beyond the basics of how to publish a book. It also covers the aftermath of promotion, which is as important to the publishing process as gaining an ISBN and understanding how to work with different kinds of publishers.

Koenig outlines how to provide review copies months before publication so there is adequate time to schedule reviews that dovetail with a book's publication date. She also encourages understanding the pros and cons of different platforms for gaining book reviews (including ones that many novices won't think about, like Instagram).

Ultimately, Koenig pins down the nuts and bolts of the publishing process in a manner that requires no advanced (or even much basic) prior knowledge.

Another subject Koenig covers, that many books about the process do not, is how authors can lay the groundwork to become an 'expert' whose advice will be solicited by podcasters and other media entities. There is no better publicity than that which comes from added value, delivered by an author who backs, say, an interview with repeated emphasis that their book holds further information, and thus will prove of additional interest to listeners or readers.

These kinds of strategies make the most of the latest technology, social media, and literary connections in the industry, affording Koenig's book a contemporary and wide-ranging series of applications. These are broad in scope and specific, with easy step-by-step insights that any novice publisher can easily absorb.

Koenig's strategies make the most of the latest technology, social media and literary connections. Each chapter is broad enough in scope to be easily absorbed, with step-by-step insights that any novice publisher can implement. These qualities place How to Self-Publish Like A Pro head and shoulders above similar-sounding books, affording it a diversity and ease of understanding that will make it a major library and reader attraction.