I recently self-published my first book, and one thing I genuinely wasn’t prepared for was feeling like I have to constantly prove that the artwork and creative work surrounding my book wasn’t AI-generated.

I hired actual artists to help bring the project to life. I hired an illustrator through Etsy to create character art, a separate artist for my cover, and someone to design my website. I even commissioned an illustrated version of myself for my About Me page so that I would match the art style of the characters throughout the site.
Someone saw that illustration and immediately assumed it was AI.

I responded and explained that no, it wasn’t AI. I specifically hired an artist and had myself illustrated in the same style as my characters because I wanted everything on the website to feel cohesive. I almost didn’t want to delete the comment either, because I’d rather publicly explain where the artwork came from than make it look like I’m trying to hide something.

I’ve actually started linking my artists in my Linktree alongside my Amazon/Barnes & Noble links. Partly because I WANT to credit and support the people who worked on my book, but also because I feel this weird pressure to have receipts showing that real people made this stuff.

TikTok has made it even more frustrating. I’ve uploaded artwork I commissioned only for TikTok to automatically label the post as potentially containing AI-generated content. So now I’m explaining, “No, these are my characters and I hired an illustrator to draw them.”
It’s just such a strange time to be a self-published author.
There absolutely is a ton of AI-generated art and content out there, so I understand why people are skeptical. But it sucks for authors and artists who are actually paying and supporting other creatives to then be accused of using AI anyway.

And now that I’m marketing my book more heavily, there’s this little fear in the back of my mind that the more people my work reaches, the more often I’m going to have to defend it.

I’m curious if other self-published authors are running into this too. Have you ever had your cover, character art, website, writing, etc. accused of being AI when it wasn’t? And do you respond to those comments, ignore them, or delete them?

EDIT: I ended up just blocking them. 😅 I explained that I hired actual artists for my cover/character artwork, but they seemed determined to keep trolling no matter what I said.
Thank you to everyone who gave genuine feedback! I’m just starting to advertise my book, so I guess part of that is learning not to feed the trolls. Going forward, I think blocking and moving on is a lot better than wasting my energy responding to hate. ✨

.Last month I watched a friend publish his first book.

He was excited. 3 days after launch, a guy DM'd him on Instagram:

"Hi, I love your book! I have 10k book lovers. I can get you 2k sales in 7 days for $150. 100% guarantee. Here's proof - screenshots of other authors I helped."

Screenshots looked real. 10 authors saying "thanks bro, got 1k sales!"

My friend paid $150.

Day 1: Promoter said "Campaign started, will update soon"

Day 3: "Going well, 200 sales already" - but Amazon dashboard showed 0 new sales

Day 5: Promoter sent a screenshot of a random Amazon rank going up - not my friend's book

Day 7: Promoter said "Done! 2,100 sales delivered!" But dashboard still showed same 12 sales from friends and family.

When my friend asked for proof, promoter said "Sales take 14 days to show on Amazon, wait" Then blocked him.

Same script. I later found 5 other authors on other social media platforms who got same DM, same screenshots, same "2k sales" promise from same account with different name.

How they work:

1. DM new authors within 3 days of launch (they stalk new releases) 2. Show fake screenshots 3. Promise guaranteed sales (real marketers never guarantee sales) 4. Take money, send fake updates for 7 days, then block

Real promotion is slow - newsletters, ARC readers, consistent content. No one can guarantee 2k sales in 7 days for $150.

Have you gotten this DM too?

For those of you who do custom bookmarks, stickers, etc., would you mind posting photos of your goodies? I'm curious what companies you guys are using and what your thoughts are on the price and quality. Plus it's fun to see everyone's stuff :)

I published on Ingram Spark and have my settings set to non-returnable. I contacted my first couple of book stores. One said they're stoked to stock my book. Another said they are also keen but want me to change to returnable rather than non-returnable. How common is that requirement for smaller (or even larger) book stores? Do most expect your book settings to be set to "returnable?" I understand the inherent risk involved. So I'm looking for advice from people who have experienced this before. For better or worse.

I have an existing book on KDP in paperback and Kindle versions, and the hardcover is printed by Ingram Spark and dropped shipped for Amazon when someone orders it.

When I published this book in 2019, I don't think KDP offered the hardcover option, but around that time frame KDP had a bad rep for hardcover quality, so I went with IS and am still with them.

I've been pleased with the hardcovers that IS produces.

I am writing the 2nd Edition of this book.

I'd like to hear opinions on the current quality of KDP printed hardcovers. Are they of high quality or are there known, consistent problems with them.

Thanks in advance for your help!

I know Amazon KDP has its advantages, but I don't know whether I can bring myself to support Amazon. Authors who've chosen to "go wide": which ebook platforms would you recommend (or not recommend) and why? I'm particularly interested in platforms suited to the US market.

If so has any benefit come from it?

Do you see a purpose?

Heard you can join for cheaper in October

So its gonna be around 35 pages.13-15 poems. Most of which are lyric poems (rhyminv, stanzas, meters) and 4-5 of them are in free form. All are about experiences and perceptions of a child persona (in his home, town, and growing up).

My concern is although I try my best to fit them into order ( Ive written the lyric poems long before; then the free verses are like almost different depth/syntaxes and such which Ive written for a week last last month so theyre like rly linked), is it gonna be not a good idea to join all of them in this chapbook?

What could be a strategy in like being intentional here. What particular questions should I ask myself in like making all of them coherent, if all of them haveing at least a unifying theme (above) would not be enough?

PS. I hope that Im in the right subreddit

okie ✧˖° i came across a handful of anthology open calls, all due this weekend, and an wondering if anyone has experience with successful publication alongside a multi-author project as such ?

did you enjoy fulfilling the prompt(s) ?
is it easier having a word cont. limit ?
was there any financial gain ?
new readers supporting your journey ?

let’s discuss ! (please)

Hola

Publique un libro en Amazon hace algún tiempo. He conseguido 100 descargas gratuitas, una venta, dos libros leídos por completo en Kindle unlimited y 0 reseñas.

Las lecturas por unlimited se realizaron en tres días es decir cada una de las personas que ingresó leyó el libro en tres días, llegué a esa conclusión porque en tres días se leyeron 151 páginas que es el total del libro. Sé que el libro engancha porque un par de lectores me lo dijo.

La única venta se dió por Amazon Ads me encontraron por que buscaron un libro muy popular, vieron el mío y decidieron comprarlo.

No sé qué hacer. Podrían darme sus opiniones? 🥹

Adjunto sinopsis (portada en mi perfil) .

SINOPSIS

No la estaba buscando. Solo deslizaba el dedo por la pantalla, como cualquier otro día… cuando ella apareció. Sara Cliville. Cantante pop. Sonrisa perfecta. Una imagen bastó para que mi mundo orbitara únicamente alrededor de ella.

Primero fue su música, luego sus entrevistas, y después... Karen. La amiga, la colega, la sombra constante a su lado. Cada gesto, cada mirada entre ellas me decía que había algo más.

Las redes empezaron a hablar. Las fans las adoraban juntas. Yo solo observaba cada mirada, cada roce, cada rumor. Mientras más investigaba, más quería. ¿Era amor lo que veía? ¿Era real?

Todos lo veían. Pero yo fui la única que decidió seguir cada pista… hasta el final.

151 páginas

Thriller psicológico

Posdata: Mi objetivo es aumentar ventas y lecturas en KDP select.

Hi all,

I'm getting ready to publish my debut novel in a few months and would really appreciate feedback on my blurb.

Thank you in advance!

Space and Spice and Everything Precise

Genre: Cozy Sci-fi

___

“I was built to help a whole planet stop feeling. Then I accidentally abducted a human who feels everything. Turns out, even aliens could use some therapy.”

— Aww (AU-17), the accidental kidnapper

Neil Kohli is a therapist from Singapore. His faded pouch holds spices from his travels and, folded in old muslin, a pinch of his grandmother’s ashes. One night, an alien ship scoops up the pouch. And Neil with it.

His abductor is Aww, an AI raised on fan fiction, comment sections, and agony aunts. He has opinions about everything, especially the human he’s starting to like. An intergalactic bromance wasn’t in his programming.

On Noumura, emotions were outlawed three centuries ago. Smiles are efficiency leaks. Dinner is snorted. Even the air is laced with powder to keep feelings quiet.

But some feelings refuse to stay quiet.

Neil has no superpowers. Just the ingredients for his masala chai and years of listening to people who were told they were broken. Noumura’s misfits find their way to a hidden room where he begins something unthinkable: a support group for aliens. 

One spice per session. One circle of strangers becoming family. And a very quiet rebellion, brewing.

____

Funny, tender, and steeped in chai, this is cozy sci-fi for anyone who has ever felt like an alien on their own planet.

Hi! A few weeks ago, I mentioned my situation: my book, which a friend had translated into English, wasn’t doing very well, whereas the original Spanish version was. Now I have another question:

For now, I want to focus on the Spanish books, and once the series is complete, I want to do a rapid release with the books that have already been professionally translated. Is it a good idea to unpublish the book that’s already out, make changes so it qualifies as a new edition, and release it as if it were new without the notes at a later date? Or is it better to leave it as is, unpublish it, and republish it with the professional translation while keeping the notes (just one 2-star review on Amazon)?

Thank you very much :)

I'm so confused about the blue and pink sections. Basically I have a single image for the front hardcover. I would like to keep as much of it as possible on the real hardcover once printed. 3mm bleed is no problem, but the template from ingramspark which identifies the blue area as bleed is far more than 3mm. I understand it has to wrap around for the top, bottom and sides but why is there blue (bleed) to the left and right of the spine? Nothing is cut there right?

Also the blue area (bleed) around the cover is obviously much larger than 3mm bleed, seems to be around 20mm, so if i extend my image all the way to the fill the blue area it will be wrapped around the hardcover right? Meaning that it will appear cut off from the front cover because it will not be visible.

How do you guys setup your covers if using a single image where you would like to keep as much of the image as possible, and how do you suggest i set mine up?

A lot of people told me to slow down. To take breaks. To stop trying to do everything at once.

But somehow, I never really managed to stop. For months, it was always the same: writing, marketing, cover design, legal stuff, taxes, social media. You name it.

I published the first book in my sci-fi romance series, translated the entire thing into English, and kept writing book two at the same time. All while trying to stay active on social media, of course.

And now? Things are finally starting to move. I have readings coming up. The English translation is with my ARC readers. Opportunities are opening up. The ball is slowly starting to roll.

And what happened to me?

I burned myself out. Exactly what everyone warned me about.

I should be promoting my upcoming English release right now. We all know how important it is to build momentum before a book launch.

But I can't. Not because I don't want to. Not even because I don't have the time.

I just have nothing left in my creative tank. It feels like my brain has completely run out of ideas. Like I've used up every last bit of creativity I had.

Now book two has stalled. I'm not promoting book one. I'm barely creating anything at all.

And the frustrating part is that things are finally happening. All those months of hard work are starting to pay off, and here I am, unable to keep up with them.

Don't get me wrong. I absolutely love being an author. The people I've met, the opportunities that have come my way, the feeling of creating something that's entirely my own. I wouldn't trade those experiences for anything.

And this isn't a pity post. I'm pretty sure the creative block will eventually lift once I've had enough time to recover.

But maybe someone out there needs to hear this, especially if you're currently trying to do everything at once:

Don't work yourself into the ground. Nobody is going to thank you for it. Least of all yourself.

Needless to say, KDP's printing costs and royalty calculations are more complicated than I expected.

What I'm really trying to understand is how much Amazon actually keeps from each sale, whether it's a paperback or an ebook.

For those who have published through KDP, what percentage do you actually take home after Amazon's fees and printing costs? Any firsthand experience would be appreciated.

Update

Thanks everyone for the replies. What I was trying to determine is printing costs, versus royalties and versus royalties in ebooks and expanded distribution.

You can say that it is $26.00 your book and amazon will take 40% after printing, so you can estimate royalties, but it is just not detailed enough for me to correctly plan so I can get the best price to market my book.

For example, when I published with Lulu years ago, their math was similar to what Amazon is showing on the calculator, therefore, whenever hitting the expanded distribution or being sold to Amazon, something extra was always taken.

This is the kind of info I was looking for. Info that aren't necessarily visible on the rules and get into a dark part of a contract somewhere. Maybe it is straight forward.

Hello good people. I have some audiobook narrator friends who recently had a baby, and they were telling me last night that it's really hard to land narration gigs right now through publishers like ACX and others. They have tons of experience and titles under their belt, but they're wanting to try to reach authors directly rather than relying on these platforms and auditions.

My assumption is that they could charge authors a lot less than what these publishers are charging while still making the same amount of money that they're making right now.

I'm an aspiring indie author myself, so I was trying to give them advice about what they can do to maybe cut out the middle man and reach authors themselves without being annoying. I just wanted to see if I could crowd-source some advice from other indie authors on what might make them want to hire their services.

So some questions for you all: where did you find your narrator? What was the biggest bottleneck for you getting your audiobook made? Did the idea of finding a narrator intimidate you, and what could have made it easier?

Any advice or relevant experience would be really appreciated.

I wrote a Southern Gothic Horror short story. Its a very unholy Christmas story. Plan to release December 1. Any of yall ever done anything like this? Successful? How did you market it?

Being new to all this marketing on social media jazz, I’ve followed some professionals in the book marketing space and one piece of advice was to “market your brand, not just your book.”

It made an intuitive sense to me but also…how exactly does one do that? Would love some tips, tricks, specific examples…whatever anyone is comfortable sharing.

I’m a self-published author, and I recently found out my book is being offered on Spotify and Yumpu without my consent. I read somewhere to scan the internet to see whether anyone was distributing unauthorized copies, impersonating me, or doing anything suspicious with my book.

To my surprise, I found two suspicious listings!

The first was on Spotify. Someone had created an episode advertising a free EPUB download of my novel. I had no idea people were using Spotify for things like this! Also I should add that it says that it is read by me... I am certainly not reading my book on any platform.

I submitted a report to Spotify, and they responded. They informed me that they had disabled the user responsible for the listing.

The second was on Yumpu. A user had posted a listing advertising a free PDF download of my book. I emailed Yumpu’s support team explaining that I was the author and had never authorized this. Unfortunately, I still haven’t received a response.

I haven’t confirmed whether either listing actually contained my manuscript because I was afraid of clicking on the link. I know I didn’t publish on either platform yet. Should I be freaking out?

This whole experience has opened my eyes to another side of self-publishing that I hadn’t really considered.

I have a few questions for other authors:

Have you ever found out your books were being pirated?

Are there other websites or platforms authors should regularly check for unauthorized downloads, fake listings, or impersonation?

What is the most effective way to get suspicious or unauthorized listings removed, especially when a website ignores your emails?

Have you used copyright takedown notices, Google removal requests, or other services? Did they actually work?

Most importantly, how can we realistically protect ourselves as independent authors? Are there preventive steps we should take before something like this happens?

***Sorry so many questions!

I understand that no method can completely prevent piracy, but I’d love to hear what has worked for other writers.

I’m learning as I go, and I hope sharing my experience helps other authors become more aware of what’s happening with their books online.

My book is not even doing that well--yet. I feel even worse knowing that someone who really wants to read it may end up getting scammed with my name involved.

I’d really appreciate any advice, experiences, or resources you’re willing to share!

I finished it. It still needs a lot of work. The prose needs to be fully flushed out. Some plot points needs to be rewritten. Some ideas need more fleshing out. Some details need to be fixed. Some ideas need to be clarified. The dialogue needs a lot of work. Some scenes and chapters need to be expanded. The dialogue needs a lot of work. The grammar and spelling need an overhaul. The overall tone could use some fixing certain parts.

But all in all it is done. It has all the parts of a story. The beginning, the middle, and an end. It flows well and it follows a consistent story. If you read it you might be confused by somethings but it is a story.

Is it too soon to call it complete and find an editor to get ready for self publishing. I have literally told no one I know about. I'm a little ashamed of how poorly written this draft is. But the idea and the story is complete.

Should I spend a few months doing my best to fix what I know it needs? I have about 6 or more pages of notes and ideas and concepts related to the overall story that I would be handing off as well.

What am I looking at cost-wise to self-publish? I'm thinking about going this route because I want to retain rights to all of my characters and worlds.

Hi! I'm a first-time publisher, and I've done a fair amount of promotional material for my book. It is a parody book. I'm struggling to find a good outlet to promote it, I would appreciate any tips / help!

Title was getting too long, but for those who have done this, if I form an LLC after publishing, how does the process of moving from a DBA to LLC work with regards to already published books/already purchased ISBNs? This is for U.S. authors specifically!

There was sparse info I could find about it online, but it seemed like if you purchased ISBNs under a DBA, even if you formed an LLC or transitioned the DBA into an LLC, the ISBNs would not be usable by the LLC. Is this true? And with regards to books already published, do you have to go in and change all the publishing information?

Originally I was going to start an LLC before publishing, but due to how costly it is and obviously this being my first book, most advise against the high investment until you're receiving money. Which I would agree with. But I do plan on transitioning into an LLC at some point, so understanding this process in advance would be very helpful! I was about to purchase my ISBNs so wanted to ask this first.

I've done in-person sales/signings as a solo author and for multi-author events in a lot of places this year. Some go better than others for me, you never know.

One store that I had a particularly good turnout for as a solo author invited me to also join a multi-author event.

This event was awful. The other authors there were nice enough as people. We were friendly to each other. But I write smutty romance, and one of the other authors is a religious and children's author. This person was literally singing religious songs on a ukulele every few minutes the whole time.

I could see people in the store actively avoiding us. Some people came up to talk to that author, which makes sense - the music matches their genre - but I only sold 4 books when my last appearance at that store sold 24.

I ended up packing up early. I have enough religious trauma in my own background that being stuck next to that music for hours was getting unbearable. I'm going to stick with solo events at that store moving forward.