I started writing poems for my placements as a student nurse. The first poem I wrote was for a stroke ward. They liked it so much that they put this on their wall for Stroke Day. I continued to write poems for every placement I did. I enjoyed doing this and I had good feedback on my poems. I initially thought I may be able to publish a book with all my poems. I ‘phoned a couple of publishers that I found in the phone book. I was told by a couple that they definitely were not interested in the poems, but one publisher gave me good advice. They told me that I should concentrate on doing a children’s book or poems for children. They told me that children’s books are very marketable.

I thought about the advice I was given for many years. I then set about writing some poems for children. I put them in a ring binder and took them to show my work colleagues. They gave me excellent feedback, so I began to believe that my poetry was marketable.

I still thought about making these poems into a book. The beginning of the pandemic 2020, I started researching publishers. I found the top publishers and researched them. I found a few were self publishing, but that seemed so daunting, I didn’t have a clue how to promote my book or how I was going to sell my book. I still wanted to publish my book though.

I chose Xlibris because they had a lot of marketing services to help make my books visible to libraries, bookstores etc.

I gave Xlibris a call. They are based in the USA, but are also in the UK. They have staff that work in the USA Xlibris, but work on UK time, so when I called them, I didn’t have to see what time it would be in Indiana, where they are based.

The staff were very helpful and told me to download my manuscript, and it would be reviewed by their team to see if it was publishable. They asked if I needed an illustrator, and at that time I said I would do my own illustrations. I can draw, but I’m not a professional. I downloaded my manuscript to them, but thought about my illustrations and felt a bit worried that maybe if it didn’t look a professional book, it wouldn’t sell, so I called them and bought their illustration service.

I was assigned a marketing consultant from Xlibris, and also a consultant who oversaw the whole publishing process. The marketing consultant was very friendly and knowledgeable. He offered many marketing services, which are very costly, but I bought them, as I am not famous, so nobody knows me, and without good marketing my book would be invisible to the market.

I bought marketing services such as adverts in The New York Times, Awards Finder, Social media ads, Radio ads, and a few more besides. The marketing services are excellent but doesn’t guarantee any sales. I initially did think that if my book went global, which it would be, when it was put on Amazon, so that is global, my book could potentially sell thousands, and with all the marketing I had in place, it could be a potential best seller, and I could make a lot of royalties on my book. The research does state that an author is lucky to sell 50 to 250 books in their life time, so I was very optimistic that I would be more successful than that.

I had to email the illustrator several times to see what was taking the time, as by now I had waited four months without hearing from them, to tell me of the progress. I eventually did hear from them, and due to Covid they had a shortage of staff, so I had to wait another two months and then my illustrations were completed.

They sent the illustrations without colour, first for approval, then once approved they coloured them, and sent them for my approval, then my book was ready for publishing. I was thrilled with the illustrations and so pleased I decided not to use mine. I received a copy of my published book and I also ordered 50 copies, which I put on my Facebook page, stating I was selling my book, if anyone would like one I would dedicate for them, and would post for cost. I sold all the 50 copies of my book in the first week, so had to order 100 books more. I was so happy I was on my way to being an author