An Overview
For my first project, I decided to explore my life-long love of writing. While I have taken classes on novel writing, am editor-in-chief of the school newspaper, and have occasionally journaled, I decided that I wanted to dive into the unfamiliar world of poetry. It was a long process, but a fruitful one as well.
After experimenting with unknown software, employing the endless cycle of writing and revision, and setting up a PayPal account to collect profit, I self-published my first book, titled "Deep Sea Fishing."
After experimenting with unknown software, employing the endless cycle of writing and revision, and setting up a PayPal account to collect profit, I self-published my first book, titled "Deep Sea Fishing."
The Process
Writing
The first step I took was creating the content. This involved going through poems for inspiration, rewriting and revising old poetry, and writing over 40 new poems. These poems were housed in a google document made up of 63 pages. I talked over each of these poems with Mr. Ward, the english teacher in Apollo. I edited for days, until I felt I was ready to print them all out and arrange them. This was the point where I decided I wanted to organize my poems in four chapters, each to fit with the theme of my book, fishing. I chose this theme because I felt like it was fitting for the content of my poems: relationships. With this in mind, the four chapters formed: The catch, focusing on the good in relationships with other people; the release, focusing on the negatives in relationships with other people; reeling, focusing on the negatives in relationships with myself; and unhooked, focusing on the good in relationships with myself. After sorting each poem into its respective chapter, I was ready to format.
Formatting
Once I had the poems written and organized, I had to find a program that would allow me to format my own book. This part was especially challenging, considering that many websites asked that you formatted your own pages. I finally found a website called Blurb that I was able to install on my computer. This program was a god send-- I had freedom to arrange and add my work however I wanted without much trouble. Inspired by Rupi Kaur's "Milk and Honey," among others, I wanted my illustrations to be simple but powerful. Using Adobe Illustrator, I drew a different fish for each chapter that I thought was representative of the content. I also drew pictures for the start and end of the book.
Publishing
Once my book was formatted, I uploaded it back onto the Blurb website. I spell checked everything one final time before sending it through processing. The base cost of a softcover book is $14.27. If I wanted to make any profit from my sales, I could add onto that price. I added $5, bringing the total to $19.27. I set up my profile on Blurb, which included a description of myself and the books that I planned to sell. I also set up my very first PayPal account to collect profit, and was on my way to sales. I promoted my book on my social media sites, hoping to spread the word about the project I worked so hard on. Blurb allows me to track my sales and have money sent directly to my PayPal account.
The Product
My final project ended up having three components: a physical softcover of my book, an online PDF of my book, and a paper written which explored the topic of a "self-made man." The essay justified my want to write and publish, while arguing the importance of motivation and drive, as opposed to luck and chance. Below are a few excerpts from my paper.
Our path in this world is not predetermined-- we wake up each day with choices to make and the actions that follow. Unfortunately, opportunity sometimes presents itself to those who don’t work hard; opportunity doesn’t always seem fair. However, without that drive, an opportunity will only get someone so far before the lack of work spoils it. |
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