I’ll preface this brief essay by saying that others may have had different experiences with these two print-on-demand giants. The following summarizes my experience in working with each platform. Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) is part of Amazon.com and that association alone may cause an independent author to hesitate. Yes, Amazon is the one-hundred-pound gorilla or…
Author: Don Paul Benjamin
Googly-Eyes and the Writing Life
Once upon a time, I taught cartooning and storybook illustration to elementary school children. At our first class meeting, I came prepared with a variety of fruits, vegetables, and inanimate objects like a stapler, a bottle, and a cup. I lined these objects up on a raised box and invited the children to tell me…
The Author’s Plate
When an independent author takes on the task of writing a novel then adds to this challenge the goal of marketing the thing, that combined work represents a very full plate. (I would have written “a very, very full plate” except the late Mrs. Dawson, my old high school English teacher, would spin in her…
A Writing Talent Test
After high school, I enlisted in the U.S. Army for a three-year tour of duty. Never having traveled farther than a car trip from Colorado to Iowa, I took the train to basic training in Missouri. Before I completed basic, President Kennedy was assassinated, and our inexperienced platoon of raw recruits and reluctant draftees was…
The River and the Rocks
Which came first, the river or the rocks? In the case of the natural stone stairway which leads from the shore of Surface Creek to our manicured lawn, the river existed first. Think of the flowing river as the context of a written story. Think of the rocks as the story. In my accompanying photo,…