Ok, so it's via Amazon, but I figured why try to find an agent or publisher (who won't be doing the marketing anyway), to publish my cookbook. I didn't have any aspirations for this book in terms of income rather than to try to recoup the money spent on the cover art.
I've learned a lot about self-publishing - or author published - in the past few months. First, it's far easier to publish an all text fictional piece of work than anything that requires tables or tabs. Second, that buying a batch of ISBNs is a really good idea if you have more than one book in you. And third, be prepared to argue with the counter person at your local printers about your copyrights and whether or not you have legal authority to print what YOU wrote.
Luckily, I called first and avoided that print shop and found one that wouldn't give me any grief for the special edition copy I had made up for a local fund raiser. I will be back to have some more done if I decide to join in on a local book signing event.
And the final lesson - don't obsess too much over your sales numbers. Resist the urge to login and check every day to see how many copies have been ordered...it could depress you.
I'll post more later on how to handle tabs and tables for an eBook. I just wanted to get the word out that Meryr Mary's Marvelous Munchies is now available on Kindle.
