Stumbling block

Good morning!

Let's return to yesterday's topic, shall we? I spoke about learning the things necessary to produce a published novel and one of those things was copyrighting. Before I copyrighted my first novel, I had delayed the process, finding one reason or another to put it off just one more day because I was intimidated by it. I knew nothing about copyrighting and was afraid that being so close to achieving my goal, I would find that the cost was too high, or there would be a variety of hoops to jump through, each one more difficult than the last. Can you imagine my surprise when I bit the bullet and found the website?

The government office responsible for the website has a tutorial that is easily downloaded and points the way toward copyrighting your work. Once in the process, you must be careful and deliberate so that you don't make any costly mistakes, but the process itself is fairly simple. And, inexpensive. The cost can be as small as $35.00, or as high as a thousand or more. Unless you are a big-time publisher or author, you DON'T want to use the option with the higher cost. You may be tempted to do so if you are paranoid and believe that a multitude of publishers, authors or illicit business interests are just waiting for you to upload your work so they can steal it, but don't give in to those feelings. Just go the inexpensive route and trust that Bigtime Publishing isn't out to steal your idea. They move so slowly anyway that your work will be out and selling before they would be able to bring it to market. And if they do, well, you have a copyright, which means that you can sue them for copyright infringement.

This is just an example of the many things that may be holding you back from publishing your work. There are many other things that can frighten and intimidate you, and I say, "Get on with it!" Stand up to your fears and go right ahead. You will make mistakes, of course. Everybody does, but they aren't insurmountable. Consider it a learning process and keep each of them in mind.

Thank you,
Derek A. Murphy
Author of Eggs of Empire, Taken Apart, It Happens Every Day and others.
Available on Kindle