Tag: The-Lost-Branch

Outskirts Press News

Thank you to all our authors for a fantastic 2018

It’s the season of thanks, so we would like to take a moment to acknowledge a handful of our authors with a heartfelt thank you for all they accomplished in 2018. We publish over a thousand books every year and have hundreds upon hundreds of successful authors worthy of commendation. But that would make this article hundreds of pages long, so if we’re not able to mention you personally, please know our thanks and appreciation extend to you, as well. Keep up the great work in 2019!

January

In January, the spotlight was on Katherine S. Egan, author of Genetics Isn’t Everything. She went on to win a first place EVVY Award in August, which she was able to accept in person at the banquet in Denver, Colorado. She subsequently became one of three finalists in the 2018 Outskirts Press Best Book of the Year Awards. Thank you, Katherine!

February

In February, Jackie Fischer won first place (and a new laptop computer) in our annual “Show Us Your Love” video contest, which celebrates both Valentine’s Day and self-publishing. Not only is she the author of The Lost Branch but, as she demonstrates in her video, she’s quite adept at rhyme, as well! Thank you, Jackie, for the fantastic video and the fantastic book!

March

Olympic Gold Medalist Mary Wineberg hit our Top 10 Bestsellers List in March with her inspiring and triumphant autobiography, Unwavering Perseverance. Even more impressive, she earned a Gold Medal in the 2008 Olympic Games in the 4×400 relay after overcoming obstacle after obstacle. “Always strive for your dreams,” she encourages. Thank you for the words of motivation, Mary! You’re a true inspiration!

.

April

The Annual Benjamin Franklin Awards are notoriously competitive, so it was no small feat when Dr. Jeanne Blanchet won a Silver Medal Award for Historical Fiction in April with her novel Man at the Cross Road. Proving herself to be anything but a one-trick pony, she quickly followed that up with an EVVY Award for her following book, Cursed. Thank you, Jeanne, for making the trip to Denver to accept your award in person and meeting some of our executive team.

May

We acknowledged the writing career of one of our most prolific authors in May when Jerry Snodgrass stepped into our monthly spotlight. Jerry has published 10 books with Outskirts Press (so far!) and was born in Butler, Missouri, in 1938. He was raised and went to school in Indianola, Iowa. He entered the military after graduating from high school in 1957 and fulfilled his dreams of serving in the military and traveling to exotic locations. He married Elizabeth Fleming in the 1960s and they had two children. The family traveled extensively during his military career before settling down in Killeen, Texas, in 2002. Thank you, Jerry, for your service and your books of valor.

June

Kevin I.J.A. Barnett Sr. went on a whirlwind virtual book tour in June for his debut book, a provocative and autobiographical examination of the United States Foster Care and Adoption System. As the author of Living My Shadows, Kevin is a retired, noncommissioned officer in the United States Army. He has served in Germany, Afghanistan and in many stateside tours during his career. He is married to Sharon F. Pelham and does motivational speaking when time permits. Thank you, Kevin, for your service and for having the courage to share such significant moments of your life for the assistance of others.

July

In July, prolific novelist Gabriel F.W. Koch learned that he was once again a finalist in the Colorado Independent Publishers Association EVVY Awards. He walked away with a Second Place EVVY Award a couple years ago for his science fiction novel Paradox Effect (not to mention an Outskirts Press Best Book of the Year nomination). This year he picked up an EVVY Merit Award for Emma and the Dragon Tooth Sword. He has published four books thus far with Outskirts Press, including his latest: And Come Day’s End. Thank you, Gabriel, for all your wonderful, award-winning books.

August

Speaking of science fiction, C.R. Norris discovered that she won First Place in the Science Fiction category, for her book Wasp on the Wind, when the EVVY Awards Banquet took place in Denver on August 25, 2018. Wasp on the Wind is Book 2 in her Wasp Chronicles Series. She subsequently was nominated to be one of three finalists in the highly coveted Best Book of the Year Awards. C.R. Norris is a perpetual student of science and mathematics. Born in Salina Kansas, her varied career has included experience as a musician, a blood banker, and an electrical engineer in the semiconductor industry. She currently resides in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where she indulges her passions for green chile, playing music and writing.

September

And it all led up to this, when the 2018 Outskirts Press Best Book of the Year was announced. This year, the honor, the award and the $1,500 Grand Prize went to T.D. Arkenberg for his biographical take on the events leading up to, and following in the shadows of, September 11. Two Towers is his fourth book but his first memoir. Thank you, T.D., for letting us experience this tragic event from such an unfiltered perspective.

October

In October we recognized our 50 bestselling authors for 2018. It takes more than a marvelous literary work to achieve success as an author; it takes the gumption and drive to promote that work to readers! To you, we extend not only our congratulations but our thanks for allowing Outskirts Press to help you reach this successful milestone!

Kevin Muldowney Aage Nost
Will Kautz Rasha Pecoraro
Michael McNamara Tui Rose
Lisa A. Romano Mohamed Elgendy
Mary Casey Asif Anwar
Vil Mirzayanov Brian Petit
L. Veach Bill McClain
Mike Gillette Tom Bisio
Mirtha Castro Mary Allison
Matthew DiGeronimo Rebecca Janes
Amy Pierotti Halo Lewis
Jane McConnell Jane Ostrow
Jill Jackson Bernard Nebel
Don Petterson Alex Cuoco
Ed Robinson Adrienne Anderson
Scott Imhoff Diana Arcieri
Patrick O’Connor Tiffany Anderson
Joseph Adegboyega-Edun Kathryn M. Mora
Bernard Nebel Jeffrey Howe
Magdaline DeSousa Steve Kelley
Michael Goodroe Hal Perkins
Jokima Hiller Rodney DuBose
Lisa Cicero Amy Meadows
Heidi Herman Paul Kotz
Luis Roman Seth Spreiter

And the year isn’t over yet. November and December are the biggest months of the year for book sales, so keep those marketing efforts going! And “Thank You” to all our amazing authors for making 2018 another banner year for self-publishing.

Want your book to be the next big prize-winner? Find out more about marketing, promoting and submitting your book for awards and reviews.

 

Promotions

Time to Pick the Winner of the ‘Show Us Your Love’ Contest!

Authors have showered Outskirts Press with the warm-fuzzies for weeks now (seriously, we’re blushing) and now it’s time to pick our favorite. We simply can’t decide which of the creative videos they submitted is best, so we’re asking for your opinions. Your votes will decide who wins a brand-new Microsoft Surface Pro in our 7th Annual “Show Us Your Love” social media event and video contest.

The three videos with the most “likes” on the Outskirts Facebook page from among this year’s entries are now up for a public vote to determine the winner. The poll ends Friday, February 23, and the winner will be announced on February 28.

Below are the three finalists. Watch the videos and place your vote. The author whose video earns the most votes will win a brand-new Microsoft Surface Pro!

Chef Jesse Jones “POW! My Life in 40 Feasts”

Peter Tokar “Langley’s RIP”

Jackie Fisher “The Lost Branch”

While there are only three finalists, you can still check out all the videos submitted for the contest on our YouTube Playlist. Let’s just say we have a clever author community! With the social media exposure all entrants have received on Outskirts Press’ Facebook Page, YouTube Channel and Twitter Feed, all participants come out winners.

Place your vote now and subscribe to our blog or check back on February 28 to see who wins.

Computer Specifications:

Features Ambient Light Sensor, Gyro Sensor, Digital Compass, G-sensor, Webcam
Brand Microsoft
ScreenSize 12.3 in
Condition New
Operating System Microsoft Windows
RAM Memory 4 GB
Model SU3-00001
Hard Drive Capacity 128 GB
Manufacturer Part Number SU3-00001
Processor Type Intel Core M3 Processor
Maximum RAM Supported 4 GB
Processor Speed 2.2 GHz
Assembled Product Dimensions (L x W x H) 9.21 x 15.17 x 1.58 Inches
Year in Review

2017 Self-Publishing Retrospective – A Year in Review

What a year 2017 has been for Outskirts Press authors. With so many new options, impressive writers, amazing books, and industry accolades, it becomes impossible to highlight everything. So rest assured this is just a small cross-section of what made 2017 an amazing year for Outskirts Press and all our amazing authors. What you may notice as you revisit these highlights (and so many more are posted on this blog daily), is that Outskirts Press remains committed to providing excellence in both personal service and book production. Simply put, the professional quality of your book and your success matters to us. Here are just a few examples…

Brooke Lewis is not only a celebrity and marketing dynamo, but she is becoming a force to reckon with in the self-help, self-improvement, and guidance fields as well. Her two books, Coaching From a Professed Hot Mess and Ms. Vampy’s Teen Tawk may have been published in 2016, but 2017 is when her “author platform” really broke out, built upon the foundation of two well-received and highly-regarded works of non-fiction.

We’re always trying to make it easier for writers to publish amazing books. One way we do this is by identifying popular genres that are complicated to publish and then offering an elegant solution. A perfect example of this is cookbooks. Self-published cookbooks are very popular, but difficult to publish properly. For this reason, many delicious recipes still remain locked away in kitchen drawers everywhere. But with the 2017 introduction of our popular One-Click Suite for Cookbooks, we brought together all the necessary components for gorgeous and delicious cookbooks in one simple, inclusive bundle.

Outskirts Press author Jackie Fischer, author of The Lost Branch, became the most recent first-place winner of our annual “Show Us Your Love” video contest and won a brand new touch screen laptop computer as a result. Way to go, Jackie! Check out her video below:

Every year Outskirts Press makes charitable donations to, and partners with, organizations, associations, and foundations that look toward art & literacy’s future. One such organization is Colorado Humanities, which holds the annual Colorado Book Awards. The awards were launched in 1991 and many of Colorado’s most prominent authors have been recognized with awards, including David Milofsky, John Fielder, Tom Noel, Stephanie Kane and Linda Hogan, among others. Judging generally occurs in April, and for the past two years, the awards ceremony has been held in Parker, Colorado (home base to Outskirts Press) and awards have been presented by Outskirts Press president Brent Sampson. Congratulations to all of this years Colorado Book Award winners!

Perennial Top 10 monthly bestseller Chidozie Osuwa built upon an incredible performance in 2016 with more Top 10 Bestselling Titles appearances in 2017 for his bestseller What She Feels and this year published the eagerly awaited sequel What She Still Feels. Even more inspiring is that these are genre-busting works of poetry (although art might be more appropriate); If there were any doubts that poetry could succeed in the self-publishing world, Chidozie shattered them soundly.

Another popular genre in self-publishing that isn’t always the easiest to pull off with excellence is the illustrated Juvenile Fiction. The difficulty lies in the oft-times complicated combination of words and illustrations. The writer of the story is usually the one initiating the self-publishing process and in many cases may not even have the illustrations yet. This was the reason we launched the One-Click Children’s Book Publishing Suite last year, which includes 15 full-color illustrations and the almost mandatory custom formatting necessary to marry the words with the art. But frequently the author is also the illustrator or pursues publication with illustrations already in hand. So 2017 marked the year we added another One-Click for Children’s Books Suite, at a lower cost since it doesn’t include the illustrations. It was a hit! And speaking of children’s books, that brings us to our 2017 Best Book of the Year winner…

Once again Outskirts Press authors were the most-awarded among all participating publishers at the annual EVVY Awards, bringing home 15 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place awards, including multiple first-place wins in different categories for Gramma Darling, by Lisa Schroeder, with illustrations by Doron Ben-Ami. Lissa is a teacher, speaker, and licensed minister living in Alaska while Doron resides in Connecticut, thus proving that successful self-publishing is not restricted by borders or limitations. Winning an Evvy Award is a pre-requisite to be considered for the annual Outskirts Press Best Book of the Year Award and its $1500 grand prize. Gramma Darling won four! Therefore, it may not have been a big surprise that it went on to win the annual Outskirts Press Best Book of the Year Award for 2017, marking the first time a children’s book has taken home top honors. To see all the details of her win and her book video, visit the blog posting by clicking here.

Congratulations Lissa and Doron!

Interested in being in the running for the 2018 Outskirts Press Best Book of the Year Award? Ultimate, Full- Color, and One-Click authors are all instantly eligible.

Start Publishing
Promotions

The Votes Are In! The Winner of Our 2017 “Show Us Your Love” Contest Is ….

Each year, we at Outskirts Press are impressed–and overwhelmed–by your entries in our “Show Us Your Love” contest. The level of interest we see both affirms our dedication to providing a rich and varied range of self-publishing services to authors looking to take the next step toward publication … and inspires us to outdo ourselves, year after year, in making your dreams a reality. Thank you, one and all, for the love that you’ve shown. You are the heart of what we do!

This year, we received a bumper crop of submissions, and are happy to announce our winner‐the video which has received the most votes across our social media platforms.

And the first place winner is …

Jackie Fischer

Jackie wins a brand new, HP – 15.6” Touch-Screen Laptop complete with Windows 10 for being the finalist receiving the most public votes for her video in the 6th Annual Outskirts Press “Show Me Your Love” promotion. Congratulations, Jackie!

Jackie Fischer is 46 years old and lives in Coram, New York. She is a full time Clinical Exercise Physiologist in Cardiac Rehabilitation for the past 20 years. She is married and has one son. Her interests include hiking, skiing, playing piano, tennis, and walking her dog Woody. She loves to travel when her time allows.

Book Synopsis of  “The Lost Branch”:
The story of my Sicily connection is fun to tell. I hope you enjoy learning a little bit about Sicily, and how our family in America reconnected with our relatives across the sea. There were two brothers that were separated at a young age because of the strict rules of immigration back in the early 1900’s. A hundred years later, a reunion of two families finally took place. There were sad times, happy adventures and special moments and memories that will last a lifetime.

Here is how the voting stacked up for our top 3 videos. Thank you to everyone that submitted a video to us this year.

Jackie Fischer, author of The Lost Branch 55.34%
Patti Reim, author of I like Big Buts 34.55%
John E. Peltier, author of The Thundering Herd 10.11%
Click here to Pre-Order Jackie’s book