New Pleasant Word Website and Extra Special Offer
We’re very excited to announce that our brand new Pleasant Word website was launched today.
It has been given a great makeover by our in-house design team and looks better than ever. Our programmers and artists were hard at work into the early hours of this morning making the finishing touches, and we want to thank them for their “above and beyond” efforts.
The new Pleasant Word website is more user-friendly, more informative, and easier to navigate. We’ve paid special attention to the sign up process, making it leaner and simpler and creating a smooth “shopping cart” experience. Our on-line publishing guide is still full of all the information new authors need to know before deciding on a print-on-demand publisher. Oh, and there’s a link to a great blog 
with all kinds of advice, tips, and useful articles for authors.
To mark the occasion, the first 35 authors who sign up for a Blue Ribbon package will receive a unique special offer – 20 extra free books (that’s 50 total) and a Jumpstart Marketing Kit (1,000 business cards and bookmarks). It’s a smart combination. Not only does it provide the high quality publishing that Pleasant Word is known for, but it gives each author extra tools to promote sales after their book is in print.
Marketing is an important – and often overlooked – step in getting a book into the hands of readers. That’s why WinePress and Pleasant Word offer such a comprehensive range of publicity and promotional options. Now, new authors can get a real “jumpstart” – with a $650 value – absolutely free.
There’s never been a better time to visit the Pleasant Word website and become a Pleasant Word author.
Tweet This!“When Will My Book be Done?”
By Tammy Hopf
Every author is curious about how long it will take his or her book to go through the publishing process.
When we suggest it might take seven to nine months, authors ask:
- Isn’t technology more advanced than that?
- Don’t we live in a microwave world?
- How come it can’t be faster?
In his book, Publishing for Profit: Successful Bottom-Line Management for Book Publishers
Some authors assume their book will be published along the same timeline as “instant” books – those written by political figures who churn out a book in time for an election… or books about high-profile crimes, terrorist attacks, or natural disasters. Certainly there is a necessity for a quick turnaround in certain circumstances.
Woll states:
The moment you start to compress the publication schedule, the more you begin to pressure those responsible for doing the work. All too often, this results in mistakes or poor performance.”
We couldn’t have said it better! That is our maxim at WinePress Group and exactly why we don’t rush through a book or promise our authors their book will be ready in one month, or suggest skipping steps for the sake of time. Each stage of producing a quality book takes a certain amount of time to make sure it gets done right. To push or skip a step can result in negative consequences.
Your book is worth the time it takes to produce results you will be proud of.
As a project manager, Tammy Hopf is the first port of call for everything concerning the actual production and printing of your book. She also directs authors to any other department they may need.
Tammy has worked with WinePress Publishing Group since 1999 and has been a project manager for seven years. As the liaison between authors and the design, typesetting, editing, and other production departments, she helps coordinate all the different aspects that transform a manuscript into a beautiful book. She enjoys working with authors to make their dreams a reality.
Tweet This!The Link between Native Spirituality and the Occult
The Christian Post’s Food for the Soul blog published the following profile about one of our authors on July 17, 2009:
By Jenn Doucette
What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.” – King Solomon (Ecclesiastes 1:9, NIV)
Not surprisingly, King Solomon had it right; there really is nothing new under the sun. Translated in modern-day lingo: been there done that. And while this applies to pleasure, love, marriage, death, recreation, and possessions, there is serious implication on the spiritual level as well.
Nanci Des Gerlaise grew up in a First Nations home in Cold Lake, Alberta. The daughter and granddaughter of Métis medicine men, she experienced firsthand the darkness of demonic affliction. From her book, Muddy Waters (Pleasant Word, 2008):
The darkness clutched me like a shroud, alive with evil, poking, prodding, whispering and hissing its unmistakable message: Fear. Slavery. Terror. Death . . . Buried under my blanket, I held my breath, my eyes squeezed shut, my chest taut with fear like the skin of the drum the medicine men pounded. Around me the house lay quiet, while the muted sounds of the forest, its hoots and chirrups and rustling, magnified my fear.”
The eighth child in a family of 18, Nanci spent much of her youth learning the ancient ways of the Métis people and the Cree language, as well as the foundations of an ancient religion she has since come to consider part of the occult.
Common elements to her everyday life were the existence of sacred pipes, dreamcatchers, sweat lodges, voodoo dolls, and fetishes. Accompanying these and other elements of Native Spirituality were abuse, alcoholism, and the continuing fear of demonic spirits.
Nanci likens this atmosphere to a people group found in the New Testament:
Ephesus was a center for black magic and other occult practices. Superstition and sorcery were commonplace, but God clearly forbids such practices. (Deut. 18:9-13). You cannot be a believer and hold onto the occult, black magic, or sorcery. Once you begin to dabble in these areas, you may become obsessed by them, because Satan is very powerful.” (KJV Commentary on Acts 19:18, 19)
Nanci warns against underestimating the power and the allure of Satan. “If you are mixed up in the occult, learn a lesson from the Ephesians and get rid of anything that could trap you in such practices.”
The connection between Native American religion and the occult may not be obvious, so Nanci details several significant connections in her book, Muddy Waters. For example, Native Spirituality teaches that every native comes with a spirit keeper for guidance and protection. These keepers represent animals, birds, plants, fish, and other parts of creation.
The foundational difference between Christianity and Native Spirituality is that Native Spirituality views the Creator and the creation as one whereas Christianity believes that God created the creation and is sovereign over it. Here’s where the elements of witchcraft, neopaganism, animism, and pantheism converge into an earth-based, rather than a God-centered, religion. From her book:
Animism
This doctrine teaches that the vital principle of organic development is non-material spirit and that spirits exist separately from bodies. The Native American attitude is that everything is animated by divinity.
Pantheism
This view sees God as a divine force that “pervades all of nature and that shows up in the individual as ‘the divine within’.” In witchcraft, pantheism is related to the ideas of ‘en¬lightenment’ and ‘occult empowerment.’
Polytheism
This is the “belief in or worship of more than one god.” Traditional Native American spirituality focuses on the Great Spirit, but animism and polytheism dominate.
Nanci wasn’t the first person in her family to come to belief in the life-changing power of Jesus Christ, and she doesn’t believe she’s the last. A couple of years ago her father-a former medicine man-lay in the hospital on the brink of death. She watched as, forced to take stock of his life, he surrendered to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. It was one of the most significant moments of her life.
When asked about her book and her message for readers, a boldness seeps in. “I want them to know the truth. Jesus Christ – he’s the only answer.”
The New Age movement is hardly “new.” Much of its practices and belief system can be dated back to ancient European civilizations. For her part, Nanci De Gerlaise has certainly been there and done that. More importantly, she wants to offer a lifeline to freedom out of the occult.
I want [Natives] to know that they’re spiritually lost. Too often they just go along with something because someone told them it’s Biblical. Discernment among Natives is vital; determining true from false is imperative. They need to check it out. They need the truth.”
Jenn Doucette is a lifelong Washingtonian and a freelance writer who lives in the Seattle area. For more information about Des Gerlaise and her thoughts on Native Spirituality, visit her blog. Her book, Muddy Waters (Pleasant Word, 2008) is available online.
Yvonne Partyka & Joanne Klinger to appear on KBRT radio
Infidelity… Betrayal … Abuse… Abandonment.
Can God be trusted? Is he faithful even when . . . ?
Yvonne Partyka & Joanne Klinger will discuss infidelity and abuse within the church on KBRITE (KBRT AM 740 in Southern California) Wednesday, July 29.
In their book, Surviving Shattered Dreams, these two pastors’ wives reveal their stories of God’s healing, restoration, and faithfulness after they and their children suffered from abuse, divorce, and shattered dreams. Each chapter asks a question the authors asked themselves, such as:
- Is this the person I married?
- Am I abandoned?
- Where was the church?
- Our children—how could you?
H.B. London, Jr., Vice President, Church & Clergy at Focus on the Family, says:
Tweet This!It breaks your heart! Any time you talk about ‘shattered dreams’ you know there is someone, maybe many, who will forever be putting back together the pieces of a broken relationship. Yvonne and Joanne know all about that. But in spite of their similar experiences, they refuse to live their lives in self-pity and defeat. They have chosen to get well and, in turn, use their journey to help others find wholeness, to focus on the happy ending.”
Sell More Books: Build a Speaking Platform
Building a speaking ministry is the single best way to sell books.
One grandparenting expert built her speaking circuit to the point of being dubbed the “grandparenting guru of the Midwest.” She spoke at civic groups, churches, corporations, women’s retreats, and PTA meetings.
She built her reputation as an expert in her field and used much of the input she received from her speaking engagements to write her book on grandparenting. She did not want to wait for a traditional royalty publisher to offer her a contract; she chose to self-publish.
She started out with 2,000 copies and sold them all within six months. She had built a substantial mailing list from her many speaking engagements and had an automatic channel of distribution for her book.
These days, it really doesn’t even matter if your book has anything to do with the topic you are speaking on; the truth is, whatever you have on your book table will sell after your audience has heard you speak. In fact, your book might not even be of interest to your audience personally, but they may very well know someone else who might benefit from the book, and buy it as a gift, complete with your signature inside!
How to Prepare
Often, having a book in print will open more doors for you to speak, or will help accelerate an already established speaking ministry, so be prepared for the inevitable. To get prepared, attend some speaker training, if possible from a Christian perspective.
Two good choices are Speak Up Speaker Services and CLASSeminars. Both of these sessions train you on the basics of effective speaking.
Many communities also offer Toastmasters groups. They typically meet monthly, and sometimes more often, and give you a good chance to practice speaking in front of a group of people.
Collateral Material
Develop collateral material to promote your speaking ministry to include a brochure or “sell sheet” that includes your picture, bio, information on your book, and different topics you speak on. A few endorsements from groups you have spoken for in the past would also be helpful. This enables you to present yourself in a professional manner to a speakers’ committee or planning board.
Another important piece of your speaking ministry materials would be a good quality audio tape or CD of you speaking to a group. Often, if someone on the planning board hasn’t already heard you speak, they will require a sample to review before inviting you.
If you don’t have a good copy of your presentation, then set up a time with a group of friends where you can present your topic and get good group feedback during the session. Make sure the taping quality is good and there is no background noise.
Spread the Word
Once you’ve learned the fundamentals of effective communication and compiled a professional set of materials to promote your speaking ministry, you should begin to let people know that you are available.
However God helps you orchestrate it, develop a system for your speaking ministry to stay organized and begin to build a platform that can be measured and leveraged in the future.
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