New Seth Book

[Deb]

One of Mary's projects was collecting unpublished sessions. I want to approach Laurel about getting them published in a book. I'm trying to figure out if anyone would actually buy it. It would most likely be the last Seth book to be published.

[T.M.]

Hi Deb,
I would buy it. 

Good Luck!

[jbseth]

Hi Deb,

Thanks for this offering.

I responded with "maybe".

I have a lot of the Seth books already, and for me personally, I much prefer that my "Seth" books be in a paperback or hardbound book format, verses a kindle, laptop or tablet format.  To me, these books are serious studying and reference materials. I'm sure you know what I mean.

-jbseth

[usmaak]

I answered Yes.  Now that I am starting to get into TES books, having another one would be good.

I read everything on Kindle and haven't read a physical book in years.  I'd be happy to have it on Kindle.

[Deb]

Thanks for the input! I added a 4th option, Print, in case there's any more input.

The trend lately has been Kindle sales outperform print, which is why I said Kindle. It's probably because they cost much less and don't take up any space. For instance, the Seth books in print, new, are usually around $20-23, Kindle $9.99 or less. I'm the old fashioned type, I may get some books from the library or even on Kindle that are not "keepers," but prefer buying Seth books in print (see attachment). You folks are sort of divided between the two, which I didn't expect.

With Amazon publishing, I'll need to prepare the book two different ways for print and Kindle, using two different types of software, which is very time consuming. Since I'll be working for royalties only (Laurel will get the lion's share), I'm hoping sales will make it worthwhile. Although truthfully I'm more interested in getting more Seth out than making money. But I'd like to think I'm worth something. And I feel like my publishing experiences with Rich Kendall's last two books were my warmup exercises for this.

I'm going to read the unpublished sessions before I approach Laurel. Mary was waiting for Laurel to cough up the Richard Bach session, because everyone wants that one. She had approached Laurel about getting these sessions published a while ago, but it never went anywhere. But this is one of the few specifics Mary asked me to pursue.

There were also two more volumes of the Early Class sessions that were never published, and Mary thought they could be included in these unpublished sessions. I have those too and need to take a look at what's there. It seems like there could end up being TWO books in that case.

When I started this forum, one of my goals was to have a place for me to collect "Seth on" various topics, since he talks about a LOT of different things, but spread throughout the books. A little here, a little there. I did begin doing that, but then Chris Galpin created the Seth search engine, I figured he'd already accomplished that and so I stopped. However, while the search engine is a great resource, it's also a tease in that he's had to leave out huge chunks of quotes in order to avoid copyright infringement issues. Well, with Mary's hard work, I realize that I can actually create a database that has every recorded session, in date order. How cool is that? Although I probably wouldn't be able to share it with anyone for a long time. But what a treasure that would be!

[michaelk]

With Amazon publishing, I'll need to prepare the book two different ways for print and Kindle, using two different types of software, which is very time consuming.

hi Deb,

it's been awhile for me but for print, one way would be to use a piece of software called Vellum (https://vellum.pub). one version of the software allows you to publish to both ebook and print versions of files. it's outstandingly simple and easy. click publish and it outputs 2 separate files, ready to publish to whatever platform you want. the cost for the version to output both types is $249, vs $199 for ebook only. i'd be willing to donate to the software purchase for you if that would help things. it would also open up another format for purchase which may get extra people purchasing. you could also output files for apple books, kobo, etc... if you wanted to get into a wider release.

for me i love print books - i get to mark up the margins with notes and stars and all the markings of a mad-man.

i believe you could write up the book in word, and all you do is simply drag and drop it onto the vellum software icon, and it will automatically create chapters, etc. but it is only avail for macs. but i also believe that there are services where you can have it done, or you can rent a virtual mac machine to do it on? all way past what i know, but at least it's avail out there if you'd like to check.

it's dead simple, not like adobe indesign, or other methods i know of. you are limited to the templates they have as far as styling, but if this is more a labor of love - you gotta love that this will cut way down on your labor for putting it out.

just some ideas if you didn't already know about vellum.



michael

[Deb]

it's been awhile for me but for print, one way would be to use a piece of software called Vellum (https://vellum.pub).

Hi Michael, I'll take a look at Vellum, thanks, very generous of you! I'd not heard of it before.

I've been using Adobe InDesign for more than 25 years, and know it inside and out. I could actually create the books in Word (yes I'm on Mac, I'd have to output Pages to Word), many people do, but it's kind of limited in comparison. With InDesign I can tag things and auto generate the ToC and Index. It also allows me to align the text to a grid, so that the text lines up from page to page, no wonky spacing. IDK, that may be automatic these days in Pages and Word. Then if I need to output for Kindle, which has no page breaks and simpler formatting than print, I can copy & paste into Pages, fix what needs to be fixed, and export to Word, or use Kindle Create which is KDP's publishing software that looks and feels like it's still stuck in the 70s. I don't know Pages very well, it seems fairly user friendly, and I see it will let me export as ePub and Apple books. Since I'm not a publisher, just a lowly (mostly retired) graphic designer, I'm trying to keep it simple.

Laurel wants to make the manuscript into four smaller books, and she wants to be spontaneous and creative with the design, and she's the boss. We're still in the ideas stage.

I prefer printed books myself, my old Seth books are so highlighted, dog-eared, underlined and worn, but to me they look well loved.

[LarryH]

I recently read a self-published book written by a former co-worker (an award-winning industrial designer), and I was shocked at how many typos there were. I have an OCD habit of circling typos in books, and when I was done, there were well over 200 typos, misspellings, improper punctuation, etc. I got to thinking that, if this had been written in Word, most or all of these typos would have been caught. Therefore, it was likely not written in Word. All of this is to say that whatever software is used, it is important that it be capable of highlighting such issues.

[michaelk]

I've been using Adobe InDesign for more than 25 years, and know it inside and out. I could actually create the books in Word (yes I'm on Mac, I'd have to output Pages to Word), many people do, but it's kind of limited in comparison. With InDesign I can tag things and auto generate the ToC and Index.

ah, got it. and that's awesome on indesign for that long. you've wrestled it to the ground then.

vellum also autogenerates the toc, just by dragging the documents into vellum (it breaks it up automatically based i think on individual files for each chapter, or by page breaks? can't remember). i used to giggle at how easy it was. after fighting ID and whatever flavor of software i was using to generate epub docs.

can't wait for the book(s). happy that you're doing them.

[Deb]

Thanks to both of you.

It's hard to imagine any program not having spell check these days! Of course, that's not always 100% reliable anyway. Laurel is currently reading the sessions, which are in Word, but she's not checking for typos. As I'm setting up the layout, I'll be reading and checking for them. Mary typed all these herself, and in the few sessions I've read I only found 2 minor typos. But that's definitely something I'll keep in mind. I won't need to do much editing, other than fixing errors, since these were dictated by Seth. 

If I don't have to make an index, which actually would be duplicating work as Laurel wants me to list the topics of each session in the ToC, right under each session number as was done in The Magical Approach, then I can use Pages, the Apple version of Word. Most desktop publishing software will generate a ToC based on heading levels, and I know Pages does.

Looking forward to getting all this decision making out of the way, and diving in!

[LarryH]

Coincidently, today I started to read Session 860 (in Mass Events), and there in the first sentence was a typo.

"Dictation: Now let us return again to our discussion of impulses, in connection with probably actions."

Clearly, what was meant was "probable actions". And that typo would not have been caught in Word.

[Deb]

I totally get that. The two I came across in the unpublished session for 03/28/1970 were a double space and "psychic" which should "be psyche", both missed by Word. I too notice typos, I used to run the word processing dept for a large law firm in Denver so they really stand out for me. I have to say that there have been relatively few with the Seth materials.

[usmaak]

I totally get that. The two I came across in the unpublished session for 03/28/1970 were a double space and "psychic" which should "be psyche", both missed by Word. I too notice typos, I used to run the word processing dept for a large law firm in Denver so they really stand out for me. I have to say that there have been relatively few with the Seth materials.

Sometimes when I'm reading a book that has a lot of typos, I'll make a list of them, along with page numbers, and then submit it to Amazon using the link that they provide.  It kind of makes me feel like an obsessive freak when I do stuff like that, but it just bugs me that much.

My latest list was for Living a Safe Universe 1.  Lynda ends sentences in ... a lot.  In the Kindle version of the book, the first letter of the first word following the ... is also a dot.  For instance:

"In the spacious present... .ll things that have existed still exist,

Dahl, Lynda Madden. Living a Safe Universe: A Book for Seth Readers (p. 38). The Woodbridge Group. Kindle Edition.

Of course that should be "All things that have existed still exist"

It bugged me enough that I had a difficult time making it through the book.  I kept repeating to myself "focus on the message" whenever I found one, and they were pretty numerous.

The second one hasn't had any of that.

[Deb]

Just an update here, Laurel and I had a flurry of activity for a few weeks and then in her creativeness, I think she overwhelmed herself, so the project has been shelved. I have a lot going on right now, so while it's disappointing I appreciate that the pressure is off for now. As I continue to delve into the information I received from Mary, I've come across a few interesting manuscripts that remain unpublished, and I find that kinda exciting.

[strangerthings]

I would prefer print, but I voted yes to kindle because I know $$$$$ might be an issue.

I would have to find a way yo print the chapters as I read them because I make notes and place tiny post-its  paper as bookmarks with specific notes on edge of pages.

I do not own a kindle lol

I would find a way to print. 😬😁

I havent ever read a kindle book.