The Great, Okay and the Ugly of E-Publishing
SHALLA CHATS with author Tina Gerow about: “The Great, Okay and the Ugly of E-Publishing”
Who‟s Tina? Tina Gerow has great passion for romance and anything paranormal. She writes “the weird
stuff” with sarcasm. Her debut novel, Into a Dangerous Mind, published by Triskelion, comes out this May.
Shalla: Hi Tina.
Tina: Hi. It‟s great to be able to talk with you.
Shalla: So you‟re getting e-published. That‟s interesting. We‟ve heard the great, the okay and the ugly
about e-publishing and we like to ask you about your experiences with it.
First of all, what made you decide to go the e-publishing route?
Tina: I heard all of the bad stories too, so as a fresh newbie, I only queried print publishers. I got lots of
„good‟ rejections – the ones that say send more! – the same with agents, but no one offered a contract.
In the meanwhile, I was getting to know authors in my local chapters who are published with Ellora‟s Cave
and Triskelion and who are all big advocates for e-publishing.
So, since my book wasn‟t erotica, I submitted it to Triskelion just to see what would happen. (That‟s before
Cerridwen Press was well-known.) And within a few weeks, they requested the full.
A month later, they sent me an email offering a contract. I accepted and have had nothing but wonderful,
positive experiences with them. My book comes out in May and they have been extremely supportive and
helpful in every aspect.
Triskelion is also actively seeking RWA recognition and I‟ll be surprised if they don‟t make it by the end of
2005. I still tell people to check out e-pubs thoroughly, because I have some friends who are with some e-
pubs who are NOT giving them very positive experiences. I keep telling them to come on over to Triskelion.
I‟m still going to actively pursue print publishing as well as future e-published books. If you get with the right
e-publisher, then the differences are just semantics – especially since some e-pubs now offer your books in
print when they sell well in e format.
Shalla: I have lots of respect for e-pubbed authors. It‟s still quite a new format. By the way, how are books
formatted? Is it a Word File? A PDF?
Tina: It really depends on the individual e-publisher. Triskelion offers PDF, MobiPocket, HTML and LIT.
Ellora‟s Cave offers Adobe PDF, HTML, MS Reader, Palm PDF, MobiPocket and RocketBook, which is the
.rb files that Rocket reader‟s accept. So, they really are quite versatile.