When It Rains, It Pours

Okay - So the meeting with the National Association of Professional Women was by far the most rewarding experience on this roller coaster to date.  First off, let me say that the meeting was comprised of some amazing, talented, wonderful people.  There was my friend Richard Perque who is running for Traffic Court Judge here in New Orleans, a woman running for the Sheriff of Orleans Parish, a man who work at Saks Fifth Avenue, an Assistant Dean, and so many other professional, experienced people.  Even the creators of What the Sleepy Animals Do at the Audubon Zoo were in attendance.

Having the opportunity to discuss my process and progress to date felt great, but the feedback was especially appreciated.  Regarding the cover: we all agreed there is room for much improvement.  The recommendations were to find a freelance artist to help me.  I know I have been trying to do this on the cheap and on the fly, but paying someone to help me with the creative end is more likely the necessary thing.  At first, they recommended stock-art (I think that is what it is called).  Stock photography.  Basically, there are these online services that will sell you a downloadable image.  They have lots of them.  For anywhere from $50 to $150, you can purchase an image.  But I don't know what file size I need or how to make the changes necessary.  At least now, I will have a graphic artist who can figure that all out for me while I focus on the content.  I also want them to figure out how to get the words exactly down the spine.  Again, something I do not feel like dealing with.

This leads to the next best thing out of that meeting.  The Assistant Dean recommended I give the book to a Community Property Professor at her institution.  I thought that was a great idea, but I actually gave her a free copy of the book and asked her to deliver it.  And...she did.  She actually dropped it off and the professor actually read it.  We scheduled a meeting.  It was amazing advice.  She said, "It lacks connectivity."  In other words, the advice was strong, but if I were to outline the content, I would be see where improvements could be made.  She said it is especially true where there is brevity.  For example, when I discuss someone being married to another person at the time of the second marriage, that is not a very common problem.  It is frankly very rare, but should I gloss over it?  Not really.  That was an area she thought could be improved.

Her recommendation was to re-outline the entire thing.  Absolute genius.  Throughout my education, I was taught to outline my content prior to writing, not to write the content and then outline it.  That was one item I was able to really jump into and the issues simply pop off the page to me.  It is simply a refreshing perspective for the original writer.  It has opened my eyes and I feel very rejuvenated!

Let's get this work improved!  I simply have to time-manage again.  I have to actually take this advice and move forward.  It is going to take some work...

CC

A BOOK REVIEW!!! Someone actually read my book and then wrote about it...

Oh, the joy!  An actual person READ my book.  Not only did they read it, they took the time to REVIEW it.  Here is how it all went down...

I had been feeling uninspired about the marketing aspect of self-publishing life.  It is just, like, work.  So, I decided to get out of my comfort zone and look into Louisiana bride Facebook pages.  I was going this direction because I know there are bridal shows in New Orleans, but I could not figure out how to get to additional information on the event.  

As I was typing key words into Facebook's search engine, I came across an adorable, pastel-ly, chevron lined blog called Louisiana Bride.  The blog is adorable (I recommend you visit it: www.louisianabrideblog.com) and she is a very regular poster all things like love, life, food, etc.  After poking around her posts, I thought I would go out on a limb and see if she would be interested in knowing more about my book and perhaps even reviewing it for her blog.  

Shockingly, she accepted!  I quickly zipped her a copy from CreateSpace and only had to wait.  A couple of weeks later, boom!  I had a review.  Here is what she had to say:

MONDAY, APRIL 8, 2013

FROM THE PROPOSAL TO EVER AFTER :: BOOK REVIEW

I was recently sent a copy of Camille Carter's book From the Proposal to Ever After A Louisiana Woman's Guide to Marriage and Community Property Laws to review and share. All opinions are my own, I was not paid, but I was given a copy for the book for free. 

Have you ever thought about marriage law? Who's legally in charge of the money in the event of your husband's death, or even yours? What happens to property you owned before you were married? Does your spouse have rights to your inheritance?

Those questions and many more were answered by Camille in her new book From the Proposal to Ever After. As a woman we happily marry without ever thinking twice about marriage law. No one ever gets married with plans to divorce, but in the event it ever were to happen you would need to know a little about the state laws.

Not only were divorce laws covered, but Camille also hit on a topic we've discussed on many occasions...death. I've thought for some time about getting a living will together and now more than ever I think we definitely need to. In case you didn't know, Louisiana works under community property laws, I was actually surprised at what all was included in community property law. Something I found very interesting was that in the event your husband were to die that 50/50 law of Louisiana's doesn't immediately deem you the now 100% owner of everything the two of you owned. Nope. his half doesn't go to you but your children, if you have no kids then it goes to his parents. Next it trickles down to his siblings, their kids...and eventually landing at cousins. I think that was the most eye opening thing I learned, while it was very good to know the marriage law, the way things pan out in death was most interesting to me.

I could turn that into a big soap box though.

I really loved this book, it was well written, & Camille did a great job at putting legal terms into words we can all understand better. I learned so much about Louisiana marriage law from this book, and plan to take what I've learned and implement it into our plans for each other, if that makes sense. While divorce isn't in our planned future, many other things that fall into Louisiana marriage law will come upon us at one time or another.

I highly recommend this book to any woman or even man who live in Louisiana or were married here. If you are about to marry you should definitely read, it never hurts to know what the law has to say and how it will affect you in different circumstances.

To learn more about From the Proposal to Ever After check out the following links ::

You can purchase Camille Carter's book From the Proposal to Ever After on Amazon for $9.99 in paperback or for Kindle. If you have a Nook you can order here.

You can also find Camille on Twitter, Facebook,  or at her blog.

Click here to view the actual post!

I do believe this is a small step for From the Proposal to Ever After and a giant leap for Camille.  I could not be happier :)  

CC