“Specifically for Maine Authors” Panel Discussion March 26The Camden Public Library will host a panel discussion, “Specifically for Maine Authors,” featuring two first-time authors from midcoast Maine and a publishing representative from Maine Authors Publishing in Rockland. The presentation will be on Tuesday evening, March 26, at 7:00 pm. The authors will give short readings from their novels and discuss their experience in writing and publishing their books.
Lynne Fernands, of Rockland, published her first novel, Noble House, with Tate Publishing in 2012. The novel, set in Maine in 1926, is about Jethro and Mary Preston and their family of six living on an idyllic farm called Noble Hill. They move through their lives with selfishly devised methods and total disregard of others. Jethro is raising his children to be winners and won’t accept anything less but he adapts his plan accordingly because he has a different vision for each of his children.
Steven D. Powell’s first novel, Patch Scratching, was published with Maine Authors Publishing of Rockland in 2011. At the age of five, in the story, Jed is abandoned by his mother in his father’s coastal Maine hometown—a father he’s never met, and who no longer lives there. Raised by Deb, a local baker, with help from his grandfather, Jed grows up. Just as he is finding his place in the world, the past comes back to challenge him again.
Powell is a lifelong resident of midcoast Maine, and is “blessed with the gift of dyslexia.” Dyslexia made school difficult, he says, but it’s also where the creativity for his writings resides.
Jane Karker is the president and founder of Maine Authors Publishing, a company which helps self-published and independent authors get their books published and in the hands of readers. The company assists in not only producing books, but also in distribution, marketing training, and publicist services for authors. The company is “truly for self-publishing authors only, letting authors set their own pricing and receive 100% of the royalties from their book sales.” She says, “I feel like prospective authors deserve to hear the realities of independent publishing — the pitfalls as well as successes. I have some data to share that would help them. I participated on a similar panel at the New England Book Festival awards presentation in Boston, and also at the Back Bay Library and Grub Street in Boston.”There will be a chance for questions and answers from the panel, and books will be available for sale at the event
