Story of My Book
shades is a book of poetry about love, loss, learning, and life.
My name is Samantha Finley and I am the author of shades. I wrote this book because I want to share my experience of vast emotions with the world.
My hope is that, in reading this book, you will discover that you are never alone in your experiences. In this book, I hope to instill the same sort of passion and excitement that I have for life in you. And then ultimately I want you to see this book as a tool to help get you through the tough times and be emotionally available for the good times.
In this book, you'll hear about:
- love: the firsts, the awkward, and the defining moments
- loss: the lasts, the painful, and the hardest moments
- learning: the middle, the eye-opening, and the richest moments
- life: the entirety, the encompassing, and all the moments
You will love this book if you are someone who understands the struggle and the balance between sex and love, family and friends, light and darkness, and learning and growing.
The Book: shades
The book is written in four parts:
Part one, love, contains poems about “catching feels”, experiencing intimacy for the first time, and defining the true meaning of love.
Part two, loss, contains poems about breakups, sexual assault, losing friends, and the trauma that comes with growing up.
Part three, learning, contains poems that showcase how to properly cope with loss, move forward with life after love, and learn to come into your identity.
Part four, life, contains poems that properly highlight the meaning of friendship and family, while also bringing light to small daily observations that often get overlooked.
What I Need & What You'll Get
This book will be published with New Degree Press. I set up the pre-order tiers to help cover the costs for publishing my book. Money raised will go towards the following:
- The Editor I will work with to revise and publish my manuscript in July 2020!
- The Cover Design of my Book - the mockups you see currently are a placeholder!
- The Layout Design for the interior of my book (Physical Copy, Ebook Formats)
- The Copyediting for My Book - to help polish the grammar and spelling prior to publication
- The Launch & Promotion Efforts for my book - when I ultimately publish this Summer
When I pre-sell 100 copies of my book, I will publish!
I am also offering some exclusive rewards for people who pre-order my book now:
- You will receive a personally signed copy of my book when I publish
- A Personal, handwritten thank you note for pre-ordering my book
- Early access to the Introduction of my Book and my entire manuscript, with the opportunity to review it and give me early feedback
- I will do a book topic/workshop seminar where I will share experience the experiences of writing my book
- And more...
About the Author
Samantha Finley, or Sam for short, is a student at the College of Staten Island studying Adolescent English Education with a concentration in Literature. She is a Pisces who is passionate about helping others and always seems to find herself in unique situations.
Sam has been writing poetry since the sixth grade and hasn't stopped since. She uses writing as her outlet for the emotions she oftentimes has trouble feeling off paper. Sam will usually write her poetry through “poetic visions” where she will see the words floating in her head before they hit the page.
When Sam isn't writing, she is usually crafting Spotify playlists based on the season, or watching TV with her mom and dog, Sebastian. You will most often find her in her school's library or at the Taco Bell in the local mall. She has insomnia but will always drink cold brew just before bed.
For more information you can connect with Sam at samfinleypoet@yahoo.com, on Instagram @hamfinley, or on Twitter @hamxfinley.
Risks & Challenges
The biggest challenge with publishing a book is delivering the finished book to the backer, specifically my mailing of the book to you. I have eliminated this risk by building into the campaign the mailing and shipping costs of your signed copies to you within each pre-order tier.
The risk of delivering the pre-sale copies of my book is contingent on the publisher we use. I will be working closely with New Degree Press to make sure we get the earliest possible ship date of the signed book copy to you. We will keep all pre-sale backers up-to-date as my book hits each key milestone and publishes. You will know when the copies of my book you pre-ordered are expected to ship.
Other Ways You Can Help
Some people just can't contribute, but that doesn't mean they can't help:
Please Share my Pre-sale Campaign on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn with your friends, family and network. Please use #shades and tag me as well as my publisher, New Degree Press so we can help amplify your efforts.
You can easily share my Pre-Sale Campaign Page via Indiegogo at the top of the page
Please share my book to 5 friends, family members, or co-workers who you think would enjoy it. Please do this as a text message or Direct Message on social media.
Thank you so much of all of your love and support!
Thanks again,
Samantha (Sam) Finley