Me and the Kindle Publishing App

By Nicola Jane Dutton

I was born in the UK and came to the USA in 1979 on a work permit as an RN and spent a rewarding career as a nurse for 34 years, living in Arkansas, Iowa and Minnesota, and now in the Mississippi Delta for the last 13 years.

I am married with children, grandchildren and great grandchildren. I volunteer with two food pantries, edit a local newspaper, and play dominoes every week with an elderly gentleman who is home bound. I am also very involved with the community as is my sweet husband. I love to travel, spends time with family and my hobbies include writing, knitting and crochet. I am passionate about helping others less fortunate than myself and like to "Pay it Forward" as the saying goes. I have an unpublished manuscript of poetry and am working on two young adult mystery novels.

Since I retired I wrote a children's chapter book but found that self-publishing was too expensive for me to consider and so put aside the idea but have continued to work on books since then, as much for my own pleasure as anything. I have a vivid imagination and have always enjoyed writing, and for my first book it was easy to formulate an idea in my head and using some memories from my childhood, came up with Hannah's Adventure. Once I put fingers to the keys, they story easily grew from one chapter to the next. I shared the story with family and friends who were enthralled and pushed me to publish.

It wasn't until September 2018 that I discovered the Kindle publishing app, through Amazon.com. There I was able to easily upload my manuscript, design a cover and first published as an eBook in October. There was no cost to me at all. Kindle also offers a paperback format and while adapting the manuscript and designing a back and front cover was not complicated it was time-consuming for me. There is no upfront cost, Amazon/Kindle print the books as ordered and ship directly to the customer and then the profit is split between us. My book is selling well through word of mouth, social media and is being read by people from 7 to 87 years old, in the US and the UK.

All the profits from this book will be donated to a non-profit organization called We2gether Creating Change, here in my small poor Delta town or Drew, MS.

Hannah’s Adventure is a chapter book originally intended for young readers between the ages of 7 and 12 years old. It has been described by one reader as ‘Alice in Wonderland meets Beatrix Potter’. Hannah discovers that she has a gift of being able to communicate with animals and discovers that there is a big problem that she is persuaded to solve. The book has Christian undertones encouraging kindness, thoughtfulness, patience, honesty, truth, trust and love.

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Nicola Jane Dutton was born in the UK in 1953. She moved 10 times before she was 20, and finding it hard to make friends, she used her imagination often to ease her loneliness. She became an RN in 1975 and moved to the USA in 1979 where she pursued a rewarding career. Always having a desire to write a children's book, she began one, after she retired from nursing. She has also written many poems and is currently working on two adult fiction novels. She is married and has a large family of children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She is also actively involved in the community, volunteering at 2 Food Pantries, editing a small free local newspaper, and helping the elderly. Her hobbies include, writing, knitting, crochet, and travelling.