Are you looking for a Publisher?
Check Amazon for my 2021 book, Fired at Fifty-Seven: My Fight for Justice in Christian Academia. For book cover and interior design, it is hard to beat. In fact, it looks as professional as any one of my more than 20 books published by established publishing houses. This volume has been set up through Amazon's KDP publishing. My job was to write the book and "hire" my dear husband John Worst to edit it. I submitted my manuscript to a long-time publishing house editor who had edited previous books of mine. After consulting his supervisors, he agreed to take on the design and publishing as a freelance project. If you are from West Michigan or are traveling to this wonderful area of the Great Lakes, stop by and see me at my business, Carlton Gardens. It is truly a destination location! I will gladly give you 7 minutes of my "expert" advice! Check out RuthTucker.com for additional information.
For further information:
Ruth A. Tucker, Ph.D. ,
Carlton Gardens ,
3140 Breton Road
Grand Rapids, MI 49512
Or email: tuckerworst [at] comcast [dot] net
This site is a work in progress---needs serious editing, but you get the idea.
Podium Press Consulting (PPC)
PPC is a new family venture comprised of Ruth Tucker, John Worst and Kayla Sosa. We’re here to help first-time writers as well as published writers who have been unable to secure a contract with traditional publishers, focusing our attention on writers primarily from West Michigan and surrounding areas. We have a family business, Carlton Gardens, and on many days you might find all three of us on location. Ideally you would stop by (after introducing yourself by email) early in the morning for your first brief interview, explaining your idea and plans to Ruth. After talking with you for, let’s say, a half hour, I would have a good idea if your project is something, we might want to look at further. I would invite you to submit your manuscript to us, each of us spending an hour reading and critiquing and then consulting with each other—that for a cost of $100, half paid at time of submission.
Having been a professor for many years during which time I evaluated term projects too numerous to count, I’m not an easy grader. But, of course, yours is very different from a college or graduate term project. Understood. But I still don't go easy on submissions. Some years ago, an acquaintance gave me more than a dozen pages of her proposed historical novel. I’ve written some fiction, but that’s certainly not my specialty. However, I read a lot of fiction and can critique a piece very quickly.
I told this young woman in a kindly way that she needed to work on her writing style. She needed to practice before actually writing her own work. I suggested exactly how to do it. Plagiarize. Yes, for practice do just that. Have handy your favorite best-selling historical novels. Type the first paragraphs—maybe whole pages—into a computer file; change names, taking care to examine the novelist’s character names; change the setting to a place you know a lot about, using interesting descriptions as the author does; then branch out and change your theme to something you know well (such as Civil War history, sports, gardening or auto sales); finally re-evaluate your plot as you contemplate the plots of your favorite authors. Don’t give everything away in the first chapter, and make me want to keep reading.
If you’re touchy as this 30-something woman was, you’d be better off avoiding me and giving you work to your mother who just might tell you it’s the best writing she’s ever read!
If we determined your work is something we could help you turn into a good book, the three of us would take on your project at the same monetary rate as our first three hours, giving you an estimate of the time frame. That would involve only manuscript preparation. From there you might want to self-publish on Amazon at no cost or get our advice on who might design your book. Kayla took over when we were ready for the final steps of publication, and she did a great job.
Now, just a bit about us:
Ruth A. Tucker, PhD, (History, Northern Illinois University) is an award-winning author who has written dozens of articles and more than twenty books translated into seventeen different languages. She has lectured and taught courses throughout the United States as well as in Canada, UK, Italy, Kenya, Korea, Japan and Singapore. Before accepting a fulltime position at Calvin Theological Seminary in 2000, she was for many years a visiting professor at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. She has taught writing courses and given writing seminars, and is eager to give an aspiring writer advice and tips for getting published. She is an idea person, quick to challenge the student about underlying factors that draw out personal strengths and weaknesses.
John Worst, PhD (Musicology, University of Michigan) is married to Ruth. He was a professor of music for more than thirty years at Dordt and Calvin universities, during which time he wrote articles, hosted a radio program, and participated in musicals and other civic performances. He has arranged and composed dozens of pieces, including a ballet score for “Alice.” Through the years he has traveled to Central America, the Caribbean, Africa and the Philippines recording music and collecting instruments to enhance his teaching. He loves literature and his volumes of his Oxford English Dictionary are always close at hand. Above all, he is a first-rate editor and proof-reader, not only finding mistakes, but also cutting wordiness, improving word usage, and suggesting literary references. He would deny it, but he’s a walking encyclopedia!
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