Hi Patricia! Good to have you here and a warm welcome to Authors.com. :) It’s a very friendly community. We’d love it if you could drop by this thread please and tell us how you discovered Authors.com. :)

Hello Patricia!

I'm new to the site and I just wanted to see what other's thought about it. Happy writing & reading!

~JM Benavidez

Smashwords is only eBooks but they do all types. They also connect with Baker & Taylor who has Blio. That is where they can bring your children's books to life. I recommend checking out Blio. http://www.baker-taylor.com/blio.cfm  I don't do illustrated books so it's not quite my style.

I don't know how it is in your state but I know here (California, Bay Area specifically) that Barnes & Noble (do you have those there?) and smaller second hand book stores are cooperative with promoting local authors (if you have a physical book). It does take a lot of foot work, face time and promoting and having a good website will help too. Just don't pull all your hair out before you get famous =)

I'm currently building my own website (well my husband is actually) and there is a lot of hidden steps that go into promoting your website and it's always changing. He's been building websites for about 8 years and google's requirements keep changing. If you don't have one to promote your books you should look into it. Almost every great (current) author has one these days.

Thank you for getting back to me =)

~JM Benavidez