Birds of a Feather welcomes Ashley Steel to the nest

Ashley Steel and Bill Richards are the parents behind the Family on the Loose website, which focuses on the art of traveling with kids. They are also joint authors of two books about traveling with children.

Bill Richards is an accomplished forest ecologist, specializing in restoring forest habitat for rare wildlife species, and his travel bug was instilled in him from an early age by his parents. Ashley Steel, PhD, is a research scientist by day, specializing in rivers, statistics, and science education. She also loves to travel and believes in the educational value of family travel, so it’s little surprise that together these parents are instilling wanderlust in the next generation.

How would you describe the type of books/genre you write?

Our books are firmly in the travel genre but, because they focus on traveling with kids, they also touch on education, parenting philosophy, and multiculturalism.  In fact, since we started writing, family travel has become its own domain with more and more families ready to get out there and experience new cultures and places.

What motivated you to start writing?

We both traveled quite a bit before we had kids and we were eager to continue our adventures after we started a family.  From a couple of early forays to Japan and Europe, we learned the value of fine-tuning our girls’ expectations.  Preparing ourselves prior to each trip and adding educational elements made these early adventures very successful; these successes got us thinking about formalizing our ideas into a book.  Next came a few notes on a napkin at a bar in The Netherlands and the rest, as they say, is history.

Tell us the journey you went on to get your books published (e.g. direct on your website, self-published, assisted-publishing, traditional publisher)

Publishing has definitely been a journey unto itself!  Once we had refined the idea for our first book and completed a rough draft, we contacted about a million publishers and agents, both local and national, to generate interest.  We went to writer’s conferences and listened to other writers publishing stories.  We even paid to pitch our ideas in person to the pros.  There were funny moments.

One publisher said our children must be “exceptional” to enjoy our travel adventures because all his kids wanted to do was sit at home watching TV.  Ironically, though he was making our point, he saw the book as unpublishable.

Once, an agent showed some interest but we couldn’t reel her in; she wanted us to add more “wack-a-do”.  Simultaneously, we built a website and developed a platform of magazine articles and blog posts.  We tried all our personal connections.  For example, an acquaintance’s daughter worked for a publisher in New York and so we wrote her a letter.  In fact, we wrote dozens of letters and made dozens of phone calls.  But, we had no luck.

Reluctantly at first, we turned to self-publishing through CreateSpace on Amazon.  We hired our own professional editor and our own professional graphic designer.  Though hiring this expertise significantly deepened our investment, we were happy to support the skills of people in our community and it made our product infinitely better.  We also started a publishing company, Rumble Books, so that our book wouldn’t look too self-published.  A business license and a logo  was all it took.  Once the book was published, we were on our own to market it but that is a whole ‘nother thing.

What publishing elements do you most enjoy and most like to avoid, and why? (e.g. design, marketing, formatting etc.)

Both of us enjoy the process of writing.  Incorporating suggestions from our editor is a bit of a thrill as she is able to add zip to dull sections and to trim our longer sentences into snappier versions of themselves.  Playing around with cover design is stressful but fun.  Both graphic designers we worked with were talented and patient.  Obviously, holding the final product in hand for the first time is a huge reward.

I’m not sure either of us enjoys self-promotion much, both because it requires us to be self-centric and because there are so many more misses than hits.  We developed a platform with the first book and that base of connections is benefiting the second book, but the whole process of marketing is still a slog that we didn’t anticipate at the outset.

With the hindsight of being a published author, anything you would have done differently?

I’m not sure.  Eventually, self-publishing has been a fun route.  We’ve learned a tremendous amount and maintained full control of every step.  Certainly, if an agent or publisher had picked us up this would have been a different journey, but we shook that tree pretty hard.  We’re still trying to make our own luck.

What tips or advice would you give an aspiring indie author who is looking to self-publish?

When an agent first mentioned the word “platform” we had no idea what she was talking.  Getting our thoughts and ideas out to our potential audience through a wide variety of media has been critical.  Our platform is now built not only on the strength of our books, but also daily contact with the blogosphere, writing articles for our own website, guest posts on travel and multicultural blogs, and a nice set of magazine articles.  Ashley was even on Rick Steves’ radio show as the expert on traveling with kids!

The best advice would be to stay true to your own voice, enjoy the control that self-publishing offers, gather as much advice as possible, and be patient.  There will be more rejections than compliments but that’s ok.  Finding a few key personal connections – the editor who thinks similarly, the experienced blogger willing to help – is essential but it takes time.

What marketing or promotional tools or techniques do you use to reach your readers?

We have a website, www.familyontheloose.com and have accounts on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram.  We belong to several amazing Facebook groups; these are sanity-savers.  They are places where you can ask stupid questions, learn from others, make connections, and get inspired.

We have also written a fairly steady stream of articles for a local parenting magazine, ParentMap.  The place where we spend the most time is constantly in flux depending on opportunity, available time, and general media trends.

What impact do you want your books to have on your readers?

We want to encourage people to travel with their kids and to learn about other cultures as they go.  Everyday life can be all engaging but that shouldn’t keep families from the adventure of discovering new places and ideas.  Getting out the door is usually the hardest part, but once you are “on the loose” it is exhilarating.

We hope that by helping parents expose their kids to other cultures and ways of thinking, the next generation will have a truly open mind, full of respect for people and for their differences.  Maybe the world can become a friendlier place through respectful, immersive family travel.

What is your latest book about?

After our first book about how to travel with kids (Family on the Loose: The Art of Traveling with Kids), we wanted to apply our philosophy and methods to a destination.  Because we’ve been lucky to enjoy many family forays through Europe, we were inspired to write 100 Tips for Traveling with Kids in Europe.

It is jam-packed with tips and ideas for every step of planning and enjoying a European family vacation: designing a kid-friendly itinerary, booking fun and interesting lodging, choosing the best ways to get around, packing light, saving money, enjoying the airplane ride, staying safe, and immersing yourself and your family in the many cultures of Europe.

What’s next on your writing journey?

We are still deeply involved in the promotion of 100 Tips, but our last couple of trips have taken us to Central America and Asia. If we sit down to write again, I can envision the series continuing into new destinations.  We’ve also tossed around the idea of a fill-in kids travel journal that would be a companion to the books we’ve written for parents.

Author Bio

Bill Richards and has wife, Ashley Steel, have visited over forty countries, have two terrific daughters, and are the authors of Family on the Loose: The Art of Traveling with Kids and 100 Tips for Traveling with Kids in Europe, both published by Rumble Books and available on Amazon. As a family, they’ve traveled in North America, Europe, Central America, and Asia. In Europe alone, they’ve explored art museums, castles, caves, kid’s museums, sewers, overnight trains, discount airlines, and river boats of all kinds. They’ve slept in hostels, fancy hotels, rental apartments, camper vans, and B&Bs. They’ve all carried backpacks, rolled suitcases, slugged skis, and even traveled without so much as a toothbrush.

• You can read more about their adventures and get great travel tips at www.familyontheloose.com.
• Follow them on Facebook at @FamilyontheLoose
• Instagram @FamilyontheLoose
• Twitter @FamilyonLoose
• Pinterest at @familyonloose

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