You want to jump right in and get your books in front of an audience. You want readers, and the excitement of a career doing what you love most. You want to be noticed, and admired.
Here’s an exciting list of why you should dive into the digital river and let it sweep you along. With some warnings about the rocks, snags, rapids and waterfalls along the way. (Sorry about that.)
• You have the soul of an independent publisher. In non-fiction you get to choose the subject, do your own research, and say whatever you like. Your style may be as elegant, pithy, or rough-hewn as you like. In fiction you get to choose the genre, the storyline, the characters, the action, the tone, the emotional impact. In sum, you write the kind of book you want to read.
Maybe it will turn out to be, for better or worse, a book unlike any other. Surely there are some other people who like the same things that you do. Maybe there are millions of them. Your vision is your result. Freedom! With all its rewards and hazards, from posh to poverty.
• Instant gratification. You can put your book in front of the reading pubic now. A former student of mine in Professional Writing at the U. of Oklahoma says it took him “about ten minutes” to put each of his two novels up on Kindle.
In earlier years there were a number of hitches along the way—a lot of writers had trouble formatting their manuscripts in a way that Kindle or Nook would accept, or that these two e-retailers could make look like solid, presentable reads. Those days are mostly over.
• You make all the presentation and business decisions yourself. You choose the title, create the cover (or pay someone to make the one you want), you write the jacket copy, you get the blurbs, you choose the price, you create the web site (or pay someone to do that), you decide when to spend a few bucks to give a boost to a book you’re pushing, you write the blog, you promote the book on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Goodreads, and other venues—in fact, you do all the social marketing exactly as you want it done.
Note: Though there are lots of other e-book retailers, I’m going to speak here mostly of Kindle and Nook because together they have about 85% of the market.
• You can write as many books per year as you want. Traditional publishers usually don’t want two Harry Bosch or Tess Monaghan volumes in a single year, fearing over-saturation. But some indie publishers are putting out two or three books a year in a YA series, or fantasy series, and discovering that their fans want all they can get.
• You may call yourself an author.
• You get to keep a lot more of the cover price. Take a look at a traditional publisher’s normal 10% royalty on a hardback, and then at Kindle’s 70% royalty, and you’ll think, ‘Gee, I learned to count in the second grade.’
Meredith and I checked out how this would work on our own forthcoming books:
Hardcover–$24.95 cover price, $2.49 and a half cent royalty to us, less 15% for our agent, net to us = just under $2.13. If we sold a modest five thousand hardcovers, we’d earn about $10,650.00.
Kindle—9.99 cover price, no percentage for an agent, net just over $6.99 royalty to us. If we sold five thousand copies, we’d make about $35,000.00. Hell of a difference. Even at the low $2.99 price, we’d still make about $10,500.00, about the same number as the hardback.
That’s assuming five thousand in sales in each case. But what price would sell more books, $24.95 or $2.99? So the difference would likely would be huge.
Explanation of pricing used in those calculations:
HARDBACK: $24.95 is standard retail price, 10% the industry standard royalty, 15% the usual agent’s commission.
KINDLE: Kindle gives a 70% royalty on books priced from $2.99 to $9.99, 35% above and below that range. There’s a battle going on there. Kindle wants to establish $9.99 as the market price for a new book in the public’s mind. Traditional publishers don’t think they can live with that. They usually price the e-versions of new books at around $12.99.
• There are e-publishing firms eager to help you. For a fee, or a royalty, a lot of companies will help you do all the tasks you need to self-publish. You didn’t know there were any such jobs? Let me count the ways:
1) Editing your manuscript. This can mean anything from developmental editing to copy-editing to proof-reading, and it’s essential. (See my blog, Yes, You Need an Editor.)
2) Getting your draft ready to go into digital form in many venues, not only Kindle and Nook but iBook, Kobo, Ingram, and scores more. Don’t you want wide exposure?
3) Getting a cover made. Many individuals and companies will make a cover for you, based on your concept.
4) Experts (sometimes self-appointed) will make a web site for you, complete with the plug-in that allows visitors to subscribe to your blog and a click that will enable them to buy a book.
5) Firms will send out messages to your mailing lists, carrying your promos or enticing people to your blog. No, your regular server won’t accept your out-going emails when there are several hundred, or more, addresses.
6) Firms will do the social marketing for you.
A lot of companies will offer to do all of this, or most of it. Most of them charge substantial fees up front, but some work for royalties only. Clearly, you’re better off with the royalty deal.
But, buyer beware. A lot of these outfits are run by hopefuls who are not much more experienced than you are and will run your project into the ditch. The only two I can recommend with some confidence, and this comes from the reports of friends, not from personal experience, are D2D (Draft to Digital), which works for 10%, and BookBaby, which charges a different amount depending upon how many of their services you want to use.
It’s possible to have the best of both worlds. You can start as an indie publisher, demonstrate some success, and move to traditional publishing. Some writers bring off the best trick of all. If they’re selling enough books, they keep their digital rights and publish in print. That’s not only good work if you can get it, it’s the best.
Which brings us to the biggest advantage of indie publishing:
• You get to keep all your rights. When you post a book on the internet, you don’t sell or lease your rights to anyone. You can take down a book at will and publish in any different way you choose. When you sign a contract with a print publisher these days, they claim all rights imaginable. Once upon a time, they made it relatively easy to get your rights back when sales ground to a near halt. Now they make it nearly impossible. Sign, on and you have likely given up your rights for your lifetime plus seventy years. Add that up and see, depending on your age, if that doesn’t come to more than a century. A small advance probably doesn’t compensate for that.
• A funny story that tells this tale. Over a decade ago my movie agent was negotiating a screenplay deal with a very famous actor. The contract provided that the actor would own all rights on all planets in our galaxy, known and unknown, all planets in all galaxies, known and unknown, and all inhabitable bodies in all universes, known and unknown. This is not a joke.
Laughing, I said to my agent, “Tell him I want to reserve the seventh ring of Saturn for myself.”
The agent said, “Win, he will not think that’s funny.”
We took the deal.
The rights grab is on, in books and in movies, and nothing damages writers and their heirs as much.
HUGELY IMPORTANT MATTERS
All of the above services cost money. Many e-publishers offer the entire package at rates that may seem forbidding. If you want to piece the work out, you can find editors at Editorial Freelancers Association at rates of $20-$50 an hour. Kirkus Media also offers editing services, from the most conceptual consultation to line-editing, at fees that usually range into the low thousands of dollars.
Many companies or artists will make covers for you, often for three to four hundred bucks. Web sites are expensive, usually starting at two grand, depending on the size. Social marketing is ferociously expensive, and costs at least several thousand dollars a month for modest services.
Lesson: A traditional publisher pays you in advance. Self-publishing is money out of your pocket in advance.
Still, e-publishing can be a jump start for a young writer. Yes, a jump-start, if you’re willing to work really hard, invest substantial money and/or time in your career, and are willing to count on some luck.
Be warned. A friend who is a major publisher said to me this week, “A few people put out e-books and lightning strikes. Good for them. But it’s like winning the lottery. It’s not a good business plan.”
LAST, LET’S GO AROUND THE LOOP-THE-LOOP OF SURPRISE
Most people think self-publishing is the path for young writers. Ironically, however, the biggest benefit of indie publishing sits plump and hot on a platter for older, more experienced writers. These encouraging words are for them:
• If you’ve been writing books for decades, you probably have a substantial back list.
• If you’ve attended to business, you’ve had the rights to these books reverted to you.
Examples: Meredith and I have now published thirty-eight books. Though a good many are still in print, we have the e-rights to about half. My friend Richard Wheeler has published eighty books, and owns the rights to most of them. Our friend Rudolfo Anaya has published a stack of books. The Taos novelist John Nichols, an acquaintance, has published about twenty.
To get into the ultra-big names, my epistolary friend Dean Koontz has published so many that the Amazon catalog needs nineteen pages to list them. Stephen King has published at least fifty-five.
• Most of these books were published before e-rights existed. If you’ve kept your rights, you’re free to publish them digitally. And they are potentially a gold mine.
• Here is one example I can speak of with authority, mine and Meredith’s. We began to publish digitally last summer, and we have just a baker’s dozen up. We began to do social marketing for them only in November. Yet our sales, and so our revenues, have increased about 50% each month. The last royalty payment from Amazon was enough to cover the house payment.
We have good reason to think that e-sales will continue to increase at a similar rate. And, as we re-acquire old books and publish new ones in digital form, they will continue to increase. Even though we plan to continue to publish traditionally, we have a good many ideas for books that are better suited to digital publication. One day, this income promises to make our Social Security look like chump change. (Actually, it already does look like chump change, but that’s another story.)
Who’da thunk it? The writers who profit most often from the newest publish technology are the old guys.
Our next mailer will ask a gigantic question: WHAT’S WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE?
That is, what’s wrong with the glowing portrait of indie publishing painted above? You won’t like the answers, but if you’re a writer, you need to understand them so, if possible, you can get around them.
Be Well — Win
About Meredith and Win Blevins
I encountered this problem in the last stages of completing my draft.
How writers change facts (what exactly are those?), bend them, ignore them, make them LARGE — all of that is creating a story.
I had cast a fairly well-known historical incident in the wrong town and the wrong year. This was an honest mistake, as the sources I consulted early were good at telling WHAT happened, but not WHERE or WHEN. I struggled with this conundrum for a long time, and finally concluded that I had to fix it somehow, else knowledgeable readers and other authors (like Win Blevins) would see that, put my book down, and never pick up another of mine again.
This was a big problem for me because I REALLY liked the vignette that I had written, and as stories go I think it fit beautifully. I could have surgically removed the entire thing and do without. Or I could have completely rewritten all the affected parts, which reached well into a half-dozen chapters. Or I could have just claimed author’s privilege and leave it be.
My online writing tutor, Doctor John Yeoman of “Writer’s Village” suggested a fix and I used it. He suggested that I recast the erroneous segments as a dream sequence. That way I could say “I know, but it was all a dream.”
Finally, I decided to leave the part of my vignette which had no historical reference pretty much as is. I had written the vignette in third person, and I kept that in place for this part.
The problematic part went into a dream sequence–a nightmare, really. Dialog went into a script format.
When the dreamer wakes up and tells about the nightmare, his companion says: “That will never happen. Not in this city.” Well, it DID happen, but not in that city. And not in the same year, by which time the dreamer had been murdered.
The historical record, believe it or not, harbors a legend that my dreamer’s friend had a nightmare that foretold the murder, the manner of murder, and the person of the murderer. The legend holds that the poor man blamed himself for the murder of his friend. (I think Win might guess the historical event so I’ll just say that five men were murdered by four others, and the friend who supposedly had the dream avenged the murder by bringing the murderers to justice.)
Long story short, people who know the history know about the dream legend. Therefore they should not be surprised to encounter another. It is, after all, an historical NOVEL.
Anyway, I’m satisfied with my solution and we will have to see if readers will accept it. I hope to have a few readers by the end of the year.
Dave, I would also offer the following advice: there is a huge difference between historical non-fiction and historical fiction. “Fiction” gives you a certain amount of license regarding use of facts. Lords of War – set during the time of the Wars of the Roses – focuses on the story of an obtuse character, Jasper Tudor – arguably without whom there never would have been a Henry VII, Henry VIII or Elizabeth I. Historical facts definitely showed that Jasper went to France and took the boy king, Henry VII, with him. I tweaked the story a little and had him shipwrecked in Brittany, a duchy at odds with Louis XI who wanted to claim the territory for the French crown. That made Jasper a political pawn for the Duke of Brittany as well as the Yorkists. I kept historical details alive and well, as well as certain events that could not be discarded. BUT….but… he met someone he never did (although the historical record bears out that he was a womanizer) and did things with her that he never did and…you get the drift. Fans of historical fiction want to see certain details that lend credibility – but remember that the historical record is usually slanted, inaccurate, and sometimes silly. So yes, dates and locations are important, but as Meredith points out, sometimes they become incidental to the focus of the story which is not usually the historic event, but the characters who live through it and what they go through. In fact, I believe George Washington had a few OMG moments while crossing the Potomac in a flimsy boat loaded with people – who wouldn’t? But you’ll never see it in a history book.
Creating a book of OMG moments for characters throughout history would be a pretty great idea.
Once Larry Block said this about writing fiction:
“I was agonizing over a scene. I knew how I wanted it to play out. But how would that wash with the law? So I called a friend who is a lawyer and told him my problem, asked him the fine points of the law regarding this situation.
“He said, ‘Larry. It’s fiction. Make up laws that fit your story.'”
Readers get too sticky about what is real, what is not, what are facts, what is fiction. Let’s let give them a ride!
We have all taken American History, and more than once–god help us–and I would bet that what you heard from different teachers either slanted the stories differently or they were just flat-out different.
Setting is important. If you are setting a story in Cornwall in the 18th century or the present, you had better know what the earth is like there, what the houses are like, that it rains. If you make Cornwall a semi-tropical zone with luscious ladies running around in sarongs your readers have either fallen into a fantasy book or a world devised by Kurt Vonnegut.
Give us stories! Take us somewhere! Make the ride smooth! That’s want we readers want. And that’s the pact a writer makes with a reader.
And let us say here:
Dreams are sometimes very difficult to use effectively.
When you sit with a friend, and this is your FRIEND, someone you care about, your brain sometimes goes blank as soon as they say, “I had the most amazing dream last night.” People love telling others about their dreams, but they often don’t want to hear about them. Unless they’re a Jungian or a Freudian shrink, and that’s okay because, 1) It’s their bailiwick, and 2) they’re getting paid.
Even at that, Freud was big on cigars and train tunnels. Which most likely prompted Jung to say, some years later, “The dream is known only to the dreamer.”
All right that was a digression. Still, flashbacks and dreams can be difficult to write, harder to read. It’s okay to move the main character into the time, through time, or into a dialogue that brings up the same material. (And certainly write dream sequences in italics.) Once a reader jumps ship, they are goners.
I made a list of about 40 words from the “Dictionary of the American West,” and used at least half of them in my manuscript. My story has no cowboys–just miners, mule packers, murderers, vigilantes, a hotelier–and Mark Twain. Everything in the story ‘did happen’ or ‘could have happened’. Landscape gave it bones; history gave it flesh; players who actually lived gave it breath, and having the “Dictionary” made it sing.
Thank you.
Wow! All the greats are here. I feel honored that I’m allowed to participate.
My historical novel, “Bloody Mountain,” is in the draft review stage now. I’m having some good editors take a look. My sister is a very good one–and I’m in communication with others. My oldest friend who walked with me down to the wilderness place where five men were murdered in 1863 is reading it to keep me honest. Doctor John Yeoman’s Writer’s Village is a great help too.
I’m familiar with reviews, as I’ve written several that are still on the top of the list at Amazon.com and have been appreciated by some very successful writers. If I see a stinker, I harpoon it. I don’t care if Oprah pushed it; if it stinks–it stinks.
Since Win Blevin’s “Dictionary of the American West” has been very helpful, I wanted to give you both my thanks. I’m ready to light a shuck as soon as I hear back from my editors.
I do have one question for Win: “Bloody Mountain” has only two fictional characters–the narrator, and a very old Sheepeater woman. The name for Sheepeaters that I found and used is Tukudeka, but the Dictionary has it as Tukuarika. Is one more correct than the other? Your advice will be very much appreciated.
I apologize if this message is redundant–I don’t see the original but it could be in vetting limbo. I suppressed my javascript blocker for this attempt.
You have sold me on indie publishing. I have been struggling with this decision for some time now, but now I know. The powerhouse writers that are participating here closed the sale. I am familiar with many of them.
My marketing plan is to travel the entire 1500 mile stage where the history I’m concerned with played out, and drop off a supply of copies at every venue that will accept them. I intend to exploit the eBook market and book signing opportunities too. My niece has done several professional level websites, so I may be able to have one built for me.
Thank you for the opportunity to brush up against the greats of western historical fiction.
Dear James — Best of luck to you!
Suggestion: Keep a journal during your travels. You never know what you might see that could become another book. We drove through, almost, the entire state of Nebraska on a dirt road through corn fields because we got lost. (We sang every song, almost, in the SING OUT songbook, corny as they were.) We had an interview gig at a radio station in a feed store. We met lots of great people. A few pretty crazy ones. It was all good.
Cheers!
Meredith and Win
OK, you sold me. I have been struggling with the pros and cons of indie publishing vs. trying to attract a publishing house. You helped make up my mind. I am now negotiating with an editor. My marketing plan is to travel the 1500 mile long stage where my story plays out and leave a supply of books with every willing venue. Then I would exploit the eBook market. I don’t have a website yet, but I may be able to secure design from a family member who has done it professionally.
Thanks very much for letting me participate in this blog and on Facebook.
Don’t forget to call the small-medium-sized newspapers along your route in advance. It could make a good story for a local reporter, and you never know if something might get picked up by a larger paper or on TV news.
I enjoyed this blog and everyone’s comments. I believe both sides have validity. I’m new at this and don’t have the background as others here but both sides can be misleading. From everything I hear, the writier still has to create his/her following in advance before many of the big publishing firms will even consider you. They don’t do that for you. And although they don’t up front charge you for all of the editing and cover designs etc, they are recovering those costs by only giving you 10% of royalities. With self publishing you have to shell out all the money up front but if it does sell you will recover most likely recover the cost. And yes, with self publishing one really can’t do it all and should seek help with editing, cover design to help make your book worth reading. There is I think some allure of the quick path to selling books with e-pulishing but the books still have to be of a quality for someone to want to read them. I kind like the throwing yourselfs to wolves with the anonymous site. Could be a great we to get realistic feedback. look forward to the next blog
Dennis, I don’t think a writer needs a following to get a contract with a major publisher. (It is true, though, that a lot of writers get started because agents or publishers notice their work in newspapers or magazines.) The most important element, I think, is good networking. Use the profs you learn from to recommend you, go to writers conferences and meet editors and agents, and so on.
Big issue: Even an excellent self-pubbed book won’t get noticed without a lot of marketing. Readers wouldn’t be able to find it among the million or so pubbed each year.
–Win
Great article, good information AND fun to read (now, those things don’t always go together, so brava!)
I think that a lot comes down to expectations, planning, expenditure and energy (assuming, hopefully, that the talent is there and that the writing–if reaches the ‘reading public’, will be worthy of being read). Also to accepting a learning curve with a novice’s mind. Personally, I am a life-time writer and a first time novel author, with what I think are reasonable expectations and willingness to do the work. Since I’m doing all that while writing a ‘traditional publishing book’ in another field, on contract and due later this year, I am clearly not against traditional publishing. For this novel, I wasn’t rejected by an agent nor extensively look for one. An agent I know and trust personally was honest about having taken her cupful of new authors for the year and I was not wanting to wait another. I explored my options and made my decision–not because I think this is the way to fast millions (not that I object, if it happens …), but because that’s what I chose to do for this adventure. I think that there is a lot to be said for seeking whatever the path you think is right for you. They key, maybe, being seeking it KNOWINGLY, or at least with open eyes.
Articles like those help a lot with this kind of stuff.
Cool beans, my friends!
(PS chump change for social security sucks)
Thank you for the well-considered comment — particularly great since you are straddling both ends of publishing as many writers are.
Absolutely agree: Understand what’s important to you, figure out how to do it within your budget of time and money and energy, then get down to it. The hard work of it and the discipline of it. Writers can not NOT write, so diving into the pool is a must.
And, you did the best possible thing — you explored your options, gave those options careful consideration in the way they applied to you, and you set your own course. (Check out Lisa’s additions regarding e-publishers and the options they offer. The gears change so quickly.)
Cheers! — Meredith and Win
These are the richest, most fair-minded, in-depth evaluations of the pros and cons of traditional and independent publishing I’ve read. They are a treasure for any author wanting to know which way to go. We are in the hands of experts.
THANK YOU, Richard. We’re doing our damnedest. The next long blog will try to add up the up and down of both sides and maybe help each writer decide for himself. The answer for us is to do both.
Clay Reynolds, a veteran published author and reviewer, brings up critical points. I would like to amplify a few. He notes that cover design is an art and profession in itself. At Amazon, you are given all the tools to design your own cover: you can select from several hundred photos and designs, a vast array of typefaces and colors. But all those resources won’t give you a cover that will both evoke the contents and sell the book. There are some cover colors, orange for example, that don’t sell well. Look at your bookshelf of hardcover books, and see what colors predominate, what colors are largely absent. you need to know these things.
Within a publishing house there are professionals devoted to making your book attractive. There are cover designers who know enough to use large type for the title, designers who know better than to use a sans serif type for a serious work of fiction, publicists who know how to set up readings and publicity interviews, sales people who know the tastes of the buyers for booksellers and distributors. (On many of my book tours, the primary object was to meet the buyers who stocked the shelves and spinner racks, not the public.)
His point is that a body of skilled professionals, including editors, copy editors, proof readers, cover designers, book body designers, publicists, sales personnel, know how to turn your story, your manuscript, into a marketable and attractive commodity.
One of the problems with electronic publishing is that your book vanishes into a vast swamp, and you will be lucky to sell your $2.99 opus to your family and friends. There is an unintended sales psychology at work here. When you put a cheap price on your book, you are telling the public it isn’t worth much. You think you’ll sell a lot of books or establish yourself as an author if you put a ninety-nine cent price on your book, but all you’re doing is giving the potential buyer an opportunity to dismiss it. I have republished many of my reverted titles as e-books, and set the price for all of them at about mass-market levels, usually $5.99. They never go on sale below that. The price announces that they are worth reading.
Recent New York Times stories have indicated that electronic book sales are flat, and may have peaked, while hardcover, trade paper, and mass market are holding their own or expanding. Electronic publication is an established medium, like the others, but it is not likely to drive print out of business. There are plenty of buyers who want a tangible product, not an ephemeral one that can vanish from their reader at the press of a button. And that brings up an interesting prospect: the self-publication of trade paperback books through CreateSpace, or similar printers. It might be the better way to self-publish if you have the requisite skills, but the price is high. That is what vanity presses do, sometimes rather well but more often not.
Mr. Reynolds is saying that a large body of professional skills go into the creation of a book, skills far beyond what most authors command, skills evolved over a professional lifetime. I certainly agree.
THANKS, Richard. You and Clay are wise heads who have a lot to contribute.
We’re delighted that this is turning into such a back-and-forth discussion. That’s what the Pro Writers Blog is intended to be.
–win and Meredith
I hate to always be the one to pour cold water on well-informed enthusiasm for Independent Publishing and e-publishing, but I fear that the role of Devil’s Advocate seems to find me more than I like. I know Win and Meredith have done their homework, and they also have a strong respect for I- and E-publishing. Their information is valuable. But in my opinion, it is not something that a novice writer should go into lightly or without considerable funds in the bank to support the enterprise. The grim fact is that for most who do, about all they realize is a great deal of expenditure with no satisfactory result. Just to look at a few specifics:
–Putting your book out before the reading public immediately. Sure, that would seem to be the case; the problem comes with the phrase, “reading public.” Are they also a book-buying public.? And how are they going to find your book? If you have no reputation as a writer, why would they Google your name or seek your titles out, even on amazon.com or some other on-line book selling site? If you’re being handled by an established e-book publisher of some kind, who will know that they exist, and among the possibly hundreds of titles they may offer on their website, what will direct anyone to yours? It’s sort of like painting a portrait, then sealing it up in a crate, then putting it out behind your house with a “Good Art for Sale” sign on it, then expecting somebody to buy it. Actually, that might be more effective in attracting customers. Simply put, if the book isn’t reviewed and publicized, no one will know it exists, so the “reading public” won’t read it. By and large, except for other on-line sites that only a relative handful of people knows exist, no one will review an e-book, at least not yet.
–You make all production decisions yourself. The problem here is that most authors are not artists or graphic designers, and even those who do have some talent in that area aren’t necessarily the best arbiters of what will attract the attention of a book-buyer. Book design is a profession and an art in and of itself, and few scribblers have a notion of what goes into it. Selection of everything from paper color to font size, chapter heading presentation, and other elements of design are traditionally made by the publishing house with little or no input from the writer. They make mistakes, sure; but they’re interest is in selling books, not in satisfying ego; therefore, their interests are served by making the product appealing in a highly competitive market. They consult with people whose sole job it is to study marketing and to survey what works and what doesn’t in terms of packaging and marketing. That’s a hard thing for most writers to know how to do, even if they have the equipment and background to do the design themselves. Even title selection can be problematic and is often subject to change if the publisher thinks that the proposed title might not be a good marketing tool.
You may call yourself an author. You can call yourself an astronaut, too, if it makes you feel good. But you’re probably not one if you’ve never been into space. You can call yourself a professional athlete, but you don’t get there by getting free golf because you marshal at a local course. You can call yourself just about anything you want; in my view, though, you’re not an author until you’ve published something that someone has paid you to publish. The payment needn’t be large, needn’t even be in cash; it can be merely that they’ve paid to produce the product, the book, as in paying a book designer to bring it to production or, at the least, bearing the cost of copy-editing and printing and distribution. If the writer pays for all that, then who has endorsed the book to certify that it’s worth publishing in the first place?
E-book do sell for less than hard-bounds. This is true. But royalties are also less. And to sell anything at all, you need book buyers to purchase the volume, and for retail prices. A well-qualified techy can download an e-book and then copy and share it with thousands of people if he/she wants. It’s not legal. Neither is recording a football game, movie or television show, then asking people to come over and watch it if they bring food or drink. But this is done all the time. But again, all of this depends on the “reading public” to be aware that your book exists, that you exist. You may say, “I write; therefore I am.” I’d reply, “My books sell; therefore, I am known.” Many established writers with legitimate presses publish books under their well-known names that don’t sell, either. Indeed, this is more often the case than isn’t; but, at least, the writer has been paid to write it.
There are outfits that will help you. Sure, again. They’ll design your book, help you with editing, do all the other production work….for a fee. Legitimate publishers do this at their own cost. They also pay an advance against royalty to the writer. The writer does not pay for any of this.
Do e-books work? Sure. There a many, hundreds and hundreds and more each day that find an audience and success. Some get movie options and residual rights sales of all kinds. No question about it. They win awards and attract attention. This is all true. But it’s also true that every day somebody in Vegas puts a dollar down, hits a number and walks away with tens of thousands of bucks in winnings. It happens all the time. Has it happened to anyone you know? How often? Think about that. The odds are probably better in Vegas.
–The real problem comes when the writer has had no luck finding a legitimate publisher for his/her manuscript, maybe not even agency representation, even after many, many submissions. So they turn to e-publishing or independent publishing to offer their book to the “reading public” something that no publishing house or agent in the country was interested in doing. If it was a product–say furniture–that some craftsman made but could find no outlet willing to buy to sell, even on consignment, at a retail level, and the craftsman then just decided to rent a storefront and market it himself, most people would say he was chasing after a fool’s errand. It’s possible that his style would catch on on its own, become fashionable and even highly desirable. it’s also likely that after six month’s overhead, he’ll go broke. Examples to the contrary (The Weedeater’s inventor comes to mind.), it remains true that if a dozen agents and/or publishing houses have turned down a book, the question has to be asked if there’s something wrong with the book. (This isn’t always true, of course; see William Kennedy’s IRONWEED on this point; of course, Kennedy also knew Saul Bellow, who knew….well, that’s the point, isn’t it?) Going ahead and spending a great deal of money to get it produced, even as an e-book, may not have a salubrious result. The odds are, actually, in favor of disappointment.
The authors of this blog have published an extraordinary number of books. So have the writers they mention–Nichols, Anaya, etc.–but those writers published with legitimate publishing houses. Chances are that if they published an e-book, they would find success with it, because they have an audience, a following, people who would seek out their newest titles as a matter of course. They’re also extraordinarily talented, proven artistic writers whose works have won international acclaim. Their success represents a goal for any writer to shoot for; but insofar as I know, there is no short-cut to such a goal. There is only hard-work, patience and perseverance, a large measure of luck, and a huge measure of acknowledged talent. There is no “get-rich quick” scheme I know of that works–even illegal ones–for everyone or really for most anyone. There is no “get-famous-as-a-writer” scheme that works, either. Best thing to do is keep writing, keep submitting, keep hoping that success will reward the effort. Doing it yourself may merely lead one to loss, disappointment, frustration, and a nagging sense that you might well have left the title to your car at home when you last visited Vegas.
Clay, HUGE THANKS for all this. What you say is legit.
You’re right–e-publishing probably works better for older, established writers than for the young people who are eager to try it. Reason? The older writers have names readers know and will search for.
Thanks for the comment about calling yourself an “author” or an astronaut. We have a personal slant on this. “Author” is a claim of social status, and thus pretentious. “Writer” refers to a person who does a job of work, a carpenter with words. Self-publishing without selling, to our mind, doesn’t entitle anyone to dub himself an “author.”
I’m puzzled by your statement that e-book royalties are less than hardback royalties. As you know, HB royalties on the first 5,000 copies are well-established at 10%. Amazon pays a 70% royalty on books priced between $2.99 and $9.99. Big diff.
Mainly, Clay, THANKS FOR CONTRIBUTING TO THE CONFAB
–win and Meredith
I agree with what you say. There is a lot of crap out there, both in the indie world and traditional world. So I would call it an even playing field PROVIDED that you get pro editing and formatting – including a cover – for your book(s). That does cost. I know – I’ve done it. One of my friends indie published a series of books on a very obtuse subject (demonolatry) and after 3 years was clearing over 6 figures. It CAN be done. BUT as the blog says, you have to put in the hours, work, and dollars. http://www.bookbaby.com is a great site to get formatting for all platforms and provides other low-cost, but valuable, resources. Many “big” publishers have a self publishing imprint – for example, Penguin has book country (www.bookcountry.com). Lightning Source – which was taken over by Ingram – does POD (print on demand) books in either e-book, hardcover, or softcover formats. Alexanders printing out of Utah or Idaho does a great job with physical books and their prices are much lower than Lightning Source. Lightning Source is pretty pricey, though, but you get the distribution.depending on your contract. Even Ingram itself is jumping on the indie bandwagon. Lulu used to be the “in” house for indies as my friend, S.J. Reisner, would tell you, But since Lulu invaded the market, their prices went up as other, less pricey, companies like bookbaby arrived with a bang. If you want a free way to market test your manuscript, you can join http://www.authonomy.com and throw yourselves to the wolves. The end goal of that is to get enough recommendations to receive a reading by a big house editor. But they are hardcore critics on that site and the great part of it is that it is all anonymous. I received many good suggestions. The grammar police troll the amazon and Barnes and Noble indie titles and WILL publicly rip you if they find even a typo, so be aware that the waters are full of sharks. If you enjoy a good swim, go for it. I enjoy the ride and even started a publishing company, Village Green Press, to have better control over my product. When my novel, Lords of War, about the early Tudors,it was selling in Britain and it did NOT get ripped I knew I had done something right. Best advice: tell yourself, “I can do this!” Then, make it so.
Lisa, THANKS for all the terrific info about the companies that help indie publishers along. And for your “best advice” at the end, BRAVO, BRAVO, BRAVO.
win and meredith
Ms. Adams, I’m not afraid of wolves, but I checked Authonomy.com and I’d like to learn your impressions and experience with it before I throw myself and my manuscript to it. My genre is historical fiction set in the gold rush era (1860s). My story is a based on a true incident that has been dealt with many times as non-fiction but not as fiction. It’s in the editing and refining stage now.
I searched unsuccessfully for a wolf-thread to throw myself to. Is there a place me on Authonomy?
Authonomy is throwing yourself to the wolves because it is actually a competition to get an editor from – I forget which big publishing house – to review the book. That said, there is a lot of recommending and liking and whatnot that is “fake.” BUT the flip side is that many of the author/reviewers DO give brutally-honest assessments of story, plot, editing, etc. Since you don’t know anyone, I found it a good sounding board for a title when it had either been edited or just to vet the story idea with the public. I joined in…..gee…2009 or so – when it first started – and it was new and different. It was vaguely catty sometimes but I always found useful comments amidst the chaff.
Here I would like to say something that we believe:
Everything is fiction. It is all seen from the viewpoint of the storyteller. How writers change facts (what exactly are those?), bend them, ignore them, make them LARGE — all of that is creating a story.An example to clarify: Let’s pretend I am going to write a book about George Washington. I visit his home. I go to Philly, to his farm, etc. (I go to many cities.) I see the bed that George Washington slept in. I dig through archives. I have arm-wrestling matches with scholars over dusty library books. I have, at least, 10,000 bits of archival material to choose from.
What do I leave out? When I make that decision the story becomes as much about me as it does George Washington. He may even become somewhat incidental.
We will admit it — we have an ax to grind on this front. We have heard, and so many times, “Oh, I only read non-fiction.” And the way people state it as if they are too remarkable to read fiction.
Are we too remarkable to be transported with words, feelings, sensations, and seasons? All those things that are not supposed to appear in a work of non-fiction unless there is a first-hand account of George Washington writing about his sense of autumn?
Enough, but you get the drift.
Meredith