This past Christmas, Amazon reported that for the first time ever, they sold more e-books than paper books. Other published reports suggest that there are six Kindle books sold now for every ten physical books, and the gap seems to be narrowing every day. So if you've been thinking about converting your paper book to an e-book, now's the time to do it.
There are a number of different sites and publishers and book shepherds and the like who will convert your book to an e-book for you. For a fee, of course. But there are also at least two sites that will convert your book for free! They will also list your book on their online e-book catalog. They will collect the money for your sales. And they will send the money to you on a regular schedule. What do you do? Not much. In fact, once you've completed the conversion process you don't have to do anything. Except put a link on your website and send out some emails announcing the good news. And add the availability to your automatic email signature, too. And, of course, promote the news in as many ways as you can.
All three of my books (CROSSHAIRS, DYING IN DEER COUNTRY and KRAZY KRITTERS OF FLORIDA) are now available as e-books at a site called www.smashwords.com. They do the conversion process for free, list your book, along with a synopsis & cover on their site, and also make your book compatible with all the major eReaders, such as Kindle, Nook, Sony, iPad, etc. They also provide very detailed instructions on how to go about formatting your book to meet their specifications. Smashwords will also get your book listed in a catalog that they distribute to Barnes & Noble, the Apple iPad, and Sony e-book stores.
The Kindle bookstore (www.amazon.com) is, of course, the best known e-book store at the moment. Their conversion process is much simpler than the Smashwords process but the final product is only compatible with the Kindle eReader. Although: Kindle also has free downloadable applications that can make their e-books readable on some of the other eReaders. Two of my three books are now available at the Kindle store. The third one has been delayed because the Kindle folks wanted some sort of written verification that I did, indeed, have the electronic rights to publish my book as an e-book. That required a letter to my publisher for clarification and validation, which I got, and then I forwarded that letter to the Kindle folks. Hopefully, my third book will soon be listed in the Kindle store as well.
That brings me to the final point. To do any of these conversions, you have to own or control the electronic rights for your book. If you've truly published your book yourself (bought the ISBN, did the layout, designed the cover, arranged for the printing, hold the copyright in your name, etc., etc.) you shouldn't have a problem. You still have ALL the rights because you were the author AND publisher. If you went through a traditional publisher, however, or through a POD publisher (like Infinity, AuthorHouse, Xlibris, PublishAmerica, etc.) you need to contact the publisher and make sure you do, indeed, still hold your electronic publishing rights. Some POD publishers will allow you to do your own e-books, some won't. Be safe. Find out for certain before you start the process. Just tell them what you want to do, and flat-out ask them if you, the author and copyright holder, have the electronic rights to publish your book yourself as an e-book. At least you'll know, right up front. This info should be spelled out in your contract as well, but sometimes the legal jargon of publishing contracts is hard for us laymen/laywomen to decipher.
E-books are here to stay, whether we like them or not. Get on board while you can. The train is definitely starting to pull away from the station.
Posted by
Russ Heitz
www.russheitz.com
Showing posts with label Traditional Publishers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Traditional Publishers. Show all posts
Friday, May 28, 2010
Sunday, January 24, 2010
The Slush Pile -- Another Extinct Dinosaur
There was an article in the Wall Street Journal recently, written by Katherine Rosman. The article was about some writers' shiniest dream and gloomiest nightmare. It's that repository of rapidly diminishing hope: the traditional publisher's slush pile. That's the enormous pile of unsolicited manuscripts that publishers and editors -- in the good old days -- waded through in their search for the next BEST SELLER.
Alas, the Slush Pile today is, for all practical purposes, extinct. None of the big traditional publishers will even accept manuscripts unless they come from reputable agents, preferably agents that work out of NYC or LA. And trying to get an agent, as some of us FWA-ers know all too well, is just as hard as trying to hook up with a traditional publisher. That's one of the main reasons so many writers are using independent publishers, or small presses, or POD publishers. They're about the only ones accessible to non-famous writers anymore.
For instance, Katherine Rosman says, 1991 "was the last time Random House, the largest publisher in the U.S., remembers publishing anything found in a slush pile. Today, Random House and most of its major counterparts refuse to accept unsolicited material."
For those of us who are not counting -- 1991 was almost 20 years ago!
Rosman goes on to say, "Book publishers say it is now too expensive to pay employees to read slush that rarely is worthy of publication.
"A primary aim of the slush pile," Rosman continues, "used to be to discover unpublished voices. But today, writing talent isn't necessarily enough. It helps to have a big-media affiliation, or be effective on TV."
Laurence J. Kirshbaum, former CEO of Time Warner Book Group and now an agent says, "From a publisher's standpoint, the marketing considerations ... now often outweigh the editorial ones."
Kirshbaum the agent goes on to say, "We are being more selective in taking on clients because the publishers are demanding much more from the authors than ever before."
Rosman also quotes Jim Levine at Levine Greenberg Literary Agency. "These days, you need to deliver not just the manuscript but the audience ... More and more, the mantra in publishing is 'Ask not what your publisher can do for you, ask what you can do for your publisher.' "
Are things different on the web? Is marketing much easier and quicker and more efficient and effective for writers today?
Rosman says, "In 2008, HarperCollins launched Authonomy.com, a Web slush pile. Writers can upload their manuscripts, readers vote for their favorites, and HarperCollins editors read the five highest-rated manuscripts each month. About 10,000 manuscripts have been loaded so far and Harper Collins has bought 4."
"One slush stalwart," Rosman says, "the Paris Review, has college interns and graduate students in the magazine's Tribeca loft-office read the 1,000 unsolicited works submitted each month. Each story is read by at least two people. If one likes it and the other doesn't it is read by a third ... The [Paris Review] literary journal publishes one piece from the slush pile each year. That leaves each unsolicited submission a .008% chance of rising to the top of the pile."
If you want more bad, but nonetheless realistic news about writing, about traditional publishing, and about slush piles, you can contact the Wall Street Journal's Katherine Rosman at Katherine.rosman@wsj.com.
Posted by
Russ Heitz
http://www.russheitz.com/
Alas, the Slush Pile today is, for all practical purposes, extinct. None of the big traditional publishers will even accept manuscripts unless they come from reputable agents, preferably agents that work out of NYC or LA. And trying to get an agent, as some of us FWA-ers know all too well, is just as hard as trying to hook up with a traditional publisher. That's one of the main reasons so many writers are using independent publishers, or small presses, or POD publishers. They're about the only ones accessible to non-famous writers anymore.
For instance, Katherine Rosman says, 1991 "was the last time Random House, the largest publisher in the U.S., remembers publishing anything found in a slush pile. Today, Random House and most of its major counterparts refuse to accept unsolicited material."
For those of us who are not counting -- 1991 was almost 20 years ago!
Rosman goes on to say, "Book publishers say it is now too expensive to pay employees to read slush that rarely is worthy of publication.
"A primary aim of the slush pile," Rosman continues, "used to be to discover unpublished voices. But today, writing talent isn't necessarily enough. It helps to have a big-media affiliation, or be effective on TV."
Laurence J. Kirshbaum, former CEO of Time Warner Book Group and now an agent says, "From a publisher's standpoint, the marketing considerations ... now often outweigh the editorial ones."
Kirshbaum the agent goes on to say, "We are being more selective in taking on clients because the publishers are demanding much more from the authors than ever before."
Rosman also quotes Jim Levine at Levine Greenberg Literary Agency. "These days, you need to deliver not just the manuscript but the audience ... More and more, the mantra in publishing is 'Ask not what your publisher can do for you, ask what you can do for your publisher.' "
Are things different on the web? Is marketing much easier and quicker and more efficient and effective for writers today?
Rosman says, "In 2008, HarperCollins launched Authonomy.com, a Web slush pile. Writers can upload their manuscripts, readers vote for their favorites, and HarperCollins editors read the five highest-rated manuscripts each month. About 10,000 manuscripts have been loaded so far and Harper Collins has bought 4."
"One slush stalwart," Rosman says, "the Paris Review, has college interns and graduate students in the magazine's Tribeca loft-office read the 1,000 unsolicited works submitted each month. Each story is read by at least two people. If one likes it and the other doesn't it is read by a third ... The [Paris Review] literary journal publishes one piece from the slush pile each year. That leaves each unsolicited submission a .008% chance of rising to the top of the pile."
If you want more bad, but nonetheless realistic news about writing, about traditional publishing, and about slush piles, you can contact the Wall Street Journal's Katherine Rosman at Katherine.rosman@wsj.com.
Posted by
Russ Heitz
http://www.russheitz.com/
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