Publishing Advice

[InvidiaRed]

I do want to publish someday and I don’t want to go into this half-cocked.

Any thoughts? Tips? Advice? Any site or resource I should avoid?

Hints on where to start?

[Desiderius Price]

Second this, especially with the alphabet soup some of us make with the story tags, this would be useful to know for those of us looking to publish or self-publish.

[Anesor]

Some authors of different genres go over their business trials and tribulations in their blogs. I follow Jim C. Hines, Holly Lisle, and Judith Knight, though if you can at convention panels you will hear more entertaining stories.  If there is a professional organization, find their site and see if they have advice for that genre or a new writer program. I know of RWA (romance writers of America which has many face to face chapters), SFWA science fiction, along with mystery and horror.

The SFWA operates Writer beware website and blog where they track best practices and the bad actors. It’s co sponsored by the other groups mentioned above and is very educational.

More people than Writer beware track major events/scandals like the way the erotic publisher Elora’s Cave just stopped paying promptly after sales. (that is the usual thing before a pub goes belly up). This the the blog of one savvy reporter, but just google or bing the company name and problems. Small presses seem to collectively have fairly short lifespans, so do your research and get help to understand the fine print of contracts. (Writer beware has a lot on recommended contracts)

I’ve self-pubbed some short stories through createspace and kindle, and sold some, but marketing is a bit beyond me. I really need a second eye on the two books I have in trunks that I’d like to send to a publisher. (SF still has a tradition of accepting on solicited novels, unlike other genrea)  Good luck.

[BronxWench]

I can only speak to my own experience, which was being published via a small press with a targeted readership (LGBTQ). The original owners of the press are tremendous people, authors themselves, and I absolutely adore them. They sold the press, though, and the new owners were not as dedicated to readers or authors. The press is gone now, and I’m the process of having my stories republished with another press.

I have never self-published, so I’ll let those with more experience speak to that, but I can tell you why I went the small press route.

First, identify the publishers in your genre. Don’t pitch a slash romance to a het-oriented publisher. Keep in mind most publishers won’t touch pedophilia, incest, rape for titillation, necrophilia, bestiality, or stories that discriminate against a particular group. Some won’t want graphic sex. Most want happy-ever-after or happy-for-now endings.

One of the keys to being successfully published is a polished, edited, proofread manuscript. One of the biggest mistakes people make is thinking they can self-edit, or that their dear friend who beta-reads their fan fiction is going to make a terrific editor. What you need is a professional editor, especially when you’re new to publishing, and it can get expensive out of pocket. A good editor makes sure you don’t leave loose ends, that your chronology makes sense, and characters don’t change names mid-scene.

Same thing with the proofreader, who looks for the technical stuff like punctuation, verb tense agreement, and all that good grammar stuff. They aren’t as expensive as editors only because they don’t spend as much time with your manuscript.

There’s cover art, and the ISBN numbers, which aren’t very expensive if you buy them in bulk, but most of us aren’t going to purchase them that way. Ten ISBNs can cost $125, and you need a separate ISBN for ebook and paperback editions.

Many publishers will send books out for review, and maintain relationships with review sites and blogs for their genre, and some even take out banner ads. But most small presses expect you to help market your book actively.

Publishers provide those services for you, and in return, they keep a portion of the royalties from each sale. Given that the publisher’s just spent good money on the gamble my book will sell and return their investment, I’m very happy to share royalties, and tweet my ass off, blog, and even buy a banner ad myself. 

Just read your contract carefully, and don’t be afraid to ask about anything that isn’t clear to you. Are you contracting for ebook rights only, or print rights? For how long with the contract run? Most are two to three years. Make sure you understand how to have your rights revert to you, if necessary. Investigate how royalties are paid, and how often. Third party sellers pay the publisher, who pays you, and that means those monies lag compared to a direct publisher website sale. How often do you get royalty reports? How are you paid: by check or Paypal or other means? Get in touch with other authors who publish with that small press, and ask how they like the publisher.

[InvidiaRed]

2 hours ago, Anesor said:

Some authors of different genres go over their business trials and tribulations in their blogs. I follow Jim C. Hines, Holly Lisle, and Judith Knight, though if you can at convention panels you will hear more entertaining stories.  If there is a professional organization, find their site and see if they have advice for that genre or a new writer program. I know of RWA (romance writers of America which has many face to face chapters), SFWA science fiction, along with mystery and horror.

The SFWA operates Writer beware website and blog where they track best practices and the bad actors. It’s co sponsored by the other groups mentioned above and is very educational.

More people than Writer beware track major events/scandals like the way the erotic publisher Elora’s Cave just stopped paying promptly after sales. (that is the usual thing before a pub goes belly up). This the the blog of one savvy reporter, but just google or bing the company name and problems. Small presses seem to collectively have fairly short lifespans, so do your research and get help to understand the fine print of contracts. (Writer beware has a lot on recommended contracts)

I’ve self-pubbed some short stories through createspace and kindle, and sold some, but marketing is a bit beyond me. I really need a second eye on the two books I have in trunks that I’d like to send to a publisher. (SF still has a tradition of accepting on solicited novels, unlike other genrea)  Good luck.

Writer Beware sounds ominous.

Is there a difference between e-book publishing and regular?

[Anesor]

Writer beware is to warn and advise writers about scams and sharks, from vanity presses and small publishers and agents who have already turned to the dark side.

Ebook publishing is faster, and you get a larger share of the money the reader throws in for your story. That and self publishing often overlap. BW’s advice for small press is better there. Large house/traditional publishing is more likely to include editing, cover, and publicity, but it’s not a guarantee anymore.

I simply cannot afford an editor, so I’m up a creek.

[InvidiaRed]

38 minutes ago, Anesor said:

Writer beware is to warn and advise writers about scams and sharks, from vanity presses and small publishers and agents who have already turned to the dark side.

Ebook publishing is faster, and you get a larger share of the money the reader throws in for your story. That and self publishing often overlap. BW’s advice for small press is better there. Large house/traditional publishing is more likely to include editing, cover, and publicity, but it’s not a guarantee anymore.

I simply cannot afford an editor, so I’m up a creek.

thank you for clarification and thank you for information.

[BronxWench]

Large house/traditional publishing can be harder if you don’t have an agent as well. They tend to not accept unsolicited manuscripts, although certain houses in the SF/Fantasy genre will accept manuscripts from authors without an agent.

Generally, ebook sales are more profitable all around. Most small publishers will pay anywhere from 30-45% of the royalties to the author for ebook sales, depending on whether or not the ebook was purchased from their website or from a third-party seller like Amazon. Third-party sellers charge a small fee to the publisher, and that’s passed along to the author in the form of a slight dip in the royalty, but many people prefer buying via those third party sellers.

Physical books generally pay a percentage of the net royalties, after the cost of printing the book, and that number is much smaller.The press I’m working with now pays 12% of the cover price, less returns. My prior publisher paid 25% of net royalties. It will vary by publisher, but ebooks tend to bring in more money for the author. That’s been my experience, anyway.

[Anesor]

Lois McMaster Bujold, multi-Hugo winner, just answered on this on Goodreads for established writer.

 

[InvidiaRed]

56 minutes ago, Anesor said:

Lois McMaster Bujold, multi-Hugo winner, just answered on this on Goodreads for established writer.

 

And how do you become established?

[Anesor]

This was more to show the numbers a published writer with many books gets. I get numbers similar to this (30-70% depending on format) but she sells a LOT more than my handful. She sells thousands of copies. Established is colloquial for multiple books in print from big publisher, multiple major awards in the field like Hugo and Nebula, and is well known enough for active fanbase and steady sales..

[BronxWench]

There are also authors in the small press venue who’d be considered established, and by that, we would mean submissions get accepted quickly, senior editors handle those manuscripts, the author has a large number of books and/or stories in publication, and has an active fanbase. But by and large, the term has come to mean the authors whose books are labeled “Bestseller” on the shelves of brick and mortar stores.