Tag: indie publishing

Are Hardcover Books on Life Support?

One of the reasons writers give for wanting a real, live, honest-to-goodness contract with a traditional publisher is that they want to see their work in hardcover. Paperbacks are all very fine, but there’s nothing like the heft of a hardcover to make you feel like you’ve arrived. Or so I hear.

Anyway, the point is that it used to be a given: if you got an agent and signed on with one of the Big Five, you were guaranteed that your book would be in print in some form or fashion, usually hardcover followed by paperback. But Publishers Weekly reported this week that as the number of brick-and-mortar bookstores dwindle, and as e-books become more popular, agents are beginning to see this change – to the point that eventually, a dead-tree edition may not be guaranteed. Continue reading “Are Hardcover Books on Life Support?”

Who or What is New Publisher House?

I just love big numbers, don’t you? Especially when they have a dollar sign in front of them. Take this one: $52 billion. A good-sized number, wouldn’t you say? I mean, if you took 52 billion dollar bills and stretched them end-to-end, they would reach…um…a really long way. (Liberal arts major here, okay?)

Why my fixation on this number? A new, and somewhat mysterious, company called New Publisher House featured it prominently it in the executive summary of “State of Independence 2014,” its report on indie publishing: “The self-publishing book market in the US currently represents over $52 billion in untapped revenue. This is twice the size of the established mainstream book publishing market’s total annual sales revenue.” Continue reading “Who or What is New Publisher House?”

Fences Schmences—Why Going Indie Was Easy

Lately I’ve seen several comments in other forums where an unpublished writer mentions they’re not sure if they should self-publish or go the traditional route. As an indie writer who has friends in both camps, I realized that their indecision was due to a lack of knowledge of each process.

Now, before all you experienced indie (and traditional) authors excoriate me with your “How the heck can a writer STILL be on the fence about this?” I want to remind everyone that they were newbies once and there’s a whole lotta information out there, some good, and some that smell worse than crab guts left in the garbage for longer than five minutes on a hot day (yes, I left them in the house overnight and yes, we almost had to move).

In an effort to help make this decision easier, I’ve listed some important considerations when contemplating whether you should go indie or try the trad route. Continue reading “Fences Schmences—Why Going Indie Was Easy”

LynneQuisition: Juliette Sobanet

Interviews by Lynne CantwellAt the beginning of the month, I grilled former indie author Jodi McIsaac about her experience working for Amazon and its 47 North imprint. This week, it’s Juliette Sobanet’s turn. She, too, started out as an indie, and has been picked up by Amazon’s Montlake Romance imprint. So far, they have published four of her books, with a fifth, Honeymoon in Paris, on the way. Continue reading “LynneQuisition: Juliette Sobanet”