Getting a book published
By Wanderlaugh
@Wanderlaugh (1622)
Australia
January 2, 2007 12:34am CST
Anybody else having the same problems getting their work published? Spend ages reading submission guidelines and playing post office and sending off reams of paper to get some drab little form letter? I ask because the modern writer works among a sea of middlemen. Publishers don't want to look at anything without an agent attached to it, which means trusting someone you hardly know with your baby. It also means publishers don't even bother to speak directly to the people making their products. I'd really like to hear opinions about this.
1 response
@auburndreams (838)
• United States
6 Jan 07
I find the whole process discouraging, but at least with the Internet we have a lot more options now. And because a lot of publishers will now accept books that are electronically transferred that should cut down on the postage costs.I'm like you. I don't like middlemen. So I'm leaning towards self-publishing, and e-books. For poetry I go to a quick print shop and just have them make 50 or so booklets for me. I sell them at poetry readings and always make my money back. And I trade them to other poets.
My problem is I not only want the book published, I want to use my own photos in it, which rules out a lot of sites that will make you a book like cafepress.com, because they don't have a way to add lots of photos. If I was just doing text, like a novel, I'd take that route though. You can order a book one at a time, and not tie up all your money in having to store stacks of books until you sell them.
But like many writers, I just want to walk into a major bookstore and see my book sitting there for sell along with all the other ones.
1 person likes this
@Wanderlaugh (1622)
• Australia
7 Jan 07
Thank you very much indeed, auburndreams. Poetry's tough at the best of times, so you're achieving more than most.
Actually, I'm finding e-books a lot more appealing because you can do so much more. What I eventually want to do is something like an e-version of the Book Of Kells, because I do a series of books about some Celtic immortals, and in print that sort of artwork is rough on printers and rougher on production costs.
Point well made. I'd love to get some more feedback from this large collection of writers we have here on mylot, so thank you again for the effort and useful info.
The independent e-publishers are a mess these days, and I'm inclined to think that it's going to be up to us to get the medium working and up to speed with the internet audience.
I think they're undercapitalised, and the promotions I've seen are pretty lousy marketing. (I actually knocked back three contracts in three days. Be good to see one of the majors take up the baton, and stop killing all those trees.
