Self-publishing: Risky Inky Business
Lulu’s (www.lulu.com) virtually free print-on-demand publishing model is unique. Other companies offer a self-publishing service online that gives authors far more control of the look and feel of their published books. There is, however, a cost.
Grosvenor House (www.selfpublishing.co.uk) will publish a book for £495, including typesetting, five “free” copies and a basic marketing package. Proofreading is extra, at 35p per 100 words. Writersworld (www.writersworld.co.uk) charges up to £1,998 for a package that includes a night in a hotel to go through the final proof. Other companies offering similar services include authorhouse.com, which charges £525 and will help authors to get an ISBN number for their books, as well as give them guidance on design.
Lulu uses technology to enable authors to upload their work, feature it on a dedicated web page and have it printed. Authors pay for any copies of the book they buy, and Lulu takes a 20 per cent commission when other people buy the book. Authors must supply their manuscript ready to print, in the correct format and sized to fit Lulu’s templates.
There are only a few high-profile examples of self-publishing success. The Yorkshire vicar G. P. Taylor’s self-published Shadowmancer books were picked up by Faber and are now bestsellers. Jill Paton Walsh was nominated for the Booker Prize for Knowledge of Angels, which she published privately after repeated rejections from commercial publishers.
These are the exceptions, however, and many authors make no money from self-published work. According to Publishers Weekly, of the 18,108 titles published by the American self-publishing company iUniverse in 2004, only 14 were on sale in Barnes & Noble and only 83 sold more than 500 copies. You are more likely to have success marketing your book if it has a small, easily targeted audience - one concentrated in a particular location, or that can be reached through specialist magazines or websites, for example.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/article738410.ece
Grosvenor House (www.selfpublishing.co.uk) will publish a book for £495, including typesetting, five “free” copies and a basic marketing package. Proofreading is extra, at 35p per 100 words. Writersworld (www.writersworld.co.uk) charges up to £1,998 for a package that includes a night in a hotel to go through the final proof. Other companies offering similar services include authorhouse.com, which charges £525 and will help authors to get an ISBN number for their books, as well as give them guidance on design.
Lulu uses technology to enable authors to upload their work, feature it on a dedicated web page and have it printed. Authors pay for any copies of the book they buy, and Lulu takes a 20 per cent commission when other people buy the book. Authors must supply their manuscript ready to print, in the correct format and sized to fit Lulu’s templates.
There are only a few high-profile examples of self-publishing success. The Yorkshire vicar G. P. Taylor’s self-published Shadowmancer books were picked up by Faber and are now bestsellers. Jill Paton Walsh was nominated for the Booker Prize for Knowledge of Angels, which she published privately after repeated rejections from commercial publishers.
These are the exceptions, however, and many authors make no money from self-published work. According to Publishers Weekly, of the 18,108 titles published by the American self-publishing company iUniverse in 2004, only 14 were on sale in Barnes & Noble and only 83 sold more than 500 copies. You are more likely to have success marketing your book if it has a small, easily targeted audience - one concentrated in a particular location, or that can be reached through specialist magazines or websites, for example.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/article738410.ece