Hot answers tagged self-publishing
11
All that readers care about is that you present them with a well-crafted compelling story. Length is of minimal importance. Some of the best written and most memorable stories have well below 60- or even 50,000 words. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Of Mice and Men, Slaughterhouse Five, Fight Club, and The Great Gatsby all have less than 60k words ...
9
Unlike the other answers, let me try to give you a practical, nuts and bolt answer.
When you go to self-publish your book, either as an ebook(Amazon, Kobo, etc) or print(Createspace etc), you are asked to give an author name. This field is not automatically filled based on your registered name. So you can fill in any name you want in the author field.
This ...
5
Short answer: No. You are supposed to register only the "best edition" with the copyright office. They have a long list of criteria for what constitutes the best edition, but it's things like a hard cover takes precedence over a paperback. See http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ07b.pdf
5
Is your goal to actually hide your identity? Like you're advocating the violent overthrow of the government and you don't want the police to track you down? Or maybe more realistically, you're afraid your writing might interfere with business relationships, like you don't want co-workers to know that you're writing sex novels? Or is it that you think a ...
5
It's been several years since I investigated alternatives, but I think your main choices are:
Create Space: low cost, minimal start-up fees (I think now the only up-front cost you have to pay is the cost of proofs, which depends on size, color, etc but would be on the order of $30). Now owned by Amazon so you can sell through Amazon very easily. They don't ...
5
You can hire a literary agent if you have an offer from a publisher and need someone to negotiate the contract. But for that it's cheaper to hire a literary lawyer.
First question: Why do you want to hire an agent? You have already published your book. It's available for free on your website.
Do you want to make money with your book? Then why have you ...
4
Do not add unnecessary filler to your book. I agree with @Lauren, @Jed and @Standback here, but let me add one thing, because you want to self-publish: the price of your book.
Length may be arbitrary, but prices are arbitrary, too. Most people expect a certain price for a certain page/word count. Or at least to pay less for a 40k novel than for a 60k one.
...
3
I think that a company "that acts like a publishing house" but has no other corporate activity is a (small) publishing house.
The one obvious benefit will be if you are successful promoting and selling your own books, then you could take on other authors using the same systems and become a larger publishing house.
Since this question is almost exclusively ...
3
Probably not a professional one.
All agents are hired - they take a percentage of whatever contracts they get you (or which they negotiate for you). You're asking if you can pay extra for an agent to represent an author or an MS which they'd otherwise turn down.
Here's the thing: an agent represents what s/he thinks s/he can sell. If they don't want to ...
3
Going on the assumption that you are talking about an e-book, I would say that the number of words doesn't matter as much, especially if you make sure that your potential readers know what they are getting in advance. My experience has been that more and more readers are starting to feel slighted if they spend $5.99 on a story they assumed to be a novel, ...
3
You're quite correct in your assumption that digital publishing removes a lot of the necessity of typical length categories. Here's some things to bear in mind when coming to a decision.
There's no restriction except "what works well for the story." Traditional publishing is bound by all sorts of restrictions and best-practices - printing costs, shelf ...
2
Publishers can do all of the things you identified in your list for you, but the degree of commitment that they apply to each will vary based on a number of factors. If they believe that you have a truly commercial product that has the potential to reach a very large fan base, they will devote more time and resources towards making your book successful.
...
2
I see this question is over 2 years old so you've probably already made a decision and gone one way or the other, but for the benefit of others who come along:
There are three issues to consider:
Getting your book physically printed.
Getting your book listed in on-line sellers, like Amazon and Barnes & Noble's website.
Marketing your book.
Getting ...
2
This is a difficult question to answer because an awful lot depends on your own personal expectations of what you expect a proofreader to achieve.
Having said that, a good proofreader should find all mistakes in a proofed draft, no mistakes should be acceptable; otherwise, what are you paying them for?
On the other hand, in my experience (and in my ...
2
You're working with a human so you'll usually be disappointed if you expect perfection. But as the author you are right to have high standards.
There are proofreading techniques, such as breaking up chapters and long paragraphs so errors stand out. Perhaps your proofreader is early in their career, perhaps not.
Instinctively I'd suggest a few rounds of ...
2
I think the confusion may be coming from the degree title. It may be that the Master by Research is a masters degree based on existing ( or ongoing ) published research, which is possible, but implies existing published research.
Research Publications mean peer-reviewed and published research work, in a set of standard journals (in IT, the ACM is the worlds ...
2
You can put anything you want as the name on the front cover and the name listed as the author of the work. However, as the publisher of the work, it's recommended that you use your real name, as this will allow you to establish that you are in fact the owner of the rights to publish and use that work.
Another option is to establish yourself as doing ...
2
Copyright applies the moment given work is solidified on a medium - the registration is not necessary at all providing that you have any reliable proof that you are the author. (you do have the copyright but the court is not omniscent, you need some way to show that you do.)
Registering with the Copyright Office only serves as such a proof, and a very solid ...
2
There are a few organizations that focus on getting new authors introduced to more readers, the one I am mainly associated with is http://bookhubinc.wordpress.com/ . Basically contact them and say that you're a writer having writen a new free book and would like help getting it known. They normally respond quickly. You don't have to use them or feel ...
2
I am doing exactly that. I created my own publishing company, which to date has published exactly one book. (My first book was published before I created this company, and I'm working on my third now.) The main reason I did this was so I could create my own imprint, i.e. publisher name and logo. It is also helpful -- I'm not sure if it's absolutely necessary ...
1
It's a sign of a poor writer if they have to use color and weird visual hints and the likes to express nuances of the scene on regular basis. There are writers who can use that skillfully and for real impact (bows to sir Pratchett with his full-page "YES") but even they use it sparingly - or all the impact will be lost.
Thing is, if you go into too ...
1
I only can give you a German perspective, but I could imagine that you face the same issues in other countries (like the US).
You can use a pen name as author, that is no problem at all. But as publisher it as a different matter.
Besides copyright and royalty payments (which shouldn't be a problem), there is the right of the readers to be considered. ...
1
Perfection is a very difficult standard to achieve.
I think the more practical standards are:
At what point does the number of errors in the text become distracting to the reader? Ten typos or grammar errors in a 66,000 word novel doesn't sound to me like something that would be really annoying.
What is typical in the industry? What's the average number ...
1
In response to your question, the answer generally is "no". You can attempt to hire an agent to represent you, but the agent has the right to refuse if they don't feel you have anything they can actually sell. Your first priority, therefore, would be to make sure you have something to sell.
I can appreciate the fact that you have gone to the trouble to ...
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