November 18, 2008
Like most organizations in the publications business, we’ve been intrigued by the Kindle, Amazon’s portable reading screen.
Did you know you can publish a book on Kindle right now? Go to Amazon’s Digital Text Platform for instructions. There is no charge up front—not a penny.
It’s all up to you
You’ll find a lot of options for upload format (including plain text, PDF, and Word), but Amazon recommends you go for optimal readability by formatting in HTML. For most writers, this requires hiring a graphic designer for about $85 an hour. Total design budget will depend on number and complexity of illustrations plus other design elements, such as sidebars.
On the other hand, a print publisher will typically design your book, although usually to their own specifications, not yours. Vanity presses—“self publishers” like iUniverse—do as much design as you’ll pay for. Their default design tends to be utilitarian, with narrow margins so as to minimize paper costs.
A better deal—maybe
With Kindle, you set your own list price, of which Amazon will pay you a royalty of 35 percent.
That’s considerably better than you’re likely to get from a print publisher, who will offer anywhere from 6 to 15 percent of list price, depending on the type of book (according to Richard Curtis in How to Be Your Own Literary Agent). Of course, if you self-publish using a vanity press, royalties are whatever you can negotiate with the outlets you persuade to distribute your book.
Kindle is sounding pretty competitive, right? But before you rush in, read the Terms and Conditions: distribution rights cannot be revoked, which means a traditional publisher probably won’t be interested in the material (they usually want exclusive rights).
At present, traditional publishers offer access to a much larger consumer base. If you sell your book on Kindle, you can only sell to people with Kindles. Although at least one analyst predicts there will be 2.2 million Kindles out there by 2010, right now there are fewer than 200,000.
Furthermore, some print publishers support promising writers with good editing and promotion. But don’t count on it. The truth, as revealed in excruciating detail by New York magazine, is that’s usually not the case anymore, except for a few favored books. If yours is not one of those marked as a potential blockbuster, you’re not likely to get much attention.
Even if you publish with an established house, you’ll probably have to do your own promotion, and your own editing. For the latter, some in our office have had good experiences with the consulting services offered by iUniverse.
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November 20th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
No matter which route you take, writing a book is a money-losing proposition for all but a lucky few. But you leave out what’s probably the best solution these days: become your own publisher. If you work with a savvy, experienced designer (like myself: shameless plug) you can produce something that is physically indistinguishable from what the big houses produce (if you’re willing to make the commitment and have a designer you can trust to do it right). You need to pay upfront for the design and printing, but you get to keep all the income from what you sell, and can leverage your book freely across all media, including Kindle and print-on-demand, without surrendering rights. And since even with a big house you generally need to arrange your own editing and promotion, all you’re really giving up is the publisher’s distribution arm, which can make it hard to get into the bookstores. But you can sell on Amazon, on your website, and out of the trunk of your car. Anyway, a pretty good book on the subject is “The Complete Guide to Successful Publishing,” by Avery Cardozo.
December 2nd, 2008 at 8:33 am
[...] reading device, Kindle, and its pro’s and con’s versus traditional print publication. His comment chided us for neglecting the self-publishing option and its many advantages for certain writers. As [...]