Traditional Vs. Non Traditional Publishing…. Prepping the Manuscript and Getting the Cover Art

THE FINAL EDITING
As a traditionally published author, the final editing for the manuscript was always a simple project: proofread the copy edited manuscript, see if there were any errors, and then send in whatever errors were found. That was it.

However, Non-Traditional POD publishing requires the YOU, the author, do the final editing, which comprises line editing, copy editing and proofreading. As most writers already know, rereading a manuscript for the umpteenth time doesn’t really work that well. Why, because whatever errors you missed – punctuation, typos, misplaced paragraphs, etc – you will usually miss again, because you are reading what you know so well you don’t usually see the errors.

My solution: Have 4 different people read the manuscript. Not just four people, but people who understand the language and are grammatically “in the know”. ) Finding anal retentive readers is also a plus.)

My choices were an accountant, a lawyer (two very anal retentive types) a friend who is an extremely avid read and my wife. My wife has always been my in-house editor, and for this final version of the manuscript, my wife used a trick we had been taught by one of my editors years ago – to read the manuscript backwards. Reading it backwards does not mean just starting on the last page, but starting with the last word and reading every word from back to front. Why?

The reason to read the manuscript in reverse is elemental. Every word sticks out. You are able to see every misspelling, every wrong spelling (to / too, is / are, new/knew, etc). This helps to make your manuscript more professional.

Once I received the four manuscripts back, I went over each of them, correcting my main manuscript and making sure everything was just the way it should be. Once that was done, all that was left was to set up the opening pages: dedication, acknowledgement, copyright and title pages. This wasn’t as simple as I’d thought.

In order to do the copyright page, I needed to have the novel copyrighted, and to get two ISBN numbers as well as a Library of Congress number (LCCN). BookSurge was there to help, and my publishing Representative explained fully what I needed to do, and what the costs would be. A few days later, I had the ISBN 10, ISBN 13 and my LCCN. My Rep had also explained how to go about getting the novel copyrighted, rather than just using a simple author’s copyright. Once again, following his instructions, I registered online with the U.S. Copyright office and set up my account. I was then able to register “Angels In Mourning” with their Electronic Copyright Office (ECO) System, and file a copy of my manuscript electronically, as opposed to having to send in either the manuscript or wait for a Galley to send them.

My next step was to set up my dedication and the acknowledgement page. Those were easy enough, but I assumed they would appear in a certain order and they did not. The acknowledgement page came first and then the dedication. For some reason, I had thought they would either be on their own page or the acknowledgements would come after the dedication. Assuming that, I’d written something into the acknowledgment that had the dedication, if read first, would have explained. Be that as it may, it was a small enough error that it really didn’t matter to anyone except me.

The title pages and my previous novels page were easily handled and once the manuscript was completed, and set up as the Publishing Representative and the BookSurge instructions called
for, I uploaded it and we were off to the races.

COVER ART
Every Author will tell you what they liked and disliked about every book cover gracing their novels. Very few author’s unless you are a damn good seller, gets to select his/her cover. Usually, the publisher chooses the cover that will best sell the book, according to the way they see the market. Very rarely does that book cover truly reflect the work contained in it. It’s also one of the major pet peeves of midlist authors.

After looking over the BookSurge template covers, and not finding anything I liked, I went over their costs for a custom crated cover, and winced. While their charges for setting up and printing a manuscript were very good, the artwork charges were a bit high (but from my research, I didn’t see anyone with any better art work rates, and quite a few that were higher).

I called a friend and graphic artist, Bonnie Brunt, who I had worked with before and asked her to do the cover. She agreed quickly, and I shipped out a manuscript for her to read. Her charges were much better than the publisher, and after she finished the book and sent me her first impression, I knew it was a winner - she had captured the real 'feel' of the story.

We went through a few revisions, but the artwork stayed the same: It was cover print (Title, author name) and back copy print and photo set up that had to be revised a few times. Once it was ready, and she and my Publishing representative talked specs, she finished the artwork and we sent it in. My book was ready for publishing!

While this was a ton more work then I would have had to do if I’d published traditionally, every minute spent was a good minute. There is something innately wonderful about handling even these tedious tasks when you know they are yours.

THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN IT, BUT….
Needless to say, when my galley arrived, and I read through it, I found four more typos and one sentence that I’d thought I’d changed. Thankfully, proofreading works and I was able to make the last changes and we were finally ready.

My next blog: Have you ever lost an editor? With Non-Traditional Publishing, losing a Publishing Rep is the same thing… Oh boy!

Tradional vs. Non Traditional Publishing.... Taking the Plunge into POD Publishing and Finding a Publisher

STEP ONE- DOING THE RESEARCH

Now that I decided to break with the traditional publishing model, and venture into the world of non-traditional publishing, I began the process of learning which of the non-traditional publishers would best suit me.

There are several major factors that must be considered: The publisher, the methods of book distribution, the online sales sites avenues, the traditional retail brick and mortar sales outlets and the marketing methods available to a POD author.

THE BOOK PUBLISHERS.

While there are several types of non-traditional book publishers available in the non-traditional publishing world, I discounted all but the Print On Demand publishers – Vanity and Subsidiary publishers, who require you buy all copies of the book and then sell them yourself was not for me.

This left Print On Demand as my choice. The choice of Print On Demand publishers was more than I had expected – Roughly, 97 different companies.

Using Google, I found a website that offered the most comprehensive database on Print On Demand Publishers I could find. The database was created by Dehenna Bailee. (http://dehanna.com/) After downloading the database, I began my comparison of the POD publishers. Before I went any further, I queried the list serves on the Mystery Writers of America, The RWA, and spoke to several of my peers in the Author’s Guild as well as several other writers who had gone the POD route. When I was finished, I had a list of a half dozen POD publisher recommendations.

As I wanted to stick with U.S. publishers, if possible, as I felt the shipping costs for the readers would be lower. I further narrowed the list to 4: Lulu, Authors House, iUniverse (which is now owned by Authors House) and BookSurge, which is a subsidiary of Amazon.com.

Then I spent another week calling the various companies (when a number was available) and speaking with their sales people (Most called themselves Author Representatives or Publishing Consultants). When I was finished with the interviewing process – at least that’s what I decided it was for me - for them, I’m sure it was called the sales process – I made my decision based on cost and the openness and willingness to explain the details of their publishing company and processes.

While Lulu seemed to be the easiest of them, and looked inviting, I also considered the overall experiences of the POD companies as well as looking at their online and retail distribution avenues. Author House / IUniverse was very strong, but their initial costs were high and the overall cost of the final product, because of the size of my manuscript for Angels In Mourning, made the end result an expensive book – around $23.00. Although the Author’s Guild uses iUniverse for their Back In Print line, a wonderful program which allows authors who own the rights to their out of print books to have them republished with only a set-up fee, and make them available for purchase online and by special order at bookstores, their costs, as I mentioned earlier, were too high for my taste.

Royalty rates were of concern as well. Traditionally published royalties averaged 6-8% for paperback and 10-12.5% for hardcover. Not a tremendous amount, but when tens of thousands of books are sold, it amounts to a lot more than a hill of beans. With non-traditional publishing, the royalties are much higher, because there is less between you, the writer and the buying public. POD royalties vary from 20% to 40% depending on the publisher. And, to be completely frank, once your book is published, you want to see royalties coming in. Why? For me, there are two major reasons: first and foremost, royalties tell me people are reading my book – which is why I write; and, second, because it helps to pay the bills!

My final decision, again based on all factors listed above, was BookSurge. One fact above all had me leaning toward them. Their Publishing Consultant was straightforward, extremely knowledgeable and seemed to have the interests of his authors in mind. I also liked the fact that they were owned by the online monster retail website, amazon.com. Their costs were reasonable, and their support seemed to be extremely strong. Royalty-wise, they are among the best in higher end royalty percentages.

My next step was to look the contract over. When I did, I found several things that made me feel better about BookSurge. The most important was that I maintained all rights to my book; and, I could cancel the contract whenever I wanted, with 30 days notice. This, I felt, was a very good thing. If I was unhappy with the publishing or sales results, I could move to another publisher. Foreign rights and dramatic rights, which are always a struggle with traditional publishers was a non issue now.

After perhaps twenty more phone calls, all of which my Publishing Representative handled with ease and understanding, I signed the contract and sent it in.
My 33rd novel was on its way to being published, and this time I had control over almost all aspects of it. I would be in charge of the final editing, cover art, the font type, and paper color. It was a good feeling.

And then, of course, came my other thoughts: What in the hell did I know about any of that, other than what I didn’t like in many of the final versions of my previously published novels? Well, I was about to find out.

My Next Blog: Making sure the manuscript was ready; starting the marketing; and, unexpected problems.

To view information about my first Non-Traditionally publshed novel, Angels In Mourning, Click here

Traditional vs. Non Traditional Publishing .... An author's choice

This blog will be the tale of my entry into Non-Traditional Publishing, otherwise known as independent press or more accurately, Print On Demand publishing. I am planning it as a long-term blogging journal, detailing my complete experiences from inception through sales.

As an author, I have published 33 novels, 32 of them with traditional publishers such as Simon & Schuster, Dell, Putnam, Dorchester, Kensington and others.

For a variety of reasons, non-complimentary to the publishing industry, and now well in the past, I took a few years off from writing and publishing. When I finally to writing and publishing, the industry had changed.

In today’s publishing world, the agent is King ( or Queen) and most writers, if they are not best sellers, live or die by what an agent feels about their work because most publishers no longer accept over the transom submissions from writers.

My journey to getting published began again, two years ago, when I wrote Angels In Mourning and submitted my novel to the agents I had known in the past. After a few dozen, “good writing, but not for us” comments, I went directly to my old editors and publishing houses. Again came a slew of “Good writing, well constructed story, good characterizations, but at this time it doesn’t fit into our lines….”

Oh, well, poor me…. It must be the book. The book must suck, was what I began to believe. But my wife refused to accept that. She had read every rewrite, every word and she refused to let me give up.

So I set about asking twenty people to read the book. Some were, naturally, friends; others were past readers, and some I didn’t even know. I asked for real evaluations not compliments and certainly not to tell me what they thought I might want to hear. The results surprised me.

Every reader liked the book. Some loved it, others liked it, even one reader who told me she didn’t like mysteries, but this one pulled her in and she read it in two days - that’s not easy when you’re dealing with a manuscript of 500 + 8 ½ x 11 pages shot out of a printer and not a regular size printed book.

Why didn’t I self publish, three of the readers asked, and take a shot with the new Print On Demand format of publishing?

I’d laughed about it. Self-publishing is for people who can’t get published – for people whose writing isn’t … good enough. It’s vanity publishing – the need to see your name on a book jacket. I was past that – way past. I’m a writer. I love to write, to tell stories that pique the imagination and to entertain. I believe that all writers have one very important thing in common: they need people to read their work and like it. Why else would we write novels?

But the thought about using Print On Demand publishing kept stirring around in my head. I didn’t want to dump the manuscript in the trash. I’d worked hard on it, and while it was mine, I believed it was good.

After these thoughts stirred around my brain for a while, I decided to investigate Print On Demand publishing. I spoke with many of the writers in my author associations – the MWA – Mystery Writers of America and the Author’s Guild, and learned that quite a few of the authors had decided to go this route in publishing.

My next step was to spend time learning about POD publishing and then finding the right POD publisher.

My next Blog will start the details of my experience finding a POD publisher, going through the process and finally publishing the novel.

While ‘Angels In Mourning’ is now available to the public, on Amazon.com, the journey is still just underway. I’ve received several great reviews, one from the review website http://www.bookideas.com/, and five 5 star reviews on amazon.com from readers who have purchased Angels In Mourning.

The review is also available at http://www.angelsinmourning.com/