Book signing, the sequel
This is from one of PA's long-time cheerleaders, and even it doesn't sound that cheery.
PA is considered a Print on Demand publisher by certain stores or people think that we are self publishers. I get asked quite often online if I am self published but I never see myself or my work in that light.
Believe me, if you were self-published - really self-published - you would make more money and your books would have more availability.
Plus, stores don't like it that the books are not returnable. For a while they used to be. I remember getting an email a few years ago stating that they now made their books returnable. But, not that long ago on here I read a response from infocenter stating that the books returnability status is on hiatus. In addition with the switch over from Ingrams to Baker&Taylor the books appear out of stock in some online sources. I found one of my books stated as being available and the other as out of stock. However, I have also found my books listed on web sites as far away as India and The Netherlands. So I guess it is questionable.
It doesn't cost much to list a book for sale. And it gladdens the heart of the author to believe that some poor factory worker in India might spend Rs. 1400 to own a copy of her book.
By the way, if PA has so much difficulty getting stores in the States to pay up, can you imagine how long it might take for a shop in India to do the same? The mind boggles. No wonder PA's contracts are for seven years.
Maybe if you offered these stores to bring your own supply of your books for the book signing
Because bookstores are happy to let people use their premises to sell their own books?
and even leave a few there on consignment if the store allows. You could give a free book to the stores manager to read so he or she will know the quality of your work and maybe on the merit of it the person might want to do a book signing of your book or stock some copies.
"Merit" apparently trumps returnability, discounts and store policies.
When you hear back again from book signings I hope Charley is handling book signings for you. Last year he did a good job with me and my book. He called several places for me and got back to me about the results. It was just a pitty that to my knowledge hardly any of them got back to him.
Um. If hardly any of the stores got back to him, what were these "results" that he reported to the author?
I want a store to really like my work and show emthusiasm for it because if the store likes and believes in my work they will do a better job selling it. The store that did a book signing of my book really botched it up. There was no announcement or advertisement for the signing put in the paper here. My alloted time was taken up by someone else for a while, the manager placed the books I left on consiignment where they would be obscured from sight and only two were out when I left five and the other three were not even on display
It's interesting that when PA is criticized for lack of distribution, one of the defenses is that bookstores can't shelve every book that's printed because then they'd need hundreds of feet of extra space.
But this author expected
five of her books to be displayed? You hardly even see five copies of bestsellers on the shelves, unless the store is doing a promotional event. Why would the store need to shelve all five?
and there was no sign out saying local author here. I believe if her attitude was that she really liked the book and not that she was doing me a " favore" she would have really tried to sell them. So next time around I want a store to sell the book that really believes in the work and not just doing me a favore.
Sigh. It's not about "believing in the work". It's about having a marketable product.
The next author's response is,
I've been with PA since '06 - I have 2 novels with them now, and 2 more I'd like to submit.
This seems to be a common theme - that despite the problems, the authors want to send more books to PA. Unless they're saying this in a fruitless attempt to get PA to pay attention to them: "We're still loyal customers! We could still make you money!"
I have yet to hear of them setting up a signing for me. I think when they set up signings it helps the company's credibility
Apparently donating money to the Haiti victims didn't accomplish this.
and would lead to many more books being sold and authors being recognized as authors.
Again, I think everyone needs to work as a team and communication is very important. There are issues that need to be resolved.
I received my initial email from Brandon stating that he was in charge of setting up book signings for me. After months of not hearing anything even though I sent numerous emails, I received and email fom Kristen stating that she is working on my list but hasn't had and success yet. That was in May.
With all the bad press and complaining from people about PA we need to work together, get some good loud press and turn things around.
If there are any NJ authors out there- perhaps we can do a group signing somewhere? Let me know.