Epublishing Overview from the New Yorker

Good for the publishing industry if iPad makes this kind of an impact, but I'll never fully endorse an apple . Besides, if and when I get an electronic reader I'ma want me some e-ink technology.

As if things weren't confusing enough. Before I wrote my first ms I never concerned myself with which publishing house put out a book I loved. Sure, I recognized logos on bookspines, but that was as far as it went. In the last year that viewpoint has completely changed (for obvious reasons).

It seems, however, that I jumped in at the craziest time, ever. Between traditional pub, e-pub, POD, vanity, physical bookstores, online sites I'm getting dizzy.

That's it! I'm writing my next novel on a roll of toilet paper and passing it around the office. Five bucks to read. If it gets ruined, perhaps by some one forgetting it was a novel and not the roll they bought at the grocery store, then that person has to rewrite it word for word on a roll of paper towels.

No, wait, still another viscious cycle. Crap.

Interesting piece. Though I think the publisher’s argument that they alone understand writers and are the writer’s only true friend is quickly fading.

Publishers maintain that digital companies don’t understand the creative process of books. A major publisher said of Amazon, “They don’t know how authors think. It’s not in their DNA.”

Good publishers find and cultivate writers, some of whom do not initially have much commercial promise.

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While this may have been true for the majority of the previous century, it’s been slowly changing as publishing houses have increasingly come under the leadership of non-book industry owners. (And has increased even more since last year when the economy went downhill.)

The time allowed for an author to build a following has decreased considerably, and publishers seem ever ready to drop an author as they look for more of the same bestseller type books that they can stock in places like Walmart.

This gives many authors even more reason to bypass them and attempt to go it alone.

I don’t know what the future holds, but I can definitely see why they’re scared. Too bad they’re not really doing anything about it so far.

brokenfingers said:

While this may have been true for the majority of the previous century, it’s been slowly changing as publishing houses have increasingly come under the leadership of non-book industry owners. (And has increased even more since last year when the economy went downhill.)

The time allowed for an author to build a following has decreased considerably, and publishers seem ever ready to drop an author as they look for more of the same bestseller type books that they can stock in places like Walmart.

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My thoughts, exactly. It is increasingly rare for a traditional publisher to give a writer an opportunity to build a readership. Epublishers, on the other hand, seem to be offering exactly that opportunity.

I appreciate the post, brokenfingers.

MartinD said:

My thoughts, exactly. It is increasingly rare for a traditional publisher to give a writer an opportunity to build a readership. Epublishers, on the other hand, seem to be offering exactly that opportunity.

I appreciate the post, brokenfingers.

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If a commercial publisher can't devote the resources needed, how can a smaller epub house? I would think the financial considerations would be even more limited.

BenPanced said:

If a commercial publisher can't devote the resources needed, how can a smaller epub house? I would think the financial considerations would be even more limited.

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The difference may be in the business model, BP.

"Traditional" commercial publishers -- by which I mean advance-paying off-set print publishers -- make a relatively large initial outlay per book: advance, plus editing, plus creation of book, plus storage of book, plus distribution, plus marketing.

A smaller epub house -- or, at least, the ones with which I'm published -- will offer no or a very small advance, plus digital book creation isn't as expensive as physical creation, plus no storage costs, and distribution is generally limited third-party online sellers who take a cut of each sale, asking little or nothing up front.

The initial outlay is many times smaller, but the author gets a much larger percentage of each sale (35% is standard). So if the book does well, everybody does well. If the book tanks, everybody loses a little. Yes, the publisher is out its money and effort, but that's a much smaller amount than that of a "traditional" publisher.

Therefore, a small epub can afford to take chances a larger "trad" pub can't. Not as much capital on the line with each book.

Neither Amazon, Apple, nor Google has experience in recruiting, nurturing, editing, and marketing writers.

It is to laugh. None, absolutely none of the Big House recruit writers. Tell me I'm wrong by showing me a single example in the last year of an author who was recruited by one of the Big Six and then went on to have a book published in hardback (or paperback). The amount of nurturing they do today is laughable. From all accounts it basically amounts to "Well, you didn't sell through, sorry" and the writer's done, contract canceled. Editing is still done, of course, but marketing? Hah! Not unless you've got a name that sells which means you're already a Big Name.

And one wonders why I was seriously considering epublishing first (and still am).

Within the last couple of years, with the changes in the industry and technology, e and self publishing have really changed also. Not only the perceptions surrounding them, but also the suitability of doing it, as well as the potential.

As a non-published writer at the moment, this both scares and excites me...

I'm very excited about my contractual agreement with my e-publisher. The possible returns are more than satisfying and I like the option of being able to buy my novel as an e-book or POD softcover.
But, it goes beyond that. I have access to a community of writers published by the same publisher where we can exchange ideas. I also have easy access to my editor and the lady in charge of getting it published.

The only thing the publisher -does not- do is advertise. So? That means I'm going to have to get the word out on my own. But, again, I have access to others who have been there and can give me guidance.

Oh yeah - they sent out a press release on the contract signing and will do so when it's released.

In a way, that's fine with me. If I've got enough to write the darned thing I sure as heck ought to be able to sell it!

Selah March said:

....plus digital book creation isn't as expensive as physical creation, plus no storage costs, and distribution is generally limited third-party online sellers who take a cut of each sale, asking little or nothing up front.

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Just a point of note - there are storage costs involved, but they are through different systems. Either the publisher has to host and provide the content directly to the consumer or use a third party distributor to do so. The costs of storage involve providing stable servers, backup in case the primary server(s) go kaput, and staffing to manage those systems and ensure they are available to the customer at the point of purchase 24/7 because digital bookstores never close.

No, digital books don't take up warehouse space and don't need to be physically shipped, you only need to create the product once (also, often done by a 3rd party), there are no print runs, no potential losses on returned stock, and fewer trees involved, but there are very definitely storage costs.

I have to be honest. I was a traditional pub snob. I wanted my book on bookshelves.
But two days ago, I received a full manuscript request from an agent who specializes in e-books. I queried the agency where she worked, and she is the one who responded, the agent who saw potential in my manuscript.
So I started doing a bit of research, and today, i would be happy to sign with an e-publisher.
Times are a changing. Sure, 5% of the market is small, but as I see it, that percentage can only grow, as e-book readers are no-where near market saturation.
Also, consider this: There are two types of book buyers. Those who seek out a book, and impulse buyers. The first type, hear about a book from friends, or the internet, or anticipate a new release. They deliberately buy that book. The second type, would buy most of their books while at the grocery store, train station or airport. 'Ooh, that cover is shiny and I like this genre.' But then, a few years ago, a major chain coughwallmartcough wanted to consolidate their book distribution through a single supplier. Good for the company that got the contract, bad for the few dozen small time wholesalers who went out of business. Almost overnight, most of the locations these impulse readers bought from disappeared.
The first type of book buyer, is still buying books. And with e-books, they still will. Some will want to hold an actual book in their hand, and with POD, they still can. But the second type, they have hope now. Now, when stranded at an airport or train station, they can find a hotspot/hub and download that book they read about last night on their friends blog.
I want in on that action.

brokenfingers said:

Interesting piece. Though I think the publisher’s argument that they alone understand writers and are the writer’s only true friend is quickly fading.


While this may have been true for the majority of the previous century, it’s been slowly changing as publishing houses have increasingly come under the leadership of non-book industry owners. (And has increased even more since last year when the economy went downhill.)

The time allowed for an author to build a following has decreased considerably, and publishers seem ever ready to drop an author as they look for more of the same bestseller type books that they can stock in places like Walmart.

This gives many authors even more reason to bypass them and attempt to go it alone.

I don’t know what the future holds, but I can definitely see why they’re scared. Too bad they’re not really doing anything about it so far.

Click to expand...

I know this is an old post, but I just saw it. I agree. All we get are books that are carbon copies of each other, a few different ones for each genre. I haven't found a new book that I loved in years. The only one recently was Ender's Game...but that's not a new book. lol. I take that back, I've only found some sci-fi books, because that's a new genre for me. But when I go to Borders, all the new releases are YA, Chick Lit, and any book that Oprah endorses. Oprah doesn't like the same stuff as I do, so I'm stuck not having much to read. I'm actually buying from indie authors on amazon and finding more stuff that I enjoy. No, it's not as polished, but the genres and styles are more to my liking.

MMcDonald64 said:

I know this is an old post, but I just saw it. I agree. All we get are books that are carbon copies of each other, a few different ones for each genre. I haven't found a new book that I loved in years. The only one recently was Ender's Game...but that's not a new book. lol. I take that back, I've only found some sci-fi books, because that's a new genre for me. But when I go to Borders, all the new releases are YA, Chick Lit, and any book that Oprah endorses. Oprah doesn't like the same stuff as I do, so I'm stuck not having much to read. I'm actually buying from indie authors on amazon and finding more stuff that I enjoy. No, it's not as polished, but the genres and styles are more to my liking.

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I could not agree more! Before I got my Kindle, I was a bit of a snob about novels that were only published by ebook companies. Kindle turned me into an impulse buyer, and, I agree, I find that I am buying indie books whose genres are more to my liking than those published by the big houses.

The comment that publishers think only they understand writers made me choke. A small press publisher probably understands their authors far more, as there is often a far more intimate relationship with them. I talked with one young lady who was hooked up with one of the big houses and it was like "Here's your check...bye". That was the amount of contact.

I think literary agents understand authors far more, but are hobbled by searching for what the publishing houses think is going to be popular for the moment - never mind that it takes an author six months to a year to come up with a book.

Kerry

MMcDonald64 said:

I know this is an old post, but I just saw it. I agree. All we get are books that are carbon copies of each other, a few different ones for each genre. I haven't found a new book that I loved in years. The only one recently was Ender's Game...but that's not a new book. lol. I take that back, I've only found some sci-fi books, because that's a new genre for me. But when I go to Borders, all the new releases are YA, Chick Lit, and any book that Oprah endorses. Oprah doesn't like the same stuff as I do, so I'm stuck not having much to read. I'm actually buying from indie authors on amazon and finding more stuff that I enjoy. No, it's not as polished, but the genres and styles are more to my liking.

Click to expand...

I agree. I used to go to the book store and leave with at least 3-5 titles. Now I might come and go 3 or 4 times before I even find one that catches my attention. (I mostly read epic fantasy--or any kind of fantasy if it looks interesting.) I thought it was just me--being picky or something. Granted, writing takes a large bite out of my reading time, but still...come on.

But then I joined an online writer's group and wow; there are still awesome stories out there. And I'm thinking of buying an e-reader because ebooks seem to be catching my attention more than print books.

::shrugs::

Now, to make things a little less clear, most legitimate epublishers also do not recruit authors. The simple fact of the matter is that any publisher that is trying to recruit an author is trying to recruit themselves into that author's wallet.

With that said, let me also state that newbies, especially newbies with no name recognition, are not likely to sell high numbers of even ebooks. The odds are simply against you. Someone like JA Konrath can sell 40 thousand ebooks in a few months time, but me? Nope, never, nada, same chances as a snowball in a 3 hour barbecue.

Because Konrath has a name. I don't. I'll sell a few dozen copies of my ebook, probably at most, a year. I've had 1 ebook up at Smashwords for 2 months now and have sold exactly 1 copy (and that was likely to a fan of a select, very specific, and very small market).

In addition, most of the ebooks up at Smashwords give those of us who actually can and have written an 80k+ word book a bad name. They're not books, they're at best short stories to novellas for the most part. They're largely porn, romance, or erotic, or poorly written vampire romance ripoffs or stories about boys who become powerful wizards or someone's D&D adventure or someone's glorious vision after having been abducted by aliens (or worse, the alien romance! ugh!).

I've talked with micro-press publishers. I've talked with agents. I've talked with published writers. Everyone agrees that epublishing should be a last resort, not a first one, and you should exhaust all possible avenues for having your work professionally published before going the epublishing route.

Now, once you've got a following, and have built your name, all bets are off.

brokenfingers said:

Interesting piece. Though I think the publisher’s argument that they alone understand writers and are the writer’s only true friend is quickly fading.


While this may have been true for the majority of the previous century, it’s been slowly changing as publishing houses have increasingly come under the leadership of non-book industry owners. (And has increased even more since last year when the economy went downhill.)

The time allowed for an author to build a following has decreased considerably, and publishers seem ever ready to drop an author as they look for more of the same bestseller type books that they can stock in places like Walmart.

This gives many authors even more reason to bypass them and attempt to go it alone.

I don’t know what the future holds, but I can definitely see why they’re scared. Too bad they’re not really doing anything about it so far.

Click to expand...

I agree. If anything, it's e-publishers that seem to invest real time and effort into authors and the cultivation thereof.

And big pubs are getting harsh with even some of their top authors. I am personally familiar with the situation of one author who has done amazingly well for her house - earning out within a month, getting second and third runs, etc - who was absolutely devastated when said house only offered her a tiny raise and a single book contract her last go round.

That's the good thing about the e-industry. Readers' interests change and as quickly as they do, the market moves in that direction, but without alienating every other option. ROFL, I mean, seriously, if I see one more 'Twilight' style YA I may just puke. To be fair, though, at least two of the 'after twilights' I've read are SO much better than Meyers' fare.

Same goes with the print romance market, which is still making a ton of cash despite the down economy. So much paranormal, alpha female lead, set in worlds where vamps/etc really exist. And the heroines are cops. For craps sake, give me something NEW print world. Oh wait, you won't? Okay, I'll go buy from an e house.

FOTSGreg said:

Now, to make things a little less clear, most legitimate epublishers also do not recruit authors. The simple fact of the matter is that any publisher that is trying to recruit an author is trying to recruit themselves into that author's wallet.

Click to expand...

This is true. None of the epubs I interact with recruit authors. All three are well established and well respected.

FOTSGreg said:

With that said, let me also state that newbies, especially newbies with no name recognition, are not likely to sell high numbers of even ebooks. The odds are simply against you. Someone like JA Konrath can sell 40 thousand ebooks in a few months time, but me? Nope, never, nada, same chances as a snowball in a 3 hour barbecue.

Because Konrath has a name. I don't. I'll sell a few dozen copies of my ebook, probably at most, a year. I've had 1 ebook up at Smashwords for 2 months now and have sold exactly 1 copy (and that was likely to a fan of a select, very specific, and very small market).

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That all depends on where you're selling, what you're selling, and if you are the lone marketer or if you're being marketed by an established e-pub. I'm not saying even the top sellers at any given e-pub are going to sell 40K copies in four months, but a thousand a month or more isn't out of the realm of possibility. Nor is it necessarily rare.

FOTSGreg said:

In addition, most of the ebooks up at Smashwords give those of us who actually can and have written an 80k+ word book a bad name. They're not books, they're at best short stories to novellas for the most part. They're largely porn, romance, or erotic, or poorly written vampire romance ripoffs or stories about boys who become powerful wizards or someone's D&D adventure or someone's glorious vision after having been abducted by aliens (or worse, the alien romance! ugh!).

Click to expand...

Porn*/romance/erotica is what sells best. I know, hard to swallow for those who look down on those particular genres, but it's the truth. And truth be told, most of what I see on the shelves at the bookstore, at least the shelves where product is moving, is much the same. *The porn part, well, a lot of romance/erotic(a) is called porn so I'm guessing that's what you meant, not actual porn.

FOTSGreg said:

I've talked with micro-press publishers. I've talked with agents. I've talked with published writers. Everyone agrees that epublishing should be a last resort, not a first one, and you should exhaust all possible avenues for having your work professionally published before going the epublishing route.

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Everyone who isn't in the e-industry thinks e-publishing should be a last resort. I say this because I have heard it for years, especially from 'friends' who were unhappy with me for choosing e, for getting published, and for doing it happily.

I know four authors who started out in e-books that were picked up by print houses. Four I know personally. None of them stooped to e-pubs, none of them stopped sending out work to NY, but they found a market where they could do what the loved, hone their craft with help from top-notch editors, make important connections in the industry as a whole, and make money.

As with ANY kind of publishing, novice writers should ALWAYS do their homework and check out companies they might be interested in submitting to or working with, but I assure you, the e-industry isn't how it's often painted: a mismash of crappy writers who couldn't make it in the 'real' world and who only put out a bunch of bunk no honest reader or writer would waste their time on.

FOTSGreg said:

Now, once you've got a following, and have built your name, all bets are off.

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That's true in any case, print or not.

omega12596 said:

That all depends on where you're selling, what you're selling, and if you are the lone marketer or if you're being marketed by an established e-pub....but a thousand a month or more isn't out of the realm of possibility. Nor is it necessarily rare.

Porn*/romance/erotica is what sells best. I know, hard to swallow for those who look down on those particular genres, but it's the truth...


Everyone who isn't in the e-industry thinks e-publishing should be a last resort...As with ANY kind of publishing, novice writers should ALWAYS do their homework and check out companies they might be interested in submitting to or working with, but I assure you, the e-industry isn't how it's often painted: a mismash of crappy writers who couldn't make it in the 'real' world and who only put out a bunch of bunk no honest reader or writer would waste their time on.

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I've done a lot of snipping, but QFT.

LOL! That QFT doesn't mean quantum field theory, does it? 'Cause I'd derail this thread to Timbuktu if that's the case.

Thanks, Dee.