Tips on how to make a PA book work for you

bstevens said:
1. Book sells through Amazon and you get standard royalties. Let’s say 10%. – $2

Your contract says 8 percent.

2. You buy the book and save 30%, therefore you earn $6.

You didn't EARN 6.00, you spent 14.00.

3. You put the book in stores on consignment at 50%

Good luck convincing the store. How many do you have for sale on consignment there?

...and you get 15%, still better than the basic royalty, an earning of $3.

4. You convince a store to purchase books on your behalf and you pay them a 5% fee for being the buyer.

Again, good luck convincing the store to go for it.

They get a 40% discount. You give them their 5%, get your 10% (8 percent) royalties and sell your books (HOW?) for an additional 35%, making 45% on the cover price. We’re up to $9.

Dream on, Kiddo.

5. You could put that book on consignment at 50/50 and split the 35% discount with Joe blow (which is 17.5%). Add the original 10% that you keep, and you’re still up to 27.5%.

The worst percentage you are going to get on your book is the royalty cheque you’ll receive.

The question isn’t who gets what for nothing; the question is how will you increase the amount paid to you on every sale?

The question is: if time equals money, how much time (money) are YOU spending to make a sale? Assuming, of course, that you can talk bookstore owners into going along with your scheme?

Any math wizards out there wanna offer some realistic numbers here?

How to make a PA book work for you

Use it as a doorstop?

bstevens said:

You don't know what my contract says and I won't tell you. You don't have to accept the standard contract. I DID MY HOMEWORK after reading all this crap.

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I sincerely wish you all the best with your book.

This is a duplicate thread. Please, one thread per topic and in one forum. Barbara, again, please read the Newbie Guide to Absolute Write - it will really help you get to know the ropes here.

That's still 10% of NET, right?

Okay, let's say that you've talked PA into giving you 10% of net.

Your book is retailing for $19.95 (for a 228 page book ... ouch!).

1. Book sells through Amazon and you get standard royalties. Let’s say 10%. – $2

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That $19.95 book went to Amazon with a (let's say) 40% discount, so Amazon only paid $11.97. Your royalty: $1.20.

2. You buy the book and save 30%, therefore you earn $6.

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I'm presuming you mean you buy the book direct from PA. According to my copy of the PA contract, that's for 21 books or more. So let's say you ordered 21 books. 30% discounted off $19.95 is $13.97, plus S&H of $1.50 for the first book plus $0.50 for every copy thereafter. $293.27 + $11.50 = $304.77. At that point you have a box of books in your basement to peddle out of the trunk of your car. How's that different from paying to get published? (Especially when you consider that if you'd just taken your manuscript down to a local printer you'd have gotten the same box of books for around $190.)

You haven't earned $6, you've spent over $300. That's before you've done any publicity or marketing. All of which cost. Don't forget to add up everything you spend, including the cost of your time, and subtract that amount from your income. It isn't profit until sales exceed expenses.

3. You put the book in stores on consignment at 50% and you get 15%, still better than the basic royalty, an earning of $3.

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Let's say that you convince a bunch of bookstores to stock your book at its full cover price of $19.95. That's still five dollars more than the average trade paperback -- and the average trade paperback is thicker. Let's say that, by magic, you get a 60% sell-through. That is, 60% of the copies that are stocked are sold (60% sell-through is the national average for trade paperbacks, by the way -- from authors that the reading public has heard of, that are advertised and promoted and reviewed, and that are priced $5 lower than yours). You put those 21 copies that you just bought for $304.77 in some friendly local bookstores, offering 50% discounts to those bookstores. 60% of them sell at $19.95, for $259.35. The bookstore takes 50%, or $129.69, leaving you with $129.66. You just lost $175.11.

Remember to subtract the price of the gas you'll burn driving back to those bookstores to pick up the books that didn't sell.

4. You convince a store to purchase books on your behalf and you pay them a 5% fee for being the buyer.

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I'm utterly baffled by what you mean by this. Walk up to the nice lady at the special order desk and say, "Hey, order my book (normally a $19.95 value) using your 40% bookstore discount! I'll pay you a buck each if you'll let me have 'em for $11.97 a piece"? Why in the world would a bookstore go for that?

But let's say they did.

Let's say that you bought twenty of your own books that way. For some weird reason the bookstore only charges you $259.35 instead of the full $399 that they'll probably ask for.

Great! You've paid to get published again! You have those 20 books, and you put 'em on consignment for $19.95. And, magically, you sell 12 of them on consignment. You split the take 50/50 with the guy who sold them. You get $119.70.

Add in the royalties, (10%, you say?) on the discounted price -- $23.94. Total in hand, $143.64. Your loss (not counting time, gas, and anything else you may have done to promote these books), is $115.71.

There's only one person who's making money on any of these deals, and that's Willem Meiners. He doesn't care if you buy the books or someone else buys 'em. (In fact, he's counting on you to buy 'em yourself. He knows there's a very strong psychological need among authors to distribute their books. Since every other avenue is closed off (by the high cover prices and ridiculous discount), he's relies on you to do the buying. It doesn't matter to him if you only buy fifty -- he knows that the guy standing next to you will buy a hundred copies of his own book. The average holds.)

In the very best, most optimistic, situation you've self-published using a very expensive printer who's taken your publishing rights for seven years. At worst ... worse.

I'm not trying to be Johnny Raincloud, but this is a repost from your other thread.

Bstevens. Take a deep breath. Welcome to AW. You aren't the only PA author on here. You have an unpopular opinion, yes, but you don't need to be all viking about it. Seriously. Welcome. Feel free to join our regular banter on writing.

1. Book sells through Amazon and you get standard royalties. Let’s say 10%. – $2
2. You buy the book and save 30%, therefore you earn $6.
3. You put the book in stores on consignment at 50% and you get 15%, still better than the basic royalty, an earning of $3.
4.You convince a store to purchase books on your behalf and you pay them a 5% fee for being the buyer. They get a 40% discount. You give them their 5%, get your 10% royalties and sell your books for an additional 35%, making 45% on the cover price. We’re up to $9.
5. You could put that book on consignment at 50/50 and split the 35% discount with Joe blow (which is 17.5%). Add the original 10% that you keep, and you’re still up to 27.5%.

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I really can't follow your math. How did you make a profit at step 2? Your book costs more than $6.

As for number four, I've dealt with bookstore managers. I honestly can't see this happening. Now, grant you, I was talking to them about music CDs, but I doubt that the overall closemindedness I encountered will change much from store to store. Maybe it does. Either way, I'd rather them buy my work without my having to go to every single bookstore and beg them to carry me.

Yes, I don't get step 2 either.

You buy the book and save 30%, therefore you earn $6.

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If I buy something, I have spent money, not earned it.

And considering how much work you have to do, seems to me that it's more like you working for the PA book, rather than the PA book working for you.

bstevens,

Have you actually gotten any bookstores to agree to stock your book? The reason I am asking is because that was my plan, too. I purchased about 700 dollars worth of my book (I believe there was a discount and that I also received 10 free books) with the intent to sell them. I made about 22 dollars in royalties and made zero dollars on sales.

I was unable to get local bookstores to stock my book and unable to sell it elsewhere. Granted, I am not a salesperson and did not have my eyes open when I published with PA as you seem to have.

Lisa Y

Lisa Y said:

bstevens,

Have you actually gotten any bookstores to agree to stock your book? The reason I am asking is because that was my plan, too. I purchased about 700 dollars worth of my book (I believe there was a discount and that I also received 10 free books) with the intent to sell them. I made about 22 dollars in royalties and made zero dollars on sales.


Lisa Y

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I believe her book has not yet been printed.

To publish on Publish America makes as much sense to me as a model, or a actress to enter their carrier without an agent. What a mess that could become. People need to think more clearly than that. It’s as though they’ve gone without guidance from the well traveled rest of the world, no guidance, no map - - lost in the world.

The pitfalls without the proper agent are enormous.

aruna said:

I believe her book has not yet been printed.

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which explains a whole lot.



at the same time, expect a post bragging about how many hits her website has gotten thanks to the multiple threads here. Same old routine, same old spamming and thinking that website hits are going to translate into sales.

not.

bstevens said:

1. Book sells through Amazon and you get standard royalties. Let’s say 10%. – $2
2. You buy the book and save 30%, therefore you earn $6.
3. You put the book in stores on consignment at 50% and you get 15%, still better than the basic royalty, an earning of $3.
4. You convince a store to purchase books on your behalf and you pay them a 5% fee for being the buyer. They get a 40% discount. You give them their 5%, get your 10% royalties and sell your books for an additional 35%, making 45% on the cover price. We’re up to $9.
5. You could put that book on consignment at 50/50 and split the 35% discount with Joe blow (which is 17.5%). Add the original 10% that you keep, and you’re still up to 27.5%.

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But none of that is going to happen:But the real problem is that your fiction is not of saleable quality. I'm not saying your work won't get better with practice, but you're not there yet. You should be working on your writing, not spending all your energy trying to peddle a book that can't and won't sell to the general public.

Why not stick around here and learn how to write? It's a good place for it.

Woah. Four sentences in which the word "I" appears six times. Caps. First person.

*Scrolling.*

Five exclamation marks!!!!!

The Thirteenth Tale is in trouble.

I don't mean to be unkind, but wow.

"But the real problem is that your fiction is not of saleable quality."

I agree and I don't say that to be nasty. I see a lot of the mistakes in your excerpt that I made as a new writer.

Barbara stick around and learn the craft from these people. I did and am a much better writer for doing so.

What it comes down to is that now I'm a salesperson instead of a writer.

I'm not a salesperson. I'll help in promotion, by doing what I do - show up when they ask me, speak when they ask me, and sign books when they ask me.

I do go and hunt out schools to visit, but again, I show up and speak to the children. They buy books without any pressure from me. Because I am not a salesperson.

I read the except.

It definately isn't ready to see publication, but please don't take that as a slam against your writing.

All things considered, you have a decent narrative voice. But you also do a lot of strange things, like "!!!!!!" and ".............." which, if you read a lot, you'll notice never appear in novels.

While your narrative voice does have initial stength, it needs polish. Badly. Your excerpt is second draft quality, at best. Read more. Dissect books and find out what works.

Myself on my blog said:

Editing can hurt. It's never bothered me, but it bothers a lot of authors.

This is the first thing Publish America fails at. They do not edit. They'll go over a manuscript for typos, sure, but that’s not editing. That’s something an author needs to do himself. It's called proofreading, and it is an entirely disassociated thing from editing. And they don't even proofread well. Reports have it that Publish America has actually inserted typos into their books. No one reads manuscripts at Publish America--not the way an editor needs to read them. The tender love, and brutal hate of the red pen is nowhere to be found within this vanity publisher's stark walls.

Heck, Publish America will even promise to take an author's prose and print it without bloody touching the text. This is the first true sign that they are nothing more than a predator. Real publishing firms have reputations to maintain. They compete with one another. Publish America is disinterested in competing--they do not want to sell books on the open market, and this is proof. I can't get two chapters into most PA novels, and, believe me, I've tried. Sometimes out of pity for the authors, sometimes out of honest buyer's curiosity, and sometimes as favors: by god, I've tried, and it is a slam on the publisher, not the authors, when I can honestly say that I've never read anything worth remembering from Publish America.

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They'll go over a manuscript for typos....

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And if they don't find enough they'll add some of their own.

James D. Macdonald said:

And if they don't find enough they'll add some of their own.

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A few comma splices here, a bad suggestion from MS word there, a couple of misspelled character names off to the left. I like to call it seasoning.

"...." Does appear in Japanese light novels. Exactly that way, sometimes with a question mark. They use it almost to distraction. I get the translations and wonder what the heck?

I take them all out when I do the adaptations, because they're not what's usual in an English-speaking novel, if that makes sense. I don't know why a writer who's from the US would use them.

We had over three hundred mistakes in our "edit" to correct. 196 were Pa- added mistakes and did not appear in the original m/s!

Saundra Julian said:

We had over three hundred mistakes in our "edit" to correct. 196 were Pa- added mistakes and did not appear in the original m/s!

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I'mma quote you in my blog on that. o.o