Tag: Marketing

Part 1 – Oh, the Vanity of it all! of this multi-post arc dealt with some folks I knew who vanity published their books back when we called vanity publishers “vanity publishers”.
Part 2 – Vanity/Self-Publishing provided an overview of Vanity and Self publishing.

I’ve talked with lots of self-published authors. They basically fall into four camps:

1. Their plan A is to approach some set number of publishers/agents and, if everyone passes, plan B is to self-publish.
2. They went straight to self-publishing and never approached a publisher.
3. They were traditionally published, things changed (new editor(s), different production demands, change in publisher’s business model/plan, collapse in market, …) and they went the self-publishing route.
4. They haven’t found a publisher who’ll take their work and gave up the traditional publishing route.

Note that camps 1 and 4 are not the same. Camp 1 is a plan of attack, camp 4 is an unplanned retreat. There’s one other camp and, so far as I know, I’m the only person in it. I’m sure there are others in here with me, I haven’t found them yet (big camp, few campers).
Continue reading “Can I be honest about your writing? (Part 3 – What Camp Are You In?)”

Part 1 – Oh, the Vanity of it all! of this multi-post arc dealt with some folks I knew who vanity published their books back when we called vanity publishers “vanity publishers”.

Vanity publishing was great in its heyday. Heck, it still is. The vanity house had no skin in the game. You paid them to publish your book. They did their best to upsell you on marketing, cover design, hard v soft cover, an ISBN, paper quality, print quality, print size, editing, proofing, copy editing, …

Again I ask, any of this sounding familiar?

What they couldn’t do is put your book on bookstore shelves. The book industry has buyback policies that no other industry (that I know of) has; If your book doesn’t sell, the bookstore can return it to the publisher and get their money back. Such a policy requires the publisher have a staff in place to handle returns and a warehouse to house returns. Vanity publishers didn’t have that.

Umm…neither does self-publishing. That’s why you can order your self-published book at a bookstore but can’t find it on the shelves.
Continue reading “Can I be honest about your writing? (Part 2 – Vanity/Self-Publishing)”

Note: this will be a multi-post arc on the theme of storycrafting versus publishing. Hope you enjoy.

Long, long ago (we’re talking late 1980s early 1990s) when we called vanity publishers “vanity publishers”, I knew a fellow who just had to get his book in print. I think the title was “The Decapitation Project”. We were in a workshop together and it didn’t matter what he submitted, everything got back to The Decapitation Project and how it was based on fact and the government had a secret lab where they were keeping heads alive.

You mean like Donovan’s Brain?

“That was a book. The Decapitation Project is real.”

A friend told me they saw him at a con with a table selling copies of his book (again, decades ago).

His self-published book.

Except back then we called it “vanity published” and it was something one only admitted to if asked.

When you had a gun pointed at your head.

If then.
Continue reading “Can I be honest about your writing? (Part 1 – Oh, the Vanity of it all!)”