You’ve written a book, and it’s the best thing ever! So, now you want people to read it. How do you get it to them? In our current publishing world, there’s three major options. You can contact a traditional big publisher, who – if everything goes well – will buy the rights to your book, edit it, put a cover on it, market it and send you money when it sells. You can contact a smaller independent (indie) press, who have the flexibility to take chances on unusual work, and who are more likely to involve you in the details of publishing – but who don’t have the same marketing reach as the big publishers, and won’t sell quite as many as the big traditionals. Avoid anyone who asks you for money to publish (known as ‘vanity press’) with the promise of royalties in the future – it’s very likely that you’ll pay a lot and not get nearly as much back. A publisher should always cover things like editing and cover art for you, even if that means your royalty share is smaller. Or you can self-publish. This means you’re the one responsible for everything – editing, cover art, formatting, releasing, marketing, selling – so you’re putting the book out under your name, and you keep the profits from it. You can sub some of the work out (eg. hire a proofreader, purchase cover-art) but it’s down to you to sell your book to the world. And the great thing is that there are plenty of ways to do that! In this article, we’re going to briefly cover some alternative methods of getting your writing out there to your readers. While we tend to think of self-publishing as being a hard copy or ebook version of a book, that’s… read more →
Anything over a short story (so over 10,000 words) ideally needs chapters. They break the story up, provide helpful stopping-points, and allow the reader to skim the front page to get a feel for where the story’s going – and pick up where they left off, if needed. It’s also a good way for the reader to get a feel for how long they’ve got left in the book – especially for anyone reading on an e-reader, who can’t just check how thick it is! But that doesn’t make chapters all that easy! How long should they be? Where should you split things? Numbers or name? How long? Ideally, you want to make your chapters all roughly consistent. For example, I write novellas and make mine 3000-4000 words long. For novels, somewhere around 6000-8000 words is good: if you make one suddenly shorter it jarrs the readers, and makes them think they’ve missed something. However…learn the rules then break ‘em. You can get some very good effects with short chapters, particularly if you’ve got something dramatic happening. imagine if you suddenly switched back to one character, only to have a dramatic murder – and then that’s it, you’ve switched away again! Frustrating, yes, but I’d keep reading to find out what happens. You don’t need chapters? The standard response to this is either “well, duh!” or “really?!” No, you don’t have to use chapters! However, good idea to break it into sections, at least….and chapters are helpful and expected. They make nice chunks of text, and the titles act as signposts to tell the reader what’s happening, let them return to it from the front page if they lose their place. On which note… What to title chapters? You’ve got a couple of options: Plain: Chapter 1, Chapter 2, etc. This doesn’t… read more →
We all know the saying, “Don’t judge a book by its cover”, but it’s a truth that a lot of us do. They’re eye-catching and make us look, but they’re also a shortcut: they give us an indication of what the book is about, and what’s inside. Swooning lady not wearing much? I don’t do romance. Spaceships and lasers? Ugh, sci-fi. Plain text and plain color? Hmm, boring. Unfortunately book covers are a major, major part of the marketing of your book. They’re also hard to get right, but you know when they are – or when they’re just not quite what you want! So, here’s some thoughts on how to make sure you’ve got an eye-catching and marketable cover for your writing. A book cover needs to do two things: give information about the book make the reader curious And that’s basically it. Simple eh? Hard Information This is definite, precise information that you need to have on the cover. There’s usually a place allocated for this – for example, you’ll look for the title in large letters, the author’s name in smaller ones, the ISBN on the back…although the format can be varied, it’s usually within fairly standard guidelines. Your name This is the name you want to be known by as an author, and the name that might be used elsewhere – for example, on your personal website, or in any promotional materials. It’s quite confusing if you’re calling yourself “Tommy Smith”, and the name on a cover is “T Smith” – I’ll be searching for books by “Tommy”. Make sure everything matches so people can find your work The title of the book A blurb The ISBN (find out more about ISBN’s here) You can add some optional extras: Reviews or taglines: “the best book in… read more →
In this article, we’re going to briefly cover the printing options for self-publishing – that is, if you want a hard copy of your book. Step 1: The Finished Text This means the book needs to be edited and proofread, with all the chapter headings in the right place, a preface and acknowledgements (if you want them) and any copyright disclaimers done. Make the text as perfect as you can. However, you don’t need to make sure the layout is perfect – if fact, it’s easier if it’s not! Make the margins all standard, and the font standard. This makes the next stage a lot easier. At this point, you can either turn the text into a print book or an ebook (or both!) Step 2: Typesetting This is the point that the text is put into a printable format. The important thing here is that typesetting is not word processing; it’s closer to artwork than it is to writing. The text positioning needs to be exact, and word processors (such as Microsoft Word or OpenOffice) tend to skip the little details that make the text look nice on a printed page. There are several different pieces of software that can be used for this; one popular one is Adobe InDesign, but there are various free systems available as well. You can actually now use Word, but it’s a very different process to writing, and you usually need to use a template. Alternatively, there are a number of professionals out there who offer a typesetting service to self-publishers, often with additional services such as cover creation or proofreading as well. If you’re not too sure you want to get into the details of the typesetting process, it’s worth paying for this stage. Step 3: Thinking About The End Result There… read more →
What is Self-Publishing? You’ve written a book, and it’s the best thing ever! So, now you want people to read it. How do you get it to them? In our current publishing world, there’s three major options. You can contact a traditional big publisher, who – if everything goes well – will buy the rights to your book, edit it, put a cover on it, market it and send you money when it sells. You can contact a smaller independent (indie) press, who have the flexibility to take chances on unusual work, and who are more likely to involve you in the details of publishing – but who don’t have the same marketing reach as the big publishers, and won’t sell quite as many as the big traditionals. Avoid anyone who asks you for money to publish (known as ‘vanity press’) with the promise of royalties in the future – it’s very likely that you’ll pay a lot and not get nearly as much back. A publisher should always cover things like editing and cover art for you, even if that means your royalty share is smaller. Or you can self-publish. This means you’re the one responsible for everything – editing, cover art, formatting, releasing, marketing, selling – so you’re putting the book out under your name, and you keep the profits from it. You can sub some of the work out (eg. hire a proofreader, purchase cover-art) but it’s down to you to sell your book to the world. And the great thing is that there are plenty of ways to do that! Over the next couple of articles, we’re going to look at options for printing, ebook and online self-publishing. But first…. Things to think about if you’re considering self-publishing Have you written the best book that you… read more →
An ISBN is an International Book Standard Number. It identifies the book, and it’s usually printed with the barcode on the back and on the book’s title page. If an ISBN was assigned before 2007, it’ll be 10 digits long. If it’s after that, it’ll be 13 digits long. The ISBN records the book’s metadata – so the publisher, the title and the country that it was published in – and is unique to that book. This means it can be easily identified by any bookseller or library. What do the numbers in the ISBN mean? The numbering system can get pretty complicated (check out the Wikipedia page if you want an in-depth analysis) but basically the numbers tell you the country, the publisher and the title, and the final digit is a checking number to ensure the code’s correct. Do I need an ISBN? Basically, yes. If you’re planning on just printing a book as a gift or a private record, you don’t need an ISBN. But if you’re planning on selling your book, or think you might want to sell it or give it away more widely in the future, you need an ISBN. What is the barcode for? Do I need a barcode? The barcode on a book is the ISBN in a machine-readable format. If you’re planning on selling hard copies of your book, then you will need a barcode. Usually, barcodes are provided by the publisher or self-publishing companies. It’s only if you’re getting your book printed privately that you’ll need to purchase a barcode along with your ISBN. Who sells ISBNs? Where can I get mine? ISBNs are sold by national agencies in each country. In the US, Bowker deals with ISBN purchases; in the UK, it’s Nielsen. If you put in “ISBN” and *your country*… read more →
There’s two hard parts of being a writer…sitting down to write, and actually writing! How do you find time to ensure that you write? And how do you make sure you use that time effectively? When do you work best? For me, it’s mornings and evenings, with a slump in the afternoon. I know that if I schedule writing time in for an afternoon I’ll most likely end up on Facebook…so I’m much better off accepting that my brain wants an afternoon nap (even if it can’t have one) and scheduling writing time in for a morning or evening when I’m more likely to focus. When do you have time available? Not everyone has the luxury of being able to pick a time. If you’re struggling to carve out time, can you make use of the small spaces between other things? Even half an hour a day is more than nothing, and will slowly build up. Can you wake up an hour earlier? (Horrible, I know, but it does add uninterrupted time to your day). Can you find a spare half-hour at lunch? Can you use a dictaphone on your commute, or take a notepad? How do you work best? I need multiple projects at various stages; if I get stuck on one, I’ll move on and work on another so that I’m never unproductive. But I know authors who focus on one project at a time and push that through to completion before starting another. What’s going to work best for you? Where do you work best? Most authors have a ‘place’ that is only for writing; the idea is that when you’re there, you associate it with writing rather than browsing FB or talking to someone, and it helps you to focus. Potentially you could also do ‘writing… read more →