That moment, you reach the point of searching for something and lift the corner of the carpet to peer underneath, you know full well that what you're looking for isn't there, but you haven't already looked. So, the corner of the carpet comes up.
I guess it's also the moment that anything you swept under there before stares balefully back at you.
A couple of things had me looking around the other day, one was Bowker's Self-Publishing in the United States. 2010 - 2015; an analysis of print and ebook publishing trends and the other was a search at the top of the page. After wasting a few minutes, alright, more than a few minutes on the trending hashtags of twitter I moved on. I typed in Publisher's Weekly and read the search result at the head of the page; chooseyourpublisher.com.
Some time ago I posted a blog on the workings of the vanity presses in general and Author Solutions in particular, I remarked on the number of times the web page of something like FindYourPublisher had Author Solutions tucked at the bottom of the page (nothing has changed).
Chooseyourpublisher had; chooseyourpublisher. Now I was curious, so who are chooseyourpublisher, moving sideways across to an Internet domain site - I used get dotted - I searched for chooseyourpublisher found the suffixes still available and clicked on the information icon of a domain name already taken and scanned the whois information.
Sound advice for an individual is to sign up for the privacy deal, big companies and organisations aren't always so particular. The owner of the domain name was tucked into the listed information and the usual suspects' information was there on the screen.
David Gaughran and Victoria Strauss and others have long held a spotlight up to the shady world of Vanity Publishers and the recent class actions dismissed against Author Solutions notwithstanding. Some of their activities deserve closer scrutiny.
What caught my eye about the Bowker report and the trends identified within the industry shed some light on Penguin Random House's quiet release of their hold on the company in January 2016. A contrast to the purchase four years previously
PRH bought AS in 2012 with considerable fanfare, and many thought the new owners would change the MO, not so! The old practises continued and the company expanded under the new owners.
However reluctant AS and PRH might have been to change their ways, the world was changing around them. The attitude towards self-publishing was shifting. Middle ranking and other authors previously held by commercial publishes were moving their back catalogues and self-publishing titles as they recovered rights previously signed away.
Commercial presses were already snapping up successful self-published authors and the expansion of authors working through the medium of the Internet shared their knowledge and experience. All contributed to a decline in the number of ISBN's issued through the Vanity outlets.
Caution is needed here; the Bowker document gives an indication of the trends visible through the distribution of ISBNs, Most self published authors are aware that an ISBN isn't essential for publication, so the picture laid out by Bowker isn't the whole picture.
What that might be is anyone's guess, but one thing seems certain, change is the only constant. Have a look at the article where I found the report and a hat tip to The Passive Voice for pointing me towards the-digital-reader.
Caution should be a watchword, check the links, dig deep into those who come knocking and ask Whois looking for your book to publish it, or help you do the donkey work. protect your investment. The time and effort you have put into your creation are worth it, and if you do make a mistake, pick yourself up and have another go.
When you need that boost, that hand up to get you back on your feet. Dust yourself down and remind yourself the large lady will have to find someone else to entertain.
Showing posts with label Author Solutions. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Author Solutions. Show all posts
Wednesday, 14 September 2016
Sunday, 10 May 2015
The Target for tonight!
It's what you are aiming for, the target is to find a publisher, someone who will travel with you and share the journey from manuscript text to published novelist.
Sounds straightforward, and it should be, but as ever there are the unscrupulous, devious and downright nasty characters in the big bad world out there!
Wednesday, 6 May 2015
Missed that one!
Wrapped up and put to bed, but with more to come, and for a moment I thought it might be while longer before I unwrapped the Author Solutions saga again, until I realised I had missed a couple and David Gaughran posted the Inside story of Author Solutions and Friends. Alongside a timely reminder of some of the practises listed in a blog by Emily Suess; the list below is by no means comprehensive;
- Non-payment of royalties
- Making out-of-print works available for sale without the author's consent
- Excessive mark-up on advertising and review services
- Failure to deliver marketing services as promised
- Breach of Contract
- Informing the customers that add-ons will cost hundreds of dollars and charging their credit cards thousands
- Shaming and banning customers who go public with their stories
Thursday, 26 June 2014
One degree more...
I briefly touched on the labyrinthine links between vanity presses and the publishing houses dotted around the world and the Internet in Come into my parlour... and this last week has seen Writer's Digest break their connection with Author Solutions and their own imprint Abbott Press. David Gaughran who has spent considerable blogging time and energy on the Author Solutions situation comments on recent developments. Both sides are being cagey, but as David describes in his blog website links have already been taken down.
A small step in the right direction and veering away by degrees, rather than closing in. There is still a long way to go.
A small step in the right direction and veering away by degrees, rather than closing in. There is still a long way to go.
Saturday, 7 June 2014
Tread carefully...
The Amazon-Hachette negotiation has occupied a lot of screen space over the last few weeks, pretty much since I started slotting a few bits and pieces together about how you might get your work out to an appreciative public.
The situation regarding the self-publishing arms of the big traditional publishers show them in close formation with the Vanity Presses, and with Author Solutions, owned by Penguin Random House in a pincer movement to grab the best via the traditional path and shuffle the rest towards the shearing sheds of the Vanities.
The door to self publish remains open.Yes; despite every negative thought and dismal sage advice about how many, or few, self-published books sell well; your readers are waiting, but you need to be careful. I've loosely touched on the issues regarding Vanity Press in general; and Author Solutions and its many subsidiaries in particular XLibris. (Xlibris.co.uk is the local branch of this multinational conglomerate) and a couple of days ago I nipped across to David Gaughran's blog Let's Get Visible and his latest piece The Case Against Author Solutions, Part 1 The numbers, looks at the methods and figures involved in the operation of this scammy company and how they saturate the internet with cleverly baited traps to snare the unwary writer. Thankfully, the majority of writers who stumble on the shiny new toy adverts look deeper and see what lurks beneath the surface, but not all. Some go down that road, at their peril and great cost. The way the adverts are designed and located is to catch the writer before they look further and find the many stories with unhappy endings at the hands of this Hydra like company.
I touched on the same point a couple of weeks ago in Come into my parlour... with my variation of the six degrees game, clicking the links and finding Author Solutions long before the count reached six. It was where I found the adverts, pumped out through GoogleAds, and sliding onto the screen with the Oxford English Dictionary and the Gutenberg Project among so many others that seemed unexpected at first, put then the GoogleAds follow their own track. It's the saturation level that is startling, the number of places the ads must be placed to proliferate at this level. David Gaughran explores this too.
The trick is to be very wary, it is a cliche that anything that seems to be too good to be true usually is, yet the independent author has tricks and traits tucked away. Observations picked up by Jim Devitt over at Indies Unlimited earmarking five distinctive traits found in many indie authors, have a look for yourself, and take them to heart, work with your imagination, check where you are in your journey towards publication and see what's around the corner you were going to walk past. Check out a website,, and then look at a handful covering the same area.
I am currently working on the draft revisions of What You Ask For, as well as completing The Obedience of Fools, and further down the list is putting Iceline into print, and the search is to find a way of doing this without breaking the bank.
Starting with 'book publishing' as the search parameters, as simple as that, and a number of options pop up, some are more helpful than others. A few offer a free quote (this may involve providing an email address, not always) based on the size, the type of book, number of pages, hard or soft cover and the sort of finish you want on the cover. The prices on the quotes can be wildly different but they give an idea of what price you can pass on the book to the customer and calculate your return on the investment.
The precise details vary from printer to printer, depending on whether they put out print run or print on demand. A UK based website that offers print on demand and distribution is FeedARead. A publishing platform funded by Arts Council England where you can sign up and publish for free, have it available to purchase through the site or for a distribution fee make it available elsewhere. Click the link and have a look for yourself; yes, there is a fee involved to cover the administration costs to set up your book for distribution. The end product is a good quality paperback, well made and a match for bookshop quality. FeedARead is available to writers of all nationalities, not just UK based.
Similarly, Completely Novel, is a print on demand service offering a variety of options for the publishing author, well laid out website with a free quote option and a series of reasonably priced packages starting with Free (and able to sell through the Completely Novel website) and monthly subscriptions offering access to distribution on line and through Bricks and Mortar stores. The finished product is good quality, suitable for a bookstore. The benchmark is that degree of product quality and the reader, quite rightly, should expect no less a quality product from the Independent author than any other source.
Shaun Allan over at Flip and Catch is looking at Print On Demand and brings CreateSpace, Lulu, Ingram Spark and Lightning Source to the list. As with FeedAread and Completely Novel each one has its own criteria for accepting a novel and adding it to thei list.
CreateSpace is part of Amazon, offering a Print On Demand platform for authors and content creators in other media and offers distribution through Amazon.com, Amazon Europe, CreateSpace eStore and ebook for Kindle, and working with on-demand printing, means that your book is always available and ready to ship. I am hoping to explore the details offered by the print on demand companies (If you have any information that might be useful why not drop me a line either through the comments box here or through the contact at www,cheekyseagull.co.uk, I would love to hear from you,) then put the comparisons together in one place as an easy reference. That may take a couple of weeks, in the meantime I'll stick with my comparisons with the packages offered by the Vanity Press.
Now and again I'm stuck with the idea that writing the novel is the easiest bit, the words flow out on to the screen, paper or whatever medium you are using, they are shuffled around in the edit and proof-reading, then after final polishing the novel is formatted and published (over-simplified, but you gett the drift). Then comes the marketing, finding places to post and generally get the word out there letting the world know that your latest work is heading their way. Not as much fun as writing, but the hard work can pay off...play with your ideas, use the imagination that created your book and see where it can take you.
Dip your toe into the marketing pool and paddle around...
The situation regarding the self-publishing arms of the big traditional publishers show them in close formation with the Vanity Presses, and with Author Solutions, owned by Penguin Random House in a pincer movement to grab the best via the traditional path and shuffle the rest towards the shearing sheds of the Vanities.
The door to self publish remains open.Yes; despite every negative thought and dismal sage advice about how many, or few, self-published books sell well; your readers are waiting, but you need to be careful. I've loosely touched on the issues regarding Vanity Press in general; and Author Solutions and its many subsidiaries in particular XLibris. (Xlibris.co.uk is the local branch of this multinational conglomerate) and a couple of days ago I nipped across to David Gaughran's blog Let's Get Visible and his latest piece The Case Against Author Solutions, Part 1 The numbers, looks at the methods and figures involved in the operation of this scammy company and how they saturate the internet with cleverly baited traps to snare the unwary writer. Thankfully, the majority of writers who stumble on the shiny new toy adverts look deeper and see what lurks beneath the surface, but not all. Some go down that road, at their peril and great cost. The way the adverts are designed and located is to catch the writer before they look further and find the many stories with unhappy endings at the hands of this Hydra like company.
I touched on the same point a couple of weeks ago in Come into my parlour... with my variation of the six degrees game, clicking the links and finding Author Solutions long before the count reached six. It was where I found the adverts, pumped out through GoogleAds, and sliding onto the screen with the Oxford English Dictionary and the Gutenberg Project among so many others that seemed unexpected at first, put then the GoogleAds follow their own track. It's the saturation level that is startling, the number of places the ads must be placed to proliferate at this level. David Gaughran explores this too.
The trick is to be very wary, it is a cliche that anything that seems to be too good to be true usually is, yet the independent author has tricks and traits tucked away. Observations picked up by Jim Devitt over at Indies Unlimited earmarking five distinctive traits found in many indie authors, have a look for yourself, and take them to heart, work with your imagination, check where you are in your journey towards publication and see what's around the corner you were going to walk past. Check out a website,, and then look at a handful covering the same area.
I am currently working on the draft revisions of What You Ask For, as well as completing The Obedience of Fools, and further down the list is putting Iceline into print, and the search is to find a way of doing this without breaking the bank.
Starting with 'book publishing' as the search parameters, as simple as that, and a number of options pop up, some are more helpful than others. A few offer a free quote (this may involve providing an email address, not always) based on the size, the type of book, number of pages, hard or soft cover and the sort of finish you want on the cover. The prices on the quotes can be wildly different but they give an idea of what price you can pass on the book to the customer and calculate your return on the investment.
The precise details vary from printer to printer, depending on whether they put out print run or print on demand. A UK based website that offers print on demand and distribution is FeedARead. A publishing platform funded by Arts Council England where you can sign up and publish for free, have it available to purchase through the site or for a distribution fee make it available elsewhere. Click the link and have a look for yourself; yes, there is a fee involved to cover the administration costs to set up your book for distribution. The end product is a good quality paperback, well made and a match for bookshop quality. FeedARead is available to writers of all nationalities, not just UK based.
Similarly, Completely Novel, is a print on demand service offering a variety of options for the publishing author, well laid out website with a free quote option and a series of reasonably priced packages starting with Free (and able to sell through the Completely Novel website) and monthly subscriptions offering access to distribution on line and through Bricks and Mortar stores. The finished product is good quality, suitable for a bookstore. The benchmark is that degree of product quality and the reader, quite rightly, should expect no less a quality product from the Independent author than any other source.
Shaun Allan over at Flip and Catch is looking at Print On Demand and brings CreateSpace, Lulu, Ingram Spark and Lightning Source to the list. As with FeedAread and Completely Novel each one has its own criteria for accepting a novel and adding it to thei list.
CreateSpace is part of Amazon, offering a Print On Demand platform for authors and content creators in other media and offers distribution through Amazon.com, Amazon Europe, CreateSpace eStore and ebook for Kindle, and working with on-demand printing, means that your book is always available and ready to ship. I am hoping to explore the details offered by the print on demand companies (If you have any information that might be useful why not drop me a line either through the comments box here or through the contact at www,cheekyseagull.co.uk, I would love to hear from you,) then put the comparisons together in one place as an easy reference. That may take a couple of weeks, in the meantime I'll stick with my comparisons with the packages offered by the Vanity Press.
Now and again I'm stuck with the idea that writing the novel is the easiest bit, the words flow out on to the screen, paper or whatever medium you are using, they are shuffled around in the edit and proof-reading, then after final polishing the novel is formatted and published (over-simplified, but you gett the drift). Then comes the marketing, finding places to post and generally get the word out there letting the world know that your latest work is heading their way. Not as much fun as writing, but the hard work can pay off...play with your ideas, use the imagination that created your book and see where it can take you.
Dip your toe into the marketing pool and paddle around...
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