publishing

Make it easy on the customer

Moriah

There’s a book I really really really want to read. However, it’s only available in e-format 2 ways: Serialized on the author’s blog (i.e., on the computer—no thanks) and via Kindle (no thanks). Now, I’m getting ready to email him and ask him if it’s available any other way, so we shall see.

There’s another book I really really really want to read. However, it’s only available in 4 formats (actually, 3 because 2 formats are identical in nature), none of which I can read on my ebook reader. The format I want is MS Reader (LIT). Why? Because I can break the DRM and put it on my ebook reader. Which, come to think of it, is probably why it’s not offered in that format.

Really, there’s enough GOOD stuff out there in more accessible formats to waste time having to read on the computer. After having had my eBookWise for a mere 7 months, I’ve gotten to where I WILL forgo a title (no matter how badly I want to read it) if I can’t get it in a format that is accessible to me. Otherwise, I’ll just go to the library, where it likely won’t be.

We’re really trying to put The Proviso in as many places as possible in as many formats as we can. It’s not just in the B10 Mediaworx bookstore (8 DRM-LESS formats bundled together in a zip), but at Amazon in both trade paperback and Kindle, at Barnes & Noble, at Books-A-Million, at Powell’s, and now at ebooksjustpublished (which takes you back to the B10 Mediaworx bookstore, but hey, it’s exposure).

Some time next week, The Proviso will be in the iTunes store as an iApp for iTouch/iPhone. Although we’ve formatted it into EPUB for those who’ve downloaded Stanza on their iTouch/iPhones, we really want to present as many options as possible to make it easy for every customer to read it the way they prefer to read it.

Because not being able to read a book I want to read the way I want to read it is beginning to weary me.

Moratorium on manuscript buying

Moriah

From Publisher’s Weekly:

It’s been clear for months that it will be a not-so-merry holiday season for publishers, but at least one house has gone so far as to halt acquisitions. PW has learned that Houghton Mifflin Harcourt has asked its editors to stop buying books. […] Another agent who had also heard about the no-acquisitions policy at HMH called the move “very scary” and said it’s indicative of an industry climate worse than any he’s ever seen.

Predictions:

1. Expect this to keep happening for a while at other major publishers.

2. More independent publishers will spring up, particularly in the ebook arena.

3. Major publishers will start mining their backlists for ebooks. Oh, wait, they already have. Credit for innovation coming right up!

4. Revisions in the advance/royalty system. E-presses blazed this trail, but Harper Studios has taken up the cause (and may end up reaping the credit for that, too).

5. This may be the death knell for the consignment system of selling books. One can hope, anyway.

Yeah, it’s depressing, but A) everybody’s having a hard time, so boo hoo at you too, publishing and B) everything is cyclical.

Quite frankly, the economic downturn and the rise of the ebook couldn’t be timed better. You build up the low-cost or free alternative in the downswing (coupled with instant gratification), something people can afford and are open to, then you see it explode once the upswing begins.

Dead tree books will NOT be a thing of the past (knock on wood), but the smart publishers and booksellers will find cheaper alternatives to bring those to market too. If you want to survive after an economic downturn, you must start thinking in the long-term instead of the short-term; you sure as heck aren’t making any money now, so figure out how to make money when everybody has some again.

Pssst, publishers and booksellers:

It’s called the Espresso.

In kiosks.

At Wal-Mart, Target, and smack DAB in the middle of your chain or independent bookstore.

Ah, homogeneity!

Moriah

So I saw this in Publisher’s Weekly online yesterday and bookmarked it to blog about, but then Janet Reid beat me to the punch.

Recently, funny things have been happening in my slush pile. I find myself receiving well-written, correctly formatted, professional-looking query letters from bad writers. Imagine my chagrin: one minute I’m intrigued by a smoothly crafted query letter, the next I’m staring down at a crackpot writing sample.

I wondered how long this would take.

I will always and forever remember a story my dad told about Hardee’s barbecue sauce and a taste-tester he met. The point wasn’t to make a standout barbecue sauce. The point was to make the barbecue sauce as inoffensive as possible to the largest number of people.

So I’ll call it the Hardee’s BBQ Sauce Query.

One comment on Janet Reid’s blog summed up my thoughts quite nicely:

Post Summary: In the 21st Century, people can Google query on how to do something and find carefully composed instructions. Thus, the prior vetting process is no long efficient for the Literary Agent.

My 2 Cents: Awesome. Adjust or die.

The book as art

Moriah

I said something in my little rant the other day that’s stuck with me: The book is the art.

To me, Harry Potter’s fabulous because it’s a whole experience. The cover art and the story work together. It’s got color, movement, focus, texture. You’re sitting there in your reading chair on a cold day (possibly snowing), drinking hot chocolate, bundled up with this heavy hardback book in your hands.

Your head’s in the story. Your eyes are seeing the specialized fonts in the header and the brilliant colors of the edge of the binding. Every once in a while, your eyes get a treat in the form of a graphic buried in the text denoting handwritten notes that give you a sense of intimacy with the events that you don’t get with typesetting. Your arms feel the weight of good storytelling. Your fingertips brush the dust jacket and feel the texture of the thick mottled matte paper, they pinch heavy paper between them and turn the pages.

I have a leatherbound edition of Alice in Wonderland. It, too, is an experience, with a little bit of the feel of age. Deckle edges are the best.

I can tell you all the usual reasons I decided to publish independently, and give you another half dozen reasons why Dude enthusiastically encouraged me to do so (the biggest being that he has faith in my work). But after my little temper tantrum, it occurred to me that there was one other reason I really hadn’t thought about much:

The whole book is the art. I had a vision for my book, the series. Even when I was sending out queries galore, I had a vision and I’ll tell you, I was vaguely depressed to think that even if I got The Call, someone else was going to take my vision and put his own spin on it–and he may or may not give a fat rat’s ass what I want or what I see. That’s not to say a graphic artist wouldn’t have done better than I could have and surpassed my vision by light years. It’s simply that I would have no control over it, a little input that might or might not be taken into account, and perhaps no veto power, especially if he was up against a deadline. This is not a client-vendor relationship between the author and the artist.

Interior design is a relative static: You design so as to make the reader unaware of your design. You don’t give him a headache, you don’t wear his eyeballs out. In short, as Zoe put it, you don’t piss him off.

I can give no advice with regard to other indies and how they handle cover design. All I’m saying is that I’m a very visual person and for me, the story is not the art.

It’s the book.