From Book to E-Book

[tlm]

Many of you know that Chance Encounters: The Story of the Innkeeper's Son was once published with Publish America. I finally sought a release from my contract and now Chance Encounters is available to the public as a E-Book through Lulu.com.

I am excited because of the reduced price. Even with that, my royalties are doubled!!thumbsup! Hopefully my web site will be updated in the next couple of days and we will see how things go!

Thanks to all of you on this site who gave me advice and helped me in this process!

[BrotherDave]

That's great! How many have you sold?
I just don't have faith in e-books yet.

brotherdave

[Keith Wallis]

As BroDave says that is great. I'd be interested to know the figures too !

[Denise]

Praise God.
_________________

…circumstances don’t determine our treatment of others,
as much as our attitude about life…

[tlm]

Thank you all for your replies. My web site didn't advertize Chance Encounters as an e-book until yesterday, so it didn't have but one hit as of last night.

I was ready to explore this avenue because I wasn't ready for Chance Encounters to die just yet. I know that most companies will have no use for the book because it was published by PA.

Now that I have done it, I am considering other works that were turned down by publishers simply because there was no huge market for them. They are works (one is a children's book) I did when I was younger and they are sitting in a box. Why not see if they might bring some joy to someone else? What do I have to lose? Naturally I will continue to work on my other projects and seek a publishing company for my Christian Romance novel.

[love2write]

Hi Toni,

Did you get your release from PA? Keep at it if you haven't heard anything from them.

Hope The Rebel's Pledge got to you in a reasonable amount of time.

I wish you all the best with Chance Encounters as an e-book. Send me a blurb for the 'Authors' News' section in Stepping Stones.

Blessings,
Rita

[tlm]

Thanks for the invitation. I sent you an e-mail with some details about my release.

PA found out that a friend and PA author put her book on lulu and they made her take it off. The later contracts gave PA all ebook rights--even though they no longer sell their books in ebook form. Go figure.

I have The Rebel's Pledge now and am planning to get started reading it very soon. My deck chair is calling to me, telling me that the evenings are getting cooler. lol.

[Merry]

Hey, congrats! Yeah, I think a few of this will 'circling' to see what happens. E-books still seem like another country to me, so it will be interesting to see how it goes.

[kriswrite]

In my experience, if eBooks are marketed well, they do great and can be quite profitable!

Congrats and good luck tlm!

Kristina

[tlm]

Thanks

My school year has just started. I haven't really had time to devote to marketing, yet. So far, all I have is a web site. I will explore marketing very soon, when school settles down.!thumbsup!

[farriswheels]

Being new to this site and new to everything about publishing, do I understand that PA is a publisher to stay away from or did I not understand that correctly? The ebooks are an interesting concept. I am anxious to see how it works for you.

[tlm]

There are many, many people who have had unhappy experiences with PA. PAs only editing consists of the use of spell check program. They do not promote your work. I would have finished my contract with them except that my 2nd book had over 2 errors per page in it. I could have never taken those error-filled books to a book signing! I asked them to fix the mess, but they kept sending me back the messed up manuscript.

Many people are concerned by their royalty payments, too. I am not telling anyone what to do concerning PA, just beware!

[farriswheels]

I visited your website. Your book looks terrific and has great reviews. By all appearances you look to be extrememly successful. Congratulations on this great work!

Yet, no other publisher wants your book now because you once had it published by PA? And they, PA, can't or won't give you a product to be proud of? Is that why you went to ebooks? Did your book never get off the ground?

If you once publish on ebooks is it possible to have the same results that no other publisher will touch it? Is published published? One publisher per book and that's it?

Please forgive me if these are dumb questions. I am in unfamiliar territory here.

[tlm]

More contemporary fiction (unless it is romantic fiction) is what is selling right now. My story is Biblical fiction. That is why most mainstream publishers didn't want to read it. PA did want to read it.

It just happened that I sent my book to them at a time when there was little information about PA on the Internet. Now there is much information, websites all over that are set up by authors who want out of their contracts. No other publishing company has that kind of track record.

The other thing that happened was that my acceptance to PA came days after 9-11. There were many news stories about publishers looking for conservative/positive manuscripts just after the 9-11 tragedy. Writers were setting aside their manuscripts to write new, more wholesome, stories because people wanted to escape from what was on the news. I assumed that is why PA accepted my book.

I did better than most PA authors. Most sell only about 50 copies to family and friends (from what I have read on the net). I sold over 200 that I know of. That was due to my setting up book signings all over the county. Sometimes PA didn't even get my books to me in time for a signing. I had to collect books in other ways!

Things worked out okay with the first book, I guess. Others had worse problems than me. There were numerous errors in the first draft of Chance Encounters, but they were fixed. With the second book, they weren't so agreeable. I couldn't let it go to print because I knew I wouldn't sell the error filled book and if they printed it, no one else would. My name was even spelled wrong on the inside pages!

I don't think that publishers are that bothered by a book being an e-book. I don't know though. I don't think an e-book can be used as a publishing credit unless it is a huge success. Maybe someone else can answer that question for you.

[tlm]

Lulu.com does print on demand books as well as e-books. They would do for your the same thing as PA and you would get to keep more money. When I did a book signing PA got about $10, the bookstore got $4, and I barely made $1.

That is not true with Lulu. I would try a mainstream publisher first. That is what I am going to do with my 2nd book. If not, there are printers who will give you more of your profit than PA.

I hope I have been of some help.

[farriswheels]

You have been very helpful. I appreciate your candidness. Thank you.

I see there is a lot to learn. I'm in my 60's so I have to learn it fast. A new career for me maybe.

So far I discovered that you can get an agent or not. Does anyone on this site think that is a good idea? Has anyone hired an agent to help you get a publisher? What is involved in that? I can see that it's one more person to get some of your profit.

Other than Zondervan who are the noted Christian Publishers?

Somewhere I read that you need an outline of the book for some publishers and others want to read the whole book. Have you, any of you encountered that one way or another?

[tlm]

My suggestion is to find some of the newest books on the topic of publishing. If you get older editions of a book, the information will be outdated. You see, the business is constantly changing. About 15 years ago, most magazine publishers did not want manuscripts e-mailed to them. Now most prefer to do business by e-mail.

Some books list publishers and agents, but beware. Two of the best books on the topic listed PA. That is where I got their address. That is why it is so important that sites like this exist. You can ask someone else about their experiences.

If you don't want to buy these books, you can find some of them at local libraries.

[farriswheels]

You have been very helpful. Thank you very much.

I wrote a much longer reply and it apparently got lost in cyberspace somewhere but I did want you to know how much I appreciated your help so I am relying this second time.

[kriswrite]

I know you didn't ask me, but I hope you won't mind me chiming in, Farris. Tlm offers great advice about reading newer books about the business of writing. And a lot depends on what you are writing (fiction or nonfiction, magazine articles or books, Christian or secular, etc.).

To find Christian publishers, a good first step is to visit a Christian bookstore and look at books similar to what you want to write. Who has published them? And how would your book(s) be different? Then pick up any legit writer's guideline book (like Writers Market or Sally Stewart's guide), which will list lots of publishers, what type of work they seek, and how to contact them.

I hope this helps just a little.

Kristina