Alyce Wilson's Blog: Dispatches from Wonderland - Posts Tagged "publishing"
New Publishing Options
Recently, while going through old papers from my filing cabinet, I've been struck by the advances in self-publishing in just the past five or six years. I dumped into the recycling bin all the flyers and price quotes gathered from offset printers while I was putting together my first poetry chapbook. Even then, I opted for print-on-demand as the best investment of my money, publishing Picturebook of the Martyrs first on Cafe Press and later on Amazon.com's CreateSpace.
Ten years ago, ebooks were primarily sold from individual author's sites as PDFs and MS Word documents. Contrast that to the many formats available via Smashwords, which converts author's manuscripts into the proper formats to be sold at a variety of online retailers.
I've begun checking out Smashwords as a potential publisher for my next book, a collection of poems and writings about my son, nicknamed Kung Fu Panda. The book, which will be called "Now with Kung Fu Action Grip," I believe has the potential to appeal to a variety of readers, especially (but not limited to) parents. Therefore, I'm beginning to think it would be best to make it available in as many places as possible.
From what I've read so far, the only possible drawback would be that Smashwords does best with very simply formatted books. However, the style guide did include instructions for inserting photos, so that could still be an option, should I choose to use any. It wouldn't, however, be worth the time and effort to do a reformat of Dedicated Idiocy, since that book is chock full of graphics.
If I chose to go with Smashwords, in addition to Kindle and a print version, I'd have to format the manuscript three different ways. However, if I use MS Word styles as I put the collection together, that should help a great deal.
I also like the fact that short fiction is published widely on the site, allowing me the option of publishing stand-alone pieces, should I choose. Perhaps I could upload one or two of my essays as a free sample of the book?
I'd be interested in hearing any feedback from authors who have published on Smashwords. What are the advantages and disadvantages?
Ten years ago, ebooks were primarily sold from individual author's sites as PDFs and MS Word documents. Contrast that to the many formats available via Smashwords, which converts author's manuscripts into the proper formats to be sold at a variety of online retailers.
I've begun checking out Smashwords as a potential publisher for my next book, a collection of poems and writings about my son, nicknamed Kung Fu Panda. The book, which will be called "Now with Kung Fu Action Grip," I believe has the potential to appeal to a variety of readers, especially (but not limited to) parents. Therefore, I'm beginning to think it would be best to make it available in as many places as possible.
From what I've read so far, the only possible drawback would be that Smashwords does best with very simply formatted books. However, the style guide did include instructions for inserting photos, so that could still be an option, should I choose to use any. It wouldn't, however, be worth the time and effort to do a reformat of Dedicated Idiocy, since that book is chock full of graphics.
If I chose to go with Smashwords, in addition to Kindle and a print version, I'd have to format the manuscript three different ways. However, if I use MS Word styles as I put the collection together, that should help a great deal.
I also like the fact that short fiction is published widely on the site, allowing me the option of publishing stand-alone pieces, should I choose. Perhaps I could upload one or two of my essays as a free sample of the book?
I'd be interested in hearing any feedback from authors who have published on Smashwords. What are the advantages and disadvantages?
Dispatches from Wonderland
Author Alyce Wilson's blog, providing both writer's thoughts and reader's comments.
...more
- Alyce Wilson's profile
- 15 followers
