New Stats on Self-Publishing

The Guardian reports that newly-released figures for 2012 show a 59 per cent increase in the number of self-published books. Here are some of the facts reported in the article:

- 391,000 books were self-published in the US in 2012 (this includes only books published with an ISBN so the figure is understated);

- this increase has been mirrored by a growing professionalism among self-published authors;

- romance and literary fiction are the top genres;

- 71 per cent of these books are purchased by women;

- more than 80 per cent of self-published ISBNs came through just eight self-publishing houses;

- Amazon's CreateSpace had the biggest year-on-year increase, followed by Smashwords, Lulu, and the Random House imprint Author Solutions.

For the full text of the article, please see http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013....