My recent book written with Judith Skinner is finally available through Amazon.com! Its one of the world’s largest book marketplaces, and we are now able to offer it for purchase at the same price we’ve been selling it through our websites and through our POD partner Lulu.comSelf publishing through print on demand uses the same huge printers as the Big Publishing Houses, provides the same beautiful quality on each page with full glossy covers, but does them as needed instead of in lots of several thousand at a time. Authors can now get books into print that publisher’s accountants cannot see as being Potential Blockbuster Hits, and this opens the market to niche books that would not otherwise be available to us all. Why should a book have to guarantee starting sales of more than 10,000 to ever see the light of day? Because that’s how the Big Guys get low enough print costs to be able to offer books to book club customers at $2.00 per title, and not many independent authors and artists have that kind of up-front cash. So, authors are happy to have their books accepted and do what is needed to have that happen–that includes giving up all rights to editorial decisions like what’s actually included in the book, whats on the cover, how it is laid out, etc. and also accepting a sliding scale of royalties–“10% of wholesale” CAN be as little as 20 cents, if the book is sold at wholesale to those aforementioned bulk-buyers like the book clubs at $2.00. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that wholesale is always 1/2 the retail price—thats not at all the case.  Sellers like Barnes and Noble, Borders, and other stores, and Amazon typically want 50-55% of the retail price themselves. This makes it difficult for independant publishers, but things are changing!
More than any time previous in history, authors and artists have the opportunity to get their work into print. Of course, the reason the Big Guys want the biggest piece of the money pie is because they do a LOT of the work and assume all the costs of printing, which are HUGE. They have staffs of hundreds who do the layout, editing, often the photography, marketing and so on. As an indepentant, we are responsable for all those things. In return, we have the right of choice–which font to use, which photograph, which projectsto feature, how to word the text, and what goes on the cover. Judith and I are both strongly in favor of keeping the rights and responsabities, and doing the work to our very best abilities and highest standards. To paraphrase the quote, “We have seen the editor–and it is us!”
We dont expect to sell a million copies. But we ARE proud of each and every copy that rolls off the press, knowing that we poured our very best abilities into this book, and it is beautiful, informative, and uniquely ours. Now, through a new arrangement with Amazon and Lulu, we can offer it to everyone in the world!!