Self Publishing

PublishAmerica Wants Your Money

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The latest scam from PublishAmerica is pretty ballsy — charging writers $99 to enter Amazon's FREE screenwriting contest. Yeah, you read right —  PublishAmerica is trying to convince authors that it makes sense to pay them to enter someone else's free contest. The frightening thing is, there are probably some suckers who will fall for it.  An incredulous, and outraged, P.N. Elrod broke the story on her blog over the weekend.  Here's the PublishAmerica pitch, with her boldfacing & annotations:

 

Dear Author:

Amazon.com has done it again. Now they have started Amazon Studios, and they want to see if your book's manuscript is their (and Warner Bros. Pictures'!) next movie. 

Basically, Amazon is now also entering the movie business, and they are crowdsourcing it, shopping among original story tellers like yourself. They have given Warner Bros. the right of first refusal. 

From Tuesday's Amazon Studios announcement: 

"We are excited to introduce writers, filmmakers and movie lovers to Amazon Studios […]  It is the goal of Amazon Studios to produce new, full-budget theatrical films based on the best projects and it will give Warner Bros. Pictures first access to the projects Amazon Studios wishes to produce in cooperation with an outside studio."

The Amazon Studio deals include rights payments of $200,000 for winning submissions, and a $400,000 bonus "if the movie makes over $60 million at the U.S. box office". It also awards prizes of $20,000 for the two best scripts in a month even if they don't become a movie.

See for all details http://studios.amazon.com/.    (No, don't, please don't.)

Here's how it works: Together with you we'll rework your manuscript a little (That's a red flag, kids!), then we submit it to Amazon Studios for their contest, following their guidelines. They award prizes monthly. (And PA collects 99.00 courtesy of your high interest rate credit card.)

 Activate your entry for Amazon Studios today: go to http://www.publishamerica.net/AmazonWarnerBros1.html, click Add to cart, (NO-NO-NO–DON'T!!!) choose a shipping option to start the activation. In the Ordering Instructions box be sure to mention the title of your book. If your book has not yet been released, add "Pre-release!"

By activating your book's submission to Amazon Studios you authorize PublishAmerica to act on your behalf and you agree that this constitutes your consent in writing. (NO-NO-NO-NO-NO!!!)

After we have received your activation you will be contacted about adding your book's list of characters and a film synopsis. 

See you in Hollywood!  (See you in hell first, PA.)

–PublishAmerica Bookstore

 

When she's done skewering PublishAmerica over their scam, she also takes Amazon to task for essentially hijacking the copyright on every script that's submitted. Which just goes to prove, nothing is ever really free.

The Name is Book, E Book.

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The Ian Fleming Estate has realized what so many other published authors already know — that if you own the digital rights to your backlist, it makes more financial sense to publish the ebooks yourself.  So the estate is publishing the digital versions of the Bond novels themselves, cutting out Penguin, which still has the entire series in print. The London Telegraph says that this move could be the beginning of a wave of established authors choosing to self-publish the digital versions of their highly successful franchises.

The books industry could lose out on millions of pounds because publishers have failed to sign up the digital rights to authors, who are expected to bypass traditional publishing houses in favour of Amazon or Google.

Industry insiders suggested that blockbusting authors including JK Rowling, Martin Amis and Salman Rushdie would be looking at the deal closely.

The digital versions of the 007 books will be published by Ian Fleming Publications, which administers the rights to the Bond books.

[…]There are many authors still working that have not signed away the digital rights to their books, allowing them to cut out their traditional publisher if they chose to. Agents said they had grown increasingly irritated by the low royalty rates offered by publishers for digital rights.

This development doesn’t surprise me at all, especially in light of the sobering news from Publishers Weekly this week about the plunge in “paper” sales and the incredible surge in digital in September.

As sales in the traditional trade segments plunged in September, e-book sales jumped 158.1%, according to the monthly sales estimates released by the Association of American Publishers. Sales for the 14 publishers that reported e-book sales hit $39.9 million in the month, and were up 188.4% in the first nine months of the year to $304.6 million. In contrast, sales in the three adult trade segments, adult hardcover, trade paperback and mass market paperback, all fell by more than double digits with the adult hardcover segment experiencing the biggest decline with sales down 40.4% at the 17 publisher who reported sales to the AAP of $180.3 million. The only other segment to post a significant sales gain in September was downloadable audio with sales from the nine reporting companies up 73.7%, to $7.7 million. Sales of audio CDs fell 42.6%, to $11.6 million, in the month at the 22 reporting companies.

Established authors with a large back-list, whether the titles are in print or not, could see significant increases in their revenues putting the digital versions of those books out themselves. And the news is getting around. Look for a surge in 2011 of established authors self-publishing the digital versions of their backlists.

This has agents scrambling for an approach on how to get a share of this potential income. I’ve already heard that some agents are talking about inserting clauses in their new agency agreements with authors that grant them commissions on the digital self-publication of any books for which they negotiated the original print deals. It will be interesting to see how that goes over.

The Mail I Get: Suspenseful Ethics Edition

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I got an email this morning from Suspense Magazine. It read:

Suspense Magazine has sent you a book recommendation!

Blood on His Hands by Mark P. Sadler

Suspense Magazine says, "Great book! Now available on Amazon Kindle."

Check it out!"

So I did.  The link sent me to Goodreads, and a four star, rave review for BLOOD ON HIS HANDS from Shannon Raab at Suspense Magazine. It read, in part:

A hunt for payback—predator vs. prey—is the underlying electrical current coursing through this colorful debut thriller by Mark Sadler. […]Not for the faint of heart, “Blood on his Hands” can make your stomach roll as well as a roller coaster while Sadler zigzags you on a frenzied chase across the country.

SM_December_Cover_FINAL_copy-426x555 That may be the strangest, most non-sensical blurb I've ever read, but that aside, what's really interesting about the review is that it's from the co-publisher of Suspense magazine, which also counts Sadler among their reviewers.

In other words, Suspense Magazine is praising and recommending a book by one of their own reviewers. So I asked Sadler about it:

Suspense Magazine is reviewing and recommending (via emails to its Goodreads followers) a book written by one of its own reviewers. Isn't that a huge conflict-of-interest? 

Sadler took offense, firing back:

They reviewed my book and then asked me to be a reviewer as they liked my style – you should check out the dates before you start throwing around accusations. Mark

So I replied that I wasn't making an accusation, but rather asking a question, one that I thought was valid. I went on to say:

Given that you are now reviewing for Suspense, it probably wasn't a wise idea for Suspense to send out an email recommending your book, regardless of whether it was reviewed prior to you becoming a reviewer for them.

I got an astonishing reply from Sadler that raised the ethical discussion to a whole new level. He wrote:

Again check your facts.. they liked the book so much they published it as an e-book and generally recommend all the books their reviewers write..we would not be great reviewers if our publication didn't like us.. and we are all doing it for free so I dont get your point..

I had to do a double-take when I saw that. Suspense Magazine is reviewing (and recommending) a book that they published that was written by one of their reviewers? And Sadler objected to my question about a possible conflict-of-interest? 

So I checked out Suspense's website and discovered that they are offering a new twist on self-publishing.

Suspense Magazine is excited to announce the opening of Suspense Publishing, a place where authors can get their book published for far less than traditional self-publishing houses. Suspense Publishing will bring the power of Suspense Magazine to its authors. We will help them market their book successfully, not by just giving you—the author—the tools to market your book, but we actually work for you to market your book.

[…]It is true that we will not publish your book in paper format, we are an EBook publisher. We are also a major magazine with a huge marketing presence.[…]Our publishing company takes the power of Suspense Magazine, an internationally read magazine, and puts your book in front of hundreds of thousands of people that read the genre that you are writing!

In other words, Suspense Magazine will use their publication to promote the work of their authors…including having their reviewers, who are apparently Suspense authors themselves, review Suspense books without acknowledging that they are also Suspense publications. Not surprisingly, the two most recent titles published by Suspense Publishing — Terri Armstrong's MORNING MENACE and Starr Reina's IN THE NAME OF REVENGE  – won praise from Suspense Magazine.  For MORNING MENACE, Suspense raved:

The intensity and inclusion of a character tangled in her own neurosis keeps the pages turning and the unexpected ending will surprise even the most adept amateur crime- solvers.

And for IN THE NAME OF REVENGE, Suspense proclaimed:

A new star has arrived in the writing world bringing readers a gripping tale peppered with unexpected bits of humor as the cast of characters and twisted turns unfold.

They claim aspiring authors who engage their services can "use the power and strength of Suspense Magazine to reach millions of readers." Really? Do they honestly believe Suspense reaches millions of readers? That would mean they are reaching more than Forbes (921,000 readers),  Newsweek's (1.6 million) or Vanity Fair (1.7 million).  I'd never heard of the magazine until I went to Bouchercon and met the publishers, John and Shannon Raab.

The Raabs seemed like nice, well-intentioned folks, who genuinely love the mystery, horror and suspense genres. But their magazine won't have much credibility in the marketplace, or in the publishing industry, if they don't follow the most basic ethical standards…and if they use their magazine as a promotional tool for the authors who pay them to package their ebooks.  

It's basic ethical conduct in journalism to try to avoid conflicts-of-interest and to disclose them when they are unavoidable. In this case, the conflicts are totally avoidable. Suspense Magazine needs to disclose when the books that they are reviewing are published by them and/or written by one of their reviewers. The magazine's readers need to know when the critics who are reviewing Suspense's books are also other Suspense authors. It means they have a bias. It's journalism 101, folks. Doing otherwise undermines the validity and objectivity, and certainly the professionalism, of the entire magazine.

My sense was that the Raabs want their magazine to be taken seriously in the field…and it won't be with such loose ethical standards. 

Top Suspense

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Authors Bill Crider, Ed Gorman, Max Allan Collins, Harry Shannon,  Dave Zeltserman and Vicki Hendricks have teamed up to create Top Suspense, a site showcasing their terrific books in e-format. 

Electronic books are soon to be a billion dollar business, yet it's more difficult than ever to find a good read, especially via digital download. With more than 700,000 ebooks already on line, with a good number of them self-published, ebook stores are becoming the equivalent of publisher's past 'slush piles'. […]The Top Suspense Group plans to slash through all the clutter.

[…]"Readers can count on us," creator and acclaimed author Dave Zeltserman explains, “Every member of our group has already made his or her mark on genre fiction, whether it's noir, crime, mystery, thriller, horror or Westerns, and in some cases, several of these genres."

[…]Zeltserman has spoken before about the difficulty readers have in searching for sites that offer seasoned professionals. Top Suspense Group members make some of their finest material available at affordable prices. Many of the ebooks will contain bonus material, such as the writer’s commentary on the book that has been purchased, or the addition of a free short story.

“We believe readers will appreciate a reliable inexpensive site that continuously delivers some of the best in contemporary genre fiction,” said Top Suspense Group member and multi-award winning author, Max Allan Collins.

It's a shrewd marketing move and they are a very impressive group of established authors with a strong line-up of books. Collectively, they've got all the genres covered, from mysteries to westerns, and have made major literary contributions in all of them. It will be interesting to see how their experiment works out.

UPDATE 11/25/2010 : Full disclosure. Since publishing this post, I have accepted an invitation to become one of the authors at Top Suspense.

Bookpros is Booksleazy

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Now that it's possible to get your book published for free, you'd think the vanity presses would just fold their tents. But there are still some out there, hoping to snag the few remaining suckers. One such company is Bookpros, also known as Turnkey Press, Ovation Books, Synergy Books, Bridgeway Books, and Phenix & Phenix Literary Publicists…and probably some names I don't even know about. They've billed themselves in the past as  "an author-funded traditional publisher," meaning they are a vanity press that wants to confuse newbies into thinking they're something else. Their crack publicists recently sent me a press release that read, in part:

I noticed you cover self-publishing topics from time to time, and I thought you might be interested in a trend piece on the evolution of self-publishing. […] With the promise of in-store distribution and full-service publicity campaigns, BookPros’ authors have easily competed at a national level. In the seven years since their founding, they have had eight bestsellers and have received more than 50 prestigious industry awards for editing and design. Many of their titles have been picked up by major commercial publishers, while others have attracted the interest of movie producers. BookPros offers a unique author-funded approach to publishing, giving authors access to quality editing and design, real in-store distribution and award-winning publicity.

Of course, they don't mention any of their "bestsellers' by name nor any of the "prestigious industry awards" that they've won because you wouldn't recognize any of the books nor any of the awards. Saying that their books have "attracted the interest of movie producers" is so vague that it's utterly meaningless. But empty boasts like that are typical in the vanity press biz.

What's truly special about this come-on is that they are touting their "unique author-funded approach" — as if they are the first people to come up with the idea of charging writers outrageous sums of money to print their books. That's chutzpah (and almost as ridiculous as vanity press huckster Brien Jones' claim in his bio at Jones Harvest Publishing that he "pioneered the concept of selling self-published books to bookstores." Yeah, right, Brien, nobody ever thought of that before).  

At this point, anyone foolish enough to go with a vanity press as blatantly sleazy as this one deserves no sympathy.

Get Badged

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GOLDBERG_Iron_On_Badge_FINAL Of all the books that I've written, my favorite is THE MAN WITH THE IRON-ON BADGE. It was nominated for the Best Novel Shamus award by the Private Eye Writers of America, and won quite a lot of critical acclaim, before falling out-of-print. Here's a sampling:

"As dark and twisted as anything Hammett or Chandler ever dreamed up […] leaving Travis McGee in the dust." Kirkus, Starred Review

"Approaching the level of Lawrence Block is no mean feat, but Goldberg succeeds with this engaging PI novel." Publishers Weekly

I want to introduce THE MAN WITH THE IRON-ON BADGE to the next wave of new Kindle, iPad, and Nook owners this holiday season… and to do that, I’d like send you a FREE COPY of the novel in whatever eformat you prefer (epub, PDF, txt, html, etc). Here’s all that you have to do:

1. Send me an email at lee@leegoldberg.com with the subject FREE BADGE BOOK and give me your name and the address of your website or blog (don’t have one? That’s okay. Read on).

2. Agree to post a review, positive or negative (but with no spoilers!) on your blog, website, Goodreads page, Facebook page, or the Amazon listing for MAN WITH THE IRON-ON BADGE by Christmas Day. (You don't have to buy the book on Amazon to review it there, you only need to have an account). 

3. Email me a copy of the review or a link to the post.

This offer is limited to the first 50 people who respond by November 30.

The book is about Harvey Mapes, a 26-year-old security guard who spends his nights in a guard shack outside a gated community in Southern California, reading detective novels, watching reruns, and waiting for his life to finally start. It finally happens when Cyril Parkus, one of the wealthy residents, asks Harvey to follow his beautiful wife Lauren. 

The lowly security guard jumps at the opportunity to fulfill his private eye fantasies and use everything he’s learned from Spenser, Magnum, and Mannix. But things don’t exactly go according to the books…or the reruns. As Harvey fumbles and stumbles through his first investigation, he discovers that the differences between fiction and reality can be deadly. 

With the help of his mortgage broker neighbor and occasional lover Carol, Harvey uncovers a blackmail plot that takes a sudden and unexpectedly tragic turn…plunging him into a world of violence, deception and murder… and forcing him to discover what it really takes to be a private eye. 

Here's a sampling of some more of the critical praise the book received from authors and critics…

“A wonderfully fresh voice in the mystery genre, Goldberg will delight fans of Janet Evanovich and Robert Crais,” – Rick Riordan, author of "Percy Jackson & the Olympians"

"Lee Goldberg bravely marches into territory already staked out by some fierce competition — Donald Westlake, Lawrence Block, the early Harlan Coben– and comes out virtually unscathed." The Chicago Tribune

"Goldberg has a knack for combining just the right amount of humor and realism with his obvious love for the PI genre and his own smart ass sensibilities. THE MAN WITH THE IRON ON BADGE is a terrific read. Goldberg is the real deal and should be on everyone’s must read list." Crimespree Magazine

"The Man With The Iron-On Badge is a quick, fun read with a satisfying and unexpected ending. Harvey Mapes is a hero I hope we see in a sequel." — Phillip Margolin, author of "Gone But Not Forgotten"

I hope you will like it, too!

King of the Kindle

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Author Parnell Hall sings in this video about wanting to be "The King of the Kindle" and has jam-packed it with author cameos from Bouchercon… including a moment with yours truly. 

 

To Speak for the Kindle

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Night Vision,Redskyfinal.jpg Paul Levine's iconic hero Jake Lassiter burst onto the mystery scene with TO SPEAK FOR THE DEAD, the first in a widely acclaimed series that has since gone out-of-print. Now Lassiter is making a triumphant return — with the out-of-print titles on the Kindle and with a brand new hardcover release entitled LASSITER coming this fall.  So I thought I'd ask Paul what it's like being one of the few authors these days who is both still very active in print and yet diving head-long into the uncharted waters of the ebook biz.

LEE: You're a recent convert to the Kindle… and in the space of just a few months, you've released many of the Jake Lassiter backlist as ebooks, including MORTAL SIN. Have they been successful? What have you learned from the experience?

 The success of the books has startled me.  “To Speak for the Dead” and “Night Vision,” the first two Jake Lassiter novels, both hit number one on the Kindle “hardboiled” and “legal thriller” lists.  So did “Reversal,” my stand-alone Supreme Court thriller.  “False Dawn” and “Mortal Sin,” the next couple Lassiter books, hit number two.

These books were long out of print and originally appeared in hardcover in the early 1990’s.  So, the point for all authors is this: books you thought were long dead have an afterlife.  You can resuscitate your out-of-print and out-of-mind books by electronically publishing them.  Also, and this is BIG: the books gather momentum and grow each month.  This is the opposite of our experience with dead-tree books, which have the same life expectancy as yogurt in the fridge. 

LEE: What are the chances that you'll write an original ebook some day soon?

I have three more Lassiters to put up on Kindle and Smashwords, which then distributes to B&N, Borders, Sony, and the rest.  Then…and I haven’t said this publically before…I’m publishing “Ballistic.”  It’s a loose nukes thriller I’ve adapted from a spec feature script I wrote some time ago.  The script had some close calls, but never was made.  After that, who knows? 

LEE: Do you think releasing the out-of-print Lassiter books will give your traditional, hardcover release next Fall of LASSITER a sales spike? Or do you think it will work the other way around?

Both, I hope! 

But let’s be realistic.  I’m the publisher of the “old” Lassiters, so I can charge $2.99 on Kindle and Kobo etc.  Will those buyers shell out $25 for a hardcover?  Should they?  Remember, too, that I have no control over what Bantam will charge for the e-book edition.  I will plead for as low a price as possible, but we know that won’t be anywhere close to $2.99.

LEE:. Do you think it's wise for unpublished authors to self-publish? What about mid-list authors who have been dropped? Is this the future of publishing…or just an additional revenue stream for authors?

Some smart-alec at the Bouchercon e-books panel said that self-published authors were producing a “tsunami of swill.”  Wait!  That was you.  It’s true, of course, but as you also pointed out, there is some very good fiction being written by otherwise unpublished authors.  It’s so damn hard to break into mainstream publishing now that it’s inevitable that some good writing will be left at the door.  The problem is that way too many writers lack the training or discipline or just plain talent to produce readable fiction.  Separating the wheat from the chaff produces…a lot of chaff.

For mid-list authors who’ve been dropped, it’s a different story.  They have the training, the experience, and some audience.  The Internet can provide a new source of income…and satisfaction.  We write because we have to….because it’s an illness, a fever…not just for the bucks.  If you want to get rich, open a burger joint across the street from a community college. 

As for the future of publishing, I’ll borrow William Goldman’s line about Hollywood, “Nobody knows anything.”

I’m Giving Away THE WALK

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The_Walk_FINAL (2) When THE WALK came out in hardcover seven years ago, nobody noticed it. I figured that was the end…but 15 months ago, I re-released it as an ebook. It was an immediate success and has sold nearly 12,000 copies so far and is still going strong.  

I want to introduce THE WALK to the next wave of new Kindle, iPad, and Nook owners this holiday season… and to do that, I’d like send you a FREE COPY of the novel in whatever eformat you prefer (epub, PDF, txt, html, etc). Here’s all that you have to do:

  1. 1. Send me an email at lee@leegoldberg.com with the subject FREE WALK BOOK and give me your name and the address of your website or blog (don’t have one? That’s okay. Read on).

    2. 2. Agree to post a review, positive or negative (but with no spoilers!) on your blog, website, Goodreads page, Facebook page, or the Amazon listing for THE WALK by Christmas Day. (You don't have to buy the book on Amazon to review it there, you only need to have an account). 

    3. Email me a copy of the review or a link to the post.

    This offer is limited to the first 100 people who respond by November 30.

    UPDATE 10-27-10, 5:14 pm: I've given away thirty books already…so if you're interested, you'd better hurry!

I Want to Suck Your Eblood

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Draculas01c Joe Konrath, F. Paul Wilson, Blake Crouch and Jeff Strand have collaborated on DRACULAS, an original novel for the Kindle. It's yet another intriguing Konrath e-book experiment. He wrote about it all on the Huffington Post. He said, in part:

"Draculas" will be exclusive on Kindle for a year, as a favor to Amazon since they've been so helpful. But those with other brands of ereaders will be able to buy "Draculas" from Amazon and convert it to the format of their choice with free ebook software like Calibre or Stanza. We have instructions for doing this on our website, www.draculasthebook.com. We also plan on doing a print release later in the year, using Amazon's CreateSpace.

Since professionalism is essential, we hired a cover artist and an ebook formatter. A publisher providing these services takes 52.5% of an ebook's cover price, and the retailer gets 30% through the agency model. That leaves only 17.5% for the author. By absorbing these sunk costs ourselves, we're able to earn the full 70% royalties and not have to share them with anyone. Though we're splitting the profits four ways, we're each earning only slightly less per copy sold (51 cents each) than we would on one of our own paperback books (64 cents each), and still only charging the reader $2.99.

The book is 80,000 words and also contains 80,000 words of extras, like the 700 emails the authors sent back-and-forth while writing this book in just eight weeks. If the book is a success, which I suspect it will be, it could lead even more published authors to try self-publishing an original ebook…even as they continue to write novels for major publishers. Judging by the conversations I had at Bouchercon, lots of writers are already considering this, seeing it not as an all-or-nothing alternative, but as an additional revenue stream. I'm one of them. But more on that later…