I’m in a bit of a quandry. My agent didn’t take on my edgy Christian novel; he said I had something there, but in essence he didn’t think he could sell it. I also have a memoir on my return to the Catholic Church that was acquired and edited by a Catholic publisher–then pulled from the process at the 11th hour because of some Church-related issues.
I’ve started on the next novel, and the company that published the book I coauthored, When They Come Home, is interested in a proposal on a follow-up title. Another publisher seems to be interested in the best friends devotional Pat Lorenz and I wrote, but we haven’t seen a contract yet.
And I turn fifty-five in about a month.
I’ve been giving some serious thought to putting out the memoir and the first novel as e-books. I wouldn’t have done that even six months ago. But time is becoming a factor. It isn’t solely an ego thing; writing is one of my ministries, and God tells us not to hide our light under a bushel basket. And who hasn’t heard about Amanda Hocking’s success?
In talking with authors who have e-published, I’ve heard about the glories of passive income and of the very, very small (think cents per copy) difference in the per-sale profit between hard-copy editions and e-books. I’ve also heard horror stories about poorly formatted e-books with ugly covers.
I’m blessed that my path has crossed those of a number of publishing insiders, people I can ask about where they see e-books going. But most writers aren’t in that position. If you’re not, I’d suggest you take a look at the advance copy of An Affordable Ebook about Writing and Publishing Ebooks and Digitally Printed Books. The author, John Franklin, is a digital publishing executive who also published traditionally. This quick read provides insights on how publishing got broken, and what options are available to today’s writers. At $2.99, it’d be cheap at five times the price.
As for me, I’m still not sure I’m going to take the plunge. But it’s great to have friends like John Franklin as sounding boards.
