Self book publishing

[Marjie3]

Can anyone give advice on how to self publish please? Have given up on literacy agents so now trying to work out how to do it myself.

Have you tried smaller publishers directly? You don’t need agents to send over manuscripts to them usually

I didn’t consider this idea - thanks - will give it a try

Much depends on what you want from publishing your book. Publishers have access to development editors, copy editors, proofreaders, marketing departments and networks of sellers. So if you're looking for your book to be "commercial" and to earn you money, they're very useful. But if your book is something you love for itself and just want to see in print, and you can absorb the costs, self-publishing can be a good way forward.

Go to Facebook and join the 20booksto50k group, they have detailed files with all of the info on how to self-publish. Also google the David Gaughran self-publishing course of videos which is excellent and might still be free.

Things I have learned:

• It is incredibly easy to self-publish and print a professional beautiful copy of your book.


• It is easy to hire the exact same cover designers and editors that top publishing companies use, and really fun working with them.


• It is also easy to pay for adverts that will push it to the top of an Amazon new release bestseller chart, which feels good.


• BUT it is very hard to make any profit at all on one book, as the advert costs are more than most readers will pay, unless you have a series of books out so that one advert sells several books. One book = you are making a loss.


• Some people are making fantastic money self-publishing, but all of them who I know either (a) started in the self pub ‘boom’ of 2013 and rode that wave or (b) are writing explicit sex, or violence, or both.

Good luck! It is a fun and exciting journey but be ready for trolls in the reviews.

Have you tried hybrid publishers? There are some great ones out there.....

I’ve never heard of a hybrid publisher - how does that work?

This is great advise thanks. I’ve seen a couple of self published books done by Amazon and they look pretty naff so it’s good to know it can be improved.

Please be aware of vanity publishing. You shouldn’t need to pay people to publish your book unless it’s straight up self publishing and you manage your own rights.

I didn’t realise it was called vanity publishing. Luckily I didn’t fall for it. I had a reply from a publisher about my submission telling me how amazing it was, then at the end they said it would cost me £2500 for them to publish it!!

@Marjie3 It’s never legit. Ever. No matter what they tell you, no reputable agent or publisher would ask you for any money towards publication, marketing or even train fare for a meeting!

You need to do your own research here! Join the Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi) - it's a great organisation full of resources for self pub authors. But do lots of reading and decide the best way for you to go.

The CIEP Directory is a good source of editors, proofreaders, book formatters, etc.

ALLi has a list of the best and publishers too: selfpublishingadvice.org/best-self-publishing-services/

Best and worst, that should say!

Which publisher was it?