The Publishing Process Part #1

For a new or aspiring author, the publishing business can be a foreign landscape that catches the uninitiated off guard. It certainly caught me. There is a ton of things you must educate yourself with and this takes time. It cannot be rushed.

You must decide if you plan to go the traditional publishing route, which through a literary agent who represents you and your work or self-publishing. There are pros and cons for both processes and it is up to the individual author to decide which route to take.

An agent and/or the agency try to sell your manuscript to publishing companies. They charge a percentage which is usually around 15% and don’t get paid unless they sell your book. The traditional route, if successful will give the author the best price and the best marketing. Although in modern times, most authors still need to do their own marketing through book signings, readings, and web pages. The author though does not have to use his/her own money to publish and deal with distribution.

If an agent asks for money from the author up-front, then the agent may not be right for you. There have been a lot of horror stories of agents who will take your money and never represent your work. In the States, there is a self-policing organization called the Association of Authors' Representatives (AAR). The AAR follows a Code of Ethics and can be trusted for the most part as none wish to be banned by the Association.

The one major issue with the traditional course is there are only so many agents and way too many writers, so agents take only the best of the crop. They weed out the rest through the query letter, which I will talk about on a later blog. Currently, Literary Agencies collect up to 2-3 thousand query letters a month. You do the math.

With self-publishing, the author pays to have the book published and must do all their own marketing. This can be a lot of work. Profits are not as high unless you have a game-changing novel. Distribution is also done by the author and you must educate yourself in dealing with retailers and on-line sellers such as Amazon, who pay a lower percentage. If the author wishes to follow this route; and more are doing so, you can find help at http://selfpublishingrelief.com/ or other websites.