Hi everybody,

I’m publishing my first children’s book, and after some research I decided to go with Lulu. The average price for a children’s book is around $8–$15, but Lulu’s printing cost alone is $17! Add shipping and a bit of profit, and my book will be too expensive.

How do you all handle this? thanks a lot!

I'd love any resources people could suggest for designing a visual-heavy magazine for both print and digital. I am selling a fixed PDF of my new zine as the digital version, but I'm concerned that it's a bit hard to read on screens, especially phones. Any examples of an indie magazine or journal with lots of images doing this well? Or guides to check out? I'm trying to figure out if I should just keep focusing on print, or spend more time with my designer trying to come up with a process that meets both formats half-way. For publishers that use a lot of images: how important is it for the digital product to have flowable text? Thanks in advance.

Hi guys, just wanted to alert you all of another scam artist, Reader’s Route. I didn’t do my usual due diligence and got taken. While I am embarrassed as hell, I’m willing to shame myself in order to prevent anyone else from being another of their victims.

Hi Everyone,

I haven't been self publishing for very long but I dived in and bought Vellum because it seemed to be what everyone loved. OMG it is so stubborn and lacking in options. I have several chapters which i do not want to be included in my table of contents. I can't find an option to simply not include a chapter in the TOC.

In my previous book I wanted to control which side of an open book my content would appear on, specifically the left. No option to simply choose which side. Why is it so lacking in settings?

I have been trying to add a bank account for over 3 months, I have

tried different banks like payoneer that Amazon accepts but still

getting the generic automated; Action required: You've

entered a bank account not eligible to receive Kindle Direct

Publishing payments email. Is there anyway I can contact Amazon

to help me review my account, it getting very annoying and

frustrating at this point.

Do they buy the book (wholesale) and then they have it forever? Won't this reduce income in the long run as people just borrow it instead of buy it?

Wrote a book 1 y ago.

Published all by myself.

Printed, ordered..

Gave few people to read it. Thats it.

Now.... Coppies are collecting dust.. On a shelf...

Did people like the book?

Yes!

What do i do???

F...g nothing!!

Just stare at that shelf and wish it magically became empty.

Just sit and think that nobody will ever care about what i have to give..

Who am I? Someone invisible somewhere..

Most beautiful things in my life happened effortlesly (bad spelling, I know).

Why do i have fight this time?

(needed to rant)

So, i used to be a Top Sales Supervisor for a known US based self-publishing company in my younger days for half a decade, way back then, it was really lucrative, especially being based offshore.. 🤷‍♂️ if anybody is somewhat curious, ask away.. 😊

I self published a local history book about a month ago. I'm in the midst of promoting it in the region. One historical society and one library want copies of the book for free. While I was researching a while back, the guy at that historical society said we was entitled to a free book. Where do I draw the line?

Recently, I've noticed when I Google the title of my book, a paid Google placement comes up with a direct link to the Amazon page. It appears Amazon buys Google ads for some books?

I haven't bought them. I was surprised.

Has anyone else noticed this? Is this good? I think it's good? Seems a bit unnecessary because it's such a unique name, but I guess Amazon wants it to come up in a higher search return than any other site?

I am currently getting ready to publish book 4 of my urban fantasy and I have been thinking about creating an audiobook version. I want it to be available via audible so I have to hire a narrator for this. I checked the going rates and I must say that at the moment I could not afford it on my own yet. I know there are options to do it on commision basis via ACX where you don't pay anything for creating the audiobook but whenever someone buys it, you get to split the royalties with the narrator, but I am not sure this is the best option for me, I would rather pay for the recording upfront. I am considering kickstarter campaign. The problem is- I am just starting and so far I have a small following, even if my current audience chops in it would probably not be enough so I would have to rely on the people who stumble on the kickstarter campaign and get interested. Have any of you had any experience with that? Does it work? Did you manage to gather the funds you were hoping for?

Just as the title says? I'm wondering if it's worth the monthly subscription for a blue tick beside my name. Would it signal trust to readers? Would readers be more likely to follow links and buy, etc.? Has anyone subscribed to get that blue tick, and was it worth it?

I’m considering doing Facebook or Instagram ads to promote my first book and I’m wondering if anyone here has had success with that? And is there a way to track that it does lead to orders?

(By the way, there are great resources in the wiki for the sub if you haven’t checked them out, but I didn’t see anything about this and I’d also love to hear people’s personal experiences.)

I am going to be publishing a book for a non-profit organization with the goal of selling it in these places, in order of importance:
1) the organization's museum/website
2) amazon
3) Barnes & Noble physical store

Because I do not like the profit margins of Amazon KDP, and because I want more design flexibility, I want to design and print on my own. This is a niche book, so I don't expect many sales outside of the museum, but it would be nice to have it available at the most amount of places. But I also don't want to create all this work for myself to sell an extra 8 books.

Should I purchase my own ISBN, design and print it, sign up with Amazon as a FBM seller, and hope I can get the book placed into B&N? Is there a downside to using ISBNServices to get a cheap ISBN instead of paying Bowker for custom version? Does Amazon/B&N look down upon that? I'm trying to save money for the nonprofit.

Or is there a better print/ISBN option I do not know about?

thanks

I don't want to mess it up but I want to get started on posting and marketing the first one SO bad and at some point I gotta get the ball rolling, the others are not finished but theyre all mapped out (I do chapter by chapter planning always) and for 15k words average I'm giving it a month in between uploads to write and polish them

I have an idea for a book and I’m looking at the self-publishing route: it would be a large format coffee-table style book with a pretty even balance of pictures/photographs and text so I need it to be laid out well to flow right. I’ve used InDesign to format magazine articles before so I know that I could theoretically design my book if I paid for that subscription, but I’m not a designer and definitely not an expert in that software. 

Is it worth putting my meager design skills to the test, or am I better off hiring a professional? If so, where can I find a reputable one?

I helped my critique partner with a blurb and she liked it so much, she suggested I offer blurb-writing as a service. I know there’s ghostwriting. Some people are staff writers for a publisher.

How does one get into these kinds of jobs? What other non-traditional writer jobs exist?

I work full-time on top of self-publishing, but my job is pretty far from writing. I’d like to change that.

My situation: my arc campaign will start mid next week. My book is available on almost every platform with the same cover. However on Goodreads the placeholder cover is showing. I first uploaded to the kdp with that cover while i was waiting for the cover artist to send me the final version. I tried almost everything for the last days, wrote in the relevant librarian group, sent a request to the team, but nothing. Its so frustrating, because I have the author profile, but dont have authorization to change the cover for the kindle edition. I even went to some local libraries in Toronto for help, but they couldnt help. Is everyone else in the same situation? I saw theres a huge backlog with aton of new requests. Im anxious because the deadline is coming for my arc, and the arc reviewers will probably be confused if they want to leave a review.

I have officially hit the two mark of having my book published in Amazon and KDP and I think I have sold 9 copies. What do I do to market?? I have reached out to influencers sent free books and nothing. I can’t afford their rates. I might have an article in the local newspaper but what else?? I stopped running Amazon ads because I felt like there was no traction. I have approx 4 reviews on Amazon and 3 on Goodreads. Any suggestions?

I know not everyone will not like your book, but I’ve heard some people say just don’t read the reviews to keep yourself from getting discouraged or changing your writing style based on negative reviews.

My mother has several published books, and recently printed a poetry collection. It was printed in another city due to cost. She has a trip to a third city, where the plan, aside from some speaking engagements at the University, was to present this new book and hopefully sell a few copies. Except it appears those copies won't make it in time, sadly.

My idea is to print some nice cards with the cover art that she can hand out as a bit of a placeholder. I'm a musician, and some bands do something like this for digital releases, with a QR for a download or whatever, and it's also a physical keepsake that can be signed, etc.

In this case, the info I hope to include is some sort of link where they'll know when there are physical copies available to buy in that city, or info to have them delivered or whatever. Given the circumstances, do you think this is a good idea? Have you ever seen authors do something like this? Is there anything you'd recommend/avoid?

For context, this is Latin America and not a huge market for poetry, but she is a respected academic and author. Would this indie band-inspired stunt be unbecoming of this context? I appreciate any advice!

First time self publisher and getting conflicting advice on the use of "____" underscores. I have a workbook with reflection sections where readers can fill in their responses, so it looks something like:

Question?

Your answer: _______

But I've heard that these underlines will be messed up in kindle reflowable format, so I should just put blank spaces (no underlines/underscores at all).

Thanks!

First of all deep congratulations from my side to all people on publishing and completing their work. It takes a lot of will and effort to do it so respect to you guys.

I didn't write a book in my life honestly, all I have done is write some short stories or poems in childhood though I liked them very much. Always thought that writing a book was out of my league. But finally got the will to start on one.

Can people share some of your insights how they started their journey till end. What kind of challenges do one generally face or you guys faced. Do things work out with a single plan, how can I prepare to tackle problems in stories whether it be large or short, do they follow same procedure. Will just working on docs , msword or a single platforms be enough or any recommendations for platform that would be best to work on nowadays.

And most importantly do you guys came to a frustrating point too, where you feeled demotivated and how did you cope with it.

Sorry if the question asked was inappropriate or disrespectful to any of you, but if any one willing to share their journey it would be very grateful of you.

I've posted a few times about this little adventure. I've published a grand total of 8 books now, four in a series, two in a related genre and two stand alone pieces. I have three more coming down the pipeline by year end. That exhausts all the writings from the years 2000-2026. The cupboard is empty and i'm beginning from a blank sheet of paper, but with a bit of experience. Current books at are 66,405 Kenp and 94 orders since I began this little journey in mid September. First amazon ad ran 09/21 and I got pretty immediate traction on book one and i'm seeing good read through it appears on the series. I've released the first book of the series on booksy and the fussy librarian. I'm about $75 under water advertising spend vs revenue. I believe we are going to call this a win and check the write a book box off. Been quite an adventure. I intend to keep writing and trying to keep the series alive, but doubt it will ever be financially viable. Just a great and fun retirement project.