MSI Press Blog

  It is Tuesday. Monday's madness is over, and Wednesday will take us over the hump, so Tuesday it is--for some serious discussion with authors. Tuesday talks mean to address authors in waiting and self-published authors who would like to go a more traditional route or who would at least like to take their steps with a publisher by their side.  Today's topic addresses slow-selling books . Books that look like tortoises. They do not take off upon release. In some cases, you could say that they fail to launch. Generally, in my experience, tortoise books fall into two categories: late discoveries and slow crawlers. Late discoveries are books that sell few, if any books, at launch. Even some years later, they are not selling in any quantity. Authors are likely to move on at this point, defeated. If they persevere, however, sometimes little miracles happen over time.  Our bestselling book of all time, laid low, napping, for TEN years; then it was discovered by an Influencer an...

  It is Tuesday. Time to tall turkey. Monday's madness is over, and Wednesday will take us over the hump, so Tuesday it is for some serious discussion with authors. Tuesday talks mean to address authors in waiting and self-published authors who would like to go a more traditional route or who would at least like to take their steps with a publisher by their side. (Much also applies to traditionally published authors whose books have not been on a perfect glide path upward to success.) Today's topic reflects a reality experienced by all but a very few authors who have recognized names, expansive contacts, big pockets (or big publishers with deep pockets), or, for one reason or another luckily found a sweet spot (typically after years of being in bitter places). Most books do not start out as NYT bestsellers and remain there for life. They either start well and fall off (usually quickly), start slowly and remain with slow and then almost no sales, or start very poorly and then ta...

  It is Tuesday. Time to tall turkey. Monday's madness is over, and Wednesday will take us over the hump, so Tuesday it is--for some serious discussion with authors. Tuesday talks mean to address authors in waiting and self-published authors who would like to go a more traditional route or who would at least like to take their steps with a publisher by their side. Today's topic addresses backlists. What are they? Why do publishers use them? What do they mean for authors? What is a backlist? Publishers have a front list of books that they are actively selling. Among these are books that "earn their keep" at the very least (i.e., costs of printing, advertising, promotion, distribution, royalties, warehousing, share of overhead, legal requirements such as copyright and permissions, etc., do not exceed the revenue they produce.  Of course, publishers would prefer that books do more than "earn their keep;" they would like them to make a profit. Working against bo...

  It is Tuesday. Time to tall turkey. Monday's madness is over, and Wednesday will take us over the hump, so Tuesday it is for some serious discussion with authors. Tuesday talks mean to address authors in waiting and self-published authors who would like to go a more traditional route or who would at least like to take their steps with a publisher by their side. Today's topic  addresses a widespread misconception by new authors: print runs. Frequently, a new author will ask how many books will be in a print run. Clearly, they have read somewhere or heard somewhere about print runs for offset books. Offset printing is becoming less common though at one time it was the only way to print books; print-on-demand is becoming more common though at one point it was looked down upon as not being the professional way to do things. Let's examine both of these to help understand the concept of "print run." Offset printing: books are printed from physical plates, an older for...

  It is Tuesday. Monday's madness is over, and Wednesday will take us over the hump, so Tuesday it is--for some serious discussion with authors. Tuesday talks mean to address authors in waiting and self-published authors who would like to go a more traditional route or who would at least like to take their steps with a publisher by their side.  Today's post addresses the question that often holds potential authors back from telling their stories, either their personal memoirs or the sharing of a lifetime of work knowledge, "Am I too old to publish a book?"  The quick answer is, of course, not. But there are realities behind publishing as an older individual that differ from publishing in the middle of one's career. Here, in this column, I am using "older" to mean individuals who have retired, typically mid-60s and later. There are, equally important, questions that underlie that age question. Let's take those underlying questions one at a time, which...