Many authors sign up with a self-publishing/POD company, innocently expecting to pay a certain price…only to discover they’d need to pay more for services you’d expect would be included in every basic package. Here are some not-so-humorous examples…
This Week:
Grant writing can be a lucrative side business for freelancers seeking to supplement their income. Be forewarned, though: this isn’t just a matter of slapping together a few words about how great a particular agency is. Today’s donors are an especially savvy lot, with many demanding more measures of accountability than mere feel-good anecdotes.
I’ve written you before but I still have questions. My first book was published by (another POD publisher) and I’m not quite satisfied with some of the services I received for the price I paid. The experience has left me a little insecure and hesitant to try another publisher. One service they provided that was helpful in promoting the book were postcards and bookmarks. I haven’t read anything about your company providing them. Do you? If not, will the individual who’ll be designing the cover provide me with something I can take to a copier?
We need success stories! Yes, we’re a paying market! See our guidelines at:
https://writersweekly.com/misc/guidelines.php
Last week, I reported that I was diagnosed with Diverticulitis after almost a month of pain…and other symptoms that you really don’t want me to post here. Some of you wrote in that it’s a good thing I wasn’t diagnosed with diverticulosis. Unfortunately, I was. I didn’t post that last week because I was in a rush.
This week, we’re going to pitch ourselves as interview sources to online radio shows.
You can read lots of comments submitted by readers concerning the Amazon / BookSurge lawsuit here:
https://antitrust.booklocker.com/
As writers, we naturally check a market’s writer’s guidelines before submitting material. And they usually answer all our questions regarding content, story length, and (ahem) payment. But not every publication is so kind as to share its guidelines on its website, or even for the asking. Even when it does, you may need more information to fine-tune a query or decide between one market and another. It could even be a new venue, without a stack of back issues or archives to read as market research.
Writers are members of the media. Why not check the publication’s media kit?
In December 2007, I read an article in WritersWeekly in which C. Hope Clark talked about book contests that welcome self-published authors. Having just published a women’s health book about coping with infertility, I immediately began visiting the websites for the various awards. At that moment, I had no idea how valuable that one article, and my reaction to it, would turn out to be.
