Interviews

The idea for this dialogue came after the controversy regarding the review of John Lacombe’s Winter Games.  If you haven’t seen that thread, check it out, it’s a long one – it has a lot of interesting commentary about how writers and/or their fans should respond to reviews, including examples of how not to respond to a review.  Carol Buchanan, who reviewed the book, didn’t like the novel.  Steven Reynolds, who reviews for SPR, liked the book in a review for the now-defunct Podler.  Carol and Steven got together to talk about the controversy and book reviewing in general. […]

A guest post by Judith D. Schwartz, a writer based in Southern Vermont and author, most recently, of The Therapist’s New Clothes, a memoir — and cautionary tale — about training as a psychotherapist. Her blog on using the Espresso Book Machine is: http://litadventuresinpod.blogspot.com.

As someone with a book manuscript making the rounds, I followed the growing acceptance of self-published work with great interest. It was reassuring to know that there were alternatives to letting the thing wither on my hard-drive. On the other hand, did I really want to do that? I mean, if I were a […]

When I read the blog entry about the launch of Book Oven, I saw this as a significant development in the changing landscape of publishing.  As I tweeted then, “Sometimes I feel like I’m fooling myself that POD’s losing stigma, but things really are changing.”  It was so refreshing to see a well-designed and maintained site talk about print on demand and other tools for publishers with no cynicism or apology.  As the site says,

There has been a revolution bubbling in the book world, and digital has arrived: ebooks, print-on-demand, and online sales mean you don’t need

Ransom Stephens has written one of the best assessments of the future of publishing that you’re likely to read (found via Pod People).  Called Booking the Future, it needs to be read – more than once.  Here we talk about the ideas put forth in the article and the success of his digitally-published novel, The God Patent, which basically proves the thesis of his essay: the future of publishing is going to look very different than it does today.  It will have many elements of self-publishing writ large.  As he says, “Though the role of publishing has […]

Self-Publishing Review: What is jexbo and why did you start it?  Are you an author yourself?

Jill Exler: Formed in 2007, jexbo™ is a website at www.jexbo.com that gives self-published authors the ability to reach new customers online for less than $1.00 per month and sell their books (jexbo receives 5% of whatever the author sells).

Readers can buy books and find unique, self-published works in various categories. And self-published authors have the ability to control the sales process, communicate directly with customers and customize a Web page for marketing purposes at no additional cost.

I started jexbo because I […]

This is the first interview on the site about a book that has crossed the line from self-publishing to micro publishing: there is a difference.  However, the founder of Write Bloody puts out his own books on the press/the press uses print on demand/writers are responsible for editing and submitting the ISBN/writers retain rights to their books/and the press lays the marketing on the writers.  So there is an element of self-publishing to the press – and SPR’s definitely a supporter of this type of hybrid publishing.

Generally, I think there’s a little too much of an us vs. them […]