News

Via Dear Author comes the news that the Espresso Book Machine is teaming up with Lightning Source to provide access to 85,000 titles from 13 publishers, beginning in May.  Simply, the Espresso Book Machine is an in-store print on demand machine that can a high-quality book in under five minutes.  News comes that:

The participating publishers, which include Hachette, S&S, Wiley, Macmillan and Norton, already work with Lightning Source. After the pilot, other publishers that print and distribute with Lightning Source will have the option of participating in the Espresso Book Machine program. That should occur in the second half

This week brings news of the first Self-Publishing Book Expo to take place in New York City in November 2009. Tickets are $275 if bought before July 15, 09 and $325 after July 15. Features include,

Sales – Unlike other industry-only book fairs, the SPBE will be open to the public, offering authors a unique opportunity to sell their books to the broadest possible audience.

Meet the Media – Producers of television and radio programs, and editors of newspapers, magazines, and online media outlets, will attend the event, all looking for great stories that may otherwise be under their radar.

In an age where the collapse of one financial giant can bring down the entire financial system, it may seem odd that one self-publishing conglomerate is able to buy up the competition.  This is what is happening with Author Solutions, which has bought Trafford Publishing on the heels of buying Xlibris a few months earlier.  Author Solutions is now in control of some of the major self-publishing players: iUniverse, AuthorHouse, Xlibris, Wordclay, and now Trafford.

The main subsidy publishers that offer competition to Author Solutions remain Lulu and the Amazon services: CreateSpace and BookSurge.  The trouble with one company owning […]

April Hamilton who runs the excellent Publetariat site and the Indie Author blog – and is generally one of the best advocates of independent publishing – has put together a list of the ten best blogs for indie authors on Blogs.com.  Included on the list are SPR’s own Mick Rooney, as well as Populist Publisher, Publishing Renaissance, and the Creative Penn.

Funnily enough, this runs counter to a bad review yesterday of the self-publishing book review blogosphere, which indirectly critiqued Self-Publishing Review – without mentioning the site by name.  Can’t please everybody, and if you run a website you’re up […]

That’s a headline we’ll be seeing more of in the future.  The barrier erected by agents on behalf of publishers has come back to haunt them.  In this instance we are talking about Carol Buchanan’s historical thriller God’s Thunderbolt: The Vigilantes of Montana which has already been reviewed by SPR.  It just won the 2009 Spur Award for Best New Novel.  Here is what Carol said on her most recent blog entry on Amazon.com:

God’s Thunderbolt: The Vigilantes of Montana” has been given the 2009 Spur Award for Best First Novel. The Spur Award is given by the Western

Yesterday, the New York Times reported the new magazine publishing venture by Hewlett Packard, Magcloud. The service uses the traditional “free” print on demand model – it costs nothing until you print it up. From Magcloud’s site:

It costs you nothing to publish a magazine on Magcloud. To buy a magazine costs 20¢ per page, plus shipping. For example, a 20-page magazine would be four bucks plus shipping. And you can make money! You set your issue price and all proceeds above the base price go to you.

In contrast, a 20-page saddle stitch publication on Lulu runs as high […]

An alert that the Writer’s Digest Self-Published Book Competition is open for entries until May 1, 2009.  I entered a novel in 2006.  I lost.  But it’s got a much better prize package than other self-publishing competitions.  For instance, the Hollywood Book Festival (also open for entries) has a grand prize of $1500 for one writer.  The Writer’s Digest competition offers $1000 to 10 first place winners and $3000 to the grand prize winner.  Of course, there are also a lot more entries as well.  In general, the Writer’s Digest competition is more commercial than a contest like the […]

Blogger Andrew Sullivan is becoming one of the better, more high-profile advocates of print on demand publishing. With a readership of over 100,000 a day and being a possible meme-starter, his support of POD is important.  This is in line with Wil Wheaton publishing with Lulu – another well-known writer using the technology. In the past Sullivan has said about the state of publishing and print on demand:

My own view is that the publishing industry deserves to die in its current state. It never made economic sense to me; there are no real editors of books any more; the