Archive | March 2011

New Icons by Djinni!

Girey! Looking cranky!

Girey is one of two protagonists of my fantasy romance journey series, creatively titled “Rin and Girey;” he spends most of the series cranky.

And Shiva! looking cranky!

Shiva is a background character in my webserial, http://addergoole.com, and the protagonist of her own super-secret miniseries (shh). She’s also a bit of an author-insertion.

Icons by djinni, from his most recent Free Icon Day

Getting Your Self Published Book in a Library – Part One – How Libraries Buy Books

This is the second in a series of guest posts from eseme

Getting Your Self Published Book in a Library Part One
How Libraries Buy Books

In a perfect world, it would be super easy to get your book into a library. Then all sorts of people would read it, and some of them would want to read your other books, and go out and buy them. A lot of people find new authors by sampling books from their library. Even if a library patron does not have the budget to buy books, they are a reader and if they love your book, they will talk about it to all their friends.

So in a perfect world, this would all be easy. Our world is not perfect, and one of the first things anyone who wants to get their book into a library needs to know is that libraries are short on two things: time and money. Library budgets often get slashed just when people need them most (recessions) and it can take years for them to recover (flat-funding year-to-year is not uncommon even when we are not in a recession). Lack of money can also mean a small staff, where everyone wears lots of hats and does lots of different jobs. So they have very little time.

When libraries buy books, they need to make the most of the time and the money that they have. Librarians do not get paid to read books. We get paid to help other people find the books they want, order the books that we think people will want, add those books to the collection, arrange programming, and a whole host of other things (I also get paid to wrangle computers). So, since we can’t read every book published, we read reviews to maximize our time.

Reading reviews should also help us maximize our book budget. Reviews help us determine if we think a book would be popular in our community, by giving us a sense of what the book is about and what it is like without reading it. We also watch pre-publication announcements, which make us aware of when a book by a very popular author will be coming out so we can order it in advance and theoretically have it on the shelf the day the book is available in stores. For instance, if it is by James Patterson (including James Patterson and someone else) we buy it because his books are wildly popular and if we are late getting the book we hear about it. We also follow, or at least glance at, bestseller lists, because they give some idea of which books people are reading (though they are not perfect, I know this, but there are a lot of people who pick which books they will read based on what is on the New York Times list – I have seen people do that). Finally, if
we have the time, we also try to be aware of what books are in the media. If a book is mentioned on the radio, a TV show, or in a local newspaper, it is likely that at least one person will show up asking for it, usually with only a partial title or saying “It was in last week’s Sunday paper, I think the cover was blue.”

Whew. Sorry that was long. But this gives you an idea of how libraries find books to buy. The order cards I currently use have a place for me to list where I found a review of the book. Because I currently order for only one section of the library (science fiction and fantasy) I get a bit of leeway on where I find reviews, as I get the review journals after everyone else. But I do need to be able to find some sort of review (I have a couple of websites I use) or be able to say “This is a bestselling author” when I place an order. Libraries do not want to buy books that never get checked out.

Unfortunately, as it currently stands, this system of reading reviews is stacked against the indie author. Your book is not likely to be reviewed in any of the major trade journals. Those include : Library Journal, School Library Journal, Publishers Weekly, and Kirkus (though there are others). They don’t review self-published books at present. They are sent books to review by Big Publishers. They don’t even review all of the ones that the Big Publishers send them.

Now, some of those journals (Publishers Weekly and Kirkus that I know of) claim to review self-published books. However, they will charge you money for this, as well as having you pay to send them the book. Again, these journals charge self-published authors an additional fee (Big Publishers just mail the book or send an electronic copy). And once you pay that fee, they do not guarantee that they will review your book (just like they do not guarantee the Big Publishers, but again, you would pay an extra fee). So you send them money and your book, and they may not review it. They will “list” you book, which means the title, author, genre, price, ISBN, and a one sentence blurb will be in the journal. Or rather, in a supplement of the journal which subscribers can opt out of. Honestly, I see this as the book review industry preying on indie authors, and I can’t recommend it.

But if you are interested:
PW Select main page http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/authors/pw-select/index.html

PW select intro to the first issue, which includes some listings (note the numbers, they got money from 200 authors and reviewed 25 titles) http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/authors/pw-select/article/45559-pw-select-introducing-pw-select-s-self-publishing-listings.html

If you want to try PW Select, details are here, note that it will cost you $149 but you do get a six month subscription to the digital edition of Publishers Weekly http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/print/20100823/44225-the-new-pw-select-a-quarterly-service-for-the-self-published.html

The other way in which library purchasing is not friendly to self-published books is where we order from. Most libraries order from either a book distributor or a book jobber. A book distributor could be the same place a bookstore orders from. A book jobber is a company that “finishes” a book for a library. They will often add a cover and a spine label, so that the book arrives at the library nearly ready to put on a shelf. Some even add barcodes to the books and create records for the library’s computer system (more on that in Part Two). These companies often have trouble getting a self-published book, or it takes longer. Thankfully, that part is changing – if your book can be ordered from Ingram or Baker and Taylor, it can probably be ordered by any library. But if your book can only be bought form Amazon or another website, a library might not be able to order it. Why? Libraries tend to pay with purchase orders, which means that they order, say,
$300 of books at once (and send a purchase order), and then pay for them later (sometimes on a quarterly basis). Also, libraries do not pay sales tax. It can be nearly impossible to set up accounts with web-based companies as a result (although Amazon has been getting better, I still hear it takes multiple phone calls).

So getting a library to purchase your book is hard, at least right now in March of 2011. Hopefully this will change. Your best bet is for a librarian to read your book and like it and have the extra money in their budget to buy it. That’s hard, because all three things may not happen. It would also help to get your book reviewed in a local newspaper, or get mentioned on a local TV station. Again, that’s hard (and I have no advice on that, sorry!). However, we will explore another option in Part Two : Donating Your Book to a Library.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/26245.html. You can comment here or there.

Getting Your Self-Published Book in a Library – A Guest Post From Eseme

This is a guest post from Eseme

Intro

Aldersprig has invited me to do a guest post on libraries, and how the acquire books, because this is something that some self-published indie authors don’t know much about. And they are curious. Great. Getting your book into a library is a super cool thing!

Why do I think this? I’m a librarian. I got my Library Science degree in May of 2007. I had worked in two libraries, one prior to starting the degree, and one while I was getting it (though that one was a university library which did not buy fiction). After getting the degree I job hunted for a while, the worked at a small rural public library (a town of 5,000) and I now work in what my state, Maine, would consider a medium-sized to large library (town of 20,000) but which most of the country considers a small library.

So I know a bit about how libraries buy books, how they add them to their collections (cataloging books and other items is among my job duties), author events at libraries (I have arranged more than one), and ebooks in libraries. I am also going to end with a few links I have found about bookstores and self-published books (I lurk on Publishers Weekly’s website, and read a blog written by bookstore owners).

Do I read indie books? Some. I read two web serials, and I have read MCA Hogarth’s self-published titles. But I haven’t read many. However, given that it is March and I have read a grand total of one novel in 2011, I don’t have much time to read anyone’s books, be they from Big Publishing or self-published. I do not hate self-published books (though I will admit that I have been handed some dubious ones in my work as a librarian). I think indie publishing lets people find the books they like, even if a Big Publisher won’t take a chance on that book.

I will warn you, this is not all rosy. Libraries, as they currently order books and add them to their collections, are not set up to easily find indie books, and it is more difficult to add them to collections. I’m going to explain why, and I hope this will give you ideas about how to reach out to your local library (and bookstores) effectively.

Also, I am a long winded individual. Particularly when talking, but I get wordy with my writing as well. I am going to do my best to keep this short, but there is a lot of info. So sorry, Aldersprig, but this is going to be about five posts, I think.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/26058.html. You can comment here or there.

Now THAT is how a weekend should be

Weekends like this past one remind me what I love (and hate) about living down here.

Saturday was a trip to Horseheads to get T. fitted for a tux for an upcoming wedding we’re both in (Horseheads is the closest town with a Men’s Warehouse; it’s about an hour away). This involved driving through some of the most depressed and depressing parts of Southern Tier, NY, but it also involved random sights like this, a stop at a winery above Watkin’s Glen, a stop at a really nice restaurant, and a really nice drive with my spouse-person. I’ll chalk it up as a win: I’m still full from those ribs!

Sunday we were still feeling like driving, so we headed out to Liedenfrost Winery, where we stopped last weekend, got a little more wine, stopped at Atwater Vineyards for a tasting (Really, really, really good wine!) and then took a hike in the Finger Lakes National Forest.

We started discussing the history of the Reiassani people while we were walking & driving, so I’ll have some worldbuilding notes and maybe an exodus map later this week.

3WW: Pause in the Journey

Three Word Wednesday is a once-weekly 3-word writing prompt.

The three words are breeze, mellow, tickle. This is set in the Rin & Girey world, before View-Point


Pause in the Journey

Girey was either still asleep, or faking it well, but the day was too nice, the sun streaming in through the tiny glass windows; Rin couldn’t stay abed any longer. She glanced again at her captive, who was, for the first time since Ossulund, sleeping comfortably and solidly, with a smile on his face. Let him rest. They would be into Callanthe civilization soon, and there would be no rest for either of them.

She slipped on her outer qitari but left her shoes and hose off. The weather was unseasonably mellow, and she wanted to enjoy it. She opened and closed the door to the way-station as quietly as she could, and stepped out into the sunlight; for the first time she since and Girey had started on their trip, she was alone.

The grass was growing, as it often did in the wet season, so quickly you could almost see it growing, and the breeze was warm, bringing a current from the sea that smelled, however faintly, of salt-water and fish. But it hadn’t been raining all that much in the last week, and the ground didn’t squish beneath her toes, so she walked out onto the small yard, kept well-cropped by visitors’ goats, as theirs were doing now, and let the wind tickle at the back of her neck and the grass tease between her toes.

It was nice to be going home, she had to admit, and yet, at the same time, terrifying. What would she do with him, her staid, grumpy Bitrani prisoner, when they were in Lannamer? What would she do with herself? The war was over, and the mopping-up stage would have far less need for healers, so she’d been given her release. She was no longer part of the Emperor’s Army, except in the most formal sense. She wasn’t a student anymore, and, though she could have gone back to the University, she didn’t think Girey would be happy there. That left palace life, and politics, or putting on the guise of a wandering healer, and taking to the roads again.

She thought through that one for a few minutes, her face tilted upwards to the sun, her hands out flat to the breeze. She could do it, and Girey would likely be all right with a small wagon and a box-bed (a long wagon, of course, for his stretched-out height, but they could still do with two goats). No one would think to look for the missing heir of Bithrain in an itinerant healer’s wagon. Nor would they look for an heir of Callenia there. It would be just the two of them, and her clients. Just the two of them…

…a flea chose that moment to bite her, and she swore softly. The palace, at least, would have more regular baths. Baths, and beds that would fit her captive. The day no longer looking quite as beautiful, she headed back into the way-station.


http://www.addergoole.com/lyn/
http://addergoole.com



This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/25534.html. You can comment here or there.

15minuteFiclet – Old Soul

Originally posted here, in response to the lyrics prompt “You don’t need a spaceship / They don’t know you’ve already lived / On the other side of the galaxy”

She opened her eyes to the world around her, her memories already fading.

She’d shared some of them with her parents-to-be beforehand, but there was a bit of a language barrier, an image barrier. They could understand, through careful, patient relaying of images, that this was not her first life. They were predisposed to believe in reincarnation – she would not have picked a host family who were not. The belief would be central to things she would need to do, if her mission were to succeed.

So would their knowledge, however faint, in what she had been before. And it seemed it would be faint, indeed. She hadn’t counted on just how different their peoples were, how vastly separated their languages, even their most basic concepts, were. She found the metaphors that would work, and left notes, signposts, for herself in her forming brain, hoping the two, combined, would get her pointed in the right direction. Then she let go, and was born.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/25050.html. You can comment here or there.