SinC Offers Two Hours of Video on the Latest Publishing Trends

For the first time ever, Sisters in Crime (SinC) is offering a series of video presentations of a SinC-sponsored writers’ workshop.

The video content, available online at no charge to members and non-members, includes more than two hours of information on the latest trends in publishing presented by crime fiction industry leaders specifically for crime fiction authors. The sessions were taped during Sisters in Crime’s annual “SinC Into Great Writing” workshop in September 2011.

The free video content includes:

Meg Gardiner: Lying for a Living
Award-winning thriller author Meg Gardiner speaks about the craft of writing and the key elements of a good read. (21 minutes)

Ellen Hart: E-publishing 101
Award-winning mystery author Ellen Hart provides an introduction to the first steps in e-publishing your novel. (9 minutes)

Libby Fischer Hellmann: To E or not to E
Award-winning crime fiction author Libby Fischer Hellmann presents the pros and cons of traditional publishing and e-publishing options. (20 minutes)

David Wilk: Trends in Publishing
Booktrix CEO David Wilk offers a look at a variety of issues facing authors today, from social media to the best materials to e-publish. (22 minutes)

Marcia Talley: Look Ma! I've Been Kindled!
Award-winning mystery author Marcia Talley provides a tutorial on publishing a manuscript for the Kindle and Nook platforms. The PowerPoint slides for her presentation are posted online with the video file. (15 minutes)

The Business of Print Publishing
Award-winning authors Cathy Pickens and Jim Huang present an overview of the business side of print publishing. (12 minutes)

Brazen Hussies Present: A Colloquium on Marketing
Marcia Talley leads a discussion of marketing possibilities. The panelists include Libby Jordan, marketing consultant for Open Road Media; Gina Panettieri, President and Executive Editor of Talcott Notch Literary Services and Debbi Mack, independently-published author. (19 minutes)

The seven-video series is available to Sisters in Crime members online at http://www.sistersincrime.org in the Members Only section at the Promoting Yourself area. Members will need a username and password to access the videos here. In addition, the video files are available to non-members online at http://www.sistersincrime.org in the Recent News section linked here.

Sisters in Crime was founded in 1986 to support the professional development and advancement of women crime fiction authors.

Selling Your Own E-books: Dana Stabenow Reports

Introduction by Dana Stabenow:

Scott Gere has been my webmaster from my first website. Along the way, we’ve talked a lot about the publishing business, as I watched and mourned my backlist going slowly and inexorably out of print.

Inevitably, e-books showed up in our brainstorming sessions - and last year he said, “Let’s just do it.”

We had no idea if we would make any money. I was petrified that his company would be out-of-pocket on expenses and not only would my e-books go away, but he’d fire me as his website client, too.

Everything of course took a lot longer than we thought it would, but Fire and Ice, my first Liam Campbell novel, went up last year three days before Christmas. Since then, we’ve been averaging about a book a month. When we’re a little farther into this process, I’ll be blogging about it with real numbers, but for now let me just say that the results have exceeded everyone’s expectations, and that no one is out-of-pocket.

Gere Donovan Press (GDP) is scanning, formatting and proofing the books, giving them terrific covers and minding the store (specifically putting the books up on iTunes, Amazon and Barnes & Noble and collecting and dispersing the income). Now they've come up with a nifty way for me to sell books through my website, which is currently active on stabenow.com (http://www.stabenow.com/e-books).

Scott wrote about our project on the GDP website, and SinC reblogs his post here for you today:

[From press.geredonovan.com]:

You may have recently encountered a wee web application that we’ve been working on. Indeed, the odds are good that its footer provided the link that brought you here.

Who is Bridgit, you ask, and what does she have to do with your eBook purchase?

Bridgit is a lightweight eBookstore cart solution, currently under development by Gere Donovan Press. Named in part for St. Brigid of Kildare, patron saint of printing presses (who was herself named for the Celtic goddess of Wisdom), Bridgit will enable small publishing houses, self-published authors and others to easily accept credit card payments in exchange for time-limited, DRM-free eBook downloads. It allows you to cut out the middle man, and bridges the gap (ouch). [Note: DRM, or digital rights management, is referred to by some as digital restrictions management.]

Bridgit assumes that the parent site provides all of the product information. Place an add-to-cart button on the book’s page, targeting your Bridgit instance, and we handle the rest. Bridgit processes the financial details of the transaction, generates download links that are unique to the customer and emails them a receipt. Books are provided in both .mobi and .ePub formats, via links which are valid for 24 hours.

In that no DRM has proven to be proof against piracy, while virtually all DRM has been shown to annoy honest people who just want to move their files from one device to another, Bridgit’s downloads are DRM-free. As devices and file types evolve, Bridgit may expand her horizons a bit… we’ll see what the market wants.

To experience Bridgit for yourself, [take a look at] one of the fine GDP eBooks from Stabenow.com. If you’re interested in discussing how Bridgit could be used to handle your own eBook transactions, or want to tell us what you think Bridgit should do, please drop us a line at press@geredonovan.com.

Dana Stabenow is the award-winning author of the 18-book Kate Shugak mystery series, the four-book Liam Campbell mystery series and the three-book Star Svensdotter science fiction series. The most recent title in the Kate Shugak series is Though Not Dead, a mystery set in contemporary Alaska that includes more than a passing mention of Dashiell Hammett's Army days in the Aleutian Islands during World War II.

Shaken: Stories for Japan

By Jeri Westerson


Early in June, Amazon will feature a new Kindle book that may be the first major e-book charitable fundraiser.

Prompted by the disaster in northern Japan, Shaken: Stories for Japan, is a collection of original, exclusive, Japan-themed short stories by some remarkable writers: Gar Anthony Haywood, Naomi Hirahara, Ken Kuhlken, Cara Black, Dianne Emley, Dale Furutani, Jeri Westerson, Gary Phillips, Kelli Stanley, Brett Battles, Robert Gregory Brown, Jeffrey Siger, IJ Parker, Wendy Hornsby, Vicki Doudera, Adrian McKinty, Debbi Mack, Meredith Cole, Rosemary Harris, CJ West, Hank Phillippi Ryan, Hong Kong film historian Stefan Hammond and Edgar-nominated author Tim Hallinan, who is editing the collection.

One hundred percent of all writer royalties for this book will be paid directly into the bank account of Japan America Society of Southern California, which has already raised more than $1 million for the relief effort.

I think this is the first time anyone has taken advantage of the rapid turnaround time possible on the Kindle and the monthly direct-deposit of royalty payments to raise money for a major charitable enterprise. This actually probably wouldn't have been possible before the advent of the ebook. (We're exclusive to Amazon only because of their payment policies, which are prompt and automatic, freeing up money as it's needed, not at the end of various bookkeeping quarters.)

When Tim Hallinan approached me about this project in late April, it was really a no-brainer. First off, I live in southern California and am intimately acquainted with earthquakes to the point where I can guess the Richter scale size of it just by the feel. That’s too intimate!

Most of the quakes that roll in from time to time are minor or come from far away (a big rolling feeling means it comes from afar, and you can hear those coming, too. A hard, building jolt means that the epicenter is quite close, a few miles or so.). But it’s like living on a precipice: Get too complacent and bad things can happen.

We don’t know when an earthquake of devastating proportion will strike and we don’t know what will happen to us and our community when it does. I live pretty far inland, so a chance at a tsunami is zero, but you don’t need a wall of water to destroy life as you knew it. The earth moving can take care of that.

I would have to say that empathy was the biggest factor that encouraged my participation in this project. But getting a chance to have a story alongside this talented array of authors was certainly another big factor. I haven’t read any of the other stories and am just as excited to get the book as anyone else. It’s a great chance to do some good and get a great collection at the same time. That seems like an easy decision for mystery readers.


Jeri Westerson, the president of the Orange County chapter of Sisters in Crime, is the author of the Crispin Guest medieval mysteries. The newest title in the series, The Demon's Parchment, was nominated for the Reviewer's Choice Award for Historical Mystery from Romantic Times magazine and the Bruce Alexander Award for Best Historical Mystery. For more information, see www.JeriWesterson.com.

Braving the New World of E-book Pricing, Part 2 of 2 Parts

By Lori L. Lake

Bransford’s final question in his essay was this:

Are we headed to free for e-book prices or will we find a way to charge as much as people are willing to pay?

Is he kidding? Of course the answer MUST BE the latter! This writing business may be creative/touchy-feely/artsy fartsy and all that, but at the end of the day, the bottom line always ends up being the bottom line. Can we make enough to live on so we can keep on being writers? Joe and Barry can afford to give books away. Evanovich and Patterson and Clancy and Dan Brown and all those other heavy-hitters could afford it. 98.9% of the rest of us would be seriously unwise to do so.

All of these people who are trying to make a name for themselves now by giving away free copies and 99-cent copies aren’t doing themselves or anyone else any favors. They may be capitalizing on the “Tragedy of the Commons,” but only those few who got their foot in the door early on will benefit. The market is flooded more every day. It’s also unfortunate to have to say that, as far as I can tell from a random experiment, far too many of them are giving away crap. (Pardon my "French.") I “bought” a couple dozen free and 99-cent books from unknown authors, and the vast majority were really odorific smelly stinkers!

This $2.99 to $9.99 price scale that Amazon has jammed down everyone’s throats is all well and good at the moment, but that means that $9.99 is being set up as the future top-end cost of a “book” (print or digital). Why are we letting readers get accustomed to that level when actually a hardback (at $25) or trade versions (at $13-16) have been underwriting the e-book process all along?

It’s clear and verified now that as every day goes by, print books are selling fewer copies and yielding smaller revenues while e-books are increasing in sales volume. But, because the price point has been set up arbitrarily, most publishers will have declining revenues – even if they sell more e-books than print books. The cost of producing and distributing a printed hardcover can’t settle at $9.99. It can’t be done that cheaply with the overhead a big press has.

This point cannot be overlooked: E-books from many publishers have been cheap so far because the physical book had already been created and it wasn’t too hard to convert it from the printed book’s digital file.

Some say NY will save money in e-book creation compared to print books because they don’t pay warehousing or for the returns process. I have to argue that all the funds saved from the cost of printing/warehousing will have to be allocated to pay someone to format, upload, and test the e-book product. Instead of paying the printer, publishers are now having to hire whole staffs to set up and administer the e-books.

So where is the big savings that warrants NY charging $9.99? There’s not enough room in the equation to pay for the expenses from initial acquisition through editing/cover/rollout to promotions all the way up to e-book promulgation to the various sales outlets. This is why most presses are trying very hard to pay 8% and 10% or maybe 15% NET INCOME to the author for e-book royalties. How else can they survive if the writer doesn’t take the hit? I’ll spare you the math on Net Income for even 15%. It’s not pretty. (Along with Dean Wesley Smith, Joe and Barry do a great job discussing this: http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/2011/04/ebooks-and-self-publishing-part-2_03.html).

The time is coming where big presses simply will not be able to afford to support the structure as it’s currently set up. Not to mix metaphors, but a lot of what I see happening lately in publishing is the fretful rearranging of deck chairs and book and magazine supplies on the Titanic. The center will not hold, and the iceberg of expectations and ignorance is about to crash into NY – which also includes everyone who is published by the big houses. The financial foundering, bankruptcies, and closings of Big Box stores is just the beginning. Indie stores are feeling it too—even if they do have dedicated readers to whom they cater. The NY publishing houses are next.

What will take the place of NY, which busily anointed numbers of authors and distributed their print books? How will the readers find books without the (seriously inaccurate) NY Times Best-Seller List? What’s this new digital world *really* going to look like when the over one million books published each year are ALL vying for the reader’s attention in the e-book virtual world?

And the big question: how fast is it coming on? In 1983, compact disks and players became available and sales grew steadily as people adopted the new technology. In 1985, David Bowie put his records on CD, kicking off a rush by other music houses to get their “Big Artist” backlists up.

I bought my last record album in April 1987. In 1983, I said I’d *never* give up my LP albums to buy CDs. I now have over 2,000 CDs, some of which duplicate my old LP collection (which is mostly long gone). Once again, new technology is on the rise and now I’ve also got several hundred digital music downloads. I say today I’ll never want to get rid of my CDs….but I suspect the day will come when they’ll all be digitized, and I’ll have moved on to the next technology.

Just like the people who are now adopting e-books and eReaders.

But to answer Nathan’s question: Many early adopters of this new technology (including me) are making enough to live on with the 70% of each $9.99/book sold, but I’m not able to sell any cheaper anytime soon. If the price goes up, I’ll be perfectly happy to go with it.

Lori L. Lake is the author of six novels, two short story collections and is the editor of two anthologies. Her most recent book, Like Lovers Do, was released on May 10. For more information, see www.lorillake.com.

Braving the New World of E-book Pricing, Part 1 of 2 Parts

By Lori L. Lake

Nathan Bransford recently wrote a timely and insightful piece called “99 Cent E-Books and the Tragedy of the Commons” in which he responds to the latest news about e-book pricing.

In addition, Jeffrey Trachetenberg has an informative article called “Cheapest E-Books Upend the Charts: 99-Cent Titles From Unknown Authors Put New Pressure on Big Publishers”. The title says it all.

Many fellow writers and colleagues have fallen into a frenzy of excitement about the prospect of getting rich (or, in the alternative, at least finally making a living) with their writing. Self-pubbed Amanda Hocking’s name is bandied about. People are telling anecdotes about authors making thousands of dollars in mere days. At long last, maybe all of those years of toil will pay off!

The much-discussed dialogue between Joe Konrath and Barry Eisler is also cited as further evidence that authors may finally receive their due. All over the place I’m hearing writers saying that all you have to do is write a book, get it online, and voilá -- instant presto money!

The problem with extrapolating the Konrath/Eisler situation to a general author’s circumstances is that those guys have made names for themselves. They’ve already built huge fan bases to rely upon and have the stature to continue to gain more notoriety. Many small press and midlist authors have cultivated fan bases as well, but there’s only so much room for blockbuster authors. A writer friend of mine once said that for pop fiction, the public can’t recall more “Big Apostles” than 12 or 13 – and she argued that the number may be lower than that since most of us can’t remember all the apostles names either.

If a writer has a dedicated group of readers and libraries regularly purchasing his or her works, then putting out her or his own e-books can certainly bring in some revenue. But I would argue that little by little, the marketplace is flooding. A tremendous number of fiction backlists are popping up steadily online, and new books are being uploaded daily (some would say frantically). The more e-books that become available, the smaller the pie gets for everyone. I know, I know, the reports are telling us that people are buying more books than ever. But that always happens when someone gets a new toy. Once the market becomes saturated with e-readers, the sales will normalize.

At some point, quality is really going to start to matter. A lot of authors are getting away with substandard editing and formatting. That won’t last much longer. (See the Jacqueline Howett meltdown for a good example of how readers are starting to fight back: http://booksandpals.blogspot.com/2011/03/greek-seaman-jacqueline-howett.html).

But the vast majority of writers – certainly almost all of the ones aspiring to the mainstream (like many of those on the SinC Yahoo listserv, for instance) – do not have the luxury of a rabid following. They can post their books all they want on Amazon and other sites, but nobody’s going to find them on page 473. Having been with a publisher or having found a niche is a HUGE advantage.

Whether you have a name or not, I would argue that charging 99 cents or even $2.99 for a full-length novel is a wretched, stupid idea. If we do the math, you can see what I mean. I’ll just use my own work as an example.

It typically takes me about 300 hours to write a complete first draft. Add another 100 hours of my own revising and editing, then another 30-50 hours for working with the editor and proofing, and I’m up to, let’s guesstimate, 440 hours. (I’m not even going to count research and the time I spend dithering and fretting and all that. And of course, this doesn’t include e-book creation time with formatting/uploading/testing, cover creation, marketing and promotions, etc., or doing all the administrative work that a publisher used to do.)

Anyway, 440 hours x $30/hour means I need to make about $13,200 selling The Novel as an e-book or I may as well go back to government work. (And I need to make AT LEAST $30/hr because the government is going to tax me out of over 40% of it!)

I’ll use Amazon as an example because they have some of the best rates for writers publishing their own work – 70% for $2.99 to 9.99 price points and 35% for .99 to 2.98. Applying their price points, here are some calculations for how many units I must sell to make $30/hour for the work I did on the book:

• I have to make 37,714 sales if the e-book sells at 99 cents.
• I have to make 18,857 sales if the e-book sells at 1.99.
• I have to make 6,316 sales if the e-book sells at 2.99.
• I have to make 4,204 sales if the e-book sells at 4.49.
• I have to make 2,699 sales if the e-book sells at 6.99.
• I have to make 2,223 sales if the e-book sells at 8.49.
• I have to make 1,889 sales if the e-book sells at 9.99.

I share those numbers to illustrate how ridiculous – or perhaps I should say, damaging – a .99 cent price point is. How can the average non-blockbuster author make ends meet? And my needs are probably a lot lower than those of authors like Joe and Barry. They can probably sell 37,714 e-books easily, I suppose – but the rest of us I’m not so sure about. I know I’m a long way off from that. I happen to write in the niche of lesbian fiction, and for many gay/lesbian authors, we have a dedicated audience of GLBT people, along with some open-minded mainstream readers, but we get little promotional support. We’re often lost completely in the enormous and busy marketplace of mainstream works. 37,714 books would be a dream that few niche and/or self-pubbed authors could achieve.

To be continued...


Lori L. Lake is the author of six novels, two short story collections and is the editor of two anthologies. Her most recent book, Like Lovers Do, was released on May 10. For more information, see www.lorillake.com.

SinC Links: The Ebook Edition

By Ellen Hart

If you're anything like me, you wait eagerly each month to see what Nancy Martin and her team of web foragers have gathered and sent out as SinC Links, the Sisters in Crime monthly alert to news of industry importance.

This service has helped me stay connected to what's happening in the publishing industry. It's timely. It's targeted information. It's relevant.

Now that so much of what's going on in the book world today has shifted to ebooks, the national SinC board decided it might be a good idea to put out a second monthly issue of SinC Links, this one aimed at all things digital.

You may have little interest in ebooks, but for those who do, for writers who understand that this may be a way to keep a backlist in print, or a way to publish a book that an agent loved but was unable to place, this kind of timely information may prove valuable.

Case in point: When the rights to eight of my older mysteries reverted to me a year ago, it seemed like a timely idea to put them up for sale as ebooks. The problem was, I had no idea how to go about it.

All of the novels were so old that no digitized copies existed. Without a Word.doc, I couldn't put them into a digital format -- whatever that was. It was a big puzzle, with few people who seemed to know exactly how to do what I needed done. Knowing that a good 70 percent of the ebooks currently sold are sold through Amazon, I wanted the books in Kindle format. I also wanted them up on Barnes & Noble and other, smaller sites. It took me months to find knowledgeable people who could shepherd me through various aspects of the process. Honestly, it shouldn't be that hard. None of this is rocket science.

With SinC Links/Ebook Edition, we'd like to connect members to information that will help them negotiate the transition. Not only that, we want to provide you with the latest information -- the best of the web -- on what's happening in the brave new world of e-publishing.

As I write this, another ebook link just popped into my mailbox: "Maybe the Mayans were right ... but they were talking about the publishing industry."

Hmm. All I can say is, wait for April. You'll find that link in your inbox.

Finally, a request. If you come across an article, a blog, an interview, anything you feel might be of interest to the membership regarding ebooks, e-publishing and the digital future, send them to ellenhart@earthlink.net.

Look for SinC Links/Ebook Edition to arrive in your mailbox on the 24th of each month. Many thanks to Lori L. Lake and Nancy Martin for joining the team and making the first edition possible.


Ellen Hart is the award-winning author of the 18-volume Jane Lawless mystery series and the eight-volume Sophie Greenway series. Her most recent book is The Cruel Ever After, a Jane Lawless mystery. Ellen is the member of the Sisters in Crime board of directors in charge of SinC's publicity efforts.

I Left My Publisher, Gave Up on Bookstores, and Started Making Money

By L.J. Sellers, author of the Detective Jackson mysteries

[Originally published at jakonrath.blogspot.com]

In January of 2010, I had one book on Kindle and sold 31 copies. I had two print books on the market with a small publisher and they weren’t selling much better. In December, I had six books on Kindle and sold over 10,000 copies. To get from point A to point B, I had to make some radical decisions.

Several circumstances came together this year that forced me to rethink everything about my career as a novelist. First, I have to thank Joe Konrath for inspiring me to believe that I too could become a successful e-book author. The other incentive came from a round of layoffs in March for both my husband and myself.

I decided I had to stop wasting time and money on things that weren’t working and focus on things that were. What wasn’t working for me was my small publisher, which couldn’t get my books into bookstores. What was working for a lot of people was the growth of e-book sales.

I set aside the novel I was writing and got busy saving my career. The first step was to rewrite and self-publish on Kindle a standalone thriller I had completed but never sold. I’d once had a big-name agent for it, so I knew it was solid. I also had a second standalone thriller that my publisher had offered a contract for, but I hadn’t signed it yet — because the book wasn’t scheduled to be released until late 2012.

That seemed like an eternal and foolish wait. I had a mortgage to pay immediately. What made sense was to get the two thrillers into the digital world where readers were buying. I took the second major step and let my publisher know I was withdrawing my standalone.

I spent a couple months rewriting and updating the stories, then I paid for editing and cover design. I withdrew the money from my miniscule retirement account and considered it an investment in my future. In August, I published the two thrillers (The Baby Thief and The Suicide Effect) on Amazon’s DTP. At that point, I had one foot in each world. I was self-published, but I still had a traditional press for my series.

Next, I rerouted my promotional efforts toward e-book readers. I quit sending marketing material to bookstores and instead joined several Kindle forums, where I participated in discussions. I got more active on Goodreads and did five back-to-back book giveaways just for the exposure. I wrote a dozen guest blogs and sent them all over the Internet.

My sales jumped significantly. By then, my publisher had uploaded the second Detective Jackson story (Secrets to Die For) to Kindle, and I started thinking about how much money I could make if my publisher wasn’t keeping most of my digital profits.

After the third Jackson book (Thrilled to Death) faced the same difficulty getting into bookstores, I decided to withdraw from my press. It took a few weeks to finally make the call. Who willingly gives up a second publishing contract? Taking back my series meant foregoing the industry’s stamp of approval. I hated to let it go, but I felt I had no choice if I wanted to make a living.

I called my publisher and asked for my Kindle rights back. I also asked to be released from the contract for the fourth Jackson story (Passions of the Dead). I knew the manuscript had not been edited, so no time or money had been invested. My publisher was not happy, but graciously granted my requests.

Letting go of that contract was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. Not only did it mean taking on the “self-published” stigma, it also meant giving up book signings, which I love. But I had looked into the future and determined that bookstores were not where most people would buy their novels in 2012. For once, I wanted to be ahead of the curve.

I sent my Jackson files to be converted to e-books, then uploaded my versions to Amazon, as my publisher took hers down. At that point, I had five books selling on Kindle, and my numbers were getting better every month. While the last manuscript was out for editing and cover design, I bought an inexpensive ad on the Kindle Nation newsletter and increased my online promotional efforts. Sales took another huge leap.

When I released the fourth Jackson story on Kindle, I dropped the price of the first book in the series (The Sex Club), to $.99. Sales for the first book skyrocketed, and a week later, sales for the follow-up stories nearly doubled.

I’m fortunate that Mystery Scene magazine has been supportive, giving all my books great reviews and eventually featuring me as an author. I received another terrific review in its holiday issue and that pushed both e-book and print sales.

I also made all my books available in print through CreateSpace, and I’ve contracted with INgrooves to target all the non-Kindle devices and libraries too.

Interesting note: For the fourth Jackson book, I made more money from Kindle sales in the first two weeks than I had made from my publisher in two years. If I had stayed with the contract, that book would not have been released for another nine months. Life is too short to wait for someone else’s publishing schedule.

Now in December, I have six e-books on the market, with all the royalties coming to me. The Sex Club consistently ranks in one of the top three spots on Kindle’s police procedural list, and the three other Jackson books are almost always in the top 25 on the same list. I’m happily writing a fifth Jackson story and calling myself a full-time novelist.

Google Acquires eBook Technologies

By Kathie Felix

Speculation was rampant this week about the meaning of Google’s recent purchase of California-based eBook Technologies for an undisclosed sum.

Limited information on the acquisition was available on the eBook Technologies website:

“eBook Technologies, Inc. is excited to announce that we have been acquired by Google. Working together with Google will further our commitment to providing a first-class reading experience on emerging tablets, e-readers and other portable devices.”

The company’s online background information states that “eBook Technologies supplies a family of intelligent reading devices and licenses technologies that enable automated publishing and control over content distribution.”

Following last month’s launch of the Google eBookstore and its 3 million offerings, many are wondering if Google is preparing to offer an e-reader of its own.

Tell us: What do you think the info giant is up to?

Mysteries Revealed at Carina Press (Part 2 of 2)

By Linda Lovely

Angela James (pictured at left), the new Executive Editor of Carina Press, a subsidiary of Harlequin Enterprises Limited, says it’s no mystery why the new digital-first publishing house is interested in mysteries.

Carina is seeking first-rate manuscripts in a wide range of genres including mystery, thriller, science fiction, paranormal, family sagas, romance and erotica. Ms. James, who comes to Carina from Samhain Publishing, is an online press veteran.

The Sisters in Crime blog thanks her for her intriguing answers to questions about Carina’s policies and ambitions in this two-part blog entry. Here’s Part II:


How do you decide on an appropriate price for an ebook?

Price is generally determined by word count. I say generally because there are times when a book may fall in a higher word count but we choose to price it lower for reasons of marketing and sales.

There’s been a lot of conversation regarding fair ebook royalty percentages for authors. Your website states you do not pay advances but pay higher royalty percentages. Do you see publishing moving toward an industry standard ebook royalty percentage?

No, I don’t, though I don’t like to use “never” since that just tempts fate to prove me wrong. But print royalties aren’t standard; I don’t see digital royalties being different because that’s so individual to each publisher’s business plan/model.

According to your website, you don’t offer DRM—digital rights management. Does that mean people who download Carina ebooks can share them with others and/or read them on multiple devices?

Yes, absolutely. We believe that the book itself shouldn’t be an impediment to either buying or reading. We also recognize that people aren’t going to have only one device over the course of their lifetime, so they need to be able to move the book around. As for sharing—it’s an important part of reading culture. We’ve all shared books with friends and family at one time or another. We recognize that you may want to share a book with someone you know will love it—and we hope that encourages them to come back and buy more titles from either that author or from Carina Press. DRM-free is about making buying and reading so easy and pleasurable that the reader won’t have a reason not to come back for more!

What distribution channels do you plan to tap in addition to your own web bookstore?

You can find Carina Press books on third party etailers such as Amazon, Books on Board, Sony, Barnes & Noble, Kobo/Borders, All Romance Ebooks and more.

Though Carina is a digital-first publisher, your publishing contract includes print and audio rights. What factors would prompt you to publish a title as a paperback or create an audio version? What if a Carina author has a print opportunity elsewhere—would you release the rights?

Audible.com receives a list of our releases and they choose from that list which titles they believe will be the most successful, using their knowledge of their customers, buying habits and any holes in genres they might have. While we can encourage Audible to look at a particular title, they ultimately choose what goes to audio (which makes sense, when you think about it, since who better to know the audio market?). To date, they’ve chosen just under 50 of our 2010 titles.

We would not wish to see a competing title on the market, so we would be unable to release print rights, especially as we may wish to use them. When and if the time comes for us to put titles in print, all titles would be considered on a similar basis: audience, marketability, needs of the print channel, etc.

Do you plan to publish any mystery/thriller anthologies or short stories?

We haven’t compiled any anthologies to date (though we are doing a holiday collection, it’s not an anthology), so I can’t speak for plans of anthologies yet, but we would certainly be open to one. Digital is a wonderful place for shorter versions of genre fiction.



Award-winning author Linda Lovely writes romantic suspense novels featuring “smart, sexy heroines caught up in danger-packed situations that require them to partner with equally smart, sexy men.” Her novel, "Counterfeit," is a finalist in the Romantic Suspense category of the 2010 Golden Heart contest sponsored by the Romance Writers of America.

Mysteries Revealed at Carina Press (Part 1 of 2)

By Linda Lovely

Angela James (pictured at left), the new Executive Editor of Carina Press, a subsidiary of Harlequin Enterprises Limited, says it’s no mystery why the new digital-first publishing house is interested in mysteries.

Carina is seeking first-rate manuscripts in a wide range of genres including mystery, thriller, science fiction, paranormal, family sagas, romance and erotica. Ms. James, who comes to Carina from Samhain Publishing, is an online press veteran.

The Sisters in Crime blog thanks her for her intriguing answers to questions about Carina’s policies and ambitions in this two-part blog entry. Here’s Part I:


What made Carina Press, a member of the Harlequin family, decide to expand its offerings beyond traditional romance and romantic suspense genres?

Digital-first publishing offers a lot of opportunities for experimentation and reaching new audiences, so it only made sense for us to open to other genres with an imprint that wasn’t branded as romance already. With the digital market expanding at an extraordinary rate every day, we believe there is room for tremendous growth in genre fiction outside romance in the digital community. We also have some exciting plans for some of our mystery/romantic suspense titles that we’re hoping to announce in the next month or so.

Why should a mystery or thriller author consider submitting to Carina Press?

I don’t suppose the response “because we rock!” will work as a satisfactory answer?

Alternate professional markets for genres such as mystery or thriller can be difficult to find. Carina Press brings to the table a wealth of editorial experience and marketing acumen. We can offer authors a partnership and a forward-thinking place to publish.

Your website indicates you’re open to the full range of mysteries—cozies, procedurals, historical mysteries and contemporaries—as well as psychological, legal, medical, and political thrillers. Are you receiving many submissions in these genres? Is there any niche that has fewer submissions than you’d like to see?

We see quite a few mystery submissions, actually, and the editors are thrilled with this. I wouldn’t say that there’s a particular subgenre of mystery that we wish we could see more of, because the spread is quite even there (though we do have an editor who’s still wishing for a pet-centric mystery series).

Thriller is the one genre we haven’t seen nearly as much of as we’d like. We’ve not yet acquired a manuscript in the genre, and it’s not for lack of trying!

How are you spreading word of your mystery/thriller offerings to fans of these genres?

We use a combination of websites and print media to market and promote to genres. Those include Suspense Magazine, RT, Dear Author, Fresh Fiction and more. And, of course, we are always open to suggestions for effective places to market to the non-romance crowd. I love to hear what’s working for others!

Your website says you’re interested in acquiring digital rights to published works. Does this include out-of-print mysteries/thrillers? Are you looking to acquire series backlists?

Yes, we would most definitely be interested in series backlists. Especially if the author is interested in continuing the series but, even if they’re only looking to republish an older series, we’d love to see it.

How many titles does Carina expect to publish in its first year?

In 2010, we’ll publish a little more than 100 titles.

How many mystery/thriller/romantic suspense titles have you acquired?

To date, of the almost 200 titles we've acquired for publication in 2010 and 2011, approximately 17% fall in the mystery/thriller/romantic suspense genres. As I noted elsewhere during the interview, we haven’t yet acquired any thrillers, but we are keen to do so (though we do have a science fiction military thriller releasing in January 2011 so I suppose that does count!).



Award-winning author Linda Lovely writes romantic suspense novels featuring “smart, sexy heroines caught up in danger-packed situations that require them to partner with equally smart, sexy men.” Her novel, "Counterfeit," is a finalist in the Romantic Suspense category of the 2010 Golden Heart contest sponsored by the Romance Writers of America.

IS "KINDLING" FOR YOU -- Part II

The Nuts and Bolts

by CJ Lyons

Being a cyber-klutz, I thought this would be the most difficult part of self e-publishing, but it actually was quite easy (if a bit tedious and time-consuming).

All the major e-pub sites have guidelines available.  All you need to do is to follow them.

The major e-pub sites I used initially were: Amazon, Scribd, and Smashwords.  I also loaded my books onto Lulu after several readers requested an avenue where they could purchase print copies. (Note: since books printed by POD technology are more expensive, I kept the price on the print books as low as I could, so I essentially make no profit from these sales, they’re more to generate good-will.)

The charge to authors to use these sites' basic services is nothing.  All provide more customized services (such as purchasing ISBN numbers, marketing packages, etc) for a fee.

Step one: create an account at the sites you’ll be using.  Through this account you’ll upload your books, track sales, make any revisions to your final product, and, at some sties, interact with customers.

Step two: read each site’s guide to formatting and follow it closely.  For all the sites I worked with, this basically came down to stripping all formatting from a Word doc of your manuscript and then exporting it in the format the e-publishing site requires. 

I found the Smashwords guide to be very thorough and in-depth with a lot of trouble-shooting tips, so I start there, transforming my Word doc to a document suitable for Smashwords and then simply export it as a html file for uploading to Amazon.

This step is the most time-consuming because you need to go through every line of the manuscript ensuring that no errant formatting remains behind and that the resulting manuscript is readable. 

Step three is almost as equally tiresome as step two.  You need to upload the re-formatted manuscript to each site and proofread it (yes, again!) to ensure that nothing is lost in translation.

Step four: add cover art, a description, tags, and set a price.  This is where using more than one platform comes in handy. 

I start by publishing my books on Smashwords because if they are qualified for their Premium Catalogue, then they'll be distributed to a variety of channels including the Sony, Barnes and Noble, iBooks, and if you want, Amazon Kindle stores.  You can also inexpensively purchase an ISBN for each book. 

Smashwords also has an easy to use coupon generator, which is perfect if you're trying to target certain groups and want to measure your success. 

I preferred to distribute to all of the channels through Smashwords except Kindle—that I did myself.  I wanted the ability to control the Kindle channel myself since I knew it would be the one with the most sales.

Step five: Hit publish and you’re done!

Additional considerations for authors with previously published works.  There are many companies who will "package" your books for you, converting them from electronic files or even scanning the actual book pages to create an editable electronic file.  Some also provide services such as editing, formatting, cover art creation, and publishing to a variety of e-stores.

Do your research and compare prices.  Many will give you references to check.  Also, make sure that you do not sign any of your author's rights away when you contract with these services.

What about the money?

Some authors may choose to give their work away for free in order to gain new readers or as a promotion tied to other books.  But most of us will be hoping to earn some income from our e-published books.

Joe Konrath believes that the price point you set is the key.  “Make your books impulse purchases by keeping the cost low.”

When I first self e-published, I experimented with a variety of prices ranging from $1.99 to $3.99 a book.  I found no real difference in the average sales on Smashwords, but the $2.99 books were the best selling on Amazon.

Since Amazon has recently increased their royalty rate for authors to 70% of books priced $2.99-$9.99 (with some caveats, be sure to read their agreement for more information), I revised all the prices on my Kindle books to $2.99.

One thing I have noticed during my eight months of e-pubbing is that Amazon out sells all other formats by at least 10:1.  Yes, those Kindle readers, love, love, love to buy books!!!

Even though the Smashword sales lag behind Amazon’s, I’ll continue to use them because of the ability to distribute to the other major e-stores such as Apple. Plus, Smashwords offers inexpensive ISBNs as well as the ability to generate coupons.

The bottom line

It’s not a huge amount of money, but I’m on track to make more in a year than I would if I took any of the offers from NYC publishers that I’d received for these particular manuscripts.  All with no expenses incurred other than my time and a few dollars for the copyright, ISBNs, and the stock art I used in the cover design.

As Konrath says, “E-books aren't a substitute for print books. Your results may vary. But this is a very exciting time to be an author. It's free to post books on Kindle. For the first time in history, we can potentially reach a wide readership, all by ourselves.

Just make sure you're giving those readers something they'll enjoy.”

I firmly agree.  In fact, I plan to upload my first "free" Amazon book in the near future as a promotion to help boost sales of my new release.  I also plan to experiment with using a penname for manuscripts that don't fit my brand.

Self e-publishing has its place in an author’s career path, whether to keep a backlist alive, to try new genres and markets, to use as a promotional tool in conjunction with traditionally published books, or to generate a little income on the side.

Thanks for reading!

CJ

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Resources:

JA Konrath’s blog, A Newbie’s Guide to Publishing

US Government Copyright Office

Amazon’s Digital Text Platform

Scribd

Smashwords

Lulu

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As a pediatric ER doctor, CJ Lyons has lived the life she writes about.  In addition to being an award-winning medical suspense author, CJ is a nationally known presenter and keynote speaker. 

Her first novel, LIFELINES (Berkley, March 2008), received praise as a "breathtakingly fast-paced medical thriller" from Publishers Weekly, was reviewed favorably by the Baltimore Sun and Newsday, named a Top Pick by Romantic Times Book Review Magazine, and became a National Bestseller.  Her award-winning, critically acclaimed Angels of Mercy series (LIFELINES, WARNING SIGNS, and URGENT CARE) is available now and the series finale, CRITICAL CONDITION, hits stores November, 2010.  Her newest project is as co-author of a new suspense series with Erin Brockovich.  To learn more about CJ and her work, go to http://www.cjlyons.net/.

IS "KINDLING" FOR YOU? (Part I)

by CJ Lyons

The publishing industry is in an era of upheaval, forcing many authors to flex their entrepreneur muscles, searching for new avenues of income and ways to keep their books in the public's eye.

One way of doing this is to self e-publish your backlist or other books that you hold the rights to.  With more and more readers embracing e-books and e-books becoming the fastest growing segment of publishing, the idea of cutting out the middle-men and keeping profits for ourselves is tempting.

Here are a few things to think about before walking the path of electronic self-publication:

Why self e-publish?

Like many authors, once I was firmly established with NYC publishers, I never thought about e-publishing or self-publishing, much less doing both!

But I found myself with four manuscripts that were all previously in the hands of NYC publishers but that for a variety of reasons never made it to publication. Then I saw a blog by multi-published thriller author J.A. Konrath discussing his own experiment with electronic self-publishing.  His argument was logical, the numbers impressive, but I was still skeptical.

I wanted these books to find an audience but I didn't want to tie them to contracts I might later regret, especially as these four novels were all romantic suspense/thrillers and my career has moved to more mainstream suspense/thriller.  So, I decided to perform my own self-publishing experiment.

I realized that I could use these books as promotional products as well as money-makers.  Since I was in control of when they were released, how long they were available, and what their price was, I had a greater freedom than I do with my traditionally published works.

This turned out to be an unexpected bonus as by the time I had them formatted and ready for publication it was December, 2009.  Then a few weeks later the earthquake in Haiti hit.  Since I'm a pediatric ER doctor as well as a thriller novelist, I wanted to raise money for Doctors Without Borders.

What better way than using my experimental self e-pubbed books?

I sent out a newsletter and posted on my website and a few blogs that I was donating the proceeds of my Kindle sales for the month of February to DWB.  I chose the Kindle format simply because it is exceptionally easy to track Kindle sales on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis through my Amazon's DTP (digital text platform) account.

What I discovered was: Kindle readers read....a lot!  I ended up raising over $1600 for DWB, which translated to almost 1700 books sold in one month on Kindle.

Possible Pitfalls

Anyone deciding to self-publish should have a good grasp of their target audience.  You want to build an audience who will stay with you and help spread the word of your books--and that means making a promise to always deliver a high quality read.

Konrath agrees.  “E-books are a perfect place to experiment and try new things, and since you own your rights, you aren't tied down to any particular genre, and you can always delete something that isn't working.

But whatever you put on Kindle should be perfect. No errors, well-edited, great covers, perfectly formatted. This should be your best work, presented in the best way possible.”

In other words, just as in mainstream publishing, self e-publishing is still all about the reader. 

It's not about clearing your closet of dusty manuscripts just because you can.  Unless you plan on giving your work away for free, your goal is to attract paying customers.  Which means the books you self e-publish need to be just as good as any book a NYC publisher is selling.

If you have a backlist that you own the rights to, they've already been professionally edited,  you're good to go.  Do be aware that publishers own the cover art, so you'll need to create a new cover for your e-book.

If you're planning to publish a book that hasn't been previously published, make certain it is professionally edited.  The four books I chose for my experiment were all edited prior to my self-publication--three by NYC editors (before their road to publication went astray) and one by a professional freelance editor.  Do not rely solely on your critique partners or your Great Aunt Martha who gushes to her bridge club about your writing! 

Remember, not only are you competing against NYT bestsellers, you're also selling a product to a consumer.  If you expect to win their hard earned money--and more importantly, their time, attention, and future sales loyalty--then you need to create a worthy product.

When using a previously unpublished book, you'll want to register a copyright (I did all four in one electronic batch using the US Copyright office's online registration) and include a copyright notice in the front of your book.  You may also want to purchase an ISBN number (this will allow you to better track your sales).  More on this in Part Two.

One pitfall I hadn't totally realized prior to publishing these books was their impact on my branding. 

These books were all romantic thrillers while my traditionally published novels are medical suspense (although with some romantic elements).  Since the romance community had praised and embraced my medical suspense novels, I thought readers would assume these books were a logical extension of my writing, although in the romance genre.

Most readers have enjoyed these books—after publishing them, I received dozens of letters from fans asking if there would be more, telling me how much they enjoyed these books.

BUT, the first few customer reviews on Amazon were not good.  Since Amazon allows you to track sales on a daily basis, it was easy to see sales plummet after these reviews.  They were still good, about 40 books a day, but lower than before the reviews when they'd averaged 50+ a day.

Since then I've had some good reviews from readers leading to increased sales that have remained steady.  But I still struggle with the knowledge that it's clear some readers were disappointed by my foray into another genre.

Questions I asked myself were: should I keep the books up with poor reviews? Should I change the author on them to a penname so I didn't "contaminate" my CJ Lyons brand?

I decided to leave them up under my own name.  It might not be the right marketing decision, but I stand by these books and it didn't feel right to make money off them and then "disown" them.

However, I did revise their descriptions to more strongly advertise them as romance, so my mainstream readers won't be surprised.  I also offer a large excerpt for free, so readers can easily try them before they buy them.

If you'd like to visit my Amazon page and check the books out for yourself, it's here.

 

Stay tuned tomorrow for Part Two: The Nuts and Bolts of Self E-pubbing

Thanks for reading!

CJ

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As a pediatric ER doctor, CJ Lyons has lived the life she writes about.  In addition to being an award-winning medical suspense author, CJ is a nationally known presenter and keynote speaker. 

Her first novel, LIFELINES (Berkley, March 2008), received praise as a "breathtakingly fast-paced medical thriller" from Publishers Weekly, was reviewed favorably by the Baltimore Sun and Newsday, named a Top Pick by Romantic Times Book Review Magazine, and became a National Bestseller.  Her award-winning, critically acclaimed Angels of Mercy series (LIFELINES, WARNING SIGNS, and URGENT CARE) is available now and the series finale, CRITICAL CONDITION, hits stores November, 2010.  Her newest project is as co-author of a new suspense series with Erin Brockovich.  To learn more about CJ and her work, go to http://www.cjlyons.net/.

You don't scare me, Kindle!

By Guest Blogger Dana Stabenow

Kindle. eReader. EZReader. The Alex. The Que. The Nook, iRex, Plastic Logic.

Every time a new e-reader debuts, the book world hurls itself into a panic.“…[P]ublishers are distracting themselves by fretting over the price of eBooks, withholding eBook releases so as not to cannibalize hardcover book sales, and watching helplessly as their businesses erode,” Reuters quoted Forrester analyst Sarah Rotman Epps. (RedOrbit.com).

So. Is this the end of the book? Am I about to be out of a job? Man, I was just getting started here.

I’m bucking the trend. I don’t think so.

The October 25 Sunday New York Times wrote, “Amazon says Kindle owners buy 3.1 times as many books as they did before getting one. Sony says its e-book users are also inspired. “You are going to see very significant growth rates,” said Jeffrey P. Bezos, the head of Amazon.

Gen Xers were raised reading on screens, and that’s how many of them are now reading books. Further, the explosion of online social networking and personal and professional blogs is accustoming many in the baby boomer generation to the habit of reading onscreen. An e-format book is going to look more familiar and reassuring every time they log on to Facebook.

I myself recently downloaded a Great Books app to my iPhone, and guess what? If I were stuck in an airport waiting for a late plane and I’d accidentally packed my book in my checked baggage (it’s happened, and the horror), I could reread Pride and Prejudice on my iPhone just fine. It scrolls past at a speed I set in a font I choose and I’ve got over 150 public domain titles from which to pick, including all of Sherlock Holmes and The Three Musketeers plus both sequels. If I were toting all that around in book form my bag would never fit into the overhead bin. Not to mention what it would do to my back trying to get it there.

So I’m selling my Star Svensdotter and Liam Campbell novels, long out of print, on Kindle and iPhone, and as soon as I get five minutes I’m going to get tech-friendly with uploading all my out-of-print titles, including short stories, for sale on all the other e-devices as well.

As I was writing this post, I checked the iTunes App store book page. The number one free app? Kindle for iPhone. Number two? The B&N eReader. As it happens, I don’t need either one of them because my app has its own built-in reader. And it and all the books it comes with cost me the magnificent sum of $1.99. At that price, you think I won’t buy more?

Eric over at Pimp My Novel says, “These cheap books might be the death of publishing, book sharing might be the death of publishing, Stephen King is delaying his e-book because e-books are the death of publishing…is anyone else bored of this conversation?” and then links to Lit Drift’s 5 Reasons Why the Novel is Not a Dying Medium, where they channel Mark Twain in saying that the death of the novel is greatly exaggerated.

On his blog, literary agent Nathan Bransford says, “Things are changing, it’s going to be an interesting/challenging couple of years as we gradually succumb to our coming e-book overlords, but it doesn’t mean the novel is going to disappear or that we’re all going to hell in a handbasket. Things aren’t going to be worse (at least in the long term), they’re just going to be different…”

I can do different. My feeling is that the more ways you can read, the more you will read, which is only good news for me. I do not mean to make light of the real changes facing everyone at every level of the publishing industry. Change is always scary.

But change doesn’t have to be bad, and in this case, I don’t believe it is.
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Dana Stabenow was born in Anchorage and raised on 75-foot fish tender in the Gulf of Alaska. She knew there was a warmer, drier job out there somewhere and found it in writing books. Her first science fiction novel, Second Star, sank without a trace, her first crime fiction novel, A Cold Day for Murder, won an Edgar award, her first thriller, Blindfold Game, hit the New York Times bestseller list, and her twenty-seventh novel and eighteenth Kate Shugak novel, Though Not Dead, comes out in February 2011.  Visit her web site:  http://www.stabenow.com/