My Journey to finding the right Publisher for me as a debut author and why it's important to explore all options.

As I hinted in my welcome message, there is a growing demand for books and authors are creating them in droves. Giant retailers such as Amazon are the most popular places to purchase a book. Why not? It's faster, cheaper and easier (albeit not as nostalgic as walking around a bookstore.) But people are always in so much of a rush these days and want the biggest, best thing yesterday. While this set-up is easy on the end user, this popular process has a massive negative impact and sometimes damaging effects on publishing companies. They don't make massive profits on books anyway, but now, there's a lot of competition and publishers can't afford to lose out. Here's the stinger; unless you’re a celebrity or an established author, the big companies like Penguin, Bloomsbury and Faber usually won't accept unsolicited manuscripts, which means you need to enlist a literary agent and there's a whole new process for doing that. It's like applying for a job where you send over the best aspects of yourself and if they like it, you have an 'interview' of sorts to prove your worth. This is before the agent even contemplates approaching a publishing company to represent you. Need I mention that you will spend a lot of time getting an agent to then have some of your hard-earned royalties go to said agent, as well as the publisher when your book sells. So if you're counting on book sales to pay your mortgage, you better make sure your book is the next best seller and you need to be prepared for the time and effort you'll need to put in for this. 

There are some 'wrong-uns' out there

Smaller, less established publishers would mitigate the risk of taking on an unknown authors by asking them to contribute a percentage towards the printing and publishing process. Now I know what you're thinking, "me, pay THEM to sell my book? I’m trying to make money here, surely my book is worth taking a risk on." It seems backwards and I can imagine, every writer thinking the same thing. Yes, there are VANITY PUBLISHERS out there that distract you with half-hearted compliments about how good your book is and then slam you with the punchline of "we can't offer you a traditional contract, but we can however offer you a hybrid one.” And then you get given a fancy contract telling you that for £2k+ upfront, they will move Heaven and Earth to make your book as good as it can be. And to add insult to injury, they then add a little disclaimer at the bottom to state success depends on the quality of the book and the target market. Vanity publishers are known for taking your money and doing the absolute bare minimum to contribute to the development of your book. Because why would they? They already have your money and they're looking for an easy sell. And if it doesn't sell, they are covered by the disclaimer. Bottom line, it’s a win-win for them and for you, it's not a nice way to be treated and you are NOT deserving of that. 

Hybrid publishing - not to be sniffed at 

That doesn't meant to say you should run for the hills every time a HYBRID PUBLISHING COMPANY approach you with an offer. My advice to you is... research, research, research. If any company asks you for money up front, it should be received with a calm caution and you have to be damned sure they are who they say they are, There are vanity publishers and there are also people who masquerade as one and are out to scam you. Look at their reviews on Trustpilot and assess the overall ratings. Don't not go with a publisher because one person online complained that they had an extremely bad service. It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation and only one bad one to lose it - Benjamin Franklin.  And listen/read what they have on offer. Take it as a compliment that they've reached out to you amongst hundreds of other hopefuls. Take your time in deciding, because you have all the time in the world (unless you have a mortgage to pay for), especially if it is an email offer. Sleep on it, reach out to authors published by that same company and ask for their honest feedback. 

Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP)

Being a debut author, I found it a massive struggle and a lot of work to find reputable companies that would take on unsolicited manuscripts for free, to the point where I seriously considered going it alone and self-publishing through KDP. I found their online instructions very informative. With a click of a button, you could have your e-book in the website for free and there were print on demand services (that you would have to pay for) if you wanted a physical book. But I just didn't feel comfortable taking that solo plunge and I'd spent too long on this book to fail and not get the most out of it. I needed a little guidance. 

Light at the end of the tunnel

And that's when I happened across The Conrad Press which is a company founded by authors to provide a service for authors. I saw the service as a form of 'guided self-publishing,' where they made it clear exactly what they do, what the publishing process was, what services they provided and how much everything would be. They didn’t ask for all the money upfront and when they awarded me the contract, it was all laid out what I could have as optional extras. The whole cost of the service wasn’t nearly as much as what the vanity publishers were asking for and all in all, it was a very good deal. I decided to pay for the marketing services, but you can decide to go it alone if you wish. I think this was a great personal choice as it put me on the map and then allowed me to run with it and do my own marketing on the side at my leisure (which as it turned out, I really enjoyed doing.) From beginning to end, the service was transparent and all the staff there are really approachable. My best experience was working with the design team for my book cover.

To summarise the benefits of the route I took:

• With hybrid publishing you get the best of both worlds - you have the established publishing experience of the firm in areas where you feel you may lack in (contacts, tools and quality control) and opportunities to make your own mark on all aspects of your work.

• You keep the rights to your own book. This means you have decision power on what happens to it before, during and after the publishing process.

• You have creative control in what your cover is going to look like, how many books you want to print and where it will be sold.

• This is a quicker process - less departments and people looking at it means a faster time to the market.

So there's my advice. I've included below some useful resources that I use/d. Each author is different and has their own ideas of publishing. And what works for me, might not work for you. So do what works for you and enjoy every step of the journey to success. You deserve it.

Resources

Writers & Artists Yearbook

Writing a Novel and Getting Published For Dummies by George Green

UK publishers accepting unsolicited manuscripts. (Note: subject to change as Feb 2025 information)

Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP)

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