Although paper books will never vanish, eBooks are rapidly becoming the most important sector of publishing. Traditional publishers have been treating authors with disdain — and giving them tiny cuts of the profit — for years. As a editor and publisher turned writer, I know the score only too well.
book by flyzipper
It’s time to do something about it. I drink a lot of coffee (surprise, huh?) and have been impressed with the Fair Trade initiative, given how badly screwed coffee growers tend to be. Growing coffee takes years. So can writing and publishing a book.
So Ghostwoods Books is a brand new deal — a Fair Trade initiative for writers. The principle is simple. Readers get damn fine books to read at a great price; writers get a friendly publisher who’s on their side, and is prepared to hand over a full 50% of the profits. Thats what partnerships are all about.
If you like reading, Ghostwoods Books are fully professional, top-quality books at least as good as any you’d buy in a store. Better, hopefully, because it’s not a committee of marketing and PR types selecting lowest-common-denominator content, but a small team of dedicated, passionate editors with decades of experience in all areas of publishing.
If you like writing, Ghostwoods Books offers a friendly, supportive, route to publication. Whilst we’re in the initial phases, publication will be electronic. If you want us to, we’ll also represent your book to print publishers. Later, we’ll be able to offer full print contracts ourselves. We’re currently open to submissions, so if you’re interested, read on!
The Case for eBooks
Despite what you may think, author’s royalties on printed books are generally pretty bad. They’re can be as low as $0.15 a copy, and even with horrible advances at just $3000 or below, books not on the A* list often don’t earn out their advance. It’s a complicated issue, but the sad truth is that everyone wants a big chunk of the sales price, and the author is right at the bottom of the pile. Unless they’re celebs, of course. But we’re not, and we assume you’re not, either.
Publishing eBooks gives a chance to cut out several stages of the feeding frenzy. Publication costs are also minimal, which helps reduce overheads. There are no print or shipping costs. Despite this, mainstream publishers have a tendency to grossly overprice electronic copies of their books, and it is really annoying readers.
Electronic publishers take between 15% and 50% of the cover price. This is pretty huge, but even in the worst cases — like Kobo — it still leaves a reasonable amount of money per sale, and that money is profit. That profit deserves to be split equally, because despite publishers’ opinions, writing a book is hard work that deserves a fair reward.
The Ghostwoods Books Approach
We’re looking for top-quality novels and non-fiction works to publish, initially electronically, at a reader-friendly price, somewhere between $5.00 and $5.99. All books will be thoroughly developed and edited before publication, as you’d expect. They’ll be properly laid out, ISBN’ed, and given attractive covers. Then they’ll be listed with every useful eBook publisher out there. We may record them as audiobooks, too. We’ll back all this up with promotion and marketing, review copies, press releases, submission to all relevant major awards and competitions, and lots of info as to how you can also help promote your work effectively.
Ghostwoods Books will only publish genuinely good books. No ifs, no buts, no back-handers. Particularly in eBook publishing, it’s vital to build a reliable reputation. The Ghostwoods Books seal will guarantee a top-quality publication. That’s worth more than a whole pallette of bus-stop posters and corny marketing stunts.
As well as electronically publishing and promoting your work, we’ll also represent your book as literary agents to the mainstream publishing industry if you want us to — and yes, that includes handing over electronic rights. The time will come when we’re able to offer print contracts ourselves, but it won’t be for a while. In the mean time, we’ll help you get there with other people, in return for standard agents’ fees. Selling just 5000 copies of an eBook is enough to get publishers to take you very seriously indeed, so we’re in the unique place of being able to bolster our agenting efforts with meaningful hard numbers.
Because our business model relies on very low up-front costs to get started, the one down-side is that we’re only able to offer a nominal advance against royalties. I know that sucks. Sorry. Normal agents wouldn’t pay any advance of course, nor publish electronically. To make up for it, we’re giving you a get-out clause.
How to Submit a Manuscript to us
If you’re interested, please email your manuscript — in a format MS Word can deal with — to ghostwoodsbooks@gmail.com. All genres / styles are welcome; ditto self-published works. We’re interested in non-fiction, too. We’ll get back to you as swiftly as possible regarding your work — very quickly, to start with, but it’s likely to slow down when things get really busy.
Things to include: A one-sentence strap-line that says who and what the book is about; a short synopsis of the book; some thoughts on things you could do to help market the book; a little info about yourself that people might find interesting, if appropriate; any other info you think is relevant; and the finished book.
Things not to include: PDFs; file formats MS Word can’t open; ZIPs, RARs, Executables, image files or viruses; ludicrous bravado; unfinished books; Public Domain works you’ve copied; manuscripts you don’t own all the rights to; books substantially shorter than 70,000 words or longer than 150,000 words; and poetry — simply because I know nothing about it.
Things that don’t matter: Page size, double-spacing, and other bits of over-anal formatting nonsense.
