Books and eBooks
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MoshPit Publishing specialises in developing ebooks by Australian authors, but we will also work with you to help you get your print book developed and out to its audience.
We will work with you every step of the way, or just for a few steps – whatever you need. It’s an exciting time, bringing your book alive, and we can help or guide you with any or all of the following:
- manuscript assessment
- editing
- obtaining illustrations
- layout
- copyright permissions
- partnering or co-branding with other businesses or government departments
- ISBN and barcode (vital if you wish to sell via the internet or bookshops)
- proofreading
- printing
- ebook creation
- website for your book and ecommerce options
- marketing
But at the risk of dampening your enthusiasm for writing the Great Australian Novel, there are a few things you should know if you plan to write a book, and these are the reasons we will recommend that you start by publishing an ebook, rather than a print book:
- Unless you’re already a ‘known author’ you will be lucky to find a publisher who will pay for your book’s development costs upfront. You will most likely have to pay for the production costs yourself – advance royalty payments are enjoyed by a relatively minor few, such as John Grisham, Stephen King and JK Rowling.
. - Printing costs money! There are various printing options, within Australia, Asia and the USA, but at the end of the day, you will still need to find the money to fund your project. And when we say money, chances are you will be looking between one and six thousand dollars ($1,000-$6,000) to produce a marketable number of book-shop quality books, depending on what sort of book you’re developing and how many copies you hope to sell.
. - Having your book in a bookshop isn’t the be-all and end-all. It’s great to be able to say ‘They’re selling my book in (name the chain store)’ but if you’re a new, unknown writer, you’re unlikely to have your book placed at the very front of the store where people will see it. Chances are it will be on a shelf mixed in with other titles of that genre - so being in a chain store shouldn’t necessarily be the aim.
. - People don’t buy books, they buy writers. If you’re well-known in your field and you can bring a new angle to something, then you will have a better chance of success in selling your book. If you’re not particularly well-known, then you’re going to have to think hard about your marketing strategy – what is your book about, why would anyone want to buy it, and when you work out who your potential buyers are, how are you going to alert them to your book?
. - Don’t skimp on the pre-printing process. This is your baby, so you want it to be as perfect as possible. Don’t waste money on printing something that hasn’t been proofread by a professional. No matter how good you were at English in high school, or what sort of academic career you’ve had since you left school, we all make mistakes and it’s better that those mistakes are found before you drop several thousand dollars on printing!
. - Don’t get your friends to assess your story. Sure, show it around, get some feedback, but at the end of the day, give it to someone who doesn’t know you – they’re more likely to be honest with you. And if that means telling you not to bother, then, while it hurts, at least you will have saved yourself several thousand dollars, not to mention a lot of space in your spare room which would have been devoured by all those unsold books! And if you do find someone who tells you not to bother, get a second opinion from someone else. If you get two outsiders saying ‘Don’t bother’ then it’s likely you have very good friends who just didn’t want to hurt your feelings.
. - If you’re not sure, or if funds are tight, try publishing an ebook first. If you’re remotely computer literate, you can set yourself up with a blog, or a Facebook page, and start talking about your book or the subject matter from it. Get a discussion going, then you can direct people to your book if you think they’re interested. If your ebook starts selling, you will soon get an idea of whether it would be a viable proposition as a book or not. We can help you create a PDF or ePub book, or both. We develop our epub ebooks so that they can be read on devices such as mobile phones, iPads, Barnes and Noble's Nook, and Kobo's reader, and with apps and programs such as, Kobo, Stanza and Adobe Digital Editions.