Author admits making up memoir of surviving Holocaust – The Boston Globe reports:

“Eleven years after the publication of her best-selling Holocaust memoir – a heartwarming tale of a small Jewish girl trekking across Europe and living with wolves – the Massachusetts author yesterday admitted the whole story was a hoax.”

Read the full article – it’s fascinating. The fictionalizing author’s own story would have made a fascinating tale, so why lie?

Amazon’s created a new self publishing option: publish on Kindle.

Is this for you?

I’ve read the Getting Started guide, and it seems straight-forward. However, payments are made to a US bank account, so this limits the service to US authors.

Here’s an interesting story from MarketingSherpa.

MarketingSherpa: How Elsevier Created New Ebooks From Old Content to Lift Revenue 15%: “SUMMARY: Libraries and other institutions continue to add online content databases to their collections. So, opportunity calls for publishers to digitize even more specialty content for these customers.

See how one reference book publisher repurposed content by digitizing thousands of print titles for its paid content site and pushed usage through complimentary downloads. Conversions were strong enough to lift book revenue 15% in 2007.”

(This article is available until February 23)

Your takeaway from this? Basically this: As important as electronic rights have been for the past decade, they’re even more important now, so make sure that both you and your agent are up to date on e-rights, and that you place a strict limit on the length of time for which you license them.

Writing a book? Forget publishers and agents: test your idea online, get readers and make money.

I love the idea of testing your projects online before you go the traditional publishing route, and I was fascinated to read that the founder and CEO of new self help site First 30 Days follows this model too.

Self-Help Site First30Days.com Launches With $5 Million from Hearst and Dick Parsons reports: “First 30 Days is starting on the Web, but it could easily expand into other media such as books and TV. In May, HarperOne will be publishing The First 30 Days by de Bonvoisin. And she plans many more books. ‘The idea in my head,’ she says, ‘was to start it as a book series. Dick Parsons said start it online. With books, I have no relationship with you.’ If she can make First 30 Days the first place people go to when they need help with life’s transition points, it could easily become more than a 30-day habit.”

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Publishing has changed. Today you’ve got many book-publication choices.

You can:

1. Find a traditional publisher (send out book proposals, get an agent, make a sale, get an advance… etc);

2. Self-publish (you have many choices here – Print on Demand, electronic publishing as PDF etc);

3. Self-publish online, using your book to gain online advertising revenue (blog your book).

Traditional book publication: it’s a long journey

To work with a publisher, you’ll need to send out query letters and/or a book proposal. A query is a letter or a few pages briefly describing your text, why it is unique, characteristics of your target market and how you can help market the book.

Most top-tier publishers don’t accept unsolicited manuscripts, so you’ll need get an agent to convince them to read yours. If they request that you forward your entire manuscript, you have one foot in the door. Be prepared to send more than one query and don’t expect a response next week.

There are writer’s guides that serve as excellent resources to find publishers who specialize in your particular genre.

These guides list the percentage of new authors published as well as the percentage of sales they pay. You may find pay rates ranging from 5-10% of sales. Some pay on wholesale sales and others on the retail amount. Do the math. Perhaps your book will retail for $14.95 and the publisher will pay 6% on retail. This means you will earn 90 cents per book sold. Of course don’t forget that the publisher is doing all the printing, distributing, and marketing of your text.

Fast-track book publication – self publishing

Another route you may want to consider is self publishing. You will be responsible for all the printing, distributing and marketing costs involved, but you will also get to retain all the profits. There are book printing companies as well as companies that specialize in assisting the self-publisher through every step along the way.

You can also opt to self publish online. This is the easiest option. However, you do need to learn the basics of online publication: how to buy a domain name, get your material uploaded to your server, and get advertisers.

Which form of publication is best for you?

In 2008, it’s completely up to you. I know several authors who’ve self published and have turned down traditional publishers who approached them.

Traditional publishing gives you prestige, but it’s far from your only option.

Write YOUR Way to Riches – Write A Book

Your life will change, when you’re a published author – writing books is the perfect home business. As an author, you’ll have successful home-based business which delivers great rewards. It’s a dream job with a perfect lifestyle.

You can write books anywhere, in your home office, or while you travel to any country in the world. Your morning commute is the steps from your bedroom to your home office – no annoying boss, no office politics.

The rewards can be huge.
Get started writing your way to riches today.