RUTH SPENSER Stuff.co.nz - 25/03/2012
WORD UP: Electronic publishing has opened the doors for many writers.
Bringing to the marketplace has always been a struggle for emerging writers, but the evolution of digital publishing formats is seeing a new wave of authors skipping the print medium entirely.
An increasing number of platforms exits to support ebooks: Amazon has recently released its popular Kindle in New Zealand, where it joins the Kobo and a variety of smartphone and iPad apps on the e-reader market.
Christchurch writer Paul Mannering has published two ebooks on Amazon's Kindle platform, a collection of short stories and a post-apocalyptic novel about genetic engineering, Tankbread. Two weeks after release, his novel had sold 400 copies, a figure many writers would envy in any format. At a price point of US$4.99 for the ebook and 70 per cent of that price received in royalties, it's a case study to whet the appetites of struggling novelists the world over.
Mannering is an advocate of professionalism in the finished product. He had his novel formatted and edited by outside experts, and commissioned a strong cover design.
"The most important advice I have for anyone considering self- publishing is to invest real money in a quality editor who knows your genre and knows the rules of written language," he says. "Many self-published books I've read suffer from bad grammar and read like an early draft of the story."
Wellington author DC Sheehan, whose novel The Mythic was recently released on Amazon, agrees that DIY is not always the best option. Although there are templates available online, he is having his novel professionally formatted so that it will "look as good as the books it's competing against - the automatic formatting tools didn't provide the necessary finesse".
Full story at stuff.co.nz