ebooks ever?

[Richard Fulgham]

Hi folks,
I was surprized that ont one person responded to my question about ebooks. Surely somebody has had a good or bad experience to relate. My impression so far is that they are not worth the trouble and that there is no future for them either. R.

[Gary Kessler]

Oh, there very well might be a future for them. And there is a current pressing need for ebooks in (mobile, compact, searchable, relatively cheap) textbook and in multimedia forms. The point, especially for noninteractive fiction, is that the market still is somewhere in the future, because not much of anyone is buying them now.

[Richard]

Thanks Gary, that's what I thought. I think I'll wait for the fad to kick in, if I live that long.

[Ralph Van Doren]

I don't agree that electronic publishing, in all its varied forms, can be considered a fad. Rather it's a revolution whose time, because of promotion and distribution problems, has not yet arrived.

[Legrand]

So, fiction is out-
what about other kinds of books? Short, info-books, how-tos, marketing, tips, whatever. I see books like this all over. Is anyone doing well with them?
I would assume so, since I see them sold in many online place.

Lockergnome's Gnometomes, for example.

[Gary Kessler]

Afraid I was being misleading with my reference to fiction in my earlier posting. The two genres that seem to be doing pretty well as ebooks already are on-the-edge Romances (ripping both the bodice and the bra) and niche science fiction/fantasy (although the latter, disappointingly doesn't seem to be taking advantage of the ebook ability to add multimedia and interactive elements to the mix).

I would think that the shorter fiction (novellas) and infobooks, how-tos, etc. would also be naturals for ebooking already, but I've seen no evidence of a high number of epublishers in this aspect of the business or of these types of ebooks doing better than their print versions. Would love to see evidence they have publishers and are doing well, so look forward to responses on that here.

Actually, I find ebook publishers very disappointing in developing a niche for themselves to this point. Instead of taking full advantage of new areas/capabilities ebooking can operate in and print publishers can't, most ebook publishers just seem to want to do the same thing print publishers do, just in different media.

[Terry Fairdale]

Gary, I've seen lots of novellas and short stories on Fictionwise, and have downloaded a few. It's a nice market for writers who have retained electronic rights to their shorter works published elsewhere--they can license the electronic rights to Fictionwise and get a little royalty every time a story is downloaded. The short stories generally cost a dollar or two, not a lot of money, and they have some big names as well as little-known authors. I sincerely doubt anyone's getting rich from it, but it's a market that can be exploited, and there aren't many markets for short fiction anymore. The only drawback to Fictionwise as a market is that an author must have some solid publishing credits before they will take him on. It's not a market for a writer looking to break in.

I think shorter non-fiction e-books are doing a reasonable but not scintillating business with various very small companies. After all, anybody can put up a website and sell shortish informational e-books. Convert your ms. to .pdf, sign up for a merchant account to accept credit cards (which you can sometimes get through a webhost), and you're good to go. Again, nobody's getting rich, but I think with some marketing it can be a nice little side business. (Yes, it's something I've considered!)

In general, the larger publishers aren't going to take on those sort of works because there isn't enough money in it, but there is a small sort of market there. However, for a first-time book-length fiction writer, as everyone has said, the market just isn't there yet.

[Gary Kessler]

Unfortunately, in the current market, it's not really a question of nobody getting rich, it's a question of very few people breaking even--certainly not the author, if he/she factors in the opportunity costs lost on the time spent writing the work.

[Nancy Schumacher]

Hi. I'm relatively new to this site -- and this is the first time I've participated on the discussion loop. But I have something to add to this ebook discussion. I've researched it thoroughly and made the personal decision to submit a romance to Awestruck Books - an ebook publisher. Within three weeks they made me an offer on my book, The MacAulay Bride, a Scottish-historical romance which will be released October of this year. This book is around 350 pages long and something I worked on for over two years, what with research for clothing, language, setting (it's set in 1888 Edinburgh.)

I worked for over a month with an editor-one on one through email on editing the book. I learned more working with her than I did in the past seven years since I seriously pursued writing for publication. That includes crit groups on line and our local writing chapter workshops, etc.. The experience was worth it--even if I don't make lots of $, which I don't expect to. And the reason isn't because it will be published as an ebook. It will also be available in print on demand through Earthling Press. It's because I haven't 'branded' myself yet as a writer. Making a name for oneself comes slow in the publishing world. There are several romance writers who remained midlist writers with New York publishers for years before they finally did make a name for themselves.

Awestruck books sends out press releases to whomever I ask, they run ads in reader publications of upcoming releases. I plan on paying for an ad in a book club publication called Romantic Times, which receives a lot of exposure. Also, I made the decision to pay a cover artist to produce a cover -- and it's a good one. Come see it at www.nancypirri.com.

Ebooks are the waive of the future--many libraries now have received funding to carry them. Slowly they will build in popularity, although I will tell you most folks I know who own them read them on their computer instead of purchasing a reader of some sort.

By the way, I'd only marketed my book to one New York publisher before chosing to go ebook route. It's right for me because of where I'm at in my life and in my writing career.

Good luck to all of you! Happy writing.
Nancy

[Gary Kessler]

FYI, Awestruck Books is marked as "recommended" by Preditors & Editors. Glad to hear you've been treated well there, Nancy. I have ebooks with New Concepts Publishers, which also is recommended by P&E, but NCP doesn't give much of any attention to its authors (doesn't even let them know when their books are released)--as far as I can determine doesn't even send the edit back to the author for review.