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Writing and Publishing, Part 55:
Becoming your own publisher:
My publishing Effort:
The Siege of Acheron:
This was my third book and again I was still a student. I was
still pretty dumb and green, so I made more mistakes and I got
worked over again. In this accounting I'm not trying to impress
anyone. I'm just telling the story the way I experienced it. As
I said before, this part is very personal. This is my view of
reality. As always, you can skip this if you wish. I promise that
I will not get angry or upset if you do.
Everyone who has ever done anything creative knows that there is a profound letdown after the creative effort ends. It is quite normal to have an empty feeling after the completion of a significant event in your life. However, the crash I experienced after the Gaffer's Shorts was quite devastating. In this particular case, the duplicity of my adversaries acted to compound the feelings dramatically. It was a crushing humiliation and defeat.
In fact, the period following The Gaffer's Shorts was probably the most depressing period of my life. The depression I felt was palpable. It was hard on my wife and I deeply regret that. Her despair came from her powerlessness in her ability to help me. It affected her happiness because she cared about me, very much. Yet, she was unable to help. What finally did help me was getting back to work.
In that, I believe The Siege of Acheron reflects my underlying faith. Creating the book brought me back to my base belief system and helped to pull me through the sewer of self pity and rage. When I started this book I had reached a point of indifference such that I did not care if I sold books or not. I'm not sure that has changed. Even so, I felt the need to express myself so I began to work.
The Siege of Acheron was a totally different kind of book. To begin with, it was my first real wholly fictional effort. It was written under the pseudonym of Willie Gaffer. It is the classic evil verses good tale. It has all of the elements of the eternal struggle. I present an evil archetype demon offset with a Christlike good archetype embodied in a schoolgirl. I also have the mandatory wise old sage of ancient wisdom. Of course, I have a hero and heroine involved in a nice romance. Along with these characters, I offer an idiot savant, a few good folks, and a brace of scoundrels. I was quite pleased with the final result. I still am.
It was with this book that I decided to change book manufacturers. That occurred because of some funny business by the people who did my first two books. When I did The Gaffer's Shorts, I expected to have significant sales. Thus a fulfillment service seemed like a good idea. Fulfillment is pretty much what it sounds like. I was to pay someone else to store my books and fulfill the orders as they poured in.
I chose the same people who had manufactured my book because it eliminated extra shipping. They required a deposit to start. Then they charged a monthly fee plus a small percent of each order. Of course, the orders did not pour in and the fees began to add up. I decided to have the books shipped to me and I did. I also expected them to return my deposit. They did not. I had to make several phone calls, send one regular letter and finally one registered letter while they sat on my money for several months. My financial situation at that time made their foot dragging more than an annoyance. I was then that I decided to go with a different book manufacturer.
That precipitated the biggest mistake that I made with this particular book. The mistake was in the printer I chose for manufacturing. I should have known when I walked in their place that it was not a good environment for book manufacturing. It was dirty and it smelled of mold and oil. The lighting was poor and the workers were not smiling. I toured the plant, I saw it, and I made a stupid decision. I should not have given them the job, but I did.
The result was not great. They used two different kinds of paper for the printing. They must have printed different signatures on different machines because it showed in the final binding. It may not be obvious to a casual observer, but I saw it instantly. A look at the trimmed edge of the book shows two slightly different colors of paper. There were also small flaws throughout the book which were clearly caused by contamination on the printing plates. These showed up on the same pages of every book I checked.
In addition, they messed up the cover. They either did the color separations incorrectly or they used the wrong combinations of inks. I'm not sure. I only know that the cover colors were not consistent. I had a specific color of red (Pantone 197) which I used for titles and subtitles. The color was different from line to line on the cover. Again, the casual observer would not notice. I did. I asked them to do the covers right and replace them. They refused.
If you ask me in person, I will give you the name of the Printing Company. I should not have to. With what I have written here, you will recognize their place. It looks and is shabby. It is a scabby building located in a shabby old downtown neighborhood of an old Michigan city. The Siege of Acheron is a great story and a great book, but the cover is flawed and the printing is flawed. It does not spoil the book. It simply makes it look to professionals like it was manufactured by amateurs. That is because it was.
As you can see, my education was getting rounded out. When I decided to publish my first book, It seemed that I was getting into the awesome intellectual world of the publishing industry. I believed that I was finally getting into a gentleman's game. I had no idea of what was to come. The behavior of my adversaries was a profound shock to me. I cannot describe the emotional impact it has had.
Welcome to the real publishing industry. It is not about a fireplace and a wingback chair with a big redbone dog and a small glass of Madeira. It's about cutthroat business and a meanness of spirit which would make a carney huckster blush. When those people broadsided me, I was an innocent victim. I am now a bit better educated. I may never succeed in commerce, but I will never be broadsided again, and I did survive.
I have said before that I want all of you to come into this business and take it away from those people. I still want that. However, if you do come in, my advice is to come in with your shields up. You must trust people if you are to get anything done, but you should be ready for betrayal at all times. Have a recovery plan ready and discount any promises you hear by 90%. Make sure you can get by if they don't keep their promise.
This is not a gentleman's club. Assume that you have no allies and you will not be disappointed. If someone insists that they are your ally, beware. They are almost sure to be trying to set you up. They are more than likely an opportunistic predator.
For the record, it was around this time that I also set up my first website. Here again I was mistaken. I thought a website would generate business. It has, in that the few orders I received, came mostly from website traffic. However, it is not enough to matter.
Next time, I'll get into some of the things I learned about
publishing with my book, Supreme Commander George.
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