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The first Independent e-Book Awards were designed to recognize excellence in electronic books, hypertext and digital storytelling. The Awards Committee has delayed publication of the submission guidelines to give members of the e-book community an opportunity to offer suggestions. The suggestion form may be used to present ideas to the Awards Committee. A draft of the submission guidelines will be posted on Monday, October 30th. Final guidelines will be published November 6, 2000. Submissions will open November 6th and must be received by December 20, 2000. Please refer to the Press Release for a list of the judges and additional information. |
The
Independent e-Book Awards are sponsored by the Mystic-Ink Community
Ariana Overton is involved with the set-up of this great new competition.
Barbara Lakey, Publisher of FUTURES Magazine for writers and
artists, has
signed an option with Snarlydog Productions, a Pacific Northwest based
Independent Film Company for the first of four of her psychological
suspense thriller series. The movie STRAIGHT EDGE will be based on Ms.
Lakey's novel, Spirit of the Straight Edge.
Straight Edge is a uniquely told story of vengeance.
An abused woman searches for The Evil Man -- a search that will change her
forever.
She is the bait, but is she the killer?
Henry Slesar, who TV guide called the writer with the largest audience in
America, says about Spirit Of The Straight Edge, "Spirit of the Straight
Edge," is a riveting, merciless, uncompromising, and powerful piece of
writing."
Clock Tower books is publishing this series electronically at
http://www.clocktowerfiction.com
It will be available from Clock Tower in
POD, PDF and most other formats. It is also available as a Trade Paperback
direct from the author, at http://www.suspenseunlimited.net/
or email Ms. Lakey at babs@suspenseunlimited.net
Extract from website: "The Standard" (http://www.thestandard.com/article/display/0,1151,19292,00.html)
E-BOOK AWARDS: ZOINKS!
I would like to invite Steven Zeitchik and his editors to visit my Web site and
repeat what he called authors now publishing with online publishers – "a
shaggy group whose offerings consist mostly of books rejected by traditional
houses" ["Judging
E-Books by Their Printers," Oct. 4].
I am not shaggy, nor have my books been rejected by New York publishers – with the exception of one, which has not yet been published. I cannot begin to imagine what made Mr. Zeitchik use a phrase like that. How could he not check with some of us first to at least look at some of our books before making such a statement? I had three books published by New York publishers until they were bought up by foreign conglomerates and forced to present a 15 percent return on investment, instead of the 6 percent to 8 percent return publishers always have presented in the past. The focus became brand-name authors with books that are all alike because that's what sold last month, and the New York publishers are afraid to rock the boat.
There is ungodly pressure on independent publishers to produce perfect manuscripts, mainly to prove to the print community that they are edited, and reputable online independent publishers are rising to the challenge because they want market share. And you know what? They're beginning to get it because the public is beginning to catch on to the New York sham. I can't tell you how many times I've heard readers complaining that those books are "all the same." Publishers are afraid to take a chance on midlist authors who are not as well-known as the brand-name authors. I can't tell you how many big, but not huge, name authors have been so badly treated by publishers that they're turning to online publishers in self-defense.
That was why I, and so many good authors like me, turned to the independent online publishers. Not because we're scruffy and not because we're rejected, but because we're sick and tired of bad treatment by publishers. So don't call us scruffy and don't call us rejects. Just call us what we are, pioneers in a brand-new industry who are writing the books we love to write.
While you're at it, call our independent publishers pioneers, too. We started the revolution; we're going to prevail through all this and we won't be fooled by [awards foundation] Frankfurt and Microsoft again. We know where the market really begins: It begins with the reader.
Beth Anderson
Author
Clocktower Books
Writer's Digest Special Issue September/October 2000
Publishing Success:
The Writer's Survival Guide to Self-Publishing and E-Publishing.
Pick up your copy today...
Our very own Barbara Lakey
has all three of her
"Spirit of the Straight Edge" thriller series as finalist in the
"New Century Awards"
Why not check out one, or all three of Barb's great books at
her website:
http://www.suspenseunlimited.net/
Rocket-e: B&N ISBN:0-7433-0022-X
in paperback and PDF late September from
ClockTower Books ISBN: 0-7433-0047-5
http://www.clocktowerfiction.com
Unknown authors used to be a dying breed, run over by publishers chasing famous names. But with the e-revolution in the publishing industry, budding writers are rising from the dust of the information superhighway.
John Cullen, Publisher of Clocktower Fiction, an internet e-book publisher said the advent of e-publishing marks a change in the publishing industry by giving rise to "mid list" authors. Unlike "front list" authors such as Stephen King or Danielle Steele, mid list authors are unknown. Fewer mid list books are printed, and they receive very little promotion. "What's been happening is because it's increasingly harder to get published, the mid list is vanishing," Cullen said. "One function of e-books is to create a new mid list where authors can be discovered."
The trend toward authors turning to the internet is a result of business decisions in the increasingly cut-throat business of publishing. "The traditional print industry has been shooting itself in the foot through mergers and acquisitions," Cullen said. "At the moment in New York City the entire industry is owned by 8 companies." As lowering costs and increasing profits has become a matter of survival in the industry, fewer publishers have been willing to take risks with new authors. "Editors are afraid to make independent decision," Cullen said. "The safest thing is to print the same thing as last month. If you deviate that's instant death." So publishers promote the big names, limiting the fresh voices to enter bookstores.
"The trend is toward safety. It's very hard for new people to break in." Beth Anderson, an author who has published three print books and one e-book said the business concerns of the printing world hurt another author she knows. When 89 percent of her hardback book sold, the publisher upped the number for the printing for the paperback version. Only 43 percent of the paperbacks sold.
"When the next book came out (the publisher) refused to do a promotion," Beth said. "Their decision directly effected the author and what happened with her next book." The economics of e-publishing take the risk factor out of publishing. Clocktower offers authors 50 percent of the returns on their book. Using computer files and print on demand presses, e-book sources will not be faced with crates of unsold books. The books are sent by .pdf files readable by Acrobat Reader, or in formats people can download to hand-held reading devices.
Within the next 6 to 8 weeks Cullen said people will be able to request paper copies of internet books that will be produced on a print on demand basis. "What makes (print on demand) remarkable is essentially for the first time customers pay for the book before it's manufactured," Cullen said. "Publishers will know how many to manufacture on demand. Within five years you'll see the guesswork going away from publishing." Cullen said customers will not be able to tell the difference between print on demand books are traditionally printed books.
Although the e-revolution appears to pose a threat to dog-eared volumes, many
authors are only using the digital base as launch pad. Angela Adair-Hoy,
co-owner, Booklocker.com and WritersWeekly.com, said e-authors who publish books
on Booklocker sign no contracts to remain web-exclusive. " We take no
rights away, pay 70% royalties, and authors are free to terminate their contract
on a day's notice. This is helpful when an author is offered a beefy advance
from a traditional publisher." Adair-Hoy said five Booklocker authors
signed contracts with traditional publishers in the last several weeks. Despite
the projection that 30 million hand-held reading devices, or ebooks, will be
sold in the next five years, the smell of printers ink is not bound to waft
away. "We just lost another author this week to a nice advance offered
by a traditional publisher," Adair-Hoy said, "and we're
thrilled."
There just isn't room in the mainstream book publishing world for characters
to sue, swashbuckle and solve a mystery in one novel. That's why three-times
published author Beth Anderson dove in to the cyber side of publishing for her
fourth book. With cyber outlets taking more risks than traditional
publishers, epublishing is growing as a viable form of publication. Anderson
signed a contract with Clocktower Fiction, a web company that allows readers to
download the book to their screen or a rocket ebook device. Clocktower will soon
allow readers to request a single copy on a "print on demand" basis. Anderson
faced repeated rejection from New York publishers, even though she was recently
nominated for an ebook award at the Frankfurt Book Fair, "the biggest event
in the publishing calendar," according to The Independent newspaper in
London. The main character in her book, "Night Sounds" will not
be pinned down to a single fiction genre. The character is a Chicago jazz
pianist who becomes embroiled in a murder investigation and a turbulent love
affair. In an industry that values simple selling points, Anderson said
there was no market for Night Sounds. "(Marketing executives) have
maybe a couple of minutes to describe and sell a book," she said. "If
they can't describe it in one word - romance or mystery - they don't want to
spend the time on it. It's too hard to market. You can send the best book in
world (to a corporate publisher), but if it doesn't exactly fit a mold no one's
going to read it." Since the book was published in April, however, it
reached the third slot on the best seller list of www.booklocker.com,
an epublisher and ebookstore that adds about 10 books per day. As a new
venue for writers, internet publishing varies widely. Ideally, anyone with the
computer savvy could type up a treatise and convert it in to ebook format. But
Anderson said reputable internet publishers have high rejection rates and edit
the books exhaustively. John Cullen, publisher of Clocktower Fiction, projects
the publisher will have a 5 percent acceptance rate when it opens to public
submissions. Five of the line editors for Clocktower hold either master's or
doctorate degrees. "Online publishing emphasizes well written
entertaining books, no matter what genre," Anderson said. Stephen King
popularized the e-format in March with the web-exclusive publication of
"Riding the Bullet." The 66-page book sold for $2.50 and 500,000
people bought it within the first 48 hours it was available. Web publishing
continued to gain credibility when the prestigious Frankfurt, Germany annual
book fair announced awards tailored to ebooks The top prize is $100,000 and
there will be $10,000 awarded in each of five categories, one of which is best
fiction originally published in ebook form. Anderson is nominated for that award
for Murder Online, a book that will hit the net in October. Epublishing
also passes more savings to readers, and profits to writers. Elimination of the
middle man means decreased costs, and Anderson gets half of the profits instead
of the 29 cents per book she received from a previous deal. Although the
hand-held computer reading device is only one of three formats in which
Clocktower produces Anderson's book, it is projected to rise in popularity.
Thirty million are expected to be sold in the next five years, each capable of
holding about 10 full-length novels. Purdue University Calumet recently
introduced 10 of the Rocket ebooks in to library circulation, and the Lake
County Public Library is currently looking in to ebook options. Although
Carolyn Strickland, Reference Services Manager at LCPL couldn't comment on
specific plans, she said instead of circulating the actual ebooks like PUC, the
LCPL would give cardholders access to download books from the web. While
the publishing industry continues to move away from the paper mill and toward
the information superhighway, the change will ultimately widen reader's options. "I
think there will always be print publishing," Anderson said. "That is
not going to stop. But there's going to be a lot more variety, more than ever.
The internet is unlimited
Copyright © 2000 J.B.
Scott
All Rights Reserved
