Forums / Publishing /
Lulu?


  • RoseBlossom100
    Jul 19 1:25 PM
    Reply
    Ok so I know how Lulu works what I want to know is what impact is has on your book. For instance my friends published a book on lulu, am I wrong to assume that they have damaged their chances of getting it professionally published and widely recognized?

    I am working on a book that I want to publish widely but I don't know if doing Lulu as a temporary fix would be a good idea or not. What are your guy's perspective?

  • Pyro Fish
    July 20
    Reply
    what is lulu?

    • Barbara
      July 20
      Reply
      lulu.com is a print-on-demand self publishing site that a lot of people use for various reasons. It's about the only one that I've found that isn't out to scam money from it's users.

  • Barbara
    July 20
    Reply
    "Self-publishing was once considered as bad as vanity publishing, but with so many self-published successes in the past few years, it is now possible to self-publish with respect." from Self-Publishing Hall of Fame http://www.bookmarket.com/selfpublish.html (just skip over the guy trying to sell his book...). There's a long list of authors who have self published, from long ago, to present.

  • Pyro Fish
    July 22
    Reply
    IF a book were published by lulu, then how would that prevent other publishers from publishing copies of your book later on? the author should own the text of a book and be able to decide if he/she wants another publisher to publish copies of their work, like an author deciding that they want the hardcover version and the paperback published by 2 different companies, or a book having a 10th or 25th anniversary re-print done by a totally different publisher than the original

  • yoshi97
    July 27
    Reply
    If a book seels well on Lulu, it seems highly likely it could go mainstream. If it doesn't do so well on Lulu, then it's possible it could be hurtful

    • Barbara
      July 27
      Reply
      Could also be a learning experience... the author would know that they need to edit, or some other rewrite to make it more 'wanted'.

      One thing I've noticed is that lulu.com is coming very close to overflow, with any and everyone publishing and wanting to sell on there. Some things are excellent, while others are very bad. I looked at someone's preview of their novel... and found no less than ten typos in it.

      I do love their 'photo book' idea, though... and am going to do one for my niece and her new husband for a late wedding present.

  • archdraconis
    October 6
    Reply
    Many "real" publishers want a "first publish" clause. They don't want to be second bananna unless your steven king, etc. This is because for the most part you give them everthing of your first book. (except your name) this is how they take a risk on you. IF you even publish half a page anywhere(and I do mean anywhere, even here on storywrite) It doesn't qualify as "first publishing, for them and they won't touch it.


    Self publishing a book is an awesome idea if you think something is really really good. Then again, you can just keep shopping it around. All those writers you like? They were shopping their books around for years, getting door after door slammed into their faces.

    It's that way in any "creative" art. Moves, Books, Plays, screen writing. You'll hear over and over just how many people said no to them. But, you all need only one to say yes.

    In the end, it's how good you think it is and how much exposure you think you can get from self publishing. if you're a self marketing genius, you can do it. But most Fiction, fantasy, etc, books are sold first in a book store, because there is still someting to judging a book by it's cover, picking it up and feeling the thickness and looking at it and seeing the type, while flipping the pages.

    Internet first publishing success are VERY rare without follow up.


  • LongTale
    October 7
    Reply

    Lulu creates problems for readers

    Since anyone can get their book on lulu, going there doesn't help readers know if the book is any good. You only have to get burned once by a promising looking book that is full of spelling, grammatical and literary errors to avoid such places forever.
    I know, your book is really good so you'll be fine. Nope. Readers have no reliable way to tell the difference between your masterpiece and the dross.
    The problem is that it is up to the author to say the book is ready for publishing. At www.longtalepress.com, we see too many manuscripts that the writer assures us are great, but in reality, they are so-so or in a few cases, no good.
    We, like most publishers, work hard to make sure that the books we put out for the public are the good ones. You don't get this with POD sites, so readers learn to stay away.

    • Barbara
      October 8
      Reply
      Lulu.com doesn't take over the story from the author. The story shall forever remain the authors property on that site, and they don't have to sign the rights away.

      On your site (which you put an incorrect url for), it states "A submission remains the property of the author up to the time that a publishing contract is signed. At that time, Long Tale Press will register copyright to the work in the author's name and license all rights from the Author. Author will grant Long Tale Press exclusive rights to the Work in exchange for royalties to be paid to the author. Up until that point, writers may remove their submissions from consideration and Long Tale Press will not publish their content." ( http://www.longtalepress.com/about/useragreement )


      lulu.com is for self/vanity publishing. And to be honest, I've read some honest to goodness crap from publishers such as St. Martin's Press, Penguin.. heck, almost every publisher that I've ever bought from. It's not exclusive to lulu.com, or any other publisher. There are services available on most self publishing sites where you can pay to be beta read, etc, to get any missed typos out of the way.

  • LongTale
    October 8
    Reply
    My post is concerned with the reader's point of view. Sure, some publishers have a few clinkers in their catalog, sometimes this is a mistake, sometimes it is a matter of taste. For the most part, the publisher picks books that appeal to their readers. If they don't they tend to go out of business. That is a big advantage to the reader over vanity publishing and explains why typical vanity book sales are in the dozens while publisher sales are in the thousands.

    As for authors and Long Tale's author agreement, giving up the rights to your book is the typical exchange you make to get into a publisher's catalog. The publisher is taking the risk that they will lose the production, distribution and marking expenses they invest in the book. Vanety presses have no skin in the game. You have already covered the expenses. How motivated do you think they are going to be to make your book a success?

    • Barbara
      October 8
      Reply
      I've been through your site, and it looks to be fairly well organized, and laid out. (except for the book store, and not being able to get more of a description of a book than the small blurb listed. I like to have a little more 'feel' for something if I'm going to buy.) Pretty concise for being online for about 3 months or so.

      One quick observation, though.

      In the 'book store', I've only seen three books... by Jason Black, Nathan Everett, and Gary Syck. On your 'about us' page, it says: "Long Tale Press, LLC is privately owned and operated by Jason Black, Nathan Everett, and Gary Syck"

  • LongTale
    October 8
    Reply
    Yep, this is a publisher started by three writers. We used our own books to seed the site. If you looked at the submissions, you would see that we have more books in the pipeline. We are careful to only publish books that our readers approve. This takes time.
    When the new books come on line, they bring with them a submission and very informative reviews. There should be plenty for you to 'feel'.

    • Barbara
      October 10
      Reply

      So, you self published?

      The readers approved of the three novels currently published? I'm not trying to be rude, or belittle the site by asking, I'm just trying to clear up the confusion I have with it.

      Also, I should point out that promoting of sites that are similar to Storywrite (post, read, comment, etc and so on) would be against the site's policy of advertising for other sites.

      (to reply to any post on here, click the 'reply' under the person's name... otherwise it gets tagged to the end of the topic, and the person it is intended for doesn't get notification of the reply )

      • LongTale
        October 12
        Reply
        The three books up there now are by the owners. This was done to get the site started. We also threw a few public domain books in the submission pile to show how that works. All this is explained on the site. So, I would call it prinming the pump, but if you prefer to call it self publishing, be my guest. The books that are coming are not self published.

        Long Tale is primarily a publishing company and this forum is about publishing, so I thought it would be OK to mention it. If I was in error, I appologize.
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