I would be lying if I said the move to publishing didn't concern me, especially considering where I am and what I'm doing. And I'm not the only one. Once the article was shared among my classmates, the majority of us had more or less become decidedly nervous. After all, Amazon can sell a number of books for incredibly low prices and if they can help authors publish books, does that mean that the publishing industry is finished?
Well...no. Not exactly. The misconception that is present in this article is that all you need to do with a manuscript is stick on a cover, slap on a price and tell people it exists. I'm not saying that Amazon won't attempt to sell their titles as best as they can but allow me to clear up one small fact.
That phrase 'It takes a village to raise a child'? It takes SO many more people than you realise to create the books that you read...in any format.
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| Here beginneth the lesson. |
The text needs edited and checked for mistakes. Mistakes happen and authors change their minds about bits and pieces. Sometimes the amazing plot twist doesn't work with one character and has to be transferred to another. Or a fact needs to be double checked before it can be stated.
A cover needs to be designed. We DO judge books by their covers (try to deny it. I dare you.) and a well designed cover takes time to be thought of, created and chosen. Yes. Chosen. There's always a couple of options created and tweaked before the final one goes to print.
The manuscript needs to be designed. What goes on the page? Any pictures? What about the typeface or font? Should it be spread out or a bit more squished?
Some hype has to be created. Even a self-published author will tell you how important marketing is. There's no point in making a book that nobody wants. Booksellers need to know it exists. This marketing technique applies throughout the process.The amount of marketing each title gets depends a great deal on who is writing it. People need to want the book and many will buy something because they recognise the author's name.
Printing needs to be sorted and booked months in advance. This is important. Printers are not sitting around waiting for the manuscript and twiddling their thumbs in between. They have jobs to do and schedules to keep. If the printing deadline is missed, it will be a while until you can get another one.
In addition, the production decisions need to be made. Type of paper, binding etc. It is the printer who helps to put the book together and it takes a long time to make these decisions, especially if you are on a budget.
And for all you tech-savvy people, there is also someone who has to translate this digitally. It does take a bit of effort to make a manuscript into an e-book that is compatible with various e-readers. And it may not even be a publisher creating it, but they will still work with the print publisher's schedule so that everything is released at around the same time.
A lot of work, and every individual in the publishing process is probably working with another five or six books at various stages of completion.
Amazon will have to deal with these same issues and are competing against some very old and prestigious publishing houses. Like it or not, reputation is everything and having a particular publisher interested in your book can be a lot more appealing than you might imagine. I won't deny that this move won't affect the industry in some way but to imply that it is finished now that Amazon has joined the show is a bit premature.
We shall just have to see how it plays out.
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