Re: Print on Demand Questions

**"* M* <B*@verizon.net>**

C.L. has great advice, here. CreateSpace does a good job and it gets your 
book into Amazon without delay. I have heard some complaints that Lulu books 
are very slow to appear on Amazon. The only two POD printers I have used are 
CreateSpace and LightningSource. Both are good for me. I heard from a 
British author that it is hard for publishers without recent previous books 
to be accepted for LightningSource but am not sure whether or not that 
applies to the USA portion of it.

I agree with C.L.about using a normal ("perfect") binding instead of spiral 
or comb. Bookstores hate any kind of spirals because they snag. Consumers 
love them, though, because the books lay flat and that makes them easier to 
use.

In my experience, you can't mix color pages and black and white pages in a 
POD book unless you pay the color rate all the way through. Color is much, 
much more expensive so if you need it, either go for a very short book to 
keep the cost down or print your book the regular way and take your chances 
on overordering and having many left over.

I love the ease with which you can direct the flow of POD books. I had a 
recent order from Australia and the cheapest way to fill it was to have the 
book printed and sent by Lightning Source. I didn't even have to fill out 
the customs form -- that was done by the printer/shipper. If a store orders 
a dozen and I have only six on hand in the basement, the order goes straight 
from the printer to the customer.

If you go with Lightning Source and put your books into their Ingram 
distribution system, it is wise to make them non-returnable. This prevents 
bookstores from ordering a lot, letting them get soiled and worn, and then 
returning them at your expense in large numbers. Having no returns keeps me 
a lot saner even if I do sell somewhat fewer. And the automatic part is 
wonderful, my dream future. The books sell, I don't have to do any paperwork 
or mailing, and I automatically get the payment from which I pay the 
author's royalty. I got a big order while I was at GWA in Indianapolis and I 
filled it from my computer.

As for digital, I already offer a number of Kindle books but am still trying 
to figure out iPad. Anyway people can have free Kindle software on their 
iPads and read the books that way. What I would really like, though, is to 
be able to make interactive, app-like books for iPad and Android devices.

Betty Mackey, Publisher
B. B. Mackey Books
www.mackeybooks.com

Books for a Great Garden Life

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "C.L. Fornari" <clfornari@mail.com>
To: "Garden Writers -- GWL -- The Garden Writers Forum" 
<gardenwriters@lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2012 5:36 PM
Subject: Re: [GWL] Print on Demand Questions

> I used Create Space for my  /A Garden Wedding /book. It didn't cost me 
> anything upfront. It was pretty straightforward although I did spend time 
> to get the formatting right and it took a couple of tries to be sure that 
> a missed space or other minor glitch didn't change the look in an 
> undesireable way. I paid for three proofs (less than $5 plus shipping) 
> before it came out right. I choose Create Space because in researching the 
> topic it seemed clear that Amazon "greases the skids" for a CS book over 
> Lulu or other services. This may be unfair, and Amazon might be percieved 
> as the bully-on-the-block by some, but it's here to stay and I want to 
> take advantage of their power, not fight it.
>

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