It’s Time to Publish to Paper

November 21, 2024 by Harvey

In Today’s Journal

* It’s Time (for me) to Publish to Paper
* The Writing
* Of Interest
* The Numbers

It’s Time (for me) to Publish to Paper

Of the 98 novels, 10 novellas, 29 short story collections, and 10 major nonfiction books I’ve published, all are available as ebooks.

But only several of my novels (maybe 20), a few of my novellas, and several of my short story collections are available in paper editions. Of my nonfiction books, I believe only Writing Realistic Dialogue and Punctuation for Writers, 2nd edition, are available in paper.

Yet readers I meet increasingly ask me what I have available in paper.

So for me, it’s time to start publishing everything to paper, including my back catalogue. Of course, I’ll still publish to ebooks as well.

And I fully intend to add my paper editions to my Payhip online discount store as well. I’ll have to figure out how that works.

I’ll do the necessary research myself first. But I haven’t decided yet where to start:

I might start with the next book I publish.

That would be the most convenient, but it’s also the 31st novel in a series. Then again (unfortunately, but it’s a nice problem to have), with my back catalogue I have several options in that regard:

• Maybe I’ll start with the first book of my current Blackwell Ops series.

• Or maybe I’ll start by putting the first of the remaining 12 books of the Wes Crowley saga into paper.

• Or maybe I’ll start with Writing Better Fiction.

• Or—since my current overall focus is on publishing at least 1,000,000 words of fiction this year—I might wait until January to start this process with the first novel I publish in 2025.

So like I said, I have options. But whatever I decide to do, I expect the process will become easier with time after that first paper book is published.

All of that said, as you have probably surmised, there are few things I like more than the sharing of knowledge.

So to begin the journey, I asked a handful of writers whom I respect and admire and who publish to paper for their recommendations and advice.

If you’re thinking about going to paper as well as ebooks, you might try these:

• First, both D2D and Amazon offer free ISBNs for paper books. This is a great way to avoid buying expensive ISBNs from Bowker.

• One writer goes with both D2D Print and Amazon Print for paper copies. He also said the process is “easy-peasy.” (Note that this author also uses Get Covers for his books whereas I plan to do my own. But from all reports, Get Covers is an inexpensive alternative and they turn out excellent covers.)

• Another writer said D2D allows you to share their paper book with Amazon.

• Another writer goes with Amazon for “small books” (fewer sales expected) and Ingram for wider distribution with larger books. (I believe Ingram does not provide a free ISBN.)

• You can go through only Amazon and still go wide with your paper book, but “expanded distribution” through Amazon is cost prohibitive in terms of the cover price.

No matter which route you choose, it’s always a good idea to order author copies (actual POD printing cost plus shipping) to sell yourself, give away, etc.

Finally, in case you did not know, every edition of a book must have its own ISBN, so one for the ebook (except Amazon, who uses the ASIN), one for the paper book, and so on.

If anyone else out there has experience with publishing to paper, please feel free to leave a comment or chime in via email.

As I experiment more with this process myself, I’ll let you know how it goes.

The Writing

Had a good day of writing yesterday with a little over 5000 words. That includes writing three new chapters on the novel and finishing a short story that’s derived from the same novel. On some days, life is truly good.

Talk with you again soon.

Of Interest

Judging, Gifts, and Golf

The Numbers

The Journal…………………………… 660

Writing of “A Lovely Surprise in Belize”
Words brought forward…… 1732

Day 1…… 1891 words. To date…… 3623 done

Writing of Blackwell Ops 31: Jack Temple

Day 1…… 1620 words. To date……. 1620
Day 2…… 5016 words. To date……. 6636
Day 3…… 3466 words. To date……. 10102
Day 4…… 1235 words. To date……. 11337
Day 5…… 3188 words. To date……. 14525
Day 6…… 3933 words. To date……. 18458
Day 7…… 3187 words. To date……. 21645

Fiction for November………………… 57234
Fiction for 2024……………………….. 894366
Nonfiction for November…………….. 19610
Nonfiction for 2024…………………… 354020
2024 consumable words…………….. 1,072,435

Average Fiction WPD (November)….. 2862

2024 Novels to Date…………………….. 16
2024 Novellas to Date…………………… 1
2024 Short Stories to Date……………… 18
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………..… 98
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)…………… 10
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)……… 255
Short story collections……………………. 29

Disclaimer: Whatever you believe, unreasoning fear and the myths that outlining, revising, and rewriting will make your work better are lies. They will always slow your progress as a writer or stop you cold. I will never teach the myths on this blog.

Writing fiction should never be something that stresses you out. It should be fun. On this blog I teach Writing Into the Dark and adherence to Heinlein’s Rules. Because of WITD and because I endeavor to follow those Rules I am a prolific professional fiction writer. You can be too.