Until a decade ago, the life of the writer went like this. The writer would be inspired to write. He would finish writing a great book. Then he would present it to his chosen publisher. He would be rejected. He would offer it to his next preferred publisher and then he would be rejected again. This could go on and on until the 100th publisher or until the writer became discouraged and gave up, whichever came first. But once in a blue moon, miracles happened. A publisher would agree to publish his book. And finally, his book would be published. That was the only way he could see his book published unless, of course, he owned the publishing company. This is known as traditional publishing.
Today, writers have many options to get their books published. Today, any writer can publish his book without breaking a sweat. He can
do it sitting down and in less than an hour, and sometimes with zero expense! That was an impossible feat before.
So how would the writers of this generation do their publishing today, without breaking a sweat, at that? There are several ways actually.
Digital Publishing or E-publishing: This is so far is the easiest way to publish. And the best thing is, it’s free. Simply choose from a wide array of platforms that offer e-publishing. Register and create an account with the platform that you chose. Follow the simple steps in publishing your book and that’s it, your book will be on the market, online. E-publishing has made many unknown authors famous and very rich. Of course, nothing is perfect. This has its downsides too. One, you don’t have a hard copy of your book. Two, the price is usually very low, making your royalty and income low too.
Self-Publishing by Print on Demand (POD): As the name implies, this will allow you to have a hard copy of your book per demand or order. Here you would submit an electronic copy of your book and when a client orders, they would print the number of books according to the order. The downside of POD, however, is the cost to the writer, which in return can affect the price of his book and, of course, could affect the total sales of the book.
Self–Publishing by Vanity Presses: This is not so popular among writers. Here, the author pays for everything to have his book published.
Subsidy Publishing: Here, the author and the publisher share the cost for the publication of the book. They are like partners and so the publisher helps in the marketing and distribution of the book.
Traditional publisher: The publisher would offer an exclusive contract to the author and does all the work necessary for making the book a hit. The downside? The publisher has complete control of almost everything about the book and has the total rights to your book.
There’s one thing that the modern day authors can truly boast of and that is their book can be published any time they want to without breaking a sweat!
