HomeCookbooksSoul Food CookbooksThe Essential Guide to Getting Your Book Published: How to Write It, Sell It, and Market It . . . Successfully |
|  | | | Customer Reviews: | | | Average Customer Review: ( 112 customer reviews )
Write an online review and share your thoughts with other customers.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
26 of 31 found the following review helpful:
A Guide to for the Perplexed Nov 04, 2010
By Algernon Moncrieff
From the authors of Putting Your Passion Into Print comes the newest must-have how-to guide about becoming an author. The Essential Guide to Getting Your Book Published takes you through the steps of how to become an author, providing indispensable advice for those who have not yet been published and do not know the ins and outs of the industry. It has chapters dealing with such topics as how to get an agent, how to deal with a less than cooperative publisher, marketing your book with or without a large publicity budget, and how to take advantage of recent advances in print on demand publishing. Of course there is much more.
The style is welcoming and makes you excited to try and get a book published since so many other guides can be a bit on the dry side. With a mixture of sobering fact and enlightening humor, authors David Henry Sterry and Arielle Eckstut talk about their own experiences as writers, sharing stories of triumph mixed in with those of horror. They talk about such different things as what happens when your book design is less than flattering, or how to parlay a novel aimed for adults into a connection for selling a young adult one. In addition there are anecdotes from other successful writers to help illustrate the main points of the book.
The book has been updated to deal with the revolution in social networking and self-publishing that has taken place in the past few years. Few other guides have been written for the age of search optimization. Writers will learn how to improve their use of Facebook, Twitter, blogging, and a host of other resources. If you want to be published in either the traditional way or using new avenues, this book will help you and will demonstrate how traditional and new forms of publicity can compliment one another.
All you NaNoWriMo writers should definitely check this book out once the dust has settled and you are wondering what to do with your finished manuscripts in January!
33 of 41 found the following review helpful:
 Anecdotes and Pep-talks Do Not a Guide Make Jun 13, 2011
By WillfromSF
I realize I'm bucking the crowd on this, but then the authors are very influential people with a lot of followers so maybe that has something to do with why the reviews are so glowing here on Amazon. And maybe not. Maybe it's just that I'm not finding it that helpful to my particular situation. I have been using the Kindle version of this book for the last several weeks as a guide for self-publishing my memoir after several months of trying to go the traditional agent route without success. I think this book may be more useful to the very few people new to getting published who are successful going that route. There certainly isn't much about self-publishing beyond a lot of generalities, anecdotes, and rah-rah enthusiasm. For example, not a single self-publishing service seems to be mentioned. I was hoping for a detailed comparison. I don't think this is really a guide so much as a lot of pieces of the puzzle but little explanation of how the writer can use them. Nothing on how to select a self-publishing service although it does cover the self-publishing scene and elements. The Table of Contents is not that helpful at finding things because the authors like to use cute names for chapters and sub-chapters so it is sometimes hard to find what you need. Social networking and marketing are described at general levels but never at the detailed level that would help a novice get into it. No blueprint. Yes I already know about Facebook and Twitter and I can sign up and do the basics without their help, but what about beyond the basics. How do you design a successful Facebook page for your book or where's the link to how to do that? What are hash marks and how do you utilize them in Twitter? Blogging is discussed, but no comparison or even mention of the major blogging services much less how to design your blog page. Anecdotes may be interesting, but they never seem to be useful for my particular situation.
This is probably a very good book for people really new to writing and publishing who want to know what the scene is like nowadays. If you are already somewhat knowledgeable about this world, as I am, you won't find much you can use to make decisions and take concrete steps. I really don't think this is a guide as it claims to be as much as a review of the publishing scene. Maybe the topic is just too large to fit in a single book, but I was hoping for much more useful information and not just an amusing read.
18 of 23 found the following review helpful:
I am one of this book's success stories Dec 14, 2010
By Roxanna Elden
"author of SEE ME AFTER CLASS: ADVICE FOR TEACHERS BY TEACHERS"
I bought the earlier version of this book, "Putting Your Passion into Print," five years ago after attending a workshop by this husband-and-wife/agent-and-author team. The workshop convinced me that these two knew their stuff and their book would be an enjoyable read. At the time, all I had was an idea for a book and a few pages of notes. Eckstut and Sterry's advice guided me through the process of crafting a proposal, finding the perfect agent for my book, and working productively with the editors and publicity people at my publishing house. My book, "See Me After Class: Advice for Teachers by Teachers," came out last June and it was one of the happiest days of my life.
I cannot emphasize enough how well this book prepared me for the path to getting published. It prepared me for the inevitable ups and downs (even with the best advice in the world, bringing a book into the world is difficult) but it kept me from having to learn about the publishing world through frustrating trial and error. It also provided much-needed encouragement through some initial rejections.
Now that my book is published (did I mention my book got published?) I've run into many people wanting to know how the whole thing works, and I always refer them to this book.
I am now working on a new project and bought "The Essential Guide" to to help me adjust to recent changes in the publishing industry. From what I've read so far, there is enough updated and new material to make the purchase worth it even though I read "Putting Your Passion Into Print."
2 of 2 found the following review helpful:
The Essential Guide to Getting Your Book Published: How to Write It, Sell It, and Market It . . . Successfully May 09, 2012
By J. Davis
"mulcyber"
If you are ready to publish your book, you have two possible routes:
1) Do what I did:
Scour the web for any and all information you can find on book proposals, query letter advice, agent discovery, self-promotion, etc. This means reading countless articles, documenting your research, visiting the library, searching for blogs on the topic of book publishing, etc.
or . . .
2) Do what I should've done:
Buy this book and read it cover to cover.
I finally DID read this book. It gave me perspective, focus and most of all, hope.
2 of 2 found the following review helpful:
Biggest help EVER! May 08, 2012
By Andy
Sterry's goal is to help any MOTIVATED author find their genre and their agent and get published. This book teaches you how to work smarter, so that you can be one of the few lucky ones who makes it as a successful writer. They really do care that you live your passion!
See all 112 customer reviews on Amazon.com
|
| |
|
|
|
