An interview with Paul Cohn about Writing and self-publishing
Please give us a little background on your books.
I’ve written two fiction books and one children’s story that
was published on a public state radio station at Montana State University. I self-published
two books. The first book I do not recommend. It was my first effort. I tried
to get it published and sold for three years and couldn’t.
The second book is called Sao Tome. You can read the first chapter at http://saotomethenovel.com/. I tried
selling it first by myself to publishers and then I had an agent for six
months. She didn’t do much and she couldn’t sell it. She bailed and then I had another agent for a year and she
worked hard for the first 6 months, then bailed. She showed it to a lot of
publishers, but they wouldn’t buy it. That’s when I decided to self-publish.
Most of the endorsements on the jacket cover are from rejection letters from
agents or publishers. The first paragraphs would gush and then the next paragraph would say, "but we won’t buy it."
A friend who
has been published has been very helpful in helping me understand the
publishing world. The agents and publishers are throwing darts when they reject books. None of their
reasons seemed valid, because the reasons they said why they weren’t
going to publish the book were things I was getting compliments on. I
think they don’t want to take a chance with an unpublished author. I did get
one very helpful idea from an agent that made a lot of editors look at it a
second time. One agent said it wasn’t sufficiently nuanced. I showed that
letter to a published writer and he said the problem with the first chapter is
that it starts out like a thriller. Historical novels should have more focus on
setting, so he told me to make the setting come alive more and I did. Mainly
the changes were in the first chapter. Another editor was helpful. She went
through and cited some places where the emotional impact was bland. That was
very helpful and I made those changes. I bet the book’s been edited 30 times. A
professional editor, a couple of friends, and I have gone through the book and
made it better. I read the novel now and I keep finding things I want to change
and little typos.
What is your writing process like?
When I was writing I would usually get up at 5 in the
morning, have a pot of coffee going and write in my PJs until I was starving.
Then I would have breakfast, do some chores and then write again until I ran
out of steam. Then I would go running or do something else. Then in the
afternoon I would edit. Most
of the time I did my creative writing in the morning.
How did you decide to self-publish?
It was an act of desperation. Self-publishing is a piece of
cake these days as far as getting the book printed. With most self-published books your friends buy three copies
and you never sell another copy. There are some self-published books that do
very well such as the book Eragon
written by a 16
year old. But most of the time they do nothing. With the first book, I didn’t
know any better. I shouldn’t have published it. The second book is good and I
think it will sell. And it is doing fairly well.
How much of the publishing process did you have a hand
in?
I did everything. The Gutter ended up too narrow, because
the book printing people didn’t give me enough information. Still, it’s very
easy to do. My daughter took the cover photo. It’s extraordinary. My daughter
and I were in Australia and it’s a picture of the Tasman sea. I saw it and it
was a very lonely picture, perfect for the book. An artist friend helped with
the cover lay out. Self-publishing is a lot of hard work but it’s pretty
straight forward.
What was the most difficult part of the writing and publishing
process?
Three years of rejections. It’s a little bit like being an
athlete, you’ve just got to keep going until you get to where you want to be.
All the rejections forced me to do the rewrites and I think the book will do better because of it. Now the toughest part is waiting for the sales to develop at some
reasonable level.
Was there a part that was easier?
The most fun part was writing the first draft. I really got
into the story, it just told itself.
What kinds of marketing did you do for your book?
The book has broad appeal, but you have to find a target
group. It’s about Jewish and Black history. I have a friend who got the names
of people in large synagogues and Black churches. We’ve sent one book to
the reading groups at each of these churches. Hopefully they will like it. The
local synagogue wrote a wonderful review of it, which I include in the package
I send out. There is also a press release with the book.
I also gave a copy to the local library. The librarian liked
it enough to recommend it to the book club. They (the library) have been very
supportive of my writing.
My business
manager came up with the idea to do a referral awards program. We think that
will make a big difference in selling the book. People will get excited and tell their friends about it. The person who recommends the books to the most others wins money. You can see it on the website for an explanation.
We’ve also sent
a copy of the book to thirty-four reviewers. Most of the reviewers won’t review a
book that is out, so we told them it was going to come out in April, even
though it already came out in January. This process stinks, too. Of the thirty-four copies we sent out, we've gotten zero reviews.
We’ve sent out 110 books total. Books are cheap. My total
cost to publish 2,400 books is $10,000 including having a business manager. But
it’s only $1.50 per book plus $1.50
for postage. I think sending out books is the most effective way to get
the information out there.
We are going to find out who does the buying for the
libraries in large cities and send that person a copy of the book. We also sent
one to the Portuguese, Israeli, and Sao Tome embassies since the book involves
those places. And we sent notices to the embassies to all the African countries
covered in the book. In other cases we sent Jewish organizations a bookmark and
a press release. It’s a bit of a crapshoot.
Would you recommend self-publishing to other writers?
No. It’s expensive and the likelihood that you are going to
do well is very low. The outfit that did my printing sent me half a dozen or
more books that they had surpluses of as examples of the kinds of format and
paper they had. For the most part these books were well written and beautiful.
I know for a fact that none of them did anything. I have 3,000 copies of my
first books in the basement. I didn’t even break even. I did 14 readings in 10
days in the Twin Cites. I probably spent $10,000 on publishing and I bet I
spent $8,000 on advertising and travel and the sales just evaporated, so even
though I sold 2,000 copies it was not an economic success. In the last seven years
it hasn’t sold a single copy.
So for your next book you will try to go the traditional
route?
If I decide to write another book it will be a sequel to Sao
Tome. People have asked for a sequel. Here’s my point: I am hoping that Sao
Tome will do so well that I will have a name for myself and then go ahead with
the sequel and have an agent and sell it to a real publisher. I’m not going to start
on my next book unless Sao Tome does well.
Do you have any advice for aspiring writers?
Find another writer who is more skilled than you. And who
you have very good, open communication with and edit once a week with him. The
reason I don’t suggest writing groups is that they can be vicious. I was in one
for a while. You are not going to get the kind of editing you want. One-on-one
it takes three hours to go over each other’s work. That has been extremely
productive for me.
Avoid agents who charge a fee. Be wary of writing
contests where they want a submission fee. Look at the economics of it. They
are preying on desperate writers and making money on the fees. There
is an outfit in Portland, Oregon that does this. In my opinion, Glimmer Train
preys on people who want to get published. They charge $25 and at 2,000
entries, they are making substantial profit off of writers.
For reviews and to read the first chapter of Sao Tome go to:
http://saotomethenovel.com/
|
