Has anyone written and sold their book. How is it done. Anyone ever use booksurg

Question: Has anyone written and sold their book!. How is it done!. Anyone ever use booksurge!?
Best Answer - Chosen by Asker:

Right now, BookSurge is involved in a lot of litigation along with its parent company Amazon!.com!.

Amazon purchased BookSurge and decided that they would no longer sell books printed by other POD (Print on Demand) publishers!. They are in the process of removing the BUY buttons from works printed by other POD sources!.

As a result, several other POD's are suing them!. They claim it is putting Amazon in the position of holding a monopoly and literally blackmailing authors into using their services!. How it will come out, nobody can tell!. If Amazon wins, people who want to self publish will be left with no options if they want to sell through them!. If Amazon loses, BookSurge may go under or be in huge financial debt from the lawsuits!. Too early to tell!.

This is the point!. You have asked two separate questions!. You have asked if anyone has written and "sold" a book!. Then you ask if anyone has ever used BookSurge!. The two questions are polar opposites!.

"Selling books" means that a traditional publisher has paid you for the rights to a work because they wish to publish it!. Using a vanity press/POD/self publisher means exactly the opposite!. It means YOU are paying THEM to print the book for you!.

Remember Uncle Jim's law when making this decision - "When publishing - money should flow TOWARD the author not AWAY from him!."

Guess which one of the two situations above meets that criteria!. Yes!. Traditional publishing!. In the other situation you are paying money - often a LOT of money for someone to print your book!. Often it is because you have made the rounds and tried to publish traditionally and been rejected!. Often it is because you just don't want to bother with the time and effort of sending out queries to traditional publishers and you want to publish NOW!.

But the differences between the two are tremendous!. One gives you books that are on the shelves in bookstores!. The other gives you books - period!. YOU have to spend the time, effort and money if you want that book to sell!. In the history of self publishing there have been about ten books that made the best seller list!. The only two I ever remember are 1) Wayne Dyer and 2) The Celestine Prophecy!. In both cases, the authors travelled the country going store to store with a carload of books they purchased with their own money!. They were able to convince stores to stock their books and often allow them to do book signings!. They personally paid for any and all promotion and advertising the books got!. With gas at 4 bucks a gallon, can you do that!? Do you have the time or money to spend promoting your book!? If not, expect to sell around 100 copies!. The average for a self published book!. Basically 2/3 as many books as you have family and friends!. And guess what!? All that effort and you STILL cannot say you are a published author because nobody published your work!. You did it yourself!. Self publishers will publish anything and everything regardless of content!. All they do is print for you!. If I wanted to, I could print the Chinatown Phone Book--just as long as my check cleared the bank!.

I have a law of my own I have posted here many times!. "If you believe in yourself and in your book, you owe it to yourself to spend at least twice as much time trying to publish it traditionally as you did writing it!."

If you go to my profile, you will find I have starred many great Q and A on writing and publishing for new authors to use!. Many successful authors have posted here!. Feel free to skim through and use their advice!. To begin with, I strongly suggest you get a copy of Writers Market!. Resist the urge to run right to the listings and actually read the front of the book first!. It will answer most if not all of your questions regarding publishing!.

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Beware of booksurge!. They are evil money-snatchers!. To sell your book you'll need an agent!. To get an agent buy a copy of Writer's Market 2008!. Right now I am in the process of trying to sell a book!. It's not easy, and you must have patience!.Www@QuestionHome@Com

Booksure is a vanity publisher!. You want to stay away from those!. You have to pay to get published!. You do all the work!. Your book doesn't go into bookstores, just online with the rest!. Expect to sell 10 copies if you're lucky!. Basically saying, stay away from it!.Www@QuestionHome@Com

They seemed very unprofessional, many misspelled words, etc!. They rarely responded to my e-mails and the finished product looked terrible!.Www@QuestionHome@Com